UN Climate Change Conference 2007

Discussion on preserving Nature: preventing the pollution, destruction and disbalancing of the finely-tuned natural ecosystems on our planet.

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Aisin
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UN Climate Change Conference 2007

Post: # 9890Post Aisin »

The UN Climate Change Conference 2007 had been held at Bali, Indonesia from 3 to 15 December 2007. Here's the URL.

Here are some extracts of the write-up that I enjoyed:
http://www.thejakartapost.com/climate/index.php?menu=stories&detail=39 wrote:“We respect our trees. But wealthy people, they don’t care, they cut our big trees because they want to have cars and they want to go to the beach,” said Felicita from Tabasco state in Mexico. “We had floods as high as two meters. We lost everything, small businesses were destroyed.”

... “We have a tree that is strong and can live for thousands of years. When we need to cut them down, we give offerings, we make rituals, we pray. But the government has now issued licenses allowing industries to cut these trees without showing respect,” said Alfred.

“Brothers and sisters, please consume only what you need. Don’t buy mining products like gold,” Alfred from Nigeria said.
http://www.thejakartapost.com/climate/index.php?menu=stories&detail=34 wrote:... Putu Adi and Kadek Purnami, a young couple from Ubud, Gianyar, surprised their guests by distributing more than 1,000 plants as wedding souvenirs.


The idea of using plants as wedding souvenir is a good one.
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Aisin
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What have you done for the earth lately?

Post: # 9891Post Aisin »

And I like this article especially, in case it becomes unavailable in future, I've quoted it here:
What have you done for the Earth lately?

Features - December 09, 2007

Endy M. Bayuni, The Jakarta Post, Nusa Dua, Bali


Remember John F. Kennedy's famous quote "ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country". In this time of global warming concerns, we should really paraphrase the second part of Kennedy's statement "ask what you can do for the planet".

On a personal level, we can all claim to have done our best in saving our beloved Earth from the current course of virtual self-destruction.

Some of us have been separating our trash into that which is bio-degradable and that which is not. Some of us go to Carrefour or other hypermarkets bringing our own paper or cotton bags instead of relying on the polythene bags generously supplied by the cashier.

I know one or two colleagues, and neighbors, who are starting to take the bicycle to work, even though they risk poisoning themselves to death from the vehicle exhaust from Jakarta traffic.

Most motorists in Indonesia have finally made the switch to unleaded gasoline. Pretty soon, we will all be told to switch to biofuel (although environmentalists are now fiercely opposing the change because of the impact of biofuel production on the remaining forestry area in the world).

Some companies in the United States have introduced the "paperless office" in which everyone works from their laptop, and documents and letters are being exchanged courtesy of Bluetooth technology.

As good as these deeds may seem in saving the planet, they all look more like fads -- the fashionable thing to do -- rather than something driven out of necessity.

No matter how much we think we have done, climate scientists are telling us that we are not making even the slightest difference as far as the march towards global warming is concerned.

The global temperature is still rising; the North Pole and South Pole are melting as is the ice at the peaks of the Himalayas. Floods are affecting many more countries and are getting worse each year.

Global warming is moving at a faster rate, in spite of our efforts to date.

What we have done so far are symbolic gestures to show that we care about climate change. But if we seriously want to save the planet, and to really make a difference, we need to go beyond symbolism.

We need to make major personal sacrifices. Our lifestyles and habits have been driving the world temperatures up.

This is something many of us are obviously not prepared to do.

Nobody is about to give up the comforts of modern life, including travels (by car, by plane or whatever mode you can think of), the cool air-condition if you live in a warm climate, and many other amenities in life that we have taken for granted but harm the environment.

Take the ongoing climate change conference in Bali this past week and next. I wish some expert would calculate just how much carbon dioxide has been emitted by flying in more than 10,000 delegates, observers and journalists to the Indonesian holiday island -- and how many hectares of trees have been felled to produce the tons of documents and brochures distributed at the conference.

And going by the UN schedule, we will need two more meetings, and five more years, before the international community can put in place an action plan to replace the Kyoto Protocol.

Those individual efforts are indeed commendable as a statement of our concern. But we need to do a lot more than that to save this planet. A more concerted global effort, and a much more serious one than the Kyoto agreement, is what it takes to do the job.

Let's hope this Bali conference is well worth the effort and the huge amount of carbon expended to make it possible.

If not, be prepared to have our own grandchildren, or great-grandchildren if this planet survives that long, curse us for our inability to act.
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alexH
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Location: TO, Ontario

Post: # 9896Post alexH »

that's a great post! :)
Especially the second one.
I'm trying to take some steps to reduce my waste output.
I stopped watching TV, its mostly useless anyway.
I'm trying to watch the stuff that i eat, and i try to make sure that whatever i'm eating didn't require the destroying of our planet, or using something that supported the exploitation of people. ie, products from china, many of them are being made by people who work in slave-like conditions. I admit i still buy some sometimes.
I need more ideas on how to help! :P
If a blind man leads another, they will both fall into a pit. -Jesus Christ

The no-mind not-thinks no-thoughts about no thing.
Gautama Buddha
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