Wednesday, June 24, 2015
mytravelfootprints: Ruby Khan helps me revisit Holland’s Keukenhof in ...
mytravelfootprints: Ruby Khan helps me revisit Holland’s Keukenhof in ...: Ruby Khan, am thankful to you fo...
mytravelfootprints: SHAKEN AND STIRRED BY MICHELIN STAR CHEF VIKAS KHA...
mytravelfootprints: SHAKEN AND STIRRED BY MICHELIN STAR CHEF VIKAS KHA...: SHAKEN AND STIRRED BY MICHELIN STAR CHEF VIKAS KHANNA “I am a hard core green juice lover, daily raw juice drinker, and evangelist...
Thursday, June 11, 2015
More funds needed in Nepal according to UN REPORT.....
More funds needed to assist 2.8 million earthquake survivors in Nepal
Report
(Kathmandu/Bangkok, 2 June 2015) An estimated 2.8 million Nepalese affected by the back-to-back earthquakes remain in need of humanitarian assistance, more than five weeks after the initial earthquake. The numbers include 864,000 people living in remote, mountainous areas who require urgent assistance, as they lost their homes and livelihoods. However, funding for the relief interventions remains insufficient.
“Our top priority is to provide vulnerable people of Nepal with the basics, to ensure their survival through the monsoon”, said Jamie McGoldrick, Humanitarian Coordinator in Nepal. “If we cannot achieve this, the progress that was made to reduce vulnerabilities before the quakes will be lost forever and we will have to face an even starker reality”.
With over 500,000 houses destroyed and another 269,000 damaged by the quakes, hundreds of thousands of people continue to stay in makeshift shelters close to where their homes once stood or too afraid to return to their damaged houses. Some 95,100 people who remain displaced are housed in 374 sites in 12 districts. Providing these people with shelter in the next two weeks before the rainy and cold season starts is a top priority for the responders.
An estimated 1.4 million people require food assistance, due to high damage to agriculture-based livelihoods. As the planting season starts this month, an estimated 236,000 people need agricultural inputs, including rice and vegetable seeds. The situation is aggravated by the large loss of livestock.
Key infrastructure, including schools, health facilities, access roads, temples and heritage sites, was also damaged or destroyed. About 1 million children were unable to resume classes at the end of May, as thousands of classrooms were destroyed or remain unsafe. Some 5.6 million people require healthcare support, including disease surveillance access to medical facilities.
To ensure these urgent needs are addressed, the humanitarian community revised its joint strategic response plan originally launched on 29 April. The adjusted strategy puts an even greater emphasis on shelter, to include assistance to families whose homes were damaged. Logistics are also important as the fast-approaching monsoon season is about to further complicate aid delivery to remote, hard-to-reach areas which are amongst the most affected.
“We continue to scale up the relief effort day after day,” said Mr. McGoldrick. “A lot has been achieved to date. Thanks to innovative approaches to aid delivery we were able to tackle many bottlenecks, including the topography challenge. I urge the international community to show its solidarity and support this effort”.
To date, $120 million was received against the $422-million Flash Appeal.
For further information please contact:
Leszek Barczak, Public Information Officer, OCHA Nepal
Tel: +977.9860.889.062; e-mail: barczakl@un.org
Orla Fagan, Regional Public Information Officer, OCHA Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific
Tel: +66.899.447.623; e-mail: fagano@un.org
“Our top priority is to provide vulnerable people of Nepal with the basics, to ensure their survival through the monsoon”, said Jamie McGoldrick, Humanitarian Coordinator in Nepal. “If we cannot achieve this, the progress that was made to reduce vulnerabilities before the quakes will be lost forever and we will have to face an even starker reality”.
With over 500,000 houses destroyed and another 269,000 damaged by the quakes, hundreds of thousands of people continue to stay in makeshift shelters close to where their homes once stood or too afraid to return to their damaged houses. Some 95,100 people who remain displaced are housed in 374 sites in 12 districts. Providing these people with shelter in the next two weeks before the rainy and cold season starts is a top priority for the responders.
An estimated 1.4 million people require food assistance, due to high damage to agriculture-based livelihoods. As the planting season starts this month, an estimated 236,000 people need agricultural inputs, including rice and vegetable seeds. The situation is aggravated by the large loss of livestock.
Key infrastructure, including schools, health facilities, access roads, temples and heritage sites, was also damaged or destroyed. About 1 million children were unable to resume classes at the end of May, as thousands of classrooms were destroyed or remain unsafe. Some 5.6 million people require healthcare support, including disease surveillance access to medical facilities.
To ensure these urgent needs are addressed, the humanitarian community revised its joint strategic response plan originally launched on 29 April. The adjusted strategy puts an even greater emphasis on shelter, to include assistance to families whose homes were damaged. Logistics are also important as the fast-approaching monsoon season is about to further complicate aid delivery to remote, hard-to-reach areas which are amongst the most affected.
“We continue to scale up the relief effort day after day,” said Mr. McGoldrick. “A lot has been achieved to date. Thanks to innovative approaches to aid delivery we were able to tackle many bottlenecks, including the topography challenge. I urge the international community to show its solidarity and support this effort”.
To date, $120 million was received against the $422-million Flash Appeal.
For further information please contact:
Leszek Barczak, Public Information Officer, OCHA Nepal
Tel: +977.9860.889.062; e-mail: barczakl@un.org
Orla Fagan, Regional Public Information Officer, OCHA Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific
Tel: +66.899.447.623; e-mail: fagano@un.org
Tuesday, June 9, 2015
CALL FOR A STRONG EMISSIONS REDUCTIONS AGREEMENT IN PARIS .Tanya Satish
CLIMATE REALITY PROJECT LAUNCHES GLOBAL CAMPAIGN TO CALL
FOR A STRONG EMISSIONS REDUCTIONS AGREEMENT IN PARIS
Tanya Satish
“I am worried
for all our children of tomorrow. The Amazon region is in danger despite our
fight to keep the earth in balance, to protect our territory and our tradition."
Said Mayalú Kokometi Waura Txucarramãe a
native tribal woman, while talking to climate leaders, international experts,
government officials and media at the Climate Change Leadership convention in
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
I was privileged to be invited to attend by the former
US VP Mr. Al Gore.
I came
away enriched and I must say I could compare India to Brazil, in more ways than
one. We have plenty of sunshine and so does Brazil, so much forest land just
like Brazil, but we in India need to fight for our forest land, our tree’s and
use sunshine which is free and powerful. What ever free space and open land we
have around you, lets keep alert and keep it open. Our residential areas have beautiful avenues of
trees and much jungle land left, hopefully it will stay intact. The message I
came away with was be global but think local. So look out for your homeland.!!
Mayalú sang
a traditional Kayapó war song to a appreciative crowd. " For me, caring
for nature is caring of my ancestors. The earth
is crying out to us to save her."
The Climate Reality Project announced its Road to
Paris effort today, a major international campaign that will bring together
citizens, business leaders, non-profit organizations, and NGOs to galvanize
climate action and encourage countries at December’s United Nations’ Framework
Convention on Climate Change’s 21st Conference of the Parties in
Paris to sign a strong emissions reductions agreement. This would include
meaningful emissions reductions commitments based on national circumstances, a
system of periodic review for these commitments, and a long-term goal of net
zero carbon emissions.
Road to Paris will focus on
mobilizing public support from the global community and citizens in eight
countries that hold strategic significance for the upcoming negotiations, as a
building block for a strong international agreement. Target countries include
Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, India, Philippines, South Africa, and the
United States. Climate Reality will also have a programmatic presence in Mexico
and Europe.
“The UN climate
negotiations in December mark a crucial opportunity for the international
community to come to a bold, universal agreement to make significant emissions
reductions commitments, including a long term goal for zero net carbon
emissions,” said former United States Vice President Al Gore, chairman of
Climate Reality. “But the Road to Paris will not end at COP21, and we
cannot afford to gamble with the future of our planet. Solutions to the climate
crisis are within reach, but in order to capture them, we must take urgent action
today across every level of society. Now is the time for people all over the
world to lend their voices to the cause and urge their leaders to take this
historic first step.”
Climate
Reality’s Road to Paris campaign will build on work the group has already
undertaken in each key country, including training new members of the Climate
Reality Leadership Corps and organizing support on the ground through local
branches. Local Climate Reality Leaders will run programs to address the unique
challenges and opportunities of each target country. With the support of
Climate Reality headquarters and in coordination with other environmental
groups, each branch will employ social/digital and earned media tactics to
educate and mobilize communities, hold events, and offer practical suggestions
for grassroots actions people can take to support and strengthen the
commitments of their national governments.
“This year
stands to be a critical turning point where the world comes together to address
climate change,” said Climate Reality President and CEO Ken Berlin. “As a
leading international climate organization with nearly 5,700 trained Climate
Reality Leaders in these eight countries alone, it is our responsibility to do
everything we can to help spur action around the globe, providing support and
guidance to the most critical players on the road to Paris.”
Climate Reality
will roll out individual country programs locally over the coming weeks.
Specific actions in each country will depend on the local political, economic,
and social landscape, and will take into account the country’s climate change
risk profile and opportunities for implementing solutions. Individual country
programs will also factor in what commitments a country has already made toward
the UN process; Climate Reality will urge some countries to make strong pledges
while holding others to the commitments they have already announced.
About The Climate Reality Project
The Climate
Reality Project is one of the world’s leading organizations dedicated to
mobilizing action around climate change. With a global movement more than 5
million strong and a grassroots network of trained Climate Reality Leaders, we
are spreading the truth and using cultural momentum to solve the climate
crisis. Former US Vice President and Nobel Laureate Al Gore is the Founder and
Chairman of The Climate Reality Project.
Green Discipline- an author coins a new discipline.
Green Discipline- an author coins a new
discipline.
Conservation
in every form can be brought about by ‘Green Discipline’ alone where the young
mind is at all times conscious about saving the planet through daily green
habits.
By
‘Green Discipline’, a term that Elsie Gabriel the author of the environment
education book Get Out Get Going Outdoors has grown to establish and coin among
field trip participants actually defines itself as - “Systematic inculcation of environmentally
friendly habits and enforcement of a course of action which lead to a
connectivity and sustainability of the environment is called Green Discipline.”
·
Parents are the first point of contact
for a child where Green discipling is concerned. For example,training in
throwing trash in the segregated ‘wet’ and ‘dry’ dustbins, not serving one self
more than one can eat at a table or even using both sides of a piece of paper.
Even recycling clothes or sneakers,wearing them more than just once or twice or
simply making them more purposeful by donating them to people who may find them
more useful,all are examples of tiny habits which contribute to the better of
the planet and each other.
·
Children usually do what they see,thus setting examples of green habits as
adults can help produce a specific character or pattern of behavior, especially
training that produces environmental improvement.
·
Adults can practice controlled behavior resulting from green training where
self-control plays a major role. If a father goes out for fishing trips or if a
mother takes the family on an outdoor picnic,these traditional family outdoor
environment social habits may get imbibed without even announcing them.Cleaning
over after the picnic and watching birds during fishing are also sub shoots of
outdoor green disciplinarily habits which may get impressed upon companions and
young adults who simply learn by watching behavior.
·
Green discipline is a course of actions leading to green goals or ideals. A
Green disciplined person is one that is willing to achieve an environmentally
friendly world at the expense of his or her individuality.
·
Green behaviour thus needs to be motivated through interactive community events
and practices.
The
people most involved with outdoor activities are the ones who do the most to
protect the natural resources they cherish. If as a parent you can get your
children to smell the fresh air outdoors more often,these very children will
perpetuate the habit of taking their children out when they become adults. Thus
the ‘Green Discipline’ is passed on from one generation to another.
Get
Out! Get Going! Outdoors! A book about outdoors environment education by
Elsie Gabriel is aimed at reaching out to citizens, parents,
students, young adults, educators, and children to enable them to
know about the value of environmental education and
outdoor environmental programmes which are fun and personality enhancing.
Supported
by ten years of research as a certified Green teacher
Elsie has immense experience in outdoor field trips which leads
participants to explore and develop a keen bonding with elements of nature. The
book protracts and catapults the fact that E.Q. [Environment
Quotient]is what can teach the next generation to invest in
conservation for future benefits.
Also endorsing the outdoor educational book is the Governor of Maharashtra,India K.Sankaranarayanan who has complimented the author, "It is our collective responsibility to bequeath to the future generation a healthy planet and quality of life. The author deserves compliments for her interactive approach to environment education as also for her commitment to the cause."
The book is also endorsed by Australian ecology educator R.A.Parton who says, "We have a wake up call for all of us to face up to a global catastrophe already gripping us in its misty fingers The point of this manuscript is that unless we all get to understand the issues at stake and make our voices heard, the big polluters will not take the action needed.".
Also endorsing the outdoor educational book is the Governor of Maharashtra,India K.Sankaranarayanan who has complimented the author, "It is our collective responsibility to bequeath to the future generation a healthy planet and quality of life. The author deserves compliments for her interactive approach to environment education as also for her commitment to the cause."
The book is also endorsed by Australian ecology educator R.A.Parton who says, "We have a wake up call for all of us to face up to a global catastrophe already gripping us in its misty fingers The point of this manuscript is that unless we all get to understand the issues at stake and make our voices heard, the big polluters will not take the action needed.".
The
book was launched by the Mayor of Mumbai Sunil Prabhu who said, “This is a powerful
teaching tool which should have been documented a long time ago. I can not
imagine a more urgent environment call out. Elsie Gabriel's appeal to become an
intrinsic embodiment of nature from the inside rather than man looking at
nature from the outside is well established."
Chapters
on Dendrology, Unstructured play outdoors, Civic sense, Safety outdoors and How to write an
environment or civic report outdoors will be found to be very valuable for
students and parents alike, specially in India where the subject of E.V.S or
Environmental science is no more a compulsory subject by academic boards.
The
book demonstrates how interactive events and projects which inculcate proactive
involvement from participants can actually build team spirit, resilience,
stamina and enhance life science knowledge. The environmental book calls out to
people to renew their faith in nature and the outside environment where a deep
connection with nature is surely revived. The aspect that environment is important
and that when participants literally use their senses of touch, sight, smell
and sound they become aware that it was the natural world that came into
existence first. The natural world bore us and nutured us and that we are an
equal part of nature thus eliminating any thought that we are disconnected. The
interactive book restores our faith in nature and that when we adults take our
own children outdoors we not only care for our off springs but also care for
the natural elements outside.
Elsie maps out a learning journey that begins with alternative teaching strategies and structured activities which will connect students with both the natural and built worlds. Environmental responsibility and wisdom is handled with acute detailing and the book is a welcome source in today’s world.
Elsie maps out a learning journey that begins with alternative teaching strategies and structured activities which will connect students with both the natural and built worlds. Environmental responsibility and wisdom is handled with acute detailing and the book is a welcome source in today’s world.
It
is the right season to simply get outdoors and discover biodiversity specially
in a world which is full of instant coffee and digital fixation, says Elsie
Gabriel founder of Young Environmentalists NGO of Powai, who is also a
photographer, scuba diver, excellent cook, world travel writer and blogger,
artist, environmentalists and now author. Elsie has authored an innovative book
to get people in India specially the student community outdoors, Get Out Get
Going Outdoors!
Celebrate World Environment day everyday!
Celebrate World Environment day everyday!
Tanya Satish
World
Environment Day June 5th was celebrated with much gusto by the Young Environmentalists
Programme Trust,Meluha the Fern ecotel Green Team and Climate Reality Project in association with the YES bank
and the Hiranandani group, Mumbai.
Seed
collection drives and tree plantations were conducted at Hiranandani Gardens
Powai Mumbai by citizens who came to support planet Earth.
The
Climate Reality Project is a non-profit organization involved in
education and advocacy related to climate change. The
project was established in July 2011 after the joining of two environmental
groups, The Alliance for Climate Protection and The Climate Project, which were
both founded in 2006 by Al Gore. In Mumbai Elsie
Gabriel Mentor of Climate Reality leadership teaches Climate change education
in communities, schools and colleges. Gabriel says, “We teach free of cost and
want more schools and teachers to join our programmes. We want the subject of
EVS ie environment science to be re-instated as main stream subject in schools
curriculum, why has it been discarded. With so much disasters and civic
problems we need the subject.”
Some
good examples of teaching lessons which are
interactive is shared here to give one an idea of how one can enhance the E.Q
which is Environment Quotient-
1.How
not to use Plastic bags. Ensure that the community awareness is created without
preaching but through free handouts of clothbags for instance. Worksheets
and certificates also boost the participants. Allow each group to bring
recyclable cloth materials and make or stitch the cloth bags and distribute the
same in markets and malls as well as local stalls.This is action oriented and
goal oriented too.
2. Tree plantations are common but carry out
all tree plantations through tree identification trails and science, explaining about the seeds
and technicalities of planting and taking care of them.This makes for a fun
trip outdoors and also promotes team building spirit.
3. Talk about pollution which harm the
planet.Take participants to identify and document pollution being caused in
their surroundings.Each one can complain and see that pollution in local areas
are stopped due to your action and coordination with the pollution authorities.
So, basically celebrate World Environment day
everyday, and make more people passionate about saving the earth from global
warming and climate change.
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