Installing a solar panel on Lefties’ snack shack in Bridgetown. Credit: Stephen Leahy/IPS

By Stephen Leahy
BRIDGETOWN, Jun 6 2014 (IPS)

Facing potential extinction under rising sea levels, many small island nations are embracing renewable energy and trying to green their economies. Although the least responsible for carbon emissions, small countries like Barbados are on the front lines of climate impacts.

“Small island nations’ voices have to be heard by the rest of the world,” said Achim Steiner, executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

“Many will undergo fundamental changes. Some will lose 60 to 70 percent of their beaches and much of their tourism infrastructure. Climate change will destroy some countries and the livelihoods of millions of people,” Steiner told IPS in Bridgetown.

Up to 100 percent of coral reefs in some areas of the Caribbean sea have been affected by bleaching due to too-hot seawater linked to global warming. Without global action to reduce emissions there may not be any healthy reefs left in the entire Caribbean region by 2050, according to UNEP’s Small Island Developing States Foresight Report.

Released in Bridgetown on World Environment Day Jun. 5, the report calculates that island nations in the Caribbean face187 billion dollars in shoreline damage from sea level rise well before the end of this century.

A 50-cm sea level rise will mean the country of Grenada will lose 60 percent of its beaches. Sea levels are destined to rise far higher than that, say recent science reports about the unstoppable melt of the massive ice sheets of Antarctica and Greenland along with hundreds of glaciers.

Islands are especially vulnerable to the impacts of global warming which will adversely affect multiple sectors including tourism, agriculture, fisheries, energy, freshwater, health and infrastructure, the report concludes.

“When our planet speaks we must listen,” said Barbados Prime Minister Freundel Stuart.

“Nature knows how to hit back,” Stuart told IPS.

For Barbados, World Environment Day with its theme “Raise Your Voice Not the Sea Level” was not just a ceremonial action but part of a commitment to become “the most advanced green economy in the Latin American and Caribbean region,” he said.

This country of 275,000 people is in the eastern Caribbean, 800 km from the shores of Venezuela. Facing recurring droughts in the past two decades, Barbados has been forced to use energy-intensive desalination to provide enough drinking water.

Imported fossil fuel means energy costs are many times higher than in rich countries like the U.S. Barbados has set a goal of 30 percent renewable energy by 2029 but expects to achieve this by 2019, said William Hines, Barbados’ Chief Energy Conservation Officer.

Solar energy is 30 to 40 percent cheaper but requires significant upfront investment since nearly everything must be imported. However, the payback period in a sun-rich country like Barbados is five to seven years, Hines said.

Aside from finding the money to build large-scale solar, integrating into the nation’s electrical grid has also been challenging. But because this is a small nation, the scope and scale of such challenges are smaller, and they can be resolved relatively quickly.

The three-coral atoll nation of Tokelau in the South Pacific became the first country in the world to become 100 percent powered by renewable energy in October 2012. Other South Pacific nations, including the Cook Islands and Kiribati, plan to be 100 percent renewable by 2020.

As a group, the 52 Small Island Developing States (SIDS) have committed to cut their fossil fuel dependence by 50 percent by 2035. This is as much about setting an example for the world as it is a solution to the crippling fossil fuel costs that devour half of some countries’ budgets.

Barbados is going beyond renewable energy and has put policies into place intended to ‘green’ its entire economy. It has already completed a three-year study called the Green Economy Scoping Study to determine what needs to be done. That research concluded that green policies are not enough, and that Barbados also needs more public and private investment, along with education and changes in consumer behaviour.

“Barbados is one of the world leaders in greening their economies,” Steiner told IPS in an interview.

Small islands need support including financing and technology transfer from the developed world to be able to make this transition and to cope with current and future climate impacts. They can and want to move quickly to diversify their economies, create green jobs, increase resource efficiency and shift to green energy, he said.

“Small islands can serve as beacons for the rest of the world,” Steiner stressed.

Irrigation near Kakamas, South Africa. Experts at the African Development Bank (AfDB) say they have witnessed irrigation systems that have been designed based on ecosystems and river basins that have later dried up. Credit: Patrick Burnett/IPS

By Isaiah Esipisu
WARSAW, Dec 9 2013 (IPS)

Africa can achieve sustainable development by scaling up “green economy” initiatives. What is needed is increased allocations from within national budgets supplemented by donor funding, claim experts.

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) defines a green economy initiative as one that results in “improved human well-being and social equity, while significantly reducing environmental risks and ecological scarcities.”

In its simplest expression, a green economy is low-carbon, resource efficient, and socially inclusive – according to UNEP.

And now, experts say that embracing this initiative through a concept known as “Low-Carbon Climate Resilient Development” – meaning engaging in projects that will help reduce greenhouse gas emission, help adapt to climate change while boosting income, will help Africa move towards sustainable development

“We do not need to destroy our ecosystem in order to build a road,” said Professor Anthony Nyong, who heads the Gender, Climate Change and Sustainable Development Unit at the African Development Bank (AfDB). “If you need to develop a coal power plant for example, you can come to the Africa Development Bank and propose to put up a solar power plant with a similar output as a way of addressing climate change, and that can form a case for the bank or any similar institution to pay the cost difference,” said Nyong explaining the way countries can raise funds from a bank like the one he works for.

He points out that many of the projects on the ground have not been sustainable. “We have witnessed irrigation systems that have been designed based on ecosystems and river basins that have later dried up, or are likely to dry up in the coming years,” he told IPS at the negotiations on climate change in Warsaw, Poland. “It is time to make decisions based on properly identified science.”

Nyong’s work at the AfDB is in line with the Low-Carbon Climate Resilient Development approach, which calls for governments to develop policies that will enable them to simultaneously adapt to climate change, reduce carbon emissions and contribute towards economic development.

Agriculture is one of the sectors that can be used to address the low-carbon development approach, said Tom Owiyo, a senior specialist for Agriculture and Climate Change – African Climate Policy Centre at the U.N. Economic Commission for Africa. “There is need to invest more in agriculture, so that it is not seen merely as a social engagement for the poor,” he said.

However, the low-carbon climate development concept involves all the sectors of economy including power generation, where countries are encouraged to invest in climate friendly power plants, the transport sector, the manufacturing sector, among others.

In a side event at the COP19, Henry Neufeldt, head of climate change research at the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) said that the global food system emits between 9.5 and 14.7 gigatonnes of carbon into the atmosphere every year. This amounts to between 19 to 29 percent of the total greenhouse gases bothering the world today.

Yet some of the methods that can be used to reduce such emissions include minimum tillage, rotation with legumes, intercropping with legumes, growing drought tolerant crops, and use of improved storage and processing technologies.

In the livestock industry, Neufeldt advocates for increased feeding efficiency, improved rangeland management, efficient treatment of manure and improved livestock health. And if one has to grow trees, then they should be multipurpose trees.

Dr Wilbur Ottichilo, a legislator and environmental expert who is a member of Kenya’s negotiating team in Warsaw, gives an example.
“Farmers in different parts of the country are already practicing farming with minimum tillage as a way of improving soil health and sequestering carbon, and so on,” said the legislator.

The “smart village” is a project implemented by the research program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) with funding from the World Bank.

Through the initiative, farmers have learnt how to keep their farms evergreen throughout the year, which makes them earn more, they are trying their hands on greenhouse farming for the first time, drip irrigation, among other techniques that have increased their food production by 60 percent,  while at the same time fighting climate change.

In the same country, the AfDB and other institutions have invested heavily in generation of electricity using geothermal plants. As well, the country is also putting up a wind driven power generation plant with funding from multilateral donors. “These are all low-carbon development projects that will cut down on emissions, increase adaptation, and at the same time generate revenue for the country,” said Ottichilo.

A quarter of a million students across the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius will be exposed to principles of sustainable development. Educating youth about sustainable development is part of this long-term vision to establish a new, ecologically sound economy. Credit: Nasseem Ackburally/IPS

By Nasseem Ackbarally
PORT LOUIS, Jul 29 2013 (IPS)

Tourism, agriculture, fishing, the water supply – climate change threatens the very foundations of society and the economy in Mauritius. As the Indian Ocean island nation develops its adaptation strategies, it is working to ground the next generation of citizens firmly in principles of sustainable development.

Launched on Jul. 5, the country’s National Climate Change Adaptation Policy Framework (NCCAPF) included familiar but worrying predictions for the future. Half of this tourist destination’s beaches could disappear by 2050, swallowed by rising seas and increasingly violent and frequent storms. Fresh water resources could shrink by as much as 13 percent while demand will rise steadily.

“We are shocked to learn that our beautiful island – or part of it – may disappear because of a rise in sea levels,” student Felicia Beniff told IPS as she emerged from a class on the environment and climate change with four friends. “We are afraid. We have many more years to live. Where will we go?”

The teenage students at MEDCO Cassis Secondary School in the Mauritian capital Port Louis are among a quarter of a million students across the island that will be exposed to principles of sustainable development.

Mauritius is working hard to correct unsustainable practices, notably through the Maurice Île Durable. Educating youth about sustainable development is part of this long-term vision to establish a new, ecologically sound economy.

At Rabindranath Tagore State Secondary School in Ilot, northern Mauritius, students put organic waste into a compost bin.

“We collect plastic bottles. We turn off the lights and the air-conditioners when we leave the classroom. We open the windows to aerate the classes. This reduces the school’s expenses. We also plant trees,” one of the students, Ashootosh Jogarah, told IPS.

His friend, Varounen Samy, told IPS that they have “now changed our attitude towards the environment.”

Mahen Gangapersad, the school’s rector, believes Mauritians have taken the environment for granted for too long without realising the harm they cause to natural resources. The new education programme aims to correct this.  “Better late than never,” he told IPS.

Tree planting, the installation of photovoltaic cells for renewable energy, endemic gardens, backyard gardening, waste segregation, compost-making, rain water harvesting and water control are now a reality at many schools. The plan is to expose the entire student population.

“So we are reaching out to 250,000 plus people,” Veenace Koonjal, special adviser to the Minister of Education told IPS. He believes this training will have a great impact on awareness among the country’s population of 1.2 million as students take what they learn home to their families and communities.

“Climate change is weakening the economic, social and environmental pillars of the island,” said the Mauritian Minister of Environment and Sustainable Development Deva Virahsawmy, at the launch of the NCCAPF.

The launch of the newly-completed policy framework was accompanied by the opening of a Climate Change Information Centre in Port Louis, an initiative that will gather local and regional information on climate change and make it available to everyone – scientists, engineers, architects, as well as farmers and students.

Strengthening and broadening knowledge, awareness and information about climate change is a key part of this island nation’s response to global warming. Mauritius, like other island states, can expect to bear the full brunt of climate change despite contributing very little to the greenhouse gas emissions that cause it.

Floods devastated the Mauritian capital, Port-Louis, on Mar. 30 but locals can expect the island to be affected by more floods, landslides and cyclones in the coming years because of climate change. Credit: Nasseem Ackbarally/IPS

Further, the policy framework acknowledges that the island’s geography and topography limit what can be done to counter harmful impacts of global warming on fishing and the coastline, tourism, or agriculture.

Khalil Elahee, chairperson of the government’s Energy Efficiency Management Office, believes the population has begun to realise the very serious impact that climate change is already having.

“People want sustainable development. So it is essential we start a new way of living and developing our island, climate change or not,” he told IPS.

“Whatever we do may not be enough but the measures taken by Mauritius in its climate change education programme help to mitigate the impact of climate change on the island,” Elahee said.

Virahsawmy said that climate change education would enable Mauritius to strengthen its resilience in key sectors of its economy and mitigate the risks and prevent losses of lives and property.

Mauritius has already received three million dollars from the Africa Adaptation Programme – funded by the Government of Japan’s Cool Earth Partnership for Africa – to integrate and mainstream climate change adaptation into its institutional frameworks and core development policies.

An official from the Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development told IPS that a Technology Needs Assessment (TNA) project is also being implemented this year. It will receive technical support from the United Nations Environment Programme’s Division of Technology, Industry and Economics, and its Risoe Centre in Denmark. It is funded by the Global Environment Fund (GEF) to the tune of 120,000 dollars.

The key aim of the TNA is to bridge the gap between identifying appropriate technologies and the design of action plans. The aim is to allow Mauritius to implement technologies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and support adaptation to climate change that is consistent with national development priorities.

The government hopes to secure more funding for adaptation and mitigation efforts from the Green Climate Fund, the U.N. Adaptation Fund and the GEF.

Beyond the classroom, several other programmes run by NGOs complement what young people are learning at school. The Youth be Aware programme of the Mauritius Red Cross, for example, engages 600 young people on the risks posed by climate change to the island.

Ghana’s bamboo frames for bicycles are being exported to Austria. Credit: Portia Crowe/IPS

By Portia Crowe
KUMASI, Ghana, Aug 23 2012 (IPS)

In Ghana, a country burgeoning with traffic congestion, increasing economic growth, and a stark urban-rural divide, making frames of bicycles out of bamboo could be the key to promoting sustainable development. It also makes stronger, longer-lasting bikes.

This is according to Bernice Dapaah, the executive director of Bamboo Bikes Initiative, which trains young Ghanaians to build, fix, and market bamboo-framed bicycles.

“We are into women, children, and youth’s empowerment. And the project reduces carbon emissions and contributes to traffic decongestion, so using it is also a form of reducing climate change,” she said in an interview with IPS.

Bamboo Bikes works in partnership with Ibrahim Djan Nyampong, the owner of Africa Items Co Ltd in Accra, and the frames are sold abroad for 350 dollars each. They cost nearly 200 dollars to build, and Nyampong — also Bamboo Bikes’ technical advisor — pays the young apprentices an additional 30 dollars per frame for their labour.

Nyampong described some of the technical advantages that bamboo frames hold over their carbon fibre or metal counterparts.

“It lasts longer than the metal frame,” he said. “You know a bamboo bike doesn’t break – it’s very durable.”

He said a control test run in Germany proved bamboo frames to be 10 times lighter than metal frames, and noted their heavy load-bearing capacity. Indeed bamboo’s tensile strength — meaning the maximum stress it can withstand while being stretched — is much higher than that of steel.

Bamboo is fibrous, and therefore shock-absorbent. It naturally dampens vibrations, so the frames do not require steel or titanium springs.

“The bamboo has also been treated against splitting and termites, so it’s very strong,” Nyampong explained.

He said the bamboo is treated for three to six months before being used for production. It is then coated in a clear lacquer to protect it against rain and other damage.

These elements have enhanced the frames’ international marketability, and BambooRide, an Austrian company, has begun importing them for sale in Europe.

“At first, we were developing the frames together with (Nyampong), because they were good, but they had to fit a certain European standard,” said Matthias Schmidt, BambooRide’s sales manager.

“So it was like a partnership, a knowledge transfer in both directions,” he told IPS.

The Austrian importers also provided Nyampong’s team with new equipment, including their first jig, to improve precision and reduce the margin of error.

Now, the Austrian company imports up to 10 frames per month, and Schmidt said he looks forward to the initiative’s continued expansion.

“Their capacity is limited… and in the case that we need more frames… we’ll need other sources. So we’re supporting Dapaah’s efforts to improve the equipment and technology,” he said.

Ensuring Environmental Sustainability 

Using bamboo rather than metal to build bicycle frames also holds several advantages for producers – and for the environment.

According to Dapaah, bamboo’s availability as a local material not only enables producers to avoid expensive import costs, but also eliminates the carbon emissions that would arise from the transport of imported materials into the country.

Bamboo is also organic and recyclable, and, unlike metal materials, does not require high levels of energy during extraction and manufacturing.

“The bamboo bicycle is environmentally friendly… because we are also fighting against climate change,” explained Dapaah.

She said the initiative also commits to ecological sustainability by working with bamboo farmers in rural communities to harvest new bamboo crops, and conserve already existent ones.

“If we cut one bamboo, we make sure to plant at least three or five more,” she said.

In addition, bamboo bicycle frames promote sustainable transportation as an alternative to motor vehicles and fossil fuels.

According to Isaac Osei, the regional director for Ghana’s Environmental Protection Agency, this is important.

“The traffic situation in the country in general is increasing, and when traffic increases it has its associated environmental issues,” he told IPS.

There are 30 motor vehicles for every 1,000 people in Ghana, and the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority registers hundreds more each day. Data suggests that vehicle ownership will continue to rise, as the country hits record levels of GDP growth per capita. Ghana has the largest GDP per capita in West Africa at 402.3 dollars in 2011.

Osei noted some of the harmful impacts of increased vehicle use, including carbon dioxide emissions and pollution from dust particles on dirt roads.

“To actually educate people to use bicycles rather than vehicles, I think it is good for the country and the world as a whole,” he said.

By employing and providing young people with technical skills, the initiative is designed to reduce unemployment and, consequently, rural poverty.

“So far I’ve trained about 10 boys,” Nyampong said. “They can build the bikes, but it’s not up to the quality control level, so we are still training them.”

In addition, Bamboo Bikes will help graduated trainees establish their own workshops, and begin to train more young people.

In 2009, Bamboo Bikes won the Clinton Global Initiative Award, and in 2010, the United Nations Environment Programme Seed Initiative award. It also garnered international attention in June when it received a World Business and Development Award at the 2012 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro.

Unless leaders act promptly, climate change and environmental degradation will only worsen and cause greater global problems, scientists warn. Crustmania/CC by 2.0

By Stephen Leahy
VANCOUVER, Feb 21 2012 (IPS)

Unless governments work actively to build a brighter future for humanity, climate change, poverty and loss of biodiversity will worsen and continue to exacerbate existing global problems, top scientists warned ministers attending the United Nations Environment Programme’s (UNEP) governing council meeting in Nairobi, Kenya, on Monday.

Replacing GDP as a measure of wealth, ending damaging subsidies, and transforming systems of governance are some possible steps they can take, the scientists said.

“The current system is broken,” declared Bob Watson, the UK’s chief scientific advisor on environmental issues.

“It is driving humanity to a future that is three to five degrees C warmer than our species has ever known and is eliminating the ecology that we depend on for our health, wealth and senses of self.”

Watson and 19 other past winners of the Blue Planet Prize, often called the Nobel Prize for the environment, presented their 23-page synthesis report, “Environment and Development Challenges”, at the UNEP meeting.

Ministers warned that because the adverse impacts of climate change and biodiversity cannot be reversed, “The time to (act) is now, given the inertia in the socio-economic system.”

“The good news is that (solutions) exist, but decision makers must be bold and forward thinking to seize them,” Watson said.

“We have a dream – a world without poverty – a world that is equitable… a world that is environmentally, socially and economically sustainable…” wrote Watson and his co-authors in their report.

Among the co-authors were James Hansen of NASA; Emil Salim, former environment minister of Indonesia; Nicholas Stern, former chief economist of the World Bank; M.S. Swaminathan; and José Goldemberg, Brazil’s Secretary of Environment during the Rio Earth Summit in 1992.

The Tipping Point

“There has been very little progress in the 20 years since the Rio Earth Summit,” said Harold Mooney, a biologist at Stanford University and 2002 winner of the Blue Planet Prize, adding that poor governance is one of the key issues.

“Decision makers and the public need to understand that we’re not going to make it,” he said.

The report recommended that leaders look beyond the interests of their own states. It also said that decision-making processes need fundamental reform, so that they empower marginalised groups and integrate economic, social and environmental policies instead of having them compete.

Mooney called preliminary plans and hopes for the Rio+20 conference in June this year tepid as well as vague, even thought the twentieth anniversary of the Earth Summit offers a major opportunity for world leaders to set human development on a new, more sustainable path.

“We are not getting to the crux of the matter. There is an urgent need to raise the stakes.”

“Weaning ourselves and the world off our fossil fuel addiction, moving on to clean energies, cannot be solved by the U.N. process,” said James Hansen of NASA, the 2010 Blue Planet winner, along with Watson.

Hansen told IPS that it is too easy for a country to refuse to meet its carbon reduction commitments, as Canada did with the Kyoto Protocol.

Fossil fuels are heavily subsidized and fossil fuel companies do not pay the huge costs of air and water pollution. Nor do they pay for the impact they have on the climate.

Hansen argued that the simplest way to address this problem would be to collect a fee from fossil fuel companies at the domestic source (mine or port of entry) and distribute the money uniformly, on a per capita basis, to legal residents, he said.

Fuel costs would rise under this “carbon fee and dividend” scheme, but the costs for the majority of people would be covered by their share of fees collected. It would also act as a financial incentive for individuals to reduce their carbon footprint, he said.

“This will have a tremendously positive impact on the economy, as entrepreneurs introduce carbon-free energies or energy efficiency.”

The Blue Planet Laureates’ paper also urged governments to replace GDP as a measure of wealth with metrics for natural, human and social capital, as well as how they intersect.

The paper also called on governments to eliminate subsidies in sectors such as energy, transport and agriculture with high environmental and social costs. In addition, it urged leaders to tackle overconsumption and address population pressure by empowering women, improving education and making contraception accessible to all.

(END)