e2 - Eye on Earth, a service of
World Watch Magazine in partnership with the
Blue Moon Fund, provides our community with a unique perspective on current events, newly released studies, and important global trends. This update service offers context to critical world events that are seemingly disparate yet often closely related, highlighting the connections between human consumption and the natural world, while telling the stories of individuals and organizations that are supporting new approaches to resource use, energy use and urban development. Eye on Earth presents the news of today with an eye towards tomorrow, illustrating how current events will shape our own future and that of generations to come.
On December 28, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) released a draft risk assessment declaring that the meat and milk of cloned cattle, pigs, goats, and their offspring is “as safe to eat as food from conventionally bred animals.”
The director general of the World Conservation Union (IUCN), a leading global conservation organization, issued a notice to the group’s members in December reaffirming a call for a moratorium on genetically modified organisms (GMOs).
In early December, I had the honor of participating in the Japan Global Youth Exchange, a unique program sponsored by the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Tokyo. As the American representative to the program, I joined a small group of young people (ages 20–35) from 30 countries to discuss the complicated relationship between environmental issues and economic development. Through intensive discussions, we developed and agreed on a proposal that acknowledges the current gap between environmental resources and the economic status quo and makes recommendations for moving forward in a more sustainable manner.
American author and illustrator Lynne Cherry spoke about her passion for conservation and her experience writing environmentally themed children’s books at a talk in Washington, D.C., on December 12.
By permitting oil exploration on indigenous lands, the government of Belize is violating international human rights law and possibly several other international treaties, according to the environmental group Global Response.
After scouring China’s Yangtze River for six weeks, a team of international experts has declared the baiji, a rare white river dolphin, “functionally extinct,” according to a statement issued by the group.
For the first time, scientists have produced a photovoltaic (PV) cell with a conversion efficiency of 40.7 percent, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) reported on December 7.
The San people of Botswana, a hunter-gatherer group also known as the "Bushmen," have won a historic court case granting them rights to ancestral lands they were driven off in 2002, the BBC reported on December 13.
Poverty and sustainable development must be addressed jointly to ensure both long-term environmental protection and poverty reduction, according to Stephen R. Tyler, author of the new book
Comanagement of Natural Resources: Local Learning for Poverty Reduction.
The consumerism and waste of the holiday season can be enough to make any environmentalist lose holiday cheer. Fortunately, whether you’re shopping for grandma and grandpa, your niece and nephew, teachers or co-workers, or other friends and relatives, you
can find gifts you’ll feel good about giving.
