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

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/-/

Rising sea claims previously disputed island

After 30 years of discussion India and Bangladesh regarding the territorial rights to an island situated in a river that forms a shared border between India and Bangladesh, the small land mass has been declared officially vanished.

Measuring 3.5 kilometers long and 3 kilometers wide, New Moore Island, or South Talpatti to the Bengali people, was first noticed in 1974 on the Hariabhanga River by satellite imaging, sitting at 2 meters above sea level.

However, since 1987, the island’s surface has been submerging due to the rising sea and now can only be seen at the lowest tide. Professor Sugata Hazra, Director of School of Oceanographic Studies in India stated, “There is no presence of the island now; recent satellite images establish this.”

Moore Island thus joins other isles regionally and worldwide that have succumbed or are effectively sinking due to the rising sea levels of global warming. We are saddened to know of yet another submerged island.

Meanwhile, we pray that the people of India, Bangladesh and indeed the world make step in unity to ease global warming via Earth-friendly decisions and compassionate lifestyles.

Supreme Master Ching Hai has on several occasions addressed the devastating effects of rising sea levels and what we can urgently do to halt them, as during an October 2009 videoconference in Indonesia.

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.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5h98JL-wXyzAx...
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-South-Central/2010/0324/Global-warming-as...
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/new-moore-no-more-rising-sea-claims-island...

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...

Loss of Arctic ice could cost trillions

The Pew Environmental Group in the USA has released a peer-reviewed report stating that damage from rising seas, floods and heat waves due to the loss of Arctic Sea ice will cost the sectors of agriculture, real estate and insurance up to US$24 trillion by 2050.

The report also estimates that heat waves, flooding and other factors are already resulting in hundreds of billions of dollars lost annually. Report author and resource economist Dr. Eban Goodstein stated, “The Arctic is the planet's air conditioner and it's starting to break down. Everybody around the world is going to bear these costs.”

During the December 2009 Copenhagen Climate Change Conference in Denmark, the Arctic Council announced new findings that the fastest way to halt the rapid melting of the Arctic is to reduce shorter-lived substances like methane, ground-level ozone and black carbon, and that the best way to ease ground-level ozone, the third most prevalent greenhouse gas, is to decrease methane.

Jonas Gahr Støre - Minister of Foreign Affairs, Norway, Arctic Council Leader (M): If there is one positive message from this report, it’s that doing something about that, if not easy, is manageable.

So while we wait for the results of curbing CO2 emissions, we need to address the issue of methane, ozone, black carbon, swiftly.

VOICE: With livestock accounting for 36% of human-caused methane, it is clear that decreasing animal agriculture is the fastest way to cool the planet and avoid catastrophe.

The Netherlands’ Environmental Assessment Agency has also calculated that global adoption of a vegan diet would reduce the costs of mitigating climate change a full 80% by 2050.

We appreciate this sobering report, Pew Environmental Group scientists. Let us all step toward the most rapid way to reduce costs and cool the Earth: the life-saving plant-based fare.

In a September 2009 videoconference in South Korea, Supreme Master Ching Hai highlighted as she has on previous occasions the need for quick action to restore Arctic ice and the planet as a whole.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: They call the Arctic ice the refrigerator of the planet, and without it, there will be more droughts and floods in other, even, faraway parts of the world.

The world’s leading climate scientists told us in television interviews that being vegetarian – meaning no animal products – is the single most effective thing an individual can do to stop global warming.

Meat is the number one cause of global warming. So, the number one solution is to stop producing it. So, we all have to be vegan. That is what the science is clearly telling us right now.

If the world’s people become vegan, one of the results is that the ice in the Arctic will be restored, and quickly, along with the repairing of nature in every corner of the planet

Isn’t that wonderful? This is the truth that I could promise you, but we all must act fast, like, yesterday.

http://planetark.org/enviro-news/item/56999
http://www.pewtrusts.org/uploadedFiles/wwwpewtrustsorg/Reports/Protecting_ocean_life...
http://www.pbl.nl/en/publications/2009/Climate-benefits-of-changing-diet.html

European butterfly species on red alert

A survey conducted by the UK’s Butterfly Conservation has found under-average populations of the winged species across 100 sites in the United Kingdom. Moreover, along with a loss of habitat and declines due to pollution, three consecutive summers of wet weather have posed difficulty for the delicate insects to fly out to find nectar and foster their young.

Head of monitoring at Butterfly Conservation Dr. Tom Brereton said that some species could be lost forever if the country experiences yet another wet summer this year.

European Commission also just released the European Red List, which revealed that certain butterflies, dragonflies and beetles are not only threatened in Europe, but are also at risk of global extinction.

We thank Dr. Brereton, Butterfly Conservation and European Commission scientists for highlighting the perilous state of our butterfly and other winged friends.

Let us move quickly toward more conscious and compassionate lifestyles to restore the conditions for these wondrous species to flourish once more. As part of her frequent endeavors to safeguard the lives of all beings, Supreme Master Ching Hai again emphasized the need for action to alleviate global warming during an April 2009 videoconference in South Korea.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: Now, we all can see that nature is changing because of global warming, and the animals are directly affected as well. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has a list called the Red List that shows the species actually disappearing from the planet.

At the end of 2008, the IUCN was monitoring a total of 45,000 species and said that 40% were threatened with extinction. It is difficult even to imagine this kind of loss.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: We should all remember that we share this planetary abode, the water, the air, the resources, the food, all of nature, we share only. We should not be possessive of nature.

So, the best thing we can do for the birds and all the animals is to stop causing suffering to them, stop killing them, stop eating them, stop damaging all our habitats. Stop damaging our environment.

Be veg, go green and save their planet too, the planet of the animals.
Thank you so much for all you have done and doing.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/7368141/Five-species-of-butterfly-in-danger...
http://www.theportugalnews.com/cgi-bin/article.pl?id=1053-20

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

Western Australia receives wake up call on dwindling water supply.

A report from Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) forecasts that the capital city of Perth in Western Australia state could see water supplies reduced by 50% in two decades.

This is due in part to less groundwater availability, including the Gnangara Aquifer that supplies Perth's drinking water, which is expected to decline 33% by 2030.

Perth and surrounding areas have already experienced a 50% reduction in water supplies since the mid-1970s, which has been attributed to global warming.

Climate Change Minister Penny Wong stated that the recent CSIRO report and its forecast of further reduced resources brings significant concern for the region.

Your Excellency, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization researchers and Australia, we appreciate your work and cautionary concern.

Let us swiftly adopt lifestyles to reverse these adverse effects and restore our planet for future generations.

In an August 2009 videoconference in Thailand, Supreme Master Ching Hai urged as she has in previous times for immediate action to counter the world’s fast dwindling water supplies.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: We have over six billion people in this world and the sources of groundwater for wells, which supports half of our world population, are dying, drying up. And the top ten global river systems, drying or ebbing away.

And three billion people are short of water. How many more, I don’t know, how many more of suffering people are we waiting before we take action? Please do it now! 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. Very simple. Just be veg.

http://www.perthnow.com.au/news/western-australia/water-supplies-could-halve-in-two...
http://www.conservationwa.asn.au/

Sulfur dioxide reduction could speed global warming

As a harmful aerosol pollutant emitted in the processing of coal, oil and industrial processes, a focus on sulfur dioxide levels have brought drastic reductions in several industrialized nations.

Currently, countries such as India and China are also making efforts to reduce these pollutants. However, a study by the European Commission Joint Research Center has found that such endeavors are likely to heat the planet more quickly.

This is because the presence of sulfur dioxide causes atmospheric cooling, which balances the heat of the CO2 released during these fossil fuel-burning processes, suggesting that heat from coal, oil and industry has played a smaller role in climate heating than previously thought.

This finding also corresponds with a report from Dr. Drew Shindell of the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration, who evaluated the interaction between methane and aerosols such as sulfur dioxide.

He also concluded that methane, generated primarily by livestock and related meat production, was having a much larger warming effect than previously understood.

Our appreciation, European Commission Joint Research Center, Dr. Shindell and all other participating scientists for this insightful finding. May such research as yours motivate more rapid efforts to reduce planet-heating greenhouse gases to preserve our environment for future generations.

As in a September 2009 videoconference in South Korea, Supreme Master Ching Hai has highlighted on many occasions that the most urgent global warming threat lies in sources other than fossil fuel-burning industries.

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.

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

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...
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/science/earth-environment/article6895907.ece

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

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

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

Dislodged Antarctic iceberg causes scientists concern.

An iceberg the size of the country Luxembourg was recently knocked loose from the Antarctic continent by an older iceberg known as B9B, which had split off in 1987. The new iceberg contains approximately one-fifth the total water used worldwide.

Climate experts are now concerned for the ice-free area that used to be protected by the now-displaced ice. As this area provides 25% of the Antarctic’s bottom water, changes in its environment could impact ocean currents that distribute heat and oxygen to waters around the globe.

Such disruption could be devastating, as noted by German oceanographer Dr. Mario Hoppema, who said, “There may be regions of the world’s oceans that lose oxygen, and then of course most of the life there will die.”

We are grateful Dr. Hoppema and all scientists for your comprehensive assessment of these unsettling and large-scale changes in the Antarctic.

May we all foster lifestyles that restore harmony to our shared ecosphere. In a July 2008 videoconference with Supreme Master Television staff in California, USA, Supreme Master Ching Hai emphasized once more our need to act in ways that enhance the survival of all life on Earth.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: If people change to a more benevolent lifestyle that is respecting all lives, then we will beget life and our lives be spared. And nature will restore the balance and repair all damages.

I wish to see that day soon, in my lifetime. It’s still repairable. But people have to realize this, and they have to know it’s urgent and they have to cooperate. The more vegan people join the circle, the more chance we have to save the planet.

http://www.france24.com/en/20100225-mammoth-iceberg-could-alter-ocean-circulation-study
http://www.hindu.com/2010/02/27/stories/2010022757422000.htm
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=124105970

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

The Philippines drastically impacted by drought

The Department of Agriculture’s Central Action Center (DACAC) has reported that El Niño-induced drought has caused the loss of more than 144,000 tons of corn and 56,000 tons of rice across 14 affected provinces.

President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has ordered water conservation measures as well as infrastructure improvements, while the Department of Agriculture is setting aside an aid package of US$19.1 million to assist farmers.

Moreover, due to low water levels of some hydroelectric dams, power shortages are also a concern. Our heartfelt thoughts and prayers go to all in the Philippines affected by these extreme conditions.

We pray for sustaining rains and a restored climate through humanity’s soon adoption of eco-friendly and compassionate lifestyles. As on many occasions, in a September 2009 climate change videoconference in Peru, Supreme Master Ching Hai reminded of the most effective way to return even dangerous conditions as these to balance.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: Some countries and communities have to cope with worsened drought situations. There is not enough water to raise crops or even to drink. So how can we handle the mass migration of tens of millions of people all at once due to desertification, the rising sea levels or the permanent loss of crop fields?

The smartest way would be to stop the worsening of global warming by being vegan. It sounds very simple but it is the best solution, the most effective and the effect of it will be felt almost immediately.

The warming atmosphere, water shortage, food scarcity, desertification - we can quickly eliminate by stopping meat production. Stop it now, no further!

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquirerheadlines/nation/view/20100219-254002/Isabela-farms-worst-hit-of-14-provinces
http://www.mb.com.ph/articles/244192/save-water-gma-orders
http://www.tribune.net.ph/nation/20100219nat1.html
http://www.silobreaker.com/northwest-farmers-feel-the-drought-5_2263241930831822884

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

Permafrost receding northward

In two concurring studies, researchers from Canada’s Université Laval and Sweden’s Lund University have found that the permanently frozen ground known as permafrost is melting at southern latitudes.

In the case of Canada’s James Bay region, the permafrost layer now begins 130 kilometers north of where it had been 50 years ago. In Sweden, scientists found over a several-year period that the permafrost in one peat mire region completely disappeared. The Canadian researchers also noted a temperature rise of some 2 degrees Celsius over the last two decades, saying that if this continues, permafrost in the James Bay region will vanish.

Not only is the melting of permafrost a sign of acute global warming, scientists have warned previously that its effects include the collapse of entire communities, which has already been seen in Arctic locations like Alaska, USA.

Worse yet are the vast underground stores of methane that are released as the permafrost melts, with tipping points beyond which runaway global warming is inevitable.

We thank you for your careful observations, Canadian and Swedish scientists, despite our alarm at what they foretell. May everyone turn to harmonious lifestyles that sustain our environment while there is still time.

As in a September 2009 videoconference held in Peru, Supreme Master Ching Hai has frequently spoken of such warning signs as permafrost melt, along with the way we can all act to halt it.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: US and Canadian scientists traveling to the Arctic have noted increased methane gas being released from the Earth’s melting permafrost, which is storing immense amounts of methane beneath the frozen surface. Other research has also highlighted how quickly the temperature is rising in the Arctic, much faster than in the rest of the world.

This means a vast quantity of methane could be released from the previously frozen soil very quickly, which would be a complete disaster for life on Earth.

One fact is clear: if we stop meat consumption and livestock raising, we will also eliminate one of the most heat-trapping gases, which is methane.

And since this gas disappears more quickly from the atmosphere, the planet will cool almost immediately.

This will also address problems like the melting permafrost, which will otherwise emit more methane if nothing is done to halt it.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/02/100217101129.htm
http://ca.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idCATRE61G5BG20100217?sp=true
http://www5.fsa.ulaval.ca/
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/02/090218081629.htm

Media report: Irish celebrity spreads veg solution with Supreme Master Television

Recently in the Environmental Data Interactive Exchange, or Edie.net, Europe’s largest environmental website that has become a main news source for environmental professionals, journalist Luke Walsh wrote about Irish top model and Miss World 2003 Rosanna Davison’s recent campaign to promote the vegan diet.

Titled “Former Miss World backs veganism for climate change,” the article stated: “Rosanna Davison is fronting the campaign for Supreme Master Television, featured on TV3 in Ireland, on buses and the Luas – Dublin's light rail tram system.

The campaign is aimed at encouraging people to re-think their attitudes to animal treatment generally and to eating meat in particular, due to its carbon footprint.”

Ms. Davison, daughter of the world-famous Irish singer-songwriter Chris de Burgh, had been a vegetarian since childhood. She decided to be vegan after working with Supreme Master Television and learning about how only a pure veg diet could most effectively stop animal cruelty while sustaining personal and planetary health.

Edie news cited Ms. Davison as saying: “Watching the effect meat production and meat consumption is having on the world around us in terms of cruelty, emissions and health issues, I was determined to totally cut out dairy, eggs and cheese and have a completely vegan diet. It's going well so far and I feel great.

I've loads of energy and just feel so much more invigorated as a result.”

Many thanks, Mr. Luke Walsh and Environmental Data Interactive Exchange, for your articles that inform readers about global warming’s most effective solution. We also extend our appreciation to you, Ms. Rosanna Davison, for your noble initiative as a beloved role model. May all of Ireland and the world join in preserving our planet with the smart, rejuvenating, and lifesaving vegan diet.

http://www.edie.net/about.asp?channel=0
http://www.edie.net/news/news_story.asp?id=17547&channel=0&title=Former+miss+world+backs+veganism+for+climate+change

Copenhagen pledges will not stop planetary demise

US researchers report that the commitments made by governments so far to reduce greenhouse gases are not enough to avert runaway climate change.

A collaborative analysis conducted by a group of scientists from several leading institutions showed that the reductions pledged in Copenhagen would still lead to temperature increases of approximately 3.9 degrees Celsius.

Expert climatologists have already stated that an increase of more than 3 degrees Celsius will bring the collapse of the Amazon rainforest, along with devastating water shortages in the Southern hemisphere, a disastrous loss of species and decreases in food production.

Earlier in the week, European researchers also confirmed that the Copenhagen commitments would lead to a global temperature rise of more than 3 degrees Celsius.

US and European researchers, our sincere appreciation for your work that clearly shows we must do more if we are to save our planet.

May we swiftly choose the most effective ways to live in harmony with the environment. In a speech addressing government magistrates and judges of Mexico City, Mexico, Supreme Master Ching Hai once more urged the world’s governments to go beyond protocol with actions to halt global warming.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: At this most urgent time for the planet, I beseech your honorable graces to please help your country and our world spare lives from the impending global warming calamity.

If you don’t, there will be too massive a catastrophe, too immense a suffering upon people, families, the children, that our conscience might never be able to bear it.

We eliminate most of the human-made greenhouse gases by simply adopting the animal-free vegan organic lifestyle.

This also leads to considerable financial savings for world governments. We cannot wait for the sustainable energy and green technology to be available and used by everyone. It would be too late.

We must become vegan to save our planet.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/12/copenhagen-carbon-emission-pledges

Slow Arctic ice growth foretells summer melt

US scientists have noted minimal ice formation this winter in the Arctic, with only 34,000 square kilometers’ growth per day in January compared to more than twice that rate in the 1980s.

Warmer temperatures were observed to be a contributing factor in the slowed ice growth. US National Snow and Ice Data Center Director Dr. Mark Serreze cautioned that such a winter phenomenon would likely mean a bigger summer melt, stating that this year’s winter ice would create only a thin layer that takes less energy to melt the following summer.

This process in turn exposes additional areas of darker ocean waters, which absorb more heat than the reflective ice and accelerate melting even further.

Dr. Mark Serreze: We will probably see, for example, an accelerated hydrologic cycle, because we were talking earlier that you warm it up, you put more water vapor into the atmosphere. Well water vapor fuels storms. So you would have, for example, more and more severe weather events.

Many thanks, Dr. Serreze and colleagues at the US National Snow and Ice Data Center, for this vital information about the disappearing Arctic ice. As we all realize the danger of the Earth’s changing climate, let us make united steps toward lifestyles that return stability to our planet.

Speaking as on previous occasions with concern for our planet’s urgent state, Supreme Master Ching Hai emphasized during a September 2009 videoconference in Japan the dangers posed by such melting, while offering the most effective solution.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: I think we’d better heed the warning of the scientists because otherwise it’s not just the ice melt, maybe we will melt also. I hope not. I hope not! And we are working frantically toward saving the planet. So if we be vegetarian, our good karma of saving lives will in turn reward us with our lives saved. That’s all I can say.

And the more vegetarian people join us, the more time we will have. That is the thing. Well, green technology, planting trees does help, but this is very secondary, very little. But the vegetarian diet will help stop 80% of the global warming and save our lives.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE6135TD20100204

Galapagos fur seals migrate to Peruvian waters

The Peru-based Organization of Research and Conservation of Aquatic Animals (Orca) recently reported that a colony of 30 fur seals had traveled some 1500 kilometers from their original Galapagos Islands home to settle in the waters of northern Peru.

This first-ever instance of the fur seals moving to an area remote to the Galapagos is being attributed to warmer Peruvian waters due to global warming.

The Peruvian Geophysics Institute indicated that the average sea surface temperature in northern Peru has risen 6 degrees Celsius over the past 10 years and thus now closely matches the sea temperature of the fur seals’ original native habitat.

More fur seals and other marine species are thus expected to act similarly in migrating to Peruvian waters.

Our appreciation, scientists at the Organization of Research and Conservation of Aquatic Animals and Peruvian Geophysics Institute, for these observations of marine animal response to global warming effects.

May such disrupting signs accelerate our actions toward lifestyles that support a restoration of balance to our planetary home.

As on previous occasions, Supreme Master Ching Hai spoke again with concern for the Earth’s fragile balance as she offered ways to encourage both awareness and hope in young people during a May 2009 videoconference in Togo.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: You can show how the migrating birds have to fly farther and farther to find a place to nest, and the polar bears swim longer and longer now because there is no more ice until sometimes they drown of exhaustion, or why the neighboring country has so many floods in recent years, so many disasters, etc.

Tell them how climate change is affecting real lives, real animals, real people, and their own lives as well.

But it’s also important to show the young people that there is still hope; we can still save the planet.

It’s a chance to be true heroes, by being vegan and spread the news of this solution.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/wildlife/7193082/Sea-lions-abandon-Galapagos-Islands-for-warm-Peruvian-waters.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8503397.stm

Tipping points could arrive suddenly

A recent study by Dr. Alan Hastings, professor at University of California, Davis in the USA and one of the world’s foremost mathematical model experts, forecasts that sudden shifts in the Earth’s natural systems could arrive precipitously, without warning. Such tipping points, which could come in response to global warming effects like the disappearance of Arctic sea ice in summer, would lead to more dramatic and relentless changes in climate, in turn disrupting other ecosystems and larger weather patterns.

Other effects that could trigger tipping points include accelerated ice loss from Greenland and the Antarctic, leading to massive sea level rises, and carbon dioxide saturation of ocean waters, with acidification that would endanger all life.

Dr Hastings offered a warning summary of the study’s implications as he stated, “This means that some effects of global climate change on ecosystems can be seen only once the effects are dramatic.

By that point, returning the system to a desirable state will be difficult, if not impossible.” Dr. Hastings, we are grateful for your expert voice on this urgent topic.

Let us avert such disturbing consequences by adopting harmonious and sustainable lifestyles now. Speaking with concern about such sudden environmental changes, Supreme Master Ching Hai highlighted the key to their prevention during an October 2008 global warming videoconference in Thailand.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: There’s no other way we can prevent such a disaster like this. We can only wait and see because we don’t know when it will strike us and where and what we can prepare anyway.

Even if we stockpile some food and all that, it is not always helpful. It just makes the world food shortage worsen. So, we can only rely on the good karma that we can create. And that we can do.

We can save ourselves right now by turning into vegan diet which is benevolent, which is very compassionate, and by being compassionate to others, Heaven will be compassionate to us.

Everything will return to a more peaceful abundance because Heaven is merciful. And we have to start to be merciful like Heaven; then we can experience Heaven.

http://www.news.ucdavis.edu/search/news_detail.lasso?id=9389
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/02/100209191445.htm

Tibet’s climate is dangerously warming

With data that was recorded across 29 observatories, including the base of Mount Everest, China’s Meteorological Administration reported that 2009 temperatures were the warmest on record and that precipitation was the lowest in nearly 40 years.

Saying that the Tibet Autonomous Region is particularly vulnerable to climate change effects, Zheng Guoguang, head of China’s Meteorological Administration stated, “The impact of global warming has accelerated glacial shrinkage and the melting glaciers have swollen Tibet’s lakes... If the warming continues, millions of people … would face floods in the short term and drought in the long run.”

Many thanks Mr. Zheng and China’s Meteorological Administration, for these factual observations that highlight our global predicament. As we pray for the safety of people in Tibet’s Autonomous Region and beyond, let us all hasten our efforts to restore the ecosphere.

As on previous occasions, Supreme Master Ching Hai spoke with concern of the rising toll of climate change during an October 2009 videoconference in Hong Kong, along with the actions needed to avert a planetary crisis.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: Tens of thousands of lakes and rivers throughout the world are drying out now due to global warming and glaciers melting. It is thus only a matter of time Knowing this, it would be best if we adopt the lifestyle that will restore the stability of our environment and benefit all beings in the world, which surely is the compassionate way of life, beginning with a vegan diet – no animal products.

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/TOE61402P.htm
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/05/tibet-warming-china