Three easy environmental resolutions to aim for in 2013

20mph speed limits, a levy on plastic bags and reducing night lighting would cost little but deliver significant benefits

Plastic bags: ‘as a small step towards cutting pointless resource use, and cleaning up our towns, cities, countryside rivers and seas, this truly is an easy win’. Photo: Andy Rain/EPA

It’s new year’s resolution time – the mince pies are sitting heavy on the stomach, the Christmas tat is spewing from every bin and it’s time for a fresh start.

For Britain’s environment, clearly the most important resolution is to restructure the government’s energy bill to put energy conservation at its heart, to restore the target of decarbonising electricity by 2030 and to follow most of the developed world in drawing a final line underneath the failed decades of expensive nuclear power.

But that’s a tough one to face this early in the year. So for now, let’s start with the small, the easily delivered, the no-brainers, the cheap and the free.

First, the simplest. Ireland did it yonks ago, Wales has done it, and Scotland is doing it: let’s put a levy on single-use plastic bags in English shops. (It’s even party policy for one party in the coalition government.) It’s surprising it’s not Conservative policy really, given the Daily Mail has made it a flagship campaign.

Bag use rose by around 5% to 6.75bn in the past year, despite claimed voluntary efforts by stores to cut back. How many times do you have to say “no bag please” in your local chain stores? The London assembly has backed action, there’s lots of excellent local campaigns. So now is the time for England to catch up with the rest of the UK.

No, it’s not going to save the planet, but as a small step towards cutting pointless resource use, and cleaning up our towns, cities, countryside rivers and seas, this truly is an easy win. Let’s get back to parity with China on this one please.

Next, let’s cut down on unnecessary night time lighting of shops in cities and towns. The French are leading the way, having banned neon shop lighting in the early hours last year, and they’re now looking at insisting the lights inside shops go off for similar hours.

Yes, I admit that those people who love to window shop between 1am and 6am might be slightly discommoded – not that I know anyone who does that. But I know that a lot of people would enjoy a reduction in light pollution – both those who like to gaze up at the stars and those trying to sleep in glare-ridden bedrooms around the shops. And even the Daily Mail might like the fact that we could build a few less wind turbines if we cut demand for electricity instead. There would be a saving on shop electricity bills and so perhaps even a saving on our shopping bills.

And this would be a small step towards the bigger range of energy reduction measures that we need, as with insulating and draft-proofing our dreadful quality housing stock and making sure that all new build homes meet the highest energy standards. It costs us all to provide extra energy capacity – we can all save cash, and improve our lives.

Finally, an environmental measure that would reduce greenhouse gas emissions, air pollution, and make our towns and cities far more pleasing places – let’s introduce 20mph speed limits everywhere people live, work and shop: make it the default urban limit. No need for lots of expensive signage – in fact you could probably clear a lot of street clutter. And motorists would see a saving in fuel costs and wear and tear, at the “cost” of an average of 90 seconds being added to their journeys.

We’re seeing big progress around the country on 20mph limits – the London borough of Islington is likely to soon be followed by others – but we could make a big national leap and save a lot of campaigners’ time and energy, and a significant number of lives, if we took an immediate step across England and Wales.

The cost of all of these three measures would be tiny, and the benefits – to our finances and quality of life – significant. They’re perfect easy resolutions to start with – then we can get more ambitious.

Author: Natalie Bennett
Source: The Guardian
Original: http://goo.gl/QTG1Y

---

FOLLOW US / SIGA-NOS:
              

Iskandar Malaysia – the green mega-city rising above Singapore

Planned eco-city for 3m people matches Luxembourg in size and showcases urban 21st-century smart living, say developers

Proposed map of the new eco-city Iskandar Malaysia.

Standing opposite Singapore, across the strait of Johor, is the site of a new project that its architects and developers hope will be the future of urban life in south-east Asia – a mega-city built along eco-friendly lines, with green energy and an end to the pollution that afflicts so many of Asia’s cities.

Occupying an area the size of Luxembourg, the site is expected to have a population of 3 million by 2025, living as an ultra-modern “smart metropolis”. Energy will be provided from renewable sources, transport will be publicly provided, waste will be diverted to other uses, and the city is planned by the Malaysian government as a showcase to be copied on a bigger scale across the region.

The world’s urban population overtook the number of rural-dwellers for the first time in 2007, and future population growth in south-east Asia – at least 9bn people are expected to inhabit this planet by 2050, up from 7bn at present – is expected to be mainly in cities in the developing world. By far the greatest growth will be in slums, by current estimates.

Iskandar Malaysia offers an alternative. The plans are for a city that not only incorporates the latest in environmentally friendly technology, but that is designed for social integration. Green spaces and areas where people can mingle and relax will improve people’s mental wellbeing and encourage social cohesion, it is hoped. Skyscrapers will be mixed with low-rise buildings and small self-contained “neighbourhoods”.

Najib Razak, prime minister of Malaysia, said in a speech: “Iskandar Malaysia [is] a smart city template – protecting the environment, promoting equitable development and addressing urban development challenges [through] the creation of smart, liveable urban communities that will yield an improved quality of life for thousands of citizens, with safer, cleaner, healthier, more affordable and more vibrant neighbourhoods, serviced by more efficient and accessible transportation systems – great destinations for businesses.”

Ellis Rubinstein, president of the New York Academy of Sciences, which is working on the “edu-city” university campus area, said it could be “a model to countries needing to accommodate the social and economic needs of fast-rising populations and environmental challenges”.

However, the project’s developers will have to overcome significant obstacles. New eco-cities have been planned in the past, from China to the US, but most have floundered. China’s Dongtan was heralded as the world’s first planned eco-city, but plans have been mired in difficulty for years. A UK project for “eco-towns” was widely ridiculed and has been all but abandoned.

So far, the Malaysian government has managed to attract support from Pinewood Studios, which will build new facilities in Iskandar, and Legoland which will build its first Asian theme park in the city. Several UK universities – including Newcastle and Southampton – are also planning to open up remote campuses.

More than $30bn has been promised for the city, of which more than a third will come from outside Malaysia.

Author: Fiona Harvey
Source: The Guardian
Original: http://goo.gl/Y7hkm

---

FOLLOW US / SIGA-NOS:
              

Satellite finds ozone hole still shrinking

The Antarctic ozone hole reached its largest size for the season on 22 September (NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center)

The seasonal hole in the ozone layer above the Antarctic this year was the second smallest in two decades, but still covered an area three times the size of Australia, say US experts.

The average size of the Earth’s protective shield was 17.9 million square kilometres, according to satellite measurements by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA.

“It happened to be a bit warmer this year high in the atmosphere above Antarctica, and that meant we didn’t see quite as much ozone depletion as we saw last year, when it was colder,” says Jim Butler of NOAA’s Earth System Research Laboratory.

The Antarctic ozone hole, which forms in September and October, reached its largest size for the season – 21 million square kilometres – on 22 September.

In comparison, the largest ozone hole recorded to date was one of 29.8 million square kilometres in the year 2000.

The ozone layer – which helps protect the Earth from potentially dangerous ultraviolet rays that can cause skin cancer and cataracts – began developing holes on an annual basis starting in the 1980s due to chlorofluorocarbons, or CFCs.

CFCs, once commonly used in refrigerators and aerosol cans, now are almost non-existent thanks to an international treaty signed on 16 September 1987, amid global concern over widening holes in the ozone layer.

Still, it could take another decade before scientists detect early signs that the ozone over the Antarctic is returning, says NOAA.

The ozone layer above Antarctica likely will not return to its early 1980s state until about 2060, according to NASA scientist Paul Newman.

Author: Reuters
Source: ABC Science
Original: http://goo.gl/j7UEf

---

FOLLOW US / SIGA-NOS:
              

Washington’s Hazardous Substances Tax Ruled Constitutional By State Supreme Court

OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) — The state Supreme Court unanimously ruled Thursday that the state’s hazardous substances tax is constitutional.

The high court upheld a King County Superior Court ruling that found the state is not precluded from using the current tax of 0.7 percent imposed on oil products, pesticides and other chemicals for environmental cleanup projects.

The state has said the tax, approved by voters in 1988, brings in about $125 million a year for those projects.

The Automotive United Trades Organization and California-based Tower Energy Group had argued that that the levy is a gas tax that should be used only for highways and roads under the state Constitution’s 18th amendment, which dedicates motor fuel tax collections to highway purposes.

The high court ruling, written by Justice Jim Johnson, said “nothing in that constitutional provision indicates that any new tax similar to a gas tax would require the Legislature to use the funds for highway purposes.”

The hazardous substances tax “statute was enacted to tax toxic substances, including motor vehicle fuel, for the purpose of cleaning up spills of hazardous substances,” the court wrote. “As a result, funds from the HST levied against motor vehicle fuel do not have to be used for highway purposes because they were never restricted to be used only for highway purposes.”

State Department of Ecology Director Ted Sturdevant was happy with the ruling.

“For more than 20 years, this tax has been doing exactly what the voters of our state intended,” he said in a written statement, noting it has led to the cleanup of old toxic messes and “prevented many new ones in our air and water and land.”

Phil Talmadge, the attorney for Automotive United Trades Organization, said the ruling created a huge loophole in terms of the motor vehicle fund.

“What this decision means is that the Legislature can get there in January and say ‘we have a big budget hole,’ and they can increase the gas tax and take those revenues and use them for education or to support social services,” he said. “It’s open season on the tax on gasoline.”

Laura Watson, an assistant attorney general who argued the case, said the decision does not open the door for using the gas tax for other purposes.

“What it says is that the hazardous substance tax isn’t limited to highway purposes, which is how we’ve been interpreting the tax for over 20 years now,” she said.

Watson said that while it’s true that the official state gas tax — which was established in the 1920s — can’t be used for anything other than road projects, the Legislature has always been able to use to pass statutes that could add a separate tax on motor fuel that could be directed to other projects, and that nothing under this ruling changes that.

“The Legislature has very broad taxing authority,” she said.

Author: Rachel La Corte
Source: Huff Post Green
Original: http://goo.gl/tj2S5

---

FOLLOW US / SIGA-NOS:
              

Adiada candidatura de Açores a património geológico da Humanidade

Os Açores podem vir a ser o primeiro geoparque do mundo na condição de arquipélago. (Foto: Daniel Rocha)

O Comité Coordenador da Rede Europeia de Geoparques adiou para Março a decisão quanto ao reconhecimento dos Açores como património geológico da Humanidade, foi revelado nesta quinta-feira.

“A candidatura não foi rejeitada. Mas é a primeira vez que a Rede de Geoparques tem um arquipélago a querer associa-se-lhe e isso tornou-se um problema para a própria estrutura”, disse José Leonardo Silva, coordenador da candidatura dos Açores.

A informação foi divulgada no encerramento da 11.ª Conferência Europeia de Geoparques, que, reunindo cerca de 300 responsáveis de 42 países, foi este ano organizada pelo Geoparque de Arouca, em parceria com a UNESCO – Organização das Nações Unidas para a Educação, Ciência e Cultura.

Para José Leonardo Silva, o adiamento “não foi uma desilusão”, porque em causa está apenas “um pedido de informação adicional” sobre o território das nove ilhas. “Não podemos pensar que isto foi um problema. Temos que pensar que estamos a colocar-nos do lado da solução”, sublinhou.

Em Portugal há actualmente dois geoparques: o de Arouca, cujos limites coincidem com aquele concelho, e o Naturtejo da Meseta Meridional, que abrange os municípios de Castelo Branco, Idanha-a-Nova, Nisa, Oleiros, Proença-a-Nova e Vila Velha de Ródão.

Segundo José Leonardo Silva, os Açores podem vir a ser o terceiro geoparque português e o primeiro do mundo na condição de arquipélago.

O Comité Coordenador da Rede de Geoparques “disse, e nós também achamos, que o Geoparque dos Açores é uma grande mais-valia para a Rede Europeia. Esperamos satisfazer todos os membros da Rede com as nossas respostas, para que consigamos entrar em Março próximo”, data da próxima reunião da estrutura, em Paris, acrescentou.

Ontem foram reconhecidos sete territórios como Património Geológico da Humanidade: Global Geopark da Catalunha Central (em Espanha), Bakani Baaton (Hungria), Sangingshan (China), Chablais (França), Carnic Alps (Áustria) e Batur (Indónesia), todos em registo de primeira adesão. O Geoparque da Ilha de Lesvos, na Grécia, também viu revalidada a sua classificação pela UNESCO, após um alargamento de território que obrigava a nova avaliação.

Autor: Lusa
Fonte: Ecosfera – Público
Original: http://goo.gl/uiWZQ

---

FOLLOW US / SIGA-NOS:
              

Ethical living: does science tourism leave much ecological impact?

Travelling as an amateur scientist on an expedition might help fund science, but it can leave a trail of chemicals behind

On thin ice: some scientic expeditions to Antarctica have done more harm than good. Photograph: Martin Harvey/Getty Images/Gallo Images

Venturing into inhospitable wildernesses to collect data, today’s scientific warriors are between a rock and a hard place. Actually they are usually in Antarctica. There’s a research gold rush to the South Pole as record numbers of scientists (5,000 each year, from 27 different countries) head out to various stations. The prize? Essential research and their own data charting the effects of climate change at the front line. Lest we forget why this is important: if the ice melted in Antarctica, global sea levels would rise by 50m.

As a way of funding their expeditions, many programmes now “carry” a number of amateur scientists. This is not an easy jolly; participants must be fit. They occupy an uneasy space between scientist and tourist. The latter are habitually blamed for putting pressure on ecosystems everywhere. But while there will be those who want to gawp at penguins, most are very well-intentioned. A recent report by Professor Steven Chown on the dangers to Antarctica found that tourists are unfairly taking all the flak for damage. Embarrassingly his research shows that when it comes to the distribution of invasive plant seeds (a serious form of pollution), scientists are more to blame than tourists. Peter Convey, a terrestrial ecologist for the British Antarctic Survey, pulled up his first weed in Antarctica in January this year and was suitably horrified.

There are good scientific expeditions and bad ones. The good ones are meticulously planned from an ecological point of view. Take Professor Martin Siegert of Bristol University. When his team journeys to Lake Ellsworth in the Antarctic in November to continue his vital work into subglacial lakes, the environment will be a priority. So although it might have taken 16 years to plan this work in order to avoid using kerosene or chemical contaminants, his team will be using a “clean” borehole even though that will give them just 24 hours to collect samples.

Leaving a trail of chemicals not only pollutes the ecosystem, it contaminates the area for future scientists so that when the next group arrives in the field to collect data, their probes detect oil and chemicals left by the last lot. Every expedition should be “clean” in this way. It’s a travesty that every expedition is not yet compelled to offer a complete life cycle analysis. Any expeditions ignoring their ecological obligations are on very thin ice.

Autor: Lucy Siegle
Fonte: The Guardian / The Observer
Original: http://goo.gl/zulwU

---

FOLLOW US / SIGA-NOS:
              

Apple volta atrás na decisão de abandonar certificação ambiental

Depois da ameaça das autoridades de São Francisco deixarem de adquirir produtos Apple, aquela empresa californiana decidiu voltar atrás na sua decisão de romper com uma importante certificação ambiental americana.

De acordo com as normas estabelecidas pela Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT), gerida pelo Green Electronics Council, os produtos das empresas certificadas deverão ser fáceis de desmontar pelos consumidores, de forma a que possam ser eliminados facilmente os componentes tóxicos, nomeadamente as baterias, com a finalidade de os produtos em questão poderem ser considerados um ‘produto verde’”.

Era precisamente deste vínculo que a Apple se queria afastar, mas o tiro saiu-lhes pela culatra, depois de uma onda de má publicidade após a decisão de abandonar esta certificação “verde”, há uma semana. Agora a empresa voltou atrás e anunciou que esta manobra foi um “erro” e que a norma do Green Electronics Council volta a estar presente nos aparelhos da empresa.

De acordo com um comunicado do vice-presidente sénior do departamento de engenharia de hardware, Bob Mansfield, a Apple ficou muito preocupada pela “decepção” manifestada pelos utilizadores, pelo que decidiu reverter a sua decisão.

Entretanto, o director executivo da EPEAT, Robert Frisbee, já veio saudar esta “inversão de marcha” empresarial, afirmando que ela deverá, no futuro, recompensar aqueles que apostam no design sem esquecer a sustentabilidade.

Fonte: Ecosfera
Original: http://goo.gl/DA0xP

---

FOLLOW US / SIGA-NOS:
              

Why supermarket tomatoes tend to taste bland

Scientists suggest breeding for uniformity inactivates a gene that affects color and sugar content.

The tomatoes at left are normal, and the two on the right are bred for uniform color. New research suggests the ones on the left are likely to be tastier. (C. Nguyen and J. Giovannoni / June 29, 2012)

The mass-produced tomatoes we buy at the grocery store tend to taste more like cardboard than fruit. Now researchers have discovered one reason why: a genetic mutation, common in store-bought tomatoes, that reduces the amount of sugar and other tasty compounds in the fruit.

For the last 70-odd years, tomato breeders have been selecting for fruits that are uniform in color. Consumers prefer those tomatoes over ones with splotches, and the uniformity makes it easier for producers to know when it’s time to harvest.

But the new study, published this week in Science, found that the mutation that leads to the uniform appearance of most store-bought tomatoes has an unintended consequence: It disrupts the production of a protein responsible for the fruit’s production of sugar.

Mass-produced tomato varieties carrying this genetic change are light green all over before they ripen. Tomatoes without the mutation — including heirloom and most small-farm tomatoes — have dark-green tops before they ripen. There is also a significant difference in flavor between the two types of tomatoes, but researchers had not previously known the two traits had the same root cause.

The study authors set out to pin down the genetic change that makes tomatoes lose their dark-green top. They focused their attention on two genes — GLK1 and GLK2 — both known to be crucial for harvesting energy from sunlight in plant leaves.

They found that GLK2 is active in fruit as well as leaves — but that in uniformly colored tomatoes, it is inactivated.

Adding back an active GLK2 gene to bland, commercial-style tomatoes through genetic engineering created tomatoes that had the heirloom-style dark-green hue. The darker green comes from greater numbers of structures called chloroplasts that harvest energy from sunlight.

The harvested energy is stored as starches, which are converted to sugars when the tomatoes ripen.

The vast majority — 70% to 80% — of the sugar in tomatoes travels to the fruit from the leaves of the plant. But the remaining amount of sugar is produced in the fruit. This contribution is largely wiped out in uniform, commercial-style tomatoes — and thus they won’t be as sweet.

Study coauthor Ann Powell, a biochemist at UC Davis, noted that this isn’t the only cause of the uninspiring flavor of modern mass-produced tomato varieties, but said it definitely contributes.

Though the scientists were not even able to taste their own creation because ofU.S. Department of Agricultureregulations, they could show through chemical tests that the sugar levels were 40% higher in their engineered fruit. Chemicals called carotenoids, which also significantly contribute to flavor, were more than 20% higher.

But don’t expect to find a tastier, transgenic tomato based on this finding on store shelves anytime soon. Plant biologist Jim Giovannoni of Cornell University, a study coauthor, said that such a product is unlikely to be developed.

“There are very few examples of genetically modified fresh-market fruit crops,” he said. Most such crops are corn and soy varieties that have been bred to resist viruses and pests, not fruits and vegetables sold on store shelves.

Still, the results could lead breeders to slightly change the way they select tomatoes for production, Giovannoni added.

“There will probably continue to be selection for uniform tomatoes,” he said. But “now that it’s known that this mutation has negative consequences, you may find that growers begin selecting for fruit that is uniformly darker green, rather than uniformly lighter green.”

Harry Klee, a specialist in the chemistry of fruit flavor at the University of Florida who was not involved in the study, said the work was a good step toward a better understanding of tomato flavor.

“This is not the entire reason the modern tomato stinks — but it’s a real significant part of it,” he said. “I promise you, if I gave you two tomatoes that were 10% different in their sugar contents, you’d be able to tell the difference…. This is a very nice piece of science that really illustrates the pitfalls of breeding without knowing precisely what you’re doing.”

The lesson for consumers is that tomatoes with less-uniform hues are a better flavor bet.

“If this information gets out there, you could see people saying, ‘If I see this tomato is not uniformly ripe, that means that it’s not the cardboard junk that they’ve been producing for the past 30 years,'” Klee said.

“It’s almost like a badge of honor.”

Author: Jon Bardin
Source: Los Angeles Times
Original: http://goo.gl/YGk4S

---

FOLLOW US / SIGA-NOS:
              

The First Global Standards for Salmon Farming

After eight years of spirited debate and delicate diplomacy, a consortium of environmental organizations, commercial fishing executives, scientists and government officials has developed the first comprehensive global standards for salmon farming.

The 91-page document specifies 100 fish-farming standards, from the use of feed and antibiotics to pesticides and fish-cage construction, and is expected to be implemented later this year by the Aquaculture Stewardship Council, a nonprofit monitoring group based in Utrecht, the Netherlands.

The new set of standards could raise the bar for farm-raised salmon sold at retail outlets in the future, because it would enable certified aquaculture farms to display a retail label — on packaging or at store counters – designating salmon “A.S.C. Certified.”

“We’re all quite glad to have reached agreement,” said Katherine Bostick, the senior aquaculture program officer for the World Wildlife fund, which was a co-founder of the council and also helped found the Marine Stewardship Council, which certifies sustainably caught wild fish.

The development of the standard was accomplished by a nine-member steering committee participating in what it called a dialogue of 500 participants from government, academia, industry and nongovernmental organizations. Through the years, there were 16 meetings in cities around the globe, and during the complex process, many drafts of standards were submitted, revised and resubmitted

Among the steering committee members were the Wildlife Fund, the Pew Environment Group, the Canadian Aquaculture Industry Alliance, the Norwegian Seafood Federation, SalmonChile Corporation, Fundacion Terram (a nonprofit Chilean group supporting sustainability) and Skretting, a fish-feed company.

During the discussions, some industry participants complained that environmentalists were unduly influencing the standards, while some environmentalists said that disproportionate weight had been given to the concerns of the salmon-farming industry.

“Nobody got everything they wanted, and everyone made compromises,” Ms. Bostick said. “We’re aware that the standards are not perfect, but these standards will be more effective than any existing standard in creating change on the water.”

Retailers could use the certification label as a sales tool for marketing to consumers concerned about health and sustainability, Ms. Bostick said. The bluish green logo carries the message “Farmed Responsibly – A.S.C. certified,” with a large white check mark.

The Aquaculture Stewardship Council oversees and accredits what it calls the “salmon-auditing process” to approve salmon producers; verification is accomplished by various independent certification bodies worldwide. By passing the audit, producers are approved to use the council’s logo (above).

The new standards “will challenge the industry to improve in many areas, and they are one of many tools that must be used to insure the health of the environment, industry and society,” said Hernán Frigolett, the steering committee representative from Fundación Terram.

Petter Arnesen, the committee member from Marine Harvest — a company that claims it is the world’s largest producer of farmed salmon — said that “as an industry, we are often challenged on lack of transparency and data from farms,” adding that “these standards require an unprecedented amount of transparency.”

More than two-thirds of farmed salmon is Atlantic salmon, but the same new standards apply to farmed Coho and King Salmon. The production of farmed salmon increased 10-fold from 1982 to 2007, and rose 50 percent in volume during the last decade, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

More than 70 percent of retail salmon comes from fish farms, and more than half of all farmed salmon originates in Norway and Chile; Scotland and Canada are also significant producers. About half of the world’s farmed salmon is produced by a half-dozen large agribusiness corporations.

The Aquaculture Stewardship Council is already overseeing approved standards for the farming of tilapia, pangasius, abalone, mussels, clams, scallops and oysters after a series of other aquaculture dialogues. Retailers are already using the certification logo in selling some of these fish. Standards for fresh-water trout are about to be issued. Also soon to be approved are standards for shrimp, seriola and cobia (large marine fin fish).

The strictures in the new salmon standard specify approved uses of antibiotics and anti-parasite chemicals to keep fish disease-free. The standards also specify that a portion of fish meal and fish oil that is fed to farmed salmon must be sustainable (carnivorous farmed salmon consume two to four times their weight in feeder fish, depleting worldwide stocks of mackerel and other species).

The new standards also specify water-quality standards, since salmon farms have long been criticized for polluting coastal areas with fish nutrients and excrement. In addition, the new standards require better training of workers and the use of more secure sea cages – called net pens — to prevent the escape of farmed salmon, which can then breed with, and reduce the ocean-survival capability of wild salmon.

Author: Glenn Collins
Source: The New York Times
Original: http://goo.gl/00D6e

---

FOLLOW US / SIGA-NOS:
              

Rio+20 gera quase 700 acordos que movimentarão US$ 500 bi

“Acordamos 692 compromissos durante a Conferência que, estima-se, mobilizarão US$ 513 bilhões em prol da causa dodesenvolvimento sustentável”, disse Sha Zukang

Sha Zukang, Ban Ki-Moon e Dilma Rousseff na Reunião Plenária da Conferência da ONU da Rio 20. (Roberto Stuckert Filho/PR)

São Paulo – O documento oficial O Futuro que Queremos é o principal assunto na boca daqueles que comentam – na maioria das vezes, de forma insatisfeita – a respeito do desfecho da Rio+20. Na tentativa de chamar a atenção para outros resultados da Conferência, o chinês Sha Zukang, secretário-geral da Rio+20, convocou na sexta-feira coletiva de imprensa para informar a respeito doscompromissos que foram assinados por empresas, instituições financeiras, universidades e governos locais durante o evento da ONU.

“Acordamos 692 compromissos durante a Conferência que, estima-se, mobilizarão US$ 513 bilhões em prol da causa dodesenvolvimento sustentável. Este é um legado importantíssimo da Rio+20. Há grandes expectativas sobre as ações dos governos, mas eles não podem fazer o trabalho sozinhos. É preciso apoio e envolvimento do setor privado e da sociedade civil”, disse Zukang, que falou com a imprensa ao lado de Brice Lalonde, coordenador executivo da Rio+20.

Entre os compromissos enaltecidos pelos participantes da coletiva, estão:

– os 200 acordos resultantes do Fórum de Sustentabilidade Corporativa da Rio+20, que foram entregues em um documento para Ban Ki-Moon (saiba mais em: Ban Ki-moon recebe documento de líderes empresariais com compromissos ao Desenvolvimento Sustentável) e
– um acordo que prevê que todas as instituições de nível superior do Brasil terão que incluir o tema da sustentabilidade em seus currículos.

“A mudança dos currículos escolares, desde a educação básica, é uma das ferramentas mais simples, baratas e imediatas que podemos usar em prol do desenvolvimento sustentável. Será um enorme avanço se os demais países se inspirarem no compromisso assumido pelas instituições de ensino brasileiras”, afirmou Antonio Freitas, da Fundação Getúlio Vargas.

A intenção da coletiva era tirar o foco do documento final resultante da Rio+20, mas o esforço da ONU foi em vão. O assunto foi abordado durante o evento – e por um dos painelistas, o presidente da Costa Rica, José María Figueres. “As ONGs, empresas e demais setores da sociedade civil desempenharam um bonito papel na Rio+20, mas os governos falharam. ‘O Futuro que Queremos’ é o título adequado para o documento resultante da Conferência, mas seu conteúdo não está adequado. O futuro que queremos é construtivo”, disse Figueres, que lamentou: “Não temos um planeta B para desdenhar do que vivemos hoje, como estamos fazendo”.

O secretário-geral da Conferência, Sha Zukang, se defendeu: “Sei que muitos países não estão felizes com o resultado, mas meu trabalho é fazer com que todos sejam iguais e não felizes”, disse. Lalonde fez coro: “O resultado da Rio+20 pode não parecer tão espetacular quanto o da Rio92, mas é com certeza mais sério e realista. Afinal, muito do que foi acordado em 92 não foi implementado até hoje”.

Antes de se retirar da coletiva, Zukang se despediu pedindo comprometimento daqueles que assinaram os compromissos. “Não podemos esquecer que o trabalho árduo começa agora. Prometer é fácil, mas manter a promessa exige esforço. O que diferencia um compromisso de uma boa intenção é a responsabilidade. Espero que estes acordos virem histórias de sucesso nos próximos anos”.

Author: Débora Spitzcovsky
Fonte: Exame
Original: http://goo.gl/iKqKv

---

FOLLOW US / SIGA-NOS: