PRESS RELEASE. In a bold outpouring of public concern for Southeast Asia’s Mekong River, more than 15,000 people from within the six-country Mekong region and around the world have signed a “Save the Mekong” petition urging governments to abandon plans for hydropower development along the river’s mainstream. The petition – written in seven languages - will be hand-delivered to Thailand’s Prime Minister H.E.
Bulletin articles
In our country, one of the crops that has caused the most negative impacts from its start to the present day is sugarcane. The sugarcane plantations are located in the Pacific Plains, a rich area with fertile soils of volcanic origin and abundant water from rainfall and the rivers born in the volcanic chain. These conditions were perfect for the development of this crop and the expansion of sugar mills.
On June 9 Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth, Nigeria (ERA/FoEN) has released a press statement describing the outcome of the landmark suit instituted by Ken Saro Wiwa Jr and other Ogonis accusing Shell of complicity in the execution of author and human rights activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and other Ogoni leaders in 1995, among other human rights abuses, as a significant milestone in the search for justice in the bloody oil fields of the Niger Delta.
The Peruvian government is not only responsible for the open repression of Amazonian peoples which it is currently carrying out, but also for the silent genocide of the last uncontacted indigenous groups still living in isolation within their ancestral territories.
The distance between climate science and climate negotiations was dramatically illustrated at the UN climate meeting in Bonn earlier this month. While scientists tell us we need large reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, governments are setting targets for emission reductions that are so low that runaway climate change is almost guaranteed.
The June 2009 Climate Talks in Bonn served as the scenario where the new push to include forest preservation within climate change negotiations was expressed.
On May 6th, Minister of Science and Innovation of Flanders (Belgium) Patricia Ceyssens planted a tree. Nothing strange in that of course. What was unusual about this type of “green” ceremony what that this was no common tree. It was in fact the first genetically modified poplar to be planted in an open field trial by the Flanders Institute for Biotechnology (VIB), to be followed by the planting of 119 more GM poplars over the next few days in the same site.
Prey Long is the largest area of intact lowland evergreen forest remaining in southeast Asia. It covers an area of about 3,600 square kilometres in the north of Cambodia. The name, “Prey Long”, means “Our forest” in the language of the Kuy indigenous people who live there. Elephants, tigers, bears, gaurs and banteng roam the forest. The hooting of the pileated gibbon can be heard. Hornbills, vipers, wild pigs and rare crocodiles, turtles, otters and frogs live in the forest.
In Muisne, on the Northeast coast of Ecuador, the inhabitants have developed a lifestyle adapted to mangrove ecosystems, based on fishing and gathering shellfish and crabs. However, their livelihood has been under threat since the eighties, when shrimp farming started expanding in the region (WRM Bulletin nº 51, October 2001).
At a ceremony held in San Francisco, USA on 20 April 2009, Marc Ona Essangui was presented with the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize, which recognizes grassroots activists who take significant risks to protect the environment and communities in their countries.
Since 9 April, the communities of the Peruvian Amazon have started what they have called an “indefinite strike” all over the Peruvian Amazon, in response to the failure of the Congress of the Republic to repeal six decrees considered prejudicial to the indigenous peoples.
The rapid rise in global demand for cheap shrimp and farmed salmon has caused extensive degradation of mangrove wetlands and other coastal ecosystems and subsequent losses in biodiversity. These losses have also destroyed livelihoods among local communities and indigenous peoples in many nations across the global South.