Urgency
Big REDD, Investments in Reforestation
Until forty years ago, the Surui people spent their days roaming the
Brazilian Amazon with bows and arrows, hunting monkeys and wild pigs.
Their only contact with the outside world was with the rubber tappers
who occasionally ventured through their territory. Then, beginning in
the late 1960s, the Brazilian government laid a 2,000-mile highway
through the heart of the jungle. Lured by the promise of cheap,
fertile land, thousands of poor farmers boarded buses, rickety
pickups, and horse-drawn wagons and bore deep into Surui tribal lands.
The results were catastrophic. First the tribe was decimated by
disease. Then unscrupulous speculators started hawking fraudulent
titles to the land, spawning bloody turf wars between the tribe and
settlers. Within a few years, the Surui population dwindled from
roughly 2,000 to fewer than 200.
Mayan Culture Offers Valuable Clues on Forest Conservation
Studies show a connection between ancient Mayans' forest conservation techniques and cultural survival, offering invaluable insight for modern foresters and conservationists.
Unlocking Mayan Secrets
According to ScienceDaily, a study by paleoethnobotanist David Lentz of the University of Cincinnati revealed that Mayan people not only practiced forest management techniques, but when such practices were abandoned, "it was to the detriment of the entire Maya culture." The Mayans of Guatemala displayed "deliberate conservation practices" that can be seen in "the wood they used for construction," Lentz said.
Can 'biochar' save the planet?
Over the railroad tracks, near Agriculture Drive on the University of
Georgia campus, sits a unique machine that may hold one of the solutions
to big environmental problems like energy, food production and even
global climate change.
"This machine right here is our baby," said UGA research engineer Brian Bibens, who is one of a handful of researchers around the world working on alternative ways to recycle carbon.
Bibens' specialty is "biochar," a highly porous charcoal made from organic waste. The raw material can be any forest, agricultural or animal waste. Some examples are woodchips, corn husks, peanut shells, even chicken manure.Yosemite's giant trees disappear
The oldest and largest trees within California's world famous Yosemite National Park are disappearing.
Climate
change appears to be a major cause of the loss.
The revelation comes from an analysis of data collected over 60 years by forest ecologists.
They say one worrying aspect of the decline is that it is happening within one of most protected forests within the US, suggesting that even more large trees may be dying off elsewhere.
James Lutz and Jerry Franklin of the University of Washington, Seattle, US and Jan van Wagtendonk of the Yosemite Field Station of the US Geological Survey, based in El Portal, California collated data on tree growth within the park gathered from the 1930s onwards.
Reforestation: Ethiopia top tree-planting country
The milestone was reached following confirmation from the Ethiopian Ministry of Agriculture that an additional 687 million trees were planted in 2008 under the country's nationwide tree planting campaign - part of the one billion trees that were planted over the last 52 days.
