By Ecological Internet's Climate Ark Climate Change Portal

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Geoengineering [search] is the proposed large scale manipulation of Earth’s oceans, soils and atmosphere with the intent of combating climate change. Modifying Earth at a planetary scale is so complex, and ecological and other side effects potentially so severe, that clearly humanity is incapable of safely engineering a biosphere [search]. Will a "Frankensphere" be constructed with dramatic unknown consequences to biodiversity and ecosystems, or will we choose to equitably reduce emissions, consumption and population? Next week’s Convention on Biological Diversity (COP 10) meeting in Japan must pass a moratorium on live geoengineering testing. Failure will mean continued implementation of ecosystem destroying technologies – precisely what has gotten us into our current climate dilemma.

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Please support EI’s proven Internet-based, grassroots global, Earth advocacy and biocentric policy-making immediately, during an unprecedented cash flow crunch, and into a new and improved future.

Dear Earth-loving colleagues,

Ecological Internet is a fierce biocentric environmental policy critic, fearlessly speaking ecological truth to power, and knowledgeably promoting only sufficient solutions for Earth's survival. Together we have created the largest and most used environmental portals, repeatedly enunciating ecologically sufficient policy to avert global ecosystem collapse, and again and again successfully taking action for ecosystems worldwide. EI has always been user supported, and we need your donation now to “Raise the Roof” – during a period of great risk and opportunity - on EI’s growing campaign for Global Ecological Sustainability. Please make your tax-deductible gift now at: http://forests.org/shared/donate/

Continue reading "EI 2010 Year-End Fund-Raiser: Raising the Roof on Global Ecological Sustainability" »

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The announcement by Gunns Ltd. pulp and logging company of Tasmania, Australia [search] that they will discontinue their involvement with primary native forest logging in Tasmania is wonderful progress. Yet Gunns has not immediately done so and logging continues in the Huon Valley. Nor should Gunns have illusions that a paper and pulp mill industry based upon toxic chlorine-bleaching, plantation monocrops [search] and ocean dumping will be acceptable. If Gunns does in fact keep and implement its promise (a big if, given their record), a global precedent has been set that old-growth native forest logging is finished. The new Australia government must follow-up by announcing an end to all old-growth native forest logging, and to promote forest and job restoration areas.

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The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) and its members, certifiers and suppliers must commit to ending the certification of primary forest timbers [search], falsely implying it is sustainable to log 500 year old trees for toilet paper, lawn furniture and other consumer items. Please participate in EI's on-going global campaign to end primary forest logging, and to protect and restore old forests, as keystone responses to abrupt climate change, biodiversity loss and global ecosystem collapse. Please take action to ensure FSC stops certifying primary forest logging; even as together we continue to successfully confront rapacious logging companies and their government enablers - 4 major victories in last months alone!

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The government of Tanzania has approved a major commercial highway across Serengeti National Park. The northern Serengeti – located near the Kenya border – is the most remote and pristine area in the Park’s entire ecosystem. Serengeti National Park's locally and globally significant ecosystem is driven by migration of wildebeest, elephant and zebra; and will be utterly devastated by the plan, as will be local livelihoods and well-being. There is a growing local and international support network protesting the project, and together we should be able to ensure it never commences.

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Shows strength of Tasmanian, Australian and global forest protection movements, yet need firm dates for commitments, and assurances other bad forestry practices will not be embraced. First and foremost, as Gunns pulls out of the Forest Industries Association of Tasmania, these old-growth native forests that were to be industrially cleared must be protected, not sold to others to log – certified or otherwise. EI’s network contributed mightily to victory.

By Earth's Newsdesk and Forests.org, projects of Ecological Internet (EI)
CONTACT: Dr. Glen Barry, glenbarry@ecologicalinternet.org

(Tasmania, Australia) - In a massive win for the environmental movement, the new head of Tasmanian timber company Gunns Limited [search] has broke ranks with Tasmania's forest industry and confirmed it will pull out of native forest logging altogether. At an industry conference in Melbourne Thursday, Gunns’ new chief executive Greg L'Estrange announced the company will move away from logging native forests [search] and develop plantation-based products. Further, Gunns revealed it would quit the Forest Industries Association of Tasmania, which was arguing for a continuation of native forest logging in the state.

The promises, if fully implemented, are a huge victory for Tasmania and Australia’s forest movement, such as the Wilderness Society, as well as a large body of international affinity campaigns. Tasmania has the tallest flowering plants on Earth, with trees reaching over 90 meters, and contains Australia's greatest tracts of temperate rainforest. Australia’s intact Eucalypt forests are also extraordinarily carbon rich. Gunns and Tasmania's environment movement have been long-time foes, culminating in a bitter five-year lawsuit brought by the company against 20 conservationists, including Greens leader Bob Brown, which Gunns lost in 2009, while failing to stifle opposition.

Continue reading "RELEASE/VICTORY: Australian Timber Giant Gunns to End Old Growth Logging" »

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Vedanta's controversial bauxite mine on the Dongria Kondh’s tribal land has been stopped, after four years of protests by local peoples supported by Survival International and a wide range of affinity campaigns, including most recently by EI’s Earth Action Network.

By Earth's Newsdesk, a project of Ecological Internet (EI)
CONTACT: Dr. Glen Barry, glenbarry@ecologicalinternet.org

Controversial plans to develop a bauxite mine on sacred tribal land in India [search] have been cancelled by India's environment ministry. The Dongria Kondh’s – an indigenous tribe who have lived since time immemorial around the mountain Niyamgiri in the Indian state of Orissa – demands have been met, and the area will remain wild, lush and sacred. Multi-national company Vedanta’s existing aluminum refinery in the area had polluted local rivers, damaged crops and disrupted the lives of the local tribe; and will now not be able to expand six-fold. This is a Dongria Kondh victory first and foremost.

The project has been delayed by four years because of the Dongria Kondh’s intense opposition locally – including the brandishing of bows and arrows – as well as from environmental and tribal rights group. Globally, a loosely coordinated campaign sought to persuade multi-national Vedanta's shareholders and financiers to distance themselves from the company. This is their magnificent victory as well – for Survival International and Amnesty International, various celebrity activists such as Bianca Jagger and Michael Palin, and numerous other loosely affiliated affinity campaigns, including most recently from Ecological Internet working with the Rainforest Information Centre.

Continue reading "RELEASE/VICTORY: Vedanta Mine Plan on Sacred Tribal Mountain Halted by Indian Government" »

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Sir Michael Somare [search] - PNG's deeply corrupted PM, and once the great founder of this amazing country - is illegally clinging to power and giving away natural resources by gutting environmental law. PNG has Earth's third largest rainforests [search] and important intact fisheries which are being threatened by his efforts to run roughshod over landowners, including those trying to stop the dumping of mine waste into Madang's bays and lagoons. Given his increasingly despotic and unbalanced behavior, it is clearly time for Mr. Somare to resign.

DISCUSS THIS ALERT:
http://www.rainforestportal.org/issues/ and http://www.facebook.com/ecointernet

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Ask the Polish government to stop exploitation of the primeval Bialowieza Forest [search]. Bialowieza Forest is on the verge of ultimate devastation caused by the state foresters and the timber industry that exploit precious Bialowieza Forest to manufacture products like furniture. Let’s support local calls for the cut to be reduced immediately, as a step to quickly ending primary forest logging in the area, and make all efforts possible to enlarge Bialowieski National Park to cover the entire area of Bialowieza Forest. EI has been active in campaign for over a decade, and things are getting active again locally as well, so time to renew the call of the Bialowieski Forest.

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Vedanta Resources, a British mining company, is set to destroy the forests, wildlife and way of life of the Dongria Kondh people. A new protest email has been added which is going to Indian government officials in support of local demands. Please take part in this new protest target. Also, our action to date has caused HSBC and WestLB banks to publicly distance themselves from Vedanta and Niyamgiri mining, an early success. This is reflected in the updated 2nd email to send. Please send both! EI is doing this alert in close consultation with local communities through John Seed and Rainforest Information Centre, Australia.

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Continue reading "ALERT UPDATE: India's Dongria Kondh Tribal Way of Life Threatened by British Vedanta Mining – Let’s Build on Initial Success" »

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Sadly and Shockingly, Rainforest Action Network is one of the primary, crucial supporters of continued primary forest logging. Let them know they must resign from FSC and commit to ending primary forest logging.

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Rainforest Action Network (RAN) has a much needed new Executive Director – Rebecca Tarbotton. For almost two years Ecological Internet has worked to get the once luminary old-growth protection organization to stop supporting Forest Stewardship Council’s (FSC) certification of industrial 1st time logging of 500 year trees in millions of year old primary forest as “well-managed” – while implying sustainability – for throw away consumer products like toilet paper, paper and lawn furniture. RAN co-founded FSC and is a long-time staunch member. Getting major forest protection organizations like RAN and Greenpeace to resign from FSC is a necessary first step before – together – we can campaign to end primary forest logging as a keystone response to global ecological sustainability.

Continue reading "ALERT! Please Encourage Rainforest Action Network’s New Leader to Work to End Primary Forest Logging" »

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By Earth's Newsdesk and the Rainforest Portal, projects of Ecological Internet

CONTACT: Dr. Glen Barry, glenbarry@ecologicalinternet.org

It is reported Ecuador will be compensated for leaving oil reserves in Yasuni National Park untouched. This is a major victory for Ecuador, the rainforest movement, and Ecological Internet – who was the first to campaign internationally on the issue.

Ecuador’s government announced today it has reached a deal with the United Nations Development Program under which donor countries will compensate Quito for leaving oil reserves untouched in a large primary rainforest filled national park. Yasuni National Park [search] – covering some 9,820 km2, or about the size of Massachusetts – is thought to be one of Earth’s most biodiversity rich sites and is also home to several nomadic Indian tribes. Yasuni’s preservation (total protection, not “sustainable management” or “conservation”) would spare Earth some 410 million metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions that contribute to global warming; while keeping biodiversity, ecosystems and cultures fully intact. The official signing is reported to be held on Tuesday.

Ecological Internet’s Earth Action Network [1] was the first to campaign internationally on threats to Yasuni from oil exploration, successfully internationalizing the issue. “This marvelous rainforest and climate victory is very gratifying and exciting,” states Dr. Glen Barry, Ecological Internet President. “Ecological Internet began to campaign in the early 2000s to protect Yasuni National Park from oil development, and continuously since. Like so many of our campaigns, it has just taken off. Our efforts were picked up by ‘The Ecologist’ Magazine, and since then a large local and global movement has been built – including the Yasuni-ITT Initiative, Scientists Concerned for Yasuni, Save America’s Forest and many other participants – who share in this victory.”

Continue reading "RELEASE/VICTORY: Ecuador Sets Major Rainforest and Climate Protection Precedent" »

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Moscow’s Khimki Forest [search] is 2,600 acres of public conservation land that is an urban refuge for people and wildlife, particularly important now Russia's record heatwave. Despite laws that prohibit road building and logging, Khimki forest is being bulldozed and cleared. Environmentalists working to protect this forest are defending the trees with their bodies while they and journalists are being attacked by thugs and arrested by police. Protesters have responded in kind by vandalizing the regional administrative buildings.

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By Dr. Glen Barry, Ecological Internet
Earth Meanders come from Earth's Newsdesk

...and All Gaia’s Creatures to Ecological Self-Defense

Gaia – the Earth System [search] – is alive and like any living entity has rights. Earth has a right to not be stripped of its vegetative skin, its flesh mined, body punctured by wells, ecosystems liquidated; and precious water, air and oceans tainted. Gaia has the right to peacefully exist and to be free of harm, violence or ecocide (to be murdered). Air, water, land and ocean ecosystems are Gaia’s self-regulating internal ecosystem organs. All Gaia’s creatures possess an equal claim upon a fair share of her bounty for continued existence. Yet Gaia has a right to prohibit at any time, using any means, any one species from over-running the biosphere and habitats shared by all.

Sadly the industrial, speculative and unsustainable capitalistic economy benefiting some humans is killing Earth. This growth machine in population, economy and inequitable consumption has established as the norm an immoral, short-sighted way of life based upon eating ecosystems and children (or at least their future) to wantonly consume and grow a bit more. If cumulative impacts of human ecosystem destruction upon Gaia continue; the Earth System dies, taking humanity, all life and creation with her. The current paradigm’s emphasis upon growth at all costs is so pernicious that almost certainly only revolution, fundamental social change and personal transformation can eradicate it.

Continue reading "EARTH MEANDERS: The Rights of Earth" »

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Despite a recent two year moratorium on further illegal logging [search] and export of precious timber from the protected areas of Madagascar, the government recently approved shipment of nearly $16 million worth of timber stolen from the country's rainforest parks. Post-coup illegal log and wildlife trade continue to threaten Madagacar's biodiversity rich rainforest [search] remnants, ecological sustainability and future potential for national advancement. Let Madagascar's transitional government, shipping industry, and French government know they will be held responsible for these ecological crimes.

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