You can adopt many things in the world, cats, dogs, cows, sheep, goats (thanks Heifer!), but now you can go one step further and adopt a rat!
Before I get some shrieks and shudders, let me explain.
I came across this while on tumblr (where else?) and immediately became interested. Since there are countries in Africa (and around the world) where there are still undetonated mines left in the ground from past or current wars, these rats are a safe way to find and get rid of them.
In Morogo, Tanzania trainers at APOPO's Training Center (on the Sokoine University of Agriculture's campus) train African Giant Pouched Rats to sniff for TNT and mine casing minerals. Covering patches of land that may take them only twenty minutes but takes a human a whole day to do.
Before you freak out over exploding rats and animal rights I should tell you that not one rat has died as a result of their job. Due to how lightweight they are (1 kilogram = 2.205 pounds) the rats do not trigger the bombs in a way that a full grown human most definitely would.
Need more convincing of how awesome an idea this is?
Mozambique once had one of the most severe landmine problems in the world. APOPO was the sole demining operator for the Gaza province, one of the most affected provinces in Mozambique. As of 2012, APOPO completed their project one year in advance.
So in this holiday season if you find yourself in need of a gift for someone who you really can never find a gift for, maybe consider adopting a rat as an option (subscriptions to magazines are nice as well).
The number of times I have wanted to go rant at give a speech to our government or governments of the world is borderline ridiculous at this point (whether it's ridiculous that I have wanted to so many times or whether it's ridiculous that I have had so much occasion to want to do so is still unclear).
But in regards to what I want to say to our world leaders at the moment regarding the environment has already been said. Back in 1992, Severn Suzuki gave this speech to the UN Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. Incredibly well spoken at the age of twelve (twelve!) she tells world leaders that they're falling short of the goals we as young people should expect of them and that eventually when we inherit this world we, not them will have to live in the mess they created, so they better clean up their act. Sadly, it seems that her words were not really heeded.
Hello, I’m Severn Suzuki speaking for E.C.O. – The Environmental Children’s Organisation.
We are a group of twelve and thirteen-year-olds from Canada trying to make a difference: Vanessa Suttie, Morgan Geisler, Michelle Quigg and me. We raised all the money ourselves to come six thousand miles to tell you adults you must change your ways. Coming here today, I have no hidden agenda. I am fighting for my future.
Losing my future is not like losing an election or a few points on the stock market. I am here to speak for all generations to come.
I am here to speak on behalf of the starving children around the world whose cries go unheard.
I am here to speak for the countless animals dying across this planet because they have nowhere left to go. We cannot afford to be not heard.
I am afraid to go out in the sun now because of the holes in the ozone. I am afraid to breathe the air because I don’t know what chemicals are in it.
I used to go fishing in Vancouver with my dad until just a few years ago we found the fish full of cancers. And now we hear about animals and plants going exinct every day — vanishing forever.
In my life, I have dreamt of seeing the great herds of wild animals, jungles and rainforests full of birds and butterfilies, but now I wonder if they will even exist for my children to see.
Did you have to worry about these little things when you were my age?
All this is happening before our eyes and yet we act as if we have all the time we want and all the solutions. I’m only a child and I don’t have all the solutions, but I want you to realise, neither do you!
* You don’t know how to fix the holes in our ozone layer. * You don’t know how to bring salmon back up a dead stream. * You don’t know how to bring back an animal now extinct. * And you can’t bring back forests that once grew where there is now desert.
If you don’t know how to fix it, please stop breaking it!
Here, you may be delegates of your governments, business people, organisers, reporters or poiticians – but really you are mothers and fathers, brothers and sister, aunts and uncles – and all of you are somebody’s child.
I’m only a child yet I know we are all part of a family, five billion strong, in fact, 30 million species strong and we all share the same air, water and soil — borders and governments will never change that.
I’m only a child yet I know we are all in this together and should act as one single world towards one single goal.
In my anger, I am not blind, and in my fear, I am not afraid to tell the world how I feel.
In my country, we make so much waste, we buy and throw away, buy and throw away, and yet northern countries will not share with the needy. Even when we have more than enough, we are afraid to lose some of our wealth, afraid to share.
In Canada, we live the privileged life, with plenty of food, water and shelter — we have watches, bicycles, computers and television sets.
Two days ago here in Brazil, we were shocked when we spent some time with some children living on the streets. And this is what one child told us: “I wish I was rich and if I were, I would give all the street children food, clothes, medicine, shelter and love and affection.”
If a child on the street who has nothing, is willing to share, why are we who have everyting still so greedy?
I can’t stop thinking that these children are my age, that it makes a tremendous difference where you are born, that I could be one of those children living in the Favellas of Rio; I could be a child starving in Somalia; a victim of war in the Middle East or a beggar in India.
I’m only a child yet I know if all the money spent on war was spent on ending poverty and finding environmental answers, what a wonderful place this earth would be!
At school, even in kindergarten, you teach us to behave in the world. You teach us:
* not to fight with others, * to work things out, * to respect others, * to clean up our mess, * not to hurt other creatures * to share – not be greedy.
Then why do you go out and do the things you tell us not to do?
Do not forget why you’re attending these conferences, who you’re doing this for — we are your own children. You are deciding what kind of world we will grow up in. Parents should be able to comfort their children by saying “everyting’s going to be alright” , “we’re doing the best we can” and “it’s not the end of the world”.
But I don’t think you can say that to us anymore. Are we even on your list of priorities? My father always says “You are what you do, not what you say.”
Well, what you do makes me cry at night. You grown ups say you love us. I challenge you, please make your actions reflect your words. Thank you for listening.
This is a story that didn't quite catch my attention until I saw this letter posted on a friends facebook wall.
For those of you who may not know, Pete Seeger is a rather important figure in the environmental movement as well as a key player in the American Folk music industry. But why would Seeger be involved in this? Let's start at the beginning. The Arctic 30 comprises of various crew members, activists, and two freelance artists aboard the Greenpeace vessel Arctic Sunrise that attempted as peaceful protest over two months ago at Gazprom's oil rig that ended with all crew members being thrown in Russian prison. They were attempting to call attention the dangers oil drilling to the environment and it's impact on climate change. Two activists attempted to board the rig when the Russian Coast Guard came sweeping in. A detailed timeline of what happened can be found here. Long story short, the activists were all out in jail and slapped with charges of piracy and hooliganism. This caused a uprising of outrage against the Russian government and uprising of support for the crew members. Among the many supporters are a number of celebrities. Even Sir Paul McCartney wrote a letter to sway Putin into letting the Arctic 30 go free. As of November 28th, all the everyone from the ship has been released on bail but still have to face the crimes they were charged with. The Piracy charge was dropped but even the hooliganism charge could have them in jail for up to seven years. But how does this tie into Pete Seeger? [Don't worry. I didn't forget about him!] With good reason, Seeger doesn't do as much as he used to in terms of environmental action.
I came across a post while scrolling through tumblr the other day. The post said that a group of elderly people in Japan had gotten together and had volunteered to help clean up contamination that occurred when the Fukushima nuclear power plant had a meltdown as a result of the tsunami that occurred in March of 2011. They wanted to replace younger workers who were at risk of getting cancer from radiation. They (the seniors) felt that they wouldn't be cheated of life if they did in fact develop cancer or any other disease from the radiation.
I was naturally curious. Stories of human selflessness in times of trouble hold a special place for me ( as they do for most people I should like to think). So I looked it up. Sometimes tumblr (trying to be helpful) can blow "news" stories out of proportion. I was worried that this might be a case of tumblr trying to do good, but not quite telling the truth.
Thankfully, my worry was misplaced. It turns out there is a group of about 400 to 500 seniors have signed up for the job. One volunteer, Kazuko Sasaki stated her reason for volunteering as, "My generation built these nuclear power plants. So we have to take responsibility for them. We can't dump this on the next generation."
What I found even more interesting is that apparently Japanese media seems to be paying them no great deal of attention while other news outlets (especially those in the US) have been paying them a great deal of homage.
Whatever does end up happening, I think the hope that is inspired by the fact that these seniors, these grandmother and grandfathers are willing to go in and work in contaminated areas to give others a better chance at living is incredible and well worth being taken seriously and being commended.
Betty and the Baby Boomers is a Hudson Valley American folk music group that all met as a result of the sloop the Clearwater built by Pete Seeger. The folk genre covers many styles. Phillip H. Farber of the Daily Freeman (Kingston, NY) says the "distinctive vocal harmonies with skillful acoustic guitar and dobro… The themes of the songs reflect the yearning for peace, concern for the environment, and awareness of social struggles that are the staple of this brand of folk music. If you are a lover of good folk, you’ll find it on I’ll Always Sing." I'll Always Sing is wonderful CD and I encourage you to check out their other stuff. This song speaks of the belief that we can change for the better. That our future is in our hands. We have something wonderful and we just need to learn better upkeep.
And yes, the man with the beard happens to be my father.
Calling all dreamers and optimistic fools Don't let go of your dream make it now make it all come true If you believe in a brighter day I know we can find our way
To this island, in a starry ocean Poetry in motion, this island earth Spinnin' like a dancer, gravity is the answer Rendezvous in the blue, this island earth
I don't know what's in store today We can spread our wings we can soar away Or we can go like the dinosaurs, they say The choice is ours to make It only seems like this to me We can wake up one day and be history Or stick around to unravel the mystery Of how we came to be
On this island, in a starry ocean Poetry in motion, this island earth A beautiful oasis for all human races The only home that we know, this island earth
I know we can touch the stars one day Kick up the dust on Mars some day Or trip the light of the Milky Way We've got to find our way If you're looking for a miracle open your eyes There was one this morning just about sunrise Dawn came breakin' like a wave on the sea And it's there for you and me
Calling all dreamers and optimistic fools Don't let go of your dream make it now make it all come true If you believe in a brighter day I know we can find our way
This post is going to be a bit long as it hits very close to home for our family. My mom worked at Scenic Hudson before working at The Nature Conservancy and I still have memories of watching her the TV as she gave talks about how we needed to clean up the Hudson and going to protests up and down the river. Luckily, the Hudson is now being taken care of in a way that it hasn't in a long time and it's laregly due to the people that I grew up with who I consider to be second mothers (go empowered women!), aunts and uncles. With that said, on with the post!
After
the Second World War, the United States began an era of rapid production. When
this happened, there wasn’t much thought to what the environmental damages
would be if production went uncontained. This proved to be deadly for the
Hudson River. In General Electric’s (GE) production
of electrical capacitors
they used they used polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) as type of cooling fluid. The
problem is, without any laws regulating where the PCBs could be dumped, GE had
dumped around 1.3 million pounds of PCBs(Stanne, 175). Couple this
with slow reaction and delayed action, the Hudson River suffered for sixty
years before any actual effort was made to clean up the river.
Perhaps one of the triggering
factors for PCBs becoming the huge issue that they became (and are) was the
removal of the Fort Edward Dam in 1973 which caused a large amount of PCBs to
be transported further down the river into the lower Hudson. Over the next two
years, scientists began finding higher levels of PCBs in the fish throughout
the River and the Toxic Substance Control Act of 1976 banning the manufacture
of PCBs was passed by Congress. It was later in this year that an
Administrative hearing found GE at fault for all the pollution.
During the 1980s, the EPA put the
Hudson on the Superfund National Priority but in 1984, the EPA called for no
action. Many found this decision unsatisfactory as studies were still coming
out showing that fish in the river were still unsafe and there was a
possibility that by dredging sediment from the river, it could be cleaned. In
1989, DEC asked for the EPA to reconsider their decision.
Image courtesy of clearwater.org
Enter the 1990s, and the situation
is only getting worse. In 1993, GE admitted that PCBs had probably been seeping
out of the ground since at least the early 80s. Later in the same year, it is
discovered that several capacitors full of PCBs had been left in river. Though
these are removed, it doesn’t stop the problem. The DEC was able to get GE to
clean up under and around the plant but could not do anything to make GE clean
up the river. The situation really hit home in 1996 however when scientists
made the discovery that PCBs were evaporating from the river and the level of
PCBs in non-fish eaters living in the Hudson River Valley. In the same year,
the EPA announced its investigation of PCB health risks would not include inhalation
pathways, endocrine disruptions, or the effects on women and children. Luckily
for the River, headway was made by the late 90s. Secretary of the Interior,
Bruce Babbitt held a press conference in which he told GE that he would no
longer accept them trying to delay the cleanup and that the Superfund project
should stop being influenced and changed by major companies to fit their goals.
It wasn’t until 2001 that GE was
lawfully required to take action for what they had. The EPA released a Record
of Decision (ROD) which was a legal order to remediate. At this point, if GE
had decided to challenge the ROD, the EPA would have had to begin cleanup by
themselves with public money. GE would have then have been at risk of having to
pay three times the costs of the cleanup costs if it lost its appeal. Seeing as
for the past thirty years GE had been trying to get out of having to pay loads
of money, it makes sense that they agreed to help with cleanup. Even then, it
took about seven years for actual cleanup to begin. As shown on the diagram
titled, “Hudson River PCBS Superfund: Sequence of Key Events”, there were a
number of bureaucratic decisions that had to be made, where dredging would
happen had to be decided, however, dredging for phase one began and
was completed in 2009. Phase two is still in progress but is going well
because, “GE exceeded its dredging goal because favorable weather allowed theChamplain Canal to remain open to dredging vessels for an extra few weeks” reports Dredging News Online.
Though phase two is still underway,
it is showing promising signs. But this comes too late for many species living
in the river. Slow government action on behalf of the EPA coupled with
unwillingness to help from GE delayed cleanup for over thirty years, causing
unnecessary damage to the important ecosystem. Want to know more? Check out these websites for more information: http://www.clearwater.org/ea/pcb-contamination/ http://www.epa.gov/hudson/cleanup.html#quest1
Stanne, Stephen P., Roger G. Panetta , and Brian E. Forist .
Growing up with two parents who are environmentalists (one works for the Hudson River Estuary Program and the other for the Nature Conservancy) meant that talking about the environment happened a lot in our family and happened everywhere, the dinner table, when I went to their offices, driving to and from daycare (hence the title of the blog), etc. This also meant from a very young age I was interested in the environment around me and how I and others affected it. This blog is going to consist of me trying to combine my interest in environmentalism with my love of history (because now matter how hard I try it's not going to be able to be kept out of the discussion- I am a history major after all).
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