Childcare: Fertile ground for healthy young eaters | Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy

http://www.iatp.org/blog/201302/childcare-fertile-ground-for-healthy-young-eaters
Posted February 7, 2013 by JoAnne Berkenkamp Erin McKee VanSlooten

When a four year old in our project was asked recently where carrots come from, he pretty well nailed it: “The ground, and farmers water them and pick them and give them to people and bunnies too, and stores.” We couldn’t have said it better ourselves.

So amidst all the gloom and doom about childhood obesity, there is reason for hope. One bright light on the path to healthier kids is Farm to Childcare (F2CC). By connecting kids with local farm fresh foods, F2CC initiatives support farmers who produce healthy choices like fruits and vegetables while helping our youngest eaters get off to a good start.

IATP launched our new Farm to Childcare pilot in Minnesota last summer. With our childcare partner, New Horizon Academy, we designed a set of practical, on-the-ground strategies to try out new approaches in childcare settings: menu innovations featuring local foods, age-appropriate curriculum, parent outreach and a rigorous evaluation program. Now we’re pleased to share some of what we did and what we’re learning. ….(more).

Environmental Justice http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre145
Environment Ethics http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre120
Food-Matters http://Food-Matters.TV

Ethiopians ‘driven out in land grabs’

http://www.africadaily.net/reports/Ethiopians_driven_out_in_land_grabs_999.html

Ethiopians ‘driven out in land grabs’
by Staff Writers
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (UPI) Feb 8, 2013

Thousands of Ethiopians are being driven off ancestral lands that the government’s selling to foreign investors buying vast swathes of farmland, a U.S. watchdog reports.

Amid a new rash of land grabs in Africa by foreign governments or business groups seeking to produce food for export, the Oakland Institute of California says that Ethiopia, one of the world’s poorest states, has leased 1.5 million acres of prime farmland to companies from India, Malaysia and elsewhere.

The institute, an independent policy think tank that specializes in food and land issues, says the crisis is likely to worsen as the foreign companies move in and start operations.

It said the Addis Ababa government plans to lease as much as 15 percent of the land in some regions of the land-locked East African country, which has long been beset by drought, famine and war.
….(more).

Environmental Justice http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre145
Environment Ethics http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre120
Food-Matters http://Food-Matters.TV

PODCAST: The canary in the climate coal mine — New Internationalist

http://newint.org/blog/2013/02/08/climate-radio-arctic-canary-tipping-point/

http://climateradio.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/climateradio/audio/ClimateRadio2013-01-AnArcticWakeUpCall.mp3

http://climateradio.org/

By Phil England

There are a number of tipping points in the Arctic which threaten to rapidly escalate the threat of climate change for the whole planet. These should serve as a wake-up call in the fight against climate change.

In this episode of Climate Radio Phil England speaks to Professor Peter Wadhams, Head of the Polar Ocean Physics Group at Cambridge University and Professor Timothy Lenton, the award-winning Chair in Climate Change and Earth Systems Science at University of Exeter.

Listen to the podcast here.

The podcast explores the science behind Arctic tipping points including:

Arctic Sea Ice NASA/Kathryn Hansen, under a CC License

Arctic Sea Ice: New data from the CryoSat 2 satellite confirms that Arctic sea ice is declining faster than most climate models predicted. Is the trend in volume decline turning exponential or are recent observations just anomalies waiting to be explained?

Greenland Ice Sheet: Work published in 2012 indicates we are now within the estimated range for tipping the Greenland ice sheet into irreversible meltdown – although a 2008 assessment suggested this process itself could take hundreds of years to complete.

Atlantic Thermohaline Circulation: Recent observations appear to suggest that freshwater from Greenland ice melt may be weakening the Atlantic thermohaline circulation – the ocean current which includes the Gulf Stream and brings warm water to the Arctic (EAC, p.20).

Arctic Methane: There are several potential sources of methane in the arctic: on-shore permafrost (which turns into wetland as it melts); subsea permafrost on coastal shelves; and methane hydrates which are locked up on the deep ocean floor.          …(more).

Global Climate Change http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre130
Environment Ethics http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre120

What You Need to See to Understand Blizzard ‘Nemo’ | Climate Central

http://www.climatecentral.org/news/what-you-need-to-see-to-understand-blizzard-nemo-15579

• Published: February 8th, 2013

By Andrew Freedman

The blizzard of 2013, named “Nemo” by weather.com, is unleashing a paralyzing blitz of heavy snow, strong winds, and coastal flooding in the Northeast. These images and videos help explain the dynamics powering the storm, as well as its potential consequences.

Global Climate Change http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre130
Environment Ethics http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre120

Obama Speech Expected To Flesh Out Climate Proposals

http://www.npr.org/2013/02/05/171138331/obama-speech-expected-to-flesh-out-climate-proposals

http://pd.npr.org/anon.npr-mp3/npr/me/2013/02/20130205_me_14.mp3

by Ari Shapiro

February 05, 2013 4:00 AM

4 min 17 sec

The big surprise in President Obama’s inaugural address was his attention to climate change. What will the president’s State of the Union address say about clean energy and global warming?

Copyright © 2013 NPR. For personal, noncommercial use only. See Terms of Use. For other uses, prior permission required.

RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

President Obama delivers his State of Union address a week from today. That speech is expected to expand on proposals the president put forth at his inauguration. One surprise in his inaugural address was a call to do more on climate change – that after a campaign that mostly ignored concerns about the environment. NPR’s Ari Shapiro looks at what environmental groups are expecting now.

Global Climate Change http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre130
Environment Ethics http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre120

A Presidential Decision That Could Change the World: The Strategic Importance of Keystone XL

http://truth-out.org/news/item/14463-a-presidential-decision-that-could-change-the-world-the-strategic-importance-of-keystone-xl

Monday, 11 February 2013 09:22 By Michael T Klare, TomDispatch |

The Keystone XL pipeline protest at the White House, November 6, 2011. Another demonstration is being planned to take place there on February 17. (Photo: Emma Cassidy / tarsandsaction)

Presidential decisions often turn out to be far less significant than imagined, but every now and then what a president decides actually determines how the world turns. Such is the case with the Keystone XL pipeline, which, if built, is slated to bring some of the “dirtiest,” carbon-rich oil on the planet from Alberta, Canada, to refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast. In the near future, President Obama is expected to give its construction a definitive thumbs up or thumbs down, and the decision he makes could prove far more important than anyone imagines. It could determine the fate of the Canadian tar-sands industry and, with it, the future well-being of the planet. If that sounds overly dramatic, let me explain.

Sometimes, what starts out as a minor skirmish can wind up determining the outcome of a war — and that seems to be the case when it comes to the mounting battle over the Keystone XL pipeline. If given the go-ahead by President Obama, it will daily carry more than 700,000 barrels of tar-sands oil to those Gulf Coast refineries, providing a desperately needed boost to the Canadian energy industry. If Obama says no, the Canadians (and their American backers) will encounter possibly insuperable difficulties in exporting their heavy crude oil, discouraging further investment and putting the industry’s future in doubt.

The battle over Keystone XL was initially joined in the summer of 2011, when environmental writer and climate activist Bill McKibben and 350.org, which he helped found, organized a series of non-violent anti-pipeline protests in front of the White House to highlight the links between tar sands production and the accelerating pace of climate change. At the same time, farmers and politicians in Nebraska, through which the pipeline is set to pass, expressed grave concern about its threat to that state’s crucial aquifers. After all, tar-sands crude is highly corrosive, and leaks are a notable risk. ….(more).

Global Climate Change http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre130
Environmental Justice http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre145
Environment Ethics http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre120

A New Manhattan Project – A lesson from Australia!

E130, e120,

EPA Criminal Enforcement: Protecting People and the Environment

E145, e120,

Responsible Investment at Harvard Coalition

Global Climate Change http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre130
Environmental Justice http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre145
Environment Ethics http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre120

Divest Harvard

Sustainable Business: Water, food and energy nexus – 3 parts

TheGuardian

Published on Feb 8, 2013

Sustainable Business: Water, food and energy nexus part one

Subscribe to the Guardian HERE: http://bitly.com/UvkFpD

In the first of our live broadcasts exploring the water, food and energy nexus, the Guardian’s Jo Confino speaks to Sir Gordon Conway from Imperial College London, Tim Fox from the Institution of Mechanical Engineers and Andy Wales, senior vice president sustainable development, SABMiller about the connections between water and food.

Part 2

Published on Feb 11, 2013

Sustainable Business: Water, food and energy nexus part two

Subscribe to the Guardian HERE: http://bitly.com/UvkFpD

In the second video from our live broadcasts exploring the water, food and energy nexus, Jo Confino speaks to Camilla Toulmin, director at International Institute for Environment and Development, David Norman, director of external affairs at WWF UK and Herbert Oberhänsli, vice president, economics and international relations at Nestlé about the role of water and food in energy production and why these three resources are so intertwined.

Part 3

Published on Feb 11, 2013

Sustainable Business: Water, food and energy nexus part three

Subscribe to the Guardian HERE: http://bitly.com/UvkFpD

In the third broadcast from our live debates exploring the food, water and energy nexus, Jo Confino speaks to Gerard Payen, president at Aquafed, Usha Rao-Monari, global head, water at International Finance Corporation and Jens Berggren, director for Stockholm Water Prize and Stockholm Industry Water Award about the interconnections between energy and water, from treatment to transportation

Environmental Justice http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre145
Environment Ethics http://courses.dce.harvard.edu/~envre120
Food-Matters http://Food-Matters.TV