The Amazon: Paying for the forest.
Aug 7th 2008, From The Economist print edition.

Brazil Ready To Accept Donations Even From Foreigners - “Tapping the world’s conscience” - An unusual prospectus for a new fund.

Left-wing government (formerly hostile to private enterprise) seeks investment from governments or individuals to be managed by the national development bank. Returns will beat the market in terms of virtue only, though investors may lay claim to a part in the salvation of the planet. Norway, the most considerate of global citizens, has already pledged $100m. Others may follow.

The Amazon Fund, launched on July 31st by Brazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, leans on an idea that has become accepted wisdom among conservationists: to stop the Amazon rainforest from shrinking, a way must be found to make preserving it more lucrative than slashing and burning it.

It is not yet clear who will be eligible for grants from the fund, but early indications are that it will give money to projects proposed by NGOs, scientists or by the governments of the states that are home to the forest. They might include supporting traditional rubber tappers and gatherers of Brazil nuts, or carefully managed forestry.

Brazilian officials have traditionally been suspicious of the involvement of outsiders in the Amazon, which comprises some 40% of the national territory.

No sooner was the fund launched than both Lula and his minister for long-term planning, Roberto Mangabeira Unger, felt the need to insist that it did not represent a giveaway of Brazilian sovereignty, and that foreigners who gave money would have no influence on government policy.

This seems a strange signal to send to potential investors. In practice some way to take account of donors’ wishes will be found, according to Paulo Adário of Greenpeace, one of the NGOs that proposed such a fund a year ago. But the intended audience was at home.

Touchiness about the Amazon still runs deep.

The generals who ruled Brazil in the 1960s and 1970s had a paranoid fear of an invasion of the Amazon. They built roads through the forest, and subsidised companies and people to colonise it.

The army is still touchy on the subject. So, surprisingly, is Brazil’s small (Maoist) Communist Party, which supports Lula but frets about foreign capitalists in the Amazon.

However hedged about, Lula’s embrace of the idea that the world as a whole has an interest in the Amazon is a sign of his country’s increasing self-confidence.

The World Values Survey is available at: www.worldvaluessurvey.org www.happyplanetindex.org

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Introducing the hybrid you can hear (so it won’t run you over).
By Michael Savage, The Independent, Thursday, 7 August 2008

Lotus said its “safe and sound hybrid technology” simulates the traditional grunt of a combustion engine

The fearsome roar of their engines is one of the first things to come to mind at the mention of Lotus, the stylish, lightweight British sports cars.

That familiar growl could soon be heard coming from a far more modest source: beneath the hitherto tranquil bonnets of other manufacturers’ electric cars.

Lotus is developing technology that will put the roar of the traditional combustion engine under the hoods of eco-friendly vehicles, in an attempt to make the quiet cars safer for unsuspecting pedestrians – particularly the blind – and cyclists.

Stealthy hybrids and electric cars have come in for criticism from groups representing the blind and partially sighted, concerned that the low hum of the vehicles puts those with imperfect sight at greater risk of being hit on the roads. Some are almost silent at slow speeds.

The engine noise is produced by a waterproof loudspeaker positioned next to the car’s radiator, making the sound seem to originate from under the bonnet. The system produces a pitch and frequency designed to help pedestrians identify the car’s speed and distance.

Lotus adapted the system from technology previously developed to block outside noise from the inside of its cars.

Electric vehicles are tipped to become a more common sight on the roads over the coming decade as drivers seek ways of minmising the cost of ever-higher petrol prices and the issue of global warming moves up the agenda.

Mike Kimberley, chief executive of Group Lotus, said: “The increased acceptance of greener vehicles such as hybrid and electric vehicles is to be encouraged; they have an important role in improving fuel economy and reducing emissions. Our technology increases pedestrian safety, while retaining the car’s environmental benefits.”

Duncan Vernon, road safety manager for the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, said: “We need to look at ways of ensuring the safety of pedestrians. We welcome innovative solutions which address this.”

Lotus hopes that manufacturers of electric and hybrid cars will adopt the technology, which it says can also be fitted to cars already on the roads for a sum that would not “break the bank”.

Pressure is growing on the Government to introduce minimum noise requirements for road vehicles, to ensure the noise-augmenting technology is used and that the new wave of quiet eco-friendly cars poses no risk to vulnerable pedestrians.

Clive Wood, transport policy officer at the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association, said: “Blind and partially sighted people use the noise of oncoming traffic as a cue for when it is safe to cross a road. If a quiet hybrid electric vehicle is approaching, then they will no longer have this cue and are immediately put at risk.”

He added: “We recognise the environmental benefits of these vehicles. However, more consideration needs to be given to the safety implications to visually impaired pedestrians.”

Silent danger on the street

*Electric and hybrid cars are so quiet many fear they pose a risk to pedestrians. One US study found electric and hybrid cars moving slowly had to be 40 per cent closer to pedestrians than conventional vehicles before their location could be detected. They have no noisy pistons, internal explosions or fan belts which cause the roar we associate with the traditional car engine. Hybrids pose an added problem. For much of the time, they are powered by a combustion engine. But at low speeds, an electric motor takes over, making them very quiet. The new system from Lotus kicks in when sensors detect the electric motor is working.

Let the diplomatic Beijing Games begin… but which leaders are taking part?
The Independent - Thursday, 7 August 2008.

(Photo) Torchbearer Yao Ming of the Houston Rockets basketball team holds the torch as he runs through the Tiananmen Gate during the 2008 Beijing Olympics torch relay.

WHO’S COMING!

*George Bush

A quiet confirmation from the White House on Independence Day helped turn the tide for China. Mr Bush is believed to have accepted a personal invitation from his Chinese counterpart Hu Jintao, and Japan and Russia quickly followed suit. He said a snub would insult the people of China. Covering his bases, Mr Bush got his criticism of Beijing out of the way yesterday.

*Sonia Gandhi

When it came to its rival developing superpower, China did not send an invitation to either the Indian head of state Pratibha Patil or Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, inviting instead Sonia Gandhi, the Italian-born head of India’s Congress Party and widow of the assassinated prime minister Rajiv Gandhi. She wasted little time in accepting.

*Nicolas Sarkozy

Unsurprisingly he has been the one to generate the most controversy. First flirted publicly with a boycott before thinking harder about the true cost of such a snub. Later realised that selling the Airbus and nuclear technology were greater priorities – whatever his human rights critics said. And he’s curried favour by shying away from meeting the Dalai Lama during the Games.

*Kevin Rudd

The Australian Prime Minister has told the Chinese some awkward truths in their own language. The former diplomat and Mandarin speaker called on Beijing to engage with the Dalai Lama in March and followed it up with a candid visit in April. He stopped short of boycotting the opener in a move which might have threatened trade links.

———————

Who’s not going:

*Gordon Brown

He is a realist over relations with China, having agreed fresh trade deals with Beijing this year, but he was unable to resist the temptation to hint at dissent and opted to stay away from the opening ceremony after the crackdown in Tibet. Mr Brown insists the two are not connected. For a politician in his parlous situation, he might regret opting for the closing ceremony instead.

*Angela Merkel

The most straightforward of Europe’s leaders on issues that China finds uncomfortable, she risked the ire of Beijing by welcoming the Dalai Lama to Berlin last year – something her predecessor Gerhard Schröder hadn’t dared to do. She has been equally blunt in pointing out that the Olympic opener clashes with her holiday, so she will not be attending.

*Stephen Harper

Canada’s prime minister appeared to be swimming with the mainstream when he confirmed in April that he would not attend the Bird’s Nest show. Looking around the G8 he had the Italians, Germans, Brits and, he thought, the US with him. A few months later the snub looks more costly and Canada’s trade minister has been forced to assure the public that it won’t hit exports.

*Hans Gert-Pöttering

The president of the European Parliament is the only leading political figure to formally boycott the ceremony. Without a trade portfolio to defend – or at least with others to do that job, he felt free to take a stand over China’s treatment of the Dalai Lama. It remains a moot point whether the invitation list ever included the German politician.

———————–

And who wasn’t welcome !!!!

*Robert Mugabe

The embattled Zimbabwean leader got his refusal in first, saying that talks to resolve the political crisis prevented him from going. However, Beijing had already made it clear in private that he was not wanted. While Mr Mugabe does not usually do as he is told, he was not willing to embarrass his Chinese backers, at a time when he needs them more than ever.

*Omar Al-Bashir

While he has been indicted by the International Criminal Court, he has not been invited by Beijing. The Sudanese leader can count on Chinese support so long as he keeps the oil exports coming, but his is not a friendship Beijing wants to project. Darfur has been rivalled only by Tibet as a negative factor in China’s international image.

*Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

The unpredictable Iranian leader was among the few leaders the rest regard as a pariah who was offered a seat at Beijing. He politely refused the invitation in May but said he might show up for the Paralympics. Despite Tehran’s insistence to the contrary, some sources insist that China had made an offer it wanted the man in Tehran to refuse.

*Kim Jong-Il

It’s hard to know whether the North Korean leader’s decision to stay at home has been greeted with greater relief in Beijing or Washington. A public encounter with Kim was not a prospect to thrill the White House – or his South Korean counterpart. Instead, his right-hand man Kim Yong Nam will be a “guest of honour”.

Thursday, Aug. 7, 2008

Nissan shows off prototypes of electric, hybrid vehicles.

By HIROKO NAKATA, Staff writer, Japan Times online.

YOKOSUKA, Kanagawa Pref. — Nissan Motor Co. unveiled prototypes Wednesday of electric and gasoline-electric hybrid vehicles it plans to launch in Japan and the United States in business 2010.

an AP photo is titled Silent speed: A prototype of Nissan Motor Co.’s new gasoline-electric hybrid speeds along the automaker’s test course Wednesday in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture.
The announcement, made at Nissan’s Oppama plant in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture, where its lithium-ion battery R&D center is located, comes at a time when competition for environment-friendly vehicles is heating up in Japan. Nissan previously said it will begin mass-marketing electric vehicles globally in business 2012.

However, “the design will be totally different” when Nissan launches the final versions in business 2010, Nissan Executive Vice President Mitsuhiko Yamashita told reporters.

MMC batteries near.
Kyodo News

Mitsubishi Motors Corp. and two other firms said Wednesday they will start mass producing lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles at a new factory in Kusatsu, Shiga Prefecture, in business 2009.

The new plant, to be completed by March 31, will produce 200,000 lithium-ion cells a year, enough to equip 2,000 of MMC’s next-generation electric vehicle, the iMiEV, according to a joint statement by the automaker, battery maker GS Yuasa Corp. and trading house Mitsubishi Corp.

Output will soon be quintupled to 10,000 cells a year, due to growing demand for lithium-ion batteries, they said.

Kyoto-based Lithium Energy Japan is building the facilities in Kusatsu. The joint firm was set up in 2007 by the two Mitsubishi firms and GS Yuasa Power Supply Ltd.

BBC News - Arctic Map, prepared by Durham University, shows dispute hotspots.

Maritime jurisdiction and boundaries in the Arctic region.

 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/staging_site/…

 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pd…

British scientists say they have drawn up the first detailed map to show areas in the Arctic that could become embroiled in future border disputes. A team from Durham University compiled the outline of potential hotspots by basing the design on historical and ongoing arguments over ownership.
Russian scientists caused outrage last year when they planted their national flag on the seabed at the North Pole.

The UK researchers hope the map will inform politicians and policy makers.
“Its primary purpose is to inform discussions and debates because, frankly, there has been a lot of rubbish about who can claim (sovereignty) over what,” explained Martin Pratt, director of the university’s International Boundaries Research Unit (IBRU).

“To be honest, most of the other maps that I have seen in the media have been very simple,” he added.
“We have attempted to show all known claims; agreed boundaries and one thing that has not appeared on any other maps, which is the number of areas that could be claimed by Canada, Denmark and the US.”

Energy security is driving interest, as is the fact that Arctic ice is melting more and more during the summer. Martin Pratt, Durham University.

The team used specialist software to construct the nations’ boundaries, and identify what areas could be the source of future disputes.

“All coastal states have rights over the resources up to 200 nautical miles from their coastline,” Mr Pratt said. “So, we used specialist geographical software to ‘buffer’ the claims out accurately.”

The researchers also took into account the fact that some nations were able to extend their claims to 350 nautical miles as a result of their landmasses extending into the sea.

Back on the agenda:
The issue of defining national boundaries in the Arctic was brought into sharp relief last summer when a team of Russian explorers used their submarine to plant their country’s flag on the seabed at the North Pole. A number of politicians from the nations with borders within the Arctic, including Canada’s foreign minister, saw it as Moscow furthering its claim to territory within the region.

Mr Pratt said a number of factors were driving territorial claims back on to the political agenda.

“Energy security is driving interest, as is the fact that Arctic ice is melting more and more during the summer,” he told BBC News. “This is allowing greater exploration of the Arctic seabed.”

Data released by the US Geological Survey last month showed that the frozen region contained an estimated 90 billion barrels of untapped oil.

Mr Pratt added that the nations surrounding the Arctic also only had a limited amount of time to outline their claims. “If they don’t define it within the timeframe set out by the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, then it becomes part of what is known as ‘The Area’, which is administered by the International Seabed Authority on behalf of humanity as a whole.”

__________

Countries in the area are Russia, Norway, Denmark (Greenland), Iceland, Canada, the US (Alaska).

We believe that 200 miles sovereignty (that is with exclusion of guaranteed maritime passage rights) from the shores of their land-mass is a foregone conclusion.

Any claims to the extension of those sovereign waters should be rejected. Those further sea-bed rights belong to the International Seabed Authority on behalf of humanity as a whole. We believe that no exception to the above should be allowed. We wrote several times that we expect China to step in and make this point stick.

We believe that this is China’s chance to declare its leading role for the 21st century.

Q&A: ‘Israel In a Weak Parallel with Apartheid’ -
An IPS Interview with Judge Dennis Davis, High Court Judge in Cape Town.

JERUSALEM, Jul 31 (IPS) - In Israel’s control of Palestinian movement, Dennis Davis sees a “stark” parallel with the old, apartheid South Africa of which he was an outspoken critic. But Davis, a Justice of the High Court in Cape Town and a prominent member of the South African Jewish community, strongly rejects those who “run from that into an immediate conclusion” that Israel is an apartheid state.

Davis, who was also involved in drafting the constitution of post-apartheid South Africa, recently visited Israel and the Palestinian territories as part of a delegation of prominent South African civil rights activists. In its closing statement, the group said it had not come “to bring solutions, or to spend our time here debating solutions,” but that it wanted “to learn, and to witness first-hand the suffering, pain, anger and human rights abuses.”

Davis, who is a former chairman of the South African Jewish Board of Deputies and a former head of the Centre for the Abolition of the Death Penalty, spoke to Peter Hirschberg from IPS about the “apartheid” parallel and about the political impotency that he senses on both the Israeli and Palestinian sides.

IPS: Israel has been accused of adopting policies that are reminiscent of apartheid South Africa. Is this a fair comparison?

Dennis Davis: I think the only issue is with the movement of people. This is remarkably similar to certain forms of influx control (in the old South Africa). And it’s so much more sophisticated. We didn’t have computers. And the separate roads and separate number plates (for Palestinians and Jews in the West Bank) is unquestionably a more sophisticated form of restriction of movement of the kind that we had. The fact that you’ve got those definitions at some of those controls, of what constitutes an Israeli and what constitutes somebody else, is not entirely unreminiscent of what we had. I was deeply disturbed by that because I hadn’t realised how stark that parallel was.

IPS: So you feel the comparison is valid?

DD: It is unfortunate that people now run from that into an immediate conclusion that this is an apartheid state. We met Israel’s Chief Justice and what is clear is that there is a pretty relaxed form of (judicial) standing by which Palestinians can petition the High Court of Justice in Israel. That’s impressive. That obviously didn’t exist in South Africa. And within Israel itself, there aren’t zones the way we had group areas (for blacks and whites). Arabs who live here can also vote and have rights of citizenship.

This is not so much a discrimination based on ethnic identity in the broad sense of Arab versus Jew. It does seem to me to be a very intricate form of social control.

IPS: Apartheid was based on racial superiority.

DD: There’s no racial superiority here. There’s no pervading ideology that confirms the inferiority of Palestinians.

Both sides play the victim. There is tremendous competition over who the victim is. When you have a notion of victimhood what you tend to do is to dehumanise the other. I think there is a lot of dehumanising of the other on both sides. If I was a Palestinian I’d probably be very, very angry. If I was an Israeli who had suffered suicide bombings I’d be incredibly angry as well.

The one group that impressed me most of all was the Parents Circle (made up of bereaved parents on both sides). I was incredibly moved by them. That sort of group and others perhaps are the beginnings of what in South Africa became a much more non-racial movement. In South Africa, the prefiguring of the society in which whites and blacks could live together began a very long time ago. The Communist Party. The trade unions. There’s much less of that here. There is such an absence of integration here.

When you separate populations like this and lock them into an almost fatal embrace then there’s a dehumanising aspect to it. What’s good about the Parents Circle is that it does show there is at least some movement toward seeing the humanity in the other. I look at the soldiers. I look at these kids. It’s got to dehumanise them. You can’t be policemen at border posts like this, having to question people, and not have your humanity affected. I cry for them.

But I think it’s incredibly unhelpful to say you can simply take this to be apartheid and therefore the South African struggle is the same and the South African solution is the same. That’s a very lazy form of reasoning.

IPS: One of the problems for Israel with the apartheid analogy is that its own leaders use it, albeit with very different intentions to those who challenge the legitimacy of the Jewish state. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has invoked the comparison, warning Israelis that if they don’t relinquish the territories they will find themselves in a South Africa-type situation in which a minority of Jews rules over a majority of Palestinians, and that will spell the end of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state.

DD: But the paradox of it for an outsider is this: that argument is very compelling but also bizarre, because at the same time that you’re making it, you then drive through the West Bank and you are struck by the permanency of settlements. So what worries one is that successive Israeli governments have made it more difficult to get to a two-state solution.

For somebody who really wants the state of Israel not only to exist but to flourish, which is me, I’ve got to say that I’m deeply disturbed by the fact that they’re trying to keep two contradictory balls in the air at the same time. It doesn’t work. If you continue to strengthen West Bank settlement for another five years, lord alone knows what will happen. You can’t do that and talk the demographic game at the same time.

IPS: When it comes to finding a way to unlock the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, can the South African paradigm be applied?

DD: If you are going to work within the paradigm that’s being argued at present in Israel, which is the two-state solution, then you are dealing with a divorce, whereas in the South African context you were dealing with a marriage. So in the South African context the entire struggle was about the terms of a marriage, whereas here it seems to be about the distribution of property after the divorce. That inherently puts you in an entirely different business.

But there is one parallel. I really do believe that if an Israeli prime minister had the courage tomorrow morning to say ‘Fine, we are going to talk about a comprehensive two-state solution and we’ll even deal with the refugee problem through compensation,’ then I think what you’d notice in the South African experience is that at some point the momentum is too great to claw it back.

When De Klerk unbanned the ANC in 1990, no way did he say there would be an ANC government. He hoped he could unban the ANC, normalise politics and cobble together a coalition that would enable him to retain power. At some point it became clear to him that he wasn’t going to be able to do it. It was too late to put the genie back in the bottle. I think that’s possible here as well. But where is this impetus going to come from?

IPS: With Olmert embroiled in a corruption scandal that seems to have ended his term in office, the current Israeli government doesn’t have the political will to take such a dramatic step?

DD: No, the government doesn’t have the political will. And the Americans (aren’t pushing). Unless there is going to be a dramatic change with Obama, if he gets in. And your economy isn’t suffering. So where is the impetus to do this? And given the divisions amongst the Palestinians at the moment, Israel could happily see them off for years to come.

This is not South Africa 1985. This is not a situation where you can say, ‘Sanctions are biting and the resistance is showing no sign of dying down.’

But it can’t work when you reach the point when you’re actually suppressing the majority of the population. How ironic it would be if all my (South African) friends who live here will then be living under something they sought genuinely to escape from.

IPS: Another difference between the two situations is that unlike the ANC, Palestinian leaders seem hopelessly ineffective when it comes to galvanising their people around a single vision and crafting a coherent political strategy.

There’s no broader vision. There’s no sense of political vision. Both Fatah and Hamas are pretending they’re totally in control and that the other one isn’t. What Hamas is able to show is that if you deal with the social question — not that they’ve done it very well — you can grab hold. But is there anything that cements and holds the Palestinian people together as the ANC did in South Africa? No.