On 27 April 2007, following a visit to the Amazon region, the President of the Republic, Mr. Rafael Correa decreed a ban on timber extraction from this area because of the imminent disappearance of the country’s native forests. In spite of this declaration, the extraction of cedar wood in the Yasuni National Park (YNP) and in the Intangible Zone continues non-stop.
Bulletin articles
In 2002, under the Tenth Plan, the Indian government set the national goal of having 33 percent of the country’s geographic area under “green cover” by 2012. The plan was even presented as part of India’s commitment towards the Millennium Goal on environmental sustainability. However, it is much more about industrial encroachment of forest land for tree plantations.
Since the year 2000, every July 26th has become an annual global commemorative day for the mangroves. This year's theme is entitled "On Behalf of Indigenous and Traditional Communities and Food Sovereignty."
In reference to this year's campaign, the Latin American Mangrove Network, Redmanglar International states that International Mangrove Action Day “proclaims a call for the rights of the indigenous and traditional communities of the mangrove ecosystem based on the recognition of our territory where we build our culture, our identity and the base for our food sovereignty.”
The main aim of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) is the conservation and sustainable use of the world’s biological diversity. It would thus seem obvious that anything that threatens biodiversity should be adequately addressed by signatories to the convention.
In May this year, a group of indigenous people who had remained in voluntary isolation established contact with the outside world. This happened in the north of the State of Para. The indigenous people walked for 5 days for over 100 kilometres through the dense Amazon forest, crossing the frontier from Mato Grosso until unexpectedly appearing in an indigenous Kayapo village.
With much song and dance, Agro-fuels have quickly found a place on the agendas of the governments of the North…and of the South. They promise energy independence, business, a solution to global warming, business, more foreign currency, business!!!
To the disappointment of some and the relief of others, tree plantation projects, particularly those involving large-scale monocultures, have been struggling to access a new subsidy offered by the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism: in the three years since the rules for afforestation and reforestation projects were adopted, and after twelve rounds of baseline methodology submissions, only one plantation, in China, has been registered as a CDM project.
Registered on last January 22, the “Project 0143 : UTE Barreiro S.A. Renewable Electricity Generation Project” of Vallourec & Mannesmann (V&M), the world's largest manufacturer of seamless hot-rolled steel tubes, is the third try of the company to get funds under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) scheme. The registered project will provide V&M with 67954 carbon credits it can sell to companies in the North who prefer buying such carbon credits to reducing emissions at home.
More and more the rush to use biomass as an alternative source of energy allegedly to reduce CO2 emissions is concealing the unsustainable consumption pattern that underlies global warming and climate change.
Reduccionist approaches focus on solutions which create even greater harm. That is the case of a major European project which has enthusiastically identified industrial-scale eucalyptus plantations as an answer for so said less polluting steel manufacturing processes.
The Indigenous hunter-gatherers of the central African forests, so-called Pygmy peoples, consist of at least 15 distinct ethnolinguistic groups including the Gyéli, Kola, Baka, Aka, Bongo, Efe, Mbuti, western Twa, and eastern Twa living in ten central African countries: Angola, Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea, Central African Republic, Gabon, Republic of the Congo (Congo), Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Rwanda, and Burundi. Their estimated total number is from 300 000 to 500 000 people.
The Ecuadorian communities affected by mining convened a Mining Uprising to take place on 5 June, World Environmental Day. Different points of resistance were established covering the national geography in Imbabura, Quito, Chimborazo, Cañar, Azuay, El Oro, Zamora and Morona. Although the protest was peaceful, law enforcement agents repressed the communities protesting during the first days, particular in Tarqui, Victoria del Portete, Molleturo and San Carlos-Balao, causing the indignation of the population over the police’s brutal and arbitrary treatment.
Indonesia has the world’s third largest area of tropical forest, after Brazil and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Although only 1.3 per cent of the world’s total forest area, Indonesia’s forests are home to 10 per cent of the world’s flora species, 12 per cent of the world’s mammals, 17 per cent of the world’s reptiles and amphibians, and 17 per cent of the world’s birds. Indonesia is the second country in the world in terms of wildlife richness. Indonesia’s forests are also home to endangered species such as orangutan, tigers, rhinos and Asian elephants.