Planning Green Futures

  The impacts that food systems have on biodiversity Increasing demand for food availability is causing food system to impact the biodiversity.   According to google search, 5 billion hectares of global land area is used for agriculture in the bid of producing food, whereas the IPBES assessment report revealed that 75 percent of the Earth’s land and 66 percent of the marine environment have been significantly altered by human actions , highly connected to food production, Sara Carlson (2020). The IPBES assessment mentioned that the agricultural crop production has increased by about 300 percent since 1970, meaning more forests and soil biodiversity and water resources are lost due to land conversion for food production.   The 30% global food waste also indirectly lead to biodiversity loss Impact biodiversity loss has on food system. Biodiversity contributes immensely to food system-production in diversely ways, however, loss of biodiversity would threaten food secur...

  The organizations involved in the work,    The two organizations that provided the scientific researches on the impact of food system on biodiversity and water system are the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and Special Report on Climate Change and Land (SRCCL) and the EAT Lancet commission. According to google search, the IPCC is an intergovernmental body of United Nation responsible for advancing knowledge on human induced climate change that was established in 1988 by the World meteorological organization and the United Nation Environment Program (UNEP) and later endorsed by the United Nation. And Google explained that EAT-Lancet Commission which is co-chaired by Walter Willett and Johan Rockström, brought together 19 Commissioners and 18 co-authors from 16 countries in various fields including human health, agriculture, political science and environmental sustainability.     The actions they are proposing, Both reports propose...

  4.5 Reading: How does palm oil affect climate and biodiversity? ·        What are the connections between palm oil and climate?   Palm oil production has both direct and indirect connection with climate change and it impacts. The growing demand for palm oil has mounted pressure on land for planting oil palm especially in tropical forests. The plants and trees in the forest play a unique role in absorbing the CO 2 produced by animals during respiration and gives out oxygen in the atmosphere (clean gas) in the process of photosynthesis. Most importantly, the GHG and CO 2 emitted in the atmosphere are largely absorbed and stored in the trunks of forest trees and soils, so when trees are cut down or uprooted and the soil exposed, the CO 2 will be released back to the atmosphere causing global warming. But this is not the major cause of climate change, as burning of fossil from industrial activities could be the leading contribution to the pr...

  4.4 Lecture 1: Interview on fisheries, climate vulnerability and blue carbon   What is blue carbon and why is it important, according to the Environmental Justice Foundation?   Blue Carbon in clear definition by Environmental Justice Foundation is referring to the carbon sequestration in the marine ecosystem, in other words, using the marine plant, phytoplankton, mangroves to sequestrate carbon over a long period of time without releasing it into the atmosphere. Living things in the water store carbon and preventing its release into the atmosphere. The blue carbon is important in mitigating the GHG produced by human activities such as pollutions, from both the land and sea. How amazing it is to understand that the ocean stores CO2 for over 1000 years. The one question I imagined is what will happen when large amount of ocean plant and animals are exploited and not enough to sequestrate the Carbon emitted in the atmosphere? And the most dismaying featu...

4.3 Reading: Global fisheries Countries who depend largely on marine resources particularly fish and fish product can be considered as losers when the marine ecosystem is adversely affected due to climate change. In another word coastal countries whose major GDP is from fisheries resources will be at the losing end in revenue generation. Also, the landlocked countries especially those whose source of animal protein is from fish are going to be part of the global communities that will also be losers. Conversely, the winners in this situation could be referred to developed countries who are engaged in distant water fishing or otherwise known as producers and suppliers of global fish and fish products.  Although the studies revealed that the increase in fish catch in the high latitude countries may not result to increase in revenue be of the low value fish, nevertheless, these countries are industrialized countries like China who are also largely involved in fish production through di...

  Activity 3.13 Analyzing Sustainable fishing practice. Case study of Sierra Leone fishing in West Africa I am reflecting on the work done by some organizations trying to “recast the net” in the waters of Sierra Leone to manage their resources sustainably. I looked at the West Africa Regional Fisheries program and the European Union intervention in the Sierra Leone fishing sector. Both organizations have the same goals of supporting the country to sustainably manage their fisheries resources. From both organizational perspectives, sustainability could be looked at the as a process in which the country continues to exploit their fisheries resource without depletion from one generation to another and to increase the economic benefit derived from the marine resources to locally benefit the people. National pressure on the Fisheries sector in Sierra Leone Many studies indicate that the fishing sector provides more than 500 000 jobs directly and indirectly for the people of S...

  Telecoupled world The concept of telecoupling has an intertwined and complex meaning the was summarized by Linderman et al. 2005) as compounded system that covers diverse socioeconomic and environmental interaction that can occur from one country or location to another and over a period of time.   The telescoping has a causative or predisposing factors, that has short or long time consequences on the countries where the interactions take place. Telescoping usual occur in international trade between two or more countries. That is the sending and receiving countries. Demand and supply of goods and services are major causes of telecoupling, and the process could have a spillover effect.   This complex interaction between human and natural condition is coupled with the societal interaction. Telecoupled world provides a wider understanding of how the socioeconomic and environmental conditions of countries interfaces over distances. The continuous interaction of these nat...