Love tuna

The European Commission has banned the fishing of bluefin tuna in the Eastern Atlantic and the Mediterranean today . Is common sense starting to prevail? Well, not quite because the spawning season is over now, and they acted only once the peak season was over and after the French have filled their quota.

This is happening -- totally coincidentally of course -- as I am about to fly tomorrow morning to Tokyo. I like sushi, I like tuna. But since we have all become aware of the bluefin tuna crisis, I have restrained myself; if I see tuna on a menu I ask the waiter/waitress what area it comes from and what fishing method was used. Of course, the poor waiters/tress never know what to say. But at least I feel good, because it gives me the feeling that -- by picking another dish -- at least I reach out to someone who will maybe convey my concern to his/her boss, etc.

I hope that today's EU late decision to ban unsustainable tuna fishing will mark the beginning of a new era, and that we (or our children) will be able soon to eat tuna without wondering if it's alright. We'll see next year.

The fact that I like some much eating good tuna reminds me of one anecdote that took place some twenty-five or thirty years ago. In the margins of some international meeting (I suppose it was a meeting of the International Whaling Commission), I was having a heated but cordial conversation with a Japanese delegate who -- in response to my argument that "there were substitute to all whale products" -- stared at me and said "no, there is no substitute to whale meat". I think I answered something like "come'on there's beef, fish, chicken, tofu" (if I said tofu, I guess the nose-of-the-Frenchman-in-me grew a few centimetres). Of course the Japanese guy was right; he could admit that there were substitutes to whale products such as sperm whale spermaceti wax used at the time for lipsticks and other cosmetics, whale oils etc, but a whale steak was a whale steak. To suggest that a battery chicken was a substitute was as narrow-minded on my part as considering that a lousy hamburger could be compared to a sushi. Although I was born French, I was in some ways a little bit culturally and gastronomically insensitive in my mid'twenties, may I say?

Today however, in 2007 with the increase of human demography and the global drive for consumption, I think it's important that we give something away. Be it tuna, whale (and other) meat, air conditioning, unsustainable holidays, etc.

[Hugo, my 20 year-old son studies at the école hotelière; very good studies (and expensive -- believe me!). But I get the impression that the course on "hostelery and the environment" says very little about the traceability of fish. Maybe I should propose to the director of the école hotelière that (instead of paying a fortune for my son's studies) I come once in a while and give them a lecture.]

Portuguese Environment Secretary on shark conservation

The video address of the State Secretary for the Environment of Portugal, Dr. Humberto Rosa at the Sharks at Risk conference we organized this week in Lisbon, is now available on YouTube.

Watch, and listen to his wise words on the environment-fisheries nexus. This may sound obvious, but bear in mind that the reality is that when an environmental official in a major fishing country like Portugal to makes such remarks, he is walking on eggs. Even if we're in 2007, twenty years after the release of the Brundtland report that coined the term sustainable development in 1987.

And note the Portuguese State Secretary's support to a European Shark Conservation Plan, coinciding with this semester's Portuguese European Union presidency.

Click here for the Portuguese version. And here for the English version.

The five Power Point presentations are also available on the Shark Alliance website.

Children of the Cold War

It's not a nuclear bomb, but the esthetic of yesterday's Russian thermobaric test has a taste of déjà-vu. To atomic test ban campaign veterans such as me, it inevitably reminds the relatively old days of nuclear weapons testing.

For the time being, it seems that it's only a media mind bomb targetted at Russian voters.

But precisely because these are not nuclear bombs, thermobaric devices are in some ways more dangerous: they're not part of any nuclear deterrence strategy, so it's likely there will be less obstacles to their launch in real warfare.

The US call their own thermobaric bomb "the Mother of All Bombs", and the Russians call their "the Father of All Bombs" because it is more powerful. Well, with this sort of verbal escalation (let alone the macho rhetoric) what's clear is that they're both Children of the Cold War.

Shark TV

When I borded my plane back home last night, there was a TV monitoring playing near the bording gate in Lisbon airport, and I got a nice mission accomplished feeling as I saw the evening news reporting on the Sharks at Risk conference we'd put together.

It's only the beginning, but I think we've put shark conservation on the Portuguese political agenda.

There is also a nice slide-show on the Shark Alliance website.

Biodiversity in Lisbon

I'm glad I found time to spend a few minutes yesterday under the wonderful centuries-old juniper tree in the Principe Real Square in Lisbon's Barrio Alto. Whenever I come to Lisbon, I always try to pay a visit to this most venerable tree which stands a few blocks above the building of the Environment Ministry.

We're expecting a lot of press interest for the Sharks at Risk conference we're organizing today in Lisbon for the Shark Alliance and in partnership with the Luso-American Foundation, coinciding with the Portuguese EU Presidency.

Tubarões em risco

We're in the middle of hectic last minute details preparation for the conference Sharks at Risk: Building an EU Conservation Plan which we're helping the Shark Alliance to organize in Lisbon next Tuesday, in partnership with the Luso-American Foundation.

Because it's an open conference, if you're in Lisbon next week you don't need to register in advance. But it is recommended to arrive a little earlier than 14h30, the time the conference begins, because we've got to begin on time, with the tight programme we've got to go through in just four hours.

Business' [r]evolution

The Financial Times has published an interesting interview with Bjorn Stigson, the President of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD).

Bjorn Stigson says that the climate needs a revolution. "I think it's beginning to dawn on people that we are talking about such a major change in society people are saying this is tougher than what we thought," he said. "How do you change society in a radical way in a democracy so the people you want to vote for you are also going to suffer the consequences of the policies that you put in place. I don't think we've seen that kind of a challenge in societal change happening peacefully. It's [only] happened in revolutions."

Five years ago, one of the last things I did before leaving my post as Political Director of Greenpeace International was to negotiate and sign a Joint Call for Action together with Bjorn Stigson, which we presented together at the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) in Johannesburg. In it, we were asking governments "to be responsible and to build the international framework to tackle climate change on the basis of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and its Kyoto Protocol." Bjorn Stigson's rationale for supporting this statement was that it was not good for corporations working transnationally to operate under different climate regimes. Bjorn does not sound more optimistic now than he was five years ago: "Our problem right now is that we don't know what the policies are going to be beyond 2012. How do you take these issues into consideration when you build a new plant that's going to live for 30, 40 years," he told the FT this week.

"We're very concerned by what we see and the lack of response from governments in grasping the responsibility they have in dealing with this issue," he added. That's pretty much what we said together five years ago in the joint statement.

The fact that in Johannesburg representatives from our two organizations spoke with one voice on one issue for the first time stunned the delegates at the 2002 World Summit. Since, people often ask me "what happened with that partnership?". Well, one thing I can say is that I think it's good that now Bjorn can say these things by himself. When we said it together five years ago, not everyone was happy. "You're getting hit on your right flank, but you should know what I hear on my left flank", I remember telling Bjorn a few days later, "but in a few years, no-one will think you've gone too far."

Here we are, five years later.

Una incoherencia incomoda

Acaban de anunciar esta mañana que el piloto de Formula 1 Michael Schumacher recibira el Premio Principe de Asturias del Deporte el 26 de Octubre.

En la misma ceremonia en Oviedo, también Al Gore recibira el Premio en la categoria Cooperación Internacional por su contribución al despertar del mundo al cambio climático.

Es curioso que al jurado y al patronato de la Fundación Príncipe de Asturias no les parezca mal celebrar a la vez al máximo representante del culto al coche (y del despilfaro energético que representa la Formula 1), y al "ecologista número 1" del momento.

O bien, ¿Schumacher va anunciar su conversión, y presentarse a la ceremonia en bicicleta?

Deserted convention

I attended the opening session of the 8th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) yesterday in Madrid.

Twenty four hours after the opening session, the official website of the convention hasn't yet been updated. The Spanish Environment Ministry which is hosting the meeting hasn't put it up on their portal either, curiously (the meeting was opened by the Crown Prince and the Spanish Environment Minister is chairing the conference, though). But thank God (or thank Kimo, rather), people can get updates through the Earth Negotiations Bulletin (ENB).

The UNCCD has always been the ugly little duck of the 1992 Rio Earth Summit outcome. If you compare the dynamic tension and political momentum that takes place when the governing bodies of the other two other Rio conventions (the CBD and the UNFCCC) hold their meetings, you get a real preaching in a desert feel with the UNCCD.

This week and next, ten years after the convention's entry into force, the Parties are discussing the adoption of a strategic plan to fight desertification. Until now, industrialised countries have been reluctant to put money into the Desertification Convention, for a variety of reasons. But now that the progress and impacts of desertification beyond Africa are increasingly obvious, perhaps they'll wake up to it?

Greening of the Pope

When I wrote about the Environment-Religion relationship last week, I did not know that Pope Benedict was about to turn environmental advocate.

Apparently.

Arctic pilgrims

I got an email from Kieran Mulvaney last night, which he wrote from the site of the first Greenpeace protest which took place in 1971 in Amchitka, one of the Aleutian Islands in Northern Alaska.

Kieran's description on his blog of his landing on the island and his visit of the crater formed by the largest US underground nuclear explosion which the early greenpeacers wanted to stop sounds like an almost religious experience.

Talking of religion and the conservation of the Arctic environment, the Religion, Science and Environment organization led by the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Archbishop Bartolomew is holding next week on a boat off the coast of Greenland their 7th Symposium: "Arctic: Mirror of Life". The Arctic venue (following past symposia in the Aegean, Black, Adriatic and Baltic Seas as well as in the Amazon and the Danube) is timely: I hope they'll seize this opportunity to call for a freeze on the Arctic grab which is dangerously accelerating this summer.

[The fact that the Arctic symposium coincides with unprecedented tensions over ownership of Arctic resources and territories is of course purely accidental as it took months to organize the Arctic symposium. So if I was the organizers, I'd say this coincidence is a sign of God who's sent them there to take action.]

As the Los Angeles Times wrote a few days ago in an editorial: "to ravage the melting ice cap for fossil fuels that will further warm and pollute the North Pole would be a tragedy for humankind." (The Cold Rush, LA Times, 24 August,2007)

I always wondered why so few mainstream religious leaders pay attention to the destruction of what they call God's creation. Although I don't hang around much in churches and temples, I've got the impression that the greening of religious leaders (and followers) is still in infancy, despite the good efforts of people like Mary Evelyn Tucker whom I met a few years ago.

[I read that the Vatican is planning to use solar photovoltaic panels; that's not bad but why don't they solarize all churches, cathedrals, monasteries, Christian schools, etc?]

Back to Greenpeace: there is a Hands Off the Arctic petition on their international website.

No rush

I am in the middle of a piece of work that led me to the website of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), the intergovernmental organization that administers the international treaty which bans the development, production, stockpiling, transfer and use of chemical weapons, and also stipulates their timely destruction. I notice that they've published the list of the seven non-signatory states.

One of the seven countries is Iraq.

That list is dated March 2007, four years after the US occupied the country allegedly to prevent the manufacture, stockpile and use of weapons of mass destruction by the former Iraqi regime.

In February 2006 the OPCW said that Iraq would ratify the treaty soon.

No Rush? [No Bush]

Whaling watch

During the last annual meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) I heard representatives from pro-whaling governments argue that there was no conflict between whaling and the so-called non-consumptive use of whales (also known as whale watching).

Against this view, the Australian Environment Minister argued that whale watching operators from his country could suffer economic loss from Japan's plan to harpoon fifty humpback whales in the Antarctic as part of their scientific whaling programme in a few months. These whales, Australia argues, are tourist attractions when they migrate close to their shore.

A Japanese newspaper, Mainichi Shimbun, reports a different kind of conflict between whaling and whale watching, which happened last Friday within Japan.

A Baird's beaked whale was harpooned off Hokkaido by a whaling boat in the presence of a nearby group of tourists on a whale watching tour who had paid to see living whales, not dead whales.

A year ago, a similar incident between a whale watching operator and a whaling boat was also reported in Norway.

Who owns the whales? -- To whom do they belong? For many years, environmentalists have argued that these animals weren't the exclusive property of the whaling industry. But the divide between pro-whaling and anti-whaling countries, loaded with all sorts of value judgements on both sides, did not help resolve the question.

With incidents such as last Friday's in Hokkaido, if the debate moves within Japan maybe we'll be closer to a solution?

Alive

I just received an email from my friend Arni Finnsson, the President of the Icelandic Nature Conservation Association (INCA). A minimalist email: it contains only the words "The End", and a link to this afternoon's Reuters story announcing that the Icelandic Government has decided to stop commercial whaling, thereby putting an end to what we said here last year was a political whaling experiment.

This morning I had another email from another whale conservation veteran, Kieran Mulvaney, who is presently on board a Greenpeace vessel in the Bering Sea off the Aleutian Islands. From the site of the first Greenpeace expedition against US nuclear weapons testing in 1971, Kieran is telling me in his email the importance for the current generation of Greenpeace activists to connect with the long history of their organization.

I read Kieran's message just before the after-lunch siesta I take everyday in summer (when I can). As Kieran made me think of the past, I realized that next year will mark the 30th anniversary of the first voyage of the Rainbow Warrior in which I took part and which took Greenpeace to Iceland for the first time, and when I fell asleep I was trying to think how many of us from the original Rainbow Warrior crew were still alive.

When I woke up, I found Arni's Icelandic-ends-whaling email message on my Blackberry.

All of us are alive!

Crash

Hace un par de meses, escribimos Chez Rémi que al hecho de que la compañia Iberia había decidido dar a sus aeronaves nombres de especies de fauna iberica en peligro se le podia dar tantas lecturas distintas que daría para escribir un ensayo.

Esta mañana, se puede leer en el periodico El País un amplio reportaje que podria constituir un cápitulo para ese ensayo.

Las rutas de la nueva terminal del aeropuerto de Madrid cruzan un espacio protegido (sic) para las aves, nos dice El País. Suena un poco como montar un circuito de Formula 1 en medio de un parque natural, ¿no?

Lisbon 9/11 Shark

In the last few weeks I have been helping our friends of the Shark Alliance to put together in Lisbon the Sharks at Risk Conference: Building an EU Conservation Plan, to coincide with this semester's Portuguese EU Presidency.

It will take place in the wonderful auditorium of the Luso-American Foundation, in downtown Lisbon. The date is really easy to remember: 11 September.

It is an open conference. So, if you're in Lisbon on 9/11, come and join us. The presence in Lisbon of outstanding specialists in shark conservation is a very special occasion.

Lazy blog

We are in the middle of summer in the Northern hemisphere. I am not taking a complete holiday this month of August because of several on-going projects, but I will be in semi-holiday mode, looking after my family and home for the rest of the month.

This means that Chez Rémi will probably go on lazy mode for a while.

The last time I took a holiday was not that long ago: a few days in Alaska after the annual meeting of the International Whaling Commission at the beginning of June. You can watch the great videos that Alex took there in Alaska. They're so funny, and the music is so good!

Incredible what one can do nowadays, only with the video function of an ordinary little digital camera! We stayed at the Drifters Lodge in Cooper Landing, Kenai Peninsula, a place we can recommend.

Have fun!

Looming subseabed cold war

Is it a sign of the times we live?

Exactly fifty years ago when the international community declared that 1957 would be the International Geophysical Year, this triggered the adoption in 1959 of the Antarctic Treaty whereby all nations' territorial claims on the sixth continent were frozen. It was a sign of peace and international co-operation-- a sign of hope in the middle of the Cold War. And years later, pursuant to a hectic worldwide environmental advocacy campaign co-ordinated by my friend and Varda Group colleague Kelly Rigg, a protocol to the treaty was signed in Madrid to prevent for at least 50 years the exploitation of mineral resources on the Antarctic continent and adjacent waters.

Fifty years later, the Cold War is over. But the Oil War is raging. Do you know that the year 2007-08 was declared the fourth International Polar Year? Probably not, but I'm sure you've heard today that 2007 is likely to mark the beginning of a looming Subseabed Cold War: Russia has planted its flag on the mineral resources of the Arctic subseabed.

The most depressing aspect of this story is that -- whereas we keep hearing grand statements from governments and the private sector [and NGOs!] about sustainable development as the new paradigm -- the truth is that today it is unlikely the Antarctic Treaty and the Madrid Protocol would be realistic propositions in our contemporary energy-hungry world.

By the way, I was born in 1957. And I hate birthday parties.

[If you wonder from where Russia, and Canada, are going to get in the middle of the Arctic the huge amounts of energy that will be required to mine the Arctic seabed, scroll down on the right-hand side of this blog until you bump into "Floating Nuclear Reactors" in the Labels section. Read it all, and remember...anything that floats is bound to sink!]

Canaries

Distributed by NASA yesterday, this satellite photo showing the plums from the bush and forest fires in the two largest of the Canary Islands gives us an idea of the magnitude of this environmental and human drama.

Canaries? Maybe we should see them like the old miners' canaries giving us a warning that we have to change course because Life is in danger.

Réacteur Cécilia

Cette photo (que j'ai cueillie sur le site de l'Elysée) est frappante sous tous les angles.

Regardez au fond à droite, par exemple: n'est-ce pas Bernard Kouchner, grand défenseur des Droits Humains devant l'Eternel, qui s'est laissé photographier au pied de ce monument kadhafiste-réaliste installé pour que le tout le monde sache bien que les forces lybiennes sont capables d'anéantir les forces aériennes ennemies? [et les civiles aussi d'ailleurs: souvenez vous de Lockerbie]

Bien sûr nous nous sommes tous réjouis de la libération des infirmières bulgares otages de Kadhafi (et de leur compagnon palestinien). Mais l'effet boumerang de la facture nucléaire risque d'être un peu lourd. En attendant, Sarkozy a pris un sacré coup de vieux en 48 heures, je crois.

Depuis deux jours j'ai reçu plusieurs circulaires du réseau Sortir du Nucléaire qui s'offusque de ce qu'ils appellent le troc nucléaire de Sarkozy. Bon d'accord, direz-vous, à Sortir du Nucléaire c'est leur métier de crier au feu pour un oui ou pour un non.

Oui peut-être. Mais alors lisez le commentaire de l'ancienne Ministre de l'Environnement du tandem Juppé-Chirac, Corinne Lepage sur son blog. Corinne (que l'on ne saurait présenter comme une talibane verte) n'a pas de cheveux sur la langue, elle non plus. Et elle a raison.

No NIMBY

Por lo general, lo mío es lo contrario del síndrome NIMBY.

¿Qué quiero decir con eso, pregunten?

A principios de los años ochenta, cuando el movimiento ecologista empezó a cobrar fuerza, quienes veían sus intereses a corto plazo amenazados por las exigencias ambientales emergentes inventaron una palabra para descalificar al movimiento ambientalista como un fenómeno egoísta en defensa de intereses particulares y en contra del bien común.

La palabra NIMBY (contracción de las palabras Not-In-My-Backyard que en Inglés quieren decir algo como no-en-mi-patio-trasero) estuvo en voga muchos años: los seguidores de los ecologistas tenían NIMBY, se decía. Cuando algún colectivo local o regional manifestaba su oposición en contra de una central nuclear o una planta química, lo primero que hacían los promotores de la central era tratar los opositores casi como unos enfermos mentales afectados por el NIMBY. Si algún concejal o alcalde tomaba el partido de los defensores del medio ambiente, a menudo sus compañeros de partido en la capital sugerían que el NIMBY era la causa del victimismo o de la irresponsabilidad de su compañero. Etc.

Aunque mi casa está en Madrid, no publico noticias o comentarios sobre esta región desde hace muchisimo tiempo porque, como digo, lo mío es lo contrario del NIMBY. Viajo tanto que me es dificil centrarme en mi patio trasero. Lo mío es lo contrario del dicho "piensa globlamente, actúa localmente" porque mi acción a nivel global no me deja mucho tiempo para lo demás. Lastima.

Pero, menos mal, el número de gente que comparte conmigo el mismo patio trasero y que lo defiende contra vientos y mareas va creciendo.

Es el caso de Ana Barreira, una abogada ambientalista madrileña cuyo bufete esta siempre al pie del cañon. Ana acaba de mandarme un "mensaje en cadena" (uno de esos que parecen spam pero que en este caso no lo es.)

Resumo: La presidenta de la Comunidad de Madrid Esperanza Aguirre propone impedir el acceso de los guardabosques a las fincas particulares, y sus tropas en la Asamblea de Madrid están a punto de votar esta ley bosquecida. No hacer nada en contra equivale a aprobar por defecto. Por lo que se invita al personal a manifestarse hoy miercoles 25 de Julio a las 16h00 frente a la Asamblea de Madrid. Así que si estas por allí, olvidate de la siesta, coges de prisa tu gorra y tus gafas de sol; todavia tienes dos horas para llegar.

No da tiempo para más. Para que quede constancia, reproduzco abajo ese mensaje en cadena:

"Como sabeis, el Gobierno de la Comunidad de Madrid pretende sacar este miercoles un Ley que nos impide, a los Agentes Forestales, acceder a los montes privados salvo para la extincion de incendios. Han intentado confundir a la opinion publica diciendo que vamos dando "patadas en la puerta" de las casas de la gente. Esta necedad no se si hay siquiera que explicarla. El domicilio es inviolable pero, las fincas privadas no son domicilios, al igual que no son domicilios los comedores, los restaurantes, las piscinas, etc... ¿Os imaginais que prohiben a los inspectores de sanidad acceder a los comedores para comprobar que todo funciona correctamente? Pues eso es lo que pretende el Gobierno de la Comunidad de Madrid. De este modo, el 75 %del monte madrileño quedaria desprotegido.

Para que os hagais una idea, en torno al 90% de los delitos urbanisticos de
Madrid son denunciados por los Agentes Forestales ¿por que no quieren que denunciemos? ¿a quien tratan de defender? Esto supone dos polos muy claros:

- La mayoria de los propietarios se quedan totalmente abandonados. Si alguien entra en sus fincas a cazar furtivamente, a cortarles los arboles, a acampar en sus terrenos... ¿a quien recurriran? Se quedaran totalmente desprotegidos. Si les entra una plaga ¿quien les asesorara?

- Por otro lado la minoria de propietarios que quieran delinquir, cometer infracciones, construirse un casa ilegal en medio de un espacio protegido tendran via libre ya que no habra nadie que les pueda controlar.

Fijaos en lo incomprensible de la Ley que pretenden aprobar que, por ejemplo en el Yelmo, santo y seña de la Pedriza, lugar que cada año visitan miles de madrileños, los Agentes Forestales tendran prohibido el acceso. Un niño podra subir al Yelmo, un Agente Forestal no. Si el niño se accidenta no podra ir el Agente Forestal a socorrerle ni podra indicar la mejor ruta para la evacuacion del chaval.

Por ello nos hemos convocado una CONCENTRACION EL MIERCOLES 25 DE JULIO A LAS 16 HORAS FRENTE A LA ASAMBLEA DE LA COMUNIDAD DE MADRID."

Youtube diplomacy

Thursday last week, I received an instant message from Ben Naimark-Rowse of Avaaz.org asking me if I could quickly-quickly pull out my webcam and quickly-quickly tape a question to the new young and flamboyant UK Foreign Secretary, David Miliband for his press conference that was just about to begin at Chatham House in London less than two hours later.

I thought it would take me only five minutes, so I said yes. But something went wrong with my webcam, and it took me ages to make it work. [Alex who could have fixed it within a few seconds was inappropriately in the UK attending his brother's graduation ceremony!] This is why maybe I give the impression on the video I sent to Avaaz that I am more concerned about my software than about climate change.

I got an email this morning from Ben, explaining that they weren't able to screen any of the videos at the press conference itself for technical reasons, finally. But they posted them on Youtube. Watch them: they make a nice sample of citizens' concerns around the world about a wide variety of real issues. [To watch them all, click on the thumbnail images at the end of the video announcement above, or at the end of my own below]

Real policy junkies will also be interested to watch David Miliband's entire Chatham House press conference online. Others will be satisfied with the highlights only.

Springfield, Japan

Duncan Currie of Globelaw just sent me a link to a Kyodo News story published by Japan Times today, "Quake-hit atomic plant sits atop a fault line".

Commenting on the statement by a Tokyo Electric Power Co. spokesperson: "After looking at aftershock location data, we have come to realize a fault lies right below the plant", Duncan asks: "Is anyone else reminded of The Simpsons?".

On the positive side, IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei's words reported at the end of the Japan Times story: "I would hope that Japan would be fully transparent in its investigation of the accident" signal that the Vienna-based agency is no longer keen to accept whitewash to protect the nuclear industry at all costs, as it was the case during the long tenure of Mr. ElBaradei's predecessor.

Staying young

Like so many people of my generation, I was a big fan of The Who in my student days.

The General-Secretary of the French Association of Writers and Journalists for Nature and Ecology, my friend Laurent Samuel (a true pioneer of environmental journalism way back in the mid 70s) has posted a commentary on his blog about two different versions of The Who's song My Generation which he found on You Tube.

Click below and watch the original track from 1967, and then scroll further down to watch the new track from 2007. [Or vice-versa]

And...stay young!

1967 version:


2007 version:

Listen to the wind

El viento - ZappInternet
Watch this video; listen to the wind (it's funny, it's got the same accent as me in English!)

Down with the clichés

I found this video "Stop the clash of civilizations" on Avaaz' website.

So many things have been tried to enhance peace in the Middle East ever since I can remember, it's hard to believe that another petition to Israeli, Palestinian and international leaders can make a real difference.

But this brave video is worth watching. And sharing.

Live Earth

I was returning last night from Geneva and Gland, when I got a call from someone working for the Live Earth initiative triggered by Al Gore (the series of simultaneous concerts a la Live Aid next week-end in New York, London, Johannesburg, Rio, Shangai, Tokyo, Sidney and Hamburg).

This person thought I could help with a last minute (last second!) problem they've encountered with a broadcaster which they thought I knew, in connection with an appeal they're asking the public to sign on to.

I'm sure they've got one or two million last second problems in their hands at the moment, and I'd love to be in a position to contribute to solving one of them. But people have got to realize that most of the time, it's real hard to respond to these kinds of last second job/favour requests. As a general rule I'd say that when you're in the advance planning phase of any project, try and put us on board your train before it leaves the station. And if possible don't forget to give us a ticket for the whole journey so that we know where we're supposed to sit and how we should pass messages to the guys in the locomotive!

Anyway, I thought I'd take this opportunity to create a link to the Live Earth website which is very rich (in content). And hope that Live Earth will indeed rock the world.

Deep ecology

Claire Nouvian kindly sent me last week the French edition of "The Deep" (en français: "Abbysses") her wonderful book on deep sea life, made up of the most stunning photos of deep sea species combined with comprehensive specilialists' articles.

Watch deepbook.org, the great descriptive and promotional website.

The Deep is set to achieve for deep sea awareness what Carl Sagan's Cosmos did nearly thirty years for space awareness.

Big fish: Michel Barnier a la pêche

Plusieurs amis français ont partagé avec moi leurs sentiments quant au Gouvernement Fillon II. Mélange d'espoirs, de craintes et d'indifférence vis-à-vis de Jean-Louis Borloo, Ministre d'Etat chargé de l'Environnement et du Développement et de l'Aménagement Durables.

On espère aussi que l'arrivée d'un big fish à l'Agriculture ait un effet positif sur le fameux Gre[e]nelle en gestation.

Tout le monde pense bien sûr aux OGMs, aux pesticides, au rôle des subventions agricoles en France et dans le reste du monde, et à l'agriculture biologique. Mais n'oublions pas que depuis hier Michel Barnier est aussi le ministre de la Pêche, secteur qui lui donnera du fil à retordre s'il veut mettre en oeuvre les engagements de la France et de l'Union Européenne visant à minimiser leur empreinte écologique. Des thons de Méditerrannée sur le point de disparaître de façon irreversible aux requins eux aussi poussés à l'extinction, en passant par la conservation des monts sous-marins, des autres écosystèmes vulnérables de la haute mer et des espèces qui les entourent menacés alors que nous venons à peine de découvrir leur existence et leur richesse biologique incomparable. J'en passe et "des meilleures" (par exemple, la razzia sur le krill qui s'annonce pour nourrir les saumons d'aquaculture quitte à affamer baleines et manchots si on n'y prend garde).

Je profite de ce post pour saluer le blog de Laurent Samuel qui vient d'ouvrir. Pionnier de l'écologie parmi les pionniers, Laurent que je connais depuis plus de trente ans n'a jamais perdu son sens critique ni son sens de l'humour. Laurent a annoncé que tous les posts de son blog auront pour titre celui d'une chanson de Bruce Springsteen, d'Elvis Costello, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, les Beatles et quelques autres. Forever Young.

Inquisition International vs. Amnesty International

A good response to the Vatican's call for boycott of Amnesty International is to buy Amnesty's just released album "Make Some Noise - Save Darfur".

Over 30 artists have recorded exclusive versions of iconic songs from the John Lennon back catalogue, whose royalties were donated by Yoko Ono. I just download the album which I'm listening now, and I can say it is (ah, ah!) an almost religious experience.

Intrigued by the Catholic Church's call for boycott of Amnesty International, I visited the Vatican's website, but I could not find their statement. So, I googled up the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace from which the call for boycott came from, but the Council's page has nothing either (maybe the Pope should send his press officers and webmasters as interns to get trained by some of the NGOs' most performing Communications Departments). Finally, I typed "Amnesty International" on the Vatican's search engine. And there I found two Vatican documents dated October 2004 and August 2005 respectively about Street Children, in which an Amnesty International report is quoted almost like the Gospel!

I'm sure Amnesty has better things to do than arguing with the Vatican, but their response on their website is right on:

""We are a movement to protect citizens including the believer but we do not impose beliefs. Ours is a movement dedicated to upholding human rights, not specific theologies. Our purpose invokes the law and the state, not God. It means that sometimes the secular framework of human rights that Amnesty International upholds will converge neatly with the standpoints of certain faith based communities; sometimes it will not. Amnesty International encouraged the Catholic Church not to turn away from the suffering that women face because of sexual violence and urged the Catholic leadership to advocate tolerance and respect to freedom of expression for all human rights defenders, including Amnesty International, just as Amnesty International will continue to defend the freedom of religion".

Vuelos

Regresando de un largo viaje en Alaska, leí este fin de semana entre Chicago y Madrid en la revista que la compañia aerea Iberia pone a disposición de los pasajeros, que han decidido dar los nombres de "Cigueña Negra" y "Oso Pardo" a sus dos últimos aviones "para marcar el compromiso de la compañia con el medio ambiente".

Se puede dar a este anuncio tantas lecturas distintas que daria para escribir un ensayo, que por desgracia no tengo tiempo de realizar.

Hace dos años y medio, realice a petición de una importante fundación internacional un estudio detallado de los desafios de la aviación civil para y con el cambio climático. Se trataba entonces en cierta medida de un tema emergente que IATA y compañias como Iberia pensaban poder ignorar. Las últimas noticias muestran que -- como les dijimos entonces -- estaban equivocados; que (puestos a hablar de aves grandes) tenian que dejar de comportarse como avestruces.

A la adopción por IATA esta semana de un objetivo de Cero Emisión para el año 2050 también se le puede dar muchas lecturas distintas. Algunos lo califican de "greenwash", es decir de palabras vacias. Pero no estoy seguro que sea la buena respuesta en este momento. Las inversiones tecnológicas evolucionan en función de los mensajes y golpes de efecto de los grandes mercados, por lo que creo que en este caso más vale (de momento) "acompañar" el anuncio de IATA que descalificarlo (lo cual daria más fuerza a las criticas a IATA y sus miembros por su oposición a la fiscalidad ambiental y al mercado de emisiones, por ejemplo).

Volviendo a las cigueñas negras, recibí ayer un email de Luis Santiago Cano, uno de los responsables españoles de "Flying Over Natura 2000", proyecto piloto de seguimiento por satelite de la migración de estas aves entre España y el corazón de Africa. El mapa que ilustra este articulo se parece a una ruta comercial (y, también, al camino hacia Europa de refugiados africanos). Pero lo que enseña es la migración de una de las cigueñas negras que Luis Santiago y sus compañeros han seguido en tiempo real durante un año. En su web, los responsables de este proyecto anuncian que ha finalizado por falta de apoyo institucional. Mientras tanto, Iberia anuncia a bombo y platillo "una campaña a favor de las especies más amenazadas", cigueña negra incluida...

Lessons from Anchorage

I had a good day out at sea today. It was good to see some of Alaska's wilderness (including a few humpback whales), and not just Anchorage's Captain Cook Hotel where I spent this last week at the Whaling Commission meeting.

Back in the hotel, I listened to Richard Black's wrap up story of the IWC meeting on BBC Radio.

As usual Richard's coverage of the IWC meeting has been very thorough and balanced (including the various pieces he wrote prior to the meeting after his recent trip to Japan).

Richard Black's written wrap up piece on BBC online also addresses important issues that need to be taken seriously into account if we want the upcoming IWC special meeting on the future of the international whale conservation regime to be useful and avoid a repetition of past failed attempts to fix the whaling controversy.

Troubled waters in Anchorage

After a week in the crowded plenary room of the IWC meeting talking about whales in Anchorage, I look forward to spending a few days to see and enjoy whales and other natural features of Alaska before returning home.

The IWC meeting started in calm waters with everyone pretending to be friendly-friendly. But this was the calm that preceeds the storm.

In the first two days of the meeting, delegates did their best to pretend that there wasn't a "pro-" and an "anti-whaling" block, to offset the verbal violence that characterized the previous annual meeting in St Kitts & Nevis a year ago. But the reality is that there is one group that is trying to hold the dyke to prevent the international whale conservation regime from falling apart, while another group is busy eroding it further. It's hard to know for how long the pro-conservation countries can continue with their fingers in the holes in the dyke.

The IWC decided today to hold, before its next annual meeting, a special meeting to discuss its long-term future. There were hardly any comments from NGOs and the press about this decision. Yet, that special meeting may be the last opportunity to restore the IWC edifice before we need to rebuild it from the ashes.

Whale conference starts

I took this photo this morning at the entrance of The Whale Tail, the pub of the Captain Cook Hotel in Anchorage, Alaska where the International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting just started. There is whale and whaling paraphenalia everywhere here in Anchorage.

Check out the Pew Whales website, an extension of the original Pew-sponsored New York Symposium website.

We had a successful Side Event yesterday here, to present the New York Symposium outcome. Approximately 120 delegates attended the Side Event. This is good because the New York Symposium outcome will be discussed tomorrow afternoon under Item 7 "The IWC in the Future" at the IWC Plenary. We also had a short press conference this morning, where Monica Medina of Pew drew attention to the letters of a significant number of US legislators demanding the Bush Administration to actively support the conservation of whales. We also called upon the IWC to modernize in line with the principles and practice of the majority of modern multilateral environmental agreements.

As I am writing this post from the Plenary room (great WIFI connection), the delegate from Ecuador is speaking to explain why his country decided to rejoin the Commission, to support the international efforts to conserve whales. The group of signatories of the pro-conservation Latin American Buenos Aires Declaration that promotes the non-lethal use of whales (whale watching and other benign research methods) has become a real super-power within the IWC.

At the last count, there are 73 countries present here in Anchorage, the majority of which should be in favour of the continuation of the moratorium on commercial whaling.

Moving the whaling debate forward

We just arrived last night in Anchorage, Alaska, to participate on behalf of Pew in the annual meeting of the International Whaling Commission which starts on Monday.

We're getting ready for the Side Event presentation that we're doing on Sunday morning to present the outcome of the New York Symposium on Whale Conservation we organized last month.

The op'ed our symposium chair Sir Geoffrey Palmer wrote for the BBC's Green Room website has just came out. Check it out, it's thought-provoking.

Oceana

De France, plusieurs personnes m'ont demandé ces derniers jours des informations sur Oceana, l'organisation non-gouvernementale spécialisée dans la conservation des ressources marines vivantes qui a été attaquée en Méditerranée il y a quelques jours par la flotte thonière française alors qu'ils filmaient leurs activités dans les eaux internationales.

Oceana a été formée il y a quelques années avec l'appui de plusieurs fondations qui avaient constaté que les ressources humaines et financières que les grandes ONG dédient à la conservation des océans ne sont peut-être pas à la mesure des enjeux. L'un des impulseurs d'Oceana au départ était Josh Reichert, Directeur de la branche Environnement de Pew, la grande fondation progressiste américaine avec laquelle je collabore moi-même sur plusieurs dossiers, en particulier comme conseiller de leur programme pour la conservation de baleines de récente création (c'est d'ailleurs avec et pour Pew que j'ai organisé le Symposium sur la Conservation des Baleines au 21ème Siècle au siège des Nations Unies le mois dernier). Dès la création d'Oceana, Reichert a cherché à créer une antenne européenne et a recruté à cette fin notre ami Xavier Pastor, un océanographe espagnol dont la carrière est passée par l'Institut Océanographique espagnol, le Groupe Ornithologique des îles Baléares, Greenpeace, et Marviva en Amérique Centrale. En Europe, Oceana décida dès le départ d'installer ses bureaux à Madrid et à Bruxelles pour mettre en avant les responsabilités de l'Espagne et de la Commission Européenne dans la conservation/destruction de la biodiversité marine.

Oceana possède un catamaran, l'Oceana Ranger avec lequel ils mènent des travaux scientifiques et de surveillance. Leurs travaux sont ensuite communiqués de façon transparente aux autorités responsables à tous les niveaux (local, national, communautaire, etc). C'est dans le cadre de leur campagne 2007 qu'ils ont filmé pendant deux semaines les activités des thoniers français.

Face aux accusations de ces derniers faisant un amalgame avec Greenpeace, Oceana s'est trouvée un peu désemparée. Le mieux est de se référer au communiqué minutieux d'Oceana décrivant les évènements. Bien entendu, ce sont les thoniers qui les ont attaqués et non l'inverse.

D'ici quelques jours le Conseil Européen doit prendre la décision de fermer ces pêcheries à moins de provoquer la disparition à très court terme des thons méditerannéens.

Les thoniers savent qu'Oceana a rassemblé des preuves de graves infractions à la règlementation européenne de leur part. Et ils ont décidé d'agir conformément au vielle adage la meilleure défense c'est l'attaque.

Pour noyer le poisson.

When Tintin joined Greenpeace

I cannot shut my computer today, on the 100th anniversary of the birth of Hergé (the father of Tintin) without sharing this image and a few anecdotes.

Like many Francophone men (children) of my generation I have been profoundly inspired by Tintin. If you ask me about the authors who have had a great influence on my upbringing, I will say Ivan Illich first, and Tintin/Hergé second (but of course, chronologically Hergé came first).

So, in 1980 when we at Greenpeace were looking out for a second boat to supplement the Rainbow Warrior, I was seriously impressed when the scoping team we had sent across all European ports came back and recommended we buy an old North Sea pilot boat called the Sirius. The Sirius, of course, was also the name of Tintin's/Haddock's boat in Red Rackham's Treasure!

Next thing I remember: I called the Hergé Studios in Brussels, took the train from Paris, and met with Bob De Moor, Hergé's right-hand (and right paintbrush). Bob de Moor was known for having done a lot of the "real life sketches" that appeared in Tintin, so I asked him if Tintin's Sirius was our Sirius. The answer was no: De Moor had sketched Tintin's Sirius himself from a boat in Antwerp that wasn't called Sirius, and he wasn't sure how it ended up being called Sirius in the book. Never mind, I said: Tintin today (read early 1981) would jump on the Greenpeace boat to save whales and stop nuclear waste dumping at sea, wouldn't he? Bob de Moor agreed, and he said he would discuss it with Hergé.

Things dragged on for a while longer afterward, due to a combination of factors (Hergé agreed but his Finance guys made an initial offer that looked extravagant to the tiny Greenpeace organization of the time; then Hergé got increasingly sick until he died; and Greenpeace management -- did it really exist at the time? -- was in many ways extravagant too). Jean-Marc Pias, one of the main Greenpeace designers at the time (who since made a very successful career in the coffee table book publishing business in Paris' Quartier Latin) followed up some time later, and finalized a deal whereby Tintin became a virtual crew member of Greenpeace's Antarctica campaign. The poster of Tintin on the Greenpeace zodiac sold faster than croissants on a Saturday morning in a Paris bakery.

A couple of years ago, I bought the catalogue of the exhibition "Tintin et les bateaux" (Tintin and boats). The authors did not seem to know that Tintin had been a proud Greenpeace crew member. Or maybe they did, but as the exhibition was displayed at Paris' Musée de la Marine, it's possible that they thought it was better not to emphasize that Tintin had joined the organisation that had campaigned against nuclear weapons testing. After all, according to a legend, General De Gaulle, father of the French atomic bomb once said that his only rival was Tintin...

Greenelle

Que dire de ce Gre[e]nelle de l'environnement lancé par Nicolas Sarkozy?

En annonçant de cette manière sa volonté d'une sorte de partenariat avec les ONG, il y a chez Sarkozy la reconnaissance du rôle incontournable de celles-ci.

Mais bien sûr, il espère ainsi qu'en cas d'échec les responsabilités soient partagées.

A cet égard il serait bon que le rôle et l'engagement du secteur privé dans ce Greenelle soit aussi transparent que celui des ONG.

Reporter in Gaza

I just signed the online petition on the BBC website to "demand the immediate release of BBC Gaza correspondent Alan Johnston [and that] everyone with influence on this situation increase their efforts to ensure that Alan is freed quickly and unharmed."

Alan Johnston has been kidnapped in Gaza on 12 March. Soon three months ago.

To follow the chronology of Alan Johnston's abduction, click on the Gaza Reporter image above.

Whale symposium presentation in Anchorage, Alaska

We've just announced the Side Event we're organizing on behalf of Pew in Anchorage, Alaska on Sunday 27 May, to present the outcome of the Symposium we organized last month on behalf of Pew at UN Headquarters in New York.

If you're going to be in Anchorage, don't forget to register as indicated on the announcement. The outcome of the New York Symposium will be discuss under Item 7 of the IWC Annual Meeting agenda, "The IWC in the Future".

I was not sure which photo to use to illustrate this post. I went for this photo taken at the end of the Symposium by Dan Birchall of the Earth Negotiations Bulletin, showing the Varda Group team (Kelly, Alex and myself) that put the Symposium together with the support of Pew and UNEP, and Sir Geoffrey Palmer and Mike Donoghue of New Zealand. We worked so hard for three and a half months putting the Symposium together, it's amazing we looked somewhat healthy at the end of it, when the photo was taken!

When the IWC in Alaska is over I'm taking a few days out with whales, seals and polar bears. I should have more exciting photos to post, then.

Vive la République ! Vive la Terre !

Les références à l'écologie et au développement durable dans l'allocution que vient de prononcer Jacques Chirac avant de quitter l'Elysée permettent de mesurer le chemin parcouru dans la prise des consciences (même s'il est vrai bien sûr qu'à de rares exceptions prêts, le Président sortant a fait au long de sa longue vie politique tout le contraire de ce qu'il prêche maintenant).

[Pour la version en vidéo, cliquez ici]

"Dans l'union, dans le respect de notre diversité et de nos valeurs, dans le rassemblement, nous pouvons nourrir toutes les ambitions. Unis, nous avons tous les atouts, toutes les forces, tous les talents pour nous imposer dans ce nouveau monde qui se dessine sous nos yeux. Unie, et en poursuivant sur la voie engagée, la France s'affirmera comme une terre exemplaire de progrès et de prospérité. La patrie de l'égalité des chances et de la solidarité. Une nation moteur de la construction européenne. Une nation généreuse, aux avant-postes des défis du monde que sont la paix, le développement, l'écologie."

"Dès demain, je poursuivrai mon engagement dans ces combats pour le dialogue des cultures et pour le développement durable. Je le ferai en apportant mon expérience et ma volonté d'agir pour faire avancer des projets concrets en France et dans le monde".

Qui sait? Peut-être Chirac sera-t-il meilleur dans son costume d'agitateur écolo-qui-n'a-rien-à-perdre que dans celui de l'homme politique? Pour l'instant il semble qu'il ait choisi Michel Camdessus comme tailleur, ce qui nous laisse pensifs (à moins que Camdessus ne change de costard lui aussi).

En tous cas, en prononçant ses derniers mots, le Président Chirac a loupé l'occasion de frapper durablement les esprits du monde entier pour les décennies à venir. Après tout ce qu'il avait dit, après son Vive la République ! Vive la France ! il aurait pu ajouter trois mots:

Vive la Terre !

Climate change: G8 down with the US?

There is an interesting story on the BBC website, about the Bush Administration's attempts to decaf the G8 Summit communiqué language on climate change. This year's G8 Summit will take place June 6-8 in Germany.

The BBC's Environment correspondent Richard Black recalls that in 2005, G8 negotiations on climate change "grew weaker" as discussions unfolded.

The # 1 rule in multilateral environmental negotiations on issues that the White House does not like is to watch out for the US Government's tactic (predating the Bush Administration), which consists in bringing down all other countries (who tend to go along by fear of going home with no consensus) to the lowest common denominator determined by Washington. Once everyone is trapped and has agreed to unambitious targets or uncompromising words the US very often drop out and announce that they cannot bind themselves anyway. That's what I called the race to the bottom in an op'ed I wrote immediately after the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg in 2002, when I was still acting on behalf of Greenpeace International.

The Bush Administration is pulling that trick again for this year's G8 Summit. But it's good to see in the BBC story that the Washington-based National Environmental Trust (NET) argues that it is preferable for the rest of the G8 leaders to make a deal that works for the environment without the US, and to let them decide later whether they want to join or not.

Sushi or not sushi?

The risk of immediate extinction of Mediterranean bluefin tuna which we discussed in our last blog on Tuesday raises important questions for consumers.

When and how is it okay to eat tuna? How can I know where my tuna comes from? Who can tell me whether it was fished sustainably? etc.

WWF's bluefin tuna website includes a consumer guide to help consumers make the choice to help answer these questions.

During a trip in Japan last year, I was interested to see that also within that country people have started to be aware that there is a severe tuna crisis. The thought that bluefin tuna meat (the best of sushi) could disappear or become extremely rare should put marine biodiversity issues into a new light in Japan.

Sarkozy in the Mediterranean: time to put words into action

Let's hope that the short holiday President-elect of France Nicolas Sarkozy is now spending on a yacht in the Mediterranean before taking office on 16 May will inspire him before one of the first major decisions of international environmental policy his government will need to make.

The Mediterreanean bluefin tuna is just about to disappear forever unless a drastic decision to stop their unsustainable harvest is taken in June, warns WWF. Until now the European Union has failed to take adecuate measures for the conservation of bluefin tuna because French authorities (together with the Italians and the Spaniards) have prefered to protect the narrow short-term private interests of a group of subsidized ship owners and tuna traders, and not the survival of the species.

There had never been as much talking and all-party commitments on environmental issues like during the Presidential campaign that just ended in France.

Despite sometimes beautiful speeches and rhetoric on environmental issues in the last few years, President Chirac has been protecting the Marseille-based tuna fleet which is destroying the bluefin tuna. But throughout his campaign, Sarkozy pledged to be different from Chirac. Repeatedly he said that (unlike his predecessor) he would put his words into action.

So, during the Presidential campaign, I picked up these words from Nicolas Sarkozy:

"The defence of the environment requires from us a fundamental change. I consider [...] that the fight [...] in favour of the conservation of biodiversity must be a major denominator of political action. [...] The conservation of biodiversity requires technical innovations but also a change of behaviour" (*)

The Mediterranean bluefin tuna test-case should be an excellent opportunity for President Sarkozy to put his money where his mouth is.

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(*) La défense de l’environnement exige de nous une rupture fondamentale. Je considère […] que la lutte […] en faveur de la préservation de la biodiversité doi[t] être un des déterminants majeurs de l'action publique. [...] La préservation de la biodiversité exig[e] des innovations techniques mais également une modification des comportements.

Future of the IWC: bringing some balance into the debate

The Secretariat of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) has circulated yesterday and posted on their website the Chair's Summary of the New York Symposium on the State of Whale Conservation we organized last month at UN Headquarters on behalf of Pew. It will be presented and discussed under Agenda Item 7 of the 59th Annual Meeting of the IWC, "The IWC in the Future", in Anchorage, Alaska at the end of the month.

This provides the opportunity of some balance in the Item 7 discussion: until yesterday the only submission under this agenda item was the Chair's Summary of the Japan-sponsored "IWC normalization meeting" held in Tokyo in the month of February.

Whale conservation: reaching out to the Caribbean

It is a well known and now undisputed fact that for a number of years the Japanese Government has taken advantage of the vulnerabilities of small island developing states to consolidate its position within the International Whaling Commission (IWC). At the Annual meeting of the IWC last year on the island of St Kitts, for example, the Japanese largely relied on conditionalities they had imposed on small island and other developing states to win by simple majority a resolution proposing the resumption of commercial whaling.

Public opinion polls commissioned by the WWF have shown that the Governments of the small island developing states who support Japan's whaling interests adopted these policies with no regard for public opinion and information.

In partnership with the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA), Lord Ashcroft has just launched a TV ad and a website to reach out in the six Caribbean countries who have lately been supporting Japan's whaling interests systematically (Antigua & Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St Kitts and Nevis, St Lucia, St Vincent & the Grenadines.)

To attract sympathy, the advocates of commercial whaling argue that whales are eating too much fish, even though fisheries experts have shown that killing whales will not increase fish stocks. The decline of fish stocks will not decrease unless governments tackle overfishing and its root causes. The "whale-eat-fish" argument is akward particularly in the Caribbean, as whales visit that region to reproduce, not to feed.

Whale conservation advocates also emphasise that Whale Watching has become a great lucrative tourist opportinity in the Caribbean. In other words, there's more money to be made from keeping whales alive than from killing them.

New York Whale Symposium outcome

We published yesterday the Chair's Summary of the Pew-sponsored Symposium on the State of Whale Conservation which we organized at United Nations Headquarters in New York two weeks ago.

I think the Chair's Summary contains a lot of constructive ideas (including new and fresh ones) to move forward and break the cul-de-sac in which the International Whaling Commission (IWC) has found itself for a number of years.

The use of the Chatham House Rule whereby individual statements from the floor are not attributed certainly helped everyone move away from the usual rhetoric. [I had noticed last year at the Annual Meeting of the IWC in St Kitts & Nevis that the vast majority of the delegations weren't really speaking to each others, but to their respective domestic audiences via the live webcast feed].

In less than a month, I will attend the Annual Meeting of the IWC in Anchorage, Alaska, where we shall present the outcome of the New York Symposium. For the first time, according to the Annotated Provisional Agenda there will be a formal discussion on "The IWC in the Future" (Agenda Item 7). We trust that the outcome of the New York Symposium will bring some balance and fresh air in this important discussion.

From Guernica to Chernobyl

Today is the 70th anniversary of the bombing of the Basque town of Guernica by the Lufwaffe in support of General Franco's rebel army during the Spanish civil war, on 26 April 1937. As I am in Madrid today, I will go visit Picasso's masterpiece Guernica at the Reina Sofia Museum (a near religeous experience for me always).

Strangely, until last night I had never realized that the anniversary of the Guernica bombing coincided with the Chernobyl nuclear explosion, which took place on 26 April 1986.

Ocean ecology Pulitzer

Our friend Kristina Gjerde sent an email around this week-end, to share the news that the Los Angeles Times reporters Kenneth R. Weiss Usha Lee McFarling and photographer Rick Loomis have received the Pultizer Prize in the Explanatory Reporting category, for their Altered Oceans series, "richly portrayed reports on the world’s distressed oceans".

Well deserved.

Coulons les centrales nucléaires flottantes

Le journal Le Monde annonce aujourd'hui que la première centrale nucléaire flottante post-soviétique sera prête dans trois ans.

Ce n'est pas vraiment une nouvelle Chez Rémi. Ce sujet me tient à coeur depuis longtemps.

Nous nous sommes déjà demandé pourquoi les Etats et les institutions internationales ayant compétence sur ce sujet laissaient faire.

Nous nous sommes aussi demandé s'il serait trop tard lorsque les organisations écologistes prendraient ce dossier en main.

Selon les déclarations que je lis dans Le Monde, Greenpeace présente ce dossier comme un enjeu de prolifération. Peut-être, mais (franchement) je pense qu'Al Quaida et autres ont des moyens bien plus simples de se procurer des matières fissiles que de remorquer une centrale nucléaire flottante jusqu'au Yémen ou ailleurs.

A mon avis les enjeux immédiats sont ailleurs. Les centrales nucléaires flottantes soulèvent avant tout trois questions:

1.- Un accident peut-il être exclu?
[Tout ce qui flotte peut couler, n'est-ce pas? Et il n'est guère rassurant que les réacteurs flottants soient construits, nous dit-on, sur le modèle de ceux des brises-glasses soviétiques dont un gise au fond de la Mer Blanche au large de la Nouvelle-Zemble suite à un accident de criticalité]

2.- Les rejets d'effluents liquides inhérents à toute centrale nucléaire peuvent-ils être évités?
[La Convention de Londres interdit les rejets radioactifs délibérés à partir des navires, aéronefs, engins flottants, plates-formes fixes ou flottantes et autres ouvrages placés en mer; comme Partie Contractante à la Convention de Londres, le Gouvernement de la Fédération de Russie a l'obligation de faire respecter cette règle par tous ses nationaux et par tous les bâtiments battant pavillon russe]

3.- Les centrales nucléaires flottantes marqueront-elles le début de l'exploitation des minerais sous-marins à grande échelle?
[Après avoir observé comment la délégation du Canada s'opposait au projet de résolution sur les centrales nucléaires flottantes au Congrés de l'Union Internationale pour la Conservation de la Nature (UICN) en 2004, j'en suis convaincu. Avec la calotte glacière en perdition en raison du changement climatique, les minerais de l'Arctique sont à portée de la main des compagnies minières...à condition de disposer de l'énergie nécessaire à leur extraction]

New York whale symposium report

I just returned from the Symposium on the Conservation of Whales in the 21st Century which we organized last week at UN Headquarter in New York.

The Earth Negotiations Bulletin summary is now available in English, and it will be available in French tomorrow.

In a few days the Chair's Summary will also be put online in the Symposium website.

New York Whale Symposium Day One

Day One of the New York Symposium just finished.

Alex is going to post today's presentations to the Symposium website soon.

More later...