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Forget Dory And Remember The Horrors Of The Tropical Aquarium Trade  


Dory is a forgetful fish. That's the quirky defining quality of the blue tang that stars in Disney/Pixar's Finding Dory, which had the biggest opening weekend ever for an animated film. Dory can't remember anything for more than 10 seconds, not until recalling old memories of her parents in captivity starts her journey and ours.

Dory's amnesia is funny, and it's played for laughs by actress Ellen DeGeneres. But in real life, there's a darker story about royal blue tangs (the kind of fish that Dory is) and other tropical fish caught for the international aquarium trade. More than half of the 12 million fish imported annually into the United States are caught using cyanide poisoning that stuns them for easy capture but kills and injures millions of nearby fish and the corals they depend on.

As Finding Dory approached its June 17 release, some news articles warned people not to buy blue tangs, which must be caught wild and are notoriously difficult to keep healthy in a standard saltwater aquarium. It was an important message given how Finding Nemo created a huge demand for clownfish in 2003.

But the true horrors of the tropical aquarium trade go way beyond the momentary popularity of any particular species. Cyanide fishing in the Philippines, Indonesia, and other countries that export tropical fish kills about two fish for every one that survives to be sold in the U.S. - and even the survivors are likely to be unhealthy and die early. The cyanide squirted onto reefs also kills the corals and contributes to coral bleaching.

Earlier this year, environmental groups filed a legal petition to ban imports of wild fish captured using deadly cyanide. At least half of aquarium fish imported into the United States have been caught with cyanide, and the environmental damage is devastating, as detailed in the report: "Poisoned Waters: How Cyanide Fish and the Aquarium Trade are Devastating Coral Reefs and Tropical Fish."

Ironically, both Finding Dory and Finding Nemo tell stories that revolve around the main characters or their family members escaping from aquariums. They yearn to be reunited with their family or swim free in their Great Barrier Reef communities rather than be ogled at in aquariums in a dentist's office or research center. So it's strange that so many young moviegoers and their families would want to keep their very own Nemo or Dory.

I get that these are movie characters and this is the entertainment industry. And yet, there I can't help but feel there's an important moment here to highlight the truly sad story of how these lovable tropical fish are captured for the international aquarium trade - drugged by a lethal poison that leaves millions of fellow fish floating dead among ghostly white corals - then this issue might finally get the attention it deserves.

Cyanide fishing is a grim reality that we'd rather forget, yet it's one we can't continue to ignore.

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Climate Change: The Large Scale Impact of Small Scale Change  

William Kamkwamba presents at the EF Global Student Leaders Summit last March in Iceland. The conference focused on the future or energy.

By Nisha Chandra

The reporter's voice blares through the television, impassioned by a need for change and an anger at the world's stubborn ignorance. Sea levels rising at an alarming rate. A global surface temperature that won't stop increasing. Warmer oceans. Shrinking ice. Ocean acidification. A teenager sits reclined, listening to the broadcast with an open but weary mind. "I know", they think. "I know. But what do you want me to do about it?"

For many, the often discussed task of 'combating climate change' seems like a distant and intimidating goal. A goal detached from any concrete change that we, as young people, believe we are able to make. But for a mind like William Kamkwamba, a mind so given to small acts of progress, such a goal becomes an easy reality. As I sat transfixed at the EF Global Student Leaders Summit in Iceland last March, listening to him speak of his work with an unmistakable fervor, I watched about 700 teenagers begin to contemplate the idea that combating climate change does not always need to occur through grand acts of scientific invention or profound discovery, but instead can often stem from making small scale changes with large scale impacts.

As a young boy growing up in Malawi, Mr. Kamkwamba witnessed firsthand what life was like without energy and clean water. During an exceptionally long and harsh drought, people were dying in his village. He says that "they were dropping down to nothing," and that "it was a future he could not accept." At age 14, with a mind fueled by creativity, he was able to create a windmill using scraps and spare parts from a junkyard to power his family home. This dream, to bring power to his home, soon became a dream for the village, to bring electricity to the whole community. With growing confidence and an unshakable tenacity, Mr. Kamkwamba built more windmills out of old spare parts and materials to light all of the homes in his compound, going from generating 12 watts to 200. His next projects would focus on clean water, malaria prevention, and solar power lighting for all of the homes in his compound. His work required a stubborn dedication to learning about and implementing clean energy. And much more than that - a dedication to making sure that his community would never have to suffer that way again. This incredible story is detailed in his best-selling book, The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind.

While at the Global Student Leaders Summit, I had the chance to introduce Mr. Kamkwamba on stage. But as I stood up there, making fleeting eye contact with the sea of teenagers who had likely heard about the potential impact of their actions so many times that it risked losing its meaning, I wondered if I myself knew what exactly this "impact" meant. For many devoted to energy sustainability, global impact is undoubtedly the end goal. But I began to realize that such progress comes about by a series of smaller scale impacts, carried out by those who want to see concrete change not just in the world at large, but in the world at their fingertips. Hearing Mr. Kamkwamba address all 700 of us, and later getting a chance to speak with him one-on-one, it became clear that I was underestimating the potential impact of smaller-scale change - and all of a sudden my perspective on "impact" became so much clearer.

Mr. Kamkwamba stressed the point that when it comes to the environment around you, "you can't just wait for someone else to come in and solve your problems." Nobody knows your community better than you, and nobody understands what is needed for its improvement better than you. Although the idea of innovation is universal, some of the most far reaching projects "start off specific to each community" he said, wanting every student to understand where local solutions come from. A solution may arise from a scientist experimenting with fusion, but it may also arise from a young boy sitting in his room creating a windmill out of bicycle parts and old pipes.

Several months after departing from Iceland, Mr. Kamkwamba's words have stayed with me. As I returned to school, I carried with me the reluctance of leaving behind an incredible experience along with the conviction that I must now lend myself to "starting small." Since then, I've been working with two other students in my class (who also attended the EF Iceland Summit) to convert our school campus to renewable energy by the means of a windmill. For students who spend the majority of their days in our school building, this project is about as local as it gets. We researched the markets, vendors, and feasibility of such a process, hoping to make the same kind of concrete change Mr. Kamkwamba praised.

Unfortunately, we were recently told that the installation of a windmill would be both impractical and unlikely, effectively ending that pursuit. But, as was mentioned countless times over the two days at the conference, true strides in clean energy would not be possible without failing, and failing fast. We hope to continue pushing, until our school community benefits from renewable energy just as Mr. Kamkwamba's village did so many years ago.

When it comes to combating climate change, no special qualifications are needed. In fields of continuous innovation such as sustainable energy, there are countless big ideas. But just as important are the small ideas, the ones that bud in your mind and gradually turn into small actions. These often may seem irrelevant, but they truly are essential. William Kamkwamba claims that "challenges are opportunities waiting for you to explore them." So go explore!

Nisha Chandra is a rising high school senior from Connecticut

This post is part of a series produced by The Huffington Post and EF Educational Tours about the recent EF Global Student Leaders Summit, which explored the future of energy from Iceland. The Summit Series combines educational travel with a two-day leadership conference, and asks students to tackle global challenges in places where those challenges are notably present or well-addressed. To view all posts in the series, visit here.

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Biologists explain function of Pentagone  
How do the cells in a human embryo know where they are located in the body and how they should develop? Why do certain cells form a finger while others do not? Biologists have explained the mechanisms that control these steps by showing why veins form at particular points in the wing of a fruit fly. The protein Pentagone spreads a particular signal in the wing that tells the cells how to behave.  
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'Green News Report' - June 28, 2016  
The Green News Report is also available via...





IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: More deadly floods, this time in West Virginia; Raging wildfire kills two in California, destroys hundreds of homes; Brexit could undermine international emissions agreement; Volkswagen to pay $15 billion in emissions cheating scandal; PLUS: TransCanada demands $15 billion from U.S. for rejecting Keystone XL pipeline... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

Listen online here, or Download MP3 (6 mins)...

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Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): The inter-generational theft of Brexit and climate change; From Brexit to Climate, Little Engagement From Young People Washington State Must Fix Salmon-Blocking Pipes: Appeals Court; Study Finds Drilling and Fracking into Freshwater Formations; BP Oil Spill Cost Fishing Industry At Least $94.7 Million In 2010; Africa's Charcoal Economy Is Cooking. The Trees Are Paying... PLUS: How The Battery Revolution Will Change How You Fly... and much, MUCH more! ...

'Green News Report' is heard on many fine radio stations around the country. For additional info on stories we covered today, plus today's 'Green News Extra', please click right here to listen!

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Is Graphite The Next Big Thing In The World Of Alternative Energy?  



Climate change is upon us. It needs to be addressed and be a priority. Searching for sources of alternative energy is an important topic and there is an important mineral that can potentially make a huge difference for future generations.

For several years now, I enjoy getting business advice from CVMR Corporation (CVMR) CEO Kamran Khozan. His firm CVMR has a nanotech and metallurgical expertise in Graphite and Graphene. Graphite which is also known as meta-anthracite is considered to be the highest grade of coal. CEO Kamran has been working through his firm on impact innovations specifically in the graphite industry, something that I had never expected has applications in the field of alternative energy. It is ironic to think that something as dirty as coal can be used for clean technology.

CVMR announced last year that it had developed two new ways of producing Graphite and Graphene. First is by way of Anthracite beneficiation using far less energy in the operation than current processes require, and second is by cracking methane gas. The company recently announced that it has developed sponges, blocks, flakes and powders made of graphite that can be utilized in several industrial applications. It can endure heat up to a maximum of 3,000° C, and under the right conditions could even store and absorb it. Graphite is also very difficult to ignite. It is especially useful to different industries because they are flame retardant; chemically inert; strong and stable at high temperatures; can absorb vapors, gases and radio waves; resistant to corrosion and chemicals; has a high electrical and thermal conductivity; self-lubricating; and possesses the flexibility of filaments and stiffness of solids.

It could be the perfect alternative to Silicon or CIGS (copper-indium-gallium-selenide). Most of us know that Silicon and CIGS are two of the materials that can convert solar power into heat energy. Compared to Silicon or CIGS, graphite is cheaper as it is commonly used for our pencils. Think of the possibilities and advantages of using graphite instead of silicon or CIGS in the production of a solar power receptor.

CVMR, in cooperation with its sister company, M-Power Corporation, has also invented a series of electricity generating units that can provide electricity from solar heat, using graphite blocks as heat collectors and storage units. This is a true paradigm shift in generating electricity from the sunlight and even from the ambient air in certain places. The units have no moving parts, use graphite to collect heat and convert it to energy without any noise, or other kinds of pollution. This is truly a game changer in the field of renewable energy.

New sources of graphite are continuously being discovered. There are prospective high-quality resources in North America and Sri Lanka. Other countries that can also be new sources are Africa, Indonesia and Australia.

Experts forecast that the consumption of Graphite, in all its forms, will increase by 2020. It was also predicted that there will be a continued shift in the graphite market. Although these predictions are something to look forward to in the coming years, we have to remember that one mineral could only do so much for our planet. We have to dig deeper, figuratively and literally, to find more and alternative sources of energy.

Image: Graphite
Image credit: Henk Caspers/Naturalis Biodiversity Center [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

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Why Should A Jaguar Be Displayed As A Mascot To Begin With?  
Yet again we face a tragedy involving captive animals. After an Olympic torch lighting event in Manaus, Juma a 17-year-old jaguar was shot and killed.

According to a statement issued by the military, the jaguar escaped as she was being returned to her cage shortly after the event. After being shot with tranquilizers, ineffectively, the animal eventually moved towards a soldier, at which point the jaguar was shot in the head and killed -- in order to preserve human life, according to the military.

This is a shameful incident, and reactions have been reverberating across the globe, mainly because the species is the symbol for the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro this August.

We must discuss two issues. We should begin by addressing this specific case, and then talk about the confinement of wild animals.



Although we don't have detailed information about what happened, one thing is clear: If the jaguar did in fact escape, someone made a huge mistake. We are talking about a predator that poses risks to human life under stressful situations. An event involving fireworks and excessive noise isn't a suitable environment for a wild animal of this size. How did she escape the enclosure?

The main line of inquiry should not focus on why the animal was shot, but rather what happened leading up to that unfortunate moment.

Regarding the shooting, despite the controversy, if there was actually a risk to human beings, sadly there was nothing else to do. I strongly believe that the decision was a tough and painful one, because the military men seem quite fond of their animals. But the main line of inquiry should not focus on why the animal was shot, but rather what happened leading up to that unfortunate moment.

What sequence of mistakes led to this tragic ending? We must have more detailed information about what happened during its chase. A tranquilizer shot could cause more stress to the animal. We must find out if the person responsible for preparing the chemical mix used the right dosage, and if the soldiers had been prepared for this type of incident. We must also find out if the safe distance between the military men and the animal was respected when the jaguar was shot. We would like to believe that both answers are affirmative, but military agencies must give us further information.

This tragedy joins a list of other incidents, such as the case of Harambe, the gorilla who died in the Cincinatti Zoo, and the lions shot dead in Chile after a man had entered the cage to commit suicide.



Some of these incidents have raised a heated debate about whether or not zoos are necessary. First of all, we must say that zoos fulfill a very important function for the conservation of wildlife. Apart from the obvious function of environmental education, the breeding programs and the genetic studies done on animals in captivity result in material of immeasurable value for the reintroduction of species and fauna recovery programs. In addition, zoos are responsible for funding wildlife conservation projects worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

Backing the extinction of zoos comes as a result of a mix of romanticism and total misinformation. We obviously need to discuss the practices of many establishments, but that does not justify the complete elimination of this activity.

I can't help but wonder: What is the message conveyed by exposing a live animal as a mascot in front of a crowd?

In the case of Juma, however, the debate must go way beyond that. Although Brazil's Jungle Warfare Instruction Center (CIGS) keeps a zoo for animals rescued from hunting and trafficking, many of which cannot be reintroduced into nature, I can't help but wonder: What is the message conveyed by exposing a live animal as a mascot in front of a crowd?

Could it be a message of environmental education or protection? I don't think so. For me, the message conveyed is that of the domination of human beings over animals, clearly illustrated by the picture of the two military men holding Juma by a chain. We must reconsider, and decide if this kind of conduct is appropriate.

I am not saying that to keep these species domesticated or in captivity is always a mistake. Not all "domination" is bad. The Onça Pintada Institute (Jaguar Institute), coordinated by Dr. Leandro Silveira, is an exemplary institution that, besides conducting field research, leads excellent activities for captive jaguars, most of them orphaned due to hunting practices. The Jungle Warfare Instruction Center itself keeps wild animals for protection purposes and is therefore praiseworthy -- but that is not enough. Public display, especially in these conditions, does not seem appropriate. If one must take further actions, the most important would be to enable CIGS to reintroduce such species into nature.

I hope this sad incident can inspire change. Ideally, all this uproar about a single animal should also be used to mobilize society at large to protest against the reduction of the population of this species. In just 30 years, we have lost 27 percent of our jaguars. Many Jumas, sadly, remain invisible.

This post first appeared on HuffPost Brazil. It has been translated into English and edited for clarity.

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The Melting Arctic Ice Calls For Protecting What I Love  
Last week I visited the Svalbard archipelago in the northern Barents Sea to bear witness to the rapid changes occurring in the Arctic. In many ways, the Arctic is the frontline of dramatic environmental changes that will impact everyone.

Until recently, the northern Barents Sea, one of Earth's last pristine environments, had been safely protected with ice cover. However, this is no longer the case. Due to the effects of climate change, sea ice is melting, the area is changing dramatically, and a new ocean is opening up. This enables the oil and fishing industries to expand into the far North.

This far away land and its seas are no longer what they used to be and are surprisingly not protected. Norway, due to its role in deciding what happens in these waters, has a key part to play. If we are to retain what we have left, and make the area more able to be resilient in the face of the changing climate, the Norwegian government must make the waters a marine protected area. Up to now, however it has shown a lack of political will to do so.

Giant Fishing Trawlers Bulldozing The Sea

Having spent 20 plus years as a climate campaigner, I didn't travel to the Arctic with rose-colored glasses. I knew the ice was melting. The Earth's 2015 surface temperatures were the warmest since modern record keeping began in 1880, according to independent analyses by NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). NASA reports that spring 2016 was the hottest recorded in the Northern hemisphere.

With the Arctic warming twice as fast as the rest of the world, the ancient glaciers of Svalbard are retreating. Witnessing the ice melt--with my own eyes in my new role as Executive Director, Greenpeace International--I imagined the day in just a short few decades when the Arctic will have ice-free summers and it petrified me.

Climate change is opening up the northern Barents Sea and the fishing industry is advancing further to the North each year. Which means previously untouched areas are turning into a new hunting ground. Dozens of giant trawlers are already above the 78th parallel, a historic development.

This industry is using bottom trawling as part of their practice. Bottom trawling does not mean just taking cod; it is like clear-cutting forests but underwater. The trawlers carry 100-metres long nets weighing with heavy metal rollers that smash everything in their path. They are like bulldozers of the sea. Fragile seabed communities of sea pens and corals that need decades to grow can be wiped out in seconds. And with the industry, comes trash.

Arctic Islands Are Covered With Trash

Probably like most people who don't live here, I imagined this part of the Arctic as a land of ice and snow with limited traces of human beings. I expected to see more glaciers and more majestic ranges covered in white. Instead our Greenpeace crew, campaign team and the three winners of our poster competition, found trash.

I wasn't sure how much trash we would find, but at the end of day one we had collected a large mound of trash--buoys, fishing nets, rope, glass, plastic bottles and more. The recurring piece of trash though was shoes--was this a message about our human footprint?

For Svalbard, it is estimated that about 80 percent of the trash washed ashore comes from industrial fishing. In annual Barents Sea fisheries surveys the highest litter counts coincide with areas of intensive fishery and shipping.

These items are not only a blight on the landscape, they are dangerous. Reindeer, polar bears and other animals get entangled in old fishing nets and suffocate. Birds consume toxic particles of plastic. Plastics can carry pollutants that, if ingested, may also accumulate through the food chain.

As part of our 'Protect What You Love' campaign, the team decided to organize a beach clean up to raise awareness about the consequences of bottom trawling and the trash left behind by the fishing industry.

According to UNESCO, globally, up to 1 million seabirds and 100,000 marine mammals and sea turtles die each year from eating plastic or getting entangled in plastic debris.

Urgent Need for Legal Protection

This unequivocal destruction of the underwater ecologies is legal. The current protected areas cover just a small part of unique marine habitats, and the rest is open for destructive oil production and industrial fishing.

For now, some of the world's largest seafood and fishing companies have committed to not expand their search for cod into large, previously un-fished areas in the northern Barents Sea in the Norwegian Arctic.

The initiative, brokered by Greenpeace, marks the first time an entire industry has collectively called for Arctic protection--in the absence of legal protection in these areas.

The agreement states that any fishing company expanding into the agreed to Arctic waters will not be able to sell their cod to a number of major seafood brands and retailers. But the agreement, though in good faith, is voluntary.

Our environment--whether it is the Arctic or the Amazon--needs protecting. I believe the Arctic waters are crucial for the life of our planet and should be protected.

The Norwegian government needs to act fast to ensure these previously untouched areas of the northern Barents Sea are protected and any expansion of fishing is stopped.

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Conservation key to curbing emissions from palm oil agriculture in Africa  
As oil palm production expands from Southeast Asia into Central Africa, a new study finds that converting Africa's forests into monoculture plantations could trigger significant carbon emissions unless governments enact mandatory policies regulating which forests can be cleared and how much remaining forest must be set aside for conservation. Developing only low-carbon forests and requiring that one acre be set aside for every 2.6 acres put into production will be essential for achieving net-zero emissions.  
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Beautifully preserved feathers belonged to tiny flying dinosaurs  
Detailed amber fossils of wings from dinosaurs just 3.5 centimetres long suggest they flew like today's birds. Such finds let us probe how flight evolved  
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TransCanada Files $15 billion NAFTA Case Against The U.S. Demonstrating Corporate Trade Deal Threats  


TransCanada, the company behind the infamous Keystone XL pipeline, just demonstrated the dangers that corporate trade pacts pose to communities and to our air, water, and climate.

On June 24, the Canadian oil company filed a trade case against the U.S. seeking more than $15 billion in damages from American taxpayers as compensation for the rejection of the Keystone XL pipeline that spared us the threat of increased climate disruption and spills of dirty tar sands oil.

TransCanada is able to bring this case thanks to rules in the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) -- rules that would be expanded in the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) pact -- that give foreign corporations, including big polluters, expansive rights to challenge environmental protections in unaccountable trade tribunals. In fact, TransCanada's case against the U.S. will be heard before a private trade tribunal with no accountability to our domestic legal system.

Here are 4 key pieces of information you should know in order to fully understand the implications of this case.

1) TransCanada's case is not an anomaly. Foreign investors -- including Shell, BP, Chevron, and ExxonMobil -- have already launched nearly 700 of these so-called "investor-state cases" against the policies of more than 100 governments. These cases have challenged for example, a moratorium on fracking in Quebec, a court order to pay for oil pollution in Ecuador, an environmental panel's decision to reject a mining project in Canada, and a decision to phase out nuclear energy in Germany.

And while all sorts of public interest policies are at risk, environmental policies have been a favorite target of corporations. Half of the new investor-state cases in 2014 targeted policies affecting power generation, mining, or oil and gas extraction. In the first five months of this year, mining corporations used private trade and investment tribunals every 2.5 weeks on average to launch, advance, or win cases against mining restrictions in Latin America alone.

2) The Trans-Pacific Partnership could mean an explosion of new cases. While investor-state cases are being used far too often to challenge policies to protect our air, water, and climate, what we've seen so far could be just the tip of the iceberg if the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a new proposed trade agreement, were approved by the U.S. Congress.

The TPP would expand nearly the same exact corporate tribunal system that TransCanada is using more than any past U.S. trade deal, roughly doubling the number of corporations that could follow TransCanada's example and could challenge U.S. climate and environmental safeguards in private tribunals. That includes big polluters like the U.S. subsidiaries of BHP Billiton, one of the world's largest greenhouse gas emitters and one of the U.S.'s largest foreign investors in fracking and offshore drilling.

In fact, the TPP would nearly double the number of foreign fracking corporations that could challenge new U.S. fracking restrictions in unaccountable tribunals, and it would enable oil and gas corporations with nearly one million acres' worth of U.S. offshore drilling leases to use this private tribunal system to try to undermine new offshore drilling restrictions.

3. TransCanada's case has implications beyond the KXL pipeline. TransCanada's NAFTA case will not reverse the Keystone XL decision: Keystone is dead, thanks to years of organizing by a diverse and dogged movement. However, the case could put taxpayers--to the tune of $100 per each individual tax return -- on the hook for the Keystone XL rejection.

Equally troubling, however, is the signal that this case may send to our or other governments considering rejection of a dirty fossil fuel project. And, as we noted in our report, Climate Roadblocks, law firms specializing in these cases are now explicitly advising "foreign investors operating in the energy sector" that they could use these tribunals "as a tool to assist lobbying efforts to prevent wrongful regulatory change."

This is another powerful reason why we can't expand this system of corporate rights through the TPP.

4. You can join the growing fight against corporate trade deals. Opposition to the TPP is steadily growing. Last month, more than 450 environmental, landowner, Indigenous rights, and allied organizations sent a letter to Congress warning that pending trade deals like the TPP threaten efforts to keep fossil fuels in the ground.

Passionate activists and diverse partners came together to defeat the Keystone XL pipeline, and we can defeat the Trans-Pacific Partnership - with your help. Take action here to ask your members of Congress to commit to vote no to the TPP, and join the growing movement calling for a new model of trade that puts the health and safety of people before the profits of big corporations that are already polluting our air and water.

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Fungi can be used to control filth fly adults, reduce egg laying  
Researchers have found that commercial formulations containing entomopathogenic fungi can not only help to control adult house flies and stable flies, but can also inhibit egg laying and larval development.  
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Previously unknown global ecological disaster discovered  
There have been several mass extinctions in the history of the earth with adverse consequences for the environment. Researchers have now uncovered another disaster that took place around 250 million years ago and completely changed the prevalent vegetation during the Lower Triassic.  
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Giving Ugly Fruits And Vegetables A Chance Will Make Us Better Citizens  
Ugliness has always been linked to nastiness and perversion. We've all seen the typecasts of the handsome good guy and the unattractive bad guy in Hollywood movies over the years. (Somehow, this formula is not as straightforward when it comes to the representation of female characters -- evil or malicious women can also have seductive attributes.)

Ugly fruits and vegetables are morally discriminated against. That is, they are treated with prejudice because of their unattractive appearance. As a result, 1.3 billion tons of food are tossed in the trash around the world every year.

These ugly fruits and vegetables can't compare with the dominant canon of fruits and vegetables. The latter look beautiful, and with their appearance comes an expectation for succulent tastes. As a result, millions of food items are pushed aside and thrown in dumps because they do not meet the aesthetic criteria of shape and color. Such aesthetic requirements are dictated by consumers and by retailer prerequisites. It is therefore more profitable to have identical merchandise that is easier to pack and store. For this reason, large-scale harvesters automatically get rid of vegetables and fruits that fall from grace.

There's an assumption that beauty and quality are connected by an unbreakable bond.

In my view, the criteria for what is ugly or beautiful is controversial. Some vegetables deviate from the required criteria -- these may include: An attractive carrot with two heads, a tomato with a horn, a twisted pepper, a gigantic and crooked cucumber or zucchini, sunburned Swiss chard or some spinach with tips weakened and rendered pale by the harsh sunlight.



But what is or is not acceptable is a cultural matter, and therefore can be changed. The differences we see in shape and color within one plant group (among apples, for example) makes us believe that ugly and beautiful fruits and vegetables will taste differently; the ugly ones will not be as tasty and may even be harmful for your stomach and health. There's an assumption that beauty and quality are connected by an unbreakable bond. Ugly fruits and vegetables are surrounded by negative stereotypes that breed fear and suspicion.

More and more people are becoming aware of this absurd discrimination against ugly vegetables, and the associated waste of tons of produce. For example, a well-known European supermarket chain has taken on the challenge of giving authentic rights to unattractive fruits and vegetables by offering them at more attractive prices. They are giving vegetables the right to be consumed, independently of their color or shape, and to be enjoyed without prejudice or discrimination. This initiative is undoubtedly inspired by the efforts of the European Union (2014 was the European year against food waste).

In my opinion, awareness, the feeling of self-efficiency, and responsibility are necessary ingredients for action and therefore for citizens' political participation.

There is a similar project run by the Portuguese company Fruta Horrible (Horrible Fruit), which uses ugly foods to help families who cannot pay full prices at the supermarkets.

It's obvious that the initiative by the supermarket chain mentioned above is based on commercial interests; interests that, without a doubt, we consider as legitimate. We look at this project from a pragmatic point of view: If it expands, if many other chains join this commercial adventure, many people around the world would have the opportunity to eat fruits and vegetables on a daily basis, and not only every once in a while.

Movements emerging in major cities, such as the ugly food movement, are very inspiring. This countercultural gesture subverts the relationship between the attractiveness of the food and its ability to nourish. If this movement grows, it would have obvious consequences for food, but it would also have a significant impact on the beliefs and attitudes of many human beings.

In my opinion, awareness, the feeling of self-efficiency, and responsibility are necessary ingredients for action and therefore for citizens' political participation.

Maybe our country would like to participate and launch campaigns so that consumers, distributors and sellers modify their beliefs and give ugliness a chance.

This post first appeared on HuffPost Spain. It has been translated into English and edited for clarity.

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CBP Agriculture Specialists at Anzalduas International Bridge Seize an Elephant Skull  

CBP Photography posted a photo:

ANZALDUAS, Texas Agriculture specialists with U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Office of Field Operations (OFO) at the Hidalgo/Pharr/Anzalduas Port of Entry have intercepted and seized an elephant skull that lacked proper ownership and exportation documentation, as required under U.S. and international law. Our CBP officers and agriculture specialists partner with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) to enforce federal wildlife laws that protect vulnerable and endangered species.
Photo provided by U.S. Customs and Border Protection

 
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Beige  

AlbertoRossini posted a photo:

 
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Red Panda  

Mathias Appel posted a photo:

Reupload. Edited it a little differently.

 
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Huge newfound deposit of helium will keep MRI scanners running  
Helium prospectors have uncovered a massive source of the vanishing gas, vital for MRI scanners, the Large Hadron Collider, NASA rocket fuel… and balloons  
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Land snail (Catinell  

Land snail (Catinella avara) collected in Rouge National Urban Park, Ontario, Canada, and photographed at the Centre for Biodiversity Genomics (sample ID: BIOUG13756-C08; specimen record: http://www.boldsystems.org/index.php/Public_RecordView?processid=SSROB5543-14; BIN: http://www.boldsystems.org/index.php/Public_BarcodeCluster?clusteruri=BOLD:ACI3602)

 
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Sustainable Fisheries: OneHealth of Future Food  


As a benefit to human and environmental health, sustainable and not linear fisheries must be employed to feed a shrinking world. We must utilize economic stimulus, more regulation in developing world fisheries, and a higher barrier to entry for susceptible categories of farm raised fish to preserve sea protein as a cornerstone of survival. The window to act lies squarely in our laps despite the recourse, potentially catastrophic, being primed for adoption by our kids.

2.9 Billion people around the Globe are reliant on seafood as a main source of nourishment. Now, fished at unmitigated scale - the same practices used in harvesting this crop from once bountiful Oceans are depleting stocks and biodiversity at an alarming rate. The backlash to this will have drastic impact on us in the United States whether you like it or not! This production model of food is not much different than the hunter-and-gather approach employed by our a primal ancestors. Not many give thought as they wolf down their sashimi that fishing the Oceans has seen limited large scale systems innovation, and is based the falsehood that Oceans are an inexhaustible resource. Modern fishing technologies focus on easier and faster methods to take, but not replenish a required ecosystem balance that depleting practices have greatly disrupted.


VIDEO: Sustainable Fisheries: Part 1

Overexploitation is a constant for in global fisheries for how long? In 2012, 80 million tons of sea protein was landed, and but a fraction was replenished through our assistance. The solution is pretty straightforward - despite being a monumental task. We must partake in being part of natural order by giving back to the sea simply so it can continue to sustain our species, and more broadly, to maintain a stable environment. Long horizon economics present a pretty clear value proposition. And, similarly to addressing climate change and sea level rise (directly correlated initiatives to sustainable fisheries), if we do not heed the warnings we're destined catastrophic backlash of epic proportion. But, there's opportunity to better connect immediate impact to economic stimulus through focus on a Blue economy streamlined in the developed world. The only future for future fisheries is a more sustainable one, and that must now be instigated by us; it's mankind's duty and opportunity.

In 2010, a significant threshold was crossed when more than 50% of total fish consumed was farm raised. With total volumes doubling since the mid-90s - the virtue of this is a bit of a falsehood often used to justify broader unsustainable methods in all sea protein production. A large portion of farm-raised come from pillaging natural fish stocks of young and/or roe without replenishment with diverse ecological footprint. What's proving worse, the vast majority of feedstuff provided to these farm raised fish, especially those higher on the food chain, come from detrimental fishing practice with no mind of sustainable practice in feeding carnivore, omnivore or herbivore alike. Furthermore, the vast majority of fisheries and hatcheries farm raising sea proteins employ deplorable and unhealthy living conditions for the fish they raise.


VIDEO: Sustainable Fisheries: Part 2

Equivalent to terrestrial animal CAFO (feedlot environments) conditions, fish live in disease infested waters teeming fecal matter and no biomimetic method of cleaning. Instead of evolving the system to make living conditions better and healthier for the animals - fisheries and material providers have instead focused on using antibiotics or genetic engineering to build resistance to current unhealthy farm environments. Similar to the concept of OneHealth discussed in the Resilient Agriculture section, even if the inhumane treatment of fish is not top on your priority list - since we are what we eat - you should care about the integrity of the stock, and equally how that protein is raised as it has immediate impact on your wellbeing.

Embracing our mounting waste-streams and that of the imprint on planetary boundaries through changing shortcut practices putting us in harm's way in the first place, we must adopt an evolution in fishery practice as a necessity. If not, markets reaching globally will lay witness to the impact of diminishing ecological capacity and environmental instability on polluted or sterilized waters. With this as an inevitable reality to be incurred within the next few decades, and probably expedited if generations to come continue with our business-as-usual approach, it's nearly impossible to call the current broadly used sea-caught and farm raised models a sound economic play.

Hailing from the Northeast United States, I live in a bellwether of global sustainable fisheries. But even there, where only 10% of seafood consumed in the region comes from local waters, there's immediate opportunity to decommoditize sea proteins coming from the thriving waters of the North Atlantic. Ripe and ready for new business and technology, focus on a better and future Blue Economy that services the 35mm populous of New England and New York already increasingly engaged in the provenance of the food they consume is a pragmatic model to gain more attention to the importance of sustainable fisheries. Methods of sharing best practices and developing greater mindshare through economic development affords insight in dealing with the inevitability on a shared horizon. Effectively, how we sustain ourselves on a shrinking planet needs numerous perspectives, but creative economic drivers now will have broad impact on future sustainable seafood production continuing to feed half the world's population.

www.AaronNiederhelman.com

Photo credits: Melissa DiPalma and Byron Niederhelman

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Brexit Of Champions: If You Don't Set The Menu, You're On The Menu  
Our poor British comrades, caught between nostalgia and exasperation, democracy and inequity (sound familiar?). The Brexit vote shows why politicians who call for these referendums try to avoid actually holding them: people tend to see it as a chance to punish the otherwise unaccountable political class. The new global normal of mass migrations, debt, low wages, stagnant economies and the steady hemorrhaging of the middle class might be easier for voters to bear if the pain was not accompanied by the greatest concentration of wealth in the history of capitalism.

The masses are pissed off.

Ever since Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher teamed up to destroy our public sphere, liberals and conservatives on both sides of the Atlantic have doggedly obeyed the neoliberal measures called for by the massive monopolies controlling the world's "free trade." This has earned politicians the distrust and disgust of most of the citizenry, pretty much everywhere. Far right parties are on the rise, offering up an intoxicating cocktail of bigotry and nationalism to blunt the hangover from a three decade binge on globalization. The day of the Brexit, Donald Trump channeled Europe's far-right discourse:

People want to take their country back. They want to have independence, in a sense. You see it with Europe, all over Europe. You're going to have more... many other cases where they want to take their borders back, they want to take their monetary back, they want to take a lot of things back. They want to be able to have a country again. So I think you're going to have this happen more and more... I think it's happening in the United States.

Trump supporters tend to see career politicians and big government as keeping America from being "great again." Those supporting Bernie Sanders see the entire plutocracy as the problem. Clinton's supporters are mostly scared of Trump.

What does all this men for the food insecurity now affecting 1 in 7 people?

Because the root cause of hunger and food insecurity is poverty it means that the candidate that has the most coherent anti-poverty platform will do the most to end hunger in the richest, most productive country in the world. Of course, neither Trump, Bernie nor Hillary is campaigning on a pro-poverty platform. But how will their policies (or lack of them) affect the poor?

For a Trump presidency, the indicator is Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan. Despite his bluster, it is very unlikely that Donald Trump has the congressional connections or political acumen to do anything structurally original once he's in the White House. Even if Trump actually does convince the Mexican government to pay for a Great Wall, the policy default will be Ryan, whose regressive views on welfare, healthcare and the poor are well known. Hillary has, well, a spotty record on these issues. While she is backing away now, her support for free trade agreements has done little to support local economies. It is unlikely she will advance a pro-poverty agenda if it means compromising her Wall Street connections. Bernie Sanders is clearly pro-poor and anti-rich. However, none of the candidates has specifically addressed the issue of hunger or food.

There is a campaign to address the plight of the US's food insecure called Plate of the Union that petitions the next president to ensure healthy food access to all people living in the US. While the petition does not indicate what specific food policies the president should pursue--nor does it indicate which policies are pro-poor--it is an important initiative because it calls for citizens to engage politically in the food system. Why is this important?

Because despite its stridence, the populism of the far right is essentially against politics--thus leaving our society open to even more manipulation by the plutocracy. If, we want to end hunger, political engagement is essential. This is true for a Trump presidency (that will greatly increase the power of Speaker of the House Paul Ryan), or a Clinton presidency (that will require enormous pressure to keep her compass firmly on the poor rather than on Wall Street). Because Sanders is basically out of the running, his value is in politicizing the issues--especially poverty and food.

Unless we "set the menu" by engaging politically to change our food system, we will find ourselves on the menu of either the regressive politics of the far right or the neoliberal politics of the established Democratic party. Let the Brexit be warning.

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Ladykiller: Artificial sweetener proves deadly for female flies  
In testing multiple artificial sweeteners, a research team found that one was particularly deadly for female fruit flies -- and left males relatively untouched. D-mannitol is a sweetener typically used to sweeten gum or add a coating to hard candy or dried fruit for those with diabetes.  
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Metabolic flexibility and immune defenses may influence species spread  
Why most species are rare has long interested biologists, but until recently our understanding of the factors driving differences in range size has been limited. New research suggests metabolic flexibility and the immune response may both influence how rare or common a species is.  
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