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Date: Sat, 27 Aug 2005 01:58:21 -0700
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Subject: The Drum Beat - 314 - MDG #7 - Ensuring Environmental Sustainability
The Drum Beat - Issue 314 - MDG #7 - Ensuring Environmental Sustainability
August 29 2005
from The Communication Initiative...global forces...local choices...critical voices...telling stories...
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This issue of the Drum Beat highlights approaches and strategies for addressing MDG #7 from around the world.
Millennium Development Goal (MDG) #7 mobilises communities worldwide to strive toward three targets meant to ensure environmental sustainability: first, to integrate the principles of sustainable development into country policies and programmes and reverse the loss of environmental resources; second, to halve by 2015 the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water; and third, to have achieved by 2020 a significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers.
Various indicators have been proposed to meet these targets; they are listed on our MDG overview page for this goal - please see http://www.comminit.com/mdgs/mdgs/mdgs-1.html#seven for details. To view additional materials, please use our Custom Search tool - http://www.comminit.com/search.html - and select the keyword for this MDG. Please also visit our MDG Impact section for more examples of the impact of communication on ensuring environmental sustainability - http://www.comminit.com/mdgs/mdgs/mdgs-8.html
Other resources available on The CI site include our Environment Window - see http://www.comminit.com/environment/ - our Sustainable Development Window - see http://www.comminit.com/sustain-development/ - and several related Drum Beats published in the past; among them: Communication for Water Sanitation & Sustainability - see http://www.comminit.com/drum_beat_152.html - and The Environment - see http://www.comminit.com/drum_beat_181.html
Next month, we will focus on MDG #8: Developing a global partnership for development. Please send your projects, articles, events, etc. to Deborah Heimann [log in to unmask]
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CONTEXT
1. Progress towards the Millennium Development Goals, 1990-2005: Goal 7 - Ensure Environmental Sustainability
Even regions that have made significant progress towards achieving other MDGs tend to have a much poorer record on environmental issues. Some figures:
* From 1990-2000, forests shrank by 940,000 square km...
* The use of ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) has been reduced to one-tenth of 1990 levels. However, per capita carbon dioxide emissions have increased in developing countries...
* Nearly half the world's population depends on solid fuels to meet their most basic energy needs. Indoor air pollution from cooking with such fuels is responsible for more than 1.6 million deaths annually, mostly among women and children...
* During the 1990s, progress was made in increasing access to improved drinking water sources. However, over a billion people are still unserved, especially in Africa's rural areas and in urban slums. An estimated 2.6 billion people - half the developing world - lack toilets and other forms of improved sanitation...
* Nearly 1 billion people worldwide - almost 1 in 3 city dwellers - live in slums, and about 200 million new slum dwellers were added to urban communities between 1990 and 2001, representing an increase of 28%.
Source: United Nations Statistics Division [PDF]
http://www.comminit.com/redirect.cgi?r=http://unstats.un.org/unsd/mi/goals_2005/Goal_7_2005.pdf
2. Climate Change & Biodiversity Loss
15-37% of a sample of 1,103 land plants and animals could become extinct as a result of climate changes expected by 2050; a rapid shift to technologies that do not produce greenhouse gases, combined with carbon sequestration, could save 15-20% of species from extinction.
http://www.comminit.com/baseline/baseline2004/baseline-29.html
3. Carbon Emissions Reach Record High
In 2003, carbon emissions (greenhouse gases) climbed to a high of 6.8 billion tons, up 4% from 2002. Carbon emissions have quadrupled since 1950, mainly due to the burning of coal, oil, and natural gas and deforestation. The USA, with 5% of the world's population, accounts for nearly 25% of global emissions. U.S. emissions of greenhouse gases could increase by 1.9 billion tons - 40% above 1990 levels - by 2020.
http://www.comminit.com/baseline/baseline2005/baseline-424.html
4. CFC Reductions have Prevented Millions of Cases of Skin Cancer
Between 2000 and 2002, total consumption of CFCs has declined by nearly 20%. Without the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer, levels of ozone-depleting substances in the atmosphere would have increased tenfold by 2050, which could have led to up to 20 million more cases of skin cancer and 130 million more cases of eye cataracts relative to 1980.
http://www.comminit.com/baseline/baseline2004/baseline-366.html
5. Investing In Water & Sanitation Produces Substantial Economic Gains (Part 1 of 2)
Worldwide, economic benefits from US$3 to US$60 per US dollar invested would be gained in the health, agricultural and industrial sectors if the MDGs related to water and sanitation were achieved. For instance, improved water storage capacity could contribute to boosting Kenya GDP annual growth rate to 6% - the amount needed to start reducing poverty effectively. The cost of such investments is well within reach of most countries - an estimated US$4-7 per capita in Bangladesh, Cambodia, Ghana, Tanzania and Uganda.
http://www.comminit.com/baseline/baseline2005/baseline-452.html
LOCAL KNOWLEDGE & INVOLVEMENT
6. Participatory Community Development (PACODEV) - Ghana
PACODEV is a women-led non-government organisation helping women in the village of Naga (Kassena Nankana district, Ghana) devise community plans for the management of natural resources. In the women-facilitated groups, video recorders and cameras were used as a training tool and as a means to record examples of environmental degradation. The women used these recordings in planning sessions to identify areas where action was needed; they also drew pictures of their environment. "Since 95% of the women are illiterate, the use of videos and drawings rather than written texts enabled them to participate fully...and make their voices heard in their own language." The community plans were then integrated into one plan and presented to the district assembly.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pds2005/experiences-3124.html
Contact Joana Francis Adda [log in to unmask]
7. Beyond Joint Forest Management: Dugli-Jawarra People's Protected Area
by Biswa Ranjan Phukan
Indians in Chhattisgarh state are exploring a new approach to forest management to try to change the attitude of people who might have otherwise dismissed conservation - and eschewed related behaviours - as a threat to their lifestyles and financial stability. For many years, a lack of clear ownership rights meant that villagers had no incentive to manage the Dugli-Jawarra forest area's resources, and illegal harvesting of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) was widespread. In the late 1980s, Indian forestry policy was adapted in an effort to address degradation; 11 Joint Forest Management (JFM) committees were established, leading to the creation of a People's Protected Area (PPA) in the forest. Broad participation of several different social groups is a central strategy. The new policies have rehabilitated the Dugli-Jawarra forests, encouraging a shift in the approach from forest management for timber production to a multiple use framework focusing on NTFPs and poverty alle!
viation.
http://www.comminit.com/strategicthinking/st2005/thinking-1355.html
8. Equator Dialogues - Global
This programme uses community-based online spaces and in-person events in an effort to provide an advocacy and learning platform for local leaders and grassroots initiatives seeking to take local steps to help achieve the MDGs. The central purpose of these exchanges is to break down barriers to community participation in political processes and policy formulation. Events have been held around the world to explore the role of the community in protecting the environment and raising incomes. The outcomes from the fora are documented in the form of Community Declarations - consensus documents, written by all participants.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pds2005/experiences-3322.html
Contact [log in to unmask]
9. At the Desert's Edge: Oral Histories from the Sahel
This book explores the culture, history, and environment of the Sahel through the memories and recollections of its people. The interviews - most of whom feature rural, elderly, illiterate Sahelians - focus on traditional land-use practice, land tenure, farming and pastoral systems, the causes of desertification, and other aspects of Sahelian life, casting light on questions like: How and why has the land come to its present, desertified state? What specific kinds of indigenous knowledge have been developed to improve life?
http://www.comminit.com/materials/ma2003/materials-149.html
10. LINKS Project - Global
This initiative focuses on the interface between local and indigenous knowledge, on the one hand, and the MDGs of poverty eradication and environmental sustainability, on the other. By organising projects, events, research, and resources, UNESCO works to build dialogue among traditional knowledge holders, natural and social scientists, resource managers, and decision-makers to the end of enhancing biodiversity. Demonstration projects are carried out in collaboration with rural and indigenous communities; one project worked to strengthen the role of Even and Koryak peoples in the Volcanoes of Kamchatka World Heritage Site (Russia) in managing the protected area in which they live.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pdskdv102003/experiences-890.html
Contact Douglas Nakashima [log in to unmask]
11. Impact Data - Global Action Plan for the Earth (GAP) - Global
Working with municipal resource managers, GAP customised this campaign to fit local conditions and the specific resource conservation needs of each community. Local staff were hired, supervised, and trained. In the USA, on average, participating communities sent 42% less garbage to landfills, used 25% less water, produced 16% less CO2, and used 16% less fuel for transportation. When the campaign was introduced to 2,500 households in Den Haag, The Netherlands, the resulting behavioural change redirected consumer demand and encouraged shopkeepers to offer products with less packaging.
http://www.comminit.com/evaluations/idkdv2002/sld-2368.html
12. Small Grants Programme for Operations To Promote Tropical Forests (SGP-PTF) - Pakistan
Pakistan is a forest-deficient country with a meager natural forest cover; a complex tenure system there "abounds with rights and concessions, spread in an in-equitable manner." In this context, SGP-PTF is built on recognising and supporting the involvement of local communities and organisations in protecting and managing forests. Grants are provided to non-governmental and community-based organisations and other associations and networks registered in Pakistan, with preference given to groups with capacity and experience in social mobilisation for natural resource management.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pds2005/experiences-3320.html
Contact Saleem Ullah [log in to unmask] OR Malik Jaffer [log in to unmask]
13. Traditional Tree Initiative - South Pacific
Agroforestry Net, Inc., a Hawaii (USA)-based non-profit organisation, launched a 2-year effort in 2003 based on a conviction that technology could support traditional cultures by communicating practical information, to the end of encouraging the planting and conserving of traditional trees. The initiative is working to produce a series of 6- to 12-page fact sheets on products, uses, interplanting applications, environmental requirements, and propagation methods relating to 50 central tree species in the region. Decisions about which information was crucial to local residents, and how to communicate it, were based on a email survey of agricultural professionals throughout the region. The demand for information is indicated by the fact that a pre-release version of one species profile (Morinda citrifolia) posted on the project website was downloaded by more than 14,000 visitors in a 6-month period.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pds102004/experiences-2700.html
Contact Craig Elevitch [log in to unmask]
14. World Habitat Day - Housing & Land Rights Day - Global
Habitat International Coalition (HIC) launched this global initiative to call people around the world to action in anticipation of, and in solidarity with, the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT)'s World Habitat Day 2005. Noting that, since the Millennium Declaration, the global slum population has risen by more than 75 million and that nearly 32% of the world's urban population (roughly 1 billion people) live in slums worldwide, UN-HABITAT is working with international and civil society organisations, cities, and governments to mobilise individuals and groups to participate in realising MDG #7. Organised around the theme of "The Millennium Development Goals and the City", this day (Oct 3 2005) is designed to encourage citizens to reflect on the state of human settlements and the basic right to adequate shelter for all.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pds2005/experiences-3324.html
Contact Ana Sugranyes [log in to unmask] OR Michael Kane [log in to unmask] OR Enrique Ortiz [log in to unmask] OR Jane Nyakairu [log in to unmask]
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ARTS APPROACHES
15. Pride Campaign to Protect the Endangered Cockatoo - Palawan, Philippines
Rare partnered with the Katala Foundation and Conservation International to develop a conservation "marketing" methodology in an effort to protect the endangered cockatoo. As part of the campaign, a colourful 6-foot cockatoo mascot traversed the island of Palawan delivering entertaining messages of conservation. A symbol for environmental protection and regional pride, the mascot visited classrooms, was featured on billboards, modeled in fashions shows, starred in puppet theatres, and was publicised on posters, stickers and buttons. As a result of the campaign, a legally protected area was established to ensure protection of the cockatoo's nesting habitat; 6 community members are now working as wildlife wardens.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pds2005/experiences-3295.html
Contact [log in to unmask]
16. Save with Greywater Cartoon
by Paul Ökrös
This 1-minute cartoon - offered in 15 languages - uses colourful graphics to demonstrate the benefits of using greywater for toilet flushing. The creator suggests that the cartoon may serve an educational role with children.
http://www.comminit.com/materials/ma2005/materials-2428.html
17. Be, Live, Buy Different - Make a Difference - United States
A joint initiative of World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and the Center for a New American Dream, this campaign aims to motivate teenagers to "learn how they can make a difference by buying differently. For example, did you know that if just one out of every ten middle and high school students each bought just one recycled notebook this year, they would save over 60,000 trees, conserve 25.5 million gallons of water, and stop 5,250,000 pounds of global warming gases from being released?" The campaign website details events in select cities such as contests and information shared on local radio stations. One effort involved asking teens to bring their imagination and rhyming skills together to create original raps and songs; 27 youth wrote and recorded songs that were professionally mastered and are featured online.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pds102004/experiences-2074.html
Contact [log in to unmask] OR Sat Jiwan Khalsa Tel.: (301) 891-3683
18. It's Our World, Our Future Too: Young People's Voices on Environment & Health Priorities - Europe
A video produced by the European Public Health Alliance Environment Network (EEN) is being used to involve children in policy making and allow young people to speak out about the environments that are failing them. In the film, youth from Russia, Belgium, Hungary and the UK describe how the damaged and deprived physical surroundings in which they live are affecting their health. The youth are encouraged to make suggestions about how they themselves and their political representatives can change the situation and bring about a better quality of life.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pds2005/experiences-3317.html
Contact Diana Smith [log in to unmask]
19. Being Caribou - North America
This advocacy-based film, book, and internet project aims to explore issues of environmental conservation in Canada's arctic region. At the centre of the effort is a documentary, produced by the National Film Board of Canada, that follows the 5-month journey of environmentalist Leanne Allison and wildlife biologist Karsten Heuer as they follow a herd of endangered Porcupine Caribou on foot across 1,500 kilometres of rugged Arctic tundra. The husband-and-wife team want to raise awareness of threats to the caribou's survival, and to inspire community-based and political activism among residents of the USA and Canada to protect the animals and their habitat.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pds2005/experiences-3297.html
Contact Erica Heuer [log in to unmask] OR Leanne Allison [log in to unmask]
MEDIA MESSAGES & SOCIAL MARKETING
20. Environment Cycle Radio F.M. 104.2 MHZ - Nepal
ECRFM104.2MHZ is a community-based radio station working since April 2004 to make the Nepalese people aware of environmental degradation and pollution, and related public health issues. The programmes are broadcast to a national audience 14 hours daily, and transmits local, national, and international news on an hourly basis in Nepali, Newari, and Tamang languages 19 times daily. With members from 3,000 stations, the Women's Division of ECRFM104.2MHZ was created based on the understanding that Nepal's underdevelopment and environmental challenges are linked to discrimination against, and the segregation of, women; this Division intends to increase the participation of women journalists in environmental reporting.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pds2005/experiences-3292.html
Contact Pramila Maharjan Surbir [log in to unmask], [log in to unmask], [log in to unmask]
21. Covering Water Quality: What You Need to Know
According to News University, understanding the complex issues of covering water quality is essential to successful journalism. This self-guided course gives journalists background knowledge (some of it region-specific) about the topic and ways of thinking about coverage issues. Offered online/on demand by News University and the Society of Environment Journalists (SEJ).
http://www.comminit.com/training2005/training2005/trainingonline-74.html
22. How to Promote the Use of Latrines in Developing Countries
by Jennifer McConville
"Since the introduction of community based promotion methods, rural India has seen sanitation coverage increase from nearly zero to 14% while total sanitation coverage increased to 31%. Community involvement and self-financing methods lead to the construction of more than 350,000 latrines in one county alone. An impact evaluation in 1999 showed consistently better excreta disposal practices in communities participating in the promotion programs. The study indicated that future sanitation promotion efforts should focus on social marketing techniques and community management of latrines." Drawing on such examples, McConville finds that "The most common element to successful latrine promotion appears to be community outreach and involvement."
http://www.comminit.com/strategicthinking/st2005/thinking-1367.html
23. Turn it Off - Toronto, Canada
Initiated by the Ontario Region of Environment Canada in collaboration with McKenzie-Mohr Associates, LURA Consulting, and the Ontario Ministry of Environment, this community-based effort used interpersonal and social marketing strategies to encourage drivers in Toronto, Canada to cease practicing the environmentally hazardous activity of idling, rather than turning off the motor, when their vehicle is stopped. Turn it Off held focus groups to explore awareness and knowledge levels and to obtain feedback on the campaign's proposed strategies and communications materials. Project monitors approached the drivers of stopped cars that were idling, speaking with them through their window to request commitment and to provide printed prompts and information (e.g., "no idling" window stickers which pledged "For our air: I turn my engine off when parked"). Turn it Off led to a reduction of engine idling incidence by 27% and idling duration by 78% overall, compared to the control site!
s.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pds2005/experiences-3293.html
Contact Doug McKenzie-Mohr, Ph.D. [log in to unmask]
24. Yogurt Lid Campaign - United States
The USA-based Stonyfield Farms is using the lids that cover its yogurt containers to communicate messages to consumers and then to spur them to take specific environmental actions. Featuring catchy tag lines, the yogurt lids encourage consumers to visit the company's educational website, where they find out how to mail their used razor handle or toothbrush to Recycline to be recycled into plastic lumber, or learn how to offset their business or household CO2 through the actions and tips shared by NativeEnergy. Stonyfield Farm's "green tag" purchases from NativeEnergy have prevented the release of more than 18,000 tons of CO2 pollution from energy use (the same global warming impact as taking 3,000 cars off the road for a year). Stonyfield Farms offers the following claims: since 1996, it has saved over $1.6 million and the equivalent of 36 million kilowatt hours of electricity, which is enough energy to power 3,500 homes for a year, while preventing over 13,000 tons of CO2 f!
rom entering the atmosphere; in 1997, it offset 100% of its CO2 emissions from its facility energy use; and since 1997, it has prevented the release of over 30,000 tons of CO2.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pds2005/experiences-3290.html
Contact Cathleen Toomey [log in to unmask] OR Billy Connelly [log in to unmask]
INFORMATION SHARING
25. Capacity Building for Nile-Basin Water Resources Management - Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania & Uganda
The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has been working with the Government of Italy under the rubric of the Nile Basin Initiative to facilitate the common pursuit of sustainable development and management of the Nile's waters. Information and communication technologies and face-to-face workshops are used as tools to build capacity within particular communities for more cooperative management of environmental resources. "All the basin states now have a relevant operational data unit, well equipped and well trained, that can provide essential information to decision-makers and policymakers at short notice....The ability to present data in a geographically referenced mode and to overlay them so that they become socio-economic and political information has enabled much-improved communication..."
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pds2005/experiences-3321.html
Contact [log in to unmask] OR [log in to unmask]
26. ICT & Ensuring Environmental Sustainability
by John Daly
With an eye to the MDG indicators, John Daly describes several ways in which ICTs can be helpful to environmental sustainability. He claims that:
* ICTs make it possible for the first time in history to detect environmental problems at very large and very small scales.
* ICTs permit unprecedented monitoring of environmental quality, and unprecedented accuracy in detection of the sources and projection of the development of environmental problems.
* ICTs can be used to empower people with unprecedented understanding of environmental systems, and of the interplay between environment and development.
* ICTs can be used to allow unprecedented intensity of communication on such issues among all sectors of society.
* Almost any intervention that can be identified to improve sustainability or reclaim degraded environmental systems can benefit from appropriate applications of ICT.
http://www.comminit.com/strategicthinking/st2003/thinking-185.html
27. KUMINFO - Ghana
KUMINFO is an integrated geographical information system (GIS) for peri-urban natural resource research that includes information from individual research projects and organisations in Ghana. A local computer supply company, Sambus ltd, supplies and repairs KUMINFO's technology; staff members are trained in the UK and Ghana. Maps and digital photographs of streams and villages in the Kwabre District are examples of information available at KUMINFO. Organisations involved in planning, such as the Environmental Protection Agency, might use this data to map water bodies and its quality in Kumasi and surrounding areas. Community members are welcome to use the facilities, as well. In one area, the Chief used the information obtained to enact a law against the cutting of trees, farming, and houses along rivers.
http://www.comminit.com/experiences/pdskdv92003/experiences-1663.html
Contact [log in to unmask]
***
This issue was written by Kier Olsen DeVries.
***
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Please send material for The Drum Beat to the Editor - Deborah Heimann [log in to unmask]
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