Green Time TV: Threats to Global Biodiversity
By Don Fitz
Increasingly, international trade agreements and financial deals are forcing countries to sacrifice natural areas to survive economically.The felling of forests may actually be increased by measures that claim to protect them.Green Time shows during April 2013 explore how extraction industries put the environment at risk.
The first show connects by skype with Anne Petermann, of Global Justice Ecology Project.She reviews what Rio +20 was, who participated, and why so many regarded it as a failure.Privatization of nature under the “green” economy is causing massive land grabs around the world.People who have most successfully protected the forests and other ecosystems are now punished by having their lands stolen by companies and put into the ecosystem services market.
The second show features Fred Raines, of the Washington University Economics Department, and Henry Robertson, of Great Rivers Environmental Law Center.They look at how financial markets have gained enormous control over natural resources.There are big environmental problems with schemes like emissions trading and cap-and-trade.They explain that “reversing the trend toward a globalized financial economy” means both supporting local efforts and managing a commons sustainably.
Carbon dioxide (CO2) is pouring into the atmosphere at an alarming rate.How are forests, carbon & climate connected?Jim Scheff, of Kentucky Heartwood, traveled to St. Louis to participate in the last two Green Time episodes.In the third show he cautions against losing sight of the importance of forests for a variety of species, medicines, spiritual uses, subsistence gathering, and various other ecosystem services.
In the fourth show he describes the agreement “Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD),” which claims to use market incentives to reduce greenhouse gas emissions caused by the destruction of forests.Scheff explains how a forest differs from a tree plantation and how it would be possible to cut native forests under REDD.He discusses how forests can be changed from being a carbon sink into a carbon source.
April shows include portions of the movies “Rio+20: From Sustainable Development to Green Economy,” “Stop the Takeover of Nature by Financial Markets,”and “A Darker Shade of Green: REDD Alert.”
Green Time now airs on KNLC stations in four Missouri areas.It appears at noon on Saturdays in St. Louis on Channel 24-1 and at 8 pm on Mondays in St. Louis on Channel 24-2, Springfield on Channel 39, Joplin on Channel 36 and Marshfield on Channel 17.
April Green Time programs air on Saturdays, Mondays & Wednesdays on these dates:
·April 6, 8, 10: “Rio + 20: What Went Wrong?”
·April 13, 15, 17: “Stop the Takeover of Nature”
·April 20, 22, 24: “A Darker Shade of Green”
·April 27 & 29, May 1: “REDD Alert.”
