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The World Bank's carbon-offset deals have produced meager results for greenhouse emissions cuts, a fact that has trust fund contributors scrambling for carbon credits before the first Kyoto Protocol commitment period expires in 2012. Donors that are worried about keeping their promises to reduce emissions have, with the help of the World Bank, shifted a portion of their money to "low hanging fruit" -- projects that yield cheap, easy and abundant emissions. But the bumper crop of cut-rate emissions reductions is undercutting the competitiveness of renewable energy and small-scale projects, which are already more expensive and pose higher investment risks.
The World Bank's plan to use its existing carbon-offset portfolio as the model from which to scale up to a "low carbon" economy should sound alarms for anyone seriously concerned about avoiding climate chaos. The Bank's foray into the carbon market paves the way for business-as-usual, while short-changing clean, renewable energy, the poor, and ultimately the climate. The Bank, on the other hand, stands to gain enormously
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According to the CDC, 76 million Americans -- one in four -- come down with food poisoning every year. Among the most common is E. coli, a byproduct of the system of industrialized animal agribusiness. Americans have a common perception that the problem stems from food coming from outside the country -- from China, say, or Mexico. Instead, it's our food that's the problem.
Instead of cleaning up its own act, the American meat industry has shifted responsibility to the consumer -- not just in the United States, but also in countries where U.S. meat is exported. The United States is using bilateral trade agreements to arm-twist weaker countries into accepting its food safety standards as a tool to expand the market control of U.S. corporations. South Korea is the latest victim.
With Korea, the United States has been insisting that no free trade deal is possible unless Korea changes its food safety import regulations for beef, recognizes U.S. beef inspections as equivalent, and opens its market to cheap U.S. beef imports. Most Koreans are dead set against these U.S. demands: a recent poll found that 87 percent of Korean housewives believe American meat is "unsafe." Koreans not only want to protect their local farmers, who will, with the implementation of the FTA, face competition from tariff-free subsidized U.S. beef imports. They are also justifiably concerned about the safety of U.S. meat, especially when it comes to BSE or Mad Cow Disease.
The U.S.-Korea ag-biotech agreement also obliges Korea to restrict its risk assessment of imported GM products for food, feed, or processing to their "intended" use. In other words, if local farmers sow GM maize kernels from the United States that were meant for cooking, the U.S. companies responsible for the transfer of the kernels are free of any liability. This is precisely how Mexico's indigenous maize crop got contaminated
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Molecule that never breaks down tied to immune system damage
Stop CO2 emission growth by 2025, but increases ok until then
Expected to be considered after legislature returns from break
Iran's regional influence is unquestionable and rolling Iran back out of Lebanon, Iraq, Afghanistan, and perhaps even Gaza may no longer be realistic.
6 year prosecution of charity ended in deadlock jury, but U.S. vows to retry
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Who really killed Martin Luther King Jr?
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Questions continue to linger about the government's involvement
Feds target families in "sanctuary" cities
Fishing season almost over, but no fuel allowed in for boats
New group seeks two-state solution
3 in 4 Israelis expect war with "one or more Arab states" in the next five years
Wants all Muslims banned from Israel
After Supreme Court refuses to recognize decision by international court
Asian nations that paid fair wage expect to lose U.S. trade to sweatshop havens like China and Vietnam
Soaring temperatures, locust invasions and forest fires
'Child porno' widely available, even sold in megastores
Africa alone lost $607 billion - 5x the amount it has received in development aid
Like the next president, his career will mostly involve cleaning up his predecessor's mess
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Stonings a Sign of Taliban Resurgence
THE WAR IN IRAQ
POLITICS AS USUAL
