Beijing City To Limit New Car Quotas In 2011

Reposted in full from Planet Ark, 24 December 2010

'Beijing will cap its new small passenger vehicle quotas at 20,000 a month in 2011 as it moves to tackle the city's chronic traffic gridlock.

The monthly quota will be distributed among fleet buyers and first-time private buyers, according to a statement posted on the municipal government's website.

Only permanent residents of Beijing as well as those in police and military services are eligible and government agencies will not be allowed to buy new vehicles in the next five years, it added.

China eclipsed the United States as the world's biggest auto market in 2009, but worsening air quality and traffic have become hazards in major Chinese cities.

By 2012, Beijing alone will have 7 million vehicles on the road, versus 4.8 million now, according to official statistics provided by the municipal transportation authorities.

Shanghai's municipal government imposes a license fee of roughly 50,000 yuan ($7,524) for each car owned.'

The Digital Story of the Nativity

Very, very clever...

‎'Avoid Romans' on Google Map Directions indeed!!!

Sourced from YouTube, 13 December 2010

Australians Planning to Waste Hundreds of Millions this Christmas

Sourced from The Australia Institute's web site, 14 December 2010

'Last year six million, or one in three, Australians received one or more Christmas presents that they never used or later gave away, a new survey by The Australia Institute reveals...

The Australia Institute's Executive Director Dr Richard Denniss said that unwanted Christmas presents represent a staggering $798 million worth of wasted money, wasted time and wasted resources...

The survey also found that around one quarter of Australians expect to give presents to people that they would prefer not to. Alarmingly, around one quarter of these reluctant givers are unable to pay off their credit card...'

Three Rules for Crowdsourcing Your Sustainability Projects

Reposted in full from GreenBiz, 20 December 2010

'A new trend in the corporate pursuit of sustainability has emerged: crowd-sourcing via social media. While adoption has been easy, gaining useful ideas has not. By looking at three recent efforts - GE's Smart Grid challenge, eBay's Green Team, and a leading European retailer's green customer foray - three rules for companies considering crowd-sourcing of sustainability ideas are coming into focus.

Recently one of Europe's leading retailers launched an online campaign which sought ideas from its customers as to how the company could further its sustainability efforts. I spoke with the company's sustainability lead under the condition of anonymity to learn how the drive for ideas went. She noted that "the response rate was higher than expected, but the ideas were either generic or impractical." A sampling of the ideas included "use less energy," "recycle more," and "eliminate packaging." They have since closed the campaign with minimal to-dos stemming from the campaign.

Compare the retailer's experience with crowd-sourcing efforts at GE and eBay. GE launched the "GE ecomagination Challenge: Powering the Grid" in July 2010 with much fanfare. After all the company, along with four prominent venture capital firms, put up $200 million to fund ideas from society writ large to accelerate the development and adoption of a smart grid. GE created a new website for the effort, incorporated aspects of social media, and installed a committee to decide which ideas to fund.

Between July 13 and September 30, 2010, nearly 4,000 ideas were submitted; collectively these ideas garnered over 70,000 comments from nearly 70,000 registered users. Every idea was publicly available to both review and support. Jeff Immelt publicly announced the winners of the ecomagination Challenge on December 2nd.

Like GE, eBay created a Green Team program and website to tap into the wisdom of crowds. The program's mission is to "inspire the world to buy, sell and think green every day." To date, over 300,000 sellers - individuals who sell goods on eBay's platform - have signed up to share ideas and views aimed at making eBay a greener sales partner.

The eBay Box, a corrugated cardboard box designed to be durable enough to be used by sellers over and over again, is among the ideas that came from this community and have been rolled out.

So how can companies emulate GE and eBay's success while avoiding the challenges faced by the European retailer? Follow these three rules:

1. Be painfully clear about the results you want from your campaign.

The European retailer's campaign fell flat in part because it wanted basic ideas. While they might not have explicitly said that, they didn't provide any rules of substance to guide their participants" thinking. GE clearly indicated the three categories of ideas they sought (ideas for Renewable Energy, Grid Efficiency, EcoHomes/EcoBuildings). These guidelines served a dual purpose: they led to self-selection of respondents (you're less likely to respond to a smart grid call for ideas if you aren't versed in the smart grid) and they directed respondents to submit best thinking in a focused area.

2. Embrace transparency.

Transparency helps promote trust - it's easy to trust someone who doesn't have anything to hide. If your company runs a campaign but doesn't publicly display the results, then [potential] participants are left to draw one of three conclusions. Either your company: didn't receive any ideas, isn't paying enough attention to the "what should we do after we receive ideas" activity or doesn't believe the ideas received are good enough to be published. In each of these three scenarios, the observer is less likely to participate. To nurture dialogue among participants and embrace transparency, GE and eBay created websites to document the ideas submitted by participants.

3. Link the campaign to co-value creation.

GE and eBay implicitly demonstrated their belief that participants' time is valuable. They did this by asking participants to contribute their best thinking to create initiatives that can not only enhance the company's financial and sustainability performance, but also enhance an aspect of participants" lives. In GE's case respondents had the opportunity to pitch ideas in return for funding to pursue those ideas. And in eBay's case sellers were asked for ideas that would help grow their businesses in a sustainable manner - a classic example of aligning eBay's sellers" interests with the company's interests.

Crowd-sourcing sustainability ideas through social media is a low-risk, low-cost tactic to enhance sustainability performance. By following these three rules, companies will increase the likelihood of a successful crowd-sourcing campaign.'

Nudge, Think, Shove: Shifting Values and Attitudes Towards Sustainability

Sourced from Involve web site, December 2010

Nudge, Think or Shove? [pdf]

'Pursuing sustainability requires widespread shifts in public behaviour. This briefing builds on a recent House of Lords roundtable jointly organised by the DEA and Involve to consider three broad approaches to influencing public behaviour: ‘nudge', ‘think' and ‘shove'.

The paper considers the benefits and drawbacks of each, and explores how the three approaches can complement one another.

It finds that:

- ‘Nudge' is effective for specific, limited shifts in behaviour such as recycling.

- ‘Think' is effective at building support and legitimacy for the big, transformational changes that we need in society, such as decarbonising the economy. ‘Think' can be particularly powerful in building people's ability and motivation to participate in and drive those transformational changes.

- ‘Shove' often helps to create the conditions under which ‘nudge' is most effective.

Building on these insights, the paper starts to sketch out an optimal mix of ‘nudge', ‘think' and ‘shove', which uses the best of all three approaches to transform social values and attitudes towards sustainability at the pace we need.'

Leaving Neverland (Why Little Boys Shouldn't Run Big Corporations)

Sourced from Leaving Neverland

Leaving Neverland" (Why Little Boys Shouldn't Run Big Corporations) not only lampoons the perpetual boys that refuse to grow up but also offers Rites of Passage as a way out of Neverland and a way into growing up...

‎The Global Financial Crisis was proudly brought to us all by little boys in designer suits that convinced suggestible authorities that they should be left in charge of the banking cookie jar. Of course they helped themselves to our cookies because “self regulation” to a child means “grab every cookie you can while no one is looking.” The only real surprise is that people are surprised at all the missing cookies.'

The Sixth Extinction

Sourced from The 6th Extinction web site

'In the Last 500 million years, the earth has experienced five mass Extinctions.

We are at a critical moment. What happens over the next 50-100 years will determine what the earth looks like for the next ten million.

Through interlocking stories, this documentary will probe the extinction crisis and examine solutions to protect the earth's gift of biodiversity.'

The Energy of Edible Cities

Reposted in full from the new economics foundation, 13 December 2010

'Listening to the BBC Food awards, it has become clear to me that food is not just enjoying a revival at the moment, but is also the most exciting area of entrepreneurship in this country – and has huge potential for revitalising our economy, one local economy at a time.

So much of this kind of idea emerges from the chattering south east, though the Transition Towns movement clearly emerged from the south west. But the north east now seems to be giving them a run for their money thanks to the emergence of the battery of ideas-in-practice around Edible Todmorden.

Edible Todmorden began with herb gardens, graduated onto planting and growing vegetables and trees around the town and then planted orchards. They are working with the council and other official bodies to find spaces of land – like the fire station and the railway station and local social landlords – to find tracts of land where things can be grown. Every school in town is now involved.

What is fascinating to me is that once you start down this path, building local economies, then history becomes far more important. Sure enough, they have a project called Dream Street that looks back into the past in order to imagine different futures.

Now that Edible Todmorden is thriving, and Middlesborough’s urban farming project is now moving in similar directions, the next Edible site is going to be York, followed by Boston in Lincolnshire.

York City Council is being urged to carry out an audit of land available for growing food throughout the city. Edible York has already joined forces with the council in July to transform an under-used plot of land by planting vegetables – and provided passers-by with salad, kale, squash, courgettes, beans and fresh herbs.

What they are doing is not that different from the Transition Towns, but it is exciting that the energy is emerging from a whole range of different transformational ideas at once. The antidote to impoverishment by supermarket monopoly and agribusiness giantism.'

An Irishman Abroad Tells It Like It Is

A few F-bombs, but too good not to share! God bless the Irish! There should be more of this calling a spade a spade...

Sourced from YouTube

UN Development Programme Adds Footprint to Suite of Indicators

Sourced from Global Footprint Network newsletter, 8 December 2010

'Sustainability is an intrinsic part of people’s ability to live satisfying lives according to the United Nations Development Programme—which is why, for the first time it has included the Ecological Footprint in its annual Human Development Report.

The Human Development Report reveals countries’ latest rankings according to the Human Development Index, a measure that scores countries according to attainment of health, education and income. But, the report explains, “human development is much broader. Empowerment, equity and sustainability are among the intrinsic parts of people’s freedom to lead lives they have reason to value.” The report points out that Norway ranks highest in terms of HDI, but consumes 3.1 times what would be consistent with global sustainability (based on global biocapacity) while the US, which ranks 4th in HDI, consumes 4.5 times that of global biocapacity.'

Japan's Ecological Footprint

Sourced from Global Footprint Network newsletter, 8 December 2010

'A report on Japan’s Ecological Footprint, which identifies leading areas of ecological demand and offers policy recommendations to address them, has generated considerable interest in the country. The Japan Ecological Footprint Report was released this August in Tokyo to an audience of journalists and environment ministry representatives. Findings have been covered by more than 50 print and online news outlets, including a feature in Asahi, a daily newspaper with a circulation of 8.22 million.

Among the report’s findings (based on 2009 National Footprint Accounts data):

Japan’s Ecological Footprint in 2006 was 4.1 gha per capita, about one and a half times the global average, placing it within the highest 25 percent of countries.

Compared with the four countries closest geographically, only Russia’s Footprint exceeds Japan’s (by a small margin). Japan’s per capita Footprint is 10 percent higher than South Korea’s and more than double that of China. However, Japan is the only country in the group to have shown a significant decrease in the Footprint over the last decade. If trends continue, 2010 may well see South Korea’s Footprint surpass that of Japan.

Japan’s production of fisheries products exceeds the available biocapacity from Japan’s continental shelf by more than a factor of three. This strongly suggests that Japan may be at risk of collapsing its fisheries, and with effects that will be felt worldwide.

Japan’s demand on forest products is well within the rate of what its forests can regenerate. At the same time, it places a high demand for wood products on countries that are experiencing deforestation, such as Indonesia. Replacing imports with domestic supply would have positive international impacts.

Read the report in English (15 MB download)

Read the report in Japanese (18 MB download)'

Taming the Vampire Squid

BRING ON THE CALAMARI!!

Sourced from the new economics foundation/The Great Transition, December 2010

'"A great vampire squid, wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money." That was how journalist Matt Taibbi described Goldman Sachs in a Rolling Stone exposé from 2008.

Now, after what is perhaps the biggest example of private-sector market-failure the world has ever seen, the banking system that fuelled the crisis is fundamentally unreformed. Even on its own terms the banking system is broken.

To design a banking system that is fit for purpose and able to underpin the imminent Great Transition to a new, low carbon, high well-being, and stable economy, we need to revisit the social and economic contract that banks have with society. We must take back our banks.

We need banking that is more like a public service, a utility that helps the productive economy function. This animation from the Great Transition campaign to take back our banks asks: when will politicians find the will to make it happen?'



'Launched to mark the start of bank bonus season, a new animation is setting out to increase public pressure on government to take on the banks and not sweep reform under the carpet. It ask politicians whether they have a plan to tame the bank, and if not, why not?

The minute-long animation is inspired by Rolling Stone journalist Matt Taibbi's description of investment bank Goldman Sachs as a giant vampire squid "sucking on the face of humanity".

The animation is backed by a wide range of influential pressure groups including: nef, Compass, PLATFORM, ResPublica, 38 Degrees, WDM, Positive Money, Tax Research and the Post Bank campaign.'

Letting Go of Bananas

...there is a lot in here to explain why it is hard to shift individual, let alone societal behaviour...and why the cult of growth is arguably our biggest banana!

'Some people get upset when you question their bananas...' - LOL!

Excerpt from Reverse Thinking, 5 January 2008

'...A banana is a fixation or a compulsion, which dictates inflexible, repetitive, self-defeating behavior.

The metaphor is taken from an ancient method for catching monkeys - still practiced to this day in parts of Africa and Asia. Here's how the capture works:

The Hunter lays down a wicker basket with a banana inside it, in a grove where monkeys are known to forage. The cage is so constructed that the monkey can get at the banana but can't pull it out because the bars of the cage are too narrow. Indeed, it cannot withdraw its hand at all unless it drops the banana. Most monkeys are smart enough to let go of the banana and go and look for better opportunities. But a minority don't - that banana just means too much to them. They stay put, holding their booby prize until the hunter comes and throws a net over them.

Like some monkeys, a lot of human beings would rather be slaves than let go of their bananas.

Here are some examples of common bananas:

• I have to be liked
• I should be in control
• I must be successful
• I must not let people down
• I must never get angry
• I should always put other peoples' needs first, no matter what happens to me
• I must be strong

Notice that what makes the banana obsessional is the absolute demand to always act or be that way - as conveyed by the 'musts' and 'shoulds' contained in the injunction. There is nothing wrong with being loved, attracting success, and helping people out. The problem arises when no deviations from the rule are permitted. If that is the case then when we can't cope, we wear ourselves out. Or, when we meet with rejection, failure, bullying or stress, then we no longer know what to do. We go on repeating the same destructive behavior like a broken record. Hoping that, sooner or later, it will work.

Some people get upset when you question their bananas. Their Conscious Mind sees that as a threat to its grasp on reality. To such people, their obsession with the banana is an 'obvious' way to be. Not acting that way is deemed by them to be 'selfish', 'unrealistic', 'immature'. etc. So holding on to bananas - even when they don't apply - is viewed as a right way to be, while discarding them is bad, immoral or stupid. This explains their compulsive character. As does the fact that some people believe that something terrible will happen to them if they let go of their bananas.

This is why so many of us repeat the same toxic relationships over and over again - exploited by 'must-have' employers, abused by 'caring' partners, manipulated by 'helpless' children, let down by 'unlucky' friends', controlled by 'wonderful' parents. Meanwhile, Bodymind is sending us emotional signals to tell us about the way things really are and what we need to be doing about that - saying 'no' when we are tired, asking for help when we are overwhelmed, taking a break when we are frustrated, demanding fairness when we are angry. But if we go on ignoring our emotions, obsessing about bananas and dwelling in toxic relationships, we end up with depression, panic attacks, or what, in Reverse Therapy, we call non-specific illness.'

A Vision for Sustainable Restaurants

Wow!!! This guy is a lot more than a chef...

Sourced from TED, December 2010

'If you've been in a restaurant kitchen, you've seen how much food, water and energy can be wasted there. Chef Arthur Potts-Dawson shares his very personal vision for drastically reducing restaurant, and supermarket, waste - creating recycling, composting, sustainable engines for good (and good food).'

Australia Faces Food Insecurity

Reposted in full from The Australian, 2 December 2010

'Australia faces a future of food insecurity unless urgent action is taken to transform the nation's production and processing systems, according to an expert review.

"If our population grows to 35-40 million and climate change constrains food production, we can expect to see years where we will import more food than we export," warned the group of industry and scientific experts, chaired by Peter Langridge, CEO of the Adelaide University's Australain Centre for Plant Functional Genomics.

In its report to the Prime Minister's Science, Engineering & Innovation Council, the working group's top priority is establishment of a national food security agency to implement a nationally-coordinated approach to food production and policy.

The food sector is overly complex, with over 15 federal, state and territory agencies involved in policy and regulation. Dozens of research, investor and industry bodies are also involved.

The PMSEIC group's call came yesterday as the National Food Policy Working Group had its inaugural meeting in Sydney. Established by Agriculture Minister Joe Ludwig, the group will advise the government on a National Food Plan.

"We support the need for a coordinated national strategy," said Ben Fargher, CEO of the National Farmer's Federation which is represented on both the PMSEIC and NFP working groups.

According to Mr Fargher, national food shortages are unlikely in the short term, but it's essential to prepare now for future food stress by building on existing expertise on food and fibre production.

"We can't take our food production system for granted," he said.

The nation's Chief Scientist and PMSEIC Executive Officer Penny Sackett agreed: "Australia is currently a net exporter of food, with considerable expertise in food production under resource constraints".

"However, the PMSEIC report suggest increased challenges to this important Australian industry including land degradation, population growth, long-term climate change, competition for arable land, scarcity of water, and nutrient and energy availability," Professor Sackett added.
The PMSEIC report recommended that the national food security agency be set up within a year's time and that it would implement the recommendations over the next five years.

Among those are an immediate increase in support for agricultural research & development, along with incentives to recruit and train a new generation of farmers, researchers and food production and processing professionals.

www.chiefscientist.gov.au '

21st Century Enlightenment

Sourced from YouTube, 19 August 2010

'Matthew Taylor explores the meaning of 21st century enlightenment, how the idea might help us meet the challenges we face today, and the role that can be played by organisations such as the RSA.'

Beginning of a Monetary Revolution?

Reposted in full from new economics foundation, 14 November 2010

'"The essence of the contemporary monetary system is creation of money, out of nothing, by private banks often foolish lending."

These are the words, not of a monetary crank, but of The Financial Times' Chief Economics Commentator, a member of the national Independent Commission on Banking (ICB), and probably the most decorated and prestigious economics journalist in the country. Martin Wolf wrote them in an article last week defending the Federal Reserve's right to embark on a second round of Quantitative Easing. He went on to say: "Why is privatisation of a public function right and proper, but action by the central bank, to meet pressing public need, a road to catastrophe?"

Quite so Martin. The truth is, as was explained at a conference in central London this weekend organised by Positive Money in collaboration with nef, that banks are no longer just intermediaries of our money. Rather, they are the creators of our money. Most estimates suggest that between 97-99% of the money in our economy is created as interest-bearing debt by banks when they make loans to us, the rest being cash. These loans are made, quite literally, but typing some numbers in to a computer and creating a liability for you, the borrower and an asset for the bank. It costs them nothing. There are complex rules - the Basel Framework - requiring banks to hold a very tiny amount of capital reserves in case of a 'run' - but essentially this is how fractional reserve banking works today.

Or rather, doesn't work. Because these same banks that can issue credit out of nothing for whatever they want (and make money out of it and whose shareholders have limited liability) also hold on to our hard-earned savings. If they just so happen to make some bad investments and get 'over-leveraged', our savings can go too. Unless the state jumps in of course. Which as we have seen, it has had to at a crippling expense to each and every one of us. But there's no need for radical think tanks like nef to make this point any more. We can just quote the Governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King, who pronounced in a speech on October 25th that:

“Eliminating fractional reserve banking explicitly recognises that the pretence that risk-free deposits can be supported by risky assets is alchemy. If there is a need for genuinely safe deposits the only way they can be provided, while ensuring costs and benefits are fully aligned, is to insist such deposits do not coexist with risky assets.”

The speakers at this weekend's conference were revealing. They included a Conservative MP, Steve Baker, the Director of a company who distributes fish and meat to 6800 retailers, a former stock-broker and banker, an eco-feminist academic as well as nef and Positive Money, both NGOs. In the audience trade unionists bumped up against city traders and young students schooled in orthodox economics cheered as they heard how most of what they had been taught was nonsense.

Left and Right appeared to be in substantive agreement over the problem. The monetary and banking system as it stand breaks all the rules of the free market and at the same time utterly fails to deliver socially just and ecologically sustainable outcomes. The alternatives will no doubt be discussed and argued over for some years to come. But it appears that a monetary revolution has just begun. As King went on to admit in his speech:

"Of all the many ways of organising banking, the worst is the one we have today."'

Auction Unwanted Items, Raise Funds for Charity

This is a clever way of incentivising reuse and raising funds for charity - when the proceeds from successful auctions are deposited into the charity's bank account, the seller receives a receipt enabling them to claim a tax deduction.

Reposted in full from ProBono Australia, 25 November 2010

Australian community organisations are benefiting from an initiative, which enables people and companies to donate and sell goods and services online with the proceeds going to their preferred charity.

AidArena has been established by a group of Queensland business people and developed over the past two years. AidArena provides an online market place to help charities nationwide by capitalising on the value of items often thrown or given away by householders.

AidArena Spokesman Don MacMillan says the online platform is excited to provide an equal opportunity for all Australian Charities, regardless of their size, or nature.
He says the Salvation Army, the RSPCA and CanTeen are among the high profile charities to join forces with AidArena. However, AidArena is available to any organisation with a DGR status, including school funds.

MacMillan says the motivation for setting up AidArena was to assist a wide variety of charities in challenging economic times and help fill the donation shortfall by utilising goods and services rather than seeking cash.

The concept of AidArena was to provide a means for people and companies to donate goods and services while receiving a tax benefit. A tax deductible receipt is issued for the full sale price of the donated item when the resulting cash donation is deposited into the bank account of the chosen charity.

MacMillan says individuals can donate any household items they aren’t using anymore such as appliances or other electrical goods, sporting equipment, furniture, art works or valuables such as jewellery.

He says instead of donating money, companies can donate obsolete or dead stock and feel great that their goods and services are being auctioned for a good cause.

AidArena uses PayPal to provide buyers with a secure online account for the payment of items. Distribution of funds is handled by AidArena, which allows the charities to seamlessly receive the funds directly into their account.

AidArena is free for everyone to use, there are no joining or subscription fees. All donated items are being welcomed but must have a starting value of $9 and already high value items have been listed.

MacMillan says besides donating goods; trade, business or professional people, could auction their services online to raise funds for charity. The donor creates an online voucher and when successfully sold it is automatically emailed to the winning bidder.

He says the AidArena website – www.aidarena.com – was designed to be easy to use and navigate even for people with limited online skills, and if donors can use a digital camera and a computer they are well on their way to enjoying tax effective giving.

AidArena is free for everyone to use, there are no joining or subscription fees. AidArena will take care of all the administration work, monitor the auctions, and will transfer the funds raised (less the administration fee that ranges from as little as 4.4% to 14% depending on the final sale price) to the charity.

AidArena asks that all charities involved promote AidArena to their support base and corporate sponsors and encourage them to donate items for auction on their behalf.

Charities, buyers, and donors, and the general public, are encouraged to follow AidArena on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/aidarena) and Twitter (http://twitter.com/#!/AidArena).

Fresh Food Rescue in Australia

Reposted in full from Woolworths, who are supporting OzHarvest and Foodbank in SA.

'Ever wondered what happens to the fresh food that is not sold in our stores?

Each year households, retailers, restaurants and businesses throw out millions of tonnes of food which then finds its way into landfill sites. Although not always fit for sale, much of it is good quality and can easily be rescued and turned into nutritious, meals for the needy or vulnerable in our society.

The Woolworths Fresh Food Rescue program aims to rescue surplus fresh food from the waste stream and turn it into meals for the needy. With a target for 2010 to provide two million meals for those in need and $2 million for those who serve them, this extensive program will help address an underlying social problem in Australia.

View the community groups that received Fresh Food Rescue grants in New South Wales, Australian Capital Territory, Queensland, Victoria, Western Australia, South Australia and Tasmania.

Woolworths recognises it has a significant role in ensuring that fresh edible food, which for various reasons cannot be sold, is put to the best possible use by turning it into meals. To do this, many Woolworths stores across the country currently work with organisations such as Foodbank, OzHarvest, FareShare, The Salvation Army and SecondBite. However, these organisations only have limited resources to collect and distribute the rescued fresh food that is so desperately required.

The Woolworths Fresh Food Rescue campaign will support these food relief charities at two core levels:

1) Expanding fresh food rescue from Woolworths stores to food relief charities. Already, over half of Woolworths supermarkets are rescuing surplus fresh food, which would otherwise go to landfill. Woolworths aims to substantially increase its partnerships with local food relief charities and soup kitchens and is actively seeking new community partners to work with stores right across the country.

2) Building additional capacity through a major grants scheme. Woolworths is contributing $2 million to help charity groups expand their operations and ensure thousands more people can access healthy, nutritious food. Over 100 food relief charities have benefited from infrastructure grants for vital items, such as vans, refrigerators, freezers and kitchen equipment.

With an ambitious target to reduce organic waste to zero by the year 2015, the ultimate aim is to have all 810 supermarkets in local partnerships. Local organisations who are keen to be part of the Fresh Food Rescue program should speak to their local Woolworths store manager.'

Latin American Nations Declare: Nature Has No Price Tag!

Can we...could we...find a way to make decisions to protect our life support systems without having to give them a monetary value? Latin American nations say: 'Yes, We Can!'

Reposted in full from Climate and Capitalism, 15 November 2010

'Bolivia, Cuba, Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Venezuela declare: “Nature is our home and is the system of which we form a part, and therefore it has infinite value, but it does not have a price and is not for sale.”

Ministers, Authorities of the Ministerial Committee for the Defense of Nature of the Plurinational State of Bolivia, Republic of Cuba, Republic of Ecuador, Republic of Nicaragua, Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, members of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas – Treaty of Commerce of the People (ALBA-TCP), gathered in the city of La Paz in the Plurinational State of Bolivia, from November 3rd to 5th, 2010.

Considering that:

1. There is within the United Nations is a push to promote the concept of a “green economy” or a “Global Green New Deal”[1] in order to extend capitalism in the economic, social and environmental arenas, in which nature is seen as “capital” for producing tradable environmental goods and services that should then be valued in monetary terms and assigned a price so that they can be commercialized with the purpose of obtaining profits.

2. Studies are being carried out and manipulated, such as the Stern Report on the Economics of Climate Change and the study on the Economy of Ecosystems and Biodiversity,[2] among others, in order to promote the privatization and the mercantilization of nature through the development of markets for environmental services, among other instruments.

3. Those who promote this new form of privatization and mercantilization of nature wish to develop a new kind of property rights which are not exercised over a natural resource in itself, but rather, over the functions offered by particular ecosystems, thus opening up the possibility of commercializing them in the market through certificates, bonds, credits, etc.

4. Under this capitalist conception that seeks only to guarantee benefit for those few who wield economic power: water should be privatized and distributed only to those that can afford to pay for it, forests are only good for capturing emissions and for selling on the carbon market that allows rich countries to avoid reducing emissions within their own territories, and genetic resources must be appropriated and patented for the enjoyment of those who possess modern technology.

Recognizing that:

The right to safe drinking water and sanitation is a human right that is essential for the full enjoyment of life, which has been endorsed by the United Nations and can only be guaranteed through the recognition and defense of the rights of Mother Earth.

Convinced that:

States are responsible for guaranteeing the sovereignty of the peoples over their natural patrimony and natural resources.

We declare:

1. That nature is our home and is the system of which we form a part, and that therefore it has infinite value, but does not have a price and is not for sale.

2. Our commitment to preventing capitalism from continuing to expand in the spheres that are essential to life and nature, being that this is one of the greatest challenges confronting humanity.

3. Our absolute rejection of the privatization, monetization and mercantilization of nature, for it leads to a greater imbalance in the environment and goes against our ethical principles.

4. Our condemnation of unsustainable models of economic growth that are created at the expense of our resources and the sovereignty of our peoples.

5. Only a humanity that is conscious of its present and future responsibilities, and states with the political will to carry out their role, can change the course of history and restore equilibrium in nature and life as a whole.

6. That instead of promoting the privatization of goods and services that come from nature, it is essential to recognize that these have a collective character, and, as such, should be conserved as public goods, respecting the sovereignty of states.

7. It is not the invisible hand of the market that will allow for the recuperation of equilibrium on Mother Earth. Only with the conscious intervention of state and society through policies, public regulations, and the strengthening of public services can the equilibrium of nature be restored.

8. Cancun cannot be another Copenhagen; we hope that accords will be reached in which developed countries truly act according to the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities, and effectively assume their obligation to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, without making climate change into a business through the promotion and creation of carbon market mechanisms.

9. That, committed to life, the countries present at this meeting agree to include in our permanent agenda, among other actions, the realization of a referendum on climate change and the promotion of the participation of the peoples of the world.

10. That it is urgent to adopt at the United Nations a Universal Declaration on the Rights of Mother Earth.

[1] Global Green New Deal, 2009
[2] The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity