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Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) – partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 18 April 2011 Representatives from more than 30 countries are expected to hammer out a formal agreement for future discussions on forest and climate issues when they meet next month in the Republic of Congo, reports the [...] Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) – partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 16 January 2011 Following the signatures of 5000 WWF supporters on a WWF online petition to stop illegal logging of precious woods in Madagascar, WWF urges Andry Rajoelina, the president of the transitional government of Madagascar to deliver what he promised and stop illegal logging once and for all.  Illegal rosewood logging in Madagascar. Photo: Stuart Pimm At a meeting with WWF representatives in October last year, the country’s President Andry Rajoelina promised to make an official declaration to stop all illegal logging of precious woods in the island’s north eastern humid forests. He declared hat resources would be made available to support local authorities to implement appropriate management plans to secure the forests in the future. However, no such public declaration has been made to date, and illegal logging continues to devastate the island’s precious and fragile environment. “Andry Rajoelina told us he wanted to stop illegal logging. He also said he wanted to call on countries who import the timber, and especially China, not to buy rosewood products anymore and is ready to co-finance actions to stop illegal logging with government funds” says Niall O’Connor, Regional Representative of WWF Madagascar and Western Indian Ocean. ”Now is the time for action. WWF urges him and the Government to deliver what they promised!” Continue reading Island logging continues unabated Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) – partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 07 November 2010 Farmers around the world are adopting new ways of producing food that both help cope with climate change and reduce farming’s greenhouse gas emissions, according to a new FAO website on ‘climate-smart’ agriculture published today.  Rice is the 2nd largest emitter of the greenhouse gas - methane Burkina Faso’s Yatenga province is being reclaimed through the use of an improved version of traditional “planting pits” known as zaï – now lands which were once barely productive are achieving yields five times greater than before. In northern Cameroon, traditional varieties of millet, sorghum and maize had low resistance to water scarcity and production there typically suffered in the face of lowered rainfalls and droughts. Starting in 2006, Cameroon’s national agriculture research institute developed improved varieties of these crops, and with support from FAO established farmer seed enterprises and got them into farmers’ fields, where today they are producing good yields in spite of unfavourable conditions. In Mozambique, smallholder farmers are getting paid for sequestering carbon through the adoption of various agrofoestry practices and reducing deforestation and degradation of forest lands. Farmers in Vietnam are being encouraged to use special “digesters” that transform farm waste into biogas used for daily cooking and lighting needs and also create nutrient-rich slurry for fertilizing fields. And on Bohol Island, in the Philippines, improved infrastructure has helped improve water management and stabilized rice production, while rice farming techniques that use less water were introduced, stretching local supplies still further – and reducing production of greenhouse gases in the paddies. “A shift to climate-smart agriculture helps advance several important goals: doing so will not only help shield farmers from the adverse effects of climate change and offer a way to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and sequester atmospheric carbon, but can also improve farm yields and household incomes,” said Alexander Mueller, FAO Assistant Director-General for Natural Resources. Continue reading Farmers adopt ‘climate-smart’ agriculture Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) – partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 06 October 2010 The world’s forest biodiversity is threatened by a high global rate of deforestation and forest degradation as well as a decline in primary forest area. In many countries, however, there is a continued positive trend towards the conservation of forest biological diversity via dedicated conservation areas.  South America accounts for the largest proportion of the loss These are some of the key findings of the final report of FAO’s Global Forest Resources Assessment 2010 (FRA 2010), the most comprehensive assessment of the state of the world’s forests ever undertaken. The final report of FRA 2010 was published today at the start of the latest biennial meeting of the FAO’ Committee on Forestry and World Forest Week, in Rome. Globally, around 13 million hectares (ha) of forests were converted to other uses (including agriculture) or were lost through natural causes each year between 2000 and 2010. That is down from around 16 million ha per year during the 1990s, the report said. More than one-third of all forests are classified as primary — showing no visible signs of human intervention. Primary forests, in particular tropical moist forests, include some of the world’s most species-rich and diverse ecosystems. Primary forests account for 36 percent (1.4 billion ha) of the world’s forest area but their area has decreased by more than 40 million ha — at a rate of 0.4 percent annually — over the last ten years. This does not necessarily mean that these forests have disappeared; rather, in many cases they have been reclassified because selective logging or other human interventions were carried out during the reporting period, FAO said. The UN agency emphasized that forests where humans have intervened can still hold important biodiversity values, contribute significantly to environmental protection, and sustain livelihoods, provided they are well managed. South America accounted for the largest proportion of the loss in primary forests, followed by Africa and Asia. Other threats to forest biodiversity include unsustainable forest management, climate change, forest fires, insect pests and diseases, natural disasters and invasive species — all of which are causing severe damage in some countries. Continue reading Global forest biodiversity threatened Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) - partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 10 July 2010 Speakers including experts here at seminar on de-forestation issues, were of the view that Pakistan’s timberlands are in urgent need of protection and conservation by the concerned authorities, in order to discourage de-forestation and illegal [...] |
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