In the words of George Bernard Shaw

In the words of George Bernard Shaw:


We are living graves of murdered beasts

Slaughtered to satisfy our appetites.

We never pause to wonder at our feasts,

If animals like men could possibly have rights.

.

We pray on Sunday that we may have light,

To guide our footsteps on the paths we tread.

We are sick of war, we do not want to fight,

And we gorge ourselves upon the dead.

.

Like Carrion Crows we live and feed on meat,

Regardless of the suffering and pain

We cause by doing so, in this we treat,

Defenseless animals for sport or gain -

.

How can we hope in this world to attain

The peace we say we are so anxious for,

We pray for it o'er hetacomba of slain,

To God while outraging the moral law,

Thus cruelty begets the offspring --- WAR !

Earth Hour 2009

"On 28 March 2009 millions of people around the globe will unite for one hour and switch off their lights to show that they care about our living planet."

World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Malaysia has invited everyone to join Earth Hour 2009 on Saturday, 28 March 2009 from 8.30 p.m. to 9.30 p.m. The campaign hopes to reach out to everyone around the world to convey support for action on climate change.

Well, it's a simple thing to do, I first thought. It's just switching off the lights in my house for 1 hour. How hard could that be? But then all the activities that I'll miss from this 1 hour started to pop up in my head. I can't watch my favourite tv program which will show at that hour. I won't be able to go online and surf the web, check my facebook account, download programs......Hmm...maybe I'll just switch off the lights and leave the tv and computer on. At the end, it's not such a simple thing to do anymore as I realise humanity has come to depend on electricity so much that it's taken for granted.

The other day there was an article in The Star which told about a small town in New Zealand called Tekapo. The townfolk reduced the light usage in all households just to protect the vast starry blanket spanning their heaven. To tell the truth, how many of us still appreciate and enjoy the starry sky (if it's not covered by pollution)? How many of us would spend time to think how much the Earth has been polluted? How many of us would stop the usage of plastic bags in order to reduce global warming?

Well, this is the time for us to stand together and take the first step in supporting the cause of fighting global warming. Vote for the cause by switching off the lights for one hour. 62 countries around the world including Malaysia (as supported by our Prime Minister) have committed to participate in the voting. Let's do our duty together and cast our vote. Malaysia Boleh!

Island sinking or at risk of rising sea level

Island sinking or at risk of rising sea level

REFERENCE (original numbers before rounding)

Maldives – 369,031 residents, southwest of India

Marshall Islands – 60,000 residents

Kiribati – 107,817 residents, approximately 30 islands submerging

Tonga – 116,921 residents

Vanuatu – 211,971 residents, some of whom have already been evacuated

Solomon Islands – 566,842 residents

Carteret Islands in Papua New Guinea – 2,500 residents

Shishmaref in Alaska, USA – 600 residents

Kivalini in Alaska, USA – 400 residents

Over 2,000 other islands in Indonesia (population not known)

Dubai – 1,241,000 residents in the United Arab Emirates considered at risk

Rajendra Pachauri : There is a grim outcome that the world would have to face, in terms of sea level rise due to thermal expansion alone, and our estimate of this level of increasing sea (level) is 0.4 to 1.4 meters due to thermal expansion alone, and if you add to this the amount of water that would be released and would add to sea level rise on the account of melting of the ice bodies then we already committed the world to a threat, which is going to affect a large number of small island states, low line coast areas across the world that clearly, gives us an absolute warning that we have no time to lose at all and we have to ensure that we start reducing emission of green house gases, as quickly as possible.

President Tong of Kiribati:
I take every opportunity to express our position to explain our situation, as the minister has explained the Kiribati is one of the most vulnerable countries to climate change. Along with our other pacific island relations, of a similar geographical structure and also other countries in other different oceans in another parts of the world which have the same structure that we have.
The Kiribati’s highest point in our Island is about average is about 2 meters above sea level.

I think we are, we might be beyond redemption, we may be at the point of no return, where the emission in the atmosphere will carry on with the momentum, will carry on to contribute to climate change, to sea level rise to the extend that in time, our small low lying island will be submerged. Because one has to feel the reality of the situation, and in order to feel the reality of the situation you have got to be there when the tides are coming over, and your are running around chasing your house goods, because the cases are floating all around, and you are trying to chase them after the waves have come. We have a whole communities, having to be relocated, villages which have been there over a decade maybe the century, and now they have to be relocated, where they’ve being living for the last few decades is no longer there.

It has been eroded. According to the scenarios, the worst possible case scenario, Kiribati will be submerged, within the century. It’s not an issue of economic growth; it’s an issue of human survival. And I think this is the point, it’s about human survival. For some at this point in time. If the world community, the different countries don’t kick the Carbon habits, there will be other countries next on the line, we would have been long gone, but I think the next countries will be next on the line.

Mr Achim Steiner (United Nation’s Under Secretary General & UN Environment Programme Executive Director):
Therefore there is no question that we have to act, and yes maybe there are many countries who will not immediately face the prospects of Kiribati, but indeed there are many island nations who are doomed already now, condemned if you want by the end of this century, to disappear. And that is just the beginning of the visible impact of climate change. The invisible part, the bits that we have not necessarily understood that are happening around us are also on their way.

Paul Tobasi – Government Representative of the Carteret Islands – It’s not their wish to go, but because the situation; it’s forcing them to move. Because today, there is also literally no food people can rely on. I think that is why most people around here are willing to go; to accept the resettlement.

Louise (F): Wonderful. And we’re going to load up those websites, links to those websites of our own because I think that’s incredibly interesting and important. Supreme Master, we move on to environmental refugees. A recent report by the Aid Agency Tearfund, estimated there are currently 25 million environmental refugees, which is more than 22 million officially recognized political and economic refugees.

And according to Dr. Janos Bogardi, Director of the Institute for Environment and Human Security at the United Nations University in Bonn, environmental deterioration currently displaces up to 10 million people per year. And there are expected to be 50 million environmental refugees by 2010. However, international conventions do not recognize environmental refugees unless such they do not have the same rights to financial and material support. What can we do to help the environmental refugees?

Supreme Master Ching Hai : What can we do? They are refugees definitely. Ur. Because if we don’t have global warming then no one would be a climate refugee, would they? So no one would like to be a refugee in this case. So now, first we can help them to get back on their feet. The one who has meaning… mean and power, yes. We must consider their refugee status, legally, because they are refugees by all means. And by stopping global warming, we can help reduce this refugee issue.

CLIMATE REFUGEES:

http://africa.reuters.com/wire/news/usnB362707.html

POZNAN, Poland, Dec 8 (Reuters) - The impact of climate change could uproot around six million people each year, half of them because of weather disasters like floods and storms, a top U.N. official said on Monday.

The U.N. refugee agency (UNHCR) was making plans based on conservative estimates that global warming would force between 200 million and 250 million people from their homes by mid-century, said L. Craig Johnstone, the U.N. Deputy High Commissioner for Refugees.

Johnstone said relief agencies would need to aid almost three million people a year displaced by sudden disasters.

Another three million would likely migrate due to gradual changes like rising sea levels, and be more able to plan.

UNHCR statistics show 67 million people were uprooted around the world at the end of 2007, 25 million of them because of natural disasters.

REFUGEES:

http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus/008200812070932.htm

Speaking on the sidelines of the Dec 1-12 summit of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), Warner said 24 million people around the world had become climate refugees already, according to an estimate made by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.

SUNK

Lohachara, India, home to some 10,000 people and one of the 102 Sundarban Islands, sank beneath the surface of the Bay of Bengal in 2006, & only 54 of the remaining 102 islands in the Sundarbans, home to 70,000 people, still remain hospitable. http://www.oceana.org/climate/impacts/rising-seas/
13 islands in the Chesapeake bay, Maryland, USA have already disappeared with threat of more to come. http://www.nwf.org/sealevelrise/chesapeake.cfm

Tuvalu (prediction it will be submerged in 50 years) The New Zealand government is already gradually taking in a quota of Tuvaluans each year and has assured Tuvalu that her 10,800 residents can find a home in New Zealand. http://www.world-mysteries.com/newgw/sci_globalw2.htm, http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/03/asia/pacific.php

Cook Islands http://www.world-mysteries.com/newgw/sci_globalw2.htm

Marshall Islands (where Majuro, one of the Marshall Islands has lost 20 % of its sea front) http://www.world-mysteries.com/newgw/sci_globalw2.htm
Kirbati http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/03/asia/pacific.php
Vanuatu http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/03/asia/pacific.php
Fiji http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/03/asia/pacific.php
Solomon Islands http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/03/asia/pacific.php
Carteret Islands of Papua New Guinea (many parts are already uninhabitable) http://www.monstersandcritics.com/science/nature/news/article_1251942.php/_South_Pacific_island-nations_endangered_by_rising_sea_levels
Ghoramara (7,000 residents have already been forced to leave as half of the island has been lost to the sea since 1978, and the biggest of the Ghoramara Islands, Sagar, which had been home to refugees from other islands, is at risk of being lost to the sea in 15 years. http://portal.campaigncc.org/node/2261
Indonesia is making plans for relocating people living on islands in Sumatra, Kalimantan, Sulawesi and Papua, where the government expects about 2,000 islands to sink by 2030 or 2040. http://current.com/items/89477012/mass_relocation_planned_for_indonesian
_islands_due_to_sea_level_rise.htm

40 Pacific Islands, part of the Alliance of Small Island States, at risk. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/12/13/1071125715575.html
A three foot increase in sea levels would put South Padre Island, Texas, USA under water, with much of Galveston Island uninhabitable. http://www.txnp.org/articles/articles.asp?ArticleID=4733
Shishmaref, an island inhabited by indigenous Alaskans in the US are at risk of losing their home of the last 4,000 years. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/08/22/eveningnews/main1926055.shtml

Dubai at risk of being under water in 50 years http://www.arabianbusiness.com/504296
-dubai-will-be-underwater-in-50-years-alerts-branson

A contest for all University and college students to win 1500 Euros by going GREEN

By Green2Cool.org

Dear Students,

RE: A Contest for All University and College Students to win 1500 Euros by Going Green

Welcome to the Green Planet Awards (GreenPlanetAwards.org), which raises awareness about the critical situation the environment is currently in, & human actions which influence climate change.

We will be holding a competition with 1500 Euros as the first prize **, which goes to the student that invites the most friends to the Green2Cool.org social networking website and informs them of the eco eating message that is available on the GreenPlanetAwards..org website. For more information please visit www.GreenPlanetAwards.org/ green2cool.

What you eat affects the environment far more than what car you drive! Excessive meat eating damages your health & contributes more to global warming than total worldwide transportation combined! * Therefore, the theme for this year’s award is ECO EATING.

How can you participate? Join the Green2Cool.org social network TODAY

Tips for using Green2Cool.org social network

1. Sign up here: www.green2cool.org.
2. Create a compelling profile highlighting the message from here: www.GreenPlanetAwards.org . We encourage people to use their own picture for their profile, as this helps to create a more personal touch to the message.
3. Upload videos and pictures about the eco-message
4. Invite as many friends as you can by email
5. Invite friends from facebook etc
6. Spread the word however you can by inviting people to view your cool profile and become your friend.
7. Add links to your profile from other web sites on the internet.

Green2Cool team

Submerged Islands: At least 18 islands submerged around the world

Let's all take a few moment to read the following message and sit down to gather our thoughts on What has humankind done to OUR planet ?

(Please unfold it to as many people as possible. Your initiation is highly appreciated ...)

Submerged Islands

http://www.suprememastertv.com/bbs/board.php?bo_table=sos_video&wr_id=73&goto_url=&url=link1_0

As the climate continues to warm, entire islands are sinking below rising waters caused from melting glaciers.

Mr. Achim Steiner - United Nation’s Under Secretary General & UN Environment Programme Executive Director - Indeed there are many island nations who are doomed already now, condemned if you want to disappear. Therefore there is no question that we have to act. And that is just the beginning of the visible impact of climate change. The invisible part, the bits that we have not necessarily understood that are happening around us are also on their way.

CLIMATE REFUGEES:

25 million people uprooted in 2007

President Tong of the Island Nation of Kiribati:
We have whole communities, having to be relocated, villages which have been there over a decade maybe the century and now they have to be relocated, and where they’ve being living for the last few decades is no longer there. It has been eroded.

AT LEAST 18 ISLANDS SUBMERGED AROUND THE WORLD:
• Lohachara, India – 10,000 residents
• Bedford, Kabasgadi and Suparibhanga islands near India – 6,000 families
• Chesapeake Bay in Maryland, USA – 13 islands
• Kiribati – 3 atolls
• Half of Bangladesh’s Bhola Island permanently flooded – 500,000

Paul Tobasi – Government Representative of the Carteret Islands – It’s not their wish to go, but because of the situation; it’s forcing them to move.

ISLANDS SINKING OR AT RISK FROM RISING SEA LEVELS (over 40 nations):

Tuvalu – 12,000 residents with no more fresh drinking water and vegetable plots have washed away

Ghoramara near India – 2/3 submerged as of 2006 with 7,000 residents already relocated

Neighboring island of Sagar – 250,000 residents also threatened

Some 50 other islands jeopardized in the India-Bangladesh Sundarbans, with a population of 2 million

Kutubdia in southeastern Bangladesh lost over 200,000 residents, with remaining 150,000 likely soon to depart

Maldives – 369,000 residents in the Indian Ocean, whose president wants to relocate the entire country

Marshall Islands – 60,000 residents

Kiribati – 107,800 residents, approximately 30 islands submerging

Tonga – 116,900 residents

Vanuatu – 212,000 residents, some of whom have already been evacuated and coastal villages relocated

Solomon Islands – 566,800 residents

Carteret Islands in Papua New Guinea – 2,500 residents whose land no longer supports agriculture

Shishmaref in Alaska, USA – 600 residents

Kivalini in Alaska, USA – 400 residents

Over 2,000 other islands in Indonesia

Dubai – 1.2 million residents in the United Arab Emirates considered at risk

There may be more islands, either uninhabited and/or not reported, that have submerged or are sinking due to climate change.

President Tong of the Island Nation of Kiribati:
We may be at the point of no return; our small low lying island will be submerged.
It’s an issue of human survival.If the world community, the different countries don’t kick the Carbon habits, there will be other countries next on the line.

Videoconference with Supreme Master Ching Hai with Supreme Master Television
Los Angeles, California, USA – July 31, 2008

Supreme Master Ching Hai : According to the scientists, there could be more than just one disaster. Rising sea level is not the only worrying event, disease will also rise. They already do so in some parts of the world.

Unless 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.
The more vegetarian people join the circle, the more chance we have to save the planet.

REFERENCE (original numbers before rounding)

Maldives – 369,031 residents, southwest of India

Marshall Islands – 60,000 residents

Kiribati – 107,817 residents, approximately 30 islands submerging

Tonga – 116,921 residents

Vanuatu – 211,971 residents, some of whom have already been evacuated

Solomon Islands – 566,842 residents

Carteret Islands in Papua New Guinea – 2,500 residents

Shishmaref in Alaska, USA – 600 residents

Kivalini in Alaska, USA – 400 residents

Over 2,000 other islands in Indonesia (population not known)

Dubai – 1,241,000 residents in the United Arab Emirates considered at risk

Ministers get close look at Antartic ice threat

TROLL RESEARCH STATION, Antarctica – A parka-clad band of environment ministers landed in this remote corner of the icy continent on Monday, in the final days of an intense season of climate research, to learn more about how a melting Antarctica

may endanger the planet.

Representatives from more than a dozen nations, including the U.S., China, Britain and Russia, were to rendezvous at a Norwegian research station with American and Norwegian scientists coming in on the last leg of a 1,400-mile (2,300-kilometer), two-month trek over the ice from the South Pole.

The visitors will gain "hands-on experience of the colossal magnitude of the Antarctic continent and its role in global climate change," said the mission's organizer, Norway's Environment Ministry.

They'll also learn about the great uncertainties plaguing research into this southernmost continent and its link to global warming: How much is Antarctica warming? How much ice is melting into the sea? How high might it raise ocean levels worldwide?

The answers are so elusive that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a Nobel Prize-winning U.N. scientific network, excluded the potential threat from the polar ice sheets from calculations in its authoritative 2007 assessment of global warming.

The IPCC forecast that oceans may rise up to 23 inches (0.59 meters) this century, from heat expansion and melting land ice, if the world does little to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases blamed for atmospheric warming.

But the U.N. panel did not take Antarctica and Greenland into account, since the interactions of atmosphere and ocean with their enormous stores of ice — Antarctica has 90 percent of the world's ice — are poorly understood. And yet the West Antarctic ice sheet, some of whose outlet glaciers are pouring ice at a faster rate into the sea, "could be the most dangerous tipping point this century," says a leading U.S. climatologist, NASA's James Hansen.

"There is the potential for several-meter rise of sea level," Hansen told The Associated Press last week. The scenario is "frightening," says the IPCC's chief scientist, Rajendra Pachauri, who met with the ministers in Cape Town before their nine-hour flight here from South Africa.

Finding the answers has been key to the 2007-2009 International Polar Year (IPY), a mobilization of 10,000 scientists and 40,000 others from more than 60 countries engaged in intense Arctic and Antarctic research over the past two southern summer seasons — on the ice, at sea, via icebreaker, submarine and surveillance satellite.

The 12-member Norwegian-American Scientific Traverse of East Antarctica — the trekkers "coming home" to Troll — was one important part of that work, having drilled deep cores into the annual layers of ice sheet in this little-explored region, to determine how much snow has fallen historically and its composition.

Such work will be combined with another IPY project, an all-out effort to map by satellite radar the "velocity fields" of all Antarctic ice sheets over the past two summers, to assess how fast ice is being pushed into the surrounding sea.

Then scientists may understand better the "mass balance" — how much the snow, originating with ocean evaporation, is offsetting the ice pouring seaward.

"We're not sure what the East Antarctic ice sheet is doing," David Carlson, IPY director, explained last week from the program's offices in Cambridge, England. "It looks like it is flowing a little faster. So is that matched by accumulation? What they come back with will be crucial to understanding the process."

The visiting environment ministers were those of Algeria, Britain, Congo, the Czech Republic, Finland, Norway and Sweden. Other countries were represented by climate policymakers and negotiators, including Xie Zhenhua of China and Dan Reifsnyder, a deputy assistant U.S. secretary of state.

During their long day here under the 17-hour sunlight of a dying southern summer, when temperatures still drop to near zero Fahrenheit (-20 degrees Celsius), the northern visitors took in the awesome sights of Queen Maud Land, a forbidding, mountainous icescape 3,000 miles (5,000 kilometers) southwest of South Africa, and toured the Norwegians' high-tech Troll Research Station, upgraded to year-round operations in 2005.

The politics of climate inevitably mixed with the science. Stranded in Cape Town an extra two days when high Antarctic winds scrubbed a planned weekend flight, the ministers were gently lobbied at lunch and dinner by Scandinavian counterparts favoring urgent action on a new global agreement to succeed the Kyoto Protocol, the deal to reduce greenhouse gases that expires in 2012.

President Barack Obama's new U.S. administration has promised action after years of U.S. resistance to the Kyoto process. But the complexity of issues and limited time before a Copenhagen conference in December, target date for a deal, makes the outcome as uncertain as the future of Antarctica's glaciers and offshore ice shelves.

Much more research lies ahead, say the scientists, including investigations of the possible warming and shifting currents of the Southern Ocean ringing Antarctica. "We need to put more resources in," said IPY's Carlson.

Outspoken scientists say political action may be even more urgently needed.

"We are out of out cotton-pickin' minds if we let that process get started," Hansen said of an Antarctic meltdown. "Because there will be no stopping it."

GLOBAL WARMING: TIME TO ACT

Reminder of a major global warming cause:

In 2006, the United Nations reported that raising animals for food generates more greenhouse gases than all the cars and trucks in the world combined.

Senior UN Food and Agriculture Organization official Henning Steinfeld reported that the meat industry is "one of the most significant contributors to today's most serious environmental problems."

WARNING SIGNS

The Antarctic has been found to experience ice melts as dramatic as the Arctic in this past summer.

After he visited Antarctica's melting ice sheets in January 2008, Norway's Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg stated, "Alarm bells are ringing. It is irresponsible for decision-makers to ignore these signals."

Findings from a study by Hans von Storch, head of the GKSS Institute for Coastal Research in Germany, indicate an unusually high warming trend in the Baltic Sea due to climate change.

The world's largest society of Earth and space scientists, the American Geophysical Union (AGU), has released a statement that identifies human activity as the sure cause of global warming.

Scientists are finding that forests and seas are reaching overload, unable to absorb more emissions, which means even more rapid temperature rises.
With global temperatures up 1.4 degrees and still rising, John Holdren, a Harvard University policy scientist, said that a total increase of 3.6 -4.5 degrees would present the danger of the world facing "intolerable and unmanageable impacts of climate change."

In 20-year study conducted by the University of Helsinki,progressively shorter winters are now weakening the ability of northern forests to soak up greenhouse gas emissions.

Lead researcher Timo Vesala commented, "This means a bigger warming effect."

Global warming makes China's glaciers shrink by 7% every year, which could have devastating effects on the 300 million who depend on them for water.
Ponds in the Arctic that have been part of the landscape for 6,000 years have dried up with the lengthening of the Arctic summer.

Rising sea levels and bigger storms caused by global warming at Ireland's UNESCO World Heritage site may wash some of the great columns away.
Meteorologists at Norway's Troll research station in Antarctica say that atmospheric carbon has reached record levels.

The effects of global warming on the sea's temperatures have lead to the occurrence of "dead zones" in the ocean.

British geologists at the University of Leicester say that the changes to the environment due to increased human population and industrialization are so great that the planet's pre-industrial Holocene era is now over and it has entered a new age called the Anthropocene era.

NATURAL DISASTERS

A United Nations report on 2007's natural disasters says nine of the ten worst resulted from climatic disturbances.

SINKING LANDS, EROSION & SEA LEVELS RISING

Australian oceanographer Steve Rintoul estimates that the rapid rate of ice melting means that 100 million people living within 1 meter of sea level "will need to go somewhere" to escape rising sea levels.

Officials relocated 20,000 islanders in the year 2000 from the lowest area of Duke of York Island, one of the islands off Papua New Guinea.

India's Lohachara Island disappeared under water due to global warming leaving 70,000 people to take refuge on neighboring islands.

The coastline in West African countries like Benin, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Guinea,and Nigeria is retreating at an average of 10 meters per year, and sea water levels on the West African coast could continue to rise.

According to Richard Lochhead, Secretary of Rural Affairs in the United Kingdom, "Our winters are getting wetter and warmer, sea levels are rising and coastal erosion is increasing.
These are happening now and we must take action."

Scientists warn that if water levels continue to rise, over 80,000 hectares in Greece could be 1.6 meters under water by 2100, with the country's western coastline also at risk.

The Maldives could be the first country to become uninhabitable because of rising sea levels due to global warming.

Rising sea levels threaten beachfront towns along the coast of North Carolina, USA, say geologists.

Scientists measuring rising sea levels say that the island state of Tuvalu will be one of the first nations to sink into the ocean.

Some areas of Vietnam southernmost province, Cà Mau, show evidence of up to 6 meters of land covered up by the sea.

Benin is slowly losing its commercial capital, Cotonou, to the rising ocean waters.

Carteret Islanders consider leaving their home as rising sea levels damage food crops and leaves the island uninhabitable.

Environmental Coastal Regions published by the Wessex Institute of Technology reports risk assessment of coastal land use due to the rising water level of the Caspian Sea.

US Geological Survey shows that Alaska's coast is eroding at a faster rate as coastal cliffs are collapsing due to global warming's melting of the permafrost which anchors the earth.

Residents from Papua New Guinea islands, at risk for submersion due to global warming, asked for help at last year's climate change conference in Bali, Indonesia.

TOXIC GASES A report first published in 2005 describes how poisonous gas bubbling up from the deep ocean could have suddenly caused the loss of the ozone layer 250 million years ago.

The UN Environmental Program reports the emergence of over 200 oxygen-depleted "dead zones" in the ocean.

New bacteria emerge, producing hydrogen sulfide gas, which is lethal to most marine and terrestrial life.

The two known causes include run-off from factories, agricultural fertilizer and waste, as well as disrupted water currents and weather, all of which are related to global warming.

"Dead zones" in the ocean caused by global warming result in no life due to a loss of oxygen and the release of hydrogen sulfide, a toxic gas.

One such dead zone is in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Oregon, USA, which has quadrupled in size over the past year. Another is off the coast of Namibia, Africa,where millions of fish die whenever the hydrogen sulfide gas erupts from the ocean floor.

Due to overfishing and the loss of tens of millions of vital sardines, waters off the coast of southwest Africa are filled with a toxic gas that is bubbling up from the ocean floor, to date killing marine life over an area equivalent to the US state of New Jersey and worsening the greenhouse effect.

HUMAN HEALTH

United Nations Secretary-General Ban urges world leaders to prioritize water security, saying that climate change and related water scarcity has caused discord in the past.

Dr. Hugh Montgomery, Director of the Institute for Human Health and Performance at London's University College states,"We are already witnessing the effects of climate change on health."

An Australian scientist, Professor Kevin Parton of Charles Sturt University in New South Wales, Australia, has stated that conditions caused by global warming such as mosquito-borne diseases may have much more impact on indigenous people due to their insufficient access to health services.

British scientists express concern about the detrimental effects of climate change on human health such as heat waves, wild fires and floods.

Australian researcher Dr. Tony McMichael reports in the British Medical Journal, "Infectious diseases cannot be stabilized in circumstances of climatic instability, refugee flows, and impoverishment."

SPECIES EXTINCTION

In the Arctic, polar bears are starving due to the warming change in habitat.
Kassie Siegel of the Center for Biological Diversity, said, "We've observed massive melting of the sea ice in the Arctic in recent years, and they can't survive without it."

A quarter of US birds are facing extinction due to global warming, and 75% of European birds are expected to see their ranges shrink.

Scientists say that if global warming continues at its current pace, at least 20% of the world's species are likely to become extinct.

What world leaders are saying:
"The good news is, we have everything we need now to respond to the challenge of global warming. But we should not wait, we cannot wait, we must not wait."
Al Gore, 45th Vice President of the United States

"We know the science, we see the threat, and we know the time for action is now."
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger,R-California, USA

"I think the science is clear that these changes are occurring.They're serious and we must act."
Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada

"We need to expand the concept of sustainable development to all the aspects of social and economic development of society."
Chi-Beom Lee, Minister of Environment, Republic of Korea

"We are on the historic threshold of the irreversible. A new industrial revolution, that of sustainable development, lies before us."
Jacques Chirac, Former President of France

"Australia's official declaration today that we will become a member of the Kyoto Protocol is a significant step forward in our country's efforts to fight climate change domestically - and with the international community."
Kevin Rudd, Prime Minister of Australia

Saying that climate change and water scarcity has been the source of discord in the past, the secretary general stated, "There is still enough water for all of us - but only so long as we can keep it clean, use it more wisely, and share it fairly."
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon

"We are now beyond a critical turning point in the debate; those who continue to ignore the threat and its causes, or invoke half-baked arguments to confuse and obstruct, will be doing the greatest disservice imaginable to current and future generations. "
Marthinus Van Schalkwyk, South Africa's Environment Minister

How you can help

1. Save lives and the planet by not eating meat

The 2006 United Nations report, Livestock's Long Shadow, documents the livestock industry's 18% contribution to global warming, which is more than the warming effect of all transportation throughout the world.

A 2007 report from the Earth Institute affirms that a plant-based diet consumes only 25% of a meat-based diet.And changing from a meat-based to a vegetarian diet is at least 50% more effective in counteracting climate change as switching from a Suburban SUV to a Toyota hybrid car.

"Please eat less meat ? meat is a very carbon intensive commodity. Don't eat meat, ride a bike, and be a frugal shopper ? that's how you can help brake global warming." - Rajendra Pachauri, Chief of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

International environmental organization EarthSave features VEGPLEDGE!TM at www.vegpledge.com, a program dedicated to helping anyone who wants to benefit the planet with a Go Veg! pledge.

Research by University of Chicago geophysics professors Gordan Eishel Gidon Eshel and Pamela Martin concludes that going vegan for one year saves 1.5 tons of emissions relative to the standard American diet, 50% more than switching from an SUV to a Toyota Prius.

New York Times article written by Mark Bittman, a non-vegetarian, explains the detrimental cost of meat consumption to our planet, our health, and to the poor.

If each person in the Netherlands goes meat-free one day per week, the lowered emissions would equal the Dutch government's goals for emission reductions for all households for one year.

A vegetarian driving a Hummer SUV is more environmentally friendly than a meat-eater on a bicycle.

In South America, where 400 million hectares of soya crops are fed to animals for human consumption, only 25 million hectares would be needed be needed to directly feed all the humans in the world.

2. Recycling does make a difference
California estimates that state-wide recycling saves energy to power 1.4 million homes, reduces 27,047 tons of water pollution, saves 14 million trees and reduces greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to 3.8 million cars.

The Technical University of Denmark found that recycled aluminum uses 95% less energy than non-recycled aluminum, 70% less energy for plastics, and 40% less for paper.

3. Planting trees benefits our Earth
Two years after planting hardwood saplings in the wettest areas of Catahoula Parish, Louisiana Tech University scientists find each acre of reforested land sequesters sufficient carbon to offset driving a car for a year.

A US Forest Service Study showed that planting 95,000 trees in two counties in metropolitan Chicago provides cleaner air and will saves $38 million over 30 years due to lower heating and cooling costs.

4. Reduce carbon emissions with alternative energy transportation
A University of Chicago study indicates that driving a Toyota Prius electric-gas hybrid car will save 1 ton of emissions per year.

Locally-grown food is deemed to have a lower carbon footprint, as demonstrated by an 2003 Iowa State University study, which found non-local food had traveled an average of 1,494 miles, versus 56 miles for local food.
"I try to save energy by using my bicycle to travel to work as often as I can." - Margot Wallstrom, Vice-President of the European Commission

5. Energy efficiency and renewable energy can help renew our Earth

The American Council for Energy Efficient Economy recommends actions to reduce energy usage such as
turning off equipment when not in use.
installing Energy Star-rated appliances and programmable thermostats
insulating hot water pipes and using energy efficient bulbs.
Install solar panels as an alternative energy source.

Environmental Friendly Way to Preserve Refrigerated Fruits and Vegetables

By Jenna

VEGETABLES!!!

AN INDONESIAN MAID SHARED WITH ME A WEEK AGO A WAY TO PRESERVE FRUITS AND VEGETABLES WHICH SHE LEARNED FROM A FAMILY WHEN SHE BABY-SAT FOR THEM IN KL. THAT FAMILY WAS USING "ALUMINUM COATED PLASTIC BAGS" TO KEEP THEIR FRUITS AND VEGETABLES FRESH FOR WEEKS!!! ITS SO AMAZING.


I THOUGHT IT WAS A GOOD IDEA TO SAVE SOME UNWANTED RESOURCE WHICH MOST PEOPLE WOULD THROW AWAY WITHOUT ANY 2ND THOUGHT AND HERE I AM SHARING WITH YOU THE USEFULNESS OF THIS UNWANTED RESOURCE.

HERE IS THE TYPE OF ALUMINIUM COATED PLASTIC BAG FROM QUAKER. YOU CAN USE ANY
OTHER TYPE AS WELL AS LONG AS IT HAS THE SAME TYPE OF MATERIAL.




YOU CAN PUT PLENTY OF FRUITS AND/OR VEGETABLES IN IT..




LOOK.....AFTER 1 WEEK.....THE VEGETABLES ARE STILL FRESH! AMAZING, ISN'T IT??? NO DEHYDRATION AT ALL.





LOOK AT THE OCRAS. THEY ARE STILL VERY, VERY FRESH WITHOUT ANY DEHYDRATION AT ALL.



BUT DON'T FOLD OR SEAL THE OPENING OF THE BAG. JUST LEAVE THE BAG OPEN AND IT WILL DO THE MAGIC WORK FOR YOU ALREADY. .......TRY IT OUT.....

YOU WOULD SURE LIKE IT VERY MUCH TOO.

INSTEAD OF THROWING THESE USEFUL THINGS AWAY, RE-USE IT AGAIN AND YOU WILL BE INHERENTLY JOINING THE GROUP OF
"SAVING THE MOTHER-EARTH" CAMPAIGN TOO.

Is It Time To Turn Vegetarian?

"The best solution would be for us all to become vegetarians".

So suggested the head of the UN climate agency, Yvo de Boer, who is attending UN-led climate talks in Germany this week. He was responding to criticism that measures to tackle climate change are partly to blame for the rise in food and energy costs. Carbon-cutting biofuels, for example, use food crops to make alternatives to gasoline.

Meanwhile, Patrick Wall, chairman of the European Food Safety Authority, has questioned whether it is "morally or ethically correct" to be feeding grain to animals while people starve. Speaking to the Times, he argued that it's time to end the EU ban on the use of animal remains to feed pigs and chickens. Lifting the ban would allow grain to be diverted to millions of starving people.

And the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation, hosting a much publicised summit in Rome this week, has warned of global catastrophe unless food reaches parts of the world where it is needed most.

So, does the global food crisis demand a radical rethink of how we distribute food? Should we worry less about feeding our animals and prioritise getting grain to people suffering food shortages - even if that affects the availability of meat?

Bersuara bagi haiwan² yg tak berdosa di Malaysia

Laungan yg menikam hati tidak diendahkan. Badan dihempap ke atas tanah sambil leher dijerut....leher dijerut sehingga mati, nyawa yg bernilai dilemaskan. Begitulah antara kekejaman yg berlaku di sekitar bandar Kuala Lumpur, di bawah tangan pekerja DBKL.

Ke mana hilangnya sifat perikemanusiaan kita? Begitu keras ke hati kita?
Sungguhpun mrk haiwan-haiwan liar, mrk tidak berdosa.

Namun syukur kpd segelintir masyarakat penyayang Malaysia yg datang bersatu menuntut hak dan keadilan bagi kawan-kawan haiwan kita yg lemah, kezaliman tersebut didedahkan. TV3 turut menyiarkan penderitaan dan kekejaman berlaku di sebalik pintu Pusat Kurungan/Kembiri Haiwan DBKL.

Malah di halaman berhampiran tapat DBKL tersebut, terdapat bangkai-bangkai haiwan terbunuh yg dibuang begitu sahaja secara terbuka. Cara pengedalian sebegini oleh pihak berkuasa amatlah dikesali.

Walau bagaimanapun, Dr Zainol Ariffin, Pengarah Jabatan Kesihatan DBKL, berjanji akan menjalankan siasatan dan memberi penerangan kpd tuntutan pencinta-pencinta haiwan Malaysia.

Untuk maklumat lanjut ttg protes secara damai hari itu dan susulan penyiasatan serta tindakan yg diambil, sila kunjungi
http://malaysiandogsdeservebetter.blogspot.com/

atau tontoni klip 360 di www.TV3.com.my

Terima kasih kpd 'Malaysian Dogs Deserve Better', sebuah projek kebajikan anjing oleh Inisiatif Pembangunan dan Integrasi Komuniti(CDII) krn bersuara bagi pihak kawan-kawan haiwan kita.

Semoga kita sentiasa dirahmati Yang Maha dgn lebih kasih sayang dan rasa hormat.

Who is a dog's best friend?

To be honest, I have not been reading the daily updates from the newspapers nor have I been watching the news on TV for some months now. First of all, I really have too little time left for this activity, which, at one point in my life... was a 'luxury' and of which I could never do without. But that was a long time ago. When I noticed that there was really nothing much one would miss out in the news reports (if you know what I mean)... I decided not to while away precious time reading up on matters that don't concern me. I was wrong.... there are things that are happening out there we care about... and they are people out there who feel as strongly about issues as we do...

During the past week or so, reports on atrocities at the animal pound in Setapak had caused hackles to rise and animal lovers have come out loud and clear with their protests on the brutal killing of stray animals rounded up by DBKL. TV3 aired some really scary scenes yesterday night and anyone who had watched the program would be as moved as NOROZ KHAN who posted this letter with a heart-touching message from the Holy Koran.

Here's the letter as it appeared in the STAR (dated 11th Feb, 2009):

"What a shame that barbarism is secretly dwelling in the dark corners of our society. People now seem to enjoy taking the lives of dogs by breaking their skulls and necks and brutally beating them to death.

Constantly we hear the same old saying that we are forbidden to touch dogs and that this animal is filthy and indecent.

If so, why would God have planted such loyalty and love in this particular animal?

To all my fellow Muslims, I shall quote from Surah Al-Kahf in the Holy Quran verse number 18: “And you would have thought them awake, while they were asleep. And We turned them on their right and on their left sides, and their dog stretching forth his two forelegs at the entrance [of the Cave or in the space near to the entrance of the Cave (as a guard at the gate)]. Had you looked at them, you would certainly have turned back from them in flight, and would certainly have been filled with awe of them.”

If our very own Holy book shows us how loyal and protective these dogs were to those who did not do wrong, where did we learn to hate and despise this animal?"

NOROZ Khan,
Kuala Lumpur.
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2009/2/11/focus/3241664&sec=focus

Thank you, Noroz... for your compassion and understanding that animals too, like man, deserve to live and die with dignity.

Perhaps, we would never understand why such things are happening and are allowed to happen....has man himself come to a crossroad where such actions are justified by his superiority over the defenceless and the weak? Would it be ethical to say that, in time, we will dispose off our own kind as we are doing now to these poor animals? I shudder to think of the possibility..... the hearts of men are so hardened as to forget how to feel and love anymore.....what a way to go!!!

Here are more news reports on the issue:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=268ZThWBoMA&feature=channel_page
http://thestar.com.my/metro/story.asp?file=/2009/2/9/central/3224186&sec=central
http://thestar.com.my/metro/story.asp?file=/2009/2/6/central/3204204&sec=central

TIMELY FINANCIAL ADVICE FROM A BILLIONAIRE

On top of everything else, the financial scenario is not getting any better. Many more are been laid off from their only source of income and the time to tighten one's belt is, perhaps, the only way to survive ...and although 77-year old Warren Edward Buffet will never need to heed his own advice, we appreciate what he has to share with us all during these hard times. So, spare a minute or more for this self-made billionaire, ranked as the world's No: 1 richest man, and to what he has to say:


We begin this New Year with dampened enthusiasm and dented optimism. Our happiness is diluted and our peace is threatened by the financial illness that has infected our families, organizations and nations. Everyone is desperate to find a remedy that will cure their financial illness and help them recover their financial health.

They expect the financial experts to provide them with remedies, forgetting
the fact that it is these experts who created this financial mess. Every new year, I adopt a couple of old maxims as my beacons to guide my future. This self-prescribed therapy has ensured that with each passing year, I grow wiser and not older. This year, I invite you to tap into the financial wisdom of our elders along with me, and become financially wiser.

**HARD WORK : All hard work bring a profit, but mere talk leads only to poverty.

**LAZINESS : A sleeping lobster is carried away by the water current.

**EARNINGS : Never depend on a single source of income. (At least make your
investments get you second earnings)

**SPENDING : If you buy things you don't need, you'll soon sell things you need.

**SAVINGS : Don't save what is left after spending; spend what is left after
saving.

**BORROWINGS : The borrower becomes the lender's slave.

**ACCOUNTING : It's no use carrying an umbrella, if your shoes are leaking.

**AUDITING : Beware of little expenses; A small leak can sink a large ship.

**RISK TAKING : Never test the depth of the river with both feet. [Have an
alternate plan ready)

**INVESTMENT : Don't put all your eggs in one basket.

I'm certain that those who have already been practicing these principles remain financially healthy. I'm equally confident that those who resolve to start practicing these principles will quickly regain their financial health.

Let us become wiser and lead a happy,
healthy, prosperous and peaceful life.

- WARREN EDWARD BUFFET -

(Check out the following link for his biography: http://www.forbes.com/lists/2008/10/billionaires08_Warren-Buffett_C0R3.html)

Muslim Vegetarians

"There is no doubt that a vegetarian diet is healthier and beneficial to health in lowering weight, blood pressure, cholesterol, and blood sugar. Our Prophet was mostly vegetarian..."
Dr. Shahid Athar, M.D., FACP, FACE Clinical Associate Professor, Indiana University School of Medicine Chair of Medical Ethics, Islamic Medical Association of North America http://www.islam-usa.com

"Islam, a religion of compassion and moderation, acknowledges animals` rights and emphasizes humans` responsibility for their welfare. A vegan vegetarian diet is healthful, promotes mental and physical well- being, and is cruelty-free. It does not include animal parts or products such as eggs and dairy products. I urge every Moslem and nonMoslem to become a vegan vegetarian."
Moneim A. Fadali, M.D., M. Ch., FACS, FRCS (C), FACC, FACCP Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgeon Author, Animal Experimentation: A Harvest of Shame

"God is Rahman and Rahim, the most compassionate and merciful. The one with true Islam draws close to God by inculcating God`s qualities of compassion and mercy, thus a true Muslim is one who honors, sustains, and protects the lives of creatures of God and does not kill them for her own food."
Ghazala Anwar, Ph.D., Professor of Islamic Studies

"Just wanted to let you know that there are other Muslims out there who support such causes. As a matter of fact, there are many Muslims out here that are vegan."
Shahid `Ali Muttaqi, publisher and music producer

Pls visit: http://www.islamveg.com/