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SPECIAL FOCUS:REVOLUTIONALIZING URBAN MOBILITY: A STEP TOWARDS

SUSTAINABILITY

Today, over half the world’s population resides in urban environments. By 2025, China alone will harbor 221 cities with populations exceeding 10 mil-lion. In comparison, Europe has 35 such cities today. With the number of ur-ban settlers expected to exceed 70% by 2050 (in developing countries), cit-

ies are set to face unprecedented sustainability challenges in the future.

INTRODUCTIONThis dire realization has yielded plethora of smart-city solutions, however, one revolu-tion will be distinctly evident; the urban mobility transformation. The indirect costs of poor urban mobility - economic inefficiency and deteriorating public health - are becoming intractable. Congestion costs Los Angeles $19.2 billion each year, with the knock-on effects of poor air-quality costing California $193 million in medical bills annually. [2] [3] The combination of exigency and opportunity will undoubtedly fos-ter change – but what will the future of urban mobility look like? This report seeks to uncover the key trends behind ground-based mobility research, address how dif-ferent cities will embrace this revolution and assess its broader knock-on effects. Public and private sector leaders around the world are abuzz with the immense po-tential of an integrated urban mobility system… what should the world expect?

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1World Ecology ReportWorld Information Transfer

Winter 2018

Winter 2018, vol. XXX No. 4

TABLE of CONTENTS

SPECIAL FOCUS:• Revolutionalizing Urban Mobility: A Step

Towards Sustainability

HEALTH AND ENVIRONMENT:• Devastating Human Impact on Planetary

Health• Critical Conditions In the Tropics: Species

in Danger• Tickborne Diseases — Confronting a

Growing Threat

FOOD FOR THOUGHT:• Lead Levels in Paint Around the World• Decorative Paints Virtually Lead Free in

Jamaica: Lead in Solvent-Based Paints for Home Use in Jamaica

DID YOU KNOW:• IPCC Special Report on Climate Change• Air Quality in Patna

GOOD NEWS:• Sanitation of Universal Water Services –

World Water Week 2018

VOICES: • Global Spotlight Report #8: The Status of

Climate Finance in Leading Greenhouse Gas Emitting Countries

• 2018 UN Biodiversity Conference• COP 24 - United Nations Conference on

Climate Change• UN Human Rights Day December 10,

2018

POINT OF VIEW• Unaddressed Future Catastrophe!

Education brings choices.Choices bring power.

World Ecology Report is printed on recycled paper.

Figure 1: Urban population growth as a percentage of total world population, 1960 - 2050. [1]

World Ecology ReportWorld Information Transfer

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The New Urban Mobility Ecosystem: The Coalescence of Trends

The burgeoning global urban population will be accompanied by a commensurate growth in urban mobility demand. By 2050, the num-ber of kilometers travelled by city-dwellers is expected to more than double and cities are unprepared to match this demand. The following trends, including widespread urbanization, are con-verging to form a uniquely symbiotic vision for urban mobility.

The Electric Vehicle (EV) DriveThe global electrical vehicle (EV) trend is picking up speed, with record sales being driven by diminishing battery costs, generous acquisition and operation subsidies, increasing industry commitment and growing con-sumer acceptance. EVs are forecasted to make-up 55% of new vehicle sales and will capture a 33% share of the auto-market by 2050. Although pio-neered by China, Europe and the United States, there are clear pockets of EV success in countries such as Norway, where EVs and plug-in hybrids represent 40% of the market and EVs make up 25% of new vehicle sales. [4]

Figure 2: Global EV and plug-in hybrid sales, 2012-2017. [4]

In the past decade, Lithium-ion batteries prices decreased steadily, driven by substantial telecommunications and EV-centric investment. Aggressive fuel economy standards in the US, EU and China has pushed automakers to explore the EV and plug-in hybrid markets further. Governments are implementing demand-focused subsidies in the form of tax-breaks, vehicle and infrastructure rebates or carpool lane exemptions. In 2016, China alone spent $7.7 billion on such EV subsidies. [5] Europe is taking similar steps – the specter of future metropolitan petrol and diesel bans is push-ing automakers and consumers away from internal combustion engine vehicles. With governmental and consumer commitment in place, we can expect automakers to extend their EV offerings in the coming years.

Public Endorsement of Shared Mobility In the last decade, ride-sharing firms such as Uber, Lyft, Grab, DiDi Chux-ing and GoJek have all uprooted the traditional taxi networks in their re-spective markets; the industry is expected to grow to $285 billion by 2030. [6] Total ride-sharing investment has grown from $5.3 to $16.1 billion between 2014 and 2016 respectively. Trading personal privacy for conveni-ence is now the norm across many industries, indicating a paradigm shift in public acceptance for the shared-mobility model.

The Race to Autonomy Concurrently, autonomous vehicles (AVs) have gained immense traction amongst automakers such as Tesla, General Motors, Toyota and BMW and the tech giants such as Alphabet’s Waymo, Apple, Baidu and Amazon. Its potential for increased road safety, promised cost savings (particularly for ride-sharing operators) and substantial advancements in onboard com-puting power have made autonomous driving both attractive and viable. Artificial intelligence has enabled computer vision, allowing AVs to make driving decisions and learn from a host of experiences. AVs have the po-tential to reinvent the car ownership, residential and urban parking models. Undoubtedly, AVs are set to disrupt more industries than the auto-market.

The Internet of Things (IoT)

The Internet of Things is defined by three characteristics: ubiquitous sen-sors, internet connectivity and rapid data transmission. For mobility, this has allowed companies such as Volvo to develop an inter-car ‘social net-work’ for hazard and traffic alerts. IoT will allow automakers to tune their autonomous driving algorithms by processing astronomic amounts of streamed user data. Meanwhile, infrastructure developers and city traffic

managers can deploy sensors to critical infrastruc-ture points and utilize artificial intelligence to op-timize traffic flows. Vehicle speed and location data can also be assimilated into these optimiza-tion models. IoT promises huge advancements in road safety, a godsend to citizens and cities alike.

Heightened Sustainability & Public Health Awareness

The emerging effects of global warming and de-teriorating public health have urged the public to pressure municipal leaders to adopt sustain-able practices. California’s legislature, for instance, recently set an ambitious goal of 50% renew-

able electricity by 2030 and 100% by 2045. [7] Pol-lution set California state back $193 million in

2005 to 2007 and annually kills 3.5 million people globally. [8] [9] This highlights the added medical cost-savings of adopting sustainable en-ergy and transportation practices to governmental health programs and citizens alike. Metropolitan areas such as Greater London, Amsterdam and Madrid continue to introduce regulations that favor EVs and shared-mobility on the pretext of curbing air pollution and increasing urban liv-ability. We can expect public and governmental action towards SDG 7, 11 and 13 be a key driver behind the urban mobility transformation.

Reimagining Public TransitRapid urbanization is exacting its toll on current urban public transporta-tion networks, with cities from Sydney to London feeling the growing pains. A shared autonomous electric vehicle (AEV) network could utilize mobile ride-hailing technologies to offer an on-demand flexible public transporta-tion system. Decentralization of traditional services from food delivery to the gig economy has increased consumer demand for flexibility and personali-zation – characteristics missing in the current public transportation model. Similar operating models could be employed in bus and mini-van services, an example being ViaVan’s growing popularity in Europe, further improv-ing fuel economy per passenger kilometer and reducing urban pollution.


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Decentralizing the Power SystemSolar panel prices have dropped by over 80% in the last seven years and are no longer a virtuous investment but a viable business case. This underscores the path to future progress for SDG 7, 11, and 13, particularly in urban settings. As prices continue to fall, we can expect a regional overhaul of the cur-rent energy production, transmission and distribution networks

Figure 3: Solar panel price and global capacity, 2010-2017. [10]

Assimilating renewables into the current grid will allow local pockets of energy generation forming micro-grids. To manage micro-grid integration, home battery storage solutions are emerging but not rapidly enough to meet demand. EVs offer an innovative solution by acting as mobile storage units. They could charge when parked near renewable micro-grids and transport energy back to residential areas. EVs would then discharge to help meet evening peak energy demand then recharge overnight during low-peak times. This would significantly smoothen local and regional inflections in energy availability, offer a viable solution for integrated renewables and lower car operating costs owners are reimbursed for serving the national grid. [11]

Symbiotic Relationships Between Trends To fully capitalize on each trend, cities must adopt an integrated perceptive to urban mobility. For instance, Jaguar and Waymo have combined their EV and autonomy capabilities to launch an EV-AV taxi service in 2020. More generally, figure 4 outlines how each trend mutually reinforces one another.

Figure 4: Symbiotic relationship between trends driving the urban mobility revolution.

1. EV’s total mileage lifespan outstrips that of a conventional internal combustion engine vehicle. EV use in public transportation is will become more cost-effective than private operation.

2. AVs merge with EVs to promote low-cost transportation AEV net-works.

3. Ride-sharing enables AEV networks to compete with mass public transit on passenger throughput.

4. Shared mobility reduces strain on existing public transit. 5. EV produced at scale will reduce battery costs, making energy decen-

tralization and storage viable. 6. EV offers a solution to energy storage and energy demand uniformity

by acting as mobile energy storage unit. 7. Increased sustainability drive and regulatory incentives drive EV

adoption. 8. Mass AV deployment will demand increased IoT adoption. 9. Shared mobility ride-hailing firms such as Uber and Waymo will drive

AV development to curtail operating costs. 10. By the same token as (1), EVs long mileage lifespan promotes shared

mobility over private ownership.

Cities Ripe for Disruption

Cities with successful urban mobility strategies, namely Sin-gapore, Stockholm and Amsterdam boast reliable multimodal public transportation services, satisfactory air pollution and minimal traffic congestion. How the urban mobility revolu-tion will manifest itself in cities will be highly variable and will depend on a city’s existing infrastructure, urban den-sity and economic history. A trifurcation of urban mobil-ity will likely occur along the following trajectories: Clean and Shared Transit, Private Autonomy, and Seamless Mobility.

Clean and Shared TransitIn dense, developing metropolises such as Delhi or Lagos, with convoluted existing infrastructure and public driving practices too complex for the in-tricacies of AVs, Clean and Shared Transit may become the adopted model. It is characterized by vehicle electrification and shared mobility but excludes


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autonomy. EVs, integrated renewable energy production and shared mo-bility would be adopted as remedies for burgeoning urban pollution and congestion. A number of ride-sharing concepts would emerge, from three-wheeled vehicles to mini-buses, integrated into the current mass-public transportation system. Extreme congestion, a frequent neglect for traf-fic rules and inconsistent infrastructure signage will render autonomous driving incompatible with such urban settings. Thus, traffic optimization will have to be explored through IoT-related infrastructure developments.

Private AutonomyIn sprawling but developed cities such as Dallas or Los Angeles, AEVs can offer a host of cost and time savings as well as parking flexibility for daily commuters. Connected to the IoT, AEVs offer connectivity for busi-ness or pleasure. Infrastructure and vehicle data can be fused together in traffic optimization systems. AEVs can be operated in fleets of ride-shar-ing public transportation networks. Dynamically routed and on-demand, these services would blur the lines between private and public car own-ership. In Private Autonomy, these operations would complement pri-vate car ownership, not supplant it. Nonetheless, such services will be a boon for low-income groups, the elderly and those without a driver’s license since they gain equitable access to convenient public transport.

Seamless Mobility consistent infrastructure to support Seamless Mobility. Their historic dependency on urban public transport warrants their commitment to innovative urban solutions. We can expect a shift towards door-to-door, on-demand multimodal service characterized by personalization and mobile connectivity. Shared, on-demand AEV networks will supersede traditional taxis and assuage the strains on existing public transportation networks. This will open up opportunities for innovative urban planning. Seamless Mobility will be driven by congestion regulations and parking costs. High-speed long-range public transport will remain the backbone of urban transportation, particularly for long-distance trips. The more flexible AEV networks will act as supplementary last-mile or short-hop solutions. Multimodal travel options will characterize ‘seamless mobility’. Nascently present today in applications such as Moovit, an integrated mobile platform to support Seamless Mobility will undoubtedly become more prominent.

The Broader Impacts of Mobility Transformation

Untold Health Benefits 4.6 million people die each year from causes directly attributable to air pol-lution, whereas smoking kills 7 million annually. [12] [13] Yet, we don’t spend half as much time debating the former as we do the latter. Transpor-tation represents nearly 70% of ambient air pollution in dense metropoli-tan settings, underscoring the dire need to enact change. [14] Uniting EVs, shared mobility and decentralized renewable energy could reduce CO2 and NOX levels in today’s megacities. NOX gases react to form acid rain but also contribute to PM10 or PM2.5 particles and ground-level ozone (O3), all of which have detrimental knock-on effects to urban public health. [15] Fine airborne particles, when inhaled, can damage lung airways, increasing the risk of contracting chronic obstructive pulmonary disease or exacerbat-ing existing symptoms. Ground-level O3, on the other hand, can increase risk of appendicitis. [16] Extended NOX exposure can induce asthma and increase the risk of lung infections. Although research is sparse, NO2 is ten-tatively linked to cerebrovascular and ischemic heart disease mortality. [17]

A cluster of poor health-related behaviors has been associated with driv-ing. The induced stress and time-suck contribute to insufficient sleep disorders, higher prevalence rates of smoking and physical inactiv-ity. These in turn are related to obesity, high psychological distress and physical health or emotional problems. [19] AEV networks would al-leviate these detrimental effects. Along similar lines, smart AVs could be programmed to recognize distressed voice commands such as “please help” and measure heart rates or irregular body movements to discern whether a passenger is suffering from say, a heart attack. The car could automatically reroute to the nearest hospital and alert staff to expect the patient’s arrival. This would usher in a new age of road safety, as the lives of passengers but also citizens in the surrounding vicinity could be saved. With 94% of vehicle accidents being attributed to human error, AVs are heralded as a near panacea for traffic-related injuries and deaths. [20] Vehicle accidents costed the US $836 billion in 2010 and are fore-casted to account for 5% of the total global disease burden by 2030. [21] [22] Tesla, Waymo and Uber AV tests have all proven the tech-nology is not immune to fatal mistakes, however, future testing data will evince their relative safety superiority. Merging the IoT with AVs will allow software developers to train their algorithms on live incom-ing traffic data. As their numbers increase, AVs will only become safer. Finally, on-demand AEV public transportation networks will inte-grate isolated citizens such as the elderly, handicapped and the youth into the urban economy. Convenient and efficacious transportation is a key driving force behind a city’s economic success – the urban mobil-ity revolution presents more than a solution, it offers an opportunity.

Blurred LinesRevolutionizing urban mobility will be a boon for certain industries and extirpate others. It will also create a plethora of new business partnerships. Utility companies will likely expand to incorporate electricity production and delivery into their spheres, typified by British Petroleum’s recent acqui-sition of ChargeMaster, an EV charging network firm. Further expansion is possible, for example Repsol’s recent partnership with Kia to establish a car-sharing transportation network in Madrid. In general, AEV networks will oust existing ride-hailing firms such as Uber or Lyft. By the same token, intro-ducing autonomy to car-sharing, private taxi and delivery services will make the three indiscernible from a technological and operational standpoint.

The Oil SectorIn the near term, EVs and shared mobility will have a nugatory effect on the oil industry since consumption reductions will be offset by increasing mo-bility demand. We can expect any curbed demand to stem from diesel con-sumption, particularly in Europe. But by 2040, EVs are expected to make up 50% of total new vehicle sales and by that time, 7.3 million barrels per day

Figure 5: Global outdoor pollution deaths, breakdown by disease. [18]


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of transport fuel will be displaced. [4] E-Bus and E-train systems will also contribute to this. In repudiation, by 2050, internal combustion engines and oil extraction are expected to become more efficient, keeping oil prices low. Therefore, the global oil industry will not become obsolete in the foreseeable future, although there may be pockets of waning transport fuel dependency.

The Power SectorElectrifying urban areas, however, will demand a restyling of current power transmission networks. In the near term, public charging infrastructure is vital to galvanizing widespread EV adoption. Such charging points offer a variety of benefits: support AEV public transportation networks, increase consumer convenience and permit EVs to integrate into the decentralized renewable energy grid. The next generation of EVs, however, are expected to boast ranges above 300 kilometers, rendering urban public charging sta-tions impotent. Because of this, investment into urban charging networks may gravitate towards slow but ‘smart’ charging rather than fast charging. To manage regional peak demand and the decentralized energy system ef-fectively, utility providers and regulators will have to work closely to fully utilize tools such as time-of-use charging tariffs and discharge incentives.

The Automotive IndustryAs urban mobility demand continues to grow and diversify, the automakers’ offerings are likely to be more heterogeneous than they are today, forcing automakers to rethink their internal skill sets. We can expect a spate of soft-ware engineering, cloud computing and data analytics experts to enter the industry. With increased vehicle connectivity, firms will increasingly pro-vide remote customer-centric services such as entertainment and software support. The automotive industry will unavoidably be dragged into the data privacy debate and be subject to the associated public scrutiny. Also, OEMs and the automotive aftermarket industry will need to redirect their focus to emerging urban EV markets. EVs have few moving parts and accrue little mechanical degradation and will require less frequent and cheaper mainte-nance. In the long term, we can expect the automotive aftermarket to shrink.

The Technology SphereThe technology industry will create a myriad of partnerships with exist-ing automakers and score influence in the market. A new sector of inter-vehicle connectivity may emerge; today’s tech giants are in prime position to scoop-up the opportunity. The Internet of Things (IoT) will allow the technology industry to pick and choose what skills to export and what to keep in-house. Sensor maintenance and low-level management may be left to public workers. Higher-level traffic optimization and data manage-ment, however, will likely be brought into the private tech sphere. To op-timize the decentralized energy grid with charge and discharge incentives, governments will have to develop their in-house expertise to safely manage the IoT. In general, traffic optimization, enhanced passenger safety, decen-tralized grid design and battery development are just a few sustainability practices that will be consolidated in the tech sector in the coming years.

The Public SectorAlthough they will not become obsolete, existing train, bus and bicycle networks will be integrated into the IoT allowing for seamless hand-offs between the old and new mobility modes. With the IoT extensively de-ployed, new mobility tax opportunities will emerge. For instance, road time-of-use rather than a non-discretionary road tax would become a valid prospect. Municipalities around the world will need to overhaul an-tiquated practices in public transportation, traffic management and resi-dential planning. Industrial parks in today’s urban hinterlands may merge

with residential developments or need to be shifted. This will demand a concomitant expansion of utility networks. To drive sustainable mobil-ity uptake, cities will need to efficaciously employ demand-side incentive programs such as dynamic road pricing and dedicated ‘sustainability’ lanes. Hyper-connected cities will become hotbeds of vulnerable cyber insecurity. Malign actors could wreak havoc by obstructing vehicle connectivity or disabling energy grids. Ubiquitous sensors offer more entry points for hack-ers – ensuring uniform security standards across the city landscape will be a perpetual dilemma for regional and national security agencies. Such agen-cies may also have to protect their citizens from corporate data mismanage-ment, a sensitive issue typified by Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica scan-dal in 2018. Metropolitan areas compete for labor talent, economic output and a higher quality of life for its citizens. Cities that successfully surmount these issues are likely to be the early beneficiaries of effective mobility.

Moving Forward with Celerity

Urban transformation timescales will vary depending on a city’s pre-exist-ing infrastructure, available capital, approach to legislative reform and so-cial commitment. Municipalities will need to address the various hurdles impeding the transformation. Galvanizing the public to embrace the risks and rewards of the digital age in key, as is eliminating outmoded budgeting divisions that hinder a unified approach to mobility. Mobility ecosystems will need strong partnerships to succeed. Blending technology, infrastruc-ture and business models will require symbiotic relationships between un-familiar industries – those that pre-emptively form alliances are less likely to be marginalized. In the next two decades, governments and urban mo-bility ecosystem players should prepare for a divarication of proactive and sluggish regions. The urban mobility transformation will occur on local, regional and national scales; applying the corresponding lens will allow in-terested actors to fully assess opportunities and risks as they come. Poor leadership could sap investment budgets and set cities back years in the drive towards sustainable growth – governments should begin to plot their paths towards next generation mobility now and be prepared to partner up.

Author: Farri Gaba

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Devastating human impact on Planetary Health

Reveals WWF’s 2018 Living Planet Report

Figure 1: From the Living Planet Report 2018: ‘Aiming Higher’, show-ing the importance of nature to people. Nature provides us with vital goods and services. Adapted from Van Oorschot et al., 2016 16

The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) is an international non-govern-mental organization that focuses on wilderness preservation and the reduc-tion of human impact on the environment. The Living Planet Report 2018: Living Higher is the 12th edition of the WWF’s biennial publication. This report reveals “devastating” impact on planetary health made by humans. Just like with air pollution, humans are hurting the planet’s natural systems, which support various forms of life, to the edge. Overexploitation and ag-riculture which deal with human consumption are also the largest drivers of biodiversity loss. Human activity is affecting the world’s wildlife, forests, rivers, oceans, and overall climate. The Living Planet Index (LPI) is a measure of the state of global biological diversity, based on trends in vertebrate populations of species from around the world. The Zoological Society of London manages the index with the World Wide Fund. The report uses this index to provide a full overview of the state of the natural world. It examines trends in wildlife by tracking the populations of vertebrate species, mammals, birds, fish, reptiles and am-phibians. It is shown that a variety of these species declined by 60% between 1970 and 2014.Using data analyzed from six different measurement tools, the report not only shows a decline for five taxonomic groups, but the risk of extinction. These groups include birds, mammals, amphibians, corals and cycads. The planet has lost about half of its shallow water corals in the past 30 years. The findings also show that human activity has hurt four of six of the planet’s processes beyond a safe limit. These include climate change, biosphere in-tegrity, biogeochemical flows and land-system change. Although biodiversity and the health of the Earth are declining,


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there is still ways to reverse this current trend. The report provides a plan for action for 2020 and beyond. This direction requires the combination of the environment and human development agendas and goals to build a sus-tainable future. There are opportunities leading up to 2020 where progress can be made on the Paris Agreement, the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and Aichi Biodiversity Targets. The SDGs that this report is targeting are SDG 13: climate action, SDG 14: life below water and SDG 15: life on land. Although there is a 2020 end date for some of the biodiversity-related SDG targets, this report suggests 2030 as an end date to provide a realistic timeline due to the difficulty of combating these current trends. The report also argues that measuring progress towards biodiver-sity targets is harder than tracking progress under the Paris Agreement on emission reductions. This is because biodiversity assessment needs multiple measures at different spatial scales and across various ecological dimen-sions. Source:

• http://sdg.iisd.org/news/wwf-report-reveals-devastating-human-impact-on-planetary

Critical Conditions In the Tropics: Species in Danger

Source: Rhett A. Butler

The proportion of species found within tropical latitudes for 10 taxonomic groups. Bars are color-coded to show the percentage of species ranges with-in the tropics. N gives the total number of species analyzed in each group. Only birds, amphibians, and mammals have been comprehensively sam-pled. Numbers at the end of the bars give the precise percentage of species whose ranges overlap tropical latitudes, as shown in the bars.

Conducting an extensive review of academic literature, a group of scientists led by Jos Barlow of Lancaster University highlight the extent of biodiversity across the seas, savannas, and forests that lie between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn. For example, they note that nearly 80 percent of the species within the 10 groups of plants and animals they reviewed live in the tropics. But even this likely represents an undercount because most research efforts historically have been outside the tropics.The tropics also house the bulk of societal diversity, including 85 percent of the world's spoken languages, and "make vital contributions to globally important ecosystem services." Tropical forests and savannas, they remark, account for more than 60 percent of global net primary productivity and 40 percent of carbon storage, respectively. Coral reefs afford local populations with food and coastal protection, while rainforests like the Amazon are the engines of regional precipitation. For example, 70 percent of rainfall in the Rio de la Plata catchment—the breadbasket of South America and the loca-tion of several major cities—is estimated to come from evaporation in the Amazon.

But the tropics are facing a mélange of well-documented human-driven threats: destruction of forests and marine ecosystems, overexploitation by the likes of industrial fishing fleets and commercial hunters, the spread of diseases and invasive species, and the growing impacts of climate change, which stress both ecosystems and their inhabitants. These threats, which often interact and build on each other, are heightening the risk of extinc-tion for many species. Already, the vast majority of recorded extinctions among five major vertebrate groups assessed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature occurred among tropical species, write the authors.Tropical ecosystems—and therefore at least 78% of global biodiversity—are at a critical juncture. Multiple interacting local and global stressors that are driving species extinctions and potentially irreversible ecosystem transi-tions are set within a changing socio-economic context," they write. "This changing context is characterized by growing and more affluent popula-tions, an increasingly globalized world, and weak governance and research capacity—all of which threaten to increase environmental degradation, con-flict and inequality."

To stave off this bleak future, the researchers call for "major improvements in local and global governance capacity and a step-change in how environ-mental objectives are integrated into broader development goals." This in-cludes conceiving and implementing conservation strategies that address the underlying drivers of environmental change, continuing to support sci-ence and research, and encouraging experimentation and innovation with new approaches and interventions.

"We need to act now to address the pressing environmental challenges fac-ing the tropics. This means being adaptive, learning by doing and embracing innovation," the researchers write. "It is vital that researchers and decision


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makers are vigilant to opportunities and risks and are willing to learn les-sons. A failure to act decisively and to act now will greatly increase the risk of unprecedented and irrevocable biodiversity loss in the hyperdiverse trop-ics."

These threats aren't likely to diminish soon. Human population contin-ues to rise, but growing affluence means that it is increasingly outpaced by resource consumption, which acts as a multiplier in terms of humanity's planetary footprint. Barlow and his co-authors go on to argue that weak governance and research capacity are further complicating the long-term outlook for tropical biodiversity unless urgent measures are undertaken.

Tickborne Diseases — Confronting a Growing Threat

Catharine I. Paules, M.D., Hilary D. Marston, M.D., M.P.H., Marshall E.

Bloom, M.D., and Anthony S. Fauci, M.D.

There has been a significant increase in mosquito-borne illnesses in Ameri-ca. In particular, the U.S. has seen the instances of tickborne infections dou-ble in the past 13 years, demonstrated by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Such diseases are often caused by bacteria (eg: Ehrlichia chaf-feensis) and parasites (eg: Babesia microti) and can lead to death.

Lyme disease accounts for 82% of reported cases, emphasizing its wide-spread nature carried by hard-bodied ticks. First identified in 1982, Borrelia burgdorferi. B. burgdorferi (which causes disease in North America and Eu-rope) and B. afzelii and B. garinii (found in Europe and Asia) are the most common agents of Lyme disease. Although multifactorial, the increases and expansions of Lyme disease are most likely attributed to the increased density and range of tick vectors. Cases of Lyme disease can range from relatively mild, like classic erythema migrans rash, to severe, like neurologic disease. Most cases can be successfully treated with antibiotics, yet 10 to 20% of individuals still experience lingering symptoms after therapy. Scientists and researchers have spent over four decades investigating Lyme disease, yet gaps remain in the understanding of the role and treatment.

Tickborne viral infections, also increasing, cause serious illness and death. Powassan virus (POWV, North American) was recognized as a human pathogen in 1958 while POWV lineage II (deer tick virus, New England) was discovered in 1997. Since then research has demonstrated individuals infected with POWV “often have a febrile illness that can be followed by progressive and severe neurologic manifestations.” Both POWV subtypes are linked to human disease, but their distinct enzootic cycles may affect their likelihood of causing disease. Other tickborne flaviviruses cause neu-roinvasive illness (Europe and Asia), despite the availability of effective vac-cines in those regions. There is an evident need for increased attention to this emerging virus.

The burden of tickborne pathogens is severely underestimated, shown by discrepancy in data of the CDC. Factors such as surveillance limitations and constraints imposed by available diagnostics contribute due to the heavy reliance on serologic assays. Diagnostic utilities are varied among labora-tories, timing of specimen collection, suboptimal sensitivity during early infection, imperfect use of diagnostics, inability of a single test to identify

Source: The Journal of New England Medicinhttps://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp1807870

coinfections in patients with acute infection, and the cumbersome nature of some assays. Furthermore, a serious challenge in nonspecific clinical find-ings has been the difficulty in differentiating acute from past infection.

However, these limitations have not only been negative, as they have en-couraged researchers to explore new technology, such as a multiplex sero-logic platform that detects antibodies to distinct epitopes, thus distinguish-ing the tickborne pathogens. Also, nonserologic platform technologies may improve diagnostic capabilities, particularly in identifying emerging patho-gens. Thus understanding the driving factors behind epidemiologic trends may be critically dependent on the development and widespread implemen-tation of next-generation diagnostics.

In the U.S., prevention and management of tickborne diseases is advanced, including measures to reduce exposure and evidence-based treatment and therapy of some infections. Thus, the biggest gap, is in vaccines: there are no licensed vaccines for humans targeting any U.S. tickborne pathogen. Of the vaccines that were marketed, such were removed due to falling sales, liabil-ity concerns, and negative reports. In the past, infectious-disease vaccines have targeted specific pathogens. Scientists may want to consider target the vector.


Winter 2018

FOOD FOR THOUGHTLead Levels in Paint Around the World

Lead found in paint is a major source of lead ex-posure for children globally. More than 100 stud-ies from 58 countries since 2009 have shown that lead in paints are still widely sold in low and mid-dle income countries. The majority of these stud-ies were carried out by IPEN-affiliated NGOs, comprising more than 3.300 solvent based paints, and containing elevated levels of lead above 10,000 parts per million (ppm) of the dry weight of the paint. The map above shows results of the most recent publicly available paint studies conducted since 2009. Specific data on the countries represented on the map can be obtained by clicking on the dots from the link: https://ipen.org/projects/eliminating-lead-paint/lead-levels-paint-around-world. The darker the color of dot, the higher percentage of paints found to contain lead levels above either 90 ppm or 600 ppm, depending on the study. The Global Alliance to Eliminate Lead Paint endorses a 90 ppm total lead content limit for all paint, but not all studies provide data below 600 ppm.More information about the paint studies, con-clusions and recommendations for further ac-tion, can be found by downloading the paint IPEN’s 2017 Global Lead Paint Elimination Re-port at:http://ipen.org/documents/lead-solvent-based-paints-home-use-global-report.

Source: https://ipen.org/projects/eliminating-lead-paint/lead-levels-paint-around-world

Decorative Paints Virtually Lead Free in Jamaica: Lead in Solvent-Based Paints for

Home Use in Jamaica

In a new study, with part of the findings released on October 24th, 2018 by the Caribbean Poison Information Network (CARPIN) and IPEN, an analysis of lead in solvent-based paints in Jamai-ca showed that nearly all paints contain total lead content below 90 parts per million (ppm) – the maximum allowable limit on lead in paint in the USA and Canada, and the same threshold rec-ommended by the UN Environmental Program. However, paints manufactured from the PPG Paints in the USA like one yellow automotive in-dustrial paint from the brand, OMNI Mae con-tains the highest amount of lead at 150,000 ppm.Dr. Sara Brosché, Global Lead Paint Elimination Campaign Manager, IPEN said that “Lead paint is a major source of childhood lead poisoning and there are no known safe levels of exposure,” “While the Jamaican study shows that decorative paints for home use are generally not manufac-

tured with added lead, there are strong indica-tions that industrial paints that often contain dangerously high levels of lead are easily available for sale in retail stores. Together with CARPIN, they are calling on the Government of Jamaica to adopt and enforce strong regulatory and import controls on lead in all types of paints, including decorative, architectural and industrial paints.”CARPIN purchased a total of 36 cans of solvent-based paint intended for home use representing 15 brands produced by seven manufacturers from various stores in Kingston and St. Catherine, Ja-maica from July 2018 to September 2018. Most of the brands were locally manufactured in Jamaica, while a couple of brands were imported from Trinidad & Tobago and the USA. The samples from these paints were analyzed by an accred-ited laboratory in the USA for total lead content. Key findings from the report, Lead in Solvent-Based Paints for Home Use in Jamaica, include:• Of the 36 analyzed solvent-based paints, 31

were decorative household paints, four were anti-corrosive paints, and one was an auto-motive industrial paint.

• All 35 analyzed solvent-based paints intended for home use contained lead con-centrations below 90 ppm.

• The yellow automotive industrial paint from the brand, OMNI Mae, contained 150,000 ppm of lead. Manufactured by PPG Paints USA and imported into Ja-maica, the paint had a warning on the la-bel stating, “leaded” and “for professional use only—not intended for household use.”

• Few paints (14 percent) provided informa-tion about lead on their labels, but no precau-tionary warnings on the effects of lead dust to children and pregnant women were provided.

• There is currently no regulation that limits the use of lead in paint in Jamaica. Most highly industrial countries adopted laws or regulations to control the lead content of decorative paints—the paints used on the interiors and exteriors of homes, schools, and other child-occupied facilities—begin-ning in the 1970s and 1980s. In Asia and Africa, many countries have adopted new strong regulatory controls over the past ten years. In addition, more countries like the Philippines, Nepal, Cameroon and Ethiopia,

In October, 2018, the United Nations Intergov-ernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued a warning in the IPCC special report stating that the world has only 12 years to act to-ward limiting global temperature to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways, in the context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change, sustainable de-velopment, and efforts to eradicate povertyThe report paints a far more dire picture of the immediate consequences of climate change than previously thought and says that avoiding the damage requires transforming the world econ-omy at a speed and scale that has never been documented in history. The report concludes that the world is already more than halfway to the 2.7-degree mark, and that Human activities have caused warming of about 1.8 degrees since about the 1850s, the beginning of large-scale industrial coal burning The report which was written and edited by 91 scientists from 40 countries who analyzed more than 6,000 scientific studies looked at The Paris agreement; long considered a threshold for the most severe social and economic damage from climate change set out to prevent warming of more than 3.6 degrees above preindustrial levels —. But the heads of small island nations, fearful of rising sea levels, had also asked scientists to ex-amine the effects of 2.7 degrees of warming. Avoiding the most serious damage requires transforming the world economy within just a few years, said the authors, who estimate that the damage would come at a cost of $54 trillion. But while they conclude that it is technically possible

IPCC Special Report on Climate Change

to achieve the rapid changes required to avoid 2.7 degrees of warming, they concede that it may be politically unlikely. To prevent 2.7 degrees of warming, the report said, greenhouse pollution must be reduced by 45 percent from 2010 levels by 2030, and 100 per-cent by 2050. It also found that, by 2050, use of coal as an elec-tricity source would have to drop from nearly 40 percent today to between 1 and 7 percent. Renew-able energy such as wind and solar, which make up about 20 percent of the electricity mix today, would have to increase to as much as 67 percent.“This report makes it clear: There is no way to mitigate climate change without getting rid of coal,” said Drew Shindell, a climate scientist at Duke University and an author of the report. The report attempts to put a price tag on the effects of climate change. The estimated $54 tril-lion in damage from 2.7 degrees of warming would grow to $69 trillion if the world continues to warm by 3.6 degrees and beyond, the report found, although it does not specify the length of time represented by those costs. The report emphasizes the potential role of a tax on carbon dioxide emissions. “A price on car-bon is central to prompt mitigation,” the report concludes. It estimates that to be effective, such a price would have to range from $135 to $5,500 per ton of carbon dioxide pollution in 2030, and from $690 to $27,000 per ton by 2100.By comparison, under the Obama administra-tion, government economists estimated that an appropriate price on carbon would be in the range of $50 per ton. Under the Trump admin-istration, that figure was lowered to about $7 per ton. The report details the economic damage ex-pected should governments fail to enact policies to reduce emissions. The United States, it said, could lose roughly 1.2 percent of gross domestic product for every 1.8 degrees of warming.In addition, it said, the United States along with Bangladesh, China, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Ja-pan, the Philippines and Vietnam are home to 50 million people who will be exposed to the effects of increased coastal flooding by 2040, if 2.7 de-grees of warming occur.At 3.6 degrees of warming, the report predicts a “disproportionately rapid evacuation” of people


Winter 201810

are banning lead use in all types of paint, including industrial and automotive paints.

• The World Health Organization (WHO) recognizes lead paint as a major source of “lead-caused mental retardation,” a disease WHO identifies as one of the top ten dis-eases whose health burden among children was due to modifiable environmental fac-tors. WHO further states that “there is no known level of lead exposure that is consid-ered safe.”[1]

• Key recommendations made in the report include:

• Government: For the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation to immediately establish a regulation that will ban the manufacture, import, export, distribution, sale and use of all paints (including indus-trial and automotive paints) that contain total lead concentrations exceeding 90 ppm. Policies to ensure that industrial paint is only available for purchase and use by rel-evant industry representatives should be adopted. Sanctions should be imposed on non-compliant companies in adherence to standardized labeling as stipulated by the government.

• Industry: Paint companies that have shifted to non-lead paint production should get their products certified through independ-ent, third party verification procedures to increase the customer´s ability to choose paints with no added lead. Paint vendors should have the required technical knowl-edge to guide consumers on the intended usage of paints and consequent risk of ex-posure to toxic chemicals. Paints for indus-trial use must be lead-safe and must carry distinct labels easily visible to consumers indicating its usage.

• Consumers: Purchase and use paints with no added lead, especially in places frequent-ly used by children such as homes, schools, day care centers, parks and playgrounds, and demand full disclosure of a paint prod-uct’s content

Source:• https://ipen.org/news/study-shows-jamai-

can-decorative-paints-virtually-lead-free

from the tropics. “In some parts of the world, national borders will become irrelevant,” said Aromar Revi, director of the Indian Institute for Human Settlements and an author of the report. “You can set up a wall to try to contain 10,000 and 20,000 and one million people, but not 10 million.”The report also finds that, in the likelihood that governments fail to avert 2.7 degrees of warm-ing, another scenario is possible: The world could overshoot that target, heat up by more than 3.6 degrees, and then through a combination of low-ering emissions and deploying carbon capture technology, bring the temperature back down below the 2.7-degree threshold. In that scenario, some damage would be irreversible, the report found. All coral reefs would die. However, the sea ice that would disappear in the hotter scenario would return once temperatures had cooled off.“For governments, the idea of overshooting the target but then coming back to it is attractive be-cause then they don’t have to make such rapid changes,” Dr. Shindell said. “But it has a lot of disadvantages.”

6 key takeaways from the new IPCC report:

1. When it comes to warming, 1.5 °C is much safer than 2 °C…but still riskier than the present.Limiting warming to 1.5 °C compared to 2 °C has clear and considerable benefits, such as sig-nificantly reducing the risks of water scarcity, ill-health, food insecurity, flood and drought, extreme heat, tropical cyclones, biodiversity loss, and sea level rise.Specifically:10 million fewer people could be at risk from sea level rise. Several hundred million people may avoid poverty susceptibility by midcentury. World population exposed to water stress may be reduced by 50%. Loss of 1.5 million tonnes of global annual catch for marine fisheries could be avoided. 10-30% of coral reefs could be savedPermafrost area three times the size of Texas may be prevented from thawing. The number of plant and animal species losing over half their habitat could be cut in half. However, the risks of these events in a 1.5 °C warmer world are still higher

than today. Adaptation needs are also more mod-erate at the 1.5 °C threshold, though adaptation limits (the point at which there are no feasible ad-aptation options available to avoid a given climate risk) may still be exceeded for threats including partial coral reef loss and stress to coastal-de-pendent communities. If limiting global warming to 1.5 °C is feasible, it must be attempted utiliz-ing mitigation and adaptation strategies designed with the goal of reducing global inequalities.

2. Remaining below 1.5 °C is possible, but requires deep and rapid emissions reduc-tions from all economic sectors.We are on pace to hit 1.5 °C global warming by 2030 at the earliest. To stay below this level, we must pursue each of the following:Decreased energy demand, Lower emissions from energy supply; Actively removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere; Fully decarboniz-ing the electricity sector by mid-century; Ensur-ing renewables are the world’s dominant energy source by 2050; Balancing land-use between sus-tainable agriculture practices, bioenergy produc-tion, and carbon storage; Emissions pathways consistent with limiting warming to below or near 1.5 °C require reaching net zero emissions around midcentury, and pursuing carbon dioxide removal mechanisms within this century. While the transitions in energy systems, land, transpor-tation, infrastructure, and industries would be unprecedented in scale, they are not necessarily unprecedented in speed.

3. Cutting methane, black carbon, and other ‘super-pollutants’ vastly increases the chances of staying below 1.5 °C.The likelihood that we will reach the 1.5 °C warming threshold is highly dependent upon the emission pathways of non-CO2 climate pol-lutants, such as methane and black carbon. If the emissions of non-CO2 pollutants are not curbed, there is a 66% likelihood of surpassing the 1.5 °C threshold, regardless of reductions to carbon dioxide. Reducing methane and black carbon emissions is also crucial for limiting the rate of warming in the near-term. It is clear that we must reduce emissions of these pollutants in addition to CO2, and several broad mitigation measures in areas such as the energy sector tackle the reduc-

tion of both.4. Waiting to cut emissions may have se-vere, irreversible effects on the planet.

Long-term warming scenarios depend upon car-bon dioxide, a gas whose emissions build up in the atmosphere over its long lifetime. Delaying emissions reductions would overshoot the 1.5 °C target, though it is technically possible to return below this threshold through intense mitigation. However, even temporarily overshooting 1.5 °C may have irreversible impacts on our natural sys-tems, including biodiversity loss or pushing past various climate tipping points.

5. Mitigation efforts may not only benefit our climate, but lead to more resilient communities.Vulnerable communities will be disproportion-ately affected by changing phenomena, through socioeconomic impacts such as food insecurity, income loss, health impacts, displacement, and increased conflict. Thankfully, the benefits of reducing greenhouse gas emissions are often twofold, as many mitigation strategies also sup-port sustainable development through improve-ments to water and air quality, public health, and ecosystem stability. This is especially true when reducing short-lived climate pollutants, such as methane and black carbon, which simultaneously cuts down on air pollution and mitigates health threats such as asthma and other respiratory dis-eases.6. More ambition is needed to stay below 1.5 °C.Even if all countries fulfilled their Nationally De-termined Contributions (NDCs) as outlined in the Paris Agreement, there is very high likelihood that we will reach 1.5 °C warming by mid-centu-ry and remain above this threshold through year 2100. Avoiding 1.5 °C global warming requires rapid and intense global reductions in both car-bon dioxide and non-CO2 climate pollutants be-yond current NDC pledges.———-Sources: • https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/07/climate/

ipcc-climate-report-2040.html• http://report.ipcc.ch/sr15/pdf/sr15_spm_final.

pdf• http://blogs.edf.org/climate411/2018/10/08/

six-takeaways-from-the-new-climate-report/


Winter 2018

Air Quality in Patna

Due to fuelwood and biomass burning, fuel adulteration, vehicle emission and traffic conges-tion, air pollution in India is a serious issue. It is among the most polluted countries in the world, and factors do not seem to be getting better. Air pollution in India kills approximately one million citizens a year. Undark is a non-profit, editorially independent online publication which explores science and how it intersects with other studies. In August 2018, it published an article entitled, “Gasping for Air in India’s Industrial North” by Gayathri Vaidyanathan. The article discusses the city of Patna and the drastic effects of pollution on the city. Patna is the capital and largest city in the state of Bihar, India. It is also the second larg-est city in Eastern India. In 2011, it’s estimated population was 1.68 million. When people think of India, most think of how much Delhi is pol-luted. However, WHO has named Patna the fifth most polluted city in the world. Delhi was follow-ing behind. PM 2.5 is a reference to atmospheric particulate matter (PM) that have a diameter of less than 2.5 micrometers. It can come from power plants, cars, aircrafts, forest fires, agri-cultural burning, and etc. These particles are 30 times smaller than a human hair. Due to the fact that they are they are so small, these fine particles tend to stay longer in the air than other heavier particles. This increases the chances of humans and animals inhaling them. Studies have found a close link between exposure to fine particles and premature death from heart and lung disease, and other respiratory problems. PM 2.5 is the most dangerous type of particulate pollution, and it is the one that affects Patna. It was recorded that at

Traffic policewoman Sandhya Bhartj directs traffic in central Patna. Her cloth mask does little to pro-tect her from the smallest particulate pollution.

times, the city can experience levels that are 60 times the recorded safe limit set by the World Health Organization. This pollution is taking a high toll. If the quality in Patna were to reach safe levels, life expectancy would go up by four years. In Delhi it would go up by six years. Just like in other na-tions, this issue is known and there are potential solutions, however it comes down to political will. This intersects with other factors like moni-toring, enforcement, and the Pollution Control Board’s budget. According to experts, more monitor-ing stations would be needed to help combat the problem. Each monitor would cost about 15 lakh rupees which is about $22,000. With the current state, new policies and enforcement cannot and should not wait for monitoring to improve. It is known that pollution control boards are one of the poorly funded agencies in India, and waiting for more stations alone could take a considerable amount of time. Patna is not unique when it comes to institutional weaknesses as an issue. However, with India’s Supreme Court and work done by non profit organizations, the central govern-ment is pushing for better measures. One of these measures includes electric cars. Vehicle emissions are a strong matter as the streets are filled with aging rickshaws, motorcycles cars, and buses and which all add to traffic congestion, increasing emissions. Just like the rest of the globe, although the weather and topography cannot be changed, emissions standards can become more strict. This would require a variety of intersecting interven-tions in both policy making and enforcement as well as the implementation of green energy programs to make the air cleaner and therefore, healthier.

Source: • https://undark.org/breathtaking/air-pol-

lution-patna/


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“We cannot change the weather; we can-not change the topography,” said Sach-chidanand Tripathi, an earth scientist at the Indian Institute of Technology,

Kanpur. “[But] we can make emissions standards more stringent.”

Sanitation of Universal Water Services – World

Water Week 2018

World Water Week, organized by the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI), is an annual event which focuses on global water issues. This initiative has engaged 135 countries, 378 organi-zations and 3339 participants through 238 ses-sions and 15 topics (Programme – World Water Week). During these sessions, critical points are discussed, including ways to address the chal-lenges of land-based sources of pollution and stimulate innovative solutions. Other sessions focus on conserving ecosystems, funding univer-sal sanitation programs in underdeveloped areas and analyzing sanitation implications on human health (Programme – World Water Week). During the World Water Week sessions, discus-sions related to global sanitation issues were sup-plemented with insightful debates pertaining to potential solutions and calls for action to increase accessibility to sanitation around the world. One of the sessions focused on the importance of strengthening the national WASH (Water, Sanita-tion and Hygiene) policy and legal frameworks to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 6 (SDG6). SDG6 – Clean Water and Sanitation focuses on “ensuring availability and sustainable manage-ment of water and sanitation for all” (UN Sus-tainable Development – Knowledge Platform). Due to the fact that access to sanitation is critical for human health, SDG6 prioritizes “safely man-aged sanitation services” in accordance with “in-ternationally-accepted health-based norms and guidance” (Programme – World Water Week).


Winter 2018

Location: Venice Beach, CaliforniaPhoto credit: Suzy Hallak

Currently, 2.6 billion global citizens, “2 billion of whome live in rural areas, reside in unsanitary en-vironments and lack access to clean water (WHO – Sanitation and Health). Living in such condi-tions increases their risk of “diarrhea, helminth infections, undernutrition, vector borne diseases,” and therefore impacts their “mental, social and economic well-being” (Programme – World Wa-ter Week). Many UN member states are currently asking for guidance and support from the public and private sector to achieve the WASH targets.Other health-related implications of sanitation on the global population include reproductive, maternal, newborn and childhood health. In 2015, WHO and UNICEF discovered that 38% of health facilities in low- and middle-income coun-tries are deprived of clean water, 19% do not have improved sanitation and 35% lack clean water and soap for handwashing (Programme – World Water Week). The same study was conducted in 2016, revealing that “over 2.6 million babies died in their first four weeks of life and thou-sands of mothers died during and after child-birth” (Programme – World Water Week). The most telling part of this study, was that “one in five newborn deaths could have been prevented by simply washing the babies in clean water and caring for them in a clean environment by peo-ple who had washed their hands” (Programme – World Water Week). Sanitation impacts all aspects of human health, and thus serious meas-ures must be taken to actively ensure availabil-ity of clean water sources for all global citizens.

In the past, achieving the SDGs for water services has been difficult for smaller towns and rural ar-eas, while major cities generally have more access to resources and the attention of development fi-nance (Programme – World Water Week). These water focused SDGs include Target 6.3, “By 2030, improve water quality by reducing pollution” and 14.1 “By 2025, prevent and significantly re-duce marine pollution of all kinds” (Programme – World Water Week). This dynamic can poten-tially be attributed to private investors’ concerns about the perceived risk-return profile. As a re-sult, domestic public finance often neglects small-er towns and rural areas and is usually allocated to other development priorities. In addition, phil-anthropic and charitable aid are usually allocated to smaller-scale projects, rather than larger-scale, governmental strategies to achieve universal coverage (Programme – World Water Week). Although user finance serves as a foundation for basic operational and maintenance-related needs, it is insufficient to meet capital maintenance re-quirements, or pave the way for investments in new infrastructure (Programme – World Water Week). This is a major issue which requires the attention of the both the public and private sector. In order to achieve this goal, coordinated meas-ures of action must be taken across the public and private sectors. During World Water Week, it was highlighted that guidelines will be implemented to foster engagement of the public and private sectors to support “sanitation investments that maximize health outcomes, including supporting

risk assessment and management for sanitation systems to safely contain, remove and treat hu-man waste” (Programme – World Water Week). In order to make public guidelines effective, voluntary actions must be taken by the private sector as well. For example, the world’s largest ocean cleanup was just initiated this year, by the nonprofit Ocean Cleanup. This nonprofit has cre-ated a $20 million floating boom system which is “designed to clean up the 1.8 trillion pieces of trash floating in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch” (Forbes – The World’s Largest Ocean Cleanup Has Officially Begun). It is very promising that organ-izations within all sectors are starting to play an active role in cleaning the globe’s water systems and increasing accessibility to sanitation for all. Another large component of achieving global sanitation of water sources is regulation of the water and sanitation services. At World Water Week, one of the meetings focused on the new UNICEF Regulation Practice Manual, which aims to clearly define the relationship between the diverse economic regulatory functions and roles by sector stakeholders, in order to promote effective and sustainable service delivery (Pro-gramme – World Water Week). This document will hopefully make regulation of the world’s sanitation systems much more efficient and ef-fective. Essentially, the Manual provides readers with an overview of mechanisms and examples of the existing regulatory frameworks, in or-der to depict the criticality of the independent regulatory function. The regulation of price set-ting, service quality, competition and consumer protection, within the scope of wider govern-ance functions and environmental implications. During the meeting, various perspectives were raised in order to highlight relationships among economic and public health functions of WHO Guide regulation in the area of enhancing drink-ing water sanitation and quality regulations and standards (Programme – World Water Week).Through global initiatives, such as the newly implemented guidelines, UNICEF Regulation Practice Manual and the global Ocean Cleanup, steps are being taken toward achieving increased access to sanitary water sources for all global citi-zens. However, UN member states must continue tracking against the SDGs and investing in their sanitation system, and finding ways to increase

Global Spotlight Report #8: The Status of Climate Finance in Leading Greenhouse

Gas Emitting Countries

Countries are divided into donors, described in effectiveness, and recipients, described in impact of international assistance. Many recipients, such as Mexico and Thailand, reported the lack of sys-tem in describing needs while donors, such as Canada and the EU, asked for better mechanisms to report on. Country Managers recently gathered to research such key issues affecting international climate finance in greenhouse gas emissions. In reviewing such, they discovered countries use in-ternational climate funding mechanisms, includ-ing but not limited to UN agencies and private sector investment. Yet, the overall level of donor finance support is incredibly low, as funding is di-minishing in some donor countries while others made substantial efforts. There are hopes for COP 24 to better coordinate finance, become more in-clusive, and accountable. Source:

• https://www.climatescorecard.org

2018 UN Biodiversity Conference

In Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, the 14th meeting of the Conference of Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity is being held concurrently with the 9th Meeting of the Parties to the Carta-gena Protocol on Biosafety and the 3rd Meeting of the Parties to the Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits arising from their Utiliza-

COP 24 - United Nations Conference on

Climate Change

Katowice, Poland2–14 December 2018

COP24 is the informal name for the 24th Con-ference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change

The COP24 climate summit will be organised by Poland in Katowice from 3 – 14 December. This year’s theme is Changing together, refer-ring to the determination of all parties to adopt in the course of COP24 decisions which are nec-essary to fully implement the Paris Agreement.

Source: • http://cop24.gov.pl/

tion. With a theme of “Investing in biodiversity for people and planet,” the Biodiversity Confer-ence is to be preceded by a high-level segments which focus on ways to mainstream biodiver-sity into sectors of energy and health and also address international community engagement. There are hopes to launch negotiations for a post-2020 global biodiversity framework to replace the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity, and also look at strategic, financial, and ecosystem-related is-sues. Further, marine conservation issues, new technologies, risk assessment, management of synthetic biology, and digital sequencing infor-mation are topics in question at the conference.

Source:

• https://www.cbd.int/conferences/2018


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accessibility for rural and underdeveloped areas. By doing so, we will prevent millions from con-tracting severe diseases due to lack of sanitation. Author: Suzy Hallak, WIT Regional Director of the Middle East

Sources:

• https://programme.worldwaterweek.org/event/7999-mission-possible-funding-uni-versal-water-services-in-every-district

• https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/sdg6

• https://www.forbes.com/sites/tre-vornace/2018/09/10/the-worlds-largest-ocean-cleanup-has-officially-begun/#2be8d60b2738

• http://www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/wwdrchap6p1_3.pdf

The question is whether or not you choose to disturb the world around you Ann Patchett, writer (b.2 Dec 1963)

One of the truest test of integrity is its blunt refusal to be compromised. Chinua Achebe Writer and professor (1930-2013)

The English Language holds half a million words in its coffers, but a typical person knows only about 5% of them (and uses even fewer)

UN Human Rights Day10 December, 2018

“Where, after all, do universal human rights be-gin? In small places, close to home -- so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. [...] Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. With-out concerted citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world." -- Eleanor RooseveltSource:

• http://www.un.org/en/events/humanrights-day/


Winter 2018

World Information TransferWorld Ecology ReportWorld Information Transfer, Inc.(ISSN #1080-3092)

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“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful

committed citizens can change the world. Indeed it’s the only thing that ever has”

- Margaret Mead

Unaddressed Future Catastrophe!

During the past 50 years 60% of our wildlife has disappeared due to elimination of habitat, destruction of forests, development and taste for exotic skins and organs. But, the world’s human popula-tion has reached over 7 billion people in 2011, currently 7.6 billion and by 2050 it is projected to be around 10 billion. One wonders whether there will be any forests or wildlife left, except in zoos.

The world population reached 1 billion people at the start of the 19th century and the momentum has been quickly expanding particularly in developing countries. The major consequence of explosive popu-lation growth is that the demands of humans will outrun the carry-ing capacity of our world - its aquifers, forests, fisheries, grasslands, and land. More areas will become cities, deserts and wastelands.

Some examples:Nigeria, which is the size of Texas, is projected to reach 440 million people in 2050.Ethiopia to 190 million.Pakistan 272 million.

While Western and Eastern Europe have reached population sta-bility as a result of planned fertility decline, and China addressed the problem with its one child policy, in most of the developing world access to family planning and effective contraception is unavailable and ignored by beliefs, customs and governments.

Consider, that as the population expands and another 2.3+ bil-lion people are added by 2050, rising seas, expanding deserts, fall-ing water tables and devastating storms, due to climate change; it will also increase the growing number of environmental refugees with no where to go except refugee camps. Most of them will be-come permanently displaced and continue producing children who will also have nowhere to go and will be sold, used or abused.

Currently, people, due to corrupt governments, are migrating from

POINT OF VIEW Africa, Asia and Latin America to North America and Europe. In response, US is erecting a fence along the border with Mexico, Med-iterranean Sea is routinely patrolled and trying to intercept African migrants bound for Europe, India is building a 10 foot high wall along its border with Bangladesh, who also have to cope with the migrants from Sri Lanka, due to their inability to control their fertil-ity rate.

It is time for all governments to consider a far less painful, in human terms, solution by accelerating a shift to smaller fami-lies in developing countries to help people break out of pov-erty. This means addressing the customs and beliefs of those that have no concept about the cost of their ignorance on the lives of their own children and of future generations.

In conclusion, the current dilemma is human rights vs. human re-sponsibilities. We lost the idea that human responsibility resides in the individual the same way as human rights do. Human rights belong to everybody, not only those that take no responsibility for their actions!

Sources:World Wildlife Fund/s 2018 Living Planet ReportEarth policy news 2014Human Development Report, UNDPThe LANCET, 2018Worldwatch Institute, Family Planning and Environmental Sustainability: Assessing the Science, June 2016

“Almost all our social evils: famines, difference between rich and poor, desertification, decrease in biodiversity, increase in the number of hereditary taints and warming of the planet originate in the population explosion....due to the fact that our new set of anti-natural values-generosity, solidarity, pride in our medical victories-had been enthusiastically aplied before we developed their logical counterpart, birth control.” Jacques-Yves Cousteau in 1992


Winter 201816

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