Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

jennifer

Global Food Deficit in Just 40 Years?

By

Hi Jennifer,

Attached is a recent speech from Greg Bourne in which he said:

“We now know, for example, that the Himalayan glaciers which feed the Ganges, the Brahmaputra, the Mekong, the Yangtze and the other great Asian rivers are likely to disappear within 40 years due to the warming of the planet.

If these rivers dry up during the irrigation season, then the rice production which currently feeds over one third of humanity collapses and the world goes into net food deficit.”

Is he being over-dramatic? Perhaps you would like to mention it in your blog.

Regards Anon.

Attached: download speech by Greg Bourne (CEO of WWF) by clicking anywhere here.

Species Vulnerable to Extinction: Part 1, The Daintree

By

Genimaculata blog.JPG

I got off a flight from Albury to Melbourne on Tuesday morning, turned on mobile phone and there was a message from a journalist asking for comment on claims by Professor Norman Myer that we were losing biodiversity at an alarming rate. My first question was, who is Norman Myer? And my second question was, is he talking about Australia? The ABC radio journalist couldn’t answer either question.

When I turned on my computer I found this story at ABC Online:

“Scientists say Earth is experiencing the largest mass extinction in 65 million years.

Environmental scientist Professor Norman Myers says the loss of species is more severe than the five mass extinctions of the geological past.

“In the lifetime of many [television news] viewers we could lose half of all those 10 million species around the world,” he said.

There are 33 extinction hotspots around the world. The Australia Museum’s Frank Howarth says two are in Australia and up to 80 per cent of the crucial habitat has been wiped out.

“One [is] north Queensland rainforest, the other is in south-western Australia but in Australian terms we have a lot of areas where we have real competition between endemic animals that are found nowhere else,” Mr Howarth said.

Green groups say current measures to protect sensitive habitats are not effective. “The Australian Government is investing a lot of money in biodiversity but it’s not being invested in the most responsible way,” Nicola Beynon, from the Humane Society International, said.

Professor Myers says if governments do not do more, the planet will continue to lose 50 species per day compared to the natural extinction rate of one species every five years.“

Can anyone name me some of the 50 species that are going extinct every day?

Anyway, I emailed the link to a few readers of this blog for comment. I am starting with this response from Neil Hewett who lives in a north Queensland rainforest:

“Hi Jen,

Biodiversity hotspots are areas that are deemed BOTH rich in plant and animal species, particularly with many endemic species AND ALSO under immediate threat from impacts such as land clearing, development pressures, salinity, weeds and feral animals.

Along with Madagascar and New Caledonia, the rainforests of north Queensland including the Daintree are recognised as one of three centres of global endemism. They contain an extraordinary biodiversity; the majority of species which are classified as either rare or threatened with extinction, and undisputedly conform with the first-mentioned criterion as a Biodiversity hotspot.

But are they under immediate threat from impacts such as land clearing, development pressures, salinity, weeds and feral animals?

According to Cafnec, The Wilderness Society, Queensland Conservation Council and The Greens readers would almost certainly think so.

And yet, the Australian Government’s Threatened Species Scientific Committee, with input from recognised experts in the field of biodiversity conservation from each Australian State and Territory, determined otherwise.

In respect to the contemporary popularity of tree-frogs, which are recognised as early indicators of environmental stress, I am advised from time to time that certain endemic species are thought to have become extinct, whilst others are disappearing.

The above image of a green-eyed tree-frog is one of the latter. I found one during the day, some time ago, when I coincidentally took balance from a tree and registered a cold, wet sensation under my grip.

Upon meticulous scrutiny and after several minutes, I finally recognised the curvature of the eye. Its camouflage was superb.

I have the very great privilege of scrutinising the central Cooper Creek portion of the ancient Daintree rainforest, on a nightly basis and have done so for over twelve consecutive years. Indeed, I believe that I have familiarised myself with the nocturnal landscape of the Daintree more thoroughly than any other person in human history. On those exceptionally wet and rare nights when conditions are suitable for green-eyed tree-frogs to congregate for communal mating events, I might encounter 2000 frogs in two hours and yet I have never seen a research scientist crossing the flooded watercourses to get into the real action.

The politics of places like the Daintree are as dark and complex and densely interwoven as the jungle understorey itself. I suspect that the exclusion from the country’s biodiversity hotspots reflects the federal coalition government’s contempt for the Queensland and local government’s popularist land-grab mentality.

Neil Hewett.“

—————
If you would like to send me information about one or more of the “50 species we are losing” every day and/or one of the ‘biodiveristy hotspots’ and/or a species of plant or animal that you consider vulnerable to extinction and/or that you believe has been incorrectly listed as rare, threatened or vulnerable to extinction, please email me at jennifermarohasy@jennifermarohasy.com.

Reality TV or Manufactured News?

By

Earlier this year, Japanese whalers in the Antarctic were accused of ramming a Greenpeace boat. The evidence suggested it was the other way around, that Greenpeace had rammed the Japanese.

Nevermind, when Greenpeace returned to Australia they were given a pat on the back by the Environment Minister Ian Campbell. He said in Parliament:

“Over summer, we as a nation have witnessed the Greenpeace ship not only visiting the Southern Ocean and running a policy of harassment against the whalers but also, very constructively, sending photographic images of the whale slaughter by the Japanese in the Southern Ocean all around the world. I had the great pleasure of meeting Shane Rattenbury and the Greenpeace team in my office [at Parliament House in Canberra] just before question time. I think other members and senators will have the chance to meet them. I must say that the work they did over the summer was in distinct contrast to the actions of Paul Watson on the Sea Shepherd, who I think set back the cause of whaling by unnecessarily taking potentially illegal action, causing collisions and potentially putting life at risk at sea.”

While the Minister may have preferred the footage from Greenpeace, the Sea Sheperds were also their with cameras rolling.

According to a recent Media Watch program, the Sea Shepherd was paid $70,000 “a decent chunk of money” to send video footage back to Channel Seven. In fact a deal was done before they had even got to the Antarctic.

Media Watch concluded that:

“Whatever you think about cheque book journalism or whaling – it’s not Seven’s job to help Sea Shepherd stage the news events that Seven is buying exclusive access to!”

Perhaps both Greenpeace and the Sea Sheperd were providing us with a form of reality television dressed-up as news?

Impact of Agriculture 10,000 Years Old

By

Clark Spencer Larsen form the Department of Anthropology, The Ohio State University, has recenty published a paper in
Quaternary International outlining how agriculture was impacting on the environment, including climate, 10,000 years ago.

Titled, ‘The agricultural revolution as environmental catastrophe: Implications for health and lifestyle in the Holocene’ its conclusions include:

“Most of us are well aware of the dramatic changes in the Earth’s landscapes as forests give way to agricultural land, and the resulting environmental degradation, loss of species, and other disasters. A common misperception is that prior to modern times, humans were much more concerned about managing their environment so as to avoid the problems that have surfaced in such a dramatic fashion in the 20th century. However, study of ancient landscapes in Mesoamerica, North America, and the Middle East
shows evidence that earlier agriculturalists had profound impacts, highly negative in some areas, on the lands they exploited.

In the Mediterranean basin, for example, nearly all landscapes were degraded or otherwise transformed in dramatic ways.

The analysis of the past reveals that the current threats to the landscape have their origins in the period of human history when plant domestication began 10,000 years (or so) ago.

Finally, once the effects on Earth’s climate by industrial-era human activities-the so-called greenhouse effect-were recognized, a number of workers assumed that it related to just the last couple of hundred years. However, new evidence of anamolous trends in CO2 and CH4 possibly owing to agricultural-related deforestation after about 8000 years ago, indicates that the negative impact involving greenhouse gases began soon after the start of agriculture.”

So organic farming is not necessarily the answer?

Giving Thanks to Whales in Nagato, Japan

By

There has been much discussion about whaling at his blog and some discussion about why the Japanese continue to hunt whales in the name of research.

It is a very foreign and offensive concept to many of us in countries like Australia even though, we had our own whaling fleets not so many years ago.

Yesterday I was sent a link to a recent story in the Japan Times explaining that despite efforts from surfers and local residents about 50 melon-headed whales were recent stranded and died in Chiba Prefecture.

The newspaper article goes on to explain that some of the dead mammals were examined by experts to try to learn the cause of death, while the remaining were to be buried in the town.

I have heard about whale cemeteries in Japan. And one reader of this blog has told me how he attended a buddhist ceremonies in Nagato where thanks was given to whales that had been killed through whaling, as well as those foetuses that have been found in pregnant females.

The ceremony also included the naming of these foetuses in a book.

Whales and whaling evidently has a deep cultural resonance in at least some parts of modern Japan.

We Will Never Run Out of Oil: Philip Burgess

By

I attended the IPA’s annual H.V. McKay Lecture on Technology in Melbourne last night. Philip Burgess from Telstra was the guest speaker on the topic of ‘Future Proofing’.

He gave an interesting and wide ranging talk that included two reasons why we will never run out of oil:

1. As the price of oil increases, we will find more of it.

2. As the price of oil or any other commodity goes up, inventive people will start looking for substitutes.

He suggested there were all kinds of examples of ‘substitutes’ including: plastic for copper tubing, grain for fuel and aluminium studs for wooden studs in home building.

He also said that we should perhaps strive to use more, not less energy, because it is through the use of energy that we create wealth.