Have Things Changed Something In 6 Years?

I posted in April 2007 some comments about de main headlines related to the environment. In that moment after 3 years, things hadn't changed a lot. Now, 3 years later, the question is reaised once again. Maybe people are more concerned, there are some steps being taken but there's a new question: can these measures catch up with the level of destruction? I'm in doubt. Three examples to think about: Europe's seas face 'bleak future', €1.1 trillion and 2010 living planet report. And now some headlines from 2004 to 2007:

• Climate change threatens beaches in the Mediterranean Sea.
• Patagonia's glaciars could disappear in twenty years time.
• Global warming could come great famines and the melting of the Himalaya.
• Climate change will leave 200 million refugees in 2050.
• Ten important natural reservas under threat.
• Global warming threatens 30% of flora and fauna.
• Equator declares the Galapago Islands at risk.
• Scientists declare the collapse of marine ecosystems.

Amen.

I Want To Be Optimistic...

...but every day it is more difficult.

Not Another Nature Film from WWF on Vimeo.

WWF's Living Planet Report 2010

Please, By Friday

Polar bears are threatened with extinction and adding them to Appendix I would ensure that commercial trade does not compound the dangers already posed by loss of habitat. Please write to your Environment Minister today and ask them to support the United States’ proposal to uplist the polar bear to Appendix I.

P.S. The place where I got the picture.

End of 2009: Year of the Gorilla

I know I arrive a bit late but what matters is the thought. Some days after having begun 2010 I would like to wish it to you.

Year after year, one that comes another that goes, that's life: someone comes, someone goes. I have taken advantage of the last post of the year to dedicate some words to the animal of the year 2009: The Gorilla.

This is not the first time I make a reference to this animal but sadly, this species like many other big mammals are on the brink of extinction and I think it is a moral obligation to me to remind my readers the nowadays situation of one of our nearer relatives in the Line of Evolution.

I always insist in the same words: The Change has to come out from everyone of us and this is usuful for different aspects of life. We don't have to wait for the Messiah, just live in the way we would like things to be. And of course I'm not the author of this quote, it is the philosopher Kant and it is something that I try to put into practice every day:

Act that your principle of action might safely be made a law for the whole world.

If continue reading, below you'll see I have left several links to information about the gorilla although we could reduce its problems to deforestation and it has three main causes:

1. Search of wood for furniture for rich people (WE).


2. Search of wood for cooking and meat for the ones who are very poor (THE OTHERS).


3. Coltan minery for the posh people who want to change their mobile at a good clip (and I say mobiles for not saying more electronic devices).

So if you consider yourself a responsible person:

• Buy wood when really necessary and take into account its origin. Look for FSC certificates or at least ask the shop assistant about any other warranties: Get the word out.

• Reuse, try to buy second hand furniture. You can find some good oportunities with a bit of patience.

• Calm down with your mobile and don't be so flashy, take profit of it for at least two years if possible and ask your mobile provider any kind of certification which shows that the coltan in your mobile has been taken out under environmental and social responsibility policies because not only elephants and gorillas are killed but also children and farmers are made slaves.

I also want to pay tribute to Dian Fossey who gave her life for defending these incredible animals and without her sacrifice gorillas would've been wiped out. Here you are some links: Wikipedia, the charity which takes her name and another where I've got the picture below.

We also have to pay tribute to Jane Goodall: link 1, link 2 and link 3. You are her foto below and one of her books made me think twice about the way I was conntected to the world and also made me give the first steps to become vegetarian.

Finally, as I paid tribute to the bucardo (link in English), I'd like to do the same with Digit because I think is not fair they fall into obscurity because of a world plenty of "noise", vanity, shallowness and greed. To those who don't know it, gorillas almost don't fight for food, their territory or mating, but leaders put into risk their lifes for trying to stand the group together. Digit was a leader whose loyalty to her family brought her to death when in 1977 she kept a tight rein on six pouchers and their dogs. Her death highlighted the inexorable human interference into the mountain gorillas habit in Central Africa. I hope Gaia has Digit in its glory and from this moment in our hearts.

In the name of gorillas (maybe they can't understand this lines but sign languaje) and mine, we would like to appreciate this time of reading and I sincerelly wish you a very happy 2010.

P.S. Here you are the link to the picture of Digit's tomb: click here.

Take Tuna Off Your Menu

I don't know if it has happened in this blog or in the spanish one, but it's not the first time I speak about the awkward situation in which the tuna is. I also know that spaniards and japanese are the most tuna meat demanding countries but everybody has to be aware of what is happening. Regrettably, at this stage of the tuna's situation, the only way politicians and tuna's hunterers will get the message will be by not buying any more. So think twice before buying a product derived from tuna, I'm not pulling your leg, bringing to extinction such important predators we are destabilizing entire ecosystimes and being selfish, putting our food resources in danger and out of control.

I leave you a video in which not only you can see the problem with the tuna but also with another species, because the most of our fishing methods are not selective, they kill everything they find in their path.

Here you have the latest news about the problem: click here and an Oceana's report.

Happy New Year 2009

One in five mammal species on the planet are facing extinction. I ask 2009 for letting recover the number of Lynx individuals, our Iberian Lynx, the most threatened feline in the world, and that tigers don't arrive to the same situation because they are on the way.

We, like them, are a miracle of Life. Lets not allow that a miracle leaves us forever, at least, because of our fault.

Iberian Lynx

Tiger - Link 1 and 2

Dedicated to Them

Who pays the round?

In October 2006 the World Conservation Union announced that West Africa Black Rhino could be wiped out and things seem not to be changed since then. Maybe the black rhino has gone.... Big mammals are facing big problems and the most of them because of the humans.

The W.A. Black Rhino is one of the many animals and vegetables species which are leaving this world in silence..... and the most of the people seem not to realize it. Everything seems to be normal, "they" try to convince us that everything is OK, that nothing happens, that nothing has changed. Our world has been always as we know it but that's the big lie. From the moment we "developped" we took to extinction many species... but it seems that nobody wants to face this question... everybody wants to be happy, to be comfortable in his/her city, going shopping and consuming, consuming, consuming..... Be happy, be empty, don't think, what for?

Who's guilty for this crime? I suppose that nobody. Corrupt politiciens who have their citizens under extreme poverty and ignorance plus a first world with crook people prepared for paying for parts or the whole animal are the perfect mix for what has happened. Sires of the first world, rich gentlement, money is not for eating but some day we will because nothing will be left. Once upon a time, the Great Indian Chief Seattle said one intelligent sentence: the white man will swallow the Earth, and nothing will be left, only a desert.

I'm not an important person, I know, I'm one among millions, but there are people who works for science, for environment, for helping people..... all of them know that environment and poverty go together..... Please, the complaints book?