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Alone, China's ban on ivory could make life worse for elephants
China has ordered all its legal ivory carvers and traders to get of the business by the end of the year. But it will have to do more if it really wants to stop poaching
China’s ban on ivory trading and processing has been hailed as a monumental step on the path to saving elephants from extinction. But if China does not simultaneously tackle its much larger illegal trade in ivory, the ban could perversely make it more lucrative for the poaching gangs who massacre Africa’s elephants and ship their tusks to Asia.
The number of legal businesses being shut down is relatively small. The plan, announced on 30 December by China’s central government, will close “a portion” (the Guardian understands it will be roughly half) of its 34 licensed carving factories and 130 retailers before the end of March 2017. The rest will be forced shut by the end of the year.
Continue reading...'Elephants are not the only victims': the lament of China's ivory lovers
For years China’s ivory carvers and collectors have been blamed for elephant poaching. Now their government is banning the ivory trade. How do they see their future?
In a tiny workshop at his home in the Tai Po district of Hong Kong, 84-year-old Au Yue-Shung shows me an ivory carving he has been working on for months. Measuring just 5x10 inches, Nine Sages in Mount Xiang depicts the 9th-century poet Bai Juyi and eight of his peers in full creative flow in Henan province, far from the imperial court that Bai once served. The point of the story is that the sages tried to maintain their integrity by staying close to nature and art, and away from the ugly politics of the time. This is a piece that Au created for himself rather than a client. It is his statement about life after going through many ups and downs.
Born during the Japanese occupation of China in the 1930s, Au joined Guangzhou’s Daxin ivory carving factory at the age of 13 as an apprentice. With only one year’s formal education and with no one caring to teach him, he taught himself drawing and carving in his spare time. Unable to afford drawing paper, he drew on toilet paper. His gift was soon recognised and by the late 1960s he had become a key carving artist at Daxin. Later, at the height of the Cultural Revolution, he decided that he had had enough of the political and artistic repression.
Continue reading...History of Australian farming: the 1960s
'Larsen C' iceberg about to break off Antarctic shelf – video
Scientists predict that a giant iceberg is about to break off from the Antarctic shelf after the sudden expansion of a rift which has been growing steadily for a decade. Several ice shelves have cracked up around northern parts of Antarctica in recent years, including the Larsen B that disintegrated in 2002
Continue reading...Best of A Big Country
How do we fix air pollution? It's simple but it needs political will
We know diesel vehicles are the key culprit, but when it comes to both long-term solutions and emergency measures the govenment has been asleep at the wheel
Cutting toxic levels of city air pollution to safer levels is simple, but not easy – it requires resolve. Yet, despite the key culprit in the UK being well known – diesel vehicles – the government has been asleep at the wheel for years.
Levels of nitrogen dioxide have been illegally high across much of the UK since 2010. In 2015 86% of major urban areas broke annual limits. Cutting this pollution means choking off diesel emissions and there is a wide range of effective measures available.
Continue reading...Air pollution, owl cafes and 25 years of UK wind power – green news roundup
The week’s top environment news stories and green events. If you are not already receiving this roundup, sign up here to get the briefing delivered to your inbox
Continue reading...The week in wildlife – in pictures
A swimming baby elephant, diving penguins and jumping impalas are among this week’s pick of images from the natural world
Continue reading...Brixton Road breaches annual air pollution limit in five days
Prepare for reanimation of the zombie myth ‘no global warming since 2016’ | Dana Nuccitelli
Pushback will be needed against an impending swarm of climate zombie myths
Climate myths are like zombies – you shoot them through the heart, walk away thinking they’re dead, and then they pop back up behind you and try once again to eat your brain.
So it is with Stage 1 climate denial and the myth that the Earth isn’t warming. It’s so persistent that it’s related to the 5th, 9th, and 49th-most popular myths in the Skeptical Science database. Climate deniers have been peddling the myth ‘no warming since [insert date]’ for over a decade.
Continue reading...Forensic science standards 'at significant risk'
London breaches annual air pollution limit for 2017 in just five days
Brixton Road in Lambeth has already broken legal limits for toxic air for the entire year, with many other sites across the capital set to follow
London has breached its annual air pollution limits just five days into 2017, a “shameful reminder of the severity of London’s air pollution”, according to campaigners.
By law, hourly levels of toxic nitrogen dioxide must not be more than 200 micrograms per cubic metre more than 18 times in a whole year, but late on Thursday this limit was broken on Brixton Road in Lambeth.
Continue reading...China cementing global dominance of renewable energy and technology
It now owns five of the world’s six largest solar-module manufacturing firms and the largest wind-turbine manufacturer
China is cementing its global dominance of renewable energy and supporting technologies, aggressively investing in them both at home and around the globe, leaving countries including the US, UK and Australia at risk of missing the growing market.
A report by the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (Ieefa) found China’s dominance in renewables is rapidly spreading overseas, with the country accelerating its foreign investment in renewable energy and supporting technologies.
Notorious bird egg thief on the run in Brazil
Inside Glanrhyd, the first solar 'eco hamlet' in Wales
Residents of the new eco hamlet in Pembrokeshire can expect greatly reduced fuel bills and shared use of an electric car
Most of the houses in the Welsh village of Glanrhyd are of traditional construction – walls made out of hefty local stone, roofs of grey slate. They can get chilly when the winter winds whistle through the gaps.
The six houses that make up the “eco hamlet” of Pentre Solar look and feel very different. They are built using light, bright timber sourced from a nearby valley. The houses are carefully insulated, airtight and powered by solar panels.
Continue reading...Serene cycling, more variety and new lanes: my Bike Blog hopes for 2017
A late list of new year resolutions include a return to mountain biking and a position in the commuting slow lane
New year resolutions are, of course, traditionally made before 1 January, not nearly a week into 2017. But I shall disregard convention – below are my cycling-related hopes for the current year.
Some are personal, some more general. I should also stress that these aren’t my sole hopes for humanity, just some specific Bike Blog-based ones. New bike lanes would be great, but I’m more keen overall on peace for all and a continued avoidance of a nuclear holocaust.
Continue reading...Diesel cars are 10 times more toxic than trucks and buses, data shows
Stricter EU emissions testing for large vehicles means modern diesel cars produce 10 times more NOx per litre of fuel
Modern diesel cars produce 10 times more toxic air pollution than heavy trucks and buses, new European data has revealed.
The stark difference in emissions of nitrogen oxides (NOx) is due to the much stricter testing applied to large vehicles in the EU, according to the researchers behind a new report. They say the same strict measures must be applied to cars.
Continue reading...All the twists, trims and turns of a good hedge lay
Stoke Abbott, Dorset Every limb is a puzzle, whether to remove or keep, how to split, where to interlace
Thunk! The billhook bites deep and splits the hazel slantwise. With a heave and a twist on the trunk, the young tree shakes its embryonic catkins against the sky and swishes down to lie lengthwise with the others. Then begins the business of trimming the prone sapling and weaving it in so it becomes both hedge and living fence.
Hedge laying is an ancient craft. Small tree trunks are sliced with a shallow, diagonal cut and then bent sideways. A thin bridge of wood remains to connect the laid tree to the live root. The horizontal trees, called pleaches or plashes, are interlaced and held in place with posts and crooks – pieces of forked stick driven into the ground. New side shoots grow outwards and upwards, regenerating the hedge from a thick, stock-proof, base.
Continue reading...Huge Antarctic iceberg poised to break away
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