replyforall blog

replyforall spotlight on: Partners in Health

February 8th, 2010

hi there, everyone!

we’re excited to kick-off the 1st of a new series in which we feature one of our partner organizations each month. quickly skim it to learn a bit more about our partners’ great work!

we kick off with our non-profit partner Partners in Health. they’ve been working in Haiti for over two decades.

What is the mission of your organization?
Partners In Health (PIH) works in 12 countries to deliver quality health care to people and communities devastated by joint burdens of poverty and disease. PIH’s work has three goals: to care for patients, to alleviate the root causes of disease, and to share lessons learned around the world.

What sets your organization apart from other groups in a similar field?
First, while our health centers and hospitals provide a full range of medical care, we take a comprehensive view of health, which includes programs that address potable water, nutrition, housing, and education. Second, we invest in both the public health infrastructure by accompanying Ministries of Health in their activities, and in the local workforce by relying on paid and trained community health workers in the countries where we work. Lastly, PIH stands out because of our extremely low overhead rate: 94% of every dollar raised goes directly to our programs around the world.

What’s the context for PIH’s presence in Haiti?

For more than 20 years, PIH has been providing vital health care services in Haiti’s Central Plateau and Artibonite Valley. Working alongside the Ministry of Health to serve a catchment area of 1.2 million people, PIH has become one of the largest health care providers in the country. PIH already had more than 100 doctors, 600 nurses, and a total of 4,000 employees on the ground in Haiti working from 12 existing PIH medical facilities in Haiti before the earthquake struck.

In what new ways have you reached out to supporters in the last year?
We have been working extensively with our supporters to help them form “Communities of Concern,” supporter-driven groups that raise awareness and funds for PIH’s work around the world. We have also released online tools that allow our supporters to initiate personalized fundraising campaigns, connect with other advocates and PIH supporters, and communicate with PIH staff. Learn more at http://act.pih.org.

Aside from donations, what is the one thing that supporters can do to support your organization’s work?
Stay informed and raise awareness:

· Friend us on Facebook

· Follow us on Twitter

· Join our mailing list

stay tuned next month for our next profile! email us if you have any questions to include for any of our partner orgs.

thanks for your continued support,

the replyforall team

Tags: Haiti, Health care, HIV/AIDS, Partners in Health, provide clean water, Replyforall

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Tech alternatives to testing, eating animals

February 2nd, 2010

Cruelty is a big topic when considering the rights of our animal friends, and science seems to be taking the lead over legislation. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in US v. Stevens that selling videos of dog fights and animal brutality and such is completely protected under our First Amendment rights. (For the record, dogfighting is illegal in all 50 states and a felony in most. The message here: apparently it’s not okay to harm animals, but if you just so happen to have video of the heinous crime, it’s totally fine to sell it for a profit.) This is going on at the same time New Zealand is working to toughen penalties for those who harm animals.

Luckily, it looks like science is making some forward strides in animal rights when it comes to cosmetic testing and what I like to call Petri Pork. Both take the animal out of the situation and use cells instead. L’Oreal helped to fund research at the Hurel Corp. to create technology that uses lab-grown human skin cells. There’s still a long way to go to make sure that the results are accurate, but if so, mice and guinea pigs could be spared. That’s huge, since it’s estimated that 50 to 100 million vertebrate animals are used for testing each year (almost all die, either from the testing or euthanasia). Is it worth it to manipulate human cells if it means sparing the lives of millions of animals?

What about stem cells? Scientists in the Netherlands have developed a way to use the stem cells of pigs to grow meat in a petri dish. They believe that, once embraced, the practice could alleviate world hunger, save the lives of pigs, and offer a green solution to raising livestock. The only question is, who will eat Petri Pork? While factory farming isn’t all that natural, either, meat from a petri dish may be a hard sell… what do you think? Take our poll at the bottom of this page!

If you have any news that you’d like to see shared with our replyforall users, email Johanna with your article, video, or link! We’d love to hear from you.

Fight the Good Fight,

Johanna Hudgens

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To make foie gras birds are force-fed huge amounts of food, leading to enlarged livers & internal damage.

By using this email signature, Johanna and ASPCA provided an hour of protective services for 19 animals.

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Court takes up free-speech case of pit bull videos (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
Lawmakers Forced to Choose Between Welfare of Budget, Animals (takepart.com)
Animal welfare victories prompt farmers’ PR moves (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
Food and Feelings: Animals and the Ethics Behind Eating (replyforall.com)

Tags: animal research, animal rights, animal testing, Animal welfare, Factory farming, Johanna Hudgens, New Zealand, pig stem cells, protect animal rights, Replyforall, United States

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Supporting Haiti with replyforall

January 20th, 2010

This morning, a 6.1 aftershock quake hit Port-au-Prince. While families search for food, water, and missing people, replyforall keeps Haiti in the forefront of our thoughts.

Americans are showing that little by little, individual actions are making a difference. After last Tuesday’s devastating 7.0-magnitude earthquake in Haiti, over $200 million have been raised through texts, calls, and mail. And over $22 million was raised for the Red Cross through ten dollar donations made by texting “HAITI” to 90999.

Our nonprofit partner, Partners In Health, has been on the ground in Haiti for over 20 years. PIH co-founder, Paul Farmer, wrote an op-ed in the Miami Herald about what can be done right now to best help the survivors in Haiti, because “there are lessons to be learned from our efforts, not always honorable or effective, to help Haiti over the past two centuries. This can change and must do so, if we are to be real partners in responding to this latest misfortune.”

One of Farmer’s suggestions was not to give in-kind donations, but financial ones. We know that small amounts can make a huge difference, and we are urging our replyforall users to do their part by sending emails. One thing that is needed by the earthquake survivors, and by the PIH doctors who are caring for them, is clean water. Your clean water cause signature raises donations for Partners In Health (and Engineers without Borders) with every email you send.

And you’ll notice that, in our sponsor section of the signature, there is a link for your email recipients to learn more about how to help Partners In Health in their relief efforts in Haiti. It’s important that we do as much as we can, as soon as we can. So if you can donate, text GIVE to 25383 to donate $10 to Partners in Health. If you can’t donate, please put out the word through your emails for others who can!

You can also keep up with what Partners In Health is doing in Haiti by following them on Twitter, @PIH_org.

Fight the Good Fight,

Johanna Hudgens

sponsored by

1.8 million children die every year as a result of diseases caused by unclean water and poor sanitation.

By using this email signature, Johanna and Partners In Health provided an hour of clean water for 846 people.

If Haiti is to `build back better’ (3quarksdaily.com)
Local donors dig deep for quake victims (windsorstar.com)
Haiti devastation emerges (theworld.org)

Tags: Caribbean, clean water, Earthquake, Haiti, Johanna Hudgens, Miami Herald, Partners in Health, Paul Farmer, Port-au-Prince, Replyforall

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Food and Feelings: Animals and the Ethics Behind Eating

January 13th, 2010

There was a wide range of reactions to my post on environmental effects of meat production, and a couple of them I found to be very interesting. I think it’s important to remember that there are many reasons that people cut meat down or out of their diet completely. Food choices are important to those of us who may not be particularly passionate about animal rights because it affects our water, our air, and our health. But at the core of meat and dairy is the ethics behind raising or, to be more accurate, producing animals for consumption. Did you know:

In 2003, the US slaughtered 9.1 BILLION animals — 8.68 billion were chickens alone. This also doesn’t include aquatic animals (no official count) or animals that die on the farms or in transit (around 100 million).
In factory farms, animals are crammed into windowless sheds, wire cages, gestation crates, and other confinement systems. Many do not ever see the sun until they are loaded on trucks to be killed.
Dairy cows must be repeatedly impregnated in order to continue producing milk. According to the USDA in 2004, 9 million cows on dairy farms live in large sheds or mud lots where disease is common.
Pigs are considered smarter than the average 3-year old human. Pigs, chickens, cattle and sheep are all sentient beings, meaning that– according to Darwin– they have “the same senses, intuitions, and sensations, similar passions, affections and emotions . . . the same faculties of imitation, choice, imagination, the association of ideas and reason though in very different degrees.”

If you can stand it, you can watch a short clip on what factory farming actually looks like. The terms “factory” and “farm” together seem like an oxymoron, don’t they?

The facts I listed are not to make you feel guilty, but rather to make you aware. We can get bogged down with the overwhelming evidence that animals are mistreated on farms, to the point that we compartmentalize and put it out of our heads whenever a food decision is made. But we should know where our food comes from, right?

As one of our users commented on our last post, if you feel like eating a hamburger, eat it. I certainly do not hold back if I really want that turkey sandwich. But I am better about whether or not I need to eat meat every day, at every meal. And when I do eat meat, I know exactly how I’m affecting the world around me.

Another commenter suggests eating organic. That’s a good idea, and I would suggest eating local, too, since there is always greater transparency and accountability if you can visit the farm 30 miles away. And you’re supporting your community economically (a la the Slow Money Movement). You can check for farms near you by visiting Local Harvest, or by stopping by your local farmer’s market.

What are your feelings on this topic, and what advice would you give our readers about food?

Fight the Good Fight,

Johanna Hudgens

sponsored by

2.95 million mice were used in the UK for testing in 2006.

By using this email signature, Johanna and ASPCA provided an hour of protective services for 15 animals.

Farmers fight back against animal rights groups (sfgate.com)
The Meatrix: The Revolting Reality of Factory Farming (naturalbias.com)
Ethical Eating (timesunion.com)
Interview With A Vegan, Part Two (themoderatevoice.com)

Tags: Agriculture, animal rights, Animal welfare, Factory farming, Farmers' market, Johanna Hudgens, Local Harvest, Replyforall

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Food for thought: eating to support animals, people, and a cleaner environment

January 6th, 2010

As I said in my last post, I’m trying to live more consciously, taking into account how my decisions affect the world around me. I thought food was a good, though perhaps the hardest, place to start. So how can my (and your) food choices support animal rights, the fight on global warming and poverty, and clean water? It’s all connected, even if we tend to compartmentalize to lessen our guilty conscience.

“People adapt their attitudes to specific contexts and may actively avoid learning about specific animal procedures and uses to minimize cognitive conflict,” said Dr. Grahame J. Coleman, professor at Monash University, Melbourne, Australia, and deputy director of the Animal Welfare Science Centre.

I have to agree. I’m guilty, for sure. I don’t want to think about my pizza’s production process, or the rights related to that rib-eye. But some facts should be hard to ignore:

The USDA reports that animals in the US meat industry produce 61 million tons of waste each year, which is 130 times the volume of human waste – or five tons for every US citizen.
The 7 billion livestock animals in the United States consume five times as much grain as is consumed directly by the entire American population.
Agriculture accounts for 87 percent of all the fresh water consumed each year. Livestock directly use only 1.3 percent of that water. But when the water required for forage and grain production is included, livestock’s water usage rises dramatically. Every kilogram of beef produced takes 100,000 liters of water. Wheat takes 900 liters of water per kilogram, and producing potatoes uses 500 liters of water per kilogram
According to the EPA, hog, chicken and cattle waste has polluted 35,000 miles of rivers in 22 states and contaminated groundwater in 17 states. (The EPA has begun to crack down on Clean Water Act violations at livestock feeding operations.)
Animal production, whether for meat or dairy, is hazardous for the atmosphere. In fact, a 2006 UN report states that meat industry alone accounts for more greenhouse gases than the emissions of all the SUVs, cars, trucks, planes, and ships combined.

You can find more facts about food production’s harmful effects by checking out books like Omnivore’s Dilemma, Livestock’s Long Shadow, and Making a Killing, to name a few. And check out this UK site about how to sustain a healthier diet and a healthier planet (which just so happens to be animal-friendly, too), or this compassionate eating guide. Every time you sit down to eat, think about it.

What are your thoughts on the topic?

Fight the Good Fight,

Johanna Hudgens

sponsored by

The fur industry demands the thicker pelt of an older animal and almost no fur comes from the slaughterhouses.

By using this email signature, Johanna and ASPCA provided an hour of protective services for 12 animals.

Animal Welfare Victories Prompt Farmers to Change – ABC News (abcnews.go.com)
Livestock accounts for 51% of greenhouse gas emissions, says new report (energyrefuge.com)
Jeff Biggers: New Year’s Resolution: Mountaintop Removal Ends in 2010 (huffingtonpost.com)

Tags: animal rights, clean water, Clean Water Act, diet, global warming, Johanna Hudgens, Livestock, Livestock's Long Shadow, Making a Killing, Omnivore's Dilemma, poverty, Replyforall, United States

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A new year’s resolution to support my causes

December 31st, 2009

When the term “New Year’s resolution” comes to mind, I think “optimistic ramblings.” Just because you buy a treadmill or a Pilates DVD does not mean you will stick to your thrice a week workout routine. Just because you say you’ll spend more time “enjoying the little things” does not mean you will stop every morning to take a second whiff of ground coffee before you rush out the door. That’s just not how it works. If you really want to change, you’d do it without a list made up at 11:59 p.m. on December 31st. If you really want to change, you’d start now.

But in sticking with tradition, I thought I would share a “Johanna” resolution that I made that fits the profile of something you might strive for in the new year (and new decade!). My resolution is simple: Live Consciously.

That probably seems silly, but I can’t tell you the number of times when I realized my day was a blur. Where did the time go? What did I accomplish? Did I do good today? Maybe this is too introspective to be productive. Maybe I’m over-thinking life in the worst way– in hindsight. But as someone who wants to make positive change in the world, it suddenly clicked that even the actions I don’t consider are affecting the world around me.

So I’ve decided that, as much as I can, I want to live consciously. That means understanding how my actions affect other people and our environment. This will start with my food choices. I need to take a much deeper look at how the food that I eat (that I support with my dollars) affects climate change, animal rights, and clean water. More on that next week.

What cause do you support with replyforall? What decisions do you make day-to-day or week-to-week that affect this cause? If you’re using replyforall’s email signature, you’ve already transformed a simple action into a meaningful one. But what else? I’m curious to hear from you about those conscious actions and how to start the revolution from the inside out. Drop me an email or comment below! And from all of us at replyforall, happy new year!

Fight the Good Fight,

Johanna Hudgens

sponsored by

Each year, roughly hundreds of bonobos are killed for bushmeat in Africa.

By using this email signature, Johanna and ASPCA provided an hour of protective services for 12 animals.

Cheat Sheet for Keeping Resolutions (online.wsj.com)
New Year’s resolutions: Yea or nay? (timesunion.com)
Survey Finds Over Half of All Americans Committing to Green New Years Resolutions (treehugger.com)

Tags: animal rights, clean water, climate change, global warming, Johanna Hudgens, new year resolution, Replyforall

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Supporting your cause during the holidays (or any day)

December 22nd, 2009

While you’re doing last minute shopping, or thinking of gift ideas for a birthday, anniversary, or graduation, consider these ideas connected to replyforall’s eight causes.

Find a cure for cancer. This year, Obama requested more than $6 billion in cancer research, with a “multiyear” plan to double its funding. That means if you supported Obama in the last election, you’re supporting this cause already! Luckily, there are many opportunities to support cancer research during the holidays, like sending cards from young artists. The Pediatric Cancer Research Foundation sells cards for the holiday season, the proceeds directly benefiting pediatric cancer research. The best part? Young patients design the cards (their info is on the back), lending a hand to future patients suffering from cancer. Turns out they’re super cute, too.

Stop global AIDS. In 2007, the estimated number of people in the US living with HIV/AIDS was 557,902 people, including 4,891 children. In the world, that number jumps to 33.4 million according to 2008 estimates, with 2.1 million children worldwide suffering from HIV/AIDS. Ending global AIDS starts at home, and it starts with you. This year, we think the best way to support this cause is to get tested and encourage others to do so. For a list of HIV test centers in the US, you can search here by location. Of course, you can also support nonprofits that provide HIV testing and treatment with everything from postage stamps to t-shirts to coffee mugs. That can make a great gift. And not just for the one who gets the coffee mug.

Defend animal rights. So this idea is one of my personal favorites because it involves loved ones and food. One of the best ways to defend animal rights during the holidays is to commit to what I like to call “guilt-free” eating. Making the effort to cook a vegan meal– even if it’s just one time– gives you the opportunity to make conscious decisions about where your food comes from and what activities you support (like animal cruelty) when buy and eat that food. There are some awesome ideas for vegan cooking at Fat-free Vegan Kitchen, including cookies, cakes, and green bean casserole. So heat up that oven, invite over your closest friends, and have a guilt-free holiday party! Other ideas on how to support animal rights can be found at ASPCA’s site.

Protect children’s rights. Human trafficking is one of the fastest growing criminal industries in the world, with profits estimated by the UN around $7 billion a year. This holiday, make sure none of your money goes to support this slave trade by checking out the list of goods made with slave labor, released by the US Department of Labor. You can also find more information and petitions to sign around this topic at Change.org, including the “8 ways to shed light on human trafficking this Hanukkah.”

Fight global warming. There are plenty of ways to “go green” this Christmas, but I think the best way is to find alternatives to gift-giving altogether. Considering the waste of producing products, from the carbon emissions it takes to run the factories to the trash that ends up in our landfills, it seems the best way to fight global warming is to take a serious look at why we think we need more stuff. But, if foregoing gifts puts a damper on your holiday, you can still be earth-friendly by making gifts by hand, buying from organic and carbon neutral companies, and wrapping them in recycled newspaper. Also, check out National Geographic’s list on how to have a green Christmas.

Provide clean water. replyforall’s nonprofit sponsor, Engineers Without Borders, has teamed up with Google, Inc. to give your holiday donation an extra punch. Double the punch, actually. From now until January 15, 2010, your donation to Engineers Without Borders will be matched by Google, doubling your investment in clean water! Your donation can fund sustainable engineering projects (one of over 350 currently in place) done by EWB in conjunction with local communities and NGOs.

End world poverty. There are plenty of ways to end world poverty this holiday season, and in the spirit of giving gifts, the best way to do so is making sure your gifts provide living wages to those who make them. You can find fair-trade gift ideas at the TransFair USA blog, and donating to micro-finance nonprofits provides funding necessary for potential business owners around the world to start up their companies. While micro-financing has recently turned scam-like for commercial profiteers like large banks, you can still provide loans by giving to nonprofits like Kiva, which has a repayment rate of over 98% and works with multiple credit unions in the area. And once your loan has been repaid, you can loan it out again, or take the money back.

Support education. Our nonprofit partner, DonorsChoose.org, gives donations to specific classrooms with specific needs. Just as the name suggests, the donor chooses which project to support– for the holidays, you can give the DonorsChoose.org GivingCard, which allows the recipient to pick their favorite project. Or, if you have a good idea of what that recipient loves, you can give for them– musical instruments in honor of your guitar-playing dad, sporting equipment for your basketball-loving best friend. Best part comes when your honoree hears back from the classroom!

We hope these can give you some last-minute ideas for the holidays, or something to come back to when a special someone’s birthday rolls around. If you have other ideas on how to support a cause, leave a comment for others to read with the cause in the subject line. As always, you can give to your favorite cause by adding the replyforall signature to your emails. Free to you, but generating donations every time you hit SEND.

Fight the Good Fight,

Johanna Hudgens

sponsored by

A year of schooling for the mother reduces child mortality by about 10%.

By using this email signature, Johanna and DonorsChoose.org provided an hour’s worth of school resources for 338 students.

Tags: AIDS, animal rights, cancer research, children, children rights, Christmas, clean water, climate change, Donorschoose.org, education, Engineers Without Borders, fatfree vegan kitchen, global warming, Google, Hanukkah, HIV test, HIV/AIDS, Holiday, human tra, Human trafficking, Johanna Hudgens, Kiva, Replyforall, world poverty

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Climate change, a recession, and the world economy

December 15th, 2009

I’m no expert, but in today’s world of marketing and consumer awareness, going green may not be the only thing you consider, but it’s certainly a factor in buying products. So, I checked; as it turns out, experts have come to the same conclusion.

Millennials, or those born between 1979 and 2001, have a strong commitment to social and environmental responsibility. In fact, in a Cone study, 69% of millennials said they consider a company’s social/environmental commitment when deciding where to shop. A Generate Insight study found that 64% of 18-29 year olds would be willing to pay more for a product if they knew some of the money from their purchase would go toward an environmental cause.

So what’s the hold up on the push for green technology? Obama has promised a commitment to lowering greenhouse gases, and has offered green technology for job creation in light of the recession. But now it looks like the United States will be taking a backseat to China?

That’s right, China’s 863 plan (named for the year and month in which it was developed) pumps billions of dollars into labs and research. As of 2006, China committed again to energy technology and increased funding for solar, wind, and hydroelectric technology. Since then, they’ve doubled their wind-power capacity year, after year, after year. They’ve also become the largest producer of solar photovoltaic cells than any other country, bringing in foreign customers from around the world.

Renewable Energy in US, China, World

When we talk about fixing our economy in the capitalist market, we have to offer products to individual consumers and sign contracts with foreign companies and investors. Renewable energy technology can do both by offering individuals eco-conscious product choices, and giving the United States energy technology to export (rather than relying on foreign oil we import). While we wait for Congress to decide on cap-and-trade, or the UN to come to a climate agreement, I’m still waiting for companies to realize that it’s actually profitable to “go green.” What do you think about renewable energy technology and it’s possible impact? I’m all ears!

Fight the Good Fight,

Johanna Hudgens

Methane is 23 times more potent than CO2.

sponsored by

By using this email signature, Johanna and ClimateCounts.org prevented 1,081 kg of CO2 from entering our skies.

Copenhagen climate summit: technological revolution needed to combat climate change (telegraph.co.uk)
Texas Curb ‘Em: How the Lone Star State Slashed Emissions (blogs.wsj.com)
The environmental shakedown of the industrial democracies in Copenhagen (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
China Emerges as Green-Tech Leader (online.wsj.com)

Tags: China, Copenhagen, Emissions trading, energy, green technology, Greenhouse gas, Johanna Hudgens, Renewable, Replyforall, United States, Wind power

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Leaked Climate Negotiations and Copenhagen Goals

December 9th, 2009

Last week we brought you leaked emails from top climate change scientists which led to dispute over whether or not “global warming” actually existed. But as the climate talks continue at Copenhagen, there’s more information to be leaked– this time from negotiations that took place before the UN summit commenced.

The “Danish text”, as it is called, reportedly sets forth an agreement between developed nations (the US and Denmark are rumored to be on the list) to work from when they arrived at Copenhagen. The problem? Developing countries see this as a behind-closed-doors deal that leaves them out of the negotiations. For nations who feel that the UN is the only place they are equally represented, this leaked info is a slap in the face. Not to mention that there is a UN legal process in place for negotiations. There is also concern that funds for combating climate change and cutting emissions in developing nations will be handled by the World Bank. (For those of you who do not know the downfalls of the World Bank, check out this article on World Bank Corruption )

Luckily, Lumumba Di-Aping, the Sudanese chairman of the group of 132 developing countries known as G77 plus China, still believes Copenhagen to be central in the climate change struggle. “We will not walk out of the talks at this late hour,” Di-Aping said, “because we will not allow the failure of Copenhagen. But we will not sign an inequitable deal; we will not accept a deal that condemns 80% of the world population to further suffering and injustice.”

We at replyforall stand behind any climate negotiation that equitably deals with issues of injustice among nations, and puts pressure on those industries who bear the brunt of responsibility for carbon emissions. And Di-Aping had some advice for all of us: “We call ordinary people to put the utmost pressure on politicians to come to their senses.”

You can sign the petition urging Obama to come to an equitable climate deal, and add the replyforall signature to stop global warming one email at a time. In one month, you can take 32kg of CO2 out of our skies, just by regularly using replyforall’s signature in your emails. What do you want to see coming out of the Copenhagen talks? Add your comment below!

Fight the Good Fight,

Johanna Hudgens

50 billion recycled aluminum cans can provide enough energy for 2.7 million homes.

sponsored by

By using this email signature, Johanna and ClimateCounts.org prevented 1,072 kg of CO2 from entering our skies.

Copenhagen climate summit in disarray after ‘Danish text’ leak (guardian.co.uk)
Climate Deal Likely to Bear Big Price Tag (nytimes.com)
“Veg Climate Alliance” Asserts: Major Shift To Plant-Based Diets Essential To Avert Water Catastrophe (prweb.com)

Tags: climate change, ClimateGate, Copenhagen, Denmark, Developed country, Developing country, Environment, global warming, Johanna Hudgens, Replyforall, World Bank

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ClimateGate: Scandal and the Future of Copenhagen

December 1st, 2009

Denmark reports that 98 world leaders will attend the climate summit in Copenhagen, all with the goal of creating a new climate negotiation before Kyoto’s expires in 2012. Even Barack Obama is planning to stop in to Copenhagen on Dec. 9, the day before he receives his Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo.

This is great news for environmentalists, as the climate for these discussions have also heated up as of late. Even the WTO has preemptively sought after a “green” deal to open up trade for environmental goods (solar panels, anyone?). In fact, the Doha Round of trade liberalization has been going on since 2001, but the negotiations continually stall over cuts in farm subsidies and industrial product tariffs. But as the Indonesian trade minister, Mari Pangestu, said, “Lowering tariffs on clean technology is not going to be enough … to address the climate change objective.”

It may be even tougher to address the issue of climate change following the so-called “Climategate Scandal.” Over the past few weeks, hackers entered into the computer systems at the Climate Research Unit of the University of East Anglia in the United Kingdom. The leaked information revealed conversations between top climate experts who support the theory of global warming. This is huge, since some of the scientists are directly affiliated with the UN’s International Panel on Climate Change. Depending on who you listen to (and whether or not they are reporting the story at all), you might see these differently.

Fox News claims the emails show how climate change proponents have tricked Americans into thinking that the climate crisis is real. It also reportss that these emails, now surfaced, will greatly impede the climate talks in Copenhagen. You can read some of the quotes and emails at the Telegraph (UK news source) and The Centre for Research Globalization (Independent Org in Montreal). The US Congress is currently investigating the scientists and their leaked emails and documents.

So what do you think? Was data manipulated to fit policy changes? And will the summit in Copenhagen be a failure because of the leak? We want to know what you think!

Fight the Good Fight,

Johanna Hudgens

More than 25% of food produced in the U.S. is wasted.

sponsored by

By using this email signature, Johanna and ClimateCounts.org prevented 1,063 kg of CO2 from entering our skies.

Browner Shrugs Off Hot Debate on Climate Change Emails (blogs.wsj.com)
UN Climate Chief Welcomes Obama Trip to Conference (usnews.com)
UN chief Achim Steiner warns of high cost of climate delays (guardian.co.uk)

Tags: Barack Obama, climate change, climate summit, ClimateGate, Copenhagen, Doha Development Round, Environment, global warming, green trade, Johanna Hudgens, Nobel Peace Prize, Replyforall, University of East Anglia, WTO

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