Archive for environment
7.18.10
please sign and pass along
As of this past week, 1.72 million gallons of toxic oil dispersant has been poured into the Gulf setting a world record. This oil dispersant is four times more toxic than crude oil. Gulf fisherman who have been hired by BP to clean up this mess are getting sick because they are NOT ALLOWED to wear protective gear, including respirators to protect themselves from breathing in the toxic oil dispersant fumes. Currently, if fishermen show up wearing their own protective gear they are fired. Why? Because it creates a libel issue.
Please take a moment to go HERE and tell President Obama to demand that BP stop blocking clean-up workers from using life-saving respirators?
Also, if you can spare a few bucks to help the Progressive Change Campaign Committee make BP accountability ads to run in Gulf states and DC, go here.
Please pass both of these links along to anybody you know who might be willing to sign or donate.
6.21.10
the bigger spill
I feel ashamed for not knowing about this. I knew oil was a dirty business, but this is unconscionable.
NYTimes: “Big oil spills are no longer news in this vast, tropical land. The Niger Delta, where the wealth underground is out of all proportion with the poverty on the surface, has endured the equivalent of the Exxon Valdez spill every year for 50 years by some estimates. The oil pours out nearly every week, and some swamps are long since lifeless.
Perhaps no place on earth has been as battered by oil, experts say, leaving residents here astonished at the nonstop attention paid to the gusher half a world away in the Gulf of Mexico. It was only a few weeks ago, they say, that a burst pipe belonging to Royal Dutch Shell in the mangroves was finally shut after flowing for two months: now nothing living moves in a black-and-brown world once teeming with shrimp and crab.
[...] As many as 546 million gallons of oil spilled into the Niger Delta over the last five decades, or nearly 11 million gallons a year, a team of experts for the Nigerian government and international and local environmental groups concluded in a 2006 report. By comparison, the Exxon Valdez spill in 1989 dumped an estimated 10.8 million gallons of oil into the waters off Alaska.
Do we blame the CEO’s of these companies? Or do we blame ourselves for not organizing (inter)national boycotts and refusing to gas up our cars and fly on big jet planes until this stops? Would that even make a difference? There must be a way for the people to wield their power (i.e. wallets) and make an impact. Maybe this horrific spill in the Gulf will be the tipping point?? Ultimately, as a unified group, we hold the power. The question is… how to unify effectively?
5.21.10
20 seconds of your time
I just sent the below email to my Senators urging them to get GMO’s out of the Global Food Security Act. Will you send an email to your Senator too? Let’s all of us help to put an end to genetically modified crops. Especially, since organic agriculture is far more environmentally and ECONOMICALLY sound in the grand scheme. All of your voices are precious! Click here to send the below email.
The UN recently released a report saying that Africa’s best hope for the future is organic agriculture. Yet the Senate Foreign Relations Committee has passed S.384, the Global Food Security Act, that would require “research on biotechnological advances appropriate to local ecological conditions, including genetically modified technology” as a condition of US aid.
Instead of cynically cloaking corporate welfare for chemical companies like Monsanto in agriculture aid packages, why not support the United Nations Environment Program’s Green Economy Initiative?
A new survey by the UN Conference on Trade and the Environment and UNEP in East Africa found that over 90 per cent of studies show that organic or near organic agriculture had benefits for soil fertility; water control; improved water tables, carbon sequestration and biodiversity.
This allows farmers to extend the growing season in marginal areas. The research in East Africa was among 1.6 million organic or near organic farmers from seven countries working on 1.4 million hectares.
Other findings include an increase in crop yields of 128 per cent since switching.
Higher incomes too are a result of not having to buy fertilizers and pesticides; as is more food availability; higher prices are paid through certification schemes for both export and domestic markets – which addresses poverty in environmentally friendly way.
Close to 90 percent of cases showed an increase in farm and household incomes and because organic agriculture is more knowledge intensive it has led to improvements in education, community bonds and cooperation on market access.
The report concludes: “Organic and near-organic agricultural methods and technologies are ideally suited for many poor, marginalized smallholder farmers in Africa, as they require minimal or no external inputs, use locally and naturally available materials to produce high-quality products, and encourage a whole systemic approach to farming that is more diverse and resistant to stress.”
4.27.10
organic inspiration
I devoured Abigail Doan’s blog this evening.
1. thracian headpieces
2. Ceca Georgieva’s green leaf jewelry
3. tatting
4. headpiece by mandy greer
5. fiber installation in Iran
3.15.10
vintage by kate
My friend Kate designed some new pieces (made from vintage beads) for the sustainable/free trade online store Jute & Jackfruit. They are so fresh and lovely and springy!
9.27.09
mildred’s lane
Go to Pia’s to read about Mildred’s Lane, a rustic yet fabulous artist’s colony in Northeastern Pennsylvania that its creator, J. Morgan Puett, compares to a little American Bloomsbury Group. You will see that she and her partner, Mark Dion, have made their colony a work of art in and of itself. Almost everything is reused, recycled or repurposed. Inspiring.
8.17.09
vintage by kate
A sample of some lovely necklaces made by my friend Kate who repurposes vintage beads into the sweetest creations. Her necklaces are sold on Jute & Jackfruit, an online (fair trade) store that specializes in sustainable clothing, jewelry and accessories designed by women artisans and designers all over the world.
7.30.09
ashley watson
Ashley Watson makes one-of-a-kind handbags etc. made from used leather jackets and purses found at thrift sores. I rarely see repurposed leather goods that I’d actually love to wear. Inspiring. (Thanks to Oh Joy!)
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