Redd Road Cancun

Members of the Indigenous Environmental Network (IEN) explain why they went to Cancun, Mexico, to show their opposition to false solutions being negotiated at the the Conference of the Parties 16 of the United Nations Convention on Climate Change. Produced by Praxis Pictures in collaboration with the Indigenous Environmental Network (IEN) to profile IEN’s RED ROAD mission at COP16. IEN is an environmental and economic justice network, based at the headwaters of the Mississippi River, in Northern Minnesota. Their work focuses on fighting to protect the sacredness of Mother Earth from toxic contamination and corporate exploitation.

For more information:

www.ienearth.org

redroadcancun.com

United Nations Climate Negotiations

Rough Cut. Sights and sounds from the streets of Cancun, Mexico, highlighting indigenous resistance to false solutions to climate change being pushed by wealthy nations and business interests.  More to come…

More of my work from COP16 Cancun HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE

(Cancun, December 4)  With the COP16 UN Climate Conference already under way, La Via Campesina has organized an international caravan transporting people from all over Mexico to Cancun. “The sixth Conference of Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 16) is already seen as a failure” stated Alberto Gomez from La Via Campesina international coordination, “that will affect the future of humanity, as its only result will be to strenghthen the intention of TNCs to divert money away from the climate crisis.”

“During the last moments of discussion, the proposals of the People’s Agreement signed in Cochabamba have been left aside. The trend is to favour carbon market and REDD (Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation), this mechanism supports global privatisation of forests, jungles and territories.» explained Gomez.”

“It is to be stated that during the negotiating process preceeding Cancun, the interest of the TNCs have prevailed giving a strong impulsion to a financial system that will impose merchandisation of the climate.”

“We do not agree with false solutions such as the carbon market because, far from reducing green house gases, it will sooner or later create a speculative system leading the world into another global financial crisis.”

“This is why La Via Campesina mobilises to denounce the irresponsibility of most of the governments who choose to support the capital rather than the interest of their nation and of humanity as a whole.” added Gómez.

“The international caravans will [started] on Sunday 28th. Their aim is to show up the Mexican government, pointing out the environmental and social devastation caused by state policies which are against the interest of the majority of the people.”

“In the camp set up by La Via Campesina in Cancun from December 2nd, various activites will be organised to denounce these policies and we ask all participants to put pressure on the Summit to adopt efficient measures against climate crisis such as those proposed in the People’s Agreement.”

“We declare that we, farmers, men and women, are necessary and useful to humanity. Our role is to produce food: we do it in a sustainable way and at the same time we cool down the planet. If we had at our disposal a different system to produce, distribute and consumme, we could end hunger and halt global warming.”

“Food sovereignty — concluded Gómez— is La Via Campesina’s alternative to capitalism which seeks to privatise even the air we breathe.”

The following photos were taken as the caravan approached Cancun. The plan was to stop at the Chichenitze Mayan pyramid, just outside the city, to hold a ceremony to celebrate their arrival. Delegates from the Indigenous Environmental Network were invited to participate in the ceremony. However, the caravan was not allowed to enter the pyramid, and ancient spiritual site for Mayan peoples which has since been transformed into an exclusive tourist site where the hundreds of indigenous and peasant farmers were not welcome. The ceremony was moved to a nearby town square, but was no less moving for all present.

(Click on thumbnails to view images)

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

On Sunday Oct. 17th, activists from Environmental Justice Toronto and the Indigenous Environmental Network came to Yonge and Dundas Square, in the heart of downtown Toronto, to invite people passing by to ask them why they protest the tar sands giga-project and start a conversation. This action was done in solidarity with BC First Nations and the  No Pipelines No Tanks Day of Action in BC.

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

“The tar sands has been called ‘the most destructive project on earth’ and its expansion is devastating the regional environment, including contaminating Canada’s precious water supply, endangering wildlife, threatening First Nations’ health and preventing Canada from meeting it’s climate commitments.”

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

“The explosive growth of tar sands projects comes at a huge cost, damaging land, air, water, forests, and the climate. Tar sands extraction and processing is one of the greatest social and ecological injustices of our time.”

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

“The world stands at an energy crossroads. As cheap, plentiful conventional oil becomes a luxury of the past, we now face a choice: to set a course for a more sustainable energy future of clean, renewable fuels, or to develop ever-dirtier sources of transportation fuel — at an even greater cost to our health and environment.”

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

“Our energy future is now — and all it requires is investing in affordable, available clean and renewable sources today that will move us beyond oil and dirty fuels that imperil our planet and our health.”

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

“Downstream communities have experienced polluted water, water reductions in rivers and aquifers, declines in wildlife populations such as moose and muskrat, and significant declines in fish populations. The tar sands are destroying the traditional livelihood of First Nations in the northern Alberta watershed.”

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

“The tar sands operations are the largest source of projected new greenhouse gas pollution in Canada. This is the number one reason Alberta and Canada’s emissions are rising instead of falling.”

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

“If the tar sands continue to operate as predicted, there is no hope of Canada meeting its international commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as outlined in the Kyoto Protocol.”

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

“Between 2 and 4 barrels of water are required to produce each barrel of oil extracted from the sands. At least 90% of the fresh water used in oil sand extraction winds up in tailing ponds so toxic that propane cannons are used to keep ducks from landing on them and dying. These tailings ponds already span more than 170 square kilometers and can be seen from space”

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

“A 2008 Environmental Defense report estimated that 11 million liters of contaminated water are seeping from the tailings ponds into the environment on a daily basis.”

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

“Tar sands development is the single largest contributer to the increase in climate change in Canada, as it accounts for 40 million tons of CO2 emissions per year, and means that thousands of hectares of ancient Boreal Forest are clear-cut and destroyed.”

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

“By 2011 it is expected that the tar sands will emit 80 million tons of CO2 emissions. And these numbers only take into account the production of oil from the tar sands. Once tar sands oil is burned as fuel, it creates further emissions.”

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

“Tar sands are transforming Canada’s boreal forests and wetlands into fuel for Americas gas tank and war machine. Canadian and US citizens are getting little benefit and suffering huge environmental costs.”

Ask Me Why I Protest the Tar Sands

“Described by the United Nations Environment Program as one of the world’s top ‘environmental hot spots,’ tar sands projects will eventually transform a boreal forest the size of Florida into a toxic industrial sacrificial zone.”

Mining (in)justice: at home and abroad is a conference on the Canadian mining industry (including Tar Sands) set to take place in Toronto on the weekend of May 7-9, 2010. It will feature leaders in movements against Canadian mining companies both within and outside of Canada and provide space for growing our own movements in alliance with communities impacted by this industry.

WHAT: Conference on the Canadian Mining Industry
WHERE: Earth Sciences Building, University of Toronto
WHEN: May 7-9, 2010
WHO: Impacted communities are coming from all over the world and within Canada. Hear speakers from Honduras, Guatemala, Carrier Sekani First Nation, Papua New Guinea, El Salvador, Ardoch Algonquin, Northern Ontario, Fort Chipewan, Mexico and more! Clayton Thomas Muller of the Indigenous Environmental Network is MCing the event!

All our welcome, and the event is free!

This is a follow-up conference to last year’s mining conference, which brought over 20 front line defenders to share their stories and strategize solutions to ending corporate impunity and strengthening the struggles against destructive mining projects around the world.

This year, we are expanding the conference into a 3 day event, providing more space for participants to meet each other, form alliances, and plan actions to foster a movement in solidarity with impacted communities.

for more information and to find out how to get involved! solidarityresponse.net, e-mail:csrtoronto@gmail.com

Confirmed speakers for 2010 include:

ROBERT LOVELACE: For nearly 25 years Bob has remained a steadfast and determined representative for the Algonquin communities of Ardoch, Sharbot Lake. He has stood strong with many allies and friends in defence of the wild rice stands near Ardoch Algonquin land. Lovelace is most well-known outside the Ardoch Algonquin community for his stand against uranium mining, for which he was incarcerated in 2008 with no objection from the Province of Ontario at the time.

CLAIRE LEHAN: Lehan is a legislative Assistant to MPP John McKay. She had worked on the creation of Bill C300 since its inception.

DIANE WIGGINS: Post Colborne resident and community organizer for the Coalition Against Contamination. Wiggins is currently involved in a lawsuit againt INCO due to nickel contamination.

CHRIS REID: Lawyer of the Ardoch Algonquin and KI Nations

JETHRO TULIN: Jethro has been organizing within and outside the Barrick’s Porgera mine since its inception (then owned by Placer Dome. In 1989, he registered Porgera’s first mine workers union and became its first secretary.Years later, Tulin returned to Porgera to find the situation worse and thus founded the Akali Tange Association (ATA), a human rights organization documenting abuses at the Porgera mine in Papa New Guinea – – a mine owned by Toronto’s Barrick Gold.

ENRIQUE RIVERA SIERRA: Rivera is a lawyer and activist working with FAO (Frente Amplio Opositor), a broad environmental and community coalition working to defend Cerro de San Pedro, including historically and culturally significant sites, from contamination and destruction by Canadian company New Gold. Rivera Sierra is currently in Canada claiming political asylum after being allegedly harassed and threatened by mining employees.

ULISES GARCIA: Organized the local referendum against Manhattan Resources which managed to expel a powerful global mining company. He is the founder of a grassroots organization called Tropico Seco, which focuses on the promotion of peaceful resistance and the holding of community and municipal referendums in Latin America concerning development initiatives.

THE COUNCIL OF CANADIANS: The council works to promote progressive policies on fair trade, clean water, energy security, public health care, and other issues of social and economic concern to Canadians. The council has been active in building awareness about problems with the Canadian Fisheries Act which has allowed metal mining companies to apply for federal and provincial approval to use bodies of fresh water as tailings ponds for mining waste.

KAREN SPRING : Karen is from Ontario, Canada. With Rights Action since early 2009, she lives and works in Honduras and Guatemala.

CARLOS AMADOR: Carlos is a teacher and community leader in El Porvenir, 15 kilometers from Goldcorp’s open-pit, cyanide-leaching gold mine – the “San Martin” mine. Since 2000, Carlos has been educating and organizing local communities in the Siria Valley, and working to resist and demand justice for the health and environmental harms and human rights violations caused by Goldcorp’s mine.

JAVIER de LEON: Javier is a Mayan Mam community leader from the village of Maquivil, municipality of San Miguel Ixtahuacan, department of San Marcos. From his small home, he looks across at Goldcorp’s ever expanding open-pit, cyanide-leaching gold mine – the “Marlin” mine. Since 2004, Javier has been educating and organizing Mayan Mam communities and working to resist and demand justice for the health and environmental harms and human rights violations caused by Goldcorp’s mine.

CLEVE HIGGINS: Cleve is working with the McGill research group for the Investigation of Canadian mining in Latin America (MICLA) and has focused on the institutional investment in Canadian gold mining companies. On May 10th he’ll be staking a mining claim on Mount Royal, and then heading to southern Mexico to make connections with the growing opposition to Canadian mining in that part of the continent.

NELY RIVERA DE SILVA: de Silva works with CEICOM, the Centre for Research on Investment and Commerce, an organization that does research and advocacy on the impacts of mining investment in El Salvador. At this time, Nely is deeply involved community organizing to prevent the second Goldcorp mine in Guatemala, that of Cerro Blanco, which is on the Guatemala/El Salvador border and threatens access to water and the contamination of water and the eco-system on both sides of the border.

STEVEN SCHNOOR: For several years, Schnoor has been working on the issue of Canadian mining companies operating in Central America — an interest that began in January 2005/ Film work includes “Desalojo (Eviction)” and “All That Glitters Isn’t Gold: A Story of Exploitation and Resistance.” Steven is presently working on a larger documentary looking at the broader implications of mining in the surrounding regions.

MIKE MERCREDI: Mike works for the Athabasca Chipewyan FN (ACFN) in their IRC department as a GIS technical specialist. He is a Traditional Environment Knowledge (TEK) and Traditional Land Use Occupations (TLUO) facilitator. He will speak on the frontline struggles in Fort Chipewyan including a plague of tar sands related cancer.

ENRICO ESGUERRA: Rick Esguerra taught International Development and Political Science at the University of the Philippines, and was involved in popular education for labour and peasant organizations before coming to Canada in 1990. Since then he has been involved in social justice, human rights and international solidarity work as a member of the Philippine Solidarity Network and the Philippine Network for Justice and Peace (PNJP). In September 2006, he made a presentation for PNJP on Canadian Mining Practices in the Philippines at the Toronto Roundtable on Corporate Social Responsibility and the Canadian Extractive Sector, hosted by the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.

TIM GROVES: is a Toronto-based investigative researcher and reporter. He has been sharing his skills with a variety of activist and community groups since 2003.

MALCOM ROGGE: is a filmmaker and writer based in Toronto. His debut feature documentary film, Under Rich Earth had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival and has received widespread critical acclaim. Rogge has also worked for human rights and environmental organizations in Canada and Ecuador, and he is on the editorial board of a national magazine devoted to politics and social justice.

ALLAN LISSNER: is an independent photojournalist based in Toronto, Canada. Allan’s ongoing project, “Someone Else’s Treasure”, examines the social and environmental impacts of the global mining industry on indigenous communities around the world. Allan has done work with many organizations including Amnesty International, Oxfam Canada, Make Poverty History, Norwegian Church Aid,the Ontario Council for International Cooperation, and the United Nations Development Program.

TENZIN LOBSANG WANGKHANG: Wangkhang is the National Director of Students for a Free Tibet (SFT) Canada, a grassroots non-profit advocacy group based out of Toronto. Students for a Free Tibet Canada is part of the SFT International network which works in solidarity with the Tibetan people in their struggle for freedom and independence from illegal Chinese occupation. Through education, grassroots organizing, and non-violent direct action, they campaign for Tibetans’ fundamental right to political freedom. SFT’s role is to empower and train youth as leaders in the worldwide movement for social justice. One of SFT Canada’s key campaigns is targeting Canadian mining companies that have lead to recent foreign gold rush into Tibet.

FELICIANO ORELLANA: is a representative of the Commission for Justice and Peace of the Franciscan Family, in the Department of Jutiapa in eastern Guatemala. Employed by Goldcorp subsidiary Entre Mares in 1998 as one of the first employee, he later got hired in 2008 and suffered an almost Fatal accident on the job, for which he received no compensation. Now Feliciano is an active leader in his community and wants to share his experience on Goldcorp Human Rights Violations and the communities’ opposition to the Cerro Blanco Mine, Goldcorp’ second large mine in Guatemala.

DR. CONSTANCIO ‘CHANDU’ CLAVER: a native of Bontoc, Mountain Province in the northern Philippines, is currently the Chairperson of BAYAN Canada. A surgeon by training and a physician by practice, Dr. Claver has been a doctor of the masses for decades, being the Executive Director of the former Community Health and Education Concerns for Kalinga-Apayao. Formerly the Vice-Chair of the Cordillera Peoples’ Alliance, and chairperson of Bayan Muna in Kalinga, Dr. Claver is known as a staunch advocate of human rights, peace and justice. In July 2006, Dr. Claver, his wife Alyce, and their daughter were targets of a political assassination attempt, which his wife did not survive. Dr. Claver recently won his claim for political refugee status; he and his daughters now live in Canada.

RBC: Fossil Fool of the Year 2010

April 1st, 2010, Rainforest Action Network Toronto naming Royal Bank of Canada the Fossil Fool of the Year 2010, for being the leading financier of the Tar Sands oil projects.

Music: Kevin MacLeod

Someone Else's Treasure - Guatemala

Someone Else’s Treasure is an ongoing multimedia project which brings to light some of the experiences of indigenous communities around the world that have been impacted by the global mining industry – including communities in the Philippines, Tanzania, Papua New Guinea, Australia, Chile, Canada, and Guatemala.

This multimedia piece focuses on communities in San Marcos, Guatemala, living next to the Canadian-owned Marlin Mine. The first two songs are by Grupo Kotzic, who are from San Marcos, singing about the peoples’ resistance to the mine. The third song is a live recording from inside the Church of San Miguel Ixtahuacan, San Marcos, where  community members were singing a song they wrote about their experiences with the mine.

In an effort to better understand the true cost of an industry that shapes the world around all of us, the focus of Someone Else’s Treasure is on the externalized – the men, women, and children, that have been left out of the equations and are therefore forced to pay the price for someone else’s treasure.

Now available in Spanish: La Riqueza de Otros – Guatemala

Read the photo essay for more information:

Someone Else’s Treasure – Guatemala

Organizers estimated that there may have been as many as 100,000 people taking part in the march; police estimates put the figure at 40,000. So the actual number was probably somewhere in between.

Another World is Possible - Another World is Coming - Another World is Reality

Tens of thousands of people joined the march

Let the Rich Pay

Nature doesn't Compromise

350 is the number that leading scientists say is the safe upper limit for carbon dioxide—measured in "Parts Per Million" in our atmosphere. 350 PPM—it's the number humanity needs to get back to as soon as possible to avoid runaway climate change (see 350.org).

Act the F*ck Now

Time for Climate Justice

Stop Global Warming! Outside the Danish Parliament building.

Bla Bla Bla ... Act Now!

Barack Obama (USA), Steven Harper (Canada), and other world leaders taking orders from the corporate puppet master.

Global South Youth

Canadian Tar Sands - World's Biggest Climate Crime

Riot police protecting McDonald's. While the mood of protest was festive and peaceful, police found reason to arrest 968 protestors, which predictably stole most of the headlines. Police claimed they made the arrests after rocks were thrown and a fire cracker was set off. Witnesses have claimed that the police rounded up people indiscriminately. The 968 arrested were tied up and forced to sit on the street in the cold for three to four hours before being bussed away. The prisoners were denied repeated requests to go to the bathroom and many of them peed in their pants as they were sitting there waiting. By morning, most of the prisoners have been released and only four are now facing charges.

We Want to Stay Here Longer. Please Be Vegan!

There is No Planet B

The march ended outside the Bella Centre, where the UNFCCC Climate Conference is being held. People lit candles and the evening ended with a candle light vigil, lighting "candles of hope to stand in solemn solidarity with the citizens of the nations whose very survival is threatened by the climate crisis."

Candles of Hope

Act Now!

Change the Future

Running Out of Time

System Change Not Climate Change

Climate Change Kills. Act Now. Save Lives.

Save Santa

Freedom to Pollute

Candle of Hope

More photos from Copenhagen:

Reclaiming Power in Copenhagen Part I

From Athabasca to Copenhagen

Recommended Reading:

“Climate Change: Leaders of the Rich World are Enacting a Giant Fraud” by Johann Hari for GlobalResearch.ca

“Against Copenhagen: Why we need to ‘lose’ at this week’s climate summit if we are to win the fight against global warming.” - By Michael M’Gonigle for The Tyee

“Playing For Keeps: Would We Listen to Nature if Our Lives Depended On it?” by Derrick Jensen for The Onion

“Expectations and Realities in Copenhagen” by Wangari Maathai

Group Stages Mock Death Outside RBC Branches in Protest of Bank’s Involvement in Dirty Oil

Feigned Collapses Represent Real Impacts of Tar Sands Destruction and Water Pollution of First Nations Throughout Athabasca Delta

RBC Die-in

Toronto - Customers visiting RBC’s newly opened downtown banking centre today were met with the sight of motionless bodies strewn along the pavement in front of the bank entrance. The bodies were those of approximately 15 Rainforest Action Network (RAN) activists who, in protest against RBC’s continued financing of Alberta tar sands production, feigned death after symbolically drinking contaminated tar sands water.

RAN activists take a drink from the Athabasca water cooler.

Leading all other Canadian banks, over the past four years RBC has provided $8.9 billion in financial support to companies operating in the tar sands. The tar sands, which are devastating the regional environment, contaminating water sources, undermining local First Nation’s people’s health and preventing Canada from meeting its climate commitments, have become a source of global shame for Canada. RAN is asking RBC to cease financing tar sands production and instead, provide financing for the production of renewable energy. 

Would you drinking water from the Athabasca River?

“RBC, as Canada’s largest bank, is positioned to lead the country towards a future of energy sustainability and environmental stewardship,” says RAN activist Kimia Ghomeshi. “Instead, RBC has chosen to become the ‘ATM’ for companies seeking financing for dirty tar sands production. I think RBC’s customers would like to know what their bank is doing with the money in their savings and chequing accounts.”

Kimia Ghomeshi describes the RBC as the "ATM for companies seeking financing for dirty tar sands production."

Tar sands projects, which extract and process bitumen, a type of crude oil, have become the leading cause of CO2 emissions growth in Canada. A water intensive process, production has resulted in the creation of over 130 km2 of toxic tailing ponds, which are now estimated to leak 11 million litres of polluted water into the Athabasca watershed daily. Downstream from the tar sands, a Government of Alberta health study has confirmed that First Nations’ communities are now experiencing elevated levels of rare cancers.

RBC Creates Climate Chaos

The protesters emphasized that RBC’s support of tar sands production is not consistent with its public commitments to leadership in the areas of corporate environmental sustainability and water conservation. As Melina Laboucan-Massimo, who is a member of the Lubicon Cree Nation, asked at the recent RBC annual shareholders meeting, “If RBC is serious about supporting clean water, why are they financing projects that are contaminating the lakes and rivers around my community?”

RBC Die-in

RBC’s “Create” PR campaign touts RBC’s environmental credentials. In one TV ad publicizing the RBC ‘s Blue Water Project, we are asked to:

“Think of all the water in the world … oceans, rivers, lakes. It may seem like a lot but only a small fraction is fresh water, and there’s only so much to go around, which is why it is so important to protect it.”

In a November 2008 speech to an environmental group, CEO Gordon Nixon proclaimed that “water is the problem of the ages” and that “life depends on water. It’s high time we remembered that.”

"Life depends on water" - RBC CEO Gordon Nixon.

Yet, in contrast to the $3 million in donations under the Blue Water Project in 2008, RBC in the same year financed an estimated minimum of $641 million with oil and gas companies operating in the Alberta tar sands. An estimate of RBC’s total fossil fuel financing based on public records shows over $50 billion financed across all business lines in 2007 (see: www.climatefriendlybanking.org) And since 2002, RBC has directly invested over $63 billion in tar sands companies such as Encana, Suncor, and Canadian Natural Resources.

Drinking from the Athabasca Water Cooler

According to industry information, toxic lakes in the tar sands stretching over 50 km leak over 11 million litres a day of contaminated water into the environment. First Nations downstream are growing increasingly concerned about water quality and elevated cancer levels and have sued the Province of Alberta over adverse environmental impacts. Tar sands are also Canada’s fastest-growing source of greenhouse gas pollution. (more at: www.ran.org/tarsands)

RBC Die-in

RBC Die-in

RBC Die-in

RBC Die-in

RBC Die-in

For more information:

Rainforest Action Network

www.tarsandswatch.org

The following call-out from the community of Cerro de San Pedro calling for the Global Day of Action Against Open-Pit Mining:

Protesters outside the shareholders meeting of Metallica Resources (now called New Gold) show their support for affected communities in Cerro de San Pedro, Mexico.

The methods and technology used in open-pit mining operations causes the destruction and exhaustion of the planet’s ecosystems. Removing forest cover, destroying soils, contaminating both running water and underground reservoirs, dividing communities, bribing officials, threatening, blackmailing, and violating human rights are all common practice for open-pit mining projects around the world.

Quit investing in violations of human rights

In contrast with its self-proclaimed ‘environmental awareness’, Canada is the global leader in open-pit mining. Canadian-based transnational corporations (TNCs) control 51% of global mining capital and Mexico in particular had a big role to play in Canada’s rise to become the world mining champion.

Human rights above mining rights

The neoliberal policies implemented in Mexico since the mid-1980s, codified and consolidated by the creation of NAFTA, were of great importance for Canadian mining companies. The erosion of labour rights aside, it is the repression of environmental movements, increasing militarization and autocracy, and the forced eviction of entire communities that have allowed for the establishment and survival of mining projects.

Mining companies must stop extraction

As of 2007, the Mexican government has granted 438 mining concessions, most of them going to Canadian companies. In the state of Chiapas alone, 72 projects cover 727,435ha of land (slightly larger than the Palestinian Occupied Territories). Half of this territory is now owned by two Canadian companies: Linear Gold and the Frontier Development Group. The territory passed into private ownership without the knowledge, let alone consent, of the communities located there, most of whom are peasants and indigenous people. The same is happening in the states of Zacatecas, Chihuahua, Sonora, Oaxaca, and Coahuila.

Rape of mother earth

A similar fate awaits much of the world. Canadian mining companies are at work in Peru, Chile, Argentina, Bolivia, Guatemala, Brasil, Panama, Honduras, Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, the Philippines, Surinam, Ghana, Congo, Tanzania, Sudan, Zambia, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, the United States, and Canada itself!

Mining Scmining!

*It is for these reasons that we call for a Global Day of Action Against Open-pit Mining on July 22nd. Given Canada’s leading role in the global mining industry, we call for peaceful demonstrations in front of Canadian embassies across the world in order to show our condemnation of these mining projects that only leave behind desolation, poverty, and death for our people while enriching the few.*

…

Affected communities around the world are reaching out to Canadians to reject the harms done to them by Canadian mining companies.

Peaceful rallies are now being planned in response to their calls in Toronto, Montreal, London, Mexico, Australia, the Philippines, and more.

In Toronto:

Wednesday 22, 2009

4:30-7:00

130 King Street West (outside the Toronto Stock Exchange)

For more on the harmful effects of the global mining industry see:

Someone Else’s Treasure

]]> http://allan.lissner.net/event-global-day-of-action-against-mining/feed/ 6 http://allan.lissner.net/the-effects-of-climate-change-are-the-greatest-threat-to-humanity-oxfam/ http://allan.lissner.net/the-effects-of-climate-change-are-the-greatest-threat-to-humanity-oxfam/#comments Wed, 08 Jul 2009 20:52:24 +0000 admin http://allan.lissner.net/?p=1713 Oxfam’s recent report, Suffering the Science – Climate Change, People and Poverty, argues that the effects of climate change pose the greatest threat to humanity.  The following are a few excerpts from the report, illustrated with some of my photos:

Flooding in the Philippines

The report combines the latest scientific observations on climate change, and evidence from Oxfam’s work in almost 100 countries around the world.

Mother and children on the streets of Bangladesh.

“Women living in poverty, who already face a daily struggle to survive, are being hit the hardest,” – Robert Fox, executive director of Oxfam Canada.

Flooding in the Philippines

A survey of top climate scientists, also published by Oxfam, said poor people living in low-lying coastal areas, island atolls and mega deltas and farmers are most at risk from climate change because of flooding and prolonged drought. The scientists named South Asia and Africa as climate change hotspots.

Drought in Tanzania

Growing rice in the Philippines

More people on the planet depend on rice than on any other crop. Rice plants react very quickly to temperature change: they show a 10% drop in yield for every 1ºC rise in minimum temperature. In parts of the Philippines, farmers have had to stop growing rice completely during the droughts caused by the ‘El Nino’ years, and river delta and coastal rice production has already suffered badly accross South-East Asia because of storms that overwhelm sea defences and salt-water intrusion into paddy fields.

Eating rice and fish in the Philippines.

An Asian Development Bank report warns that rice production in the Philippines could drop by 50-70 per cent as early as 2020.

Fisherman in Tanzania

Crops are only one part of the food story. Fish stocks are also endangered by climate change — threatening the loss of a significant source of protein and income for the 2.6billion people who get 20 per cent of their protein from fish. In many countries, dependence on fish consumption increases with poverty. In addition, 500 million people in developing countries depend — directly or indirectly — on fisheries for their livelihoods.

Fisherman in the Philippines

Both wild and farmed fish are threatened by a whole range of climate-driven problems — from raised sea levels and floods that damage fish farms on coasts and in river areas, to the increasin acidification of the oceans as a result of GHG emissions. A recent study suggests that 90 per cent of the food resources of the ‘coral triangle’ of the western Pacific will be gone by 2050, potentially affecting 150million people.

Health problems in Tanzania

In the last few months, several bodies including the Commonwealth countries’ health ministers have concluded that climate change is the greatest threat to health globally this century. The poorest and hottest countries will suffer the most. The loss of healthy life years as a result of global environmental change is predicted to be 500 times greater amongst poor African populations than amongst European populations. Climate change-driven alterations in patterns of disease and illness are already occurring globally, and 99 per cent of the casualties of climate change now are in developing countries.

Urban slums in Bangladesh

Rapid urbanization — which can be spurred by climatic factors as people seek new livelihoods in cities — brings disease with it. Urban sprawls often lack health infrastructure, and migrant workers may not be able to afford care and medicine. Some of the worst health statistics emanate from cities.

Escaping the heat in Tanzania

Small increases in temperatures hit human beings hard. None of us, no matter how well acclimatised, can do heavy work effectively above 35ºC or so. A couple of degrees higher than that, and our bodies soon get exhausted. Once core body temperature passes 38ºC, heat stress may set in. The body tries to cool down by sweating; dehydration may follow. People’s work rate slows. Ultimately, production and incomes decline.

Rice farmer in Bangladesh.

“Working under the open sky during summer has become nearly impossible in the past four years or so — for farmers and their cattle alike.”  — Mir Ahmed, Bangladeshi farmer.

Getting water in Tanzania

Finding and transporting clean water is a central occupation in the working day of many people in developing countries, especially women. When a community is short of food, or suffering an outbreak of desease, there are immediate ways in which they can be helped. However, scarcity of water is a much greater problem. According to the UN Development Programme, over one billion people lack access to safe water today, and that number can only increase.

2009 is one of the most important years in human history. In Copenhagen in December, politicians will meet at the 15th Conference of the Parties (COP) to the UN Climate Change Convention. This meeting will decide whether we face a future on a hot glowering planet, or whether we set a course for climate safety for everyone.

see the full report for more information and references.