Organic is often used interchangeably with other concepts and terms like ‘natural farming,’ making it confusing for consumers to identify the food that they are getting. To distinguish which food is clean, fair, certified, and safe in the market, one must know what organic means. Marco Schlüter, Head of Strategy and International affairs of Naturland, one of the leading farmer associations and certifiers for organic agriculture in the world, discussed this topic during the launch of their partnership with ECHOstore, a local store that promotes organic and sustainable products that advocates in nurturing and sustaining the self, the community, and the planet.
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PAN Asia Pacific (PANAP) joins the Global Day of Condemnation of the Tumandok Massacre. A month after the extrajudicial killings of nine indigenous Tumandok farmers in the Philippines, justice has not been served. This culture of impunity that allows the grisly massacre of small food producers who are merely defending their legitimate rights to land must end. Based on our monitoring of land-related human rights violations, 63 out of 123 rural people killed from January to November 2020 were indigenous peoples. Next to Colombia, the Philippines recorded the highest number of land-related killings.
Read the full article here Proclamation No. 760, issued in 2014, declared every January as Zero Waste Month in the Philippines to promote the redesign of processes and products to systematically reduce, if not eliminate, the quantity and toxicity of waste that industries, businesses, institutions, households, and individuals generate. Its goal is to guide people, businesses, and institutions to change their lifestyles and practices toward sustainable systems in an ethical, economical, and efficient way, and to ensure that wastes become valuable for other uses. Even years before the declaration, Philippine environment groups that are also members of the Break Free From Plastic (BFFP) movement have already been working toward zero waste for a future free from plastic pollution. Under a zero-waste approach, recycling, composting, reuse and minimization of waste help decrease the volume of trash sent to landfills.
Read the full article here In the pre Covid-19 world, energy transition was already at the forefront of the minds of policymakers and investors in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Renewable energy infrastructure investment in the region had been strong, reflecting government efforts to reduce carbon emissions, as well as due to the lower costs involved, given cheaper technology and economies of scale. Although construction activity in the sector weakened significantly in 2020 due to fiscal constraints as governments diverted budgets towards social expenditure, investment in the renewable sector is expected to pick up quickly. To improve the renewable energy capacity and revive the pandemic-hit economies, ASEAN governments have laid out an aspirational five-year sustainability plan under the second phase of ASEAN Plan of Action for Energy Cooperation (APAEC) 2021-2025. Under this, ASEAN energy ministers agreed to set a target of 23% share of renewable energy in total primary energy supply in the region and 35% in ASEAN installed power capacity by 2025. This would require approximately 35GW-40GW of renewable energy capacity to be added by 2025.
Read the full article here MANILA – Contrary to military claims that they were members of militia of the Communist Party of the Philippines, the slain indigenous peoples in Panay had long been asserting their right to land and life in the face of so-called development projects. In return, they had been tagged as enemies of the state and subjected to intense militarization over the years. For the past decade, the Tumandok of Panay island has been opposing projects that would end up submerging their communities, their sources of livelihoods, and their centuries-old culture and tradition.
Read the full article here In just the last half-century, humans have caused a staggering, worldwide drop in the number of sharks and rays that swim the open oceans, scientists have found in the first global assessment of its kind, published Wednesday in the journal Nature. Oceanic sharks and rays have declined by 71 percent since 1970, mainly because of overfishing. The collapse is probably even more stark, the authors point out, because of incomplete data from some of the worst-hit regions and because fishing fleets were already expanding in the decades before they started their analysis.
Read the full article here Hanoi (VNA) – The final pitching competition and awards ceremony for the Ending Plastic Pollution Innovation Challenge took place in Hanoi on January 26. Funded by the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation, the ASEAN-wide competition aims to tackle plastic pollution in coastal areas of Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines by seeking, upgrading and spreading innovation solutions. Among 14 finalists, four teams won the awards, namely Galaxy Biotech, Green Joy and Refill from Vietnam and CIRAC from Thailand. Each winner received a seed funding of 18,000 USD and will start a 9-month impact acceleration programme.
Read the full article here Confronting this reality together in the Atlantic Garbage Patch built bridges between the plastic industry and environmental NGOs. Five of the ideas workshopped during the summit are funded and up and running today (including the Plastic Pickers Operational Working Group). The summit made a powerful impact, but the crisis is far from resolved. The need for a complete overhaul of our broken system for managing waste is clear. The growing consensus is that the most effective way to do this is through a U.N. Global Treaty on Plastics. In 14 months at United Nations Environmental Assembly’s Fifth Session (UNEA-5), the U.N. will decide on whether to move a treaty forward.
Read the full article here MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines, an archipelagic country that is regularly exposed to tropical cyclones, was among the countries most affected by extreme weather events from 2000 to 2019, an environmental think tank said in a report. According to Germanwatch’s Global Climate Risk Index, the Philippines ranked fourth in the list of countries most impacted by climate-related catastrophes in the past 20 years. The risk index analyzed and ranked to what extent countries and regions have been affected by effects of storms, floods and heatwaves.
Read the full report here CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY--Undeterred by her young age, a 12-year-old girl has started raising funds for the restoration of corals in Camiguin province. Sofia Pardo began her environmental advocacy when she was just 10, as a graduating student of the International Baccalaureate Primary Years Program, where the pupils were required to choose a project that they are passionate about. Pardo said there was no question about her love for Mother Nature.
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