Valentine's Day Roses Bought in UK Could 'Bleed Lake Naivasha Dry,' Warns Ecologist
ScienceDaily (Feb. 11, 2011) — A University of Leicester ecologist who has spent over 30 years researching wetland conservation at Lake Naivasha in Kenya has warned that the country is being "bled dry" by the UK's demand for fresh flowers. He called on UK supermarkets to show more concern about the health of the natural environment that the flowers come from.
Dr David Harper, of the Department of Biology, University of Leicester, has been working at Lake Naivasha as part of ongoing research and projects on the ecosystem of lakes in Kenya.
Dr Harper...
Re-Greening Africa in the Footsteps of Wangari Maathai
By Isaiah Esipisu
Nobel Laureate Professor Wangari Maathai campaigned to save the Mabira Forest Reserve.
Credit:Isaiah Esipisu/IPS
NAIROBI, Sep 28 , 2011 (IPS) - Africa needs to remain focused and continue following the late Professor Wangari Maathai’s initiatives for environmental sustainability in order to address climate change across the continent, environmentalists say.
Maathai, the first African woman to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, in 2004, was founder of the Green Belt Movement , which aimed to reforest Kenya, stop soil erosion and provide firewood for...
The Center for Sustainable Drylands (CSD) has now been established at the LARMAT Department. This collaborative effort between University of Nairobi and Colorado State University promises to bring much more visibility to our research and training programmes.
About the Center
The Center for Sustainable Drylands is one of 11 partnerships between Africa and U.S. institutions of higher Education that has received a two-year funding through a competitive grant process by Africa -USAID/Higher Education for Development Initiative.
The implementation of the Center’s activities will be done collaboratively with other institutions/organizations...
Allan Savory pursued an early career as a research biologist, game ranger, soldier, politician and international consultant in Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). Exiled in 1979, he co-founded the non-profit Center for Holistic Management in 1984 and in 2009 the Savory Institute with his wife Jody Butterfield and colleagues in the United States. In 1992, they formed a second non-profit (social welfare) organisation, the Africa Centre for Holistic Management, near Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, donating a ranch that would serve as a learning site for people all over Africa.
In 2003, Savory was awarded the Banksia International...
Wars of the future will be fought over water as they are over oil today, as the source of human survival enters the global marketplace and political arena. Corporate giants, private investors, and corrupt governments vie for control of our dwindling supply, prompting protests, lawsuits, and revolutions from citizens fighting for the right to survive. Past civilizations have collapsed from poor water management.
Watch full film here. If you and I plant each a tree, and learn how to conserve water and energy. If the rest in the world around us follow suit, we can abate a brisk future for our generations after us. We need to protect, conserve...
Yann Arthus-Bertrand was appointed by the United Nations to produce the official film for the International Year of Forests. Following the success of Home which was seen by 400 million people, the photographer began producing a short 7-minute film on forests made up of aerial images from Home and the Vu du Ciel television programmes. This film will be shown during a plenary session of the Ninth Session of United Nations Forum on Forests (24 January - 4 February 2011) in New York. With the voice of EDWARD NORTON. www.goodplanet.org/forets
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Mau Forest Complex is the largest watershed (water tower) in Kenya, and a key pillar to the future of the nation and her economy. Forty percent of the Kenya's hydro-electric power is generated from rivers flowing from Mau. The famous Mara River supporting the booming tourism industry in Maasai Mara Game Reserve and Serengeti National Park originate from Mau. without Mau Forest Complex, there will be no Wonder of the World in the Wilderbeast Migration. Mau is therefore, not just an ecosystem, but an entire life-system, a source of water, biodiversity and many other environmental goods and services besides regulating the changing climate. The...
Can we win the struggle against locally accelerated environmental and climate change? Yes we can. But, how, you ask? During his campaigns, the current US President, Barrack Obama told Americans “we are the change that we seek”. How true! Kenya can change, if you and I change, Kenya can protect her environment, if I protect the environment where I am living or working. Together we can restore, protect and conserve our environment. We can demand our County and Constituency leaders give more priority to environmental matters. We could stop blaming others and climate change for our environmental problems, and take control and responsibility in order...
Most people in the rural areas in Kenya can attest that the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) has precipitated a lot of development in the rural areas, where the ‘direct government funding’ could not reach before. Roads have been repaired; bore holes sunk, bridges, dispensaries and schools built with CDF kitty (especially where leaders were not corrupt). Similar case can apply to the protection of our environment and restoration of our damaged ecosystems. As the government aims to increase the current forest cover from 1.7% to 10% by ambitiously planting of 7.6 billion trees, Constituency Environment Fund (CEF) proposal can be a means of achieving...
'It's Our Turn To Eat!' or so Michela Wrong's Githongo story went! Back to our subject, Mother Nature is calm, serene and cool and will not raise a finger as we go about destroying her. We can almost have our field day on it, excising and clearing forests to grow tea, 'that it's better than the trees', doing legal and illegal logging, burning charcoal, cultivating up-slope and on the river-banks, approving buildings in urban riparian areas and on top of rivers, building roads through wetlands and dying to justify it, tolerating people in the forests and debating all the year-long how to compensate them, and whether their Title Deeds are...
The Constituency Environmental Committee (CEC), terms of reference shall include:
· Regularly consult and discuss with the local people in Location-based meetings on the priority areas that the fund can take care of with sole aim of restoring and protecting the environment.
· Administer the Constituency Environment Fund (CEF) at constituency level
· Vet and hire Constituency Environmental Inspectors (CEIs) and Assistant CEIs
· Vet and fund environmental-based...
This post is a continuation to the previous post, 'Restoring and protecting micro-watersheds and wetlands in Kenya - A policy proposition'
a) Hire out springs and other chemi-chemi’s (all wetland areas in privately owned farms), for protection and conservation, and pay such land owners yearly in exchange of the forgone benefit from the said wetland. Replant Cypereceae and Juncaceae species in such wetlands where necessary. The farmer who has leased out his wetland shall be allowed to use it in a non destructive way, meaning he or she cannot cultivate or graze as long as the contract is in force. Instead cut and...
Kenya is plagued with numerous environmental problems that will need concerted efforts of all young and old to counter before restoration becomes too costly or impossible. In this post, I present a policy concept proposition that if adopted and implemented can go a long way in restoring and protecting our wetlands and micro-watersheds. The stakeholders are you and me, the friends of the Kenyan environment, the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources, and the State and all its subjects.
I propose the formation through an Act of Parliament (thus becomes Law), a Constituency Environment Fund...
The vulnerability of communities to environmental change is a major setback to sustainable development in Sub-Saharan Africa. One of the impacts of human vulnerability to environmental change is the forced movement of people, creating what has come to be known as environmental refugees. The notion of environmental refugees describes a new insight on an old phenomenon-large numbers of the world's least secure people seeking refuge from insecure biophysical environments. Although the phrase 'environmental refugee' is controversial among advocates of the classical definition of refugees (political and social), it has gained in popular usage....
The environment is life, supporting people and other living things. Environment is widely recognized as a 'pillar' of sustainable development. It provides essential goods and services which contribute to meeting basic human needs, and is essential to human development and quality of life. It provides services to ecosystems, including water catchments which protect freshwater resources, wetlands, riverbank environments, biodiversity habitats and ecologically functioning landscapes. The environment is also a sink of the wastes generated from different human activities.
The root causes of environmental change have both natural...
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