A recent article in the BBC shows how recent violence in Kenya sparked from election disputes has affected the flower industry. Usually Valentines means that workers can expect to work longer hours, and make some extra money. Others can take temporary work on these large farms, but this year ethnic violence has forces many of these workers to flee their homes and jobs, leaving the Kenyan flower industry in a difficult situation for the highest demand of the year. The industry seems to be running on about 80% of it’s usual workforce, while some of the more fortunate workers have been offered housing on the farms, and have thus been able to keep their jobs, many have been forced to send their families to live elsewhere. The most unfortunate ones had to leave everything behind, or worst yet were killed.

Violence has also disrupted transportation routs forcing flower farmers to incur more expenses by having to charter flights to deliver their product. And while we can hope that this violence will be passing, failing to deliver on the industry’s most important day can damage confidence in the Kenyans flower industry for years to come.

In Colombia Valentine day has been adopted by workers in the flower as International Day of Flowers Workers; a day designed to raise awareness about the poor conditions in which many workers toil. This movement is being highlighted by Florverde certification which places its symbol on flower production which meets their social and environmental standards. Now Florverde is trying to increase labor standards and work with trade unions to continue improving the industry.

Florverde certification covers about 25% of the Colombian flower industry, and its criteria include standards such as sealing fumigated areas to protect workers. Although these seem like obvious steps it is actually commons to have workers in the same area where pesticides are being used. In the past the industry has also seen some very nasty disputes over labor issues and attempts at unionizing. Currently there are some farms that have greatly improved conditions for workers offering decent wages, and daycare, but many other farms still have a very long way to go.

Now partnerships with European markets may help improve the situation. In order to sell in European markets, Colombian flowers would have to meet UK’s Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI). Complying with ETI includes freely chosen employment (no prison labor), freedom of association and respecting collective bargaining, safe and hygienic working conditions, the absence of child labor, living wages, reasonable working hours, the absence of discrimination, having regular employment, as well as no tolerance for harsh or inhumane treatment (read their full code here).

It would be great if the other large consumer of cut flowers would also set up to the plate and help improve conditions in this industry that brighten our days, while exploiting so many others.

You can read the BBC article about Kenya here, Colombia here. You can read another article on the situation in Kenya from the Washington Post here.

Image from AP Photo/Bernat Armangue.

Being that we can’t go back in time to study previous climate patterns, Prof. Zerefos of the National Observatory of Athens has begun a study of old master pieces to learn more about global weather patterns.

Using impressionist pieces created mostly in the 19th century, scientists are focusing on the differences between the usage of red and green hues to create hypothesis of how much pollution was in the skies specially after the eruption of large volcanoes. The redder the sunsets, the more pollution was in the air.

Impressionist artists of the time did a great job of capturing real scenes to the extent that scientist have been able to see patters between the art and periods of high pollution after major volcanic eruptions. Such is the case when various artists created richer sunsets for three consecutive years after the eruptions of Tambora in 1815, Bubuyan (Philippines) in 1831, Consiguina (Nicaragua) in 1835, and Krakatoa in 1881. Some of the artists being used include J.M.W. Turner, Rubens, Rembrandt, Gainsborough, and Hogarth. Edvard Munch’s red skies in The Scream are thought to be the effect of Krakatoa as seen from Norway.

The scientists involved in this project are already looking into extending their research to include paintings from the 20th century.

You can read more about this from an article in the Guardian, or more specifically about the impact of major volcanic eruptions and their effects world-wide in Simon Winchester’s Krakatoa: The Day the World Exploded, August 27, 1883.

Image info. here.

The latest update of the Red List of Endangered species is bringing attention to a number of new animals now threatened with extinction. According to the World Conservation Union, we are facing an extinction rate 10,000 higher than was expected. According to the report, one in four animals is threatened, as well as 1 in 8 birds, 1 in 3 amphibians, and 70% of the worlds plants.

Species added to the list are labeled as extinct (EX), extinct in the wild (EW), critically endangered (CR), endangered (EN), vulnerable (VU), lower risk/ conservation dependent (LR/CD), near threatened (NT), least concern (LC), or DD for data deficient.

All this information is housed in a major database with the World Conservation Union and can be accessed here. When searching the database you can type in the common name for a species and will get results including the species scientific name, and level of endangerment. Clicking on a specific species will provide more information on taxonomy, and citation information relating to how the species was evaluated for inclusion in the Red List. In the photo gallery you can find photographs of a few of the endangered species along with a brief explanation of its current situation.

This new list should make us all aware that while there are efforts out there to preserve wildlife, they are not providing the desired results, and further action should be taken to correct the situation.

You can read more about this from an article in The Hindu. There is another article in Practical Fishkeeping about discussing fish on the Red List.

Image info; Golden Lion Tamarin, (Leontopithecus rosalia), EN. Image from the World Conservation Union.

In the 1970’s the various Apollo missions took a number of highly detailed photographs of the moon which have been seen only by a handful of scientist. For three decades these photographs have been preserved in a freezer, but now Arizona State is making these images available through the web.

The photographs are being scanned at a 14 bit resolution, meaning that digital versions of the these black and white images have about 16,000 shades of gray, there are also a few highly detailed color images. The high resolution will allow for maximum conservation of detail, and accurate geometric fidelity.

NASA expects to gather many more images of the moon with their 2008 lunar reconnaissance mission. You can see some of the Apollo images at The Project Apollo Image Gallery (although they aren’t very well labeled); or try Google Moon.

You can read an article on the subject from the BBC here.

Image from The Apollo Image Gallery.

A few days ago the Christian Science Monitor had an interesting article about conservation efforts for bufeos, (also known boto, pink dolphins, or fresh water dolphins). Scientist Fernando Trujillo from the Colombian based Omacha Foundation is behind a five nation project which also includes Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, and Venezuela. Their research hopes to gather information on population numbers and the current state of the species in order to help project it, and to use the bufeo as the poster child for a larger preservation campaign of the Amazon and Orinoco rivers.

Hopefully these efforts won’t be coming too little too late, as was the case just last week with the less fortunate fresh water dolphin in the Yangtze River whose extinction seems to have been confirmed. The Indus, Ganges and Mekon rivers also have fresh water dolphins, the populations of none of which are in good shape.

I’ve been lucky enough to have seen pink dolphin while drifting down the Orinoco river many years ago, but the memories are as fresh as if it had been just yesterday; they really are an impressive sight, and hopefully this charisma will help preserve them and the larger river ecosystem in which they live.

The International Society for the Preservation of the Tropical Rainforest has some more information on pink river dolphins here, so does Project Boto, here. A good book on the subject is the Journey of the Pink River Dolphin by Sy Montgomery.

Boto image by Pasajero on Flickr.

I just finished reading an article in the BBC about a retired teacher who goes to great lengths to avoid producing waste. It was amazing to read about how she can find life in seemingly old, and useless items, time and time again. For instance a pair of pants that no longer fit, first became part of a bed for the dog and later became elbow patches on a jacket.

Producing such little waste was commons a couple of generations ago, and is probably still common in rural settings, but in the city this is basically unheard of. At my grandmother’s home in Colombia I remember that she was able to produce practically no waste. Paper and other materials that burned were used in the wood oven, vegetarian food scraps went to the cows, and meat scraps were used to feed the dogs. Glass was the only thing she had trouble reusing, but there was an old man who went by a couple of times a month collecting glass for recycling. Me, I have always lived in cities and as much as I try, I still produce much more garbage.

Still there is a push to be more aware of our wastefulness and certain communities in the UK are taking matters seriously. The UK local councils of Bath and North East Somerset promoted “Zero Waste Week“, where people were encouraged to produce as little waste as possible. Some participants were able to reduce their waste by as much as 75%!

If you are still having trouble producing less waste you can use Freecycle, a great website that allows you to connect with other people who may want old things that you are giving away. Freecycle also has local websites where you can connect with people in your community.

In an effort to classify, and preserve the world’s wild plant diversity, the Millennium Seed Bank Project (MSBP), based in Britain, is serving as the globe’s depository. Motivated by global changes in climate patterns, the MSBP has set out to gather as much material as possible in the hopes that if any of these plants species were to die out, they might be able to reintroduce them to the wild at a later stage. In May the bank collected it’s 1 billionths seed, and counting. The MSBP works with over 100 partners world wide and so far has material for 18,000 plant species originating from 126 different countries. By 2010 they hope to have 10% of the planets flora covered.

Norway was started a parallel project, the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, based in the Svaldbard archipelago, above the Arctic Circle; here they intend to gather seeds for the world’s food crops, in an effort to save them from natural disaster, wars, or other major catastrophes. A significant difference between these two projects is that the MSBP is collecting material to preserve species with no immediate, known, economic value.

The collecting of seeds, whether for profit or not, presents interesting dilemmas and discussion turns to how humans can “help” certain plants adapt to changing global weather patterns, thus directly manipulating natural selection.

When seeds are gathered scientist make note of the conditions the plant was living under. Next seeds are dried for several months, and once desiccated they are placed in silver envelopes and stores in temperatures of -20C. Under these conditions seeds are expected to last up to 500 years. The practice of banking seeds can be traced back all the way to Mesopotamians, who’s methods serve as the basis for todays seed banking approach.

Other seed bank projects include the Heritage Seed Library, which aims to make available vegetable varieties that are not common, and the Seed Savers Exchange, which focused on preserving heirloom seed.

You can read further on the subject by looking at an article in the Christian Science Monitor, and another article in News West.

Image info; boy with seeds, dandelion seeds, Svalbard Seed Bank.

26.02.08 - The Svalbard Seed Bank has received its first collections of seeds in a ceremony with Noble Prize winner Wangari Mathai. The vault is located in the remote region of the Svalbard Islands because they are geologically stable, remote, and the frigid temperatures will provide natural refrigeration. You can read more about this, and see a layout of the vault in an article from the BBC here, or from the NYT here.

Yesterday was World Environment Day, and one more day to try to get our attention around the collective damage we are doing to the planet. World Environment Day was created by the United Nations’ General Assembly in 1972 in order to stimulate thinking and create awareness about environmental issues. This year’s theme was “Melting Ice - a Hot Topic?” In support of International Polar year major celebrations were hosted by Norway, with particular emphasis on the city of Tromsø.

In a spirit of environmental awareness, Rafael Correa, president of Ecuador has challenged wealthy country to actively engage in the preservation of our collective natural resources. Correa is asking for $350 million dollars, annually for 10 years, in exchange for not drilling in Ishpingo-Tipitini-Tambocacha fields which are part of the Yasuni National park and are located in the country’s northern jungle. This land has been declared a Biosphere Reserve by UNESCO and it is said that is hold more plant and animal diversity than all of the USA and Canada combined.

Ecuador is a very poor country and they could definitely use the money, whether it comes from oil, or from protecting the jungle. Since president Correa is a known leftist, it would be a very interesting proposal to see him spend this money on education and social improvements, thus making the most of out the project. You can read an article in the International Herald Tribune about this.

A recent file for copyright of Birkam yoga has attracted new attention to the Indian government’s efforts to safeguard their traditional knowledge. The Indian government has put a group together which is working on protecting material such as ancient texts written in Sanscrit, Urdu and Persian, yoga positions, and traditional healing practices. The Indian government has already set up a database for this knowledge called the Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (you need a member to use it), which will eventually function in English, French, German, Japanese, and Spanish. This project started back in 2001 with collaboration from National Institute of Science Communication and Information Resources (NISCAIR), the Department of Ayurveda, Yoga & Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy, the and Department of Industrial Policy and Promotio. The project is expected to be completed in December 2008.

Such a massive project might initially seem unrealistic and daunting to tackle, specially since patents are usually given to “new” inventions, but given this increasingly growing practice by private companies to patent and restrict use to plants and practices that have been used for millennia, maybe this isn’t such a crazy idea after all.

India’s push to protect its traditional knowledge actually began a while back. In 2003 India proposed a law to fight “protect traditional knowledge and Western piracy [...] knowledge“. This proposal sought to encourage disclosure of traditional knowledge and reward those who help out. Once the information was gathered, it could be patented and thus protected from encroachment.

Earlier this month Suketu Mehta wrote an opinion piece in the International Herald Tribune where she points out the contradictions and complications with this process. She points out that knowledge in India has been protected through caste lines, not legal or economic ones, and that while piracy is common in India, often Indians get upset when Westerners make money of their traditional knowledge. In the end she comments that this new practice of wanting to claim ownership of everything is hurting those in the developing world. In 2005, under pressure from the WTO, the Indian Parliament passed a law making it illegal to make generic versions of patented medications. This in a national with over a billion people, many of which live in absolute poverty.

We’ll see where all this rush to put everything in private hands ends up…

You can see and read more on the subject from PBS; USA Today; BBC.

30 Days of Sustainability is a project around Vancouver, Canada where citizens, corporations, government and the society at large are engaging in activities that affirm an environmentally sustainable lifestyle. They have great ideas planned for all of the 30 days. For instance tomorrow is “Turn it Off! British Columbia”, when communities throughout B.C. will be dimming or tuning off their lights and appliances. Here is a list of tips to participate in this activity, regardless of where you live.