Category: RT Newswire

USE ME! Essentially, this is a catch all for everything. This is probably the ONLY category where things that are not directly related to Rising Tide affiliates/allies should go. For example if a coal company goes out of business (and we didn’t directly cause it) it should probably only go here.

Cities Should Do More to Protect Nature – UN

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Cities Should Do More to Protect Nature – UN

SPAIN: October 9, 2008
 
BARCELONA, Spain – The world’s burgeoning cities must do more to safeguard animals and plants by increasing parkland, planting trees and recycling resources, the UN’s top biodiversity official said on Wednesday.
 
“The battle for life on earth will be won or lost in cities,” Ahmed Djoghlaf, executive secretary of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity, told Reuters.
Cities cover just two percent of the planet’s land area but dictate 75 percent of the use of the world’s natural resources, he said. City dwellers have an impact far into the countryside, with rising demand for water and food.

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Indonesia Papua Forests Seen Under Palm Oil Threat

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Indonesia Papua Forests Seen Under Palm Oil Threat 
  
INDONESIA: October 9, 2008
 
JAKARTA – Indonesia must do more to save pristine rainforests in Papua from destruction, particularly with plans to open up huge tracts of land to develop palm oil plantations, environmentalists said on Wednesday.
 
The rapidly expanding palm oil industry in Southeast Asia has come under attack by green groups for destroying rainforests and wildlife, as well the emission of greenhouse gases.
“Although the deforestation rate in Papua is still low, the threat is very high, for instance, with palm oil plantation expansion,” Bustar Maitar of Greenpeace said.

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Forest CO2 Storage Plans Should Aid Poor – Alliance

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Forest CO2 Storage Plans Should Aid Poor – Alliance 
 
SPAIN: October 9, 2008
 
BARCELONA, Spain – Forest protection can help fight climate change but any UN-led projects must also ease poverty and safeguard rights of indigenous peoples, an international alliance said on Wednesday.
 
The group, spanning 250 representatives of business, trade unions, forestry companies, governments and local and indigenous peoples, laid down guidelines for an international drive to tap forests to help soak up heat-trapping carbon dioxide.
Deforestation, with trees burnt to clear land for farming from the Amazon to the Congo, accounts for 20 percent of world emissions of greenhouse gases blamed for global warming. Trees store carbon dioxide as they grow and release it when they die.

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Environmentalists Score Phosphate Mine Victory in Florida Wetland

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 6, 2008
4:00 PM

Environmentalists Score Phosphate Mine Victory

CONTACT: Earthjustice
David Guest/Monica Reimer, Earthjustice, (850) 681-0031
Environmentalists Score Phosphate Mine Victory
Project that would have destroyed 480 acres of wetlands halted

BRADENTON, Fla. – October 6 – Earthjustice scored a major win today when
the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers suspended a permit that gave Mosaic
Phosphate the go-ahead to destroy 480 acres of high-quality wetlands
within the Peace River watershed.

“This permit suspension is a victory for the people of Manatee County and
everyone who lives in the Peace River basin” said Earthjustice attorney
Monica Reimer. “This establishes that the permit should never have been
granted. It didn’t comply with the law.”

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