On May 11, the UN Committee on Food Security will vote on voluntary guidelines to govern the practice of land tenuring. Ahead of that decision, a coalition of NGOs has released Land Matrix, a data visualization tool that helps paint a more complete picture of an issue that’s become increasingly important in many parts of the developing world over the past four to five years.

Also known as land grabbing, land tenuring involves acquiring land at low prices and using it to fuel food and cash crop production, the creation of biofuels or forestry. Data on exactly how much land has been purchased is hard to come by, although a 2010 World Bank report suggests it could as much as twice the amount we’re aware of.

View the Land Matrix at http://landportal.info/landmatrix

Source: UN Dispatch

India’s economic growth and political stability are at stake in coming years if it does not change its approach to water management, a member of its natural resources planning commission told Reuters-AlertNet.

Mihir Shah, who has been asked by India’s government to come up with a new water resource strategy, said the sector needed to become more  sustainable, efficient and focused on how water is used and how it reaches people.

“If this is not attended to, India’s growth story will completely go off the rails,” Shah said during an interview at the Global Water Summit 2012 conference in Rome.

Read the full report on AlertNet

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)'s Natural Resources Management and Environment Department has released a new website called "Sustainability Pathways". This website hosts projects under development that looks at some aspects of sustainability, such as:How do we define and measure sustainability in the food and agriculture sector? Check the SAFA project and e-Forum;

• In a choc scenario such as high energy price, could organic livestock systems meet consumption demands sustainably? Check the SOL project;
• How could producers be best rewarded for environmental stewardship? Check the PES project;
• What is the environmental footprint of the food loss and waste and could it be reduced? Check the FWF project and database;
• What are the agriculture, forestry and fisheries issues in the global move towards a green economy? Check the GEA project.

It also feature relevant FAO publications and partnerships, as well as a list of interesting meetings: http://www.fao.org/nr/sustainability/

The carbon map: Making sense of climate change responsibility and vulnerability

An interesting infographic video of “responsibility” for climate change and its resultant “vulnerability” – so who should actually be doing what?!

via The carbon map: making sense of climate change responsibility and vulnerability.

Poor roads and transport infrastructure are key factors in the
marginalization of women and other disempowered groups, but there is
little understanding of the many ways in which a lack of mobility
affects people’s lives. In South-east Asia, huge strides are being made
in highway development and regional economic integration, and the
connections between mobility and livelihood are extremely dynamic. The
complex interplay of factors makes these connections both interesting
and challenging for study. Do roads necessarily bring economic
opportunities and prosperity? How does the possible change in mobility
transform the lives of women and marginalized groups? How does the
differential impact of these changes on people depend on geographical,
social, and historical factors and people’s own capacities to make
optimum use of the new resource?

Gender, Roads, and Mobility in Asia is a collection of case-based
research in developing countries exploring the inter-relations between
gender, poverty, and mobility, especially in the context of
transportation development. It brings together stories from different
points of transformation and what emerges is a nuanced picture of how
people’s own positions and capabilities – gender, age, ethnicity,
literacy, and education – influence the impact of the infrastructure
development on their lives.

This book should be read by policy makers, transportation planners,
development practitioners and researchers, undergraduates,
postgraduates, and academics in the areas of gender and development
studies and transportation planning and management.

To purchase the book, please visit: http://developmentbookshop.com/gender-roads-and-mobility-in-asia.html

FAO has released a new short document entitled, “100 days to Rio +20, 100 facts: Making the link between people, food and the environment” . The 8-page document is a quick read, and covers facts on a number of topics, including – hunger, water, forestry, gender, fisheries, land, food, nature and the environment.

Some excerpts:

4. Malnutrition is the single largest contributor to disease in the world. In developing countries, almost five million children under the age of five die of malnutrition-related causes every year.

12. The amount of food wasted by consumers in industrialised countries each year (222m tons) is almost as high as the total net food production of sub-Saharan Africa (230m tons).

28. 28  Number of countries that are withdrawing 20 percent of their water resources annually, indicating substantial pressure and impending water scarcity: 8

36. Deforestation affected an estimated 13 million hectares per year between 2000 and 2010; net forest loss was 5.2 million hectares per year, due to afforestation and natural expansion.

46.  In sub-Saharan Africa women contribute between 60 and 80 percent of the labour for food production, both for household consumption and for sale.

53. Fish contributes to food security in many regions of the world. Numerous developing countries rely on fish as a major source of protein; in 28 of them, fish accounts for over 40 percent of animal protein intake.

70. Arable land per person is shrinking. It decreased from 0.38 hectares in 1970 to 0.23 hectares in 2000, with a projected decline to 0.15 hectares per person by 2050.

85. Overall, post-harvest food losses can run from 15 percent of food production to as high as 50 percent. These losses are due to a variety of reasons, including harvesting at an incorrect stage of produce maturity, excessive exposure to rain, drought or extremes of temperature, contamination by micro-organisms and physical damage.

97. Agriculture and deforestation account for about one third of global greenhouse gas emissions from human activities, specifically 25 percent of carbon, 50 percent of methane and over 75 percent of nitrous oxide.

Read the full document of 100 faxts

The latest issue of the Economist magazine has an article on the threat from rising water and sinking buildings.

IT IS the peak of the rainy season in Indonesia: good for farmers, but not so welcome for the 9m or so citizens of Jakarta. They hope to dodge the “five-year curse”. In 2007 flooding inundated nearly three-fifths of the capital, killing 52 people, displacing some 450,000 more and costing nearly $1 billion. Five years before that floodwaters killed about 60 residents and forced 365,000 from their homes.

Read the full article: http://www.economist.com/node/21550322

In the architecture and construction industry, the sustainability of a building is often calculated using tools that reduce the meaning of the concept to a set of numbers. To re-energise the idea of sustainable construction, the Holcim Foundation proposes five qualitative measures that will help make a building truly endure.

1. Progress: innovation and transferability
2. Planet: environmental quality and resource efficiency
3. People:  ethical standards and social equity
4. Prosperity: economic performance and compatibility
5. Proficiency: contextual and aesthetic impact

Read full article

Sustainable Business

New book:
Business and Climate Policy: The Potentials and Pitfalls of Private Voluntary Programs
Edited by Karsten Ronit

Climate change has become one of the most important and challenging global policy fields. Attention has primarily focused on the successes and failures of states and intergovernmental organizations but many more actors are involved and contribute to solutions. Business, often seen as spurring climate change, harbours a lot of potential for problem solving. Today, a rich variety of private voluntary programs address climate change.

Private voluntary programs are private in the sense that they are initiated by and made up of businesses, voluntary in the sense that businesses are free to join or leave them, and programs in that a variety of formal rules, resources and bodies are often established to administer and evaluate the schemes.

Further information on the book from United Nations University

Urban Environmental Management:
Considering the challenges of limited oil resources, increasing energy prices, climate change, environmental pollution and health risks, it is essential to establish an efficient transport system that meets demand, but consumes as little energy as possible.

The new SUTP Sourcebook Module entitled  “Urban Transport and Energy Efficiency” serves as a navigator for decision makers and stakeholders, including local and national authorities, the private sector and non-governmental organisations. It provides a comprehensive overview of measures and policies designed to promote greater energy efficiency in transport, and assigns specific tasks and responsibilities to particular parties. Case studies illustrate international experiences in implementing measures to increase energy efficiency in transport.

The 88-page, full-colour document, authored by  Susanne Böhler-Baedeker and Hanna Hüging is available for download here (7.6 Mb) – New users may need to register first and then proceed for download.

Dramatic before-after photos of the recovery and reconstruction that has been happening one year after the March 11 Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami.

Follow this link and click on each “After photo” to see the “Before” situation at the same location.

A strong sustainability agenda, covering economic, environmental and social issues, is no longer an afterthought, done by a stand-alone unit, or limited to planting trees.

According to a recent MIT Sloan School of Management study, most managers surveyed in the worldwide research firmly believe that a sustainable strategy is a *competitive necessity*

The study saw an increase in the sustainability commitments of companies, with both internal and external factors driving sustainable business practices.

Read an extended summary and/or download the report  at: http://sloanreview.mit.edu/feature/sustainability-strategy/

With a very diverse range of cultures and geographical features, the Asia-Pacific Region is 42.2% urbanized, with half of the world’s urban population now in Asia-Pacific. Cities in the region are home to 1.76 billion people – 12 out of 21 mega cities (with more than 10 million residents) are in Asia-Pacific.

These and other interesting information,covering a wide range of issues and themes, are part of the recently released report, “The State of Asian Cities 2010/11″ by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia Pacific (UN-ESCAP) and United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT).

The full report can be downloaded from the following URL:
http://www.unhabitat.org/pmss/listItemDetails.aspx?publicationID=3078

Over the last many years, Prof. David Edgell, Professor of Tourism at East Carolina University, has been compiling an interesting list of "Ten Important World Tourism Issues" for the forthcoming year. His latest list, for 2012:

1. Repercussions on the travel and tourism industry from the global economic slowdown   
2. Concern for safety and security remains an important issue for the travel industry
3. The transformative impact tourism has on global socio-economic progress
4. Negative impact on the travel industry of increases in fuel prices and airline fees
5. Importance of maintaining a  destination’s social, cultural, natural and built resources
6. Effect on tourism from natural and man-made disasters and world political disruptions
7. Influence of increased use of electronic and other technologies on the travel industry
8. Changes in tourism demand resulting from increased travel by emerging nations
9. Greater interest in potential long term consequences of climate change on tourism
10. Need for increased national/local leadership in tourism policy and strategic planning

The list was developed using information from university discussions, conferences and seminars, tourism documents, surveys, industry data, books, articles, and publications, and utilization of a modified Delphi approach in gathering certain research information and obtaining a consensus viewpoint.

FOUR out of five Latin Americans live in cities, compared with fewer than half of Asians or Africans. The region’s 198 biggest cities—those with more than 200,000 people—account for 60% of its economic output, with the ten largest alone generating half of that. The productivity gains that flow from bringing people together in cities have been one of the drivers of economic growth in Latin America over the past half century or more. But congestion, housing shortages, pollution and a lack of urban planning mean that Latin America’s biggest cities now risk dragging down their country’s economies.

Read the full article – http://www.economist.com/node/21525915?fsrc=scn%2Fcitylimitslatinamerica
Source: The Economist magazine

Abdul Bayes, a professor of economics at Jahangirnagar University in
Bangladesh, recently argued in Bangladeshi newspaper The Financial
Express that non-government organizations (NGOs) have improved the
credit market in rural Bangladesh by increasing the use of microcredit
from institutional sources as opposed to informal sources like friends,
family members and moneylenders which may charge an “exorbitant rate of
interest” .

Citing the national population census of 2001 and the agricultural
census of 2008, Bayes posits that 60 percent of rural credit comes from
institutional sources, much of this through NGOs, as compared to less
than 30 percent two decades ago. Poverty has fallen from 70 percent to
48 percent among households accessing microcredit and from 57 percent to
40 percent among those not accessing credit. The use of microcredit
proceeds has also changed from mostly consumption to more
enterprise-related expenses like buying rickshaws, opening grocery shops
or arranging small-scale trading operations. The author notes that
farmers have not been choosing to access credit from NGOs for higher
risk, crop-related activities because of the “loan recovery lust by
NGOs.”

The author also attacks the argument that NGOs have made many of
their borrowers “go broke.” Approximately one third of NGO members
perceived that their economic condition has deteriorated over time, the
same proportion as in control households. On the other hand, 46 percent
of NGO members expressed that their economic condition has improved
compared to 42 percent of the control group. Thus, concludes Bayes, the
argument that NGO members are worse off than non-members is invalid.

Source: microcapital.org

Sustainable tourism in its purest sense, is an industry which attempts to make a low impact on the environment and local culture, while helping to generate income, employment, and the conservation of local ecosystems. It is responsible tourism that is both ecologically and culturally sensitive.

According to the World Tourism Organization, sustainable tourism is tourism that leads to the management of all resources in such a way that economic, social and aesthetic needs can be fulfilled while maintaining cultural integrity, essential ecological processes, biological diversity and life support systems.

Taking a leaf from the definition of sustainability itself, sustainable tourism is also defined as a process which meets the needs of the present tourists and host communities whilst protecting and enhancing needs in the future.

These and related issues are explored in detail in GDRC’s Sustainable Tourism Gateway. The URL is http://tourism.gdrc.org/

New research has investigated the complex relationship between energy consumption and public health, by analysing historical data from around the world. It indicates that electricity does not provide additional health benefits for countries with low levels of infant mortality, and that increased coal consumption has negative health impacts.

In the next 20 years the International Energy Agency predicts a 50 per cent increase in global energy demand. Currently coal is the dominant fuel used for power generation (more than 40 per cent is sourced from coal) and, without policy changes, it will continue to dominate.

The relationship between energy and health is complicated. Electricity can help provide clean water, sanitation and reduce exposure to indoor air pollution from energy sources, such as coal and wood burning in homes. However, its production from fossil fuels increases outdoor air pollution and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, which ultimately lead to climate change and associated negative health impacts.

Health has seldom been the focus in energy policy research. This study analysed data on health and energy statistics from 1965 to 2005 to examine the relationship between two established general measures of health (life expectancy and infant mortality) and electricity consumption across 41 countries with very different histories of development. Data were from several sources, including UNICEF statistics, the human mortality database and the Review of World Energy.

The results indicated a difference between countries that had a high infant mortality/low life expectancy in 1965, and those with low infant mortality/high life expectancy in 1965. For high infant mortality/low life expectancy countries, such as Brazil, India and Indonesia, there was a fall in infant mortality with increased electricity consumption. However, for low infant mortality/high life expectancy countries, such as the majority of EU Member States, electricity consumption had no apparent impact.

Electricity consumption was associated with improved health only in countries with infant mortality greater than 100 deaths per 1000 live births in 1965. This supports previous research that suggests electricity consumption can improve public health in countries with high infant mortality, as there is greater opportunity for positive impacts through improved sanitation and water supply.

The results also indicated there was no link between life expectancy and electricity consumption. The researchers suggest this is because infants are more vulnerable to impoverished circumstances, so the impacts of electricity on infant mortality are greater and more immediate than on life expectancy.

However, when coal consumption was considered independently from electricity consumption, analysis indicated that increases in coal consumption were associated with both higher infant mortality rates and reduced life expectancy.

The results have strong implications for energy policy in terms of possible health impacts. The finding that coal consumption negatively affects health is of particular concern in the light of projected increases in coal use for power generation. However, further research is needed to analyse subpopulations within countries in terms of access to electricity and health status, as well as causes of death. Better data on other potential influences, such as educational level, vaccination and health care access, would be helpful in estimating energy impacts more accurately.

Source: Gohlke, J.M., Thomas, R., Woodward, A. et al. (2011) Estimating the Global Public Health Implications of Electricity and Coal Consumption. Environmental Health Perspectives 119(6):821-826. http://ehp03.niehs.nih.gov/article/fetchArticle.action?articleURI=info%3Adoi%2F10.1289%2Fehp.1002241

With climate change quietly (or loudly, depending on your viewpoint!) becoming pervasive in every lifestyle decision that we are taking daily, two other major environmental themes also jostled for position in the forefront of the global developmental agenda – that of biodiversity and desertification.

Together, the three are called the “Rio Conventions” or just Big Three, which were promulgated during the Rio Summit that took place in 1992 in Rio de Jenero, Brazil. In 2012, the Summit returns to Rio for the “Rio+20″ summit – the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development.

At its sixty-fifth session, the United Nations General Assembly declared the period 2011-2020 to be “the United Nations Decade on Biodiversity, with a view to contributing to the implementation of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity for the Period 2011-2020” (resolution  65/161).  This came along with a simultaneous declaration of United Nations Decade for Deserts and the Fight against Desertification (UNDDD) for the same period of 2011-2020.

More information:

• Rio+20: http://www.uncsd2012.org/
• Climate Change Convention: http://www.unfccc.int/
• Bio-Diversity Convention: http://www.cbd.int/
• Desertification Convention: http://www.unccd.int/

Mr. Sha Zukang is Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs and Secretary-General of the 2012 UN Conference on Sustainable Development. In a recent talk, he highlighted some of the key challenges that the UN and its member states are facing in the run up to the Rio+20 summit (which will return to Brazil in 2012).

The key seven issues are:

• green jobs and social inclusion
• energy access, efficiency and sustainability
• food security and sustainable agriculture
• sound water management
• sustainable cities
• management of the oceans
• improved resilience and disaster preparedness

Cutting across the above seven issues is climate change – a high priority in its own right. Another critical cross-cutting issue is the means of implementation, including technology, financing and capacity building.

More info on Rio+20, including full text of the above talk is at: http://www.uncsd2012.org/rio20/

Contributing to an expanding debate on economics and climate change, Climate and Development Knowledge Network (CDKN) has launched a Guide to Green Growth.  Aimed primarily at national planners and policy advisors in developing countries, the Guide focuses on the role of economic tools in planning for green growth.

How do decision-makers create a vision and strategy for green growth? What skills do planners need to work effectively with the range of green growth tools available? And how do they assess which tools are right for them?  These are some of the questions explored by the CDKN Guide.

The Guide concludes that green growth planning needs to be an iterative process, adapting to local developments over time and responding to the needs of national and local stakeholders. Planners rarely find the process straightforward and rely on economic principles and tools to inform the process. However, conventional tools may not address environmental and social dimensions adequately or look beyond economic metrics. New tools and methods have emerged and existing ones have also evolved. Opening up the ‘black box’ of economic tools so that they are more accessible to policy makers and stakeholders, and using them to obtain real commitments, remain key challenges.

The Guide touches on case studies in Borneo and Rwanda to highlight how stakeholder participation in green growth planning can work in practice.

Download the guide: http://cdkn.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/CDKN-Guide-to-Green-Growth.pdf
Source: Climate and Development Knowledge Network (CDKN)

In
a path-breaking development, high-level officials from the Ministry of
Environment and Ministry of Industry from Indonesia, and those from
Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), Japan, together with top
decision-makers from Daikin Industries Ltd., and Panasonic Corporation,
two of the largest Japanese manufacturers of air conditioning
equipment, reached an agreement to introduce high-efficiency ozone and
climate-friendly air-conditioners in the Indonesian market.

Representatives
of the Indonesian government, Japanese government and UNDP were
visiting Osaka and Kusatsu, Japan, during 6-8 June 2011, where the air
conditioning manufacturing facilities of Daikin and Panasonic are
respectively headquartered.

“Panasonic
and Daikin have agreed to help Indonesia introduce this technology as a
part of the project to be implemented by the United Nations Development
Programme (UNDP) to simultaneously protect the stratospheric ozone
layer and the climate,” said Mr. Satoshi Sadatani, Deputy Director of
METI-Japan’s Ozone Layer Protection Promotion Division.  “This new
industry-government partnership is the latest example of Japanese
leadership in helping protect the earth for future generations. Daikin
Industries and Panasonic Corporation are the first to join this
partnership, and we expect more companies, industry associations, and
institutes to join in the weeks and months ahead as we work together to
harmonize technical standards and create a level playing field that will
encourage the best technology in Indonesia, Japan, and worldwide.”

Source: Ozone News, 15July 2011

About 25 million tons of debris need to be
cleared from three prefectures (Miyagi, Fukushima and Iwate prefectures) affected
by the March 11 Earthquake and Tsunami. This is equal to almost 10 years of
everyday garbage collected by them. The amount is about 1.7 times the debris seen in the 1996 Great Hanshin Earthquake. Iwate Prefecture alone will need some 3 million sq.
meters of land to temporarily store a total of 6 million tons of debris
scattered around the prefecture, but has been able to secure only 40
percent of the land needed so far.

Clearing the debris is a precondition for
people to return to their homes and start reconstruction and rehabilitation.
Four months after the disaster, only 20 to 30% of the debris has been cleared,
and processing the debris in temporary dump sites is yet to begin.  It is expected that the process of clearance alone will take three to four years to complete.

 But local governments are faced with a
multitude of problems:

• Lack of flat land to temporarily store the
  debris before it is processed and reused or landfilled. This includes
  resistance from local residents near potential temporary sites.  
• High cost of clearing the debris, including
  costs of equipment and vehicles.
• Mixed debris that is difficult to sort out
  wood and other types of debris, making reuse difficult (for example, using pelletized
  wood as a fuel for factory furnaces).
• Problems of jurisdiction of waste – for example,
  disposing of cars and vehicles falls under a different agency, compared to
  debris which is the responsibility of local governments.
• Debris is currently mixed up with a number
  of marine and other dead animals, making its clearance more difficult.
• Small capacities of local waste disposal
  companies to handle the large volume of debris
• Conflicts between local, prefectural and
  national governments related to jurisdiction, cost-sharing and other issues.
• Radioactive debris, contaminated sil and other materials near the crippled nuclear plant requires special handling, which will take longer and is more expensive. Other toxic and hazardous materials such as asbestos, dioxins and PCBs pose additional problems of their own.
  
• Obtaining permission from property owners before damaged buildings are destroyed.
  

 These and other issues are being studied by GDRC and a full report will be produced very soon.

The impact of the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake and Tsunami has been devastating, with humanitarian needs still not fully met.

Besides the human toll, the impact of the disaster on the private sector has also been huge. Damaged factories, stockpiles destroyed, supply chains disrupted, and production curtailed due to power cuts. This are familiar scenarios that have been reported widely in the mass media.

But how has the private sector actually responded? The desire of the business sector to get back on its feet has been very strong – both within the sector itself, and also with the support incentives being provided by local and national governments and financial institutions.

What is further interesting is how the disaster has provided an opportunity for innovative solutions and technologies to be developed and implemented not only as a disaster preparedness issue, but also as a means to reduce resource consumption, especially energy-related (electricity, gas, water etc.).

Below is a compilation of some of the innovative solutions being developed by the private sector as a direct result of the 3/11 disaster:

1. Sharp Corp. and Shin-Kobe Electric Machinery Co. produced a disaster-relief photovoltaic (PV) system and shipped their first cargo of the products to earthquake and tsunami disaster-stricken areas on March 31, 2011. This product is a stand-alone PV system combining Sharp solar cells with Shin-Kobe storage batteries and an alternating current (AC) power strip. With the electricity generated by the system, the people suffering in the areas can charge their cell phones, watch TV programs, and light up light-emitting diode (LED) bulbs.

2. Panasonic Corporation, a leading Japanese electronics manufacturer, announced on March 29, 2011, that it would donate one unit of its Life Innovation Container for victims of the powerful earthquake that hit the northeastern part of Japan on March 11, 2011. The Life Innovation Container — a transportable unit equipped with solar modules, power storage batteries, and a power control unit — was originally developed to supply electric power to areas with no electricity in Africa and other developing nations. It will be installed to support a local disaster task force at the Bay Side Arena in Minamisanriku, Miyagi Prefecture, by providing power for communication facilities and equipment in the quake-hit area.

3. Three major Japanese manufacturers, Hitachi, Ltd., Mitsubishi ElectricCorp., and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd., have reached a basic agreement on the consolidation of their hydroelectric systems businesses, the companies announced on March 30, 2011. In the coming years, hydroelectric power generation is expected to attract continuous demand as a clean renewable energy contributing toward the realization of a low-carbon society. The three companies reached a common recognition that the most effective means to strengthen and expand related business would be to pool their respective operating resources and engage jointly in hydroelectric power generation system operations.

4. About 20 organizations, including the Institute for Sustainable Energy Policies (ISEP), a non-profit organization that conducts research and provides recommendations on energy policies, launched a disaster relief project utilizing natural energy on April 4, 2011. The project involves providing electricity by installing solar panels in evacuation centers, public facilities and temporary housing. At the same time, it involves providing hot water by installing solar water heaters and providing a bathing facility service that uses wood boilers, particularly in areas where infrastructure is underdeveloped.

5. U’s Corp., a used cooking oil recycling company in Japan, delivered relief supplies from Taiwan on April 2, 2011 by a Vegetable Diesel Fuel (VDF)-driven truck to Kesennuma City Hospital in the area struck by the disaster on March 11, 2011. The company carried out this project as part of its “Tokyo Oil Field Project 2017,” cooperating with Side By Side International, a non-profitable organization, which provides relief supplies and mental support to people in difficult situations including poverty and natural disasters.

6. Mitsubishi Motors Corp. announced on March 17, 2011, that it will donate i-MiEV electric vehicles and Triton four-wheel-drive pickup trucks for use in disaster relief operations in areas afflicted by the Great East Japan Earthquake. The i-MiEV and Triton were selected as disaster relief vehicles to be used in the afflicted areas where gasoline supply is limited. The selection was based on the response to growing demand for use of electric vehicles that do not require the construction of special facilities, simple needing an electricity supply, and for vehicles with high power on rough roads and good carrying capacity. The company’s first shipment of 30 i-MiEVs was sent on March 18, and the number of disaster relief vehicles will be increased to meet the needs of afflicted areas in the future.

There are many such examples (the six examples above were collected by Japan for Sustainability, an NPO based in Tokyo).

 The report throws new light on current issues and challenges which
national and local governments, the business sector and organised civil
society are facing. On top of putting forward a number of
recommendations, this report testifies to the wealth of good, innovative
practice that countries of all sizes and development stages have
accumulated across the region.

It shows us that sustainable human
settlements are within reach, and that cooperation between public
authorities, the private and the voluntary sectors is the key to
success. This report highlights a number of critical issues –
demographic and economic trends, poverty and inequality, the
environment, climate change and urban governance and management.

The report can be downloaded from the following website: http://www.un-habitat.org/pmss/listItemDetails.aspx?publicationID=3078

Preparations for the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (“Rio+20″) are well underway.

The  Conference will take place in Brazil on 4-6 June 2012 to mark the 20th
anniversary of the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and
Development (UNCED), in Rio de Janeiro, and the 10th anniversary of the
2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) in Johannesburg.

The Conference will focus on two themes: (a) a green economy in the context
of sustainable development and poverty eradication; and (b) the
institutional framework for sustainable development.

Further information: http://www.uncsd2012.org/

With a population of 128 million, Japan has 2.4 million vending machines for soft drinks alone – that is, one machine for every 54 persons. In urban areas such as Tokyo or Osaka, the ratio becomes one machine for every 21 persons!!

One vending machine sells from 6,000 to 10,000 drinks in a year. Each machine can hold upto 20 or so drinks. They account for 34% of all drinks sold in the country.

 Drinks normally cost JPY 120 (about USD 1.5). But with this kind of penetration, what are the real costs?! Energy, CO2, transportation, refrigeration etc.?

On the occasion of activities jointly organized by the UN-Water Decade Programme on Advocacy and Communication (UNW-DPAC), UN-Habitat, the UN-Water Decade Programme on Capacity Development (UNW-DPC) and the Water Supply and Sanitation Collaborative Council (WSSCC) at Deutsche Welle Global Media Forum (20-22 June 2011), different information materials on the human right to water and sanitation have been produced.

These include:

• A Short Glossary on the human right to water and sanitation which defines frequently used terms http://bit.ly/kimZ4D
• A Media Brief presenting the current situation and some examples illustrating how the human right to water and sanitation is being implemented in practice http://bit.ly/mCz9g8
• A Reader, which provides basic references for easy reading and some of the latest and most relevant United Nations publications on this issue http://bit.ly/iAvqri
• Eight Short Facts on the human right to water and sanitation http://bit.ly/k45MFs
• A UN Milestones document presenting the UN historical background and evolution of recognition of the human right to water and sanitation http://bit.ly/jEnOiq

Also, a new thematic section on the human right to water and sanitation is now accessible from the Water Decade website: http://www.un.org/waterforlifedecade/human_right_to_water.html

The United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (UN CSD)
meets every year at the UN headquarters in New York. UNCSD meetings for
this year are currently underway (May 2-13 2011). Called CSD-19, it is
organized around several meetings under the banner of the “Policy
Session.”

Before the actual CSD-19 meets, a series of Intergovernmental
Preparatory Meetings are organized (for CS-19, it took place 28 February
to 4 March 2009). The IPM’s report, submitted to CSD-19, is available
at the following link: http://www.gdrc.info/docs/CSD-19_IPMreport.pdf

Using the 1992 Rio Summit output – Agenda 21 – as its basis, the
current CSD-19 focuses on the thematic issues of (a) Transport, (b)
Chemicals, (c) Waste Management – Hazardous & Solid Waste, (d)
Mining, (e) 10 Year Framework of Programmes on Sustainable Consumption
& Production Patterns.

These themes are part of the CSD Multi-Year Programme of Work – http://www.un.org/esa/dsd/csd/csd_multyearprogwork.shtml,
where each year focuses on a set of themes. By looking at list of
themes, and studying the policy options presented, it shows the concern
of national governments, and the global initiatives being undertaken as a
result.

Keep yourself updated on the CSD-19 discussions: http://www.un.org/esa/dsd/csd/csd_csd19.shtml

Following a recommendation of the Parties to the Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD) at their conference in October 2010, the UN General Assembly declared 2011 – 2020 the UN-Decade of Biodiversity. By doing so, the United Nations emphasized the ecological, economic, cultural, social and aesthetic dimension of biodiversity and its overall significance for sustainable development.

The UN Decade aims to make a contribution to achieving the revised and updated global biodiversity targets agreed at the 10th Meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP10) to the Convention of Biological Diversity. The biodiversity targets and a new strategy take into consideration the ongoing biodiversity loss on a global scale.

The Decade builds on the 2010 International Year of Biodiversity and is intended to support the implementation of the 2011-2020 Strategic Plan for Biodiversity that was adopted by Decision X/2 of the 10th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP10) in October in Nagoya.

The Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity says:

The United Nations General Assembly proclaimed the period from 2011 to 2020 as the United Nations Decade on Biodiversity in its Resolution 65/161:

Decides, following the invitation of the tenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, to declare 2011-2020 the United Nations Decade on Biodiversity, with a view to contributing to the implementation of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity for the period 2011-2020, requests the Secretary-General, in this regard, in consultation with Member States, to lead the coordination of the activities of the Decade on behalf of the United Nations system, with the support of the secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity and the secretariats of other biodiversity-related conventions and relevant United Nations funds, programmes and agencies, and invites Member States in a position to do so to contribute, on a voluntary basis, to the funding of the activities of the Decade;

The Decade coincides with and supports the implementation of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020 adopted by the Conference of the Parties at its tenth meeting held in Nagoya, Japan.

More information: http://www.cbd.int/

A recent publication from GreenLeaf Publishers, “The New Rules of Green Marketing” by Jacquelyn Ottman lists the 20 rules of green marketing:

1. Green is mainstream. Not too long ago, just a small group of deep green consumers existed. Today, 83% of consumers – representing every generation, from Baby Boomers to Millennials and Gen Ys – are some shade of green. Moreover, there are now finely defined segments of green consumers.
2. Green is cool. Once a faddish preoccupation of the fringe, green is not only mainstream, it’s chic. In fact, green consumers are early adopters and leaders who influence purchasing behavior. Celebrities and other cool types generally are espousing green causes. People show off (and self-actualize) by tooling around in a Toyota Prius (or soon, we predict, in a Nissan LEAF electric), and carry cloth shopping bags to look the part.
3. Greener products work equally or better – and are often worth a premium price. Thanks to advances in technology, we’ve come a long way since the days when greener products gathered dust on health food store shelves because they didn’t work as well and were not a good value. Organics, hybrid cars, and safer cleaning products now command a price premium.
4. Green inspires innovative products and services that can result in better consumer value, enhanced brands, and a stronger company. Savvy managers no longer consider the environment to be a burden that represents added cost and overhead – but an investment that can pay back handsomely.
5. Values guide consumer purchasing. Historically, consumers bought solely on price, performance, and convenience. But today, how products are sourced, manufactured, packaged, disposed of – and even such social aspects as how factory and farm workers are treated – all matter.
6. A life-cycle approach is necessary. Single attributes such as recyclable, organic, or energy-efficient matter greatly, but don’t mean a product is green overall. Recycled products still create waste, organic strawberries can travel thousands of miles, and CFLs contain mercury. So a more thorough, life-cycle or carbon-based approach to greening is necessary.
7. Manufacturer and retailer reputation count now more than ever. In addition to looking for trusted brand names on supermarket shelves, consumers are now flipping over packages, saying, “Who makes this brand? Did they produce this product with high environmental and social standards?”
8. Save me! Scrap the images of planets! Bag the daisies! Nix the babies! Even the greenest consumers no longer buy products just to “save the planet.” Today’s consumers buy greener brands to help protect their health, save money, or because they simply work better. That’s why products such as organics, natural personal care and pet care, and energy-efficient products are leading the way in sales.
9. Businesses are their philosophies. It used to be that companies were what they made. International Business Machines. General Foods. General Motors. Now, businesses and brands are what they stand for. Method. Starbucks. Timberland.
10. Sustainability represents an important consumer need, and is now an integral aspect of product quality. Green is no longer simply a market position. Products need to be green. Brands need to be socially responsible. Period.
11. The greenest products represent new concepts with business models with significantly less impact. If we simply keep greening up the same old “brown” products we’ve been using forever, we’re never going to get to sustainability. With time running out, we’ve got to “leap” to service replacements for products, and adopt entirely new ways of doing business.
12. Consumers don’t necessarily need to own products; services can meet their needs, perhaps even better. Consumers historically met their needs by owning products, but concepts like Zipcar and ebooks are starting to prove that utility and service are what really matters.
13. The brands consumers buy and trust today educate and engage them in meaningful conversation through a variety of media, especially via websites and online social networks. Talking “at” consumers through traditional media and paid advertising can’t build loyalty among empowered consumers in a connected world.
14. Green consumers are strongly influenced by the recommendations of friends and family, and trusted third parties. With rampant cynicism about traditional forms of advertising and a backlash in place against perceived greenwashing, savvy marketers leverage purchase influencers and third parties like NGOs and especially eco-labelers.
15. Green consumers trust brands that tell all. BP, ExxonMobil, and SIGG learned this lesson the hard way. It’s no longer enough to have a well-known name. Today’s brands become trusted by practicing “radical transparency,” disclosing the good – and the bad.
16. Green consumers don’t expect perfection. Just like there’s no more whitest whites, there’s no greenest of the green. Consumers expect that you’ll set high goals (i.e., perform beyond mere compliance), keep improving, and report on progress.
17. Environmentalists are no longer the enemy. Recognizing the power of the marketplace to effect change, many environmental advocates willingly partner with industry, offering useful guidance and expertise.
18. Nearly everyone is a corporate stakeholder. No longer confined to just customers, employees, and investors, publics of all stripes are now corporate stakeholders: environmentalists, educators, and children – even the unborn.
19. Authenticity. It’s not enough to slap on a recycling logo or make a biodegradability claim. Brands viewed as the most genuine integrate relevant sustainability benefits into their products. That’s why HSBC and Stonyfield Farm aim to reduce the carbon impacts of their operations.
20. Keep it simple. Plato was an environmentalist: “Simplicity is elegance.” Today’s consumers are cutting out the needless purchases, and getting rid of the gadgets and gizmos that don’t add value to their lives. That’s why they are migrating to brands that help express these values – Method, Starbucks, Timberland. It’s just that simple.

Source: http://www.greenleaf-publishing.com/default.asp?contentid=106

ICLEI Press Release

8 December 2010, CANCUN/MEXICO – For the first
time, the crucial role of local governments in fighting climate change
has been recognized officially at the UN climate talks in Cancun (COP16).
The local government delegation has achieved a tremendous success, with
cities and local governments now being recognized by states as ‘governmental
stakeholders’.

Mayor of Mexico city and holder of the Mayor
of the Year 2010 title, Marcelo Ebrard, said that the reference to local
governments as governmental stakeholders finally gives recognition to cities
as key actors in the fight to tackle climate change. The UN climate talks
have been dominated by national interests for decades. The unprecedented
number of participants and media interest in Copenhagen last year underlined
that the role of local and sub-national government in implementing climate
actions would have to be recognized and given a stronger position opposite
national interests.

By 2050 two thirds of the world’s population will be living in cities,
while 75 percent of emissions come from urban areas. Bo Asmus Kjeldgaard,
Mayor for the Environment of Copenhagen, Denmark, highlighted that local
governments are already ahead of the game when compared to national governments,
as they provide local solutions to the global climate challenge. Local
governments have to deal with the problem as it’s on their door step –
whether there is a global agreement between national governments or not.

Just days after 142 cities launched the Mexico City Pact and committed
to reporting their climate action, commitments and performance through
the carbonn Cities Climate Registry (cCCR), this latest triumph of being
recognized officially as “governmental stakeholders”, marks an important
step in enabling cities to keep delivering real climate change action.
Speaking at the ICLEI side event, Martha Delgado, Environment Secretary
of Mexico City and ICLEI Vice President, and ICLEI President and Vancouver
Councillor, David Cadman, both urged more cities to sign up to the Mexico
Pact and report their emission and actions. Thus allowing the impact they
are making to be measurable.

Ronan Dantec, Vice Mayor of Nantes and Climate Spokesperson of UCLG, said
it is a question of credibility of the climate talks to recognize cities
as the most important capacity to reduce carbon emission in a short time.
Speaking passionately about the hard work of cities to influence the climate
negotiations, he pointed out that five words in the text of COP16 can be
the key to unlocking the full financial capacity needed for cities to keep
acting. Speaking of concrete examples, Patrick Hays Mayor of North Little
Rock, USA, mentioned his cities hydro electric plant, which helped a large
industrial vehicle company becoming more energy efficient, enhancing its
economic viability and creating 600 new jobs – all while protecting the
environment people are living in.

The governor of Quintana Roo, Mexico, Félix González Canto, spoke about
how his state is implementing local solutions to climate change for example
by introducing a biogas plant where an open land fill had been before.
Cathy Oke, Councillor of Melbourne, Australia, which aims to be a zero
carbon emissions city by 2020, urged the UNFCCC to work closely with local
authorities to support frameworks that lead to better implementation of
clean development mechanisms on a local level, but have a significant global
impact.

COP16 President Espinosa clearly expressed her strong support for the climate
work being carried out by cities and local governments worldwide, and is
willing to find a permanent platform for dialogue with LGs in the process
of the COPs.

– end of ICLEI press release –

ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability. ICLEI is a world association of local governments and municipal organizations
that have made a commitment to sustainable development.

http://www.iclei.org/

The delivery of timely and packaged information at the right level to the right users has considerable externalities for a variety of purposes – in facilitating informed decision-making or in reducing unequal access to resources.

Recognizing the importance of this need, GDRC has interlinked the three programmes under its Information Sphere (Knowledge Management, Information Design, and information and communication technologies or ICTs) to form a ‘Learning Lab’

What is a Learning Lab? It is a place where different aspects of the learning process are analyzed and studied. It looks at the entire life-cycle of information management, from collection and analysis, to presentation and use of information.

For GDRC, the Learning Lab represents a critical skill that we all have to posses to be able to use the right form of technology to present information in the right format, in order to manage knowledge properly.

The Lab has produced GDRC’s Capacity Building Policy, and is now in the process of developing two of GDRC’s strategy papers – (1) Dissemination and Communication Strategy, and (2) The capaCITY programme

See more info at: http://www.gdrc.org/spheres/learning-lab.html

A very interesting YouTube video that explores how the digital revolution is impacting pedagogy and everything we do! Originally released with the title, “Shift Happens”, the video is now in its 4th version with new insights and statistics.

From the introduction to the video:

“This is another official update to the original “Shift Happens” video. This completely new Fall 2009 version includes facts and stats focusing on the changing media landscape, including convergence and technology, and was developed in partnership with The Economist. For more information, or to join the conversation, please visit http://mediaconvergence.economist.com and http://shifthappens.wikispaces.com.“

Did You Know 4.0

The “Shanghai Declaration” was released at the Summit Forum on the last day of the Shanghai Expo 2010 “Better City – Better Life”. Over 6 months a total of 73 million visitors came to the 5.28 square kilometer Expo park.

Expos have changed their meaning over time, and this time it was an ‘Urban’ Expo. There was an urban best practices area with 47 urban best practices cases. Six official forums were held and literally hundreds of conferences and exhibitions within the Expo and on the sidelines in Shanghai and in China on themes related to the fields of urban planning and urban design.

The official declaration is meant to be a public and global document. Its content comes to no surprise to us, yet we should have a reason to celebrate the increased global public interest in the quality of our cities and environments.

Expo website: http://en.expo2010.cn/
Declaration:  http://en.expo2010.cn/a/20101031/000012.htm

One of the challenges facing us today is the need to introduce a more life cycle oriented approach to addressing production and consumption. Such an approach stimulates recycling and reuse of products, and reduces materials and energy use during production and consumption.

Meeting these challenges requires a range of measures, including, for example, better products and services, which reduce the environmental impacts from the use of energy, resources, or hazardous substances. We also need to place emphasis on issues sucy as cleaner, more efficient production processes, which strengthen competitiveness, and shifts in consumption towards goods and services with lower impacts.

In order to facilitate and enhance decision-making and policy/strategy development on sustainable and eco products and services, GDRC developed a ‘database-of-databases’ to provide a ready reference on existing information available via the internet.　The database contains information on the author or organization maintaining the database, a brief description, its technical and geographical coverage, number and type of entries and the web address through which the database can be accessed.　A total of 25 databases have been presented . The broad range of databases cover a number of aspects of eco products and services, including their manufacturing, design, use and maintenance. Information on other similar databases are also included in the list.

To view the resource, please visit – http://www.gdrc.org/sustbiz/eco-products-database.html

The project, “Story of Stuff” presents an interesting animated video on the problem of electronic waste called “The Story of Electronics”

It explores the different issues in a very easy to understand way, and asks the question – why the ‘designed for the dump’ approach is creating a huge problem that is toxic and detrimental for the environment. The video calls for products that are safe, long-lasting and is included in a take-back programme.

From the website:
The Story of Electronics, released on November 9th, 2010 at storyofelectronics.org, takes on the electronics industry’s “design for the dump” mentality and champions product take back to spur companies to make less toxic, more easily recyclable and longer lasting products. Produced by Free Range Studios and hosted by Annie Leonard, the eight-minute film explains  ‘planned obsolescence’—products designed to be replaced as quickly as possible—and its often hidden consequences for tech workers, the environment and us. The film concludes with an opportunity for viewers to send a message to electronics companies demanding that they “make ‘em safe, make ‘em last, and take ‘em back.”

Enjoy viewing the video at: http://storyofstuff.org/electronics/

The seven core subjects covered in the standard are: (1) Organizational Governance, (2) Human Rights, (3) Labour Practices, (4) Environment, (5) Fair Operating Practices, (6) Consumer Issues, and (7) Community Involvement and Development. On the environmental front, the standard reflects key environmental principles such as precaution, polluter pays and the UN Global Compact principles etc.

The standard was approved in voting via national standards bodies earlier this year. The process of developing the standard involved participation by 99 countries, of which 60 were developing countries. In the final decision this year, only five countries failed to vote in favour of the standard.

The standard lists key considerations and expectations for action related to each of the Core Subject items. It gives a definition of “Social Responsibility / SR” (2.18) that refers to sustainable development. Please note also that it is NOT a certifiable standard, but rather a broad introduction to Social Responsiblity, SR referred to as a “guidance standard”.

Developing the standard over the last five years under leadership of the Brazilian and Swedish standards bodies, was a group of close to 500 experts. The membership of the ISO SR Working Group was the largest and the most broadly based in terms of stakeholder representation of any single group formed to develop an ISO standard to date.

More information from the ISO website – http://www.iso.org/iso/social_responsibility

The recent back-to-back disasters in Indonesia highlight the difficulties in ensuring effective early warning systems, complexity in coordination and ultimately the lack of local capacity to respond to the challenges when national assistance is stretched thinly across simultaneous disasters.

The latest RSIS Commentary by Irene A Kuntjoro and Sofiah Jamil [No. 138/2010 dated 1 November 2010] explores this issue in detail. Read full document at:
http://www.rsis.edu.sg/publications/Perspective/RSIS1382010.pdf

Designing and developing the activities of GDRC’s 15 research programmes is in itself a major exercise of information collation, design, packaging and dissemination. Much thought goes into these processes, and a number of good (and not-so-good) lessons have emerged from these experiences. They were first shared on GDRC’s Mosaic Newsletter, and are now presented in its Information Design Programme in an easy-to-use manner. 

See – http://www.gdrc.org/info-design/mosaic/index.html

This is an on-going process of capturing lessons learnt in information design, and new items will be added to the above webpage regularly!

Why heritage? Effective conservation of heritage resources not only help in revitalizing local economies, but also brings about a sense of identity, pride and belonging to residents.

See: http://www.gdrc.org/heritage/doc-repository.html

The Ministry of Agriculture Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) of Japan has estimated that about 23 million tons of food was wasted in 2007. This is worth almost JPY 11 trillion (approximately USD 110 billion), which is the monetary equivalent of Japan’s annual agricultural output. Moreover, it cost JPY 2 trillion to process that waste.

In Tokyo alone, food accounts for 30 percent of all household waste. That’s about 6,000 tons a day, which is enough to keep 4.5 million people alive for a day. As a whole, 40 percent of food ends up in the garbage.

Consider the above in light of the paradoxical fact that more than 60 percent of food in Japan is imported.

There is a tendency to think of sustainable development as being predominantly related to environmental issues. And conveniently forgetting the social and economic dimensions, which together make up ‘sustainability’.

This was brought home by a post today on “Sustained Voices,” a feature of the Sustainable Development programme of GDRC.  Annalise Smith of Australia says that, for her, sustainable development ” … should help everyone not be self-centered”

Sustained Voices is at: http://www.gdrc.org/sustdev/voices.html

In any conflict situation, different people behave differently – depending on the situation, their view of themselves, their ability to contribute to the situation, and the behaviour/participation of others in the conflict.

A simulation game was organized as a part of the training session on “Leadership for the Local Environment” held at the United Nations University from 6 to 9 July 2000. During the simulation, three groups, representing three urban stakeholders, the local government, business and industry, and NGOs and the community, attempted to resolve a potential conflict situation – a unilateral decision of the local government to build a waste incinerator – through dialogue, debate and discussion.

Albeit humorously, have a look at the different roles played by the participants during the simulation game! Developed as a part of the Urban Governance programme of GDRC, the document URL is:
http://www.gdrc.org/u-gov/drama/index.html

 

World Bank’s CGAP – The Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (http://www.cgap.org/) has produced an interesting report on small savers among the poor, who save small amounts regularly. The report’s authors say that ” … Many microfinance institutions are already serving small savers profitably and many more could do so.” They conclude that savings accounts, which are a very high-cost product for microfinance institutions to offer, can nonetheless generate high profits through cross-sales of loans and other products to small savers, and by the fees generated from the savings accounts. The report bases its views on case studies of ADOPEM in the Dominican Republic and Centenary Bank in Uganda.

Reference:
Westley, Glenn D., and Xavier Martín Palomas. 2010. “Is There a Business Case for Small Savers?” Occasional Paper 18. Washington, D.C.: Consultative Group to Assist the Poorest, World Bank, September.

Downloadable from – http://goo.gl/9eDv

From GDRC’s Sustainable Development programme –
The Seven Triads of Sustainability

The document shares research results of seven ‘Triads of Sustainability’ – where seven issues (1) participation, (2) decision-making, (3) partnership, (4) governance, (5) knowledge and information, (6) continual improvement, and (7) lifestyles, which lead to sustainability, are explained in detail with case studies. These triads are key ingredients that define and drive sustainability, particularly at the local level.

Read the document at: http://www.gdrc.org/sustdev/triads/triad.html

In an historic move, the United Nations General Assembly voted unanimously in July this year to create a new entity to accelerate progress in meeting the needs of women and girls worldwide.

The establishment of the UN Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women – to be known as UN Women is a result of years of negotiations between UN Member States and advocacy by the global women’s movement. It is part of the UN reform agenda, bringing together resources and mandates for greater impact.

GDRC welcomes and supports this initiative. The Gender and Development research programme of GDRC focuses on the criticality of incorporating gender perspectives in local management and community development programmes. This highlights the need for better equality, equity and efficiency to be borne by both men and women for balanced development.

Japanese eating habits have seen a tremendous shift in the last few decades that has substantially increased its unease with food security. Some of the oft-repeated reasons include – eating off-season food, eating exotic and ‘foreign’ food, abandoning local/traditional foods, cheap transportation and refrigeration technologies, affluence and accessibility, urban lifestyles and separation from food growing regions/areas, eating out and eating more processed food,  Many of the so-called ‘traditional’ foods are now in fact made using imported foods.

This has resulted in Japan being ranked 124th in the world in terms of food security. Consider this – its
food self-sufficiency now stands at 39%. This means that 61% of all the food eaten by Japanese (in calorific terms) is imported! With an strong globally-oriented growth rate, just one percent of its economy  is based on agriculture!

See video from Japan’s Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ok3ykR2GHCc&feature=player_embedded#!

Check out Earthweek – A Diary of the Planet, which provides very interesting breaking news on climate change, the environment and other aspects that is changing the earth’s natural beauty.

As we read the news items, a serendipitous ‘long-arm of humans’ becomes evident – of how our consumption patterns and lifestyle choices are inducing change in the environment that go far beyond the immediate and proximate.

Visit – http://www.earthweek.com/

Social entrepreneurship is the work of a ‘social entrepreneur’ – someone who recognizes a social problem and uses entrepreneurial principles to organize, create, and manage a venture to make social change (a social venture). Whereas a business entrepreneur typically measures performance in profit and return, a social entrepreneur focuses on creating social capital.*

A non-governmental organization is one type of social enterprise. NGOs provide much needed services to their respective communities, and thorough planning during the start-up process is crucial to developing an effective and professional organization that is able to meet the myriad challenges faced by the world today.

GDRC has developed a NGO Management Toolbox covering different aspects of setting up and managing an NGO. One of the most popular tools in the toolbox is on “Starting an NGO”. This can be viewed at:

http://www.gdrc.org/ngo/start-ngo/index.html

[* Source: Wikipedia]

Innovative communities are able to bring in new methods, ideas, etc. to improve their environment, and initiate changes through human intelligence and knowledge, especially of imaginative thought or artistic ability.

So an innovative community is one that has a sustained wellspring of creativity, with the capacity to stimulate, nurture, develop and productively harness the inherent innovative qualities of its members.

But a lot has to go into defining and forming a community in itself, even before its innovative qualities can be tapped. GDRC has been researching on this and related themes in its Innovative Communities Initiative. See: http://www.gdrc.org/sustdev/inn-comm/

GDRC goes social!

Besides this blog, the Global Development Research Center (GDRC) can also be found on:

• Facebook – http://www.facebook.com/gdrc.org
• Twitter – http://www.twitter.com/gdrcdotorg
• Youtube – http://www.youtube.com/gdrcdotorg

Contributions to these social channels are welcome. Please contact GDRC at hsrinivas@gdrc.org

On August 21, we exceed nature’s budget

It has taken humanity less than nine months to exhaust its ecological budget for the year, according to Global Footprint Network calculations.

Today, humanity reaches Earth Overshoot Day: the day of the year in which human demand on the biosphere exceeds what it can regenerate. As of today, humanity has demanded all the ecological services – from filtering CO2 to producing the raw materials for food – that nature can regenerate this year.  For the rest of the year, we will meet our ecological demand by depleting resource stocks and accumulating greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

“If you spent your entire annual income in nine months, you would probably be extremely concerned,” said Global Footprint Network President Mathis Wackernagel. “The situation is no less dire when it comes to our ecological budget. Climate change, biodiversity loss, deforestation, water and food shortages are all clear signs: We can no longer finance our consumption on credit. Nature is foreclosing.”

Earth Overshoot Day Occurring Earlier Than Ever

Last year, Earth Overshoot Day was observed on September 25, 2009. This year, the day is estimated to come more than a month earlier. This is not due to a sudden surge in human demand, but rather to improvements in the calculation methodology that enable us to more adequately capture the extent of overshoot. For example, our latest data show we have less grazing land than previously estimated. As a result, the ratio of how much we use as compared to how much we have has increased. The graph below shows when Earth Overshoot Day would have occurred in past years based on our most recent accounting of overshoot.

Source: Global Footprint Network – http://www.footprintnetwork.org/

The current century has the dubious distinction of being an ‘urban century’. More than half the population of the world live in cities; cities are growing much faster than national population growth rates; and most of the ‘global’ problems that we are facing have their starting points and precedences in very urban settings.

Going beyond size alone, or contribution to GDP, the Global Cities Ranking looks at how much a city influences what goes on away from its boundaries – markets, cultures, innovation etc. It covered a city’s business activity, human capital, and information exchange to its cultural experience and political engagement. The 2010 Global Cities Index was created as a collaboration between Foreign Policy, management consulting firm A.T. Kearney, and The Chicago Council on Global Affairs.

See the full ranking and further details at: http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/08/11/the_global_cities_index_2010

Over the last several years, Prof. David Edgell of East Carolina University has been sharing his list of “Ten Most Important Tourism Issues”.

Presented as simple ‘headlines,’ his list for 2011 makes interesting reading, with sustainability being an underlying theme that runs through all the items. Disasters and conflicts, internet and communication technologies, and policy and planning tools also make the list.

A specific geographic region has also been singled out – East Asia and Pacific Region – as a destination, as well as a source of tourists.

Here is the list:

1. Repercussions from the global economic slowdown on tourism  
2. Continuous concern for safety and security with respect to tourism
3. Significance of sustainability in the development and management of tourism
4. Effect on tourism from natural and man-made disasters
5. Growth in the use of electronic and other technologies in tourism
6. Impact on tourism with the introduction of new destinations
7. Importance of fuel costs on tourism
8. Influence of mega events on tourism
9. Using strategic tourism policy and planning tools for communities and nations
10. Recognition of increased tourism activity in the East Asia and Pacific Region

The list was developed using university discussions; conferences and seminars; tourism documents; survey information; industry data; books, articles, and publications; and utilization of a modified Delphi approach in gathering certain research information and obtaining a consensus viewpoint.

Here’s one obvious serendipitous tag: clean water and conserving biodiversity.

The UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) says that in our rapidly urbanizing world, clean water is a precious commodity whose economic value is greater than the money gained from clearing the forests and wetlands that provide it. Intact forests and wetlands ensure clean and reliable drinking water.

Poor environmental management of these ecosystems, however, tends to result in poor water quality. Significant amounts of money are spent rectifying this problem – often through expensive water treatment infrastructure. Money can be more effectively spent by restoring the ability of the natural environment to fix the problem for us!

A recent report by the Ramsar Convention on illustrates how wetlands Water, wetlands and forests interact to produce healthy and productive ecosystems. Forests and wetlands help capture and store water to mitigate floods in periods of heavy rain and ensure steady water flow during drier seasons. Many forests depend on groundwater for survival, and rely on wetlands to replenish this.

Look at it from a city perspective – a third of the world’s cities get their water supply from forested/protected areas.

The potential of reusing or recycling used tyres are only now being realized – as a road surface material, products such as roofing tiles, flooring tiles, carpet liners, athletic tracks, artificial grass etc.
Understanding the policy options for tyre disposal is a critical starting point that is facilitated by good qualitative and quantitative data. It will also help to understand the potential and develop a unique and customized tyre reuse/recycling system. GDRC has been helping set up such a system for Tripoli.

You can now follow GDRC on Facebook and Twitter to keep yourself updated on what GDRC is doing, or questions that are driving its programmes, or activities that it is carrying out.

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Global-Development-Research-Center-GDRC/66976630019
Twitter: https://twitter.com/gdrcdotorg

GDRC is now working on an initiative to assist the city government of
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, to develop an urban heritage conservation
strategy.

For a city in a developing country, heritage conservation is a public strategy that has considerable and serendipitous externalities. Besides the intangible benefits of preserving culture, there is the income generation and job creation potential from tourism sector, better urban governance (including public participation and partnership), improved urban finances, et al.

The Urban Heritage and Conservation programme of GDRC has been working and researching on these and related issues. More info will be uploaded to the website as the project progresses …

GDRC is collaborating with “CC-base” – an initiative to create a baseline for adaptation and mitigation of climate change in Indonesia.

The initiative aims to create a comprehensive information baseline on existing condition and trends (covering social, economic and environmental aspects) in Indonesia based on GIS and spatial/remote sensing data, especially on land use and land cover changes to ensure adaptation and mitigation activities of climate change are implemented in scientifically sound basis.

Such verified data will form the base for modeling and decision support systems at all levels of governance – national, provincial and local, as well as facilitate stakeholder dialogue to push for adaptation and mitigation action.

More info:
http://ccbase.wordpress.com/

While ’3Rs’ stand for reduce, reuse and recycle of resources and wastes, the concept itself goes beyond just better waste management and calls for the building of an economy based on the life-cycle approach, covering both sustainable production and sustainable consumption.

The 3R approach, focusing on reduce, reuse, and recycle, essentially aims to set up a sound material cycle society within the concept of a life-cycle economy, where consumption of natural resources is minimized and the environmental load is reduced, as much as possible.

An important serendipitus tag that cuts across many themes covered by GDRC’s programmes, it lays the responsibility of achieving sustainable development squarely on individual decision-making that takes place daily at the micro level!

See GDRC’s infopac on 3R issues:
http://www.gdrc.org/uem/waste/3r-index.html

According to the estimates from the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU), over 500 million people – a staggering more than a quarter of the world’s working population – are working in the informal economy worldwide.

The informal economy accounts for more than 35% of the world’s gross national product and employment growth in the informal economy has been approximately 5% per year compared to employment growth in the formal, legally regulated economy has been barely 1%.

It is an undisputed fact that women workers are disproportionately represented in the informal economy all over the world. Women workers in the informal economy are a growing number and are one of the most vulnerable groups in society. These women workers are involved in diverse jobs such as agriculture workers, forest workers, fish workers, rag pickers, construction workers, home-based workers, domestic helpers, street vendors, contract or dispatch workers, part-time workers, casual workers and workers in very small enterprises.

Recently there have been attempts to recognize the needs of women in the informal economy and the following article highlights a rich mapping of the work currently carried out in the Asia Pacific with regards to organizing women in the informal sector.

Read more: “Informal work – getting back to ‘bread and butter’ union action”
http://www.icftu.org/displaydocument.asp?Index=991215447&Language=EN

Think about it – from 60 to 90 percent or more of economies of most countries are actually run by small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Single owner enterprises, with single sources of income, a single line of products or a combination of these features characterize SMEs.

Providing microfinance, and creating necessary conditions for microfiance to be used for environmental management, is an important aspect for poverty alleviation. This is particularly true in developing countries and in post-disaster situations.

GDRC has been exploring this issue in its Programme on Microcredit and Microfinance.

- Environmental Colours of Microfinance: http://www.gdrc.org/icm/environ/environ.html
- Microfinance and Disasters: http://www.gdrc.org/icm/disasters/index.html

What kind of lifestyles, particularly urban, needs to be adopted? How can economic growth goals be reconciled with environmental ones? Who plays the key roles in this case – the manufacturers? The national government? The local government? Or the citizens? What kinds of participation and partnership structures can we put in place for this purpose? Indeed, there can be no ‘one policy’ to achieve reduction goals – and a comprehensive mixture of policies need to be developed. What would these look like? Who does what, when and where? And indeed why? What are the motivations?

Global environmental problems and the solutions to mitigate them can find their legitimacy for dialogue only if a local dimension is kept in mind – indeed, the local human dimensions in finding solutions for environmental problems is by far the way forward in this respect. Decision-makers, using buzzwords such as ‘public choice,’ ‘informed consent,’ and ‘community participation,’ have now come to realize that it is critical to understand the relevance and implication of global problems from the man-on-the-street perspective, even in order to start defining the problem. How can the focus on the man-on-the-street be built? Who has to do this? What indeed are the ‘human dimensions’ of environmental development and management?

Scientists have striven to remain independent and rational so that their work would not be influenced by outside pressures. But with an increasing realization of the interlinkages between problems, solutions and the ‘humans’ who are part of both, scientific research will have to find partners and partnerships in unlikely places to find and justify the solutions that they will suggest & Increased globalization of the economy, with decision-making processes far removed from the local levels, has had a negative and deteriorative impact on the environment. This highlights the old ying and yang debate of quantitative growth of the local economy, and the qualitative improvement of the local environment. Which comes first? Both have their priorities and their advocates & is there a ‘good’ and a ‘bad’?

In the final analysis, it is the community that can actually decide on things that affect their lives and what is best for them. How can such thought-processes and leadership be fostered? Paternalism not-with-standing, how can local governments and other bureaucracies be made to ‘listen’ to the community? What kind of future vision of symbiosis be built ground-up? How can local desires and wishes be reconciled with national priorities? Indeed, how can the middle ground be identified and fostered??

And so the debate goes on …

You probably have heard of the REDD Initiative – Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation initiative. The Climate Change Conference in Bali, in December 2007, opened the possibility of developing an incentive mechanism for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD). One example of REDD is the World Bank’s Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF). Some REDD mechanisms already feature in the voluntary carbon markets.

REDD mechanisms can deliver multiple benefits. In addition to mitigating climate change, REDD can support livelihoods, maintain vital ecosystem services, and preserve globally significant biodiversity. Discussions on the linkages between REDD and biodiversity conservation are increasing. A number of research projects and policies are being developed around the issue. However, Parties to the CBD noted that the benefits will not necessarily be automatically achieved.

REDD is being spearheaded within the UN system by UNDP, FAO and UNEP. See a presentation on how they are doing this. Also keep yourself updated on REDD and related issues at: http://www.redd-monitor.org/

Much of what GDRC does in its various programmes have direct or indirect implications for the REDD initiative. REDD will be an interesting serendipitous tag for GDRC to interlink local issues and dimensions to larger issues at the global level.

Of the 6,600+ people who come to GDRC’s website every day, an online visitor is confronted with 15 programmes and approximately 130 sub-themes, 7,900 files, 42,000 links, and more … talk about information overload!

But for GDRC, this volume of information simply represents the varied and interlinked research interests of its Virtual Fellows and Institutional Partners. However, keeping it updated, current and interesting is a never-ending and uphill task.

For the casual visitor, information packaging is all the more important. GDRC looses out a bit here, due to (1) lack of a strong search mechanism (besides the all-encompassing Google Search);and (2) lack of ‘wrappers’ or overviews/summaries that help contextualize and interlink info together.

Mmm … more work to do, but so much more for Serendipity. And for the a-ha! to happen.

Here’s a serendipitous tag for you – footprints. Not the footprints-in-the-sand variety, but the imprint you leave on the planet as a result of resources consumed and wastes generated. The ecological overshoot that our lifestyles are generating is cause for much concern, and in fact the real starting point for sustainability action.

Forget global warning or CO2 emissions. To reduce our footprints, what information would you need? What decisions would you have to take? How can everyone be involved – rich and poor? What solutions – technology and skills – are out there? What can businesses and consumers do?

Read more about footprints at: http://www.gdrc.org/uem/footprints/index.html

Though not (yet) a part of GDRC’s programmes, the concept of social capital is an interesting precondition to many of the themes and issues that are covered in its 15 programmes. Social capital is formed out of “the networks of relationships among persons, firms, and institutions in a society, together with associated norms of behavior, trust, cooperation, etc., that enable a society to function effectively.”

Take microfinance – much of its success lies in the presence of social capital within the communities that use microfinance. Effective disaster risk reduction practices have succeeded in some communities, but failed in others – research has shown that success has depended on the level and strength of social capital in the community. Active involvement of the community in heritage and conservation efforts have also largely been affected by the pride that the community feels about their locality – another vote for its social capital.

And sustainable development itself – if it has to happen, will happen at the community level. And in the daily decisions and consumption patterns that we adopt. Concern for our neighbours, for the community and for future generations can easily be activated when social capital is high …

Maybe its time for the Sustainable Development programme of GDRC to pick up this thread of thought and create a new feature page!

A serendipitous tag that always sticks to my mind is that of the informal economic sector – always there, invisible but necessary, and unsupported but functioning.

Much needs to be tagged to the sector – poverty alleviation, education and health, training and skill development, market development, but also social issues such as gender etc.

Recently, the informal sector also got mentioned in disaster management – how does the question of “business continuity” be asked of informal economic activities (when it is not recognized at all in the first place)? Considering that most of the people in the sector are from the lower economic rungs? No easy answers there, but needs exploring …

See GDRC’s programme page on the informal sector

An interesting piece of news on the link between providing good mobility (in terms of walking, bicycling, and public transport) and increasing the economic opportunities of low income people in cities, and hence poverty alleviation:

European Urban Knowledge Network – “Promote bicycling, walking and public transport to improve chances for poor people”:
08-06-2007

How can transport policy contribute to the goal of more inclusive cities? What role does the car play in ensuring mobility for all?”

I subscribe to several tourism-related email lists, particularly those related to ATLAS [www.atlas-euro.org]. In the range of activities, events and publications that are being carried out in this field, it was interesting to see a large cross-section of topics being synchronized with tourism.

Of particular significance is how the research and development activities on tourism are being linked to economic development (but of course …), but also to heritage conservation and environmental/ecological preservation. Clearly, the multiplier effects of one sector has implications and advantages (or disadvantages) for other sectors as well.

GDRC works on all the three themes – tourism, heritage and environment – but in separate silos. it will be interesting to bring them together in a Special Feature.

A key aspect of the GDRC Programme on Urban Governance is that of leaders and leadership. And so the title of a recent World Bank Institute’s meeting theme struck my eye as a good set of leadership ‘matters’:

VISION: Does the leader have a vision for the future? Does it match the wishes, needs and aspirations of the community that he/she leads?

EFFECTIVENESS: How effective is the leader in delivering on his/her promises? How capable ha she/she been in accomplishing stated goals and objectives?

ACCOUNTABILITY: How has the leader set up accountability in his/her working? Who is he/she accountable for? with respect to the community he/she serves?

These and many more of such attributes drive a good leader in being able to deliver to his/her constituency, their wishes and aspirations!

Go to GDRC’s programme on Urban Governance

The voluntary sector in most developing countries (including NGOs, CBO etc.) are in a double dilemma – on one hand, many of the rules and regulations that they have to adhere to actually originate from the for-profit private sector. On the other, the bad actions of some of the NGOs taints the sector as a whole, calling for stricter monitoring and enforcement of the rules and regulations.

It is good to see some change in attitudes and approaches towards the sector, but much more needs to be done!

PIB Press Release: National Policy on the Voluntary Sector 2007

Send your comments to me at hsrinivas@gdrc.org.

Packaging information properly so as to facilitate its contextualizing and customizing by the user to create tacit knowledge is an iterative cycle. Where is information available? Who has it? How can we match user needs with information available? What are the interlinakages between the different pieces of information? What enhancements can be envisaged to the info patterns? How can the products developed be improved further? How can the info products be delivered to the user? These are some of the questions that are covered in the cycle.

Ultimately, good information management is an aid to decision-making, of understanding what and how information is used, and developing a channel to deliver it to the user. Based on a user-needs assessment, information is collated and analyzed to build patterns. The iterative process is repeated by incorporating feedback and review it until it matches the needs of the user. This is the ‘Information Desgin Cycle’

Welcome to the GDRC Blog, “Serendipitous Tags”

In this complex world of ours, problems that we face may not be the ‘real’ problem – there will always be problems behind problems, and so solutions that we propose should beget more solutions. It is this interconnectedness that lies at the core of everything that GDRC does.

The multi-disciplinarity of GDRC’s 15 programmes help in discovering the connections and associations among different issues not apparent at first. This is the thinking that went into the creation of this blog – Serendipitous Tags – in making unexpected links when tagging different pieces of knowledge.