Posted on 03 December
2009 - Those people unable to make it to
the Copenhagen Climate Conference this month
can still contribute to stopping climate
change – by using a new search engine from
their own computers.
The same day the conference
begins on Dec. 7, web users can start using
a new green search engine called Ecosia.
The new application, powered by Yahoo! and
Microsoft’s Bing search engines, will allow
internet surfers to protect about 2 square
meters of Amazon rainforest just by clicking
on sponsored links.
Although users do not
donate any money themselves, the company
behind Ecosia will donate at least 80 percent
of its income from sponsored links to WWF’s
rainforest protection programme in Brazil’s
Juruena-Apui region.
“The green search engine
is a very modern and inventive method of
saving the world climate without a huge
effort”, says WWF Germany’s director Eberhard
Brandes.
“Every year billions
of dollars are being earned in the internet
only from advertising revenue”, says Christian
Kroll, founder of Ecosia. “There is a more
eco-friendly way of using these huge profits:
the money should better be used to fight
global warming.”
Each click on a sponsored
link through Ecosia will provide WWF’s Amazon
rainforest with a protected area of 2 square
metres. Accordingly, 500,000 users and 1
million searches could save 2 million square
metres of rainforest every day, the same
size as Monaco.
“If only one percent
of global internet users accessed Ecosia
for their web searches, we could conserve
a rainforest area as big as Switzerland
every year,” says Kroll.
Rainforests are highly
endangered and in the last 50 years more
than a half have vanished. Every year a
rainforest larger than England is burned
or cut down. Deforestation is one of the
most important sources of CO2 emissions
in the world.
By using the green search
engine internet users also reduce their
own carbon footprint as the servers of Ecosia
use eco-friendly electricity. The search
engine will be tested starting Dec. 3 and
officially launched on on Dec. 7t. On the
website users can also check how many square
metres of rainforest have already been saved
by themselves and by the whole community.
+ More
Species survival hinges
on UN meeting
Posted on 04 December
2009 - Rome, Italy – The fate of valuable
marine species – including Atlantic bluefin
tuna – likely will be decided at an upcoming
United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization
(FAO) meeting next week.
An FAO expert panel
on commercially traded marine species is
meeting Monday to consider whether it will
recommend support for stricter trade regulations
for the six species – a critical step to
ensuring that they are not harvested to
extinction.
In addition to Atlantic
bluefin tuna, species under consideration
include spiny dogfish, porbeagle, red and
pink corals, scalloped hammerhead sharks,
and the oceanic white tip shark.
The panel’s decision
on each species will affect the outcome
of the 15th Conference of the Parties to
the Convention on International Trade in
Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora,
in March (CITES COP 15). Many countries
that vote at CITES – especially those with
strong fisheries interests - rely on the
panel for advice on how they should vote.
CITES, which is an international
agreement between governments that works
to ensure that international trade in wild
species does not threaten their survival,
normally offers its own scientific assessment
on all the proposals it receives. However,
in response to the concerns of larger fishing
countries, it made an agreement with FAO
that tasks the organization with conducting
its own technical assessment of proposals
for commercially traded marine species.
“This is a critical
meeting as it could influence important
decisions about the future of these species,”
said Amanda Nickson, Director of the Species
Programme at WWF International. “Each one
being discussed needs stronger trade restrictions
as they are all overharvested, particularly
Atlantic bluefin tuna.”
“WWF calls on the panel
to endorse these proposals and encourages
CITES Parties to give these species the
break they need for recovery.”
