Climate change causes unprecedented coral bleaching

According to a team of scientists from Australia’s Southern Cross University, warming ocean waters have imperiled coral reefs in Lord Howe Island Lagoon, the world’s southernmost such ecosystem, This year has seen the hottest, driest, most cloudless January in recorded history, and Dr. Peter Harrison, who led a survey of the reefs east of Sydney said that the two degree Celsius rise in temperature since 1993 has endangered the reefs as well as a sea anemone that is home to a rare type of fish.

As such overheating causes the coral to expel crucial algae that give them their color, a soon return to normal temperatures could allow the reefs to survive but only after decades of recovery.

Dr. Harrison explained that global warming is behind these changes as he stated. “It's exactly what you predict from warming seas. This is a warning of likely future increases of stress on this world's southernmost reef.”

Dr. Harrison and colleagues at Southern Cross University, we appreciate your detailed observations of the imperiled coral reefs. Our prayers that all are motivated to speedily adopt sustainable lifestyles that preserve the delicately interconnected life on our planet.

During a November 2008 interview with Ireland’s East Coast Radio FM, Supreme Master Ching Hai reiterated a concern she has often expressed about the preciousness of coral reefs as part of the biosphere affected by global warming.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: Now, the coral reefs are there for some reason. See, there are many factors that affect coral reefs, like coastal development, water pollution, changing sea water temperature because of global warming.

Some scientists predict that most of the coral reefs could disappear in the near future if global warming increases.

Coral reefs are just like the forest on land. They are the protectors of 100-plus countries’ coastlines against storm surges and hurricanes. They are the protectors. And they are also the supporters of over 25% of all marine species.

So you see how important it is. And there are many more things that we have not discovered about the benefits of coral reef and marine life. We must protect a living and healthy sea, as it relates to our living and healthy self.

The solution is vegetarian diet

http://www.france24.com/en/20100324-climate-change-puts-australian-reef-knife-edge
http://www.scu.edu.au/research/whales/index.php/14/
http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/pacbeat/stories/201003/s2855135.htm
http://www.sciencealert.com.au/news/20102603-20767-2.html

Accelerated glacial melt causing water sources to dwindle

As home to 70% of the Earth’s tropical glaciers, Peru has witnessed a 30% loss of glacial mass in the last 30 years due to climate change. Catholic University Research Center Director Bernex Nicol expressed his concern about the matter in a talk given on the radio station Radio Programs of Peru.

With shortages already threatening cities like Lima, where 1.5 million people are currently without water, further reductions are anticipated from factors such as the disappearance of freshwater springs in the northern Andes, where over 50% have dried due to deforestation.

Moreover, Peru’s National University of Engineering Director Julio Kuroiwa has stated that further shortages are expected in Lima, where water supplies could decrease by another 25% over the next decade.

Meanwhile, demands on this fragile resource are further complicated by metal contamination coming from mines in the country’s highlands.

Our appreciation Directors Nicol, Kuroiwa and colleagues for your evaluation and voiced concern about the vanishing Peruvian glaciers and their effect on people’s lives.

Let us act in unison now to stabilize the security and survival of the Peruvian people and all inhabitants of our shared Earthly home. As on previous occasions, Supreme Master Ching Hai spoke during a September 2009 conference in Peru about the country’s water crisis and how to bring relief to this global problem.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: In Peru, the loss to glaciers is equivalent to 10 whole years of water supply for Lima city.

With 8 of the country’s water basins already noted as being insufficient to meet people’s needs, Peru’s President Garcia announced in 2008 the construction of two desalination plants to try to address the water scarcity. It’s that urgent already in Peru.

Dwindling water supplies have caused escalating tensions and even conflicts to erupt as many people, including disadvantaged farmers, don’t have enough water, or are struggling for their share.

So please, before the situation gets any more out of hand – let’s choose the vegan diet. The future effects will be greatly eased. Only then will we have a manageable situation.

Be veg, go green, so we can all save the planet.

http://www.peruviantimes.com/limas-water-supply-to-decrease-by-25-percent-over-next...
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/sci/2010-03/28/c_13227756.htm
http://www.peruviantimes.com/brack-limas-water-supply-secure-over-next-years/285418

Cholera deaths in Kenya linked to climate change

Severe droughts and intense flooding are among the climate change-induced water woes that Kenya and other Eastern African countries have experienced in recent years.

Along with tolls from these disasters, many people have at times been forced to drink unclean water and thus become exposed to the water-borne pathogen, cholera.

At least 13 people have perished from the disease, with hundreds of cases confirmed, many requiring hospitalization. The government has also shut down schools as a preventive measure.

Cholera causes severe diarrhea and vomiting and can be fatal within 24 hours if left untreated. Kenyan health officials have been working to distribute clean drinking water door-to-door in the affected areas to stop the spread of the disease, and the United Nations Environment Program is calling for such measures as wetlands and coastal mangrove preservation to restore these natural water purification systems.

Our appreciation, health officials and United Nations Environment Program for your caring assistance in bringing relief to the people of Kenya.

Let us all become part of the solution to climate change through sustainable daily actions on our shared planetary home. During a May 2009 videoconference in the African country of Togo, Supreme Master Ching Hai expressed her concern for the global warming effects already threatening the lives of the African people, also highlighting what could be done to halt them.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: Sadly, global warming is affecting African countries in all the severest and some of the most visible ways. Increased temperatures mean erratic rainfall – either too little or too much at a time – so we have ravaging floods that drown the crops and fires that burn the forest.

There are more frequent droughts, heat waves, floods, storms, frosts, freezes, and locusts than before. These impacts of climate change increase food insecurity and the food crisis in Africa. There is also increased risk of diseases. The United Nations is afraid that hundreds of millions of people in Africa are at risk.

This is just a handful of all the news reports coming out about global warming in your land. I’m sure there are more.

So let us try our best to help remind and encourage our leaders to do something. If the world becomes vegan as a group, we can remedy the disasters that affect us globally.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=121392§ionid=351020506
http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/289412
http://www.clubofmozambique.com/solutions1/sectionnews.php?secao=social...
http://www.nation.co.ke/News/regional/-/1070/885016/-/8rc5bn/-/

Warming climate causing drastic forest decline

In various regions of the world, huge tracts of trees are perishing. Scientists have observed that a common factor of their often sudden demise has been increased heat and drought.

Across western North America, for instance, forest die-off has been especially disastrous, with 70,000 square miles being lost in the Canadian and US Rocky Mountains to beetle infestation as warming temperatures cause the insects to move to higher and higher altitudes.

In Australia, a recent report stated that nearly a third of the trees had died in a 20,000 square-mile savanna area, while a study in Russia of 9,400 square miles of tree-covered land also observed significant losses, with hot, dry conditions in forested regions like Siberia bringing extreme wildfires in eight of the last 10 years.

In Africa, climate change is being identified as the cause of demise for local trees such as the quiver tree, camel-thorn, and the giant 30-foot-tall succulent known as euphorbia.

Although when alive, these wondrous lungs of our Earth are continuously absorbing carbon dioxide, US Geological Survey ecologist Dr. Craig Allen, who has studied forests around the world, warns that as the trees perish, they actually become a source of greenhouse gases. We thank Dr. Allen and all international researchers for this reminder that our own well-being is truly linked to the health of the world’s forests.

May we all attend now to their silent calls of distress through our own swift adoption of more life-sustaining ways. Supreme Master Ching Hai has long highlighted the need to care for the ecosphere, including the world’s trees, and shield them from the tolls of global warming, as during a videoconference in Formosa (Taiwan) in July 2008.

Everyone knows by now that protecting the environment, protecting the animals, are actually protecting ourselves. So we must protect the environment.

We should have more rules, more guidelines, to protect natural habitats. Because sometimes we overlook the long run effect. Then the consequence is very, very detrimental to ourselves and to the planet, just like what we are facing right now.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: People must be more aware of our dire situation and that everyone’s responsible action does help to minimize or stop global warming. We should act fast.

Be veg. Go green.

http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2252
http://blog.climateandenergy.org/2010/03/16/forest-die-offs-in-the-rocky-mtns-and...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/mar/16/forests-insects
http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2252
http://wildfiremag.com/tactics/russian_fire_season/

Scientists say extreme winter weather fits global warming

According to the assessment of both US and European researchers, the frigidly cold weather and massive storm systems that occurred this past winter throughout the US and Europe were all part of a warming climate.

Frank Boettcher, Director of the German Institute for Weather and Climate Communication, stated, “Right now, temperatures in Greenland are 15 degrees Celsius above the season's long-term average.”

He went on to say that even with the cold temperatures in Central and Northern Europe, German weather statistics reveal an average temperature that is at least one degree Celsius higher than 100 years ago.

Moreover, a 2009 US Climate Impacts Report stated that global warming has caused large cold weather systems to move northward, with mid-latitude storms decreasing in frequency but rising in intensity as the hotter air retains more moisture, resulting in the release of enormous amounts of snowfall.

Satellite data in fact showed that the two large winter storms that recently impacted the US occurred during the warmest winter on record for the region. Director Boettcher and other European and US scientists, we are grateful for your insights that remind us of the perilous state of our ecosphere.

Let us all do our utmost to restore planetary stability by acting now in united and Earth-supporting ways.

As during a January 2009 videoconference in Mongolia, Supreme Master Ching Hai has often emphasized the real urgency of global warming and our actions that can quickly counter it.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: We are already facing so many untold natural disasters on a daily basis such as earthquakes, severe storms never seen before, volcanoes, ice melting and many island nations that have sunk under the water already and many are sinking.

And the climate has become very, very strange, like it became warm where it should be cold and it became cold where it should be hot. And this can only be alleviated through a return to the ancient ways of our wiser elders, one that exists in harmony with nature and respect of other beings, a true brotherhood of love with all.

We can still do that; it’s not too late.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: We should remind everyone to be veg, to invoke the mercy of the Buddhas, and we will be better protected.

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/ips/...
http://www.whitefieldconsulting.com/wordpress/?p=2463
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1962294,00.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/11/science/earth/11climate.html
http://www.globalchange.gov/publications/reports/scientific-assessments/us-impacts/full...

Oceanic dead zones emit potent greenhouse gas and accelerate global warming

As a growing number of oxygen-deprived “dead zones” in the world’s seas not only threaten marine plant and animal life, the suffocating waters also give off the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide.

In an article published in the journal “Science,” Dr. Lou Codispoti, oceanographer at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science in the USA explains that the warming oceans are causing microbes, especially those in the more shallow, low-oxygen zones, to produce high levels of the gas, which are then passed into the atmosphere to further aggravate climate change.

Along with trapping 289 times more heat than carbon dioxide over a 20-year period, nitrous oxide also further depletes the Earth's ozone layer, thus increasing our exposure to harmful UV radiation.

Dr. Codispoti, your study indeed sounds a warning that cannot be ignored and we are grateful for your observations. Let us all act now in planet-cooling endeavors to stabilize the environments of both land and sea.

Supreme Master Ching Hai has often cautioned about the detriments of poisonous gases being released by the warming oceans, along with global warming’s root solution, as during an international gathering with our Association members in February 2008.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: You see, the gases are fuming from the ocean and from the land that’s been deforested. It’s fuming everywhere. It’s just that at the moment, it’s not so intense. , yeah? But it’ll be more and more intense if we don’t do something.

Everybody knows by now, from the UN Report that meat eating, animal raising, it’s one of the worst factors, or even the worst factor of global warming.

And nobody talks about it. Everybody says, okay, new energy, biofuel, hybrid car, dig a hole and store the carbon. As if it will not bust one day. And before that you have to breathe in already, as if it will not affect you.

What is so difficult, to put down one piece of meat, and replace it with one piece of tofu. Which is exactly the same, better nutrition. Better for your health. More economized.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/03/100311141213.htm
http://www.epa.gov/nitrousoxide/sources.html
http://www.inhabitat.com/2010/03/12/aquatic-dead-zones-produce-greenhouse-gas-300x.../

Record high temperatures reported across Canada

With parts of the Arctic and northern Quebec reaching more than 6° Celsius above normal seasonal averages, the nation’s Meteorological Service has reported that this past winter was the warmest and driest on record.

Along with up to 60% less precipitation in some regions for this year alone, the past decade has produced 4 of the ten warmest years on record.

Meanwhile in the United States, a recent analysis by the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) affirmed that average temperatures in the past decade have continued to rise rapidly despite year-to-year fluctuations caused by El Niño and La Niña cycles.

Our heartfelt thanks, Canadian and US scientists for this revealing data, despite its unsettling observations.

Let us all move now to adopt planet-cooling actions that restore the balance of our shared global home. In a video message during a June 2009 climate change conference in Veracruz, Mexico, Supreme Master Ching Hai spoke of the quickest way to reverse the case of ever-extreme temperature rise.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: The past decade has twice, at least, seen the hottest average annual temperatures ever recorded in our planet’s history. So, we must cool the planet, first and foremost. And one of the most effective and fastest ways to reduce the heat in the atmosphere is to eliminate methane production.

Methane not only traps up to 72 times more heat than carbon, it also goes away from the atmosphere much faster than CO2.

We can start by cutting down on the biggest methane producer in the world, that is, animal raising. So, to cool the planet most quickly, we have to stop consuming meat in order to stop the livestock raising industry

If everyone in the world would adopt this simple but most powerful practice of an animal-free diet, then we could reverse the effect of global warming in no time.

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2010/03/canwinter-20100320.html...
http://www.msc-smc.ec.gc.ca/ccrm/bulletin/national_e.cfm
http://www.msc-smc.ec.gc.ca/msc/contents_e.html
http://wwwp.dailyclimate.org/tdc-newsroom/2010/03/global-cooling-is-bunk-draft-nasa...
http://www.aolnews.com/science/article/nasa-scientists-say-earth-is-still-warming...0

Climate change and development seminar held in Mexico

In preparation for the United Nations Climate Change Conference to be held in Mexico City, Mexico this coming November, the Inter-American Development Bank hosted a seminar on climate change and development. Supreme Master Television’s correspondent is in Cancun on location.

Mexican Correspondent (F): We are reporting from the Convention Center of the City of Cancun, Mexico where the Annual Reunion Assemblies of Governors is being held under the organization of the Inter-American Development Bank.

Juan Rafael Elvira Quesada – Secretary of Environment and Natural Resources, Mexico (M): We need to give all the support to the Mexican negotiations, to bring something useful to humanity at the end of the year.

VOICE: Invited speakers to the forum included Chair of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri; renowned Nobel Prize winning Mexican scientist Dr. José Mario Molina-Pasquel Henríquez; Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change Yvo de Boer; former Irish President and United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson; and Mexican Environment Secretary, Juan Rafael Elvira Quesada.

Panelists’ discussions included consideration for such topics as climate justice, in that the populations most affected by global warming are often the least equipped and protected.

Dr. Rajendra Pachauri (M): There are some countries in the world, some communities, that are going to suffer the impacts of climate change much more than other countries.

Mary Robinson (F): We need to make progress, because the poorest are suffering very much from climate change.

VOICE: During an interactive session with the audience, Supreme Master Television’s correspondent asked about the dietary solution to climate change.

Mexican Correspondent (F): The vegan diet is an effective solution to mitigate global warming, and it doesn’t require thousands of dollars of investments. What do you think about this?

Mary Robinson – 7th President of Ireland, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (F): I’m glad you asked that question. I feel very strongly that we need to have an awareness that this is both an intellectual and an educational tool for every family – for every mother, every father, every grandmother like me, and in our schools, we need to have a wholly different approach now.

Dr. Rajendra Pachauri – Chair, United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 2007 Nobel Peace Prize (M): When people ask me what lifestyle changes, one of the things that I say is to reduce meat consumption.

And I want to give an example. About two years ago, I addressed a group in the city of Ghent in Belgium, and that started a movement, as a result of which they have now declared one day a week as a meatless day.

It’s healthy for individuals; it’s also healthy for the planet.

Mexican Correspondent (F): Broadcasting for Supreme Master Television from Cancun, Quintana Roo in Mexico.

VOICE: Our appreciation all esteemed seminar participants for your concerted efforts to pave the way toward solutions on climate change. Let us act on measures in all world citizens’ best interest, including global adoption of the planet-saving meat-free diet.

In an August 2009 videoconference in Thailand, Supreme Master Ching Hai once again urged government leaders toward bold actions at this crucial time to halt global warming.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: To sum up, to all the leaders, I call on them once more to put their love first for their countrymen and women, and for all the children to accept with courage the deed that must be done, to use the mighty power in their hands entrusted by people to save the world.

The global livestock industry is now contributing almost about as much to global warming as the energy sector, or even more. And I know it contributes at least 80% of it. Just be vegan. And please, be quick. Our days are numbered.

British eco-organization Natural England calls for protection of peat lands from damaging practices such as plowing and burning, which is causing the release of CO2 emissions equivalent to 350,000 households per year.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/7465370/Damage-to-peat...
http://www.edp24.co.uk/content/edp24/news/story.aspx?brand=EDPOnline...

Seabed methane could spell climate disaster

In a new study published in the journal “Science,” a team of researchers from Russia, United States and Sweden have found that thawing permafrost is causing 8 million tons of methane to be released from the seabed of the East Siberian Arctic Shelf each year.

This alarming amount from just one location is equivalent to the total that had been previously estimated for all the world’s oceans and causes concern that a tipping point may have already been reached.

Lead researcher, Dr. Natalia Shakhova of the University of Alaska-Fairbanks in the USA noted that current average methane concentrations in the Arctic are already the highest in 400,000 years.

Of equal concern is the fact that, averaged over a 20-year period, methane is 72 times more heat-trapping than CO2; however, these potentially vast permafrost methane emissions are not included in climate change prediction models.

Dr. Shakhova and international colleagues, we are grateful for your sharing of such factually urgent observations. Let us act in accordance with their dire implications and move swiftly toward sustainable ways to save our ecosphere.

Supreme Master Ching Hai has spoken with concern on several occasions about the risks of melting permafrost, as during a September 2009 videoconference in South Korea.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: Since 2007, scientists have seen more and more evidence of methane from permafrost melt, with recent discoveries of pure methane gas bubbling up from the bottom of the Arctic lakes in both northern Canada and Russia. This situation is so alarming that

UN Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change Chairman Dr. Pachauri has referred to the potential for “abrupt, irreversible climate change” from the melting permafrost. This irreversible effect, we want to avoid at all costs, especially since it may not be as far away as we would like to think.

The more people who eliminate meat and, indeed, all animal products from their lives, the more we have a chance to save the planet and not only that, to actually restore our earthly home to her original grace and beauty and even more so, more than what we have known, more beautiful, more abundant, more peace, more gladness than what we have known up to now.

So please, be a part of the solution and join in first by being vegan yourself and helping to spread this message as much, as quickly as possible: Be Veg, Go Green, Save the Planet.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7050312.ece
http://esciencenews.com/articles/2010/03/04/methane.releases.arctic.shelf.may.be...
http://www.theage.com.au/national/seabed-methane-leaks-cause-alarm-20100305-pox2...

Honeybee crisis deepens

This past winter on Vancouver Island, Canada, the British Columbia Ministry of Agriculture and Lands noted a staggering 90% loss of the vital winged insects. A longer summer season due to climate change is thought to have weakened the bees’ immunity as they worked overtime collecting pollen to further the species of both flowers and foods consumed by humans.

As scientists raise concerns about the Vancouver Island decline spreading further inland, a recently published study in the USA, where bees continue to perish from the malady known as Colony Collapse Disorder, found unprecedented levels of chemical pesticides in their North American beehive homes.

The nation’s federal courts have issued a ruling in support of more stringent regulations. Canadian and US researchers, we appreciate this message of alert to the dying honeybees, and are also grateful to all scientists and officials working to protect them.

Our prayers that humans everywhere turn to the organic, vegan diet as the best way to spare resources and protect all life. As during an August 2008 international gathering, Supreme Master Ching Hai has long indicated that troubled species such as the bees show the need for urgent, necessary lifestyle changes to stabilize the Earth’s ecosystems.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: My God, now the continued decline of bees has affected the food now. This is nothing new, but they keep reporting it’s getting worse all the time.

Because if there are no bees, there is no pollination. And then some food, some fruits and some vegetables depend on the pollination to bear fruits. And now a lot of bees have died We might have no food because of no pollination. So you guys maybe just start planting something at home. Some things that don’t need the bees.

But this is terrible, this is such a disaster The people don’t take care of the environment, and let all beings keep dying like this.

Just to be vegan, how difficult can it be? Is it difficult? Even if it is, this is the only choice we have to survive, then why not?

Why not just change to the vegan diet?

http://www.examiner.com/x-40360-Vancouver-Environmental-News-Examiner~y2010m3d9-Climate-change-linked-to-death-of-90-of-Vancouver-Island-honeybee-population
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2010/03/09/bc-vancouver-island-bees-die.html
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100324/ap_on_sc/us_food_and_farm_disappearing_bees
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/57474/title
/Bees_face_unprecedented_pesticide_exposures_at_home_and_afield
http://news.discovery.com/animals/honey-bees-disappearing-still-a-problem.html

Climate change is real and now

A report by Australia's top science bodies, the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) and the Bureau of Meteorology sounds the alarm about the imminent dangers of climate change.

Saying that temperatures have risen about 0.7 degrees Celsius in the last 50 years, the report also states that both CO2 and methane are at their highest levels in perhaps 20 million years.

As a result, every region of the country is warming during every season, and each decade surpasses the previous decades’ temperature records. Sea levels rising by 9 cm between 1993 and 2009 along with changes in precipitation represent other marked consequences of climate change, with rainfall in the north and central parts of the country increasing substantially while decreases in the south and east have led to severe droughts.

Scientists at Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization and the Bureau of Meteorology, we are grateful for this report which is also a call to action.

May we all unite in restoring harmony and balance to our Earth. In an October 2009 videoconference in Indonesia, Supreme Master Ching Hai referred to the experts’ increasingly serious reports on climate change, and reiterated the most urgently needed countermeasures.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: Now, according to expert scientists, the atmospheric temperatures are rising so steeply that we do not have much time left to change. And that is just what they have predicted up to date.

The effects of climate change can be seen in so many ways, with increased flooding, droughts, fires and even earthquakes everywhere in the world.

How do we stop these alarming changes The greenhouse gases released from the animals, from their waste, agricultural runoff, and the activities related to these massive operations have been identified as the primary, the number one cause of global warming.

We have to halt the meat consumption and the livestock raising Instead, we should choose to buy organic vegetable and fruit products to save our lives and those of our families, save the animals and the planet.

http://www.sciencealert.com.au/news/20101603-20714-2.html?...
http://www.france24.com/en/20100315-australia-07-degrees-warmer-over-past-50-years
http://www.gdacs.org/reports.asp?...

World Water Day observed across the globe

With experts increasingly aware of a looming shortage, this year’s theme of the United Nations’- sponsored event was “Clean Water for a Healthy World.”

Held on March 22, participants worldwide gathered to raise awareness and call for action in protecting both quality and quantities of the precious resource.

As acknowledged by many environmentalists, addressing the massive consumption and pollution of both the meat and dairy industries could effectively eliminate the Earth’s water crises, as this farmer in California, USA shares.

Grape farmer located near dairy factory farms, California, USA (M): The ones that have been doing all these nuts, grapes, vegetables, fruits; we’ve been doing that for the last hundred years. We had a lot of water. The central valley of California feeds America, and also other countries. Ever since the dairy moved in, the water level in my well went dry.

My neighbors’ well went dry. One, two, three, four of our wells are dry. Our water level was really high before. Now our water level is so low, the farmers that are doing all the vegetable and fruits are hurting for water, because we got the dairy here.

VOICE: The United Nations Environment Program also held a three-day event in Nairobi, Kenya, where policy makers and scientist participants released a report revealing that more lives are lost to contaminated water than to wars or other conflicts.

In fact, every 20 seconds, one child less than age 5 succumbs to water-related disease. Highlighting once again a livestock-based source of the majority of the world’s water problems was Mr. Rick Dove of Waterkeepers Alliance in North Carolina, USA.

Rick Dove – Southeastern representative for Waterkeeper Alliance (M): In eastern North Carolina there are about ten million hogs producing more fecal waste each and every day than all the people in the states of North Carolina, California, New York, Texas, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, North Dakota combined.

On some of our rivers like the Neuse, we’ve lost over a billion fish, dead fish since 1991, and just this year we’ve lost about 200 million on the Neuse River.

VOICE: We thank Mr. Rick Dove and all the concerned participants of World Water Day 2010 for helping raise awareness of our need to preserve this life-giving resource.

As more and more people awaken to the link between water scarcity and livestock, may we soon herald a meat-free world of lush abundance for all.

Supreme Master Ching Hai has often addressed the need for action to reverse these planet-wide tolls, as during an August 2009 videoconference in Thailand.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: Many tens of thousands of rivers and great lakes are dying, dead, gone or going. And I don’t know how many more we must wait for to die in order for us to wake up.

The leaders of the nations must do something. The people of all nations must do something.

We have to do something to avoid the tragedy that is already happening to billions of other people. There are one billion people hungry already because of climate change, and short of water and food.

And three billion people are short of water.

Just be veg. Stop the meat, dairy, fish industry. Be benevolent. Create a merciful energy that will envelop our world, that will emit mercy, love, protection for us and our children on this planet. Please take action now.

http://www.fastcompany.com/1593806/world-water-day
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-deane/reflecting-on-world-water_b_508036.html
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Africa/2010/0322/World-Water-Day-Dirty-water-kills...
http://yubanet.com/world/World-Water-Day-2010-Highlights-Solutions-and-Calls-for...

Climate change reaffirmed as human-caused

A year-long study by an international team of scientists has reached the same conclusions as the 2007 UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, namely that global warming has been induced by humans.

Led by the United Kingdom’s Met Office, the study evaluated more than 100 recent scientific papers, finding that only human activities could account for the millions of tons of greenhouse gases emitted and the corresponding steep rise in global temperatures since the mid-twentieth century.

Lead researcher Dr. Peter Stott stated, “The fingerprint of human influence has been detected in many different aspects of observed climate changes. Natural variability, from the sun, volcanic eruptions or natural cycles, cannot explain recent warming.”

Other signs include new evidence of warming in the oceans, which in turn is causing increased atmospheric evaporation, with resulting accentuation of weather extremes worldwide, so that places like the United Kingdom become wetter while arid areas such as East Africa are even more dry.

Our sincere appreciation, Dr. Stott and other Met Office scientists for your factual assessment of humanity’s role in the Earth’s now-perilous state.

Let us heed such compelling conclusions and swiftly adopt lifestyles that protect our planet for future generations. Supreme Master Ching Hai has often emphasized the human-based causes and need for immediate action in curbing global warming, as during an interview published in the September 2009 edition of The House Magazine.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: It’s too serious. Too serious. Although there is no way to assess completely, for the moment, already more than a decade ago the United Nations conservatively estimated that there were 25 million climate change refugees – a decade ago, these are people forced from their homes and communities due to rising sea levels and a host of other natural disasters, so-called natural disasters, but in fact these are all man-made.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: These situations will only worsen, not improve, until we stop the cause. This means to halt the livestock production and meat consumption.

If humans switch to the vegan diet, the Earth will begin cooling immediately and many of these dilemmas can even be reversed. So please, be veg and do good, to save the planet and all the beings on it, including you and me.

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/humans-umustu-be...
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/2832934a-27f6-11df-9598-00144feabdc0.html

Scientists discuss the need for a greener diet

In order to avoid runaway climate change, industrialized countries have agreed to a 2050 goal of a 90% reduction of greenhouse gas emissions compared to pre-industrial levels.

Toward this end, scientists are emphasizing the need for behavioral, rather than technological, approaches for faster results. This is especially true in the area of food.

Multiple studies have suggested that reducing or eliminating meat consumption would be more cost effective and quicker in reducing greenhouse gas emissions than attempting to develop technologies to capture the large-scale emissions involved in meat production.

Dr. Juha-Matti Katajajuuri, senior researcher at MTT Agrifood Research Finland, evaluated the climate impacts of various typical Finnish meals, ranging from meat-based to vegan.

He found that vegetarian main courses had a 50-60% smaller climate impact compared to their meat-based counterparts. Dr. Katajajuuri also highlighted the likelihood of obtaining more immediate results from a behavioral approach.

Dr. Juha-Matti Katajajuuri – Senior researcher, MTT Agrifood Research Finland (M): It is a lot more challenging to find easy and new technological solutions by which we can reduce the environmental effects of food production.

VOICE: Industrial ecologist and climate scientist Dr. Peter Tom Jones of the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium, agreed, saying that personal human action rather than technical change is the key for greener food consumption.

Dr. Peter Tom Jones – Industrial ecologist and author, Vegetarian (M): This entails: more local chains, more organic food, less dependence on oil.

In that manner you can drastically reduce the environmental impact of the production issue.

But then a second essential component of the reduction in the food sector has to do with our meat and fish consumption.

VOICE: Dr. Jones, a vegetarian himself, stated that if governments encouraged the consumption and production of organic vegan foods, the international reducing of emissions by 90% would be attainable, with added health benefits.

Peter Tom Jones, PhD (M): We can easily go to a reduction of 90% if associated with the agro-ecological food model, with even much healthier nutrition.

So there would be less nutritional disease, less cardiac and blood vessel disease, less diabetes, less obesity, etc.

VOICE: Our sincere appreciation, Dr. Katajajuuri, Dr. Jones and associates for your research in the crucial area of food production emissions.

May all governments and co-citizens start now to eliminate costly animal products and switch to organic plant-based fare to halt climate change. Supreme Master Ching Hai has often emphasized the priority of dietary change needed to save the planet, as during a September 2009 videoconference in South Korea.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: In order to call ourselves a low-carbon or carbon-free society, we must eliminate our meat consumption, because that is the number one cause for climate change – that is, our meat consumption.

In fact, if we focus on shifting people to be vegan, it will save us much more money than green technology, and of course it’s much more effective.

And I urge you, the government leaders, because our time is running out, we have to act on this now. Please explain to your co-citizens this important truth and tell them we must work together to become animal-free consumers.

We have a very short time to save our planet. We have a great planet to save. We have a great precious treasure, that is, our children, to save.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=limits-on-greenhouse-gas-emissions
http://www.mtt.fi/english/
http://www.se2009.eu/polopoly_fs/1.24468!menu/standard/file/Juha-Matti...
http://www.petertomjones.be/content/blogsection/6/27/

Ocean scientists sound the alarm

Chemical oceanographer Dr. Jeremy Mathis and a team of researchers at the University of Fairbanks Alaska in the USA have found that the rising acidity of northern ocean waters has decreased its ability to absorb calcium and aragonite.

These minerals are vital for shell-bearing animals, with related studies already demonstrating that the region’s king crabs suffer higher mortality rates as ocean acidity increases.

Meanwhile, oceanographer Dr. Jack Barth and colleagues at Oregon State University have also expressed concern about the effect of global warming on the Pacific Ocean, having observed that hypoxic, or low oxygen, regions have expanded.

Recently, species such as Dungeness crabs, sea stars and sea anemones have been seen dying off in massive numbers due to oxygen deprivation. Moreover, noxious bacteria thrive in these conditions.

Highlighting the forecast of such events from previous climate change models, Dr. Barth stated, “The real surprise is how this has become the new norm. We are seeing it year after year.”

Dr. Mathis, Dr. Barth and colleagues at the University of Fairbanks and Oregon State University, we appreciate your detailed studies and share your concern about this disruption to ocean ecospheres.

Let us all quickly join hands in meaningful actions to halt climate change and protect all lives on our planet. Supreme Master Ching Hai has often expressed concern about the grave state of the oceans while also highlighting the solution for the entire planet, as during a May 2009 videoconference in Togo.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: Scientists are now concerned that dead zones like this will just continue to be more and more, get bigger and bigger, which of course is lethal for all life.

From the oceans themselves, we are seeing warming temperatures, rising sea levels, increasing acidification and terrible levels of pollution. So global warming is affecting the oceans, which in turn is affecting the fish.

This is an equally urgent situation as the one presented by livestock industry, and it has the exact same solution. Stop eating the flesh; stop killing for food; stop eating the fish. This will help restore the balance of both the ocean and land, immediately.

http://www.csmonitor.com/Environment/Global-Warming/2009/1204/global-warming...
http://www.sfos.uaf.edu/directory/faculty/mathis/
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/sci/2010-03/08/c_13201667.htm

Widespread drought afflicts China

Southwestern Yunnan province has been experiencing the most severe drought in six decades with some regions not having received rainfall since August 2009. Neighboring Guangxi and Guizhou provinces have also lacked rain, which has been disastrous for farmers.

Some 2.55 million hectares constituting 85% of Yunnan's total growing area and containing such crops as wheat, sugarcane and vegetables have been affected.

Provincial authorities reported water shortages for nearly 5 million residents and over 3 million livestock animals.

With the drought also grounding boats on the Mekong River, the Marine Bureau has stopped issuing permits and is warnings vessels instead to stay away from the waterway. It saddens us deeply to know of the suffering of the Chinese people.

Our prayers for the blessing of rain and that humans everywhere quickly adopt sustainable lifestyles that restore balance to our Earth. During an October 2009 videoconference in Germany, Supreme Master Ching Hai voiced, as she has many other times, her concern for humanity’s plight at this dire time on our planet, while at the same time highlighting the actions necessary to alleviate such crises.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: With current droughts and water shortages already affecting millions and only expected to get worse, worse and worse. But even though our predicament is very grave, we do still have time if we act now. And the solution is still very simple.

It’s the vegan diet – no animal products.

Scientists have found that each person eating a meat and dairy based diet uses around 4,500 gallons of water per day, compared to 300 gallons per day for a vegan diet.

This also means that 1 pound of animal protein requires 100 times more water to produce than 1 pound of grain protein.

Over the course of a year, the vegan diet saves approximately 1.5 million gallons of water per person.

This is the key. If everyone switches to this beneficial lifestyle, our planet will be cooled in no time, scientifically speaking and my promise.

http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90001/90776/90882/6900486.html
http://in.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idINIndia-46421320100224
http://www.prensa-latina.cu/index.php?option=com_content&task...

Antarctic Peninsula ice sheets melting at worrying rate

US Geological Survey (USGS) researchers who have been conducting a first ever survey of Antarctica’s entire coastline coasts are now reporting that the southern portion of the Antarctic Peninsula, which is its coldest, has been retreating for sixty years, with the biggest changes occurring since 1990.

The scientists report that this condition is likely suggestive of the situation across all of Antarctica, whose ice sheet contains 91% of the world’s glacial water and could cause a 60 to 73 meter sea level rise if all the land-based ice were to melt.

As noted by environmental experts, even one meter of sea level rise would jeopardize food supplies across the world. USGS scientist Jane Ferrigno stated, “The loss of ice shelves is evidence of the effects of global warming.

We need to be alert and continually understand and observe how our climate system is changing." We thank Dr. Ferrigno and associate scientists at the US Geological Survey for your careful monitoring of the Antarctic.

Let us act now to restore the planet-cooling balance of our world’s ice caps by choosing lifestyles in greater harmony with nature.

As mentioned on previous occasions, Supreme Master Ching Hai spoke again during a November 2009 videoconference in Washington, DC, USA of the most direct way to avert the potentially catastrophic consequences of global warming.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: Greenland is shedding 85 million tons of icebergs each day due to warming, and at a rate that is increasing by 7 percent each year. The West Antarctic Ice Shelf is also melting, with 3.3 meter sea level rises forecast that would threaten cities like New York, Washington, D.C., and San Francisco.

And if all of Antarctica and Greenland were to melt – meaning the ice – then the sea levels could rise to as much as 70 meters, which would be deadly or disastrous to most lives on Earth.

You may ask, what is the main cause of this damage and destruction to the environment?

It’s methane, which is produced primarily by the livestock industry.

NASA announced that methane actually contributes much more to global warming than previously understood and it traps 100 times the atmospheric heat over 20 years. And the largest source of methane is? You know - livestock.

So, to solve this, we do need to move quickly, and of course we know what to do, right?

Yes? Be vegan.

http://news.mongabay.com/2010/0223-hance_antpen.html
http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/enviornment/ice-shelves-on-antarctic-peninsula...
http://www.earth-policy.org/index.php?/books/pb4
http://www.springerlink.com/content/h28l707685463333/
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/may/31/cattle-trade-brazil-greenpeace...

Government and schools rally for meat-free meals

On March 4, all 151 elementary and middle schools in the Formosa’s (Taiwan) Chiayi County pledged that Friday meals would be without any beef, pork, chicken, lamb or fish.

This health- and environment-promoting measure was led by Chiayi County Magistrate Zhang Hua-guan.

Zhang Hua-guan – Chiayi County Magistrate (F): From now on, every Friday, we shall have healthy veg lunches. What does it mean to have healthy veg meals?

It means that there is no meat, no beef, no chicken, no pork, no lamb. With this kind of meal, our students will be much healthier and livelier.

Children assembled (M,F): Okay!

VOICE: At the official starting event, County Magistrate Zhang and students enjoyed a nutritious vegan lunch with soy protein and pumpkin-cabbage soup. Also attending in support were the heads of Chiayi County universities, high schools, and elementary schools.

Dr. Lin Jin-chao – Dean, Toko University (F): After this activity, I will make a report to our president to have the school join together with County Magistrate Zhang.

VOICE: With the Formosan(Taiwanese) Environmental Protection Department finding that eliminating meat is a simple, effective, and practical way to reduce

greenhouse gas emissions, the central government is now recommending that schools across the island make meat-free meals available one day each week.

Dr. Lin Tsong-Ming – Deputy Minister of Education, Formosa (Taiwan), VEGAN (M): Global warming is becoming worse. As to the vegetarian diet, I think we can encourage it.

VOICE: The Chiayi plan, like other recently introduced reduced-meat programs in Yunlin, Hsinchu, and Changhua Counties, emphasizes healthy eating habits and especially the halting of global warming by avoiding animal products.

Tseng Nan-shun – Principal, Song-May Elementary School (M): Being veg is the way for us to reduce the danger of global warming, and I totally agree with it.

Chen Yun-ru – Student, Jhu-Tsun Elementary School (F): With the serious situation of global warming, meat eating is causing a lot of bad effects.

VOICE: Another aspect of this county-wide initiative is its encouragement of respect for life and care for the animals.

Dr. Huang Gui-nan – Professor, Tatung Institute of Commerce and Technology (M): The first consequence of being veg is less killing, and this is a kind of ethical education.

Zhuang Ming-xun – Student, Jhu-Tsun Elementary School (M): We have to do something to protect the animals.

VOICE: Our respectful accolades, Magistrate Zhang, Chiayi County and other Formosan governments and schools! May this be the start of even greater meat-eliminating actions to curb climate change, save the animals and ensure a safe and healthful future for all children!

Group of students (M,F): Be veg! Go green! Save the planet! Yeah!

British government agency Natural England reports that nearly 500 species of flora and fauna became extinct in the past two centuries alone, with 1,000 more now on the brink of vanishing forever due to hunting, pollution and climate change.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/mar/11/extinct-species-england

Climate change taking a toll in Âu Lạc (Vietnam)

With no rainfall since September 2009 in the northern part of the country, forest fires have ignited in the provinces of Lào Cai and Lai Châu. Moreoever, the Red River is at its lowest in more than 100 years, with passage by boat currently impossible while regional rice farmers are in need of water for newly planted seedlings.

Alarmingly, the southern Mekong Delta is also experiencing water shortages. Worsening global warming effects have not only reduced Mekong River water levels to record lows, ocean salt water has encroached an unprecedented 60 kilometers inland this year, threatening 100,000 hectares of rice.

Central Âu Lạc has also been affected, enduring high temperatures that have caused hundreds of people to seek medical treatment at local hospitals for conditions of heatstroke, severe dehydration and other respiratory illnesses.

We are saddened to know of this suffering caused by the increasingly dire state of our planet.

Let us act now to bring relief through sustainable choices that help restore harmony to our Earth’s cycles. As on previous occasions, Supreme Master Ching Hai spoke during an August 2009 conference in Thailand about global warming’s critical tolls and the need to curb them.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: In Âu Lạc (Vietnam), you probably know of global warming related problems such as the untimely flooding and encroachment of the sea of the Mekong Delta region – both of which have caused havoc and further threat to the region’s vital rice and fruit crops.

This is due to a combination of sea levels rising, along with the effect of melting glaciers, which are now causing excessive floods but eventually will cause drought and vastly diminished water supplies as well.

So we must work quickly to avoid such unwanted outcomes.

And the most effective way is the organic vegan diet, organic vegetable farming. This is also the fastest way to reverse the increased warming climate to prevent further damage and disaster.

If everyone does this – be veg – the Earth will begin to cool and we will have more time to implement the measures to eliminate all the carbon emissions. So please, be veg,and tell everyone else of these benefits.

http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=88320
http://english.people.com.cn/90001/90777/90851/6909249.html
http://english.vietnamnet.vn/Health/201003/Sweltering-weather-sending-kids-elderly-to-HCMC-hospitals-898122/

Sulfur dioxide pollution highlights methane as key to global warming

With countries such as China and India now reducing pollutants containing sulfur dioxide, Dr. Frank Raes, head of the Climate Change Unit of the European Commission Joint Research Center in Italy reports that the planet is likely to heat more quickly in response.

Sulfur dioxide, which is emitted in the processing of coal, oil and other industrial processes, has already been significantly reduced in many developed nations.

Although it is harmful to health, sulfur aerosols create an atmospheric cooling effect that offsets the heat emitted by the CO2 released in these same processes.

This suggests that the heat from coal, oil and industry in developing nations has played a smaller role in global warming than previously thought. Such a finding corresponds with the conclusions of Dr. Drew Shindell from the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration, who estimated that because of sulfur dioxide’s cooling effect, methane, which is generated primarily by activities related to meat production, is heating the atmosphere much more than previously thought.

Our appreciation Dr. Raes and European Commission Joint Research Center fellow scientists, for this insightful finding. Let us choose the fastest way to return to health and cool the planet, namely, through the safe and Earth-friendly vegan diet.

As mentioned on previous occasions, Supreme Master Ching Hai reminded once again during a September 2009 videoconference in South Korea that the most urgent global warming threat lies in sources other than carbon dioxide.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: If the goal is to be a truly carbon-free society, we should consider all the major sources of greenhouse gases emissions. You see, we are emitting greenhouse gases not just through the fumes from factories, houses, and cars, but also through the products that we choose to consume. Besides, CO2 is cancelled out by aerosols, which are released at the same time from burning fossil fuels.

Even though aerosols are very detrimental to our health, they actually have a cooling effect that cancels out the CO2 heat in the atmosphere.

So the warming climate problem is not from CO2 I repeat, it’s not from carbon dioxide. It is from other sources, mainly methane.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: First and foremost, eliminate the single largest source of human-caused methane, namely, livestock. Stop animal products, then we stop global warming.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20527481.400-smoke-bomb-the-other-climate-culprits.html
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/science/earth-environment/article6895907.ece

Global warming to necessitate land use changes

According to a new report by Britain’s Government Office for Science, increasingly hotter, drier summers could cause extreme water shortages as river flows are reduced by 80% even as a rise in population of 9 million people is expected by 2031.

Scenarios in the report, written by 300 contributing scientists, economists and planners, include a future in which greenhouse gas emissions would be controlled by carbon rationing and state-mandated reductions in the space allocated to livestock as well as forced migration of citizens from places like the crowded southeast to more northern towns.

Chief UK scientific adviser and director of the research, Professor John Beddington warned, “Over the next 50 years we cannot manage land in the way we’ve done…

The effects of climate change and new pressures… could escalate, seriously eroding quality of life.” Professor Beddington, Government Office for Science and all report contributors, we are thankful for your objective report informing of outcomes we would wish to avoid. Let us join in making choices today that allow a harmonious and plentiful future for all on our planet.

During an August 2008 interview by Ireland’s East Coast FM Radio, Supreme Master Ching Hai highlighted as she has on previous occasions our need to act upon the factual information provided by scientific experts.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: According to the scientists, whatever they have predicted or prescribed about our critical situation is accurate up to 99%. They want us to change the way we live our lives, to protect our fragile ecosystem, by cutting down CO2 emissions. And the fastest way that individuals can do, without a lot of protocol and ado, is to be veg.

It’s truly critical now, as we have witnessed increasing disaster worldwide, due to climate change.

We still have time, we still have a little time to change the course of destiny, thanks to the vegetarian population, old and new members that reduce the most karmic retribution in the shortest span of time.

But it’s not much. We must change fast to avoid much more damage to the Earth as well as loss of more lives and resources.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7041857.ece
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/26/uk-land-management
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/7317864/Land-management-in-UK-must-change-to-cope-with-climate-change.html

Mars ice map reveals past climate change

Using laser technology from the Italian Space Agency, a map constructed from data gathered by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has revealed the remnants of a formerly vast ice sheet located between the Martian equator and its North Pole.

What remains of the ice is now scattered below rocky debris on the planet’s surface, with portions that extend to a kilometer in depth.

Scientists estimate that the intact ice sheet existed some tens to hundreds of millions of years ago, and Dr. Jeffrey Plaut of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory stated, “It's definitely a record of a different climate period.”

While land contours have indicated for decades that Mars contained water and ice, this first-ever confirmation through laser technology also supports the likelihood of previous periods of climate change.

Our appreciation, Dr. Plaut and scientists at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and Italian Space Agency for sharing these intriguing findings. May such valuable information continue to expand our understanding of our planetary neighbor and indeed our Earth.

Speaking during an August 2009 videoconference in Thailand, Supreme Master Ching Hai reminded that past events on Mars are an opportunity for us to act in protecting our own fragile climate.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: We only need to look at our own neighboring planets, Mars and Venus, to see that the vision is bleak, is disastrous, if we don’t make the right choice,the right change now.

Any planetary scientist knows that Mars and Venus went through dramatic atmospheric changes in the past, similar to what we have begun to experience right now.

Long ago, Mars and Venus were once a lot like our planet - they had water, life, and people similar to us. But the inhabitants of Mars and Venus destroyed their respective planetary homes because they raised too much livestock, and the gases released triggered an irreversible greenhouse gas effect, plus poisonous hydrogen sulfide in the case of Mars.

So let’s not end up like either Mars or Venus, our neighboring planets. Humanity must uphold a gentler, higher standard for the Earth to continue supporting life.

http://news.discovery.com/space/mars-ice-sheet-map-climate.html

Pamela Anderson speaks for seals and the environment

The Canadian-born actress, a vegetarian spokesperson for the organization People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), recently organized a media event in Vancouver, Canada calling for the cancellation of the Canadian seal hunt this year.

Prior to the event, the actress had written a letter of appeal to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, asking him to spare the seal pups, whose survival is already threatened by habitat loss due to global warming.

Pamela Anderson - Vegetarian (F): This is another reason to stop the seal hunt - the environmental information that the Canadian government has now found is that the ice caps are the lowest in the last 30 years.

We are even asking this year to stop it, so we could actually have a bigger population, because their population is going to be nonexistent pretty soon.

VOICE: With petition signatures that have reached the prime minister numbering half a million thus far, members of the Supreme Master Ching Hai International Association also showed support, and had a chance to present Pamela Anderson with an SOS bag on the vegan solution to climate change.

Accepting the gift, Ms. Anderson shared her encouragement for the actions people can engage in to stop animal cruelty as well as protect the environment.

Pamela Anderson (F): I have loved animals since I was little, so I was an animal activist since I was little. There’s just so much difference we could make. I think it’s just really important to do whatever you can.

Supreme Master TV (M): Is our diet part of that solution?

Pamela Anderson (F): Yes! Being vegetarian is a great way to a healthy environment. It is better than driving a hybrid car. Factory farming is one of the leading causes of global warming as well.

So, there are lots of conscious things we can do. The more I find out, the more I change my life. I just think that’s what we all need to do.

VOICE: A grateful salute, Pamela Anderson for your valiant and compassionate shining star to protect the seals and the planet. Indeed, may all of humanity foster the conscientious and life-saving vegan lifestyle for the wholesome future of our fellow co-inhabitants and the Earth.

As often mentioned in her wish to safeguard all beings, Supreme Master Ching Hai highlighted the connection between our treatment of animals and the planet’s climate crisis during a November 2009 videoconference in Washington, DC, USA.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: The whales and the seals are some of the many animals who literally radiate love to balance our planet. They were born here to help us to fill in the void of love that we lost through our inconsiderate actions.

But sadly, we kill them. If we kill these beings, we’re really killing ourselves. We take out the balance that is greatly needed at this time, in our dire situation.

Please inform yourself of the unimaginable, utterly cruel and utmost inhumane treatment involved in the meat and dairy production, or fishing even, as well as lab experiments or the animal fur industry.

How can we degrade ourselves into such a heartless state of being, by supporting these cruel, heart-wrenching practices? I hope it is clear that the best, and really the only way, is to be vegan.

http://www.theprovince.com/news/Pamela+Anderson+calls+cancellation+seal+hunt... +Vancouver+media+event/2622875/story.html

Climate change to bring more intense tropical storms

A study by the United Nation’s World Meteorological Organization (WMO) has analyzed four years of peer-reviewed research on the ocean storms that are known as hurricanes in the Atlantic and typhoons in Asia.

Using a mid-range forecast of 2.8-degrees Celsius temperature rise for global warming, the WMO research forecast future storms with more powerful winds and higher amounts of rainfall.

Moreover, some areas would likely see big jumps in the number of severe weather patterns.

The WMO also reported that these findings were consistent with ones published in 2007 by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, noting the likelihood of more intense cyclones, with additional rainfall and higher wind speeds.

United Nations World Meteorological Organization scientists, we sincerely appreciate your careful work that alerts the public to the likelihood of such perilous extreme weather.

Let us join in wholehearted efforts toward planet-protecting lifestyles to ensure a stable home for future generations. Expressing her concern as she has on many occasions for humanity’s plight, Supreme Master Ching Hai spoke of such intensifying weather extremities during an August 2009 videoconference in Thailand.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: If we look around, we can see the growing frequencies and strength of disasters everywhere. Flood events worldwide are now three times higher than in the 1980s. In 2008, there were 40 category 5 storms, the most ever recorded including in the Atlantic, India and Bangladesh, and in the Philippines.

It takes just one category 4 or 5 storm to destroy a major city, just one.
These are truly almost always the consequences of humans’ violent actions. The number 1 action is meat eating. We can stop the disasters, make them go away for good, forever, if all of us switch to the organic vegan diet. Pray it be so.

http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-world/tropical-storms-to-be-more-intense-20100222-oo8z.html

New film focuses on climate change in Formosa (Taiwan)

Indian girl speaking before UN delegates (F): I’m so much concerned about climate change, because I don’t want our future generations to question us, just as I’m questioning the need for more concrete action on climate change today.

VOICE: Through compelling facts intermingled with voices of eminent scientists along with powerful music and imagery, a new documentary has been bringing citizens together in shared concern for Formosa’s future in the face of global warming.

The film “±2 Degrees C” was named based on scientists’ conclusion that human survival depends on limiting global temperature rise to within 2 degrees Celsius.

Producer Sisy Chen, a renowned Formosan media personality, said she wished to bring the climate change reality, such as rising sea levels, closer to home.

Sisy Chen – Formosan (Taiwanese) media host, producer of “±2°C” (F): On a global scale, the first group of people who might be wiped out the most vulnerable are those on the islands in the Pacific Ocean and Africa. Next, it affects the Asian countries like Formosa.

VOICE: Based on data from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the Central Research Institute, the documentary informs viewers that Formosa’s densely populated areas are in locations vulnerable to disasters; that the island has one of the world’s 10 highest rates of erosion, and that typhoons and heat waves are increasing in severity.

In fact, the film was made deliberately within just six months of Typhoon Morakot, so that it would be widely screened on television and in city and county government venues by the time the next storm season struck.

Chung-Ming Liu – National Taiwan University Climate Change Center (M): Extreme weather events will be happening continuously in the future. We predict that the temperature will hit the record high next year.

VOICE: During the February 22 premiere of the film, the unprecedented gathering of more than 1,000 people was also attended by high-level government officials, including Formosan Premier Wu Den-yih and Legislative Yuan President Wang Jin-Pyng.

When asked how global warming should be addressed, President Wang, along with producer Sisy Chen, expressed their support of the veg diet solution.

Wang Jin-pyng – Legislative Yuan President (M): Cows, pigs and so on release gases and feces which are part of the cause of greenhouse gas emissions.

So if you consume less meat, people will raise less livestock. The less livestock raising, the less gas emissions It’s simple logic.

Sisy Chen (F): I am Sisy Chen. “±2 Degrees C,” Be Veg, Go Green, Save the Planet.

VOICE: Kudos and our appreciation, Ms. Chen and all involved in the making and promotion of this timely documentary. We join the Formosan people in shared resolve to halt the real cause of climate change, praying that all will do so in time through the most effective organic vegan diet.

In an October 2009 videoconference in Formosa (Taiwan), Supreme Master Ching Hai once more shared her concern for those who suffer from the effects of our urgent planetary situation, asking governments and citizens to quickly take proper action.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: We also do not forget all the islands and other countries who are submerging or sinking or disappearing or disappeared because of climate change. My heart is troubled every day, thinking of all these innocent people and all the defenseless animals who have to suffer in this great upheaval we call climate change.

But we still have time. We could not reverse the effect of climate change in the past. Whatever happened due to typhoons and floods and earthquakes, etc., we could not reverse the effect. But we could stop future disasters by returning to the compassionate vegan diet and encouraging others to do the same. The government has the power to do this.

I beg all the governments of the world, please, do this before it’s too late, for the sake of your citizens and your own children as well.

* This documentary is also available for downloading at its official website http://正負2度c.tw

History shows that sea levels can rise very quickly

An article published in the February 12 issue of Science magazine describes a study led by US geoscientist Dr. Jeffrey Dorale, in which rock samples were collected from caves off the coast of Mallorca, Spain.

In so doing, the researchers not only identified sea level changes over the past 135,000 years, they discovered that the oceans can rise as much as 2 meters in a century.

Noting that this is nearly 12 times as fast as in the past 100 years, Dr. Dorale stated, “This has major implications for future concerns with sea-level change.

The mechanisms underlying these dramatic changes need further onsideration as we look to a future of impending climate changes.”

Our thanks, Dr. Dorale and team, for your detailed work and its cautionary forecast for our future. Let us all engage in actions that restore harmony and beauty to our shared Earthly home.

Concerned for humanity, Supreme Master Ching Hai has often addressed the tolls of global warming such as rising sea levels and the need for actions to curb them, as during an interview for the September 2009 edition of The House Magazine.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: People forced from their homes and communities due to rising sea levels and a host of other natural disasters, so-called natural disasters, but in fact these are all man-made.

Sea level rise, for example, threatens half of the world's population living within 200 kilometers of a coastline. Seventeen million in Bangladesh have fled their homes already, mainly because of coastal erosion.

At least 18 islands have completely submerged around the world thus far, with more than 40 other island nations at risk from rising sea levels, and planning to relocate.

If humans switch to the vegan diet, the Earth will begin cooling immediately and many of these dilemmas can even be reversed. So please, be veg and do good, to save the planet and all the beings on it, including you and me.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=sea-caves-reveal-rapid-rise-in-ancient-ocean-levels
http://www.usnews.com/science/articles/2010/02/12/sea-levels-erratic-during-latest-ice-age.html

India halts genetically modified food crops

Citing concerns for human health and the environment, the government of India has decided not to introduce genetically modified brinjals (eggplant), the nation’s third most important crop after potatoes and tomatoes.

India’s Environment and Forestry Minister Jairam Ramesh stated that although the measure was proposed as a way to stabilize food prices and ease impacts of climate change such as declining yields, concerns expressed by environmentalists and farmers as well as the potential hazard to public health made it too large a risk.

Research thus far has shown that besides human health risks, genetically modified crops also require increased application of pesticides and have not been noted to produce higher crop yields.

We thank Your Excellency and India for your careful consideration and wish to safeguard human health. Wishing that organic plant-based farming may continue to flourish in India, providing wholesome nourishment for all.

In a March 2009 videoconference in Mexico, Supreme Master Ching Hai cautioned about the effects of such practices as genetic modification, offering an alternative that also addresses climate change.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: Genetically modified food is not very good for health. We don't need that. If we don't raise animals, we have enough food, extra for everybody.

Even to feed freely to the hungry people, free of charge. And still have 1 billion portions left over. And organic farming yields plentiful food and, at the same time, absorbs 40% of CO2.

So, organic farming is good for everything and good for us, and good for the farmers to have a new job, good for our health, good for the planet.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB40001424052748704140104575058383515565108.html
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1964217,00.html
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5g3zjL-uMZ2_dQ6fh0YeAm7YMPMlQD9DT2D205
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE61F0RS20100216
http://www.namnewsnetwork.org/v2/read.php?id=110107

Seychelles threatened by rising sea levels

In the Indian Ocean nation of 155 islands and 80,000 people, beaches have become noticeably more crowded as the ocean waters have crept inland within just a decade.

Apart from the country’s infrastructure becoming inundated by the forecast of a two-meter sea level rise, other urgent problems include once-thriving coral reefs that are already dying due to warmer ocean temperatures.

The increased heat is also threatening animal species such as a rare sea turtle that depends on stable temperatures to bear its young. Knowing of this increasingly urgent situation, Seychelles President James Michel had addressed the United Nations Copenhagen Climate Conference in December 2009, saying, “I am not here to celebrate the limited progress, but to speak out once again, as we have always done, of our fight for survival, our human right to exist.”

Your Excellency we are touched by your concerned appeal for climate action. Let us join in united efforts to stabilize the environment for the preservation of our globally shared planetary home. In an October 2009 videoconference in Indonesia, Supreme Master Ching Hai expressed her deep concern for all sinking island nations, offering the one sure remedy for their safety.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: The threats imposed by global warming are more than imminent; they are already here, as you can see through many disasters, upheavals, climate refugees, phenomena around the world.

It’s the rising sea levels as well that force people to lose their home, their ancestral home, to go begging elsewhere; losing also their dignity, losing everything, not just physical possessions, but losing their loved ones as well.

We must change while there is still time. If we want to receive the mercy of Heaven for our life here on Earth, we must first be merciful in granting the same dignity and freedom of life to the animals.

So please, everyone, plant veg, be veg and we can go green later when we’ve already saved the planet.

http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100212/FOREIGN/702119852/1135/pollarchive