Population, Family Planning,
& Ecology News Digest
Archives May 2000 - August 2000
August 30, 2000 Associated Press
Global Warming a Threat.
Global warming could fundamentally transform a third of the world's plant and animal habitats by the end of this century, estimated 20% of the species in the Arctic and northern latitudes could die out due to shrinking habitat, said a report by World Wide Fund for Nature - known as the World Wildlife Fund in the US and Canada. "As global warming accelerates, plants and animals will come under increasing pressure to migrate to find suitable habitat," said the report's co-author, Adam Markham, executive director of the U.S.-based group Clean Air-Cool Planet. Walrus and polar bear populations could disappear and New England may become stripped of its spruce and fir forests. The northern latitudes of Canada, Russia and Scandinavia could lose 70% of their habitat, and Iceland 82%. In Russia, Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Iceland, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Georgia - and in seven Canadian provinces and territories, more than half the existing habitat is at risk. In the U.S. states of Maine, New Hampshire, Oregon, Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas, more than a third of habitat is in danger. Parts of Alaska and Eurasia had warmed in winter months by as much as 11 degrees in the last 30 years. Coastal and island areas would be at risk from warming oceans and rising waters. Levels of carbon dioxide are now about 30% higher than pre-industrial levels, and could hit double the pre-industrial level by 2050.
August 22, 2000 ENN.com
Study finds benefits in natural crop
Some Chinese farmers have abandoned planting single types of rice in
their paddies and adopted a more natural, mixed variety harvest. They
were rewarded with bigger harvests and no longer had to spray
expensive fungicides. Seeing their neighbors achieve larger harvest
and saving money on fungicide, farmers from 10 townships joined the
experiment in 1999, bringing the total area of diverse planting to
8,255 acres. Although the sticky rice yields a larger return, it is
susceptible to fungus which is often controlled with expensive
chemicals. "I think our goal should be to fool with Mother Nature as
little as possible," Mundt said. "Sometimes there is a simple
fundamental fix that makes a whole lot more sense than going for a
real high-tech system." -rvs
August 14, 2000 The Jakarta Post
Jakarta: Warning for Teenagers.
Women who have children between the ages of 20 and 34 years of age are two
times less vulnerable than women who have children
when they’re 15 to 19 years old. Raditya Wratsangha
of the Indonesian Family Planning Association and a
gynecologist says that the babies of teenagers were
usually more weaker than babies born to women aged 20
to 29, especially those 5 years of age and younger.
The World Health Organization (WHO) figures that there
are about 4.2 million women in Asia each year that
have abortions. Ninuk Widyantoro, a psychologist at
the Indonesian AIDS Foundation said that most
teenagers from Indonesia receive very little
information about sex, “Parents are worried that
discussing contraceptives with teenagers could cause
the teenagers to do something improper…” m.o.
August 14, 2000 Christian Science Monitor
Abortion Debate Divides Mexico.
Under Mexican law, states have exempted cases of rape and mother's well-being from the abortion ban. Earlier this year when a 14-year-old rape victim was denied an abortion, the abortion debate reached a focal point. Abortion was outlawed this month in the state of Guanajuato even in cases of rape. Abortion has emerged as a surprise summer litmus test of where the new government stands on women's rights. President Fox served there as governor in the 1990s. Legislators from Fox's Catholic-leaning National Action Party (PAN) were the ones who pushed for the law. Some opponents fear that Fox will ban abortion for the whole country. Fox insisted that a similar initiative at the national level would not be coming from his government. The Party of the Democratic Revolution center-left (PRD) government of Mexico City proposed several amendments to city laws to widen abortion rights. It is estimated that 1 million or more illegal abortions are carried out each year, making abortion the fourth-highest cause of death among Mexican women. Some Mexican states guarantee a right to life beginning at conception and others abortions after bearing three children. rvs
August 22, 2000 New York Times
Zimbabwe: Battling AIDS in Africa by Empowering Women
In Africa, AIDS is mainly heterosexually transmitted and 25 to 30% of the population is infected with H.I.V. Dr. Nancy Padian, an epidemiologist and director of research for the AIDS Research Institute of the University of California at San Francisco, has found that persuading people to use condoms is far easier than originally thought: more than half the uninfected women who come to regular family planning clinics in Harare are able to persuade their male partners to use them. Padian is also trying to encourage them to
use female methods of contraception: female condoms, spermicides, diaphragms. Women are taught to negotiate strategies. In role-playing strategies they are presented with
obstacles and have to work out ways to overcome them. They are encouraged to talk about sexual activity with their partners, and taught that
these discussions are healthy. Factors contributing to the higher susceptibility to AIDS are: the higher prevalence of other sexually transmitted diseases, the lack of male circumcision, (a factor in the man's susceptibility) and poor health due to infection from parasites, poor nutrition, etc. African men often have multiple partners and still have their monogamous partner. Women are generally monogamous with the exception of those in the sex trade. Another factor is the practice of "dry sex," which women believe that men prefer. Micro loans, which are small loans to women to help them start businesses of their own, economically empower women, which helps them negotiate sexual activity.
August 23, 2000 Post-Soviet Press
Russia: Is Government Ready to Tackle Demographic Crisis?
In special parliamentary hearings, Russia's decline in population was discussed. According
to the RF State Statistics Committee, in 1992 Russia's permanent population was 148.7 million people, while at the beginning of 2000 it was only 145.5 million, decreasing by 2%. Last year it decreased by 768,400 people, or by 0.5%. During January and February 2000, Russia's population fell by 157,800, which is 13.6% higher than the decrease
for the same period of 1999. Life expectancy is down to 59.8 years for men and 72.2
years for women. Recently, there were 2-3 times more deaths than births in 27 regions, 3 deaths per birth in 10 provinces, and in one Province, four deaths per birth. The
number of babies born in 1998 declined by nearly 50% compared to 1987, and
dropped another 5.3% from 1998 to 1999. Second and third child births are almost halved. Only 1.3 million of 4 million pregnancies end in births. Normal births account for 31.8%, and in some regions only 25%. Infertility occurs among 15% of married couples. One third of newborns has defects. The number of people who died in 1999 was 7.6% greater than in 1998. this Russion supermortality is caused by mass impoverishment, domestic civilian conflicts and a sharp rise in disease. The main causes of death among the working-age
population are accidents, poisoning, and injuries. The underlying causes are: protracted social and economic crisis, unemployment, chronic delays in the payment of wages, salaries, pensions and social-welfare benefits, the decreased affordability of medical care and medicines, prolonged psychological stress, uncertainty about one's future and the future of one's children, and the criminalization of society. The death rate of 15 to 19 year olds has increased by 40%. At this rate, only 54% of today's 16-year-old boys will live to retirement age. 100 years ago, 56% of men lived until age 60. Only 10% to 12% of the younger school children are healthy, 8% in the middle grades, and 5% in the upper
grades. 50% of teenagers aged 15 to 17 suffer from chronic ailments.
August 29, 2000 World Watch Institute
Climate Change Has World Skating on Thin Ice
The discovery of water at the North Pole shocked many researchers recently, adding more evidence that not only is the ice covering the Earth melting, it is melting more rapidly than previously thought. At current rates of melting, scientists project that in fifty years the Arctic Ocean will be ice free during the summer as these ice sheets have already declined 42% in the past 40 years. Greenland is also in crisis as it loses more ice at lower levels, with more than 51 billion cubic meters of water each year being swept away (the equivalent of the annual flow of the Nile River). Antarctica, the continent on at the South Pole roughly the size of the US, appears to have a stable ice covering, but scientists predict that won't last. As the ice shelves surrounding this continent continue to disappear at a faster rate, losing 3,000 square kilometers from 1997 to 1998, researchers report that temperatures at the South Pole have risen 2.5 degrees Celsius (4.5 degress Fahrenheit) since 1940. Studies also show that snow and ice are retreating from the world's main mountain ranges: the Rockies, Andes, Alps, and the Himalayas. The Alps alone are a cause of concern, with a shrinkage of glacial area topping 40% since 1850, leading many to predict that glaciers will disappear from the mountains in the next century. These alarming conclusions are not surprising, as Swedish scientist Svante Arrhenius warned in the early 1900's that burning fossil fuels could raise levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) and cause a greenhouse effect. Statistics bear his warnings out, as in the past 40 years atmospheric levels of CO2 have grown from 317 parts per million (ppm) to 368 ppm, and temperatures since 1975 have increased from 13.94 degrees Celsius to 14.35 degrees. Such minor fluctuations in temperature have devastating effects, such as increasing precipitation in mountainous regions while decreasing the snow, resulting in more flooding, shrinking snow/ice masses, and less snowfall to run into rivers during dry seasons. Studying the Himalayas, with the third largest massive snow/ice mass in the world, is telling; should ice there continue to melt at current rates, the hydrology of several Asian countries including Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Thailand, Viet Nam, and China will be severely affected and these populations will be foced in-land to regions which are already overcrowded. Through a concerted effort to lower atmospheric CO2 levels, human populations can take control of the increasing greenhouse effect. Most crucial, perhaps, is the removal of fossil fuel burning as a major energy source, and recent efforts by some automobile companies indicate that a shift towards hydrogen-powered cars might begin in the next few years.jb
August 25, ENN
Endangered Species: State Parks Threatened by the Maw of Sprawl
In a report released by the National Park Trust, urban sprawl and lack of federal funding are major threats to more than 10.8 million acres of American land which contain 3,266 state parks. According to this report, "Legacy: The Crisis on Our Parks," over 62,013 acres of state park land in 10 states are threatened by development and residential sprawl. "What we need are big dollars to save the Etowahs all over the country," claimed director of the Department of State Parks, Recreation, and Historic Sites in Georgia, Bert Weerts. Weerts, citing that the once-lovely Etowah Indian Mounds Historic site northwest of Atlanta once overlooked rolling pastures and tree-lined foothills, reports that now all that can be seen from the important mounds are houses, schools, and increased traffic. The National Park Trust's report concludes that state parks provide solitude, recreation, living laboratories, inspiration to artists, and much-needed habitat for plants and animals. As well, they site important connections to cultural, historical, and natural places for a community. Additionally, in the spirit of American capitalism, these sites produce an income and increase local land values. Weerts concludes. "We need to put pressure on the legislators to put more land aside. It would be nice to have a little more money available to acquire buffers for parks that are most threatened. We can't save everything, we just try to do what we can with the money that's available." jb
August 15, 2000 The Bakersfield Californian
Natural Gas Prices Seen Rising 50% or More
For who use natural gas to heat their homes, this winter's heating bills could be 50% higher than last season's, warns the US Department of Energy. The rise in prices is indicative of a falloff in production, short supplies, and high demand by industry and electric utilities. Spot wholesale prices for natural gas have already doubled from a year ago, averaging from $3.50 to $4.50 per thousand cubic feet. The result is that utility companies will pass their increased costs on to consumers, and residents of the Midwest, Ohio valley, and Northeast are warned that they will see heating bills skyrocket. Those trying to fall back on oil for heat won't fair any better, as the Dept of Energy also predicts steep prices in store for those customers as well. Heating oil prices topped $2 a gallon in New England and other parts of the Northeast last winter but are expected to be higher this year as production of heating oil drops. "There is a risk of price spikes similar to last winter in the Northeast for heating oil as well as for diesel fuel if inventories are not built up to adequate levels by the end of the year," stated a Dept. of Energy report. Recent higher demand for gasoline has meant that refineries have concentrated more on this fuel, and less on producing heating and diesal oils. Natural gas has faired no better in recent years, as the demand for the fuel has increased 10% this year alone. The cleaner-burning fuel is getting harder to come by, and the American Gas Association reported that for the week ending July 28, 2000 there was 1,920 billion cubic feet of natural gas in storage, 17% (386 billion cubic feet) less than for the same time last year or enough to run America's appetite for natural gas for five days. jb
August 21, 2000 Christian Science Monitor
A Kenyan 'Guiding Light,' With Moral Lessons.
"Ushikwapo Shikamana" is a soap opera in Kenya aimed at getting people
to talk more openly about social issues in Kenya, such as family planning,
AIDS, drug abuse, female genital mutilation, and forced marriage. It focuses on social issues like AIDS, drugs, and family planning. It's title means "If assisted, assist yourself." Population Communications International, a nongovernmental organization
(NGO) in New York, has sponsored the show since 1998 here in Kenya and has used the soap opera medium in Brazil, Mexico, India, and just this summer in China. In countries like Kenya, contraception and other sensitive subjects, like whether girls have the right to be educated, can often be best tackled through fictional drama. Once they have seen the show, women are more likely to discusss touchy topics with their children and husbands. The soap's action takes place in three settings: Langoni, the prototypical rural village; Kanyageni, an urban slum; and posh Ulimboni. In Langoni, men control the women and girls, with female circumcision, early marriage, and lots of children the norm. Kanyageni faces problems of crime, drug abuse, prostitution, and poor housing. The characters all have connections back to Langoni.
August 21, 2000 Deutsche Presse-Agentur
India Not to Use "Coercive" Methods to Control Its Population.
In reply to a suggestion that a law be enacted to bar people who have more than two children from standing for parliamentary and state legislative seats, the Health Minister of India, C.P. Thakur, told parliament that the government will use "persuasive methods" rather than coercive to encourage parents to have small families. Although India became one of the first nations in the region to adopt a family planning program, in 1951, the program got off to a sluggish start, picked up speed in the 1960s, but taking a dive, in the 1975-77 years when then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi imposed emergency rule, with sterlisation camps and forced vasectomies. India has now abolished targets for family planning service providers and switched to programmes within the larger context of reproductive health
care.
August 23, 2000 PAI/Reuters
Scarcities of Water, Crop and Forest Land Projected.
According to recent projections by Population Action International, the number of people living in countries facing serious shortages in water will increase four-fold in the next 25 years, bringing totals from the modern 505 million to more than 2.4 billion. This announcement was made in PAI's booklet called "People in the Balance: Population and Natural Resources at the Turn of the Millenium," which examines six natural resources in their current and projected states. Robert Engelman, lead author of the report, says that while population growth seems to be slowing down, "we can't take this trend for granted. Hundreds of millions of people, most of them in developing countries, still lack access to basic health care, including family planning. We must do more to change this, beginning today - not in some future decade. People's lives hang in the balance." The PAI report finds that carbon dioxide emissions have increased, with the US contributing more than 20% of total greenhouse gas production despite the fact that the country holds only 5% of the world's people. Another finding was the decline in global fish production, and the increased reliance on aquaculture which now provides one fish of every three consumed. PAI revealed that one-fifth of the 6 billion humans on earth live in 12% of the land surface in areas which have the highest density of biodiversity, and in these tight areas population growth is 1.8% annually, higher than the 1.3% overall world rate. A final conclusion was that 420 million people live in countries that have only .07 hectare of cultivated land per person, the absolute minimum parcel size capable of providing someone with an annual vegetarian diet devoid of chemicals and fertilizers. However, this number is projected to increase to between 557 million and 1.04 billion in the next 25 years. Confirming that each nation must do their part to prevent overpopulation and resource depletion, PAI calls for universal access to basic reproductive care, universal access to secondary school education, and more economic opportunities for women. Despite confirmation of these goals at the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo, financial resources to achieve these goals have been short in coming, with PAI citing the US in particular as failing to meet any of its commitments.jb
August 20, 2000 ENN/AP
Warmer Weather Melts North Pole Ice.
*
For the first time in 50 million years, visitors to the North Pole can see
water. A mile-wide stretch of water at the top of the world is visable as a hole in the the thick ice that usually covers the Arctic Ocean at the North Pole. The water could be the result of global warming. *Link requires subscription (free)
August 22, 2000 ENN/Reuters
World Farm Area Could Support 10 Billion People, Experts Say.
*
Current world cropland has the potential to support up to 10 billion people,
almost twice the world's population, but disease, weather problems and water
shortages ravage food production, according to Hartwig Geiger, professor of
genetics at the Hohenheim University.
"More than 50% of the yield potential is lost to diseases, weather
conditions, a shortage of water and inadequate research." Hubert Spiertz,
another geneticist, warned that the full yield potential of the world's
farmed areas could never be realized. Geiger said that the development of
genetically modified (GM) crops can provide answers to malnutrition problems
such as a shortage of provitamin A, from which125 million children worldwide
suffer, leading to blindness in the worst cases. Where rice is the staple
diet, shortage of porvitamin A is common. The failure to feed a growing
population in a sustainable way would lead to "enormous environmental
damage, social dislocation and reduced economic growth that will affect the
whole world." *Link requires subscription (free)
August 17, 2000 Oil and Gas Journal
Developing Nations' Energy Consumption Declines.
Joanne Disan, director of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs'
Division for Sustainable Development, told the the United Nations Committee
on Energy and Natural Resources that energy consumption in the world's
developing countries has declined 2.3% over the last year, "seriously"
hampering economic and social development performance in these nations. In
contrast, increased consumption was among Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries, where energy demand stuck to a
10-year growth trend. OECD countries currently represent almost 60% of total world commercial energy demand.
August 17, 2000 BBC Online
Carbon at 20 Million Year High.
Carbon dioxide is at a 20 million-year high, but in the last 60 million
years there were even higher levels, say Dr. Paul Pearson of the University
of Bristol and professor Martin Palmer of London's Imperial College in the
journal Nature. The level of greenhouse gases would be equal to
double the level of pre-industrial carbon dioxide concentrations by 2030,and
triple by 2100, if current trends continue. According to a Calgary Herald
Aug 18 article, NASA scientist James Hansen this week released a paper
showing that carbon dioxide caused by human use of fossil fuels is not the
leading cause of global temperature change. Rather, methane,
chlorofluorocarbons and soot are the real culprits, he said. Hansen noted
that reducing these pollutants would be relatively inexpensive and would
deliver immediate health benefits.
August 20, 2000 New York Times
US: Gore Would Give More UN Support Than Bush.
Based on a comprehensive questionnaire on topics involving US participation
in the international community, a report from Campaign for UN Reform says
that US Vice President Al Gore would give more unqualified support to the
United Nations than his opponent for the US presidency, Texas Governor
George W. Bush. Bush said he would never place US troops under UN command
and would pay US debts to the UN only after reforms are enacted and US dues
lowered. Gore said it is time that the United States pay its UN dues "in
full, on time and without conditions." Gore also expressed support for the
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women,
the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Law of the Sea Treaty and the
Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which the US Senate rejected last year.
August 21, 2000 Singapore Straits Times
International Scrooge.
An editorial in the Singapore Straits Times says that while the United
States will spend $310 billion on its military in 2001, it spends only $10.4
billion (or just 0.11 per cent of its GDP)
on international development and humanitarian aid.
"Its failure to support the UN adequately ... undermines the international
body's operations, including peacekeeping missions that the US wishes it to
undertake." Each American contributes only about US $29 to foreign aid.
August 12, 2000 Alternatives for Simple Living
Environmentalism for People of Faith.
Known widely as simply Alternatives, the group Alternatives for Simple
Living was founded in 1973 as a non-profit organization dedicated to
equipping "people of faith to challenge consumerism, live justly and
celebrate responsibly." An active and progressive group dedicated to leading
an international fight against consumerism, Alternatives has focused on
rescuing Christmas from the clutches of big business, who they believe
"usurp our holy day" and "exploit people and the environment." jb
August 27, 2000 Business Wire
Record Levels of Foreign-born in NYC.
A human tidal wave has added one million immigrants to New York City in the
last 10 years. Foreign-born residents are now 40% of the total of the
population, according to new United States Census Bureau figures. In 1990,
foreign-born residents were only 28%. The new figures come from a
15,417-household survey taken in 1999 by the Census Bureau. Without
immigration, NYC's population would be shrinking. Another sampling shows
that 54% of children through the age of 18 are either foreign born or
have foreign-born parents. Dr. Philip Kasinitz, a sociology professor at
Hunter College said "Absent immigration, we would be seeing a very different
New York, with neighborhood abandonment and depopulation." [This may be
true, but can the U.S. environment afford more people? More people consume
more electricity and fossil fuels, use more water, and require more building
materials. Sprawl results from overcrowding and lack of open space in the
cities.]
August 1, 2000 ENN
Appetite for Bush Meat Increases
*
Basic survival drives human populations to use what naturally occurs around
them. In the eastern and southern African countries of Kenya, Tanzania, Botswana,
Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia and Zimbabwe, more and more people are suffering
from poverty and famine and are consequently turning to wild animals as an
economic resource and a source of food, resulting in a serious decline in
wildlife populations outside protected areas, according to a report entitled
Food For Thought: The Utilization of Wild
Meat in Eastern and Southern Africa from TRAFFIC, a wildlife
trade-monitoring program sponsored by WWF Worldwide Fund for Nature and IUCN
- the World Conservation Union, Thousands of species, from insects to
rodents to elephants, are killed for their meat, including once taboo and totem species
such as zebras and hippos." In six of the seven countries surveyed, bush
meat was substantially cheaper than domestic meat. "Geographically, bush
meat research has also focussed on western and central Africa, leading many
to perceive bush meat use as a tropical forest phenomenon (that mostly
effects primates)" said Sabri Zain, communications manager for TRAFFIC.
*.Link
requires subscription (free)
August 9, 2000 Santa Maria Times GNP and
Nature
by Bill Denneen.
We evolved in a 'natural world'. We are a product of this 'natural world'.
We are creating a different/plastic/synthetic world that is very different
from that in which we evolved. Our GNP looks great. Our prosperity couldn't
be better.
We are liquidating our 'natural capital'---the resources and ecosystem
services that make possible all of life----the habitat in which our species
evolved.
Is this the direction/limb that we want to be on?
August 9, 2000 Opinion
What Has Gore Done on Environmental Issues?
by Ned Grossnickle.
Gore pledged at the 1994 Cairo Conference that the US would do their
fair share to support international family planning which would be $800 -
$900 million/year.
August 10, 2000 Agence France Presse
Ethiopian Population Grows By Nearly Three Percent
Abdullahi Hassen, of the Ethiopian Central Statistics Authority said the
current growth rate was 2.92%, down from 3.9%. The country's estimated
population of 62 million people would rise to 83.5 million by the year 2010
and 129.1 million in 30 years. Such growth will pose a treat to providing
adequate health and education services, employment and housing.
Environmental degradation would speed up. Fertility rates have dropped from
6.9 children in 1994 to 6.5 children in 2000. Ethiopia is the third most
populous country in Africa, after Nigeria and Egypt.
August 11, 2000 Agence France Presse
Does the World Have the Will To Feed the Hungry?
Despite the fact that the global population is growing fast and is expected
to top eight billion by 2030 and 9 billion by 2050, the United Nations Food
and Agriculture organization (FAO) says the world has the resources and the
know-how to feed everyone, but half a billion people will go hungry and many
millions will starve to death due to war, politics and economics, more than
climate change, natural disasters or plagues. FAO reports that the numbers
of undernourished people in developing countries has declined from 960
million (or 37% of the global population) to 790 million (18%) in 1996. FAO
says that cereal production is growing faster globally than the world
population. The world can produce enough food for each person to have a
quota of 2,720 kilocalories per capita per day, although in sub-Saharan
Africa, the average is only 90 calories above the agreed critical threshold
of 2,100. The French relief organization Action Against Hunger (ACF) says
"Famine is no longer a result of natural disaster. The map of great famines
exactly matches that of wars." Conflicts over land or resources such as
diamonds, oil and water are likely to continue preventing the even spread of
food supplies. "In the Vanni region of Sri Lanka, the population is on the
brink of starvation, because the government has banned the use of fertilizer
for the reason that it could be used by the Tamil Tiger rebels to make
bombs. In Iraq, because President Saddam Hussein has not complied with
western demands, 1.4 million Iraqis have died including 500,000 children,
the UN estimates. Unknown numbers of Chinese peasants go hungry and Cubans
and North Koreans are on rations of 500 calories a day due to the political
isolation of their governments. In addition, the strain on fresh water
reserves is expected to increase by 40% over the next 20 years, and age-old
tension between dry countries is likely to be exacerbated. Even if food
needs are met, there is growing concern that the environment will continue
to deteriorate as a result of pollution, erosion and deforestation, making
land, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, increasingly unproductive.
Technical advances such as genetically modified foods and increasingly
efficient farming methods make the outlook for industrial food production
hopeful. [Not all would agree with FAO's optimism and many wonder what the
world will do for fertilizer when petroleum becomes less accessible, and
what will happen when overpumped aquifers can no longer support crops. See
April 4 article by David Pimentel: Ten Billion Mouths to Feed]
August 9, 2000 Africa News
Tanzania; 50,000 Kids Die Yearly Due To Insufficient Breast Feeding
If a child is well breast-fed in the first months, without additional foods,
except for medicine prescribed by doctors, diseases like diarrhea and air
borne diseases are less likely to attack, says Dr. Ali Mzige, director for
preventive services in the Ministry of Health. Dr. Aaron Chiduo, the
Minister of Health, emphasised that children have a right to breast feed.
However, "Despite the fact that breast feeding is the only ideal way to feed
the majority of infants, it has been learnt from research findings that
there are possibilities of transmitting HIV infection from mother to child
through breast feeding," he stressed. If a mother is HIV-positive, the
average risk for HIV transmission through breast-feeding is 10-20% or
one in seven children. The level of HIV/AIDS is much higher in maternal
clinics where up to 36% of expectant mothers is proven HIV positive, and in
Dar Es Salaam, over 50% of women admitted to hospitals are HIV-positive.
Recent surveys revealed that 529 women die out of 100,000 giving birth every
year because of excessive bleeding after birth, unsafe abortion,
hypertensive disorders and abstracted labor. Other causes are disease like
malaria, hepatitis, HIV/AIDS and anemia, which are aggravated by pregnancy.
Also 150 children out of 100,000 born die before they reach five years,
often from diseases like malaria, HIV/AIDS, diarrhea pneumonia, and
malnutrition. Declining literacy among community and again especially among
women, has reduced their ability of health seeking behavior. Despite
significant improvements in life expectancy, infant mortality and
immunization coverage since independence, gains are being eroded, partly as
a result of the AIDS epidemic. Infant mortality (86 per 1000 live births),
under-five mortality (144 per 1,000 live births) and maternal mortality (530
per 100,000 live births) are considered to be very high. The total fertility
rate is 5.6 and contraceptive prevalence rate remains very low at 12% for
modern methods. Per capita spending on health is only $3.5 a year.
August 9, 2000 Agence France Presse
Thailand Registers Slowest Population Growth in Decades
Thailand's population, now at 60.6 million, is growing by only 1.05% a year,
the lowest rate since the census started in 1960, the National Statistics
Office (NSO) said. In 1990, growth was reported at 1.96% a year. Several
Thai pundits have questioned whether the country will be able to care for
its rapidly growing elderly population, particularly since Thailand has less
state social welfare than Japan. [But with a bigger population, will there
be enough resources to handle the needs of the population?]
August 9, 2000 AP
Teen Births Drop to Lowest Rate in 60 Years
Teens are more terrified than ever of sexually transmitted diseases, and
they are putting
off starting families to take jobs with good pay available in the booming
economy . Their birth rates are the lowest in at least 60 years and both
religious groups that push abstinence and advocates for contraceptives and
sex education in schools are taking the credit. The National Center for
Health Statistics reported that the birth rate for teenagers has fallen 20%
in the last 10 years. Among girls ages 15 to 17, the rate fell 6% from 1998
to 28.7 births per 1,000 today. Among black teens, the rate dropped a
dramatic 38% from 1991 to 1999. Clinton consequently urged Congress to
approve $25 million for what are being called "second-chance homes," where
teen parents can live and get job counseling and learn parenting skills.
July 29, 2000 ENN
Gas-busters: Algae Comes to the Aid of Coal-Fired Plants
Algae, sunlight and photosynthesis can be used to absorb carbon dioxide from
the combustion of coal and lower emissions from an average-sized power plant
by 20%, according to a team of scientists at Ohio University who have
received a $1.07 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy. Carbon
dioxide resulting from the coal burning is force through tubes of running
water as it passes through the smoke stack. The combination of carbon
dioxide and water creates bubbly bicarbonates, ions that form when carbon
dioxide is made soluble in water. The water is then forced through a series
of screens covered with living algae exposed to sunlight filtered by a
special system of solar panels, satellite dishes and fiber optic cables. The
filtering system was developed by scientists at the Oak Ridge National
Laboratory. "The algae basically drink the bicarbonates," said David
Bayless, lead researcher on the project. Oxygen is the by-product and the
expended algae can be used as fuel for biomass incinerators or as
fertilizer. A blue-green algae able to survive in the almost-boiling water
of hot springs in Yellowstone National Park was used in the process. [Coal
burning is one of the leading causes of greenhouse emissions]
July 27, 2000 ENN
Extinction Traced to Methane Burp
Many forms of life, including 80% of some deep-sea species, suddenly
vanished 183 million years ago. In an article published in the journal Nature, huge
reservoirs of methane trapped beneath the ocean floor rapidly escaped during
prehistoric volcanic-caused global warming and depleted much of the sea's
oxygen, according to new research by Stephen Hesselbo, an Oxford University
researcher. The study also raised questions about the stability of today's
sea floor reservoir of methane hydrate, which the federal government plans
to study as a possible energy source. "How easy it is to release the methane
that is there," Hesselbo said. Methane hydrate is formed beneath the sea
floor when algae from the surface dies and sinks. Beneath the ocean floor,
methane exists in an ice-like state but is susceptible to changes in
pressure and temperature. Researchers believe that during the Jurassic
period carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases were spewed into the
atmosphere by massive volcanic eruptions, warming the subocean floor by deep
ocean currents, which in turn freed the methane from its suboceanic cage.
The methane then used the oxygen in the water or atmosphere to form carbon
dioxide, accelerating the global warming. The release was estimated to be
20% of the present-day 14,000 billion tons of gas hydrate on the sea floor.
The event took place over 5,000 years. [Other governments, including the
Japanese, are also studing this possibility. Harvesting the methane also has
a potential for releasing it into the atmosphere. But, as our huge
population uses up available petroleum, the attention of energy hogs will
turn to risky alternatives.]
July 31,2000 The Fresno Bee, CA
Yosemite Sewage Pollutes Merced River.
On July 27th a blocked pipe at the National Park Service waste-water
treatment plant caused sewage to pour into the river. This is the fifth
occurrence in 16 months - this time up to 200,000 gallons. Vistors 12 miles downstream have been warned not to swim, fish or go in the water. The malfunction occurred while a
rebuilt section of the line was being tested. The waste water from
showers, bathrooms and other places in the park, packed up through a storm
drain and out through a manhole. The sewage spills related to construction
last year dumped a total of 50,000 gallons of sewage water into the
protected Merced River. The river is protected under the Wild and Scenic
Rivers Act. rvs
July 21, 2000 ENN
Iceman Cometh to Greenland; Sea Level Rises.
Ice around Greenland’s ice sheet is melting at a rate of three feet a
year, enough to raise sea level 0.005 inches annually according the
experts at NASA’s Wallops Island Flight Facility (WIFF). This rise will
not threaten coastal regions but shows that the ice sheets are changing.
Although the margins of the ice sheet are thinning, the interior is
thickening due to increased global temperature. Greenland’s ice cap is
1,000 miles long, 400 miles wide and two miles thick at the center and
contains the second most amount of freshwater on earth, enough water to raise the sea
level by 23 feet if all of it were to melt. The ice sheet is
an indicator of the global climate change occurring. Currently,
researchers are trying to determine why the ice sheet is thinning and
thickening simultaneously. They wonder if is a natural process or due to
human activities. "With three-quarters of the world’s population living
within a coastal region, this situation needs to be monitored closely,"
said a scientist at WIFF. rvs
July 10-24, 2000 Candadian Business
Running on Empty.
Jim Gray, chairman of Canadian Hunter Exploration Ltd, said that North America is just about to hit the wall on supply and demand for natural gas. The Canadian Energy Research Institute estimates that gas demand for electricity generation could almost triple over the next decade. In three years natural gas has skyrocketed from $1.12 to $5.80 per thousand cubic feet. Since 1986, US imports of Canadian gas have increased fivefold and Canada’s share of the US gas market is expected to climb to 18.4% from 14% in the next five years. Half of the reserves in the Western Canada Sedimentary Basin, the shallowest and easiest to exploit, have already been drained to warm North American homes. Mike Sawyer, the executive director of the Citizen’s Oil and Gas Council said, "By next winter, gas prices could be 300 to 400 times higher."
July 29, 2000 ENN/Associated Press
Water Temperature Rise Hurts Coral.
Tropical waters in the Northern Hemisphere are heating at a higher rate than
other waters, threatening coral reefs. Scientists from the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Association discovered that tropical waters above the equator are
heating at a rate of 1 F. degree per decade, 10 times the global rate.
Scientists think the increased water temperature is the cause of coral bleaching
over the past decade. Coral bleaching would have a devastating effect on
invertebrates and other organisms who make their homes in coral reefs. rvs
July 27,2000 CNN.com
India Bans Government Employees From Having
Child Servants by AP
In New Delhi, The National Human Rights Commission has placed a ban
on Indian employees employing children under 14 as servants. The
commission had been campaigning for the ban since 1997 although most
Indian states had already imposed the ban. Child labor is popular in
India. Most children are pulled out of school to help their parents
during harvest time. They also work in the textile, construction,
carpet and other industries.-rvs
July 27, 2000 ENN
Tribal Hunters Turn Wildlife Protectors - By Hunting Again.
In the harsh scrub jungle of Dambana in eastern Sri Lanka, hunting has been
banned for more than a decade. But desperate wildlife rangers, unable to
stem the tide of poaching in the scrub jungles of eastern Sri Lanka, have
given the aboriginal Veddah tribe the right to hunt again in the forest
sanctuary. The Veddahs lived by hunting and gathering honey and herbs for
thousands of years, left alone by the goverments which came and went. But
in November 1983, the government told the Veddahs to move. The country's
main river, the Mahaweli, which flows through the tribe's jungles, was
dammed at several points, creating massive irrigation schemes and hydropower
reservoirs. Hundreds of new villages were built along the canals. Farmers
came from afar to take advantage of the government's offer of free land and
houses. Forest cover dwindled. A few large forest areas were declared as
sanctuaries, in order to save the vanishing numbers of elephants, bear and
leopards. The Veddah lands were included in Maduru Oya National Park and
declared off-limits to all hunters. The Veddahs were relocated to the new
agricultural villages. 130 families left the jungle. Stripped of its
traditional guardians, the well-stocked forest turned into a paradise for
poachers, mostly soldiers and policemen from nearby bases, their automatic
rifles mowing down deer and boar at an alarming rate. Nine Veddah families
remained in their mud huts bordering the sanctuary, witnessing the jungle
being denuded of the animals that the tribe depends on for food, and at the
same time harassed or arrested by Wildlife Conservation rangers who tried to
keep them from gathering food inside the park.
Now the Veddahs have permits to hunt for their own food, but are not allowed
to kill animals to sell. In return for the permits, they are asked to help
watch for poachers.
July 31, 2000 ENN
Transpacific Pollution Leaves Thicker and Thicker Trail.
Rising industrialization in Asia is discharging millions of tons of
previously undetected contaminants annually into the winds that travel
across the Pacific Ocean. Every spring there are massive dust storms in Asia
that transport soil across the Pacific to the US, previous research has
shown. Now Thomas Cahill, a researcher and professor emeritus of physics and
atmospheric science at the University of California at Davis and an
international authority on the atmospheric
transport of pollutants has found that "sulfate and organic aerosols are
also present, and in roughly the same amounts." These aerosols are killing
crops, spreading illness in Asia, appear to be adding toxic materials to
waters in America, and they could dramatically alter global climate. Every
year, Asia burns millions of tons of coal in coal-burning power plants and
coal-fired locomotives. Aerosols are also generated from metals production,
vehicle exhaust, home heating, and overtilling of dry-area farmland. The
U.S. has slowed it's annual releases of sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere
from about 20 million tons to 13 million tons between 1990 and 2000, while
Asia's has climbed to about 45 million tons. Pollution of the air above the
Pacific ocean, will change the heating/cooling effect of the ocean and
produce changes in the weather. The research project is called the
University of California Pacific Rim Aerosol Network and it works by
determining the origins of these aerosols by finding the unique signature of
their origins in their composition of trace elements, such as nickel,
copper, zinc, arsenic and lead. Aerosols with these unique signatures from
Asia have been detected all the way to the Rocky Mountains in the United
States.
July 27 2000 BBC Online
Forest Fires 'Set to Worsen'
WWF, the global environmental campaign, and the World Conservation Union
(IUCN) Climate change will result in more frequent and stronger El Nino
episodes and consequently more forest fires. The next El Nino weather
disturbance in the Pacific, is due within two years, The recent forest
fires in Greece and Indonesia (1997-1998) are "only a foretaste of a global
disaster waiting to happen". The Greek fires ravaged the Pindos mountains,
home to brown bears, wild cats and wolves, and the island of Samos; nearly
all the forests around Athens have now gone. Political action is urgent.
"Early warning systems need to be built up; agricultural practices need to
be altered; effective enforcement and implementation of national and
international law need to be galvanised." "The fires in Indonesia were and
are arson on a grand scale by landowners wanting to clear forests for
plantations for export crops."
July 28, 2000 National
Geographic
Too Many People
Why do rational adults continue to bring babies into places of starvation?
Many people, "especially in very poor societies, haven't gotten introduced
to the idea that you can do anything about controlling fertility." said
population analyst Tom Merrick of the World
Bank. In the Horn of Africa, 8 million people risk starvation. Three years
of insufficient rains, complicated by two years of war between Ethiopia and
Eritrea,
have devastated the region. Aid workers report rotting corpses, fields of
dead cattle, and weakened children being eaten by hyenas. Nearly 80% of the
livestock in Kenya has died. Since 1991, Somalia has been without a central
government. It is a dangerous place for aid workers because of feuding
warlords. In the long run the land simply can't support the number of people
who are trying to live on it.Population growth has slowed or even stopped in
Europe, North America and Japan, but global population is still rising at a
rate of about 78 million people per year, most of it taking place in the
world's poorest and least-prepared regions. Even HIV/AIDS is not a panacea
for overpopulation. The population of Botswana, where 20% is affected by
HIV/AIDS, is expected to nearly double by 2050. Women are less likely to
have large
families if they have a chance to earn an income. William Ryan of the World
Population Fund says "We estimate that the number of children in many
developing countries would fall by a third if there were access to the kinds
of services that people need."
July 21, 2000 The Oregonian
[Portland] A Growing Problem: Hillsboro Wants Farmland for Housing and
Will Take its Case to the State. Big business and farmers are
coming head to head over land use in the fertile Tualatin Valley west of
Portland, Oregon. Intel has announced plans to put 7,600 new jobs in this
region's already overcrowded town of Hillsboro. More jobs means more people,
but the city is running out of room. "We're basically going to come to a
screeching halt in terms of home-building activity," predicts Hillsboro's
city manager, Tim Erwert. Recent state laws have severely limited the
development of farmland, but that won't stop Intel and other high tech firms
from pushing forward. Threatening legal action against local farmers who
claim that the farmland is too valuable to be covered over
with buildings, Intel argues that workers who live far from their jobs snarl
the traffic by commuting, which in turn leads to short tempers. The legal
suit filed by Intel will go before a state committee by the end of the year.
jb
July 24, 2000 The Nation
Fertility Rates Drop. by Amartya Sen, author of
Development as Freedom, and recipient of the Nobel Memorial Prize in
Economic Science in
1998. Perhaps the most immediate adversity caused by a high rate of
population growth lies in the loss of freedom that women suffer when they
are shackled by persistent bearing and rearing of children. Global warming
is a distant effect compared with what population explosion does to the
lives and well-being of mothers. Female illiteracy, lack of female
employment opportunity and economic independence contribute substantially to
the muffling women's voices in society and within the family. Not knowing
about family planning or available family planning facilities is also an
important source of helplessness. Cultural and religious factors often force
young women toi accept a subservient position and the burden of constantly
bearing and rearing children which husband or parents-in-law have placed on
them. A long history sanctifies such practices and generates uncritical
acceptance. On the other hand, women's empowerment, through employment,
education, property rights, etc., can lead to the reduction of the fertility
rate. The Indian states of Kerala, Tamil Nadu or Himachal Pradesh have
experienced speedy fertility declines which can be linked to the rapid
enhancement of female education, employment opportunity, and and other
empowerment of young women. The states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, and
Rajasthan, on the other hand, give few economic and educational
opportunities to young women and experience high fertility rates. It is
notable that China, where coercive one-child policies were employed,
fertility rates fell from 2.8 to 2.0 from 1979 to 1991, while in Kerala,
where fertility decline was freely chosen, fertility rates fell much faster,
from 3 to 1.8 in the same period. In Kerala, the rate of expansion of female
literacy has also been faster than China's, and consequently, Kerala's
infant mortality rate has continued to fall fast while it has not in China,
where it is now double Kerala's, even though they were roughly even in this
respect in 1979. [This is an excellent article and deserves a full read.
Unfortunately, it is not on-line. Look for The Nation, No. 4, Vol. 271; Pg.
16 ; ISSN: 0027-8378 at your library.]
July 22, 2000 London Guardian
Washington will Miss Greenhouse Target.
The United States has admitted that it can not, and perhaps will not, reach the greenhouse gas reduction target accepted at the 1998 Kyoto climate conference. In a recent statement by American under-secretary of global affairs Frank Loy the US confirmed that unless Europe gives way and allows the US to purchase "carbon credits" the country, which produces 25% of the world's carbon dioxide emissions, will not meet its obligations. According to the Kyoto conference, signing countries agreed that they would cut their greenhouse gas emissions by 7% before 2010. Loy cites that the growing economy in the US prevents reduction in carbon dioxide emissions, and instead wants to excuse American discrepancies by purchasing credits from nations who produce less than this projected amount of carbon dioxide. Tony Juniper of Friends of the Earth responded to this attitude saying, "The US is doing tricks with arithmetic rather than deal[ing] with some of the fundamental problems of profligate use of fossil fuels." Loy did admit, however, that there was growing concern in the US over pollution and global warming. Citing a recent announcement from NASA that a warmer earth is eroding more than 50 billion tons of water a year from the Greenland ice sheet, he confirmed that the American government was dedicated to attempting greenhouse gas reductions. Such statistics, however, feed into the increasing concern that melting ice sheets will have devastating effects on the earth's climate. Research suggests that over the past one hundred years, the sea level has risen about 23 cm, covering once dry low elevation levels. jb
July 18, 2000 ENN
Plant Oils Give Petroleum a Run for the Money.
With the impending crisis foretold by the world's over-reliance on non-renewable resources such as petroleum, farmers are stepping forward with their own solution. Pointing out that plant oils and fats have the same base chemical structure as petroleum, Professor Bernard Tao of Purdue University calls this agri-solution "the obvious substitutes." Fossil fuels were plants millions of years ago, and Tao explains that the essential ingredient of both petroleum and plant oils is hydrocarbon, a carbon atom surrounded by hydrogen atoms. Gasoline ranges from between 7 and 10 hydrocarbons in length, with diesel fuel coming in at 15 carbons long, while plant oils are 14 to 18 hydrocarbons long. This means that if plant oils are to be used as a fuel source, modern gasoline engines are not going to
be able to handle the change. However, Tao cites that the shorter a chain of carbons is, the more explosive the fuel can be, and thus suggests that perhaps tropical crops like coconuts, which have shorter stands of hydrocarbons when compared to wheat or corn, be
transgenetically modified to create oils closer to the 8-carbon ideal. Further, Tao points out that most petroleum is used into create inks, paints, and coatings, espousing a belief that plant oils could easily replace fossil fuels in these products, as was the case before World War II. In the move from a black gold economy to a green gold economy, Tao concludes that the need for petroleum is never going to go away, thus confirming that monitoring and reducing the use of existing petroleum is crucial. jb
July 1, 2000 eMagazine
American Rivers: Damning the Dams
Dams on many North American rivers are causing native freshwater species, including several varieties of fish, mussels, crayfish, frogs, and snails, to go extinct as fast as those living in tropical rainforests. In a study entitled "America's Most Endangered Rivers of 2000" by conservation group American Rivers, 13 American rivers face serious immediate environmental threats, 8 of which are on the list due to dams. Washington's lower Snake River tops the list for the second year, being cited again due to four dams on the river operated by the Army Corps of Engineers. These dams have transformed the once free flowing river into a series of slackwater ponds, thereby bringing salmon and steelhead to the brink of extinction. Rebecca Wodder, president of American Rivers, says, "We have blocked the flows, straightened the curves and hardened the banks of thousands of miles of waterways. By changing the most fundamental qualities of rivers--their natural shapes and flows--we've made it difficult for them to support life." The National Hydropower Association claims that hydropower dams produce pollution-free power while enhancing biodiversity and improving habitat. However, Anthony Ricciardi, a freshwater biologist at Canada's Dalhousie University, is unimpressed with this assertion, citing that dams pose a major problem for the ecological health of rivers, and contribute to other problems. "We also have to look at water quality, organic and chemical pollution and runoff from streets and yards," he says. "The invasion of exotic species--the zebra mussel for example--is also something that has to be addressed." Ricciardi also points out that if current trend in river and wildlife destruction continue, more species will be lost in the next 100 years then during the past century. jb
July 1, 2000 eMagazine
India: A Dramatic Decline Needless Alarm over Population.
India is not China. As the world's largest democracy, we have some constraints. We can't adopt draconian measures. Sanjay Gandhi tried to innovate. That cost his mother her power and the country a perfectly innocuous term, called family planning. The expression continues to be taboo even today, reflecting a part of our psyche. Can well-intended proposals like that put forward by Dr J V Narlikar for reducing the number of parliamentary seats in the states which have not been able to check their population, be rammed down the throats of those who make up nearly half of India? Prof R D Karve, the pioneer of India's birth control movement, said "No one will practise birth-control to meet the danger of growth in population. People will practise it for their individual good". People will resort to family planning if they perceive it to be safe, if they think it satisfying, if they consider it beneficial to themselves. In Andhra Pradesh fertility has declined sharply despite the fact that the female literacy is among the lowest in the country and the per capita income in AP was also lower than the national average. Today in India, both in the urban and rural parts of every state without exception, birth rates are declining, though in varying degrees. The rate at which people are choosing to have smaller families is faster than the pace at which the death rate is decreasing. We are moving towards a fertility replacement level as opposed to towards population disaster.
July 20, 2000 Jakarta Post
Jakarta:Family Planning Program Not Yet Popular
Among Men Of the over 27.7 million active members of family
planning program across
the country only about 2% are men, according to the National Family Planning
Board (BKKBN). Men often support the state-sponsored family planning
program, but their participation is low due to lack of information, the lack
of services and facilities for men. Condoms are perceived as reducing sexual
enjoyment, and are associated with immorality. Vasectomies are even more
unpopular due to ignorance of the procedure and worries that something could
go wrong or of not being able to perform following the surgery. A vasectomy
involves minor surgery with a low possibility of failure and will not affect
a man's sexual activity and desire. It is also less complicated than a
tubectomy.The failure rate, however, is 5 to 9%. Out of 27.1 million women
who are taking part in the program, over 9.7 million prefer injections,
while 7.7 million take pills, 5.2 million use IUD, 3.1 million use implants,
1.2 million prefer tubectomy and 9,957 use vaginal contraceptives.
Pakistan's contraceptive prevalence survey in 1994-1995 showed that out of
17.8% of those taking part in family planning program, 14.1% of them were
using male contraceptive methods. Bangladesh studies showed a 11.9% male
usage. "We aim to increase men's participation in the family planning
program to 10% by the year 2005," said a spokesperson for the BKKBN.
July 20, 2000 BBC News
'100% Success' for Male Pill Trial
Clinical trials in Scotland, China, South Africa and Nigeria of a male
contraceptive pill suggest it is 100% effective, with no harmful
consequences, and could be available within five years, Edinburgh University
scientists say. The contraceptive, developed by Dutch firm Organon,
introduces the male sex hormone testosterone and desogestrel which stop the
production of sperm into the blood stream.
July 19, 2000 World Watch
Right Whale Battles Brink of Extinction and Entanglement in Fishing
Gear.
The International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) announced today that the
North Atlantic Right Whale continues to battle with extinction. Their
numbers are currently less than 300. These whales suffer from entanglement
in disused or abandoned fishing gear, as well as life-threatening injuries
from collisions with boats. IFAW's research team is involved in
dis-entangling the whales from the lines and other cast-off gear, as well as
completing a study involving the deployment of accoustic underwater bouys,
which record the sounds of the whales and boats. "If we do not act now, the
North Atlantic right whale may become extinct in our lifetime," said Jared
Blumenfeld, IFAW Director of Habitat for Animals. mc
July 17, 2000 PR Newswire
American Life League: USAID Responsible for AIDS Epidemic, AIDS
Orphans; Genocide Hidden in AIDS Relief Package.
[Can you believe this?] "For the past few decades, funding for condom
distribution abroad has fueled the spread of the HIV/AIDS virus," said the
American Life League, attacking Clinton's $54 million HIV/AIDS relief
program for Africa-a program titled "Leadership and Investment in Fighting
an Epidemic," or LIFE. "AIDS mortality
has skyrocketed over the past decade and a half, concomitant with USAID's
massive condom distribution campaign. ... by occasioning promiscuity under
the false guise of 'safe sex,' condom distribution has created genocide in
the name of AIDS relief. .. By USAID's own admission, over one billion
condoms have been provided to men, women and adolescents throughout the
developing world over the past few decades." [Didn't the Catholic Church
inhibit the use of condoms until the epidemic was well under way? How can
only one billion condoms (many of them never used) distributed between a
billion young couples in the third world over several decades possibly
promote any significant degree of promiscuity? What should they do - the
millions of wives who need protection from AIDS because of the acts of
errant husbands?]
July 18, 2000 World Watch
Himachal Set to Achieve Zero Population Growth.
The fertility rate in Himachal has declined to 2.14 in 1998 from 2.97 in
1992 and the growth rate is expected to reach zero by 2015. The region has
large Gujjar population which was basically a nomadic tribe with a migratory
lifestyle. The state had enacted a law which debars candidates having more
than two children from contesting Panchayati Raj institution elections. The
state had also introduced incentives for panchayats which recorded the
lowest birthrate in the form of a cash award of Rs one lakh for local
development work annually. Chief minister Prem Kumar Dhumal said that female
education should become the focus of population control efforts and added
that Himachal had the unique distinction of making education for girls free
till the university level. The mean marriage age for girls was 20.5 years in
Himachal and the sex ratio had increased to 1019 in 1999 as compared to 976
in 1991.
The state is spending Rs 140 crores in the health sector. "There are 3100
health institutions in the state providing family planning services, but the
difficult topography, inhospitable terrain and want of communication
facilities were affecting accessibility to the services," Dhumal said.
July 19, 2000 Sierra Nevada Forest
Protection Campaign
Fisher Headed for Extinction in Sierra Nevada.
The fisher, an old-growth forest dwelling carnivore, is
headed for extinction. The Forest Service's plan does not provide enough
protection to save the fisher from extinction or avoid having the fisher
listed as an endangered species. It has been eliminated from the northern
and central Sierra, isolating fisher in the southern Sierra from fisher in
northern California. This isolation, in combination with a small population
size and continued habitat loss, places the southern Sierra population of
the fisher in immediate danger of extinction. The fisher is a major predator
in the area and may keep rodent populations in check. A relative of the mink
and otter, it has a long, slender body with short legs, a long bushy tail,
and it runs in a bounding gait, with
their front feet leaping forward together, followed by the back feet, and
walks on the whole foot, unlike other carnivores.
July 18, 2000 Agence France
Presse
Thailand to Start Sex Education from Kindergarten Level.
Thailand will implement a new program aimed at curbing teenage pregnancies
and AIDS
infections. According to Suwanna Vorakamin of the public health ministry's
family planning and population control unit, teachers would be trained to
tackle sex education frankly
and scientifically, which would help erase the taboo on discussing sex in
public. Reaching children at a young age would enable them to delay the
start of sexual activity and eliminate the risk of unwanted pregnancy once
they became teenagers. Sex education was vital in reducing the rate of
abortions and HIV-AIDS transmission Thailand, where the disease has so far
infected nearly one in 60 people.
July 18, 2000 New York
Times
Shortchanging Foreign Aid. The House foreign aid bill which
was passed last week allows an overall allocation that is far too low to
meet American foreign policy objectives, and President Clinton has
threatened to veto it. Both the House bill and the Senate version that
passed in June are nearly $2 billion below the White House request for
fiscal 2001. The House version cuts the contribution to development loans by
40%, reducing basic infrastructure loans to the poorest countries.
International women's health
programs will not be adequately funded, and peacekeeping and nuclear
nonproliferation funding would be reduced. The House bill also contains a
provision that would deny assistance to foreign NGOs that use their own
money to provide abortions or engage in political debate to change abortion
laws. The Clinton administration accepted a one-year restriction as part of
a deal with Congressional Republicans to pay back dues owed to the United
Nations. The House bill maintains funding for international family planning
at $385 million, which is 30% below 1995 levels, before Congress slashed the
program. However, the House did approve an amendment to increase funding to
$225 million for debt
relief for the world's poorest nations. The poorest nations are now spending
up to 60% of their budgets to service debt on old loans, and are unable to
direct scarce resources toward health and social investments that can reduce
poverty. [Americans spend less than an average of $5 a year per capita on
foreign aid and less than $1.50 in foreign family planning assistance].
July 12, 2000 ENN
Health Care Without Harm Commends Ann Arbor's Decision to Ban
Sales of Mercury Fever Thermometers.
For decades, mercury has been used in thermometers and other products made
by humans. With the demand for medical technologies due to the increasing need
of medical facilities to facilitate the overwhelming sick, came pollution
and more sickness. The mercury contained in thermometers is deadly, causing
sickness in humans and the other organisms in the environment. Since mercury
accumulates in the muscle tissue of fish and mammals, advisories in many
U.S. states recommend against fish consumption of over one meal of sports
fish per week.
Now, cities, such as Ann Arbor, Michigan are banning the manufacturing,
selling, or importing of mercury contained thermometers. With this ban,
Ann Arbor is taking a step to prevent further pollution. As research is
conducted, new laws are being passed to
reduce the amount of pollution that we as humans are causing to the
environment. Ann
Arbor has taken a step to solving one problem caused by the increasing
number
of humans. BP
July 11, 2000 AP
New campaign to promote U.S. support for global family
planning.
A five-year multimillion-dollar education campaign, named PLANet, has been
funded by The David and Lucile Packard Foundation, to get the American
public and the U.S. Congress to expand access to reproductive health care
and contraceptive services around the world. "Family planning is the key to
saving the lives of mothers, children and
planet Earth" is the message to be sent in television, newspaper and
magazine advertisements. Amy Coen, president of Population Action
International, said "The simple truth is that a lot of couples don't plan
their families because they can't," .. "150 million married women in the
developing world would use family planning services if
they were available. They are not." Family planning could save about three
million
children's lives a year, by helping women to space births by at least two
years, and save the lives of some of the 600,000 women who die every year
from the complications of pregnancy and childbirth. World population grows
by almost 80 million people per year. Slowing population growth will protect
the environment and allow developing countries to invest in education, jobs
and health care. The participating organizations are Population Action
International, Planned Parenthood, National Audubon Society, CARE, and
Communications Consortium Media.
July 6, 2000 Talk Back Live
Interview with Ralph Nader.
Question from Battista: "What would you do about the influx of illegal
aliens?"
Nader answers: "The employers who want illegal aliens to come so they can
exploit them at cheap wages and not have to pay any benefits because the
workers can't object, they're illegal, we have to enforce the law against
these employers, No. 1. ... No. 2, if we had a more decent foreign policy
toward Mexico and Central Mexico where we sided with the peasants and the
workers once in a
while instead of the oligarchs and corrupt government, there wouldn't be
such a desperate economic condition for these desperate people to move north
and expose their entire lives to crossing the border like that. And third, I
don't think this country should be engaged in a brain drain of highly
talented scientists and computer specialists from Third World country that
desperately need them in order to bring them here instead of paying American
specialists an adequate wage. And that's what's called the high-brow part of
the immigration issue. We are hogging too much talent from other countries
where these countries and their peoples need their
entrepreneurial, their scientific and their technical talents. So we need to
pay attention to that."
July 13, 2000 Worldwatch
20th Century Power System Incompatible with Digital Economy.
Power interruptions due to the vulnerability of central power plants and
transmission lines cost the United States as much as $80 billion annually,
reports the Worldwatch Institute in Micropower: The Next
Electrical Era. "The kind of highly reliable power needed for
today's economy can only be based on a new generation of micropower devices
now coming on the market. These allow homes and businesses to produce their
own electricity, with far less pollution." Fuel cells, microturbines, and
solar roofing, are as small as one-millionth the scale of today's coal or
nuclear plants-and produce little if any of the air pollution of their
larger cousins. Wind power, small geothermal, microhydro, and biomass
systems also hold important roles in the emerging decentralized electricity
system. Located close to where they are used, small-scale units can save
electricity consumers millions of dollars by avoiding costly new investments
in central power plants and distribution systems. The First National Bank
of Omaha, in Omaha, Nebraska, hooked its processing center up to two fuel
cells that provide 99.9999% reliability. Widespread adoption of micropower
in the U.S. could cut power plant carbon dioxide emissions in half. In
developing nations, small-scale power could lower carbon emissions by 42%
relative to large-scale systems. In rural regions, where 1.8 billion people
still lack access to electrical services, small-scale systems are already
economically superior to the extension of transmission lines-and
environmentally preferable to continued reliance on kerosene lanterns and
diesel generators. Many electric utilities, however, perceive micropower
systems as an economic threat and often place barriers in the way of
micropower. In the developing world, the opportunity to leapfrog technology
exists, but will outdated central power plants win out?
July 13, 2000 Earthtimes
Marking World Population Day, UN highlights India's Adverse Sex Ratio
.
A UN Population Fund's (UNFPA) representative in India says that, although
progress has been made in promoting family planning and reproductive health,
overall population trends show the country is hardly a role model: India's
greater number of males would indicate discrimination against women, from
depriving girls of food, education and health services to killing of female
babies and fetuses. There are 1069 males for every 1000 females, compared
with 1049 in Bangladesh, 1072 in Pakistan and 1081 in China. The world
average is 1015 males for every 1000 females. While illegal, ultrasound is
being used to determine the sex of the child and, in prosperous northern
states, female fetuses are sometimes aborted. The result is a higher sex
imbalance in the north. India's population has grown by 1.64% in each of the
last five years, a rate that is lower than Pakistan's, Nepal's, Bangladesh's
and most of sub-Saharan Africa, but higher than the world average of 1.33%.
After seven years of languishing, a draft Population Policy was adopted in
February. Most states of India have their own population policies. India has
made progress in increasing the number of medically supervised births,
boosting the use of contraceptives, lowering infant mortality and enrolling
girls in primary schools. But little progress has been made in reducing
maternal mortality and increasing literacy among adult females.
July 12, 2000 Newsweek
Ex-INS Officials Call for Amnesty.
Three former Immigration and Naturalization Service district directors felt
there was a need for an amnesty program, claiming that the country's economy
was booming and there were unfilled jobs in many sectors. [If the economy
is booming, why do we need more jobs?] The amnesty program would legalize 5
- 8 million newcomers to the country. About 3
million undocumented immigrants benefited from the 1986 amnesty. Lobbying
efforts will take place next week in Washington, with a march on Capitol
Hill on July 20. "Surely the INS directors are aware of what a disaster the
last amnesty was," said a spokesman for Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), chairman
of the House immigration subcommittee. "Experts called it the biggest
immigration fraud in the United States ... Amnesty is a clear motivator for
illegal aliens. If we want more illegal aliens, grant amnesty." [Note: the
population growth rate of the U.S. is about 1%, which will lead to a
doubling of the population in 70 years. A large part of the population
growth is due to legal and illegal immigration.]
July 13, 2000 Earthtimes
US Pays UN $135m, But is Still Biggest Debtor.
Owes More Than $1.5 Billion
The United States paid the United Nations $135 million yesterday, reducing
its longstanding debt for peacekeeping operations. Washington disputes the
$1.5 billion amount. Japan owes a reported $164.2 million for the regular
budget. Germany, France, Italy and Russia are also in arrears. Cash flow
problems resulting from members' nonpayment causes regular budgetary
shortfalls and a deficit of $800 million needed to reimburse more than 72
nations that have provided troops and equipment for peacekeeping operations.
Although critics of the UN have alleged waste and corruption as causes of
the UN's massive debt, its budget has been trimmed by more than $100 million
and 1,000 staff positions have been cut since Kofi Annan became
secretary-general more than three years ago.
July 13, 2000 Financial
Times
Summers Hits at Congress over Debt Relief Level
In a vote on July 12, the US House of Representatives left the US debt
relief figure at $69 million,
rejecting an amendment to that would have added $390 million over the next
two years for international debt relief. Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers
and Gene Sperling, President Bill Clinton's economic adviser, said that this
would fall short of US obligations under the Highly Indebted Poor Countries
(HIPC) initiative launched last year by the world's richest countries. "We
are richer than ever before and we are growing faster than ever before,"
Summers said. US officials are concerned that other nations may use this as
an excuse to back down from their own promises, threatening the collapse of
the whole initiative.
July 13, 2000 Washington
Post
Study: Anti-AIDS Gel Spreads Virus Instead
UNAIDS Warns Against Use Of Common Spermicide
A study presented at the13th International AIDS Conference, which involved
990 prostitutes in four African and two Asian cities showed that a common
spermicide, nonoxynol-9, may increase the chance of infection from the HIV
virus rather than help prevent it. Women at risk of contracting HIV should
not use it. "If you use nonoxynol-9 in a high-risk situation, you are
probably wasting your money, and you may be wasting your life," Dr. Joseph
Perriens of UNAIDS warned.
July 13, 2000 Washington
Post
AIDS Spurs a Crisis of Orphanhood Across Africa
.
The crisis of AIDS orphans in Africa will continue to grow for at least a
generation, according to a study released by the US Agency for
International Development. One in seven children under 15 in sub-Saharan
Africa will have lost a parent to AIDS by 2010. Ten years ago, 4% of
children in sub-Saharan Africa had one or both parents. Approximately 20% of
those cases were due to AIDS. This year, 6% of children will be orphans,
with AIDS causing 47% of the cases.
July 13, 2000 Washington
Post
Discussion on Safe Motherhood Held: 70% of Women Suffer from Malnutrition in
Bangladesh,
according to a UN Population Fund (UNFPA) country representative. Also,
violence against women, including domestic violence, is a serious problem in
Bangladesh. Professor Nurun Nabi said that ensuring reproductive rights and
safe motherhood should include population planning, education, poverty
alleviation, gender equality and male participation.
July 12, 2000 Mumbai Indian
Express
India: Bombay Population Projected To Hit 27M By 2015
Bombay's substandard housing is putting people at risk, said a city official
following the death of 50 people in a mudslide. The population of Bombay,
India's largest city, will almost double to more than 27 million people by
2015, according to UN projections released recently. Migrants are drawn by
financial and entertainment industries, overtaxing the ability of the aging
city's infrastructure to cope with increasing demands for water, health,
housing, transport and education. More than half of Bombay residents sleep
on the sidewalks or in cramped brick and tin huts lining the streets. During
the monsoon shanties built alongside high-rise buildings are flooded with
filthy water from
choked drains. 60% of
Bombay residents are eligible for family planning programs, but people fail
to understand the situation due to high illiteracy rates, and high infant
mortality rates means that people aren't interested in limiting the number
of children they lose so many at a young age. "People come here to work
because in Bombay they can do any odd job anywhere and their stomach can be
filled," said one midwife. "But in a few years, there will not be any place
to walk on the streets, there will be so many people and huts". The World
Bank is assisting a population project in the states of Assam, Rajasthan and
Karnataka.
July 12, 2000 Responsible Choices Action
Network House Rejects Coburn Mifepristone (RU-486)
Amendment.
The House rejected (187-182) Rep. Tom Coburn's
(R-OK) amendment to the House Agriculture Appropriations bill that
would have prohibited the FDA from testing, researching, developing,
or approving any drug that induces an abortion. Previously, in 1998
and 1999, Rep. Coburn was successful in passing his amendment.
July 10, 2000 Population Action
Network
U.S.
House of Representatives to Vote Soon on International Family
Planning.
As early as this week, [maybe Thursday] the U.S. House of Representatives
will
consider legislation that includes funding for international
family planning programs. Family planning empowers women and
helps protect the environment by allowing women to choose
smaller families and manage natural resources more
sustainably. Click above to take action!
July 7, 2000
The Hindu
Ecological Access to Food and Water: A Major Environmental
Challenge.
"A hungry people listens not to reason nor cares for justice, nor is bent by
any prayers" said Roman philosopher Seneca, 2,000 years ago, . There is
little use in preaching ecology and inter-generational equity to the nearly
billion children, women and men who will go to bed partially hungry tonight.
Agricultural scientist Dr. M. S. Swaminathan advocates a four-point action
plan to provide a community-led food security program that protects the
ecological foundations essential for sustainable food and water security.
The world's population was only 940 million in 1798 when Thomas Malthus
expressed his apprehensions about human ability to produce food to match the
needs of increasing human numbers. At that time, Marquis de Condorcet, a
French mathematician, remarked that the population will stabilise itself if
children are born not for mere existence, but for "happiness", meaning
social, economic, educational and ecological "happiness". Even though the
global population has now reached over six billion, Malthusian fears were
not realized because of tehnological advances which kept the growth rate of
food production above population growth rates. It has become apparent,
however, that the very progress in agriculture has, in several areas of the
world, eroded water security, owing to the unsustainable exploitation of
groundwater and inadequate efforts in storing rainwater. In addition, food
security challenge shifted from physical to economic access to food at the
end of the 20th century. Due to a famine of jobs, at least 300 million in
India suffer from poverty induced hunger and every third child born is
underweight (below 2.5 kg) due to maternal and foetal undernutrition. Such
low birth weight children suffer from handicaps in brain development, an
irony since this century has been christened as "Knowledge and Innovations
Century". Today in the developing world, annual imports less exports of
cereal grains amounts to 88 million tonnes at a cost of US$14.5 billion, and
the demand is expected to increase at least by 40% in the next twenty years.
Milk and meat have been imported in large amounts since the early 1970s and
this is expected to increase eight fold between 1995 and 2020. In the
meantime, per capita arable land and irrigation water availability is
shrinking while biotic and abiotic stresses are increasing. Food imports by
countries have the same impact as importing poverty and unemployment. Modern
industry promotes jobless economic growth. On the other hand, agriculture,
agro-processing and agri-business foster job-led economic growth. The
population supporting capacity of major ecosystems has already been exceeded
in most developing countries. Population pressures are particularly high
near megabiodiversity regions where land, water, flora, fauna and atmosphere
support systems are all in distress. The challenges during this century will
be both economic and ecological access to food. Swaminathan's four point
action plan for food security includes an 1) Integrated Natural Resources
Management (INM) through local level socio-demographic charters at the
grassroots (village) level, 2) Integrated Gene Management, 3) Community Food
and Water Security System, and 4) Restructuring global institutions. INM:
The major purpose of a village level socio-demographic charter is to
sensitise the local community on the population supporting capacity of their
ecosystem, with components including a) Environment management to prevent
loss of top soil, depletion of ground water, pollution of lakes and rivers,
deforestation, loss of grazing lands, conversion of forests into
agricultural land and air pollution, with water harvesting, watershed
management and the efficient and economic use of water to receive highest
priority; b) Hygiene and housing: safe disposal and recycling of garbage,
sewage and human waste; c) Health security, which would include reproductive
health issues like maternal and child health care services, reproductive
health education, tuberculosis and AIDS prevention and care, provision of
safe and affordable contraception, prevention of infant mortality; d)
Education: higher enrolment in primary schools, and more education of the
girl child; e) Nutrition security: balanced diets and safe drinking water.,
including nutritional supplementation of pregnant mothers and children under
five and to eliminating micro-nutrient deficiencies. f) Gender code: to end
gender inequity and discrimination including adverse sex ratios, inequitable
property rights, dowry, female foeticide and infanticide, higher female
mortality and morbidity, higher female illiteracy, feminisation of poverty
and food insecurity for women. The role of women in the conservation and
improvement of agrobio-diversity will be given explicit recognition. India's
national bio-diversity legislation, the Plant Variety Protection and
Farmers' Rights Act, now before Parliament, provide for recognising and
rewarding the contributions of tribal and rural families to genetic
resources conservation (biodiversity) and improvement. Community seed banks,
supported by microcredit, and grain banks operated by a self-help groups
need to be established. In the re-negotiated World Trade Agreement,
industrialised countries should make provision for recognising and rewarding
primary conservers of bio-diversity and holders of traditional knowledge,
mostly found in developing countries and indigenous communities. Breeders'
and farmers' rights should be protected with intellectual property laws.
April 10, 2000 SIECUS
Increased Efforts to Support Contraceptive Care.
A formally popular birth control method, the Today Sponge, may soon be back
on drugstore shelves. Five years ago the sponge was removed from store
shelves because manufacturing plants had high levels of bacteria. The patent
was purchased by Allendale Pharmaceutical Company. FDA approval of the
proposed new plant and packaging is pending. A high demand for the sponge is
expected: it can be purchased without a prescription, is portable, and can
remain in the vagina for up to 24 hours. However, it is only 90.8% effective
and does not protect against STDs.
May 30 through June 9, 2000
CCMC
Women 2000, also known as Beijing+5, brought thousands of
women and men from 185 countries to a United Nations General Assembly
Special Session evaluating women's progress worldwide since the 1995 Fourth
World Conference on Women in Beijing. Leaders from the United States and
around the world, including hundreds of representatives of non-governmental
organizations (NGOs), held panels, workshops and special events throughout
New York City.
July 3, 2000 Times Of India
50 Years From Now, It'll
Be a Grey India.
By 2051, only 19% of the country's population would be up to the age of 14
years. Currently this group constitutes almost 38% of the population. The
median age will rise by 17 years from 21 years now to 38 years in 2051.
Couples are opting for one child, or at the most two - and with advancement
in health services, will experience an increased life expectancy. According
to the Population Foundation of India, a voluntary organisation working in
association with the Union government, about 15% of the population will be
over the age of 65 by 2051. By then, India will have an evened out sex
ratio, which was 108 males per 100 females in 1991. The total fertility rate
- number of children per woman) in India would is expected to come down to
2.52 between 2011 and 2016, and is expected to reach 2.1 in 2026. [Note: click here for more information on greying
populations]
June 28, 2000 AP Writer
Kansan Sponsors More Restrictions on Aid for Coercive Family
Planning
The "Tiahrt Amendment," named for conservative Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Kan.,
bans
U.S. aid to foreign governments that force women to be sterilized, have
abortions or use contraceptives. The $13.3 billion foreign aid bill passed
recently in the House Appropriations Committee ordered the U.S. Agency for
International Development's inspector general to investigate potential
violations of the ban. The panel was, however, "pleased" and "encouraged" by
U.S. AID's extensive efforts to ensure that population programs remain
voluntary. A human rights watchdog office, funded by the U.S. and Peruvian
governments, reported a handful of instances where a woman was sterilized
without her consent, or was refused her baby's birth certificate until she
agreed to be sterilized, or in which women were sterilized by doctors who
had been drinking liquor. At least two women died, and in several cases
doctors were indicted for criminal injury. "I think the days of having
programs in developing countries which are coercive are - I won't say gone,
but at least in the countries we work in, they don't exist," said Duff
Gillespie, U.S. AID deputy assistant administrator of population, health and
nutrition. Planned Parenthood Federation of America says the program is not
and never has been needed and say that Tiahrt is working to undermine family
planning programs, with a voting record in opposition to programs and
statutes that would expand family planning services.
June 30, 2000 NWF
Call to Action from National Wildlife
Federation. It is vital that your Senators and Representative
hear from you now! It is more important than ever to highlight the
fundamental role that international family planning assistance plays in
protecting the health
of women, children, families, and the environment. Population growth
drives deforestation, causes the pollution of air, water and soil, and
results in the fragmentation of wildlife habitat, which forces many species
to the brink of extinction. Slowing population growth, protecting the
health of woman and children, promoting democracy, and preserving
our natural environment is crucial to the global community.
June 29, 2000 UNFPA
July 11 - World
Population Day
Saving Women's Lives is the theme of World Population Day, 2000,
sponsored by the United Nations Population Fund.
June 29, 2000 Financial
Times
World Needs GM Crops, Says UN Food Chief.
UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Director-General Jacques Diouf
yesterday said he supports the use of genetically modified plants and
animals in order to feed an ever-expanding world population. The estimated
800 million hungry people in the world could be fed with conventional crops
if they were evenly distributed to developing countries, but a shortage of
arable land will make it impossible to feed a world population that is
expected to peak at 9 billion people without genetically engineered crops
that require less pesticide, need less nitrogen and phosphorous to grow and
offer poor people improved nutrition, such as added vitamins or metal
elements like chromium, zinc and manganese. unw
June 29, 2000 Financial
Times
Earth Charter to be Launched Today.
The Earth Charter Initiative,
which codifies principles for sustainable development, was 28 years in the
making. The launch of the document occured in the Netherlands, the main
Western country that "kept faith" in this "troubled project." The charter
was supposed to have been agreed to at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de
Janeiro, but disagreements between developed and developing countries on
issues such as reproductive health stymied consensus. Steven Rockefeller, a
philanthropist who chaired the charter's drafting committee, will begin a
campaign for an international covenant based on the charter, to be adopted
by the UN General Assembly in 2002. The charter contains 16 main principles
to be promoted by businesses as a measure of sustainable development. The
first four guiding principles are: Respect earth and life in all its
diversity; Care for the community of life with understanding, compassion and
love; Build democratic societies that are just, participatory, sustainable
and peaceful; and Secure Earth's bounty and beauty for present and future
generations.
unw
June 29, 2000 Pew Center
Forests: Report Explores Role In Mitigating Climate Change.
Land Use and
Global Climate Change: Forests, Land Management and the Kyoto
Protocol, (pdf) a report released by the Pew Center on Global Climate Change
says that forests and soils could play a major role in helping reduce the
risks associated with climate change and direct reductions of greenhouse gas
emissions. The Kyoto Protocol encourages countries to reduce greenhouse gas
emissions from fossil fuel combustion. It also encourages emissions
reduction through planting trees, reducing deforestation and improving
management of agricultural soils -- measures known collectively as Land Use,
Land Use Change and Forestry (LULUCF). The language in the Kyoto Protocol
lacks of functional definitions" for common words such as "forest" and
"reforestation," the report said. Also, the impacts on various countries
will depend on the nature of their forests. "Key rules have been left
undecided, allowing countries to push for interpretations that may weaken
commitments made under the Protocol," said Eileen Claussen, president of the
Pew Center. unw
June 29, 2000 Agence
France-Presse
UNDP: Human Development Report 2000
Released Today.
The 11th annual Human Development Report, commissioned by the UN Development
Program, ranks 174 countries on life expectancy, education and income. UNDP
officials hope that the report will allow countries to take a closer look at
their progress on human rights and development. No drastic changes occured
from last year. Canada is ranked as the top country in terms of life
expectancy, education and income. Norway, the United States, Australia and
Iceland are ranked second through fifth, while Niger and Sierra Leone are
again at the bottom of the list. Japan and Belgium dropped slightly from
fourth and fifth, to ninth and seventh, respectively. 176 countries
participated, with 12 unable to provide the necessary information. The 48
poorest countries account for less than 0.4% of global exports. The combined
wealth of the world's 200 richest people hit $1 trillion in 1999, while the
combined income of the 582 million people living in the 43 least developed
countries was $146 billion; To achieve universal provision of basic services
in developing countries would cost an additional $80 billion annually;
Civil wars in the past 10 years have killed 5 million people worldwide; More
than 30,000 children die per day from mainly
preventable diseases; Each year, 40 million births worldwide are not
registered; Between 85 million and 115 million girls and women have
undergone some form of female genital mutilation; Estimates show one in
three women have been subjected to violence in an intimate relationship;
Worldwide, women occupy only 14% of parliamentary seats; In 1999, nearly 90
journalists and media people were killed while doing their jobs; In 1900, no
country had universal adult suffrage, while almost all countries do today.
unw
June 27, 2000 Associated
Press
Panel Declines Abortion Limits Ease.
A House committee declined on Tuesday to ease limitations on U.S. support
for international family-planning organizations that advocate abortion
rights, language which was included in a $13.3 million foreign aid bill. The
decision was reached by a 34-26 mostly party-line vote. The controversy has
in past years has held up payment of nearly $1 billion in back U.S. dues to
the United Nations. Rep. Nita Lowey, D-N.Y. sought passage of an amendment
that would modify the current law to allow U.S. support of non-governmental
organizations that use their own, separate funds to lobby for changes in
abortion laws.
The House bill does not yet have a number. The Senate foreign aid bill is S.
2522.
June 26, 2000 The Washington
Post
Group to Pay Addicts to Take Birth Control.
A California-based group, Children Requiring A Caring Kommunity (CRACK),
will make a provocative offer to Washington's drug addicts: obtain long-term
birth control and get $200 in cash. Placards advertising the program will be
placed in 500 Metro buses. The Washington DC effort will be headed by
Melanie Folstad, who adopted a low birth-weight baby delivered by a
drug-addicted D.C. woman who was being held in jail. The campaign started in
Anaheim and has spread city by city to Los Angeles, San Francisco, Phoenix,
Seattle, Kansas City, Chicago and other cities. The program has been called
simplistic, racist and dehumanizing, taking advantage of drug abusers with
mental illnesses, making them even more vulnerable to the influence of easy
cash. 236 women and one man have collected the reward so far. Barbara
Harris, the group's founder, figures the program is trading a small sum to
pay to avoid the greater cost of coping with abandoned children. Most of
CRACK's board members are black. Harris is married to a black man with whom
she raised six biracial children before adopting four African American
siblings of the same drug-addicted mother. Folstad's adoptive son and two
other children she is now adopting are African American. Planned Parenthood
says that "We believe that any program that offers cash as an incentive to
take birth control or become sterilized is inherently coercive." Harris
wonders how "vulnerable women can make a rational decision to have a free
abortion when they are under the influence of drugs?" The program rewarded
237 drug addicts, whose history before treatment revealed 1,501 pregnancies,
527 of which ended in abortion. Of the 966 completed pregnancies, 117
infants were stillborn and 39 died after delivery. Among the 810 children
who survived, 537 are in foster care. Of the participants, 101 were white,
102 - black, 25 - Hispanic, 3 - Indian, and 6 - biracial. Under the CRACK
program, 117 had a tubal ligation, 67 took Dep-Provera, 23 had an IUD, and
the only participating man had a vasectomy.
June 22, 2000 PAI
House Subcommittee Holds at $385 Million, Continues Gag Rule
Restrictions.
Joint study projects 100,000 deaths prevented by restoring aid to 1995
levels. On June 20, the Foreign Operations Subcommittee of the
House Appropriations Committee marked up the FY 2001 foreign assistance
bill, failing to match either the Senate-passed level of $425 million for
international family planning (population) assistance, or the
Administration's request of $541.6 million. Equally disappointing was the
decision by subcommittee chair Sonny Callahan (R-AL) to keep in the bill
last year's controversial policy rider aimed at limiting speech around
abortion issues in other countries (by foreign organizations with their own,
non-U.S. money). This decision flies in the face of the widely-reported plea
made by House GOP leaders last month to keep spending bills free of divisive
policy amendments.
June 23, 2000 The Washington
Post
The Abortion Pill.
The abortion pill RU 486 (also known as mifepristone) has been available to
women in much of Europe for more than a decade, and it recently became
available in Spain, the Netherlands, Australia and Israel. It has been used
by more than 500,000 women around the world, with only a small percentage of
women reporting excessive bleeding or other complications. It works by
blocking growth of the placenta. Given to a woman up to the 49th day of
pregnancy (in most countries), it is followed in 24 to 72 hours by a second
drug, misoprostol, which triggers contractions. The combination was deemed
"approvable," four years ago by the FDA. Twice a rider has been attached to
the House version of the agricultural appropriations bill which forbids the
FDA from testing, developing or approving "any drug for the chemical
inducement of abortion." The amendment passed the House by three
votes last year, but was dropped in the conference committee. Abortion
advocates are concerned by restrictions that may be placed by the FDA upon
RU 486, for example: only doctors trained in providing surgical abortions
would be allowed to prescribe the drug. Another drug, methotrexate, approved
for use as a chemotherapy agent by the FDA in 1953, has been used to induce
thousands of abortions in
recent years. Once a drug is approved for one use, physicians can use it for
other kinds of treatment. RU 486 is 95% to 97% effective compared with 90%
to 92% for methotrexate, and it acts much more quickly and predictably. [In
early pregnancy, the embryo is the size of a grain of rice. kgp]
June 22, 2000 PAI
ALERT: Funding for International Family Planning Needs Your Help.
June 21, 2000 Christian Science
Monitor
A Thousand Years of World Population. How Many People Does it Take to
Change the World? With six billion people and counting,
Planet Earth faces crossroads on coming to terms with population growth.
The world population remained relatively static at 300 million from AD 1
until a 1,000 years later. But in the last 500 out of humankind's 50,000
years, humanity's prospects improved: harvests grew with the introduction of
crop rotation and fertilization, and very rudimentary health measures were
put into practice. Because of lower death rates, mothers began to see more
of their children survive into adulthood. The Industrial Revolution boosted
incomes and made food cheaper. Famines had less impact when trains were able
to bring in excess grain. Cities started treating sewage and providing clean
drinking water. Good health "exploded" and life expectancy rose. Nicholas
Eberstadt, a demographer at the American Enterprise Institute, said "It's
not because people started breeding like rabbits. It's that they stopped
dying like flies." About 1780, about the time of Malthus' dire predicitons,
families in Europe began cutting back the number of children they had,
raising fewer children not because of disease or famine but because they
chose to - perhaps because more children were more expensive to raise, and
when city life and education became a factor, fewer children meant a better
life for the family. But, like braking a speeding train, slowing population
growth can be difficult. While population growth has gone through
demographic transition in Europe and the U.S., the spread of public
sanitation, and introduction of antibiotics and other medicines to the third
world has caused population to boom there. But even there, birth rates are
now dropping: Asia has gone from an average of 5.7 children to 2.6 today.
While it took the US 200 years to go from a birth rate of 7 to 2,
Bangladesh has [nearly] done that in 20 and Iran has more than halved its
fertility rate in only ten years. Some countries have been slow in reducing
their birth rates. If such nations don't take the next step in the
demographic transition, they will quickly overwhelm their resources and,
perhaps, the world's.
June 21, 2000 World Watch
Population Growth Sentencing Millions to Hydrological
Poverty
At a time when drought in the United States, Ethiopia, and Afghanistan is in
the news, it is easy to forget that far more serious water shortages are
emerging as the demand for water in many countries simply outruns the
supply. Water tables are now falling on every continent. Scores of countries
face water shortages as water tables fall and wells go dry. Governments can
no longer separate population policy from the supply of water. Most of the
estimated 3 billion people to be added in the next 50 years will be born in
countries already experiencing water shortages, lacking enough water to
drink, satisfy hygienic needs, and to produce food. In the following
water-short countries, population will grow in 50 years by large numbers:
India will add 519 million (half again), China 211 million, Pakistan 200
million (now at 151 million), and Egypt, Iran, and Mexico, will increase by
half again. China, India, Saudi Arabia, North Africa, and the U.S. overpump
and deplete aquifers at 160 billion cubic meters annually. Since it takes it
takes 1,000 tons of water to produce 1 ton of grain, this 160-billion-ton
water deficit is equal to 160 million tons of grain or one half the U.S.
grain harvest. 480 million of the world's 6 billion people are being fed
with grain produced with the unsustainable use of water. 70% of the water
consumed worldwide is used for irrigation, 20% by industry, and 10% for
residential purposes. But agriculture almost always loses to industry. The
1,000 tons of water used in India to produce 1 ton of wheat worth perhaps
$200 can also be used to expand industrial output by easily $10,000, or 50
times as much. In the American West, the sale of irrigation water rights by
farmers to cities is an almost daily occurrence. Migration to cities means
that residential use of water triples due to indoor plumbing. The average
U.S. diet which includes meat requires 800 kilograms of grain per person a
year, compared to 200 kilograms for people eating starchy diet in India and
other countries. Four times the consumption of grain equates to 4 times as
much water. Water short countries that have begun to industrialize are
finding it is better to import grain than to grow it. If we decided abruptly
to stabilize water tables everywhere by simply pumping less water, the world
grain harvest would fall by some 160 million tons, or 8%. Recommendations
are to eliminate the water subsidies that foster inefficiency, raise the
price of water to reflect its cost, and shift to more water-efficient
technologies.
June 19, 2000 ENN
New Analysis
of World's Ecosystems Reveals Widespread Decline.
A pioneering analysis of the world's ecosystems reveals a widespread decline
in the condition of the world's ecosystems due to increasing resource
demands. The analsysis, by the World Resources Institute (WRI) warns that if
the decline continues it could have devastating implications for human
development and the welfare of all species. The analysis examined coastal,
forest, grassland, and freshwater and agricultural ecosystems. The health
of the each ecosystem was measured, as based on its ability to produce the
goods and services that the world currently relies on. These goods/services
include production of food, provision of pure and sufficient water, storage
of atmospheric carbon, maintenance of biodiversity and provision of
recreation and tourism opportunities. The analysis shows that there are
considerable signs that the capacity of Earth's ecosystems to produce many
of the goods and services we depend on is rapidly declining. To make matters
worse, as our ecosystems decline, we are also racing against time since
scientists lack baseline knowledge needed to properly determine the
conditions of such systems. MT
June 15, 2000 NY Times
As Atlanta Grows, Water Evaporates in Wilting Drought.
The Gulf Coast of Florida is experiencing the driest spring in a century.
The National Drought Monitor lists the crescent from Tampa to New Orleans as
experiencing extreme drought. West Texas and northwest Missouri, as well as
parts of the West and Midwest have experienced a similar lack of rain. Yet
the Atlanta
region is adding nearly 100,000 people a year, more than a million people in
those 14 years, most of the growth in suburban areas, where the lawns need
watering, swimming pools need filling, air-conditioning demands high
reservoir levels for hydroelectric, and people like to take numerous
showers. Cotton and peanut farmers in the south are impacted, having to
irrigate earlier this year than ever. Water tables are falling, and ponds
aren't filling. Some parts of Georgia have received less rain in the last 25
months than at any time in recorded weather history. The regional climate is
changing in a profound way, moving from many years of stability with
predictable rainfall to a far more variable climate that will veer between
years of plenty and years of scarcity, says Dr. David E. Stooksbury, the
state climatologist. Watering restrictions are in effect and are likely to
be tightened as the drought goes on. Similar water restrictions involving 26
cities and counties were applied during the 1986 drought. Lawns went brown
and trees toppled. The state is seriously considering a total watering ban
in the northern region if the drought continues. The Atlanta Regional
Commission says the demand for water is expected to increase by 50% by 2020,
which will never be met without a 10% cutback in water use.
June 15, 1998 Forbes Magazine
Cheap Oil: Enjoy it While it Lasts!. [This is an old article, but significant in that it is from an oil industrialist and worth repeating.]
Not this year, nor the next, but maybe as soon as five years hence [from 1998], oil prices will start to rise, says Franco Bernab, chief executive of the Italian oil company ENISpA. Well before 2010, he believes, the world will be vulnerable to 1970s-style oil shocks. Bernab is a former economics professor and in the 1970s was a senior economist at the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation & Development. OPEC and countries like the Soviet Union overstate their reserves because they use the concept of geological reserves [everything that might be in the ground] rather than the West's concept of economically producible reserves," he said. jh
June 11, 2000 ZPG Alert
Emergency Contraceptives Are Safe, Effective and Prohibited at All
Wal-Mart Pharmacies.
As a matter of company policy, Wal-Mart doesn't carry emergency
contraceptives (EC). This ban was extended from the contraceptive Preven to
include Plan B when it was approved recently by the FDA. EC, like other
contraceptives, prevents pregnancy. Unlike other contraceptives, EC only
works within 72-hours AFTER sexual intercourse - after a condom breaks, or a
birth control pill is forgotten. About half of all unintended pregnancies
occur because of some type of contraceptive failure, which could happen to
anyone who's sexually active. In many areas, 24-hour Wal-Marts are the only
drugstores in town. There are an estimated 3 million unintended pregnancies
and 800,000 abortions that occur each year in the United States.
June 11, 2000 ENN
Where Bacteria Meet the Beach.
*
In 1998, California beaches statewide were closed for a total of 3,273 days
- compared
with 745 days in 1991, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council.
Most of the closures were due to sewage spills and urban runoff (muck that
runs off from streets, rooftops and lawns). The growing populations and
aging sewer systems add to the problem. Improved bacteria-level monitoring
and heavy El Nino rainy seasons have also contribute to the increase in
closures. California's 740-mile coast has more than 50,000 visitors and
annually, which generates $14 billion, a fifth of California's total $67.9
billion travel and tourism industry. A new law says that coastal counties
must test ocean water weekly from April to October, to see if bacteria and
pathogen levels are low enough to allow swimming and fishing. *.Link
requires subscription (free)
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| click on
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June 10, 2000 ENN
Deforestation May Be Starving Songbirds.
Fragmented forests may not provide enough food for certain songbird
populations, according to a recent study of the nesting and feeding habits
of the eastern yellow robin in southeastern Australia by zoologist Liana
Zanette. Comparing smaller areas in fragmented forests to larger, less
fragmented, areas, the researchers found that female robins received 40%
fewer feeding visits from their mates, leaving the nest more frequently and
subjecting the fledglings to predators. Females bred three weeks less on
average, the eggs were lighter, and nestlings were cheated on dinner and
had a smaller body mass.
June 9, 2000 ENN
Kyoto Provision: Spare the Forests, Boost the Economy.
Imagine a world in which humans combat global warming, conserve the rain
forest and fill the coffers of developing countries all at once. Claire
Kremen, a conservation biologist at Stanford University in Palo Alto says in
Science that proposed provision in the Kyoto Protocol that would
allow wealthy countries to receive credit for financing rain forest
conservation in
developing countries would also eliminate the economic incentive to sell the
forest to logging concessions." Developing countries practice conservation
usually don't get aid, and could "make more money by logging."
June 8, 2000 ENN
Famine-struck North Korea Reports Another Drought.
*
North Korea, already dependent on international food aid for survival,
reported another drought has hit all parts of the impoverished country,
devastating the spring crops. Temperatures in the main rice growing
provinces have been six to nine degrees higher than normal for this time of
year. Rainfall has been only 20-30% of the average. An estimated 2 million
people have died from malnutrition and related diseases since 1995. Pastures
have dried up fodder for domestic animals is short. Pyongyang plans to ask
for another $250 million under a plan to achieve food self-sufficiency in
2002. The latest harvest y