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Japan, U.S. vow cash to gain climate deal
America set to join $100 billion aid fund: Clinton
By ERIC JOHNSTON and SETSUKO KAMIYA
Staff writers
COPENHAGEN — In a last-minute attempt to achieve a breakthrough at the U.N. climate summit in Copenhagen, Japan and the United States announced Wednesday and Thursday short- and long-term financial pledges for developing countries to mitigate the effects of climate change over the next three years and to adapt to the future effects of global warming by 2020.
The announcement of new aid packages came on the ninth and final day of formal negotiations on a deal for new emissions reduction targets for the post-2012 period, following the expiration of the first period of commitments under the Kyoto Protocol.
On Wednesday evening, Japan pledged ¥1.75 trillion ($15 billion) in public and private funding to help developing countries adjust to climate change between 2010-2012. The U.S. announced Thursday morning it would work to help provide developing countries with up to $100 billion annually through yet-to-be-determined financial mechanisms and incentives by 2020 for adaptation to future climate change.
"We're announcing this pledge in the hope that it will become a driving force for the negotiations to move forward and come to a meaningful agreement," Environment Minister Sakihito Ozawa said Wednesday, at Japan's first open press briefing of the COP15 conference.
Of the total, public finance comprises about ¥1.3 trillion ($11 billion) and the rest will be collected from the private sector by creating a new plan involving the Japan Bank for International Cooperation, said Vice Foreign Minister Tetsuro Fukuyama. Details of that plan were still being discussed and will require a change in the law, he added.
Ozawa's announcement now means short-term financing pledges for developing countries, which the United Nations said should be around $30 billion by 2012, have nearly been met. The European Union announced last week that about $10.8 billion in total would be available for the remaining period and the U.S. and other countries were expected to contribute as well.
But the long-term financing of the deal has been the more controversial issue. Economists and nongovernmental organizations have said that anywhere between $140 billion and $200 billion or more would be needed by 2020 to assist developing countries facing desertification, increased floods, crop failures and potential climate refugees displaced by severe weather patterns due to global warming.
"Today, I would like to announce that in the context of a strong accord, in which all major economies stand behind meaningful mitigation actions and provide full transparency as to their implementation, the U.S. is prepared to work with other countries toward a goal of jointly mobilizing $100 billion a year by 2020 to address the climate change needs of developing countries," U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said.
"We expect that this funding will come from a wide variety of sources, public and private, bilateral and multilateral, including alternative sources of finance," she said.
But while both Japan and the U.S. offered developing nations a carrot, the pledges also came with a big stick, as Ozawa and Clinton said developing nations must commit to legally binding emissions cuts.
"If those conditions are not met, we'll have to withdraw this pledge," Ozawa said.
In a warning directed toward China — which insists that its reduction target of 40 percent to 45 percent per unit of gross domestic product by 2020 compared with 2005 levels is a domestic, voluntary measure and should not be codified in an international treaty — both Ozawa and Clinton said there were conditions attached to their pledges, which included participation in a new deal, and emissions-reduction actions that were transparent.
"I've often quoted a Chinese proverb which says that when we are in a common boat, you have to cross the river peacefully together. Well, we are in a common boat," Clinton said.
"All of the major economies have an obligation to commit to a meaningful mitigation action and stand behind them in a transparent way."
It remained to be seen whether the new pledges by the U.S. and Japan would be the game-breaker negotiators had been looking for to move the negotiations forward.
Fundamental differences over the amount by which countries should reduce their emissions remain.
The Japan Times: Friday, Dec. 18, 2009
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Saturday, December 19, 2009
Japan, U.S. vow cash to gain climate deal
Sunday, August 23, 2009
DAMMING OF A MIGHTY RIVER
DAMMING OF A MIGHTY RIVER
The Tasang and Hutyi dam projects may force the Karenni people to relocate from their homes and lose their heritage
Writer: By Pongsit Pangsrivongse
Published: 23/08/2009 at 12:00 AM
Newspaper section: Brunch
The mighty Salween River stretches from the high plains of the Tibetan Plateau to the Andaman Sea. In Burma, it runs through the Mon and Shan States where it is the lifeblood of the indigenous people, nourishing the land and feeding the countless ethnic groups living there. Though their customs, languages and traditions vary, one thing unites them all - their reliance on the powerful Salween River. The fact that the fruitful river has always been full of fish enforces a sense of security for them. However, their sustainable lifestyle is reaching a precarious chapter, according to concerns echoed in the seminar on the construction of Tasang and Hutyi Dams. The recent seminar was arranged by local anti-dam groups, including Towards Ecological Recovery and Regional Alliance (Terra), Salween Watch, Healthy Public Policy Foundation (HPPF) and guest speakers such as Htoo Paw, a representative of the Karenni Human Rights Group.
According to the dam-protesting organiser, the construction of the Tasang and Hutyi Dams close to Tak province on the Thai-Burmese border will be a dire consequence to the ecology of the river and villagers who depend on its resources.
But the seminar did not touch only the environmental side.
Despite the fact that the project is purely civil construction, it has slowly unveiled the conflict between the junta and the indigenous people highlighted recently when the Karen National Union (KNU) was attacked by troops from the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) and the ruling junta's State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), according to Htoo Paw.
This invasion reportedly forced more than 4,000 Karennis out of their homes, thus adding to the ever growing number of desperate refugees attempting to seek asylum in Thailand.
What perhaps is more painful for the locals than losing their homes and their land is losing their heritage and their source of income and life staple. With the flooding of the land they have lived on for centuries, members of these tight-knit communities will be dispersed. Many of them will no longer be able to rely on the waters for fish.
SOON A THING OF THE PAST: Fish from the Salween River being sold at a local market.
The fear is real. According to Dr Nirand Pitakwatchara, a member of National Human Right Commission, some of the dam projects spelt doom for communities living around the project. "This is a lesson that should have been learned from the controversial Pak Moon Dam where the presence of a reservoir resulted in the decimation of fish species," said Dr Nirand, also a former Thai senator.
The implications extend beyond the rights of the indigenous people.
Forced relocation has already led to exponential migration into Thailand. Salween Watch, a Chiang Mai-based non-governmental organisation, estimated about 60,000 Burmese ethnic villagers will be displaced by the Tasang Dam alone.
With their land turned into a colossal lake covering 500,000 rai (80,000 hectares) and faced with the threat of the junta, they will have nowhere to turn but Tak province in Thailand, adding more to security problems.
Social stability aside, the two projects should also be revised in terms of investment worth. The two dams were the realisation of power plants under Thailand's Power Development Plan (PDP).
According to Suphakit Nuntavorakarn, economic researcher at Healthy Public Policy Foundation (HPPF), both projects should be revised or scrapped as the demand for energy has been lowered since the economic contraction.
Since 2003, according to an estimate by the HPPF, the electricity surplus has been around 1,000 megawatt (MW) each year. A building facility for one megawatt of electricity costs 30 million baht; around 30 billion baht was invested on unused electricity. Last year, the economic crisis resulted in an overestimation of electricity needed, resulting in an absurd surplus of 4,333MW.
It is not that the government did not recognise this over projection and risk of investment.
In February, the energy ministry revised the new PDP for 2009 to 2024. Plans to import electricity from neighbouring countries decreased to 5,036MW, from 13,244MW. The Hutgyi and Tasang Dams' construction should have been dropped along with the reductions in the import of electricity.
In these uncertain economic times it would be unwise to dispense funds so recklessly. Such an irrational investment will certainly not justify the catastrophic consequences of this dam, which will demolish the invaluable cultural heritage and dignity of the people so bonded to this great river, concluded the participants.
How are you helping to reduce your carbon footprint? Share your eco-friendly activities, or comments, or disapprovals and email outlook@bangkokpost .co.th. Remember to type 'Earth Alert' in the subject box. http://www.bangkokp ost.com/life/ family/22562/ damming-of- a-mighty- river
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Liquor distillery fire kills five near Yangon
Posted : Sun, 23 Aug 2009 09:11:40 GMT
Author : DPA
Print this article email this article Comment on this article
Yangon - A fire at a liquor distillery on the outskirts of Yangon killed at least five people and injured eight others, witnesses said Sunday. The fire raged through the Myanmar Winery Distillery Company Limited, situated about 50 kilometres north of Yangon, all Saturday night, leaving four employees dead who could be identified and one unidentified body.
Eight people were injured in the blaze, five of whom were admitted to Yangon General Hospital, and three others at Hlegu Hospital.
Some 47 fire trucks were sent to control the flames, which destroyed at least one of the vehicles before the fire was put out, a witness said.
The distillery, producer of a local liquor, was owned by five Myanmar nationals.
Copyright, respective author or news agency
http://www.earthtim es.org/articles/ show/282499, liquor-distiller y-fire-kills- five-near- yangon.html
Monday, May 18, 2009
Burma building 13 hydropower plants - Xinhua
http://uaelp.pennnet.com/news/display_news_story.cfm?Section=WireNews&Category=HOME&NewsID=178088
May 18, 2009 (BBC Monitoring via COMTEX) -- [Xinhua "Roundup" by Feng Yingqiu: "Myanmar Works To Meet Growing Demand of Electricity"]
Yangon [Rangoon], May 18 (Xinhua) - Myanmar [Burma] has been working to meet its domestic demand of electricity, building up a total of 13 hydropower plants covering the power grids of the whole nation since 1988 when the present government took office.
Installed generating capacity of these established power plants now accounts for only 3 per cent of that of the whole country, said the editorial of Monday's official newspaper New Light of Myanmar.
On completion of other 35 ongoing hydropower projects, the editorial predicts that Myanmar will be able to fulfil domestic electricity demand in the future.
The newly-inaugurated hydropower plant, Shweli-1, on last Saturday represented one of the country's latest achievement in the aspects and the production of the plant is seen as being able to satisfy the nation's power demand to an extent.
Claimed as the biggest power plant of its kind so far, the Shweli-1, located near at Mantat Village, 27.2 km southwest of Namkham, northern part of Shan state, possesses an installed generating capacity of 600 megawatts (mw) which can produce 4.022 billion kilowatt-hour (kwh) yearly.
Shweli-1 also stands one of the three large-scale hydropower projects being implemented along the Shweli River.
Originating in China's southwestern Yunnan Province, the Shweli River winds its way around Muse and Namkham and then flows into Myanmar's Ayeyawaddy River.
The completed project reflects not only friendship between Myanmar and China but also mutual cooperation between the two countries, the editorial appraised.
In the very near future, another power plant, Yeywa, which is bigger than Shweli-1, is expected to emerge.
Up to now, all the hydropower stations across the country can generate more than 1,400 mw of electricity and the 35 ongoing projects could in the future add 32,900 mw or 79 per cent to its installed capacity.
These projects lie along the rivers of Ayeyawaddy, Chindwin, Sittoung and Thanlwin which are blessed with lots of water resources. Along the Ayeyawaddy basin are Yeywa, Shweli, Zawgyi and Mone creek projects, the editorial disclosed.
Meanwhile, experts estimated that with the country's total available water resources, up to 43,400 mw of the capacity could be produced.
Although Myanmar does not have enough electricity at present, it will in not-too-distant future, be able to fulfil its domestic demand, the editorial anticipated. With change in people's living condition and with the growing number of industries, the consumption of electricity across Myanmar has significantly increased year after year, calling for more efforts in the sector for national development and people are urged on their part to help develop the national economy by improving their business.
Source: Xinhua news agency, Beijing, in English 0412 gmt 18 May 09
Thursday, April 2, 2009
Huge Population of Rare Dolphins Discovered
http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/550615/
Newswise — The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) announced today the discovery of a huge population of rare dolphins in South Asia—but warns that the population is threatened by climate change and fishing nets.
Using rigorous scientific techniques, WCS researchers estimate that nearly 6,000 Irrawaddy dolphins, which are related to orcas or killer whales, were found living in freshwater regions of Bangladesh’s Sundarbans mangrove forest and adjacent waters of the Bay of Bengal—an area where little marine mammal research has taken place up to this point. Prior to this study, the largest known populations of Irrawaddy dolphins numbered in the low hundreds or less.
Each discovery of Irrawaddy dolphins is important because scientists do not know how many remain on the planet. In 2008, they were listed as vulnerable in the IUCN Red List based on population declines in known populations.
The results of the study were announced today at the First International Conference on Marine Mammal Protected Areas in Maui, Hawaii and published in the Winter issue of the Journal of Cetacean Research and Management. Authors of the study include Brian D. Smith, Rubaiyat Mansur Mowgli, and Samantha Strindberg of the Wildlife Conservation Society, along with Benazir Ahmed of Chittagong University in Bangladesh.
“With all the news about freshwater environments and state of the Oceans, WCS’s discovery that a thriving population of Irrawaddy dolphins exists in Bangladesh gives us hope for protecting this and other endangered species and their important habitats,” said Dr. Steven E. Sanderson, President and CEO of the Wildlife Conservation Society. “WCS is committed to conservation of these iconic marine species from dolphins, sea turtles, sharks to the largest whales.”
“This discovery gives us great hope that there is a future for Irrawaddy dolphins,” said Brian D. Smith, the study’s lead author. “Bangladesh clearly serves as an important sanctuary for Irrawaddy dolphins, and conservation in this region should be a top priority.”
Despite finding this extraordinarily large population, the study’s authors warn that the dolphins are becoming increasingly threatened by accidental entanglement in fishing nets. During the study, researchers encountered two dolphins that had become entangled and subsequently drowned in fishing nets—a common occurrence according to local fishermen.
In a second paper, published in the March/April issue of Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystem, Smith and his coauthors report the additional long-term threat to the dolphin population of declining freshwater supplies, caused by upstream water diversion in India, coupled with sea-level rise due to climate change. These circumstances also threaten Ganges River dolphins, an endangered species with a range that overlaps with that of the Irrawaddy dolphins’ in the Sundarbans mangrove forest. The recent likely extinction of the Yangtze River dolphin, or baiji, is a potent reminder of how vulnerable freshwater dolphins are to extinction via the impacts of humans.
The Irrawaddy dolphin grows to some 2 to 2.5 meters in length (6.5 to 8 feet) and frequents large rivers, estuaries, and freshwater lagoons in South and Southeast Asia. In Myanmar’s Ayeyarwady River, these dolphins are known for “cooperative fishing” with humans, where the animals voluntarily herd schools of fish toward fishing boats and awaiting nets. With the aid of dolphins, fishermen can increase the size of their catches up to threefold. The dolphins appear to benefit from this relationship by easily preying on the cornered fish and those that fall out of the net as the fishermen pull it from the water. In 2006, WCS helped establish a protected area along the Ayeyarwady River to conserve this critically endangered mammal population.
WCS is currently working closely with the Ministry of Environment and Forests in Bangladesh on plans for establishing a protected area network for both Irrawaddy and Ganges River dolphins in the Sundarbans mangrove forest. Funding is critical to sustaining these activities along with WCS’s long-term efforts to study the effects of climate change on this habitat, support sustainable fishing practices, and develop local ecotourism projects.
Support for this study has been provided in part by the Kerzner Marine Foundation and Ocean Park Conservation Foundation, Hong Kong (OPCFHK). This study was also funded in part by the U.S. Marine Mammal Commission. The Convention on Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS) has also supported WCS efforts as part of a regional program for cetacean conservation in the Bay of Bengal.
The Wildlife Conservation Society saves wildlife and wild places worldwide. We do so through science, global conservation, education and the management of the world's largest system of urban wildlife parks, led by the flagship Bronx Zoo.
Together these activities change attitudes towards nature and help people imagine wildlife and humans living in harmony. WCS is committed to this mission because it is essential to the integrity of life on Earth. Visit: www.wcs.org
Special Note to the Media: If you would like to guide your readers or viewers to a web link where they can make donations in support of helping to save wildlife and wild places, please direct them to: www.wcs.org/donation
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Cruise Specialists Hosts Name Top Five Cruise Ports Around the World
http://www.foxbusiness.com/story/cruise-specialists-hosts-cruise-ports-world/
LaGraff and Atkins recently revealed their top five spots to visit onboard a cruise:
1. Islands of Tahiti: Water, Water, Water! "If you love to swim, these
are the best waters in the world for a dip," explained Atkins.
"The islanders spend hours in the warm, blue waters. Every day you
can see families playing on the beach and gracefully bodysurfing the
waves." The duo recommends snorkeling while drifting with the
current down the beachfront, watching the hundreds of colorful fishes.
2. Saigon: "The streets are utter chaos with noisy scooters, cars,
hawkers and street vendors, but Saigon is a fun place to visit,"
said LaGraff. "You can visit the American War museum, check out the
fascinating Cu Chi tunnels, shop at the colorful local markets in
Chinatown, or pamper yourself with reasonably priced spa
treatments."
3. Burma: "We added Burma to our list because of its past and
hopefully its future," declared LaGraff. "Before the military
takeover, the Burmese people were some of the most artistic and
enlightened in the world. We find their everyday street scenes
fascinating, as well as the hundreds of breathtaking Buddhist pagodas
that dot the landscape."
4. Sydney: "We love entering Sydney by ship as the entrance is through
a narrow pass called the heads," described Atkins. "Slowly the
great city unfolds like a movie, culminating in the magnificent opera
house." They travel everywhere around Sydney on the fast and
efficient ferry system. One of their favorite activities is climbing the
famed harbor bridge Sydneysiders call "the hangar" to get a
good workout and enjoy super views of the city.
5. Shanghai: "We hereby declare Shanghai our favorite shopping city in
the world, surpassing our old number one -- Hong Kong," exclaimed
Atkins. "There are bargains galore, and street stalls are loaded
with all sorts of clothes and collectibles. Tailors are good and cheap,
as are the fabrics, especially silk. One of the couple's favorite
places to visit in Shanghai is the Bund, a lively people watching
pedestrian walkway along the Pudong River that boasts excellent views of
Shanghai.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
World Water Day: Critical water shortages in Myanmar need to be addressed
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/fromthefield/218926/73a20713c1f0d19b3e964dd07a48fc6c.htm
20 Mar 2009 14:40:11 GMT
Source: Merlin - UK
Reuters and AlertNet are not responsible for the content of this article or for any external internet sites. The views expressed are the author's alone.
On World Water Day 2009, Merlin would like to draw attention to the critical clean drinking water shortages in the Irrawaddy Delta in Myanmar.
Clean drinking water has always been a scarce resource in the Delta, but these shortages have been exacerbated by the devastating effects of Cyclone Nargis in May last year. The fact that the height of the dry season is fast approaching means that water shortages will peak imminently.
The Delta opens out onto the Bay of Bengal, meaning that southern stretches of the river are saline whilst the more northern parts are fresh water. As the dry season advances, what is known as the salt/fresh water interface moves up the Delta, as less fresh water arrives from inland rivers. Waterways in the affected area become progressively more saline as the dry season wears on.
Each year, many communities' water ponds are insufficient to last throughout the dry season, and villages without access to freshwater sources are faced with the challenge of importing water from other villages with more extensive ponds. Pre-cyclone, it was usually just a case of buying water from the nearest village, and a whole industry of boat-borne water vendors thrived during the season.
However, many of the boats used by the villagers and by water vendors were destroyed in the cyclone and those who still have transport will probably have to go much further afield to find water. More critically still, people just don't have the resources they normally do to buy water, having had their assets and livelihoods destroyed by Cyclone Nargis.
Andre Steele, Merlin’s Water and Sanitation Technical Manager, says: “The immediate need is to provide clean drinking water. And in the long-term, communities need support to be able to capture and store the abundant amount of rain that falls in the wet season.â€
Since Cyclone Nargis, Merlin has carried out an extensive programme to clean community drinking water ponds, rebuild damaged water tanks and distribute jerry cans and water filters.
The water and sanitation team, consisting of two expatriates and 33 national staff, has installed and is running one water treatment unit and six reverse osmosis machines. Reverse osmosis machines are able to produce drinking water from otherwise contaminated sources including river water. Using 12 cargo boats, Merlin is distributing water to 90 villages, with a total population of 40,000 and to date has distributed 1,115,000 litres of purified water.
Dr Paul Sender, Merlin’s Country Director in Myanmar, says: “This life-saving intervention will reach all members of all households, with a particular emphasis on the most vulnerable population groups, including children, the elderly and disabled. Children are particularly important, as they are most at risk of contracting water-borne diseases. In order to provide a comprehensive and sustainable approach to the problem, we are simultaneously addressing the issue of poor sanitation.â€
Merlin is adopting an approach called Community-Led Total Sanitation (CLTS), a process devised to mobilise a community into building and using latrines and to stop open defecation by creating an understanding amongst villages of the risks associated with poor household level waste disposal.
Sanitation teams visit villages to talk about the dangers of open defecation and support and encourage people to change their behaviour and start building latrines. This approach has rarely been tried in the aftermath of such a large-scale natural disaster but has proved to be a highly effective intervention and so far this activity has been completed in 25 villages out of the 90 villages receiving water distribution.
All of the above programmes are having an immediate impact, in terms of reducing water-borne diseases, but more sustained investment is needed to make a real difference in the long-term.
Find out more about our long-term work in Myanmar
You can help save lives: Please donate now
[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Save the Mekong Coalition Launch
http://www.bicusa.org/en/Article.11066.aspx
March 14th 2009 in Bangkok
A new coalition to save Southeast Asia’s Mekong River will be launched at a special photography exhibition in Bangkok this weekend.
The exhibition by one of Thailand’s leading photographers, Suthep Kritsanavarin, is entitled “Siphandone – Mekong Fishing Under Threat.”
The Siphandone area is located on the Mekong River in southern Laos, nearby to Thailand’s Ubon Ratchathani province and Cambodia’s Stung Treng province. It is just one area threatened by a series of eleven big hydropower dams proposed for the lower stretches of the mighty river, which is shared by China, Burma, Thailand, Lao PDR, Cambodia and Vietnam.
The Save the Mekong coalition was formed in response to growing public concern about the effects big dams would have on the Mekong’s migratory fish stocks, regional food security, and the livelihoods of millions of people.
The coalition is open to non-government organizations, community groups, academics, artists and ordinary citizens within the Mekong region and internationally, anyone who shares concerns regarding the future of one of the world’s greatest river systems.
Save the Mekong aims to do two things: raise public awareness about the risks associated with damming such an important international river, and persuade policymakers to adopt more sustainable and peaceful ways of meeting people’s energy and water needs.
Over the coming months, Save the Mekong coalition partners in the Mekong region and internationally will launch a series of activities supporting the coalition’s message.
During March and April, Save the Mekong will be collecting signed postcards from people in the Mekong countries and around the world, urging the region’s political leaders to keep the Mekong flowing freely as a precious source of food, income and life for present and future generations.
People can also sign an online petition.
More information on the coalition and plans to build hydropower dams on the Mekong is available in English, Burmese, Chinese, Khmer, Lao, Thai and Vietnamese on the coalition’s web site www.SavetheMekong.org.
More information on the coalition and plans to build hydropower dams on the Mekong is available in English, Burmese, Chinese, Khmer, Lao, Thai and Vietnamese on the coalition’s web site www.SavetheMekong.org.
For more information, CONTACT:
Premrudee Daoroung, Co-Director, Towards Ecological Recovery and Regional Alliance (TERRA) Tel. 02-691-0718-20, 081-4342334 email: fer@terraper.org; www.terraper.org
Carl Middleton, International Rivers, Mekong Program Coordinator, Tel: 084-6815332 Email: carl@internationalrivers.org; www.internationalrivers.org
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Scientists find Dracula-fish in Burma
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=88227§ionid=3510208
Wed, 11 Mar 2009 15:33:24 GMT
The Danionella dracula
Researchers have found a fish with Dracula-like fangs, which they believe is one of the most interesting recently-identified vertebrates.
The 17mm-long fish, which was found in a stream near Mogaung in Burma, is the only one of its kind to have bones projecting through the skin that resemble real teeth.
Writing in the Royal Society's journal Proceedings B, scientists at London's Natural History Museum say the males use their fangs to jostle each other, but they do not bite.
"When you watch them in captivity you can see the males sparring," BBC quoted NHM's Ralf Britz as saying.
"They display with their lower jaws open incredibly widely, then they nudge each other; but we don't see any wounds."
Scientists say the translucent fish is the only known species of over 3,700 types of carp-like fish to have evolved with teeth.
"The teeth that Danionella dracula has are very surprising because none of the other 3,700 species in the Cypriniform group have any teeth in their jaws,” said Dr. Ralf Britz of London's Natural History Museum.
"In fact, they lost their jaw teeth about 50 million years ago in the Upper Eocene Period. Danionella dracula, however, evolved its own dracula-like teeth structures by growing them from the jaw bones rather than re-evolving jaw teeth," he explained.
HRF/TE/HGH
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Myanmar drawing private-companies-involved reforestation plan
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-03/08/content_10971778.htm
www.chinaview.cn 2009-03-08 22:41:56 Print
YANGON, March 8 (Xinhua) -- Myanmar is drawing a 30-year plan involving the participation of private companies in a bid to prevent forest from depletion and preserve natural environment.
Under the plan, a private company of Kaungmyat is projected to grow 200,000 teak plantations in the country, the local Flower News said Sunday, adding that as part of the plan, the company will also grow 405 hectares of wood plantations including teak and hardwood in the first five years.
According to other local report, the private Htoo Foundation has started an initial three-year project (2008-2010) of planting 8,100 hectares of teak in Myitkyina and Bhamo, northernmost Kachinstate of the country.
More companies such as ATSO Green, Yeedagon, NRTC and Honda plan to grow 48,600 hectares and 7,493 hectares in Bago division and Kachin state respectively.
Since 2005, the Myanmar government has granted private companies for cultivation of teak and allotted land for them for the purpose and such allotted land has now reached up to 80,000 hectares in two divisions or states in the country.
Meanwhile, foreign agencies are also helping Myanmar green the country's dry zone in the central part. Of them, the Korean International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) has introduced a project worth of 1.5 million U.S. dollars to improve rehabilitation capacity of the deforested Nyaung U region.
Besides, a Japanese company, the Kokusai Kogyo Co., has also offered to provide consultant services for an a forestation project in the same dry zone under a grant aid assistance worth 61million yens (nearly 500,000 U.S. dollars), according to earlier official report.
There are 155,340 square-kilometers of reserve forests and protected public forests in Myanmar with 52,650 hectares of forest plantations, statistics show.
Myanmar is rich in forest resources with forests covering about50 percent of its total land area.
Editor: Yan
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Global warming
http://www.educate-myanmar.com/2009/03/global-warming.html
Thursday, March 5, 2009
ကမၻာၾကီး ပူေႏြးလာတာ လူေတြ ေၾကာင့္ စက္ရုုံ ေတြေၾကာင့္ ျဖစ္တယ္လိုု ့ ေျပာလာတာ ကိုု
ျပန္လည္ ေခ်ပ ၾကပါတယ္။
ကမၻာေပၚမွာရာသီဥတုု ေျပာင္းလဲတတ္တာ သဘာဝ ျဖစ္ပါတယ္။
အေၾကာင္းမရွိအေၾကာင္း၇ွာ ျပီး အစိုုးရ ဆီ က ေထာက္ပန္ ့ေငြေတြရေအာင္ ဖန္တီးေရးသားၾကတာ ကိုုတင္ျပထားတာ ဖတ္ရပါတယ္။
Topic: Global Warming
Global Warming Man Made or Natural Cycle?
Over the last hundred years the Earth has been warming. This warming is believed to lead to many issues such as drought, weather extremes and famine. The man made global warming theory states that man made CO2 is causing Earth to warm at an alarming rate; thus, the warming will continue.by Adam Rink
(libertarian)
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Over the last hundred years the Earth has been warming. This warming is believed to lead to many issues such as drought, weather extremes and famine. The man made global warming theory states that man made CO2 is causing Earth to warm at an alarming rate; thus, the warming will continue. While some scientists believe CO2 is the culprit, other scientists believe the world’s warming and cooling happens in cycles due to various factors. Some of these scientists believe that Earth is starting a cooling trend after a long warming trend. Therefore, the trillion dollar question is global warming caused by CO2 or is this Earth’s natural cycle?
Carbon dioxide is the gas that is responsible for global warming under the man made global warming theory. CO2 is also a part of everyday life. Therefore, this gas should not be confused with smog, which creates a low level ozone layer that can be harmful to humans. CO2 is less than 2% of the world’s atmosphere. Meanwhile 93% of all CO2 is stored in the world’s oceans; the rest is stored the biosphere in things like plants. Oceans move CO2 into the atmosphere and then remove it as continual cycle. Warmer waters, like tropical waters, store less CO2 than colder arctic or deep waters. As CO2 increases in the Earth’s atmosphere, the oceans work harder to remove it. CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere have increased 30% since the pre-industrial era. The ocean has also increased its absorption of CO2 from roughly 2.0 Pg of CO2 in the 1980s to 2.4 Pg in the 1990s. Along with the oceans increased CO2 absorption, plants and trees also take in more CO2. This extra absorption of CO2 increases crop yields and plant growth.
The question arises if man is increasing the CO2 significantly or if the oceans are naturally warming and releasing more CO2 as a part of a cycle? Unfortunately, most graphs shown in news articles only go back 120 years, starting in the 1880s. One glance at these graphs and a person could easily deduce that man and industrialization has caused global warming. Many seem to forget that the last ice age was over 100,000 years ago, so looking at the last 120 years for temperature change seems inadequate. Archeologists have found cities under the oceans, such as the one in India that is 9500 years old. This indicates that the Earth must have been warming for some time, possibly including many warming and cooling cycles. Going back 2000 years paints a better picture than the 120 year "hockey stick" graph. In the Middle Ages the temperature deviation was the same as today. This period did not have industry that created man made CO2.
Images are from GlobalWarmingArt.com, red line is the most recent reconstructed model. Darker lines indicate older models.
Another interesting fact is that even though man made CO2 has exponentially increasing from 1950 to today, temperature from 1940 to 1980 decreased. Scientists back in the 1970s believed that pollution was causing global cooling. The real problem is that any model based off a lower point, like 1880s temperature, would make the model appear that the earth is on fire. Instead of using incomplete models, models need to include a couple of temperature cycles to fully understand how the Earth behaves.
At least 70-80% of the Earth’s warming effect comes from water vapor and clouds not CO2. CO2 traps about 10-20% of the world’s heat. Other contributors to warming include high altitude cirrus clouds and sunspots. Cirrus clouds block radiant heat from escaping the Earth’s atmosphere. Sunspots have been known throughout history to have an effect on the Earth’s temperature. From 1645 to 1715 there were very few sunspots recorded. This also was a period referred to as the little ice age. Over the last 60 years, our sun has been very active with a record number of sun spots recorded. This could also be the reason that ice caps on Mars are melting and other planets in our solar system are experiencing warming, like Jupiter.
By studying models that are more inclusive, scientists are now worried about the warming trend reversing. The Antarctic Ice Sheet is growing at a record pace. The media seems to focus on just the Wilkins ice sheet, which is only 0.01% of Antarctica’s ice cover. The rest of the ice cover is returning 60% faster than last year at 4.0 square km. Even Greenland is seeing a 15 year high in ice levels between Canada and itself. In the US this spring has been much cooler than normal for most of the country. These events are leading more and more scientists to believe the Earth is in for a cooling trend. If global cooling occurs, agricultural life could change as we know it. This could lead to a worldwide food shortage and a displacement of millions of people.
Currently, the United States Congress is debating a potential five trillion dollar energy policy. This policy will place carbon caps on corporations. This will raise cost of energy significantly. Money raised from these caps would be redistributed to more expensive renewable energy projects. The poor will suffer the most as they will have to contend with rising food prices, rising gas prices and now rising energy costs. With so many factors causing global warming, the anti- CO2 movement seems very reckless and will cause many people to suffer.
Fighting emissions from cars and factories is a very noble cause. Pollution can cause all sorts of problems like asthma. To say the world is warming because of humans is a very bold claim. Lots of factors go into warming the Earth. To focus on just one, CO2 is very naïve. It can also be very dangerous as it sacrifices our economic stability and standard of living. Doubling the price of gasoline over the last few years has caused food costs to shoot up; fishermen and truckers to be put out of business; and many low income people to suffer. Now, Congress is debating to do the same thing to electricity prices.
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Posted by May Burma at 6:14 PM
1 comments:
Anonymous said...
Keeping in mind that windmills are hazardous to birds, be wary of the unintended consequences of believing and contributing to the all-knowing environmental lobby groups.
Climate and economy are being linked. Yes there has been warming since the Pleistocene. Climate is a multiple input, multiple loop, multiple output, complex system. The facts and the hypotheses do not support CO2 as a serious 'pollutant'. In fact it is plant fertilizer and seriously important to all life on the planet. It is the red herring used by the left to unwind our economy. That issue makes the science relevant.
Water vapour (0.4% overall by volume in air, but 1 – 4 % near the surface) is the most effective green house gas followed by methane (0.0001745%). The third ranking greenhouse gas is CO2 (0.0383%), and it does not correlate well with global warming or cooling either; in fact, CO2 in the atmosphere trails warming which is clear natural evidence for its well-studied inverse solubility in water: CO2 dissolves in cold water and bubbles out of warm water. The equilibrium in seawater is very high; making seawater a great 'sink'; CO2 is 34 times more soluble in water than air is soluble in water.
CO2 has been rising and Earth has been warming. However, the correlation trails. Correlation, moreover, is not causation. The causation is being studied, however, and while the radiation from the sun varies only in the fourth decimal place, the magnetism is awesome.
“Using a box of air in a Copenhagen lab, physicists traced the growth of clusters of molecules of the kind that build cloud condensation nuclei. These are specks of sulphuric acid on which cloud droplets form. High-energy particles driven through the laboratory ceiling by exploded stars far away in the Galaxy - the cosmic rays - liberate electrons in the air, which help the molecular clusters to form much faster than climate scientists have modeled in the atmosphere. That may explain the link between cosmic rays, cloudiness and climate change.”
As I understand it, the hypothesis of the Danish National Space Center goes as follows:
Quiet sun → reduced magnetic and thermal flux = reduced solar wind → geomagnetic shield drops → galactic cosmic ray flux → more low-level clouds and more snow → more albedo effect (more heat reflected) → colder climate
Active sun → enhanced magnetic and thermal flux = solar wind → geomagnetic shield response → less low-level clouds → less albedo (less heat reflected) → warmer climate
That is how the bulk of climate change might work, coupled with (modulated by) sunspot peak frequency there are cycles of global warming and cooling like waves in the ocean. When the waves are closely spaced, the planets warm; when the waves are spaced farther apart, the planets cool.
The ultimate cause of the solar magnetic cycle may be cyclicity in the Sun-Jupiter centre of gravity. We await more on that.
Although the post 60s warming period appears to be over, it has allowed the principal green house gas, water vapour, to kick in with more humidity, clouds, rain and snow depending on where you live to provide the negative feedback that scientists use to explain the existence of complex life on Earth for 550 million years. Ancient sedimentary rocks and paleontological evidence indicate the planet has had abundant liquid water over the entire span. The planet heats and cools naturally and our gasses are the thermostat.
Check the web site of the Danish National Space Center.
http://www.space.dtu.dk/English/Research/Research_divisions/Sun_Climate/Experiments_SC/SKY.aspx
Friday, February 13, 2009
Junta's business crony to build Nature Park in northern Burma
http://www.mizzima.com/news/inside-burma/1701-juntas-business-crony-to-build-natural-park-in-northern-burma.html
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – The Burmese military junta's business associate, the Htoo Trading Company, has begun building a Nature Park in Northern Burma, which will house rare species of butterflies, orchids and wild animals.
Earlier the Nature Park was to be built by Woodland Company in association with the Forest Department near Mularshidee village in Puta-O township of Kachin State. It has now been taken over by Htoo Trading.
"The park will cover 500 acres and is expected to be completed by 2010. Now the survey work has started and we hope the construction work can be started after two months. The main aim of this project is to boost tourism in this region," the project's official told Mizzima.
The butterfly park in the project will have over 50 rare species of butterflies from Burma especially from Kachin State with over 1,500 varieties and will resemble the Butterfly and Insect Park in Singapore.
Besides, the Nature Park will have rare Burmese orchids and rare animals like red panda and Takin, the official said. But he declined to say whether foreign experts have been roped in for the project.
Earlier, as a business expansion move in the tourism sector, the 'Balloons over Bagan', a subsidiary of Htoo Business Group, took over the 'Malikha Lodge', the highly rated guesthouse in Puta-O.
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Business tycoon Tay Za, owner of the Htoo Groups of Company, is among the list of businessmen that the United States had imposed sanctions on for his alleged role in supporting the ruling military regime's human rights violations and being a crony of the junta. He is also barred from visiting the US and his cash and assets were frozen in the US.
In the project area of the 'Nature Park', another hotel of the Htoo Trading Co. is under construction.
A sales manager of a travel agency in Rangoon said, "On the completion of this hotel, they will sell tour programmes to visit the park and for tourists to stay at the hotel. Currently they are running such tour operations in association with Malikha Lodge. We heard that there will be skiing in this region ".
Currently the 'Treasure' tour agency is operating tour programmes for those visiting areas around Puta-O and staying at the Malikha Lodge.
"Their tour programme will cost at least USD 1,500 per head depending on the itinerary and duration of stay," he added.
The Puta-O region, which is located in the foothills of the Himalayas, is a major tourist attraction site with abundance of wildlife. Bird watchers and tourists who love adventure frequently visit the area for mountaineering and hiking in the jungles. It is also home to several unique and rare birds, butterflies and orchids.
According to an eco-tourism operator in Rangoon, about 40 international tourists have either booked tour programmes to visit Puto-O region or have visited this region from December 2008 onwards.
"Since he [Tayza] has his own hotels, own airlines and enjoys favourable business opportunities from the junta, he took over everything," said another tour operator.
But he added that he has not lost hope in remaining in the business. "There's a saying in the tour business that the tourism industry is a 'Non-chimney industry' from which we can reap handsome profits while making little capital investment. Moreover the customers will never be exhausted in this business."
'Air Bagan' airline owner Tay Za has already has a chain of hotels in most of the famous tourist attractions sites in Burma including Rangoon, Mandalay, Inle lake in Shan state, the ancient city of Bagan, and Poppa and Ngapali beaches.
China’s Water Woes: Past, Present, and Future
http://thechinabeat.blogspot.com/2009/02/chinas-water-woes-past-present-and.html
2/12/2009
The Chinese droughts have just begun to move onto the front pages of the world's newspapers, but the droughts are just the latest sign of much more dire warnings of water woes in China. Some China experts are talking about this (see, for instance, today's event at the Wilson Center on "Temperatures Rising: Climate Change, Water, and the Himalayas"), but, in China Beat fashion, we're hoping to encourage many more people to do a little more reading and talking about it too, so we invited Ken Pomeranz to reflect on the present news and suggest a few further readings for those who are interested.
By Ken Pomeranz
Water is back in the China-related news lately – and that’s almost always a bad sign. Most recently, we have had stories about the grinding North China drought; this may be the worst since the late 50s drought that exacerbated the Great Leap Forward famine. A bit earlier, we had the report of credible (though unproven) research suggesting that last May’s catastrophic Sichuan earthquake may have been triggered by pressure from the water stored behind Zipingpu Dam. (See here for an early report, and then the slightly later piece, with more about the key Chinese scientist involved, by Evan Osnos of the New Yorker). Late in January, Jiang Gaoming of the Chinese Academy of Sciences released a sobering piece (China Dialogue, January 22, 2009) about how accelerating the construction of dams in China’s Southwest – part of the P.R.C.’s ambitious stimulus package to fight the global recession – is worsening the already considerable environmental and social risks involved, with some projects beginning before any Environmental Impact Assessments have been completed. Such a confluence of events is enough to make a historian think back…to about six weeks ago.
When the China Beat crew decided to put together our book China in 2008, I drew what you could consider either the long or the short straw, depending on your tastes: light editorial duties in return for writing an “end of the year wrap-up” piece to go at the end of the book. (Most of the copy had to go to the press by November 1, and a book with the sub-title “10 months out of a year of great significance” somehow didn’t seem right.) And as the last days of the year ticked off and I tried to figure out what things about 2008 to emphasize, water kept winding up at the center. Here’s an excerpt:
“The Olympics briefly focused attention on China’s serious air pollution problems…But China’s water woes are at least equally pressing, and it may be easier to see what effects they will have. Two little-noted news items from near the end of the year may illuminate that – after we review some background.
Water has always been a problem in China, and effective control of it has been associated with both personal heroism and legitimate sovereignty for as far back as our records go…. But water scarcity is probably an even greater problem than excesses, especially in the modern period. Surface and near-surface water per capita in China today is roughly ¼ of the global average, and worse yet, it is distributed very unevenly. The North and Northwest, with over half the country’s arable land, have about 7 percent of its surface water; the North China Plain, in particular, has 10 to12 percent of the per capita supply for the country as a whole, or less than 3 percent of the global average. China also has unusually violent seasonal fluctuations in water supply; both rainfall and river levels change much more over the course of the year than in either Europe or North America. While the most famous of China’s roughly 85,000 dams are associated with hydro-power (about which more in a minute), a great many exist mostly to store water during the peak flow of rivers for use at other times of year.
The People’s Republic has made enormous efforts to address these problems – and achieved impressive short-term successes that are now extremely vulnerable. Irrigated acreage has more than tripled since 1950, with the vast majority of those gains coming in the North and Northwest; this has turned the notorious “land of famine” of the 1850-1950 period into a crucial grain surplus area, and contributed mightily to improving per capita food supplies for a national population that has more than doubled. Much of that, however, has come through the massive use of deep wells bringing up underground water far faster than it can be replaced; and a great deal of water is wasted, especially in agriculture, where costs to farmers are kept artificially low. (Chinese agriculture is not necessarily more wasteful in this regard than agriculture in many other places – and certainly the deviations from market prices are no worse than in the supposedly market-driven United States – but its limited supplies make waste a much more immediate problem.) Water tables are now dropping rapidly in much of North China, and water shortages are a frequent fact of life for most urban residents. (Beijing suffers fewer water shortages, but only because it can commandeer the water resources of a large surrounding rural area included in the municipality.) Various technologies that would reduce water waste exist, but most are expensive. More realistic pricing of irrigation water would help – but probably at the price of driving millions of marginal farmers to the wall, and greatly accelerating the already rapid rush of people to the cities. Consequently, adoption of both of these palliatives is likely to remain slow.
Instead, the state has chosen a massive three-pronged effort to move water from South to North China – by far the biggest construction project in history, if it is completed. Part of the Eastern section began operating this year, and the Central section is also underway (though the December 31 Wall Street Journal reported a delay due to environmental concerns). The big story in the long run, however is the Western line, which will tap the enormous water resources of China’s far Southwest – Tibet alone has over 30 percent of China’s fresh water supply, most of it coming from the annual run-off of some water from Himalayan glaciers. (This is an aspect of the Tibet question one rarely hears about, but rest assured that all the engineers in China’s leadership, including Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao, are very much aware of it. Tibetans, meanwhile, not only see a precious resource going elsewhere when their water is tapped: they regard many of the lakes and rivers to be dammed as sacred.) The engineering challenges in this mountainous region are enormous, but so are the potential rewards, both in water supply and in hydropower – the electricity water can generate is directly proportional to how far it falls into the turbines, and the Yangzi, for instance, completes 90 percent of its drop to the sea before it even enters China proper. The risks, as our two stories make clear, are social and political as well as environmental…
Call the two news stories the “double glacier shock.” On December 9, Asia Times Online reported that China was planning to go ahead with a major hydroelectric dam and water diversion scheme on the great bend of the Yarlong Tsangpo River in Tibet. The hydro project is planned to generate 40,000 megawatts – almost twice as much as Three Gorges. But the water which this dam would impound and turn northwards currently flows south into Assam to form the Brahmaputra, which in turn joins the Ganges to form the world’s largest river delta, supplying much of the water to a basin with over 300 million inhabitants. While South Asians have worried for some time that China might divert this river, the Chinese government had denied any such intentions, reportedly doing so again when Hu Jintao visited New Delhi in 2006. But when Indian Prime Minister Singh raised the issue again during his January, 2008 visit to Beijing, the tone had changed, with Wen Jiabao supposedly replying that water scarcity is a threat to the “very survival of the Chinese nation,” and providing no assurances. And so it is – not only for China, but for its neighbors. Most of Asia’s major rivers – the Yellow, the Yangzi, the Mekong, Salween, Irrawaddy, Brahmaputra, Ganges, Sutlej, and Indus – draw on the glaciers of the Himalayas, and all of these except the Ganges have their source on the Chinese side of the border. Forty-seven percent of the world’s people, from Karachi to Tianjin, draw on those rivers.
In short the possible damage to China’s neighbors from this approach to its water and energy needs is staggeringly large – and the potential to raise political tensions is commensurate. Previous water diversion projects affecting the source of the Mekong have already drawn protests from Vietnam (and from environmental groups), and a project on the Nu River (which becomes the Salween in Thailand and Burma) was suspended in 2004. But this project has vastly larger implications for both Chinese and foreigners. If, as some people think, the twenty-first century will be the century of conflicts over water, Tibet may well be ground zero.
Of course, China is hardly the only country that has ever appropriated water (not to mention other resources) that others see as theirs; I am writing in Southern California, made much more livable by denying Mexico Colorado River water it is theoretically guaranteed by treaty. And there is also something to be said, environmentally, for anything that provides China with lots of electricity and isn’t coal…
But that’s where the second glacier shock of 2008 comes in – news that this crucial water source is disappearing faster than anyone had previously realized. A report published in Geophysical Research Letters on November 22 noted that recent samples taken from Himalayan glaciers were missing two markers that are usually easy to find, reflecting open air nuclear tests in 1951-2 and 1962-3. The reason: the glacier apparently had lost any ice built up since the mid-1940s…And since the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change estimates that the Himalayan highlands will warm at about twice the average global rate over the next century, there is every reason to think the situation will get worse. One estimate has 1/3 of the Himalayan glaciers disappearing by 2050, and 2/3 by 2100. If that scenario is right, then even if all the engineering challenges of South-North water diversion can be solved, and even if China undertakes and gets away with taking water away from hundreds of millions of people in South and Southeast Asia, the resulting fix might not last very long…”
Strangely, these stories have attracted very little press coverage. There is, however, an excellent video at the Asia Society website. And there is a fair amount of stuff that’s worth reading about China’s water problems in general. If you are interested in learning more, here are a few things I would recommend:
1. James Nickum has a nice, short, summary of the South-North water transfer project available online. His December 1998 essay in China Quarterly, “Is China Living on the Water Margin?” (#156, 880-898) seems to me to have held up very nicely for a 10-year old overview of this rapidly changing set of problems (and as regular readers of this blog know, we give extra points for punning titles).
2. Another useful overview from several years ago (more technical than Nickum’s) is Olli Varis and Pertti Vakkilainen “China’s 8 challenges to water resources management in the first quarter of the 21st Century,” Geomorphology 41:2/3 pp. 93-104 (November 15, 2001). If you’re at a place where you can access the web version (i.e., a library with a subscription), you’ll find lots of useful further links to click on. (Here is one link for those with a subscription through ScienceDirect.)
3. Elizabeth Economy’s The River Runs Black seems to me to overstate the problems at some times (and since I don’t have a sanguine view, that should give an idea how, umm, black, her take is), but it’s a very good introduction to some of the relevant policy-making agencies and processes.
4. Dai Qing’s various essays on Three Gorges and other hydro projects are very useful, as is the collection Mega-Project (which included both official and unofficial views of the project).
5. Probe International often has good material, as does the International Rivers project.
6. And since plugging oneself is OK on a blog, I have a long-ish essay on the history of Chinese water management in a forthcoming collection of essays on environmental history: Burke, Edmund III, and Kenneth Pomeranz, editors The Environment and World History (UC Press, forthcoming March, 2009).
Posted by The China Beat at 2/12/2009 07:13:00 AM
Labels: China Behind the Headline, Global China, Tibet
Monday, February 9, 2009
Last call for forests in Northern Burma -MIZZIMA
http://www.mizzima.com/edop/commentary/1671-last-call-for-forests-in-northern-burma.html
by Phyusin Linn
Sunday, 08 February 2009 05:39
Forests in Northern Burma, some of the last frontiers of Asia's rain forests, are facing a chronic threat.
Logging is back in Kachin State under a new mask. Logging no longer will be the illegal business in one of the world's biggest green regions that houses most of the teaks left on earth. Logging this time has returned into the region with bigger ambition and the safer shield under the title of agro-forestry development projects.
For decades, deforestation in Kachin State was traditionally carried out by agricultural farming industry of the local people and Asia's one of the longest civil wars in the nation. High speed massive illegal logging was introduced to the region only by logging companies from neighbouring Yunnan Province only after China's economy started roaring in 1990s. And it remarkably escalated in 1998 when China banned logging in its nation after facing serious floods in their home land. Forests in northern Burma were dwindling quickly in early 2000 and Kachin State became a hottest target for all the international watchdogs. But, finally, loggers have found a new and safest way to continue their business with a higher speed.
Everything started in 2006 when the government began promoting a nation wide bio fuel campaign to grow a castor oil across the nation as a state crop. Although state sponsored project of growing castor oil plants only kept the people busy in other areas, but in Kachin State, it killed the forests that once survived from the hands of the loggers in early 2000. Companies cleaned the forests to grow the castor oil in a massive scale. As a result, logs and other forest products, as usual, were brought and sold to the Chinese logging companies.
Companies got enlightenment, copying the model of castor oil projects, to expand the logging business in the region on a massive scale. They said castor oil should not only be the state crop, there are several other important crops that the state should focus on in a large scale in the region. And the companies said they will dutifully serve those noble endeavours to develop the region.
Under the forest regulations issued in May, 2008, companies who want to run an agro-forestry project can rent the forest areas from the Ministry of Forests with a 30-year deed.
Companies borrowed the loans from the banks in Yunnan Province. Banks and logging people in Yunnan were enthusiastic to help their neighbouring friends' decision to develop the massive farming industries.
More tractors, dozers of cars and other machineries were ambitiously brought to the region. The roads between Kachin State and Yunnan were reconstructed again. Roads became even much better than the Yangon-Mandalay highway.
A Kachin local remarked, "the better road we have the more trees we lose".
And finally companies take their share dividing the forest areas in Kachin state. There are four major crops that the companies are growing in Northern Burma such as sugar cane, rubber, tapioca and castor oil. Each company takes an average of 200,000 acres of forest land in the region.
Needless to say, they all cut the trees, again, to clean the forests before they started growing the state crops. But this time the scale is larger and lethal to the trees left in the region. A forest official said that the major reason of deforestation in northern Myanmar is expanding the agricultural projects. He concluded that the best way to maintain the forests is to conserve the present forests rather than reforestation. Because to see the success of reforestation in the future is not so certain, he continued.
How good are the reforestation projects in Kachin State?
There are some reforestation projects in the region where forestry officials are trying to grow teak and other trees to re-green the land. But unfortunately the scale and the timing is no match to counter the loggers' projects.
Forests in northern Myanmar were registered by the British government as the Permanent Forests Estates (PFE) for the first time since 1895. But after independence, the first time the Burmese government registered one forest as PFE was only in 2005.
The speed of logging is far beyond the speed of reforestation.
Trucks loaded with Burmese logs are still passing the border to China.
Trees are dwindling in the region.
And the impact on environment has been escalated.
This is a call not only to the people in Burma but to everyone in Asia.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Over 1,000 Chinese workers in Burma’s Chibwe hydropower project
http://mqvu.wordpress.com/2009/01/18/over-1000-chinese-workers-in-burmas-chibwe-hydropower-project/
International Rivers has picked up this article, written by KNG and dated 13 January, from the Kachin News website.
To expedite the hydropower project in N’Mai River at Chibwe city in
Burma’s northern Kachin state, about 1,000 Chinese workers have been inducted in the project site since late December, 2008, said local sources. (…) The Chinese workers are employed by China’s
China Power Investment Corporation (CPI) and they are working together with about 300 Burmese workers of the Burma-Asia World Company which is owned by Burma’s former drug king Lo Hsing Han, residents of Chibwe said. (…)
Mr. Awng Wa, an anti-dam activist and chairman of Kachin Development Networking Group (KDNG) based on the Sino-Burma border told KNG today, “Chinese companies working under CPI in Chibwe hydropower project are also taking out valuable minerals from the project areas to China while working for the hydropower project.” (…)
Owners of restaurants in Chibwe are also seriously suffering and are
about to close their shops because the workers in Asia World Company eat daily at their restaurants without paying for the past six months to a year. On the other hand, owners of house construction stores have to provide the materials demanded by the company without getting payment for a long time.
The shop owners are unable to complain to the CPI and Asia World
Company because they are strongly backed by the Burmese ruling junta, added local residents.
Chibwe hydropower project is one of a total seven hydropower projects in Mali and N’Mai Rivers in Kachin state which is being built by the CPI and Asia World Company of the junta since 2006. The Chibwe hydropower project will generate a total of 2,000 MW of electricity.
According to sources from the two companies, the Chibwe hydropower project is being implemented under a 20-year project.
What surprised me about this article is that there are anti-dam groups operating on the Burma-China border. What, NGOs in Burma? I have imagined that border region to be ultramilitarized and ultrapoor, not the sort of place you’d have lots of space for dissidence or “civil society” (though Chinese merchants in Boten, who had come over from there, say that the environment was more “modern” than in Laos). So I am very curious about this “anti-dam group.” This would be a great place to check what a people who have (or so it is said in Western accounts) been pressganged and terrorised by various armies and drug lords for long actually think about development imported from China. This article certainly suggests that military-style requisitioning is still in fashion, to the benefit of the Chinese managers now.
Another point to note is that Lo Hsing Han, by the sound of his name, is probably Chinese; but is he a former KMT or a former Red Guard/BCP? Guo Xiaolin in her work on Burma-China relations (see Bibliography, Working Paper 1) does point out that a number of former Red Guards went over the border to aid the Burmese Communist Party and then became major drug players.
This entry was posted on January 18, 2009 at 10:14 am and is filed under Southeast Asia. Tagged: Burma, hydropower. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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Wednesday, January 7, 2009
Disaster-heavy 2008 raises pressure for climate pact, insurance
http://www.alertnet.org/db/an_art/20316/2009/00/5-174834-1.htm
05 Jan 2009 17:48:00 GMT
Written by: Megan Rowling
Cyclone Nargis survivors sit outside their shelter in Mawlamyinegyun, Myanmar, June 2008.
IFRC/John Sparrow
After December's uninspiring U.N. climate change talks in Poland, the process that's meant to lead to a new global pact in Copenhagen at the end of this year could do with a shot in the arm.
While the world waits impatiently to see how U.S. President-elect Barack Obama will tackle climate change once his administration gets up and running in late January, perhaps a few disaster statistics will help fill the gap.
At the end of December, Munich Re - one of the world's biggest reinsurance companies - said a large number of tropical cyclones, combined with May's earthquake in Sichuan, China, made 2008 one of the most devastating years on record.
Although there was a drop in the number of events that resulted in financial losses - from 960 in 2007 to 750 - the number of people affected and the scale of the losses jumped.
More than 220,000 people died as a result of natural catastrophes - including around 135,000 after Cyclone Nargis hit Myanmar in May (this figure includes those still missing) and 88,000 in the China quake. The high death toll makes 2008 the deadliest year since 2004, the year of the Indian Ocean tsunami.
And costly weather-related disasters helped push the total of economic losses to $200 billion (up from $82 billion in 2007). Adjusting figures for inflation, 2008 was the third most expensive year on record, exceeded only by 2005, which was the year Hurricane Katrina battered America's Gulf Coast, and 1995, when an earthquake devastated the Japanese city of Kobe.
Of course, the Sichuan earthquake was not caused by climate change, and it's difficult to finger global warming as the main culprit behind one-off events like Cyclone Nargis.
But Munich Re also pointed out that 2008 was a particularly heavy year for storms, which brought sea surges, flooding and high winds to the U.S. mainland. And the company stated that 2008 added to the evidence that climate change is boosting the risks of, and losses from, natural disasters.
"This continues the long-term trend we have been observing. Climate change has already started and is very probably contributing to increasingly frequent weather extremes and ensuing natural catastrophes," said Munich Re board member Torsten Jeworrek.
"These, in turn, generate greater and greater losses because the concentration of values in exposed areas, like regions on the coast, is also increasing further throughout the world."
Delving into some of the details on storms and temperatures provides a little more insight:
2008 was the fourth most severe hurricane season since reliable data have been available.
The number of tropical cyclones in the North Atlantic - at 16 - was much higher than the long-term average, and above the average of 14.7 during a warm phase that started in 1995.
Half of the windstorms in 2008 reached hurricane strength, with five classified as major hurricanes.
2008 was the tenth warmest year since the beginning of routine temperature records, and the eighth warmest in the northern hemisphere, according to provisional estimates from the World Meteorological Organisation.
This means the 10 warmest years ever recorded all occurred in the past 12 years.
Munich Re said it was "very probable" that the warming of the earth's atmosphere is due to the greenhouse gases emitted by human activity.
"The logic is clear: when temperatures increase, there is more evaporation and the atmosphere has a greater capacity to absorb water vapour, with the result that its energy content is higher. The weather machine runs in top gear, bringing more intense severe weather events with corresponding effects in terms of losses," said Peter Höppe, who heads Munich Re's research on geo risks.
"This relationship is already visible today in the increasing heavy precipitation events in many regions of the earth, the heatwaves, and the hurricanes in the North Atlantic," he added.
At the same time, Munich Re stressed the importance of sealing a new global pact this year to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, which is due to replace or extend the Kyoto Protocol from 2013.
"The next climate summit in Copenhagen must quite clearly fix the route for reducing greenhouse gases by at least 50 percent by 2050 with corresponding milestones," said Jeworrek. "If we delay too long, it will be very costly for future generations."
Yet even if governments do find the political will to agree on new emissions targets, experts agree that the global warming already in the pipeline will lead to more extreme weather in the coming decades.
That's why finding ways to protect vulnerable people - particularly the world's poorest - from potential disasters, and helping them adapt to a changing climate is judged to be an essential part of a new global deal by many developing countries.
INSURANCE FOR THE POOREST
The negotiations which inched along in Poland included significant discussions on how to insure developing countries against disasters and help them put in place prevention measures.
A proposal from the Munich Climate Insurance Initiative - a coalition of insurers, non-governmental organisations and climate change experts - outlines a mechanism to manage climate risk that could be part of the new global pact.
The proposal says premiums for insuring property and infrastructure in developing countries from large-scale extreme events would be between $3 billion and $5 billion per year. Adding insurance for medium-scale losses and prevention measures would raise the annual cost to around $10 billion.
It sounds like a lot, but if you compare it to the scale of losses in 2008 - $200 billion - the cost starts to look a little more reasonable.
What's more, although the amount of losses covered by insurance rose by 50 percent last year to $45 billion, people, companies and other entities without insurance still had to swallow massive damage worth around $155 billion.
And if you look at who bore the brunt of uninsured losses in 2008, it's quite clear the people left high and not-so-dry were those least able to cope in developing countries.
According to Munich Re's breakdown, overall losses for the Myanmar cyclone reached $4 billion, but the column showing the proportion covered by insurance is blank. The Sichuan earthquake caused losses of $85 billion, but only $300 million of that was insured.
In comparison, half of the losses from Hurricanes Ike and Gustav which hit the United States - totalling $30 billion and $10 billion respectively - were covered by insurance, as was $1.3 billion of $1.6 billion in damages caused by tornadoes there.
Three-quarters of the $2 billion losses from winter storm Emma, which brought high winds, thunderstorms and hail to large parts of Central Europe in March, were also insured.
These statistics highlight how a lack of insurance in poor countries greatly increases the risks from climate-related disasters.
A few aid agencies are already trying out medium-sized schemes that cover small farmers from the effects of droughts and floods. In November, for example, the U.N. World Food Programme and the International Fund for Agricultural Development launched a $1 million initiative with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation that aims to shield poor rural farmers from the impact of natural disasters and climate change.
And the Munich Re Foundation has teamed up with the German government's development agency, GTZ, to offer micro-insurance to small businesses and labourers in Jakarta who are regularly affected by river flooding. The annual premium is 4 euros and there's a payout of 25 euros if the river rises above a certain level.
"We have to make sure there is a payout for smaller losses that occur more frequently, and we need partnerships to balance out the good and bad years," Thomas Loster, chair of the Munich Re Foundation, told AlertNet at the U.N. climate talks in Poland. "We have to make (insurance) understandable to poor people."
Koko Warner from the United Nations University, who presented the Munich Climate Insurance Initiative to climate negotiators, said the international scheme could encourage more investment in micro-insurance.
"There is a lot going on but in some ways it needs a push," she said. "Governments find this (initiative) really attractive because it will help develop markets and pay for climate change adaptation."
If an international insurance facility with a focus on protecting developing countries were to be included in a global climate deal, it should at least go some way towards reducing today's stark financial inequality in disasters.
Reuters AlertNet is not responsible for the content of external websites.
Monday, December 15, 2008
Climate change, food security affecting Asian countries - Healthcare Minister
http://www.dailynews.lk/2008/12/15/news21.asp
“Every minute, a woman dies during pregnancy and childbirth because she did not receive adequate care and prompt treatment.
“By increasing interventions for safe motherhood, we can save the lives of half a million women and seven million infants each year, and at the same time prevent millions of women from suffering from infections, injury and disability,” said Minister of Healthcare and Nutrition Nimal Siripala de Silva at the International Conference of Parliamentarians of South East Asian Region countries. The conference was held in Hanoi, Vietnam on December 12.
The Minister said: Since its inception in 1981 in Beijing, the AFPPD has come a long way taking up many burning and vital issues in order to support the formulation of multi sectoral policies related to population and development in the countries of our regions.”
“These meetings have brought greater understanding and cooperation among the parliamentarians of our countries and they have helped us learn from the experiences of one another and on the whole to steer our policies in complimentary ways.”
“You have selected an important and extremely relevant theme for deliberations this year - “The climate and food security challenges in the light of population growth”, Minister de Silva said.
“I wish to emphasize that climate change and food security are two of the most significant issues that threaten the lives of the people of our countries, and in some instances they could threaten even our very survival as nations. Therefore we appreciate the work of the Asian Forum of Parliamentarians to make us well aware of these issues and help to prepare ourselves well in advance to meet the challenges that are upon us.”
“Perhaps nowhere is the need for reproductive health services more urgent than in the fight against HIV/AIDS and in family planning. Reproductive health services that empower women and young people with life-saving information and skills will help prevent HIV from spreading and further reduce suffering and social and economic setbacks.
The UNFPA reminds us very rightly that directing more resources to all these issues is critical in attaining the Millennium Development Goals, the internationally agreed framework to halve poverty by the year 2015,” he said.
“We are living in very uncertain times. Obviously, recent information on the meltdown in the American banking industry drew everyone’s attention, but the actual literal meltdown of ice in the North and South poles and of the Himalayas do not get sufficient attention but if the risks to humankind will be far greater than any bank collapse.”
“Countries of South East Asia are at different stages of development of their national food and nutrition policies. UN information indicates that countries like Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Myanmar have already established their national policies and work plans.
Bhutan has included food security as a part of its primary healthcare programme. In Thailand we know that their food security policy is a major part of the health development plan and the healthy lifestyles strategy while DPR Korea and Timor Leste have concentrated on nutrition management in crisis situations,” the Minister said.
He said however the most critical issue in the Region right now is the increase in food prices and food insecurity. Rising food prices have been transmitted to the South East Asian countries but still the increases are slightly less than that seen internationally. A quick comparison indicates that the rise in Bangladesh has been the sharpest, while being moderate in Nepal with the lowest rise being in Indonesia.
The onset of the price increases have also varied, with some affected as early as 2006 and others not until mid 2008. The effect depends partly on the price but also on other factors such as recent natural disasters. Consumers in the countries with the highest national per capita incomes such as Indonesia, Thailand and Sri Lanka had been less responsive to the change in prices than countries with lower GNPs.”
Friday, December 12, 2008
Sacrificing the Mekong River Basin in the Name of Electricity
http://ki-media.blogspot.com/2008/12/sacrificing-mekong-river-basin-in-name.html
Wednesday, 10 December 2008
Written by John Schertow
Toward Freedom
The Mekong river is considered the lifeblood of southeast Asia. It starts out on the Qingzang plateau in Tibet, a place known as 'roof of the world', and makes its way through Burma, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam before pouring itself into the China Sea.
Along this path, carved out over millennia, the Mekong has ensured the health and security of countless people, providing them with food, water for crops, and a means of trade and transportation. Today the Mekong supports as many as 100 million people. However, the onset of Hydro development, which began in the early 1990s, threatens to drastically change that.
In effect, the Mekong River Commission (MRC), an inter-governmental body of Mekong countries, wants to turn the Mekong river basin into an international sacrifice zone, where abundance and food security will be replaced with increasing poverty, food shortages and the heavy loss of diversity.
It's strange, but the MRC says this is all necessary and that they have no choice but to exploit the natural resource power of the Mekong river, because of the never-ending need for more electricity in Southeast Asia's urban centers. And so, they are attempting to build dozens, possibly hundreds of dams along the river and its tributaries.
At the same time the MRC insists that it supports sustainable development, that it cares deeply about the Mekong basin and, as stated in their mandate, that they will make every effort “To promote and coordinate sustainable management of water and related resources for the countries’ mutual benefit and the people’s well-being” in a manner that is “consistent with the needs to protect, preserve, enhance and manage the environmental and aquatic conditions and maintenance of the ecological balance exceptional to this river basin.”
It certainly sounds like something local, riparian communities and environmental groups can support. However, the reality of the MRC is a far cry from this glowing image of social and environmental heroism.
In fact, it's often suggested that the MRC must be replaced because out of either fear or inability or just plain old greed, it has created “a vacuum of accountability” that allows developers move forward with their hydro projects “unchallenged,” with little regard to their effect on the Mekong basin or its inhabitants, without even so much as an environmental assessment.
Results and Consequences
Next to the Amazon, the Mekong River is the world's most bio-diverse inland waterways. It is home to as many as 1,250 species of fish, including the giant catfish and the world's few remaining freshwater dolphins.
Each year, between June and December, the Mekong grows to about thirty times its low season size, replenishing the water table and triggering a mass migration of fish to their breeding and feeding grounds in Cambodia's Tonlé Sap Lake.
"As the floodwaters recede, the fishermen of the region work together constructing what are, in effect, long bamboo fences around the lake to trap the migrating fish. The fences stretch for some 1,500 km, using 3 million stakes or more. Huge quantities of fish are caught - around 30 tons an hour in one single fishery. Although this is not industrial fishing in the accepted sense, it is artesian fishing on a massive scale and a truly impressive sight," describes the New Agriculturist.
Historically, the communities would get about 80% of their nutritional needs from this annual effort.
Today, such a prospect is impossible. "It is now estimated that the total fish catch from the Lower Mekong Basin is two million tons per year," the New Agriculturist adds.
More than that, communities say the dominant species have begun to mature at a much younger age, which means, on top of the steep decline in population, the fish are now smaller and less valuable. Some communities say they now have to fish 'night and day' - even for weeks on end, to meet the same yield that they would historically gather with ease. Others have been simply forced to abandon their livelihood altogether.
Communities rely on farming to meet the rest of their subsistence needs. However, this too is being threatened by the dams. "The dams’ reservoirs retain a lot of nutrient-rich sediment that would otherwise be spread by [the] annual floods to the lower Mekong," says Nguyen Tan, an agriculture expert at Can Tho’s Department of Agriculture and Rural Development in Vietnam.
This is causing soil throughout the basin to become less fertile, which, on top of affecting the health of the ecosystem, is leaving farmers with no choice but to rely on poisonous chemical fertilizers.
Displacement is another major concern. To date, hydro development has primarily taken place on the upper end of the Mekong, where there are at least three dams in operation, and as many as 280 more in various stages of planning and development.
It is unclear how many people have been displaced by the upper Mekong dams, however, there is an increasing push to get started on the lower Mekong, particularly where it runs through Laos, which threatens to displace more than 75,000 people, and "condemn millions [more] to serious food shortages and increased poverty," says Chris Lang, an environment researcher based in Frankfurt.
Jeremy Bird, the executive director of the MRC, claims there will be "...tremendous efforts... targeted towards first of all avoiding those impacts."
It's almost comical, given that Bird says any such effort should not involve those who would be affected the most, the riparian communities.
Bird's opinion was brought to life in September 2008, when “the MRC organized a meeting in Vientiane to discuss the proposals to dam the lower Mekong,” Lang points out. “None of the millions of people who will be affected... were invited to the meeting." Bird explained to a journalist from Inter Press Service that he did not see that as a problem on the grounds that the meeting was held in English and "in an environment that the communities are not familiar with."
Drowning the Future
In an industry that drowns in hypocrisy, much like the forest regions and livelihoods it destroys, Mr. Bird's statements should come as no surprise. The MRC, while presenting itself as a champion of sustainable development, has and will continue to facilitate the destruction of the Mekong river basin, threatening along with it the livelihoods and cultures of millions of people.
After all the name of the game here is power, not the kind we need for light bulbs and cell phone chargers, but that all-corrupting power where, be it through the clench of a fist, the muzzle of a gun, or through scratches on some eco-friendly paper, one can decide the future of countless others.
This desperate situation begs the need for the riparian communities to come together and confront the MRC, the state governments, and the corporations that will force them to bear the full burden of hydro development while benefiting from it the least.
***
You can find more articles by John Schertow at his blog, www.intercontinentalcry.org
Myanmar at centre of elephant smuggling trade: report
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iFeSkJXcMIdcyuDmR6f96bvF-p5g
BANGKOK (AFP) — Myanmar is at the centre of an illegal trade in elephants and ivory, with more than 250 live animals smuggled out of the country in the past decade, a report said Wednesday.
Most of the elephants were destined for use in the tourist trekking industry in neighbouring Thailand, said the report by the wildlife trade monitoring network TRAFFIC.
Smuggling of live elephants and ivory is in "blatant contravention" of national laws and of the CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora), the group said.
"Our research found evidence of corruption allowing the illicit smuggling of ivory and elephants to take place," Chris Shepherd, senior programme officer with TRAFFIC, was quoted as saying in a statement.
"Females and juvenile elephants are particularly targeted to supply the demand from the tourism industry in Thailand, where they are put to work in elephant trekking centres," said Shepherd.
Smugglers took elephants over the frontier by bribing border officials, the report said, citing one guard as saying he had charged up to 200 dollars per animal because he was saving up to fly to Germany for the 2006 World Cup.
Yet no cross-border trade of live elephants had been reported to CITES by either Myanmar or Thailand, and some traders said elephants had disappeared from parts of Myanmar owing to numbers captured for the live trade, it said.
A survey by the group of 14 markets and three border markets in Thailand and China, which both adjoin Myanmar, also found 9,000 pieces of ivory and 16 whole tusks for sale, it said.
Reports of elephant disappearances and the amount of ivory on sale "suggests that trade poses a significant threat to the survival of Asian elephants in Myanmar," said Vincent Nijman, a co-author of the report.
Myanmar has the largest elephant population in Southeast Asia, with an estimated 4,000 to 5,000 animals, the report said.
TRAFFIC and conservation group WWF called on authorities in Myanmar to work closely with enforcement officers in Thailand and China to address the illegal trade.
"Both Thailand and China must do much more to increase enforcement and crack down on this insidious trade," Susan Lieberman, director of the WWF international species programme, was quoted as saying in the TRAFFIC statement.
It called for greater monitoring of domestic elephant populations in Myanmar, including the use of microchip and tattoo-based identification systems to prevent illegal cross-border movement.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
15 more hydropower dams for Burma (Myanmar)
http://asianenergy.blogspot.com/2008/11/15-more-hydropower-dams-for-burma.html
Junta to Permit Building of 15 More Hydro dams
The Burmese ruling junta is reportedly planning another 15 hydroelectric projects on Burma's rivers in addition to the 22 already on the drawing board or under construction.
If approved, the 15 hydrodams would have an electricity-generating capacity of almost 14,000 megawatts-on top of the 16,500 MW expected to result from dams already being developed.
"These dams, if they reach fruition and their full operating potential, would deliver more electricity than Thailand currently uses," energy consultant Collin Reynolds in Bangkok told The Irrawaddy this week.
"It's ironic, given the paltry level of electricity-generating capacity that Burma lives with in the 21st century. The Burmese have a mere 1,700 MW according to their own government's latest official figures. Such a low level explains why Burma looks black on nighttime satellite pictures of the region."
Neighboring Thailand has a generating capacity of 26,000 MW and will be a major recipient of hydropower generated in Burma. Other countries who will tap this power source are neighboring energy-hungry giants India and China.
The Chinese will not only be major recipients of the Burmese hydropower-their state-owned companies are heavily involved in the construction work to build them, the official Chinese news agency Xinhua said this week.
The companies include Yunnan Machinery and Equipment Import and Export Co, the Farsighted Investment Group Co, Gold Water Resources Limited and the China Power Investment Corporation, which alone will build seven dams, said Xinhua.
Posted by Saigon Charlie at 6:46 PM
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Saturday, November 22, 2008
DEVELOPMENT-VIETNAM: Rare Criticism of Dams Surface
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=44797
By Tran Dinh Thanh Lam
CAN THO, Nov 21 (IPS) - While arguments against the development of hydropower dams on the Mekong River and its tributaries have from time to time emerged in Vietnam’s state-controlled press, rarely have government officials been as open with their criticism as they have in recent months.
In late September, the ‘Thanh Nien’ newspaper reported the deputy secretary general of the Vietnam National Mekong Committee (VNMC), Dao Trong Tu, telling an international meeting that "the development of dams for hydroelectricity generation (on the Mekong and its tributaries) could have unforeseen negative consequences for a country like Vietnam".
At the meeting, a regional hydropower consultation organised by the Mekong River Commission (MRC) in Vientiane, Laos, Nguyen Van Trong, deputy director of the state-run Research Institute for Agriculture said "20 million Vietnamese people in the Mekong Delta, who rely on fish for export and water for irrigation, would be negatively impacted" by dam building.
Such statements come as Vietnam itself emerges as a key player in the construction of dams in the lower Mekong River and its tributaries. Vietnamese firms are involved in the construction of several dams and are eyeing plans for several more.
"I am so happy to hear for the first time Vietnamese officials claim far and loud that hydropower dams are ruining our fisheries," Nguyen Tu Be, a 45 year-old fisherman from Can Tho, in southern Vietnam, said when asked by IPS for a response.
Be, who has been making a living fishing on the Hau River, a tributary of the Mekong, since he was a young man, reported that his catch has fallen significantly in the last few years. "People say that the dams built upstream have prevented the fish migrating to Vietnam’s section of the Mekong," he said.
Years ago, Vietnamese fishermen could easily catch tonnes of migrating Shutchi and pagasius catfish that take refuge in Vietnam’s stretch of the Mekong during the dry season.
Fishermen used to sell the best mother fish to aquaculture farmers to spawn and grow catfish in cages for export. Now that healthy mother fish are harder to find in Vietnam’s section of the Mekong River, many fishers have been forced to travel upstream as far as Cambodia’s Tonle Sap to fetch them.
But in the Tonle Sap, the situation is no better.
Cambodian fishers do not only report that household catch is declining. They say that the composition of the catch is also changing, so that they are netting less large, high value fish each year.
"Some people also believe that the severe floods that submerged vast regions in Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam in the past few years may be the result of Chinese dams in Mekong upstream," said Nguyen Tan, an agriculture expert at Can Tho’s Department of Agriculture and Rural Development. "My big concern is more for the Mekong sediment."
"The dams’ reservoirs retain a lot of nutrient-rich sediment that would otherwise be spread by annual floods to the lower Mekong," Tan said.
Because the soil becomes less fertile with a reduction of sediment from the Mekong, farmers must rely more and more on pollutive chemical fertiliser, he added.
Some 60 million people along the 4,800-kilometre path of the Mekong, which flows from Tibet, through Burma, Laos, Thailand and Cambodia before flowing out to the South China Sea through Vietnam, depend on the river for transportation, food and water for their crops.
Particularly controversial has been the construction of several dams on the Mekong mainstream, including the Chinese stretch of the river called Lancang, and several plans to develop dams on the Mekong mainstream in Laos, Cambodia and Thailand.
To foster the "environmentally sustainable development" of the Mekong, lower riparian countries Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam formed the MRC in 1995, signing an agreement that stated dam construction on the mainstream must be subject to prior notification between countries.
Any development involving the diversion of water out of the Mekong in the dry season must proceed on the basis of the agreement of all members.
China and Burma, the other two countries sharing the river, are mere observers in the commission. China maintains that its dams help prevent flooding in the Mekong Delta during the wet season.
In the meantime, the four MRC member countries, facing high oil prices and the need for more electricity to sustain economic growth, are revealing plans to construct their own hydropower plants on the Mekong mainstream.
There are different estimates of hydropower projects at various stages of planning, ideas and design, but some put at 80 the projects identified in the lower Mekong basin.
Of these, eight are planned for the lower Mekong mainstream, five in Laos, two in Thailand and one in Cambodia, activists say.
The most controversial of these is the Don Sahong dam, which will be built on the Mekong mainstream in Laos’ Khone Falls, where the river forms a complex network of narrow channels before flowing into Cambodia.
The dam will block the deepest channel on that section of the river and only one migratory fish can easily pass through at the peak of the dry season, April to May, when the water level of the Mekong is at its lowest.
This will effectively stop the dry season migration of fish between the feeding habitats of the Tonle Sap and upstream breeding zones in Laos and Thailand, critics say.
Phnom Penh is also mulling plans to build a dam on the mainstream in Kratie province, central Cambodia. A Chinese company is undertaking a feasibility study of the dam.
Environment groups have criticised the MRC for what they claim is the organisation’s strong pro-hydropower orientation.
In 2007, a coalition of 175 environmental and civic groups has sent an open letter saying it remains "notably silent despite the serious ecological and economic implications of damming the lower Mekong".
In March this year, 51 citizens’ groups and individuals from all six Mekong countries challenged the MRC to deal with what they called the organisation’s "crisis of legitimacy and relevancy, recently exemplified by its failure to respond to civil society concerns over plans to dam the lower Mekong mainstream".
Vietnam’s steady economic growth has fed a massive increase in demand for power. In addition to importing power from China and Laos, Vietnam has built several hydroelectric dams on its own rivers and is involved in projects across the border in Laos and Cambodia.
In Laos, Vietnamese companies are building the Xekamen 1 and Xekamen 3 dams on the Xekamen River, a tributary of the Mekong.
Vietnamese firms are also involved in projects that include a 1,410-megawatt dam scheme being overseen by PetroVietnam Power Co near Luang Prabang. A memorandum of understanding was signed mid-October 2007.
"So far, we have not succeeded in fighting Chinese hydropower dams because China is not a MRC member," said Tan. "But now that huge projects are being planned on the Mekong mainstream, the VNMC is right to ring the alarm on the damages brought by big hydropower dams."
"Too many big dams built on upstream as well as on downstream Mekong will wreak havoc to our fishing and agriculture," he added.
In a speech marking VNMC’s 30th anniversary in September, Pham Khoi Nguyen, Minister of Natural Resources and Environment and committee chair, stressed that VNMC’s role was to "help protect Vietnam’s rights and benefits and reduce the negative impacts of development around the upper reaches of the river".
(END/2008)
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