Tierramerica - Ecobrief

Ecobreves – GUATEMALA: A Call to Protect Cloud Forest

By IPS Correspondents and - -
Local and national authorities are calling on the Guatemalan Congress to declare El Amay mountain, in the northern department of Quiché, a protected area, because it is one of the country's few cloud forests and is habitat for symbolic Guatemalan species like the quetzal bird.

Ecobreves – COLOMBIA: Ban on Tuna Fishing

By IPS Correspondents and - -
The Colombian Institute of Rural Development, INCODER, has banned tuna boats from fishing in the Pacific Ocean until Sep. 12. The measure is intended to protect the endangered yellowfin (Thunnus albacares) and bigeye (Thunnus obesus) tuna species.

Ecobreves – MEXICO: Transgenic Maize Report Feeds Doubts

By IPS Correspondents and - -
Activists received with skepticism a scientific report released this month with great fanfare that assures that no trace of transgenic maize was found in a specific area of Mexico, a country where the presence of genetically modified corn has been recorded since 2001.

Ecobreves – BRAZIL: Teeth from Stem Cells

By IPS Correspondents and - -
In around five years the people of the world could have the option of a "third set of teeth," formed from stem cells, if resources can be found for experiments, says Brazil's Silvio Dualibi, researcher with the Federal University of Sao Paulo.

Ecobreves – GUATEMALA: Mayan Relics Discovered

By IPS Correspondents and - -
Archeologists led by Jonathan Kaplan, of the United States, discovered on Guatemala's southern coast a statue and a building with a 400-meter front -- part of a Mayan city corresponding to the late pre-classic period, 300 to 200 years B.C.

Ecobreves – CHILE: Environmentalists Fight Government Secrets

By IPS Correspondents and - -
The Chilean government has pledged to five environmental groups to promote a constitutional reform that would eliminate the obstacles to information held by public entities.

Ecobreves – VENEZUELA: New Evidence of Mercury Contamination

By IPS Correspondents and - -
A study of 209 artisanal miners and their families in El Callao, a town in southeast Venezuela along the Yuruari River, a source of gold and diamonds, found that 105 of them had toxic levels of mercury from inhaling the vapors of the heavy metal.

Ecobreves – HONDURAS: Communities Unite to Fight Forest Pest

By IPS Correspondents and - -
Communities of the Río Plátano biosphere, in the northeastern departments of Olancho and Mosquitia, Honduras, have joined forces and in less than two months staved off four attacks by the northern pine weevil plague in the pine forest.

Ecobreves – CUBA: An Education in Sunshine

By IPS Correspondents and - -
A solar research center created in the eastern Cuban province of Granma aims to instill in youth attitudes of caring for natural resources.

Ecobreves – COLOMBIA: Port a Threat to Whales

By IPS Correspondents and - -
Colombian ecologists are fighting the proposed deep-water port in the western Málaga Bay and the Gorgona and Tribugá islands, where in the next few weeks some 800 humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) will begin to gather as part of their annual migration pattern.

Ecobreves – BRAZIL: More Contamination, Fewer Males

By IPS Correspondents and - -
Urban pollution contributes to the gender imbalance of the population, to the detriment of males, as do violence and the longevity of females.

Ecobreves – PERU: President Blocks Environmental Law

By IPS Correspondents and - -
Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo's rejection of the new General Law on the Environment, approved by Congress, has opened a debate on the priorities of the population's quality of life and the conditions that most benefit economic growth.

Ecobreves – ARGENTINA: A Move for Responsible Forest Management

By IPS Correspondents and - -
The international Forest Stewardship Council and the Argentine Fundación Vida Silvestre (Wildlife Foundation) are calling on government and non-governmental organizations to draft standards for managing forests.

Ecobreves – GUATEMALA: Looking for Energy in the Trash

By IPS Correspondents and - -
Municipal authorities in the Guatemalan capital began tests to calculate the amount of gas emanating from the city's landfill, with hopes of using it as an energy source for nearby residents.

Ecobreves – BRAZIL: Whale Watching on the Rise

By IPS Correspondents and - -
The July-November whale watching season has begun in Brazil, a tourist activity that is in its nascent stages but quickly growing. This year the northeastern state of Bahia will increase the number of embarkation points from three to five, in hopes of doubling the number of people going out in boats to see whales like the humpback (Megaptera novaeangliae), which gather there to reproduce.

Ecobreves – CHILE: Police Protect Biodiversity

By IPS Correspondents and - -
The Chilean National Environment Commission, CONAMA, is training the militarized police, known here as Carabineros, to protect the country's biodiversity.

Ecobreves – CUBA: Turtles the New Attraction

By IPS Correspondents and - -
A development plan in the village of Cocodrilo, on the southwestern Cuban Isla de la Juventud (Isle of Youth), aims to draw ecotourists to one of the most important projects for hawksbill turtle (Eretmochelys imbricata) management in the Caribbean.

Ecobreves – GUATEMALA: The Capital Turns into a Dump

By IPS Correspondents and - -
In the Guatemalan capital some 2,300 tons arrive each day at one huge central dump, according to a study conducted for the city government by the company Guatemalan Environmental Engineering Services.

Ecobreves – HONDURAS: Women Build Eco-Housing

By IPS Correspondents and - -
With no need for iron bars for reinforcement, or cement, women in the village of Campo Cielo, in the outskirts of the Honduran capital, began four months ago to build ecological houses with sand, soil and plastic bottles -- and they are proud of what they have accomplished.

Ecobreves – ARGENTINA: Town Says No to Pesticide Storage

By IPS Correspondents and - -
Residents of the town of Bouwer, in the central Argentine province of Córdoba, are staging street protests against a temporary storage site for 12 tons of DDC (dichloro diphenyl trichloroethane) and other highly toxic pesticides.

Ecobreves – BRAZIL: Amazon Deforestation on Decline

By IPS Correspondents and - -
A sharp decline in deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon in June -- 95 percent in comparison with the same month in 2004 (plummeting from 10,017 to 531 square km) -- is raising hopes for success in fighting the phenomenon.
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