If you imagine Planet Earth having a routine health check, the Living Planet (LPR) report would be its biennial diagnostic report. The study is a science based analysis of the state of the planet – the health of our forests, rivers and oceans, as well as the impact of humans.

Dr Chris Hails, Director, Network Relations, WWF International discussed the key findings of LPR 2012 on 16th June 2012 at the Botany Centre, Singapore Botanic Gardens.

Video link here

1. LIVING PLANET INDEX : The poor are bearing the brunt

The Living Planet Index (LPI) measures the changes in the state of the planet’s ecosystems by studying population trends of more than 2500 species. The LPI reflects the biodiversity of the earth.

The Global LPI, whose data is provided by the Zoological Society of London, showed a 28% decrease during the time period of 1970 to 2008, while in tropical countries, the decline was to the tune of 60%. This reflects the rapid destruction of natural habitats in the last 30 years.

The LPI in temperate countries increased by 31% over the same period, which could be a result of environmental conservation.  As Dr Hails pointed out, most of the biodiversity in temperate areas declined during and after the industrial revolution – big historical losses which are not reflected in the time period under study.

The global terrestrial, freshwater and marine indices all declined, with the freshwater index declining by 37%. The tropical freshwater index’s decline by 70% is most alarming.

The biodiversity trends of high, middle and low income countries also reflect disparities. The index shows a 7% increase in high income countries, a 31% decrease in middle income countries and a 60% decline in low-income countries, showing that poorer nations are rapidly losing their biodiversity. It is the poor who are most dependent on nature directly for their livelihoods and sustenance.

 2. ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT: The rich are overconsuming

The Ecological Footprint measures the amount of land area per person, needed to produce renewable resources, including the area of vegetation required to reabsorb the carbon being emitted into the atmosphere. In 2008, humanity’s ecological footprint was 18.2 billion global hectares (gha) or 2.7 gha per person

This is compared with Biocapacity or the area of land actually available to produce renewable resources and absorb carbon emissions. The earth’s biocapacity in 2008 was 12.0 billion gha, or 1.8 gha. 

This difference between the ecological footprint and biocapacity represents an ecological overshoot. It takes 1.5 years to regenerate the renewable resources required to sustain the current human population. Another way of expressing the same is that we’re using the resources of 1.5 planets to keep us ticking. Instead of living off our natural capital, we’re living off the interest.

There are huge footprint disparities amongst nations. Higher income, more developed countries have in general a higher footprint than poorer, less developed countries. The top 10 countries with the largest Ecological Footprint per person are Qatar, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Denmark, the United States, Belgium, Australia, Canada, Netherlands, and Ireland.

Singapore ranks 12th in its Ecological Footprint, which would require 3 planets to sustain this level of consumption.

If you click on the filter of “carbon” on the interactive graph above, Singapore ranks 5th in the world in its carbon footprint, and the highest amongst Asia-Pacific countries.

According to BBC News, “ It’s a view that doesn’t sit well with the government because the report attributes emissions to the country where carbon is consumed, instead of where it is produced.

The WWF explains that if a car is made in Japan but exported to Singapore, its carbon emissions are counted under Singapore not Japan.”

Dr Hails also highlighted that China and India are likely to experience the greatest increase in footprint by 2015, equal to 37% of the world’s total.

3. PRESCRIPTION FOR THE PLANET- Business as Usual is not a choice

As Jim P. Leape, Director General, WWF International said recently, “We are living as if we have an extra planet at our disposal. We are using 50 per cent more resources than the Earth can provide, and unless we change course that number will grow very fast – by 2030, even two planets will not be enough.

“But we do have a choice. We can create a prosperous future that provides food, water and energy for the 9 or perhaps 10 billion people who will be sharing the planet in 2050.”

Source: The Living Planet Report 2012

Dr Hails highlighted a few solutions especially certifications that are improving the sustainable use of resources.  These encompass:

1. The Forest Stewardship Council certification for sustainable timber and products such as furniture and paper, which do not overexploit forests.

2. The Marine Stewardship Council certification which helps consumers identify fish which are endangered.  80% of the world fish stocks are overexploited, according to FAO which predicts that the stock of fish species for food is expected to collapse by 2048.   Singapore in particular can take action to limit its impact on the ‘coral triangle’, a biodiverse but threatened tropical fisheries zone, by encouraging sustainable fish consumption, as Dr Hails mentions in the video.  WWF’s Sustainable Seafood Guide is available for download here.

3. The Roundtable for Sustainable Palm Oil, which is working on sustainable palm oil to protect tropical rainforests in Indonesia and Malaysia.  As Michelle Desilets pointed out in an earlier interview with EWTT, the RSPO has its loopholes, but as ‘the only game in town’ , the process needs to be strengthened and made more robust.

To read the full Living Planet Report 2012, please click this link. 

ABOUT THE WRITER:

Bhavani Prakash is the Founder of Eco WALK the Talk .com.  She is a sustainability speaker, trainer and writer can be contacted at bhavani[at]ecowalkthetalk.com. Follow Eco WALK the Talk on Facebook, Twitter, Linked IN and YouTube

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The Third Pole is thus known because it is the largest frozen area of fresh water outside the two polar regions.  Also called the Hindu Kush- Himalayan (HKH) region, it extends 3,500 km over all or part of eight countries from Afghanistan in the west to Myanmar in the east.

It is the source of ten large Asian river systems -– the Amu Darya, Indus, Ganges, Brahmaputra (Yarlungtsanpo), Irrawaddy, Salween (Nu), Mekong (Lancang), Yangtse (Jinsha), Yellow River (Huanghe), and Tarim (Dayan).

Picture credit: http://www.icimod.org/?page=43

The river and river basins provide water to 1.3 billion people, or 20% of the world population. They also support livelihoods of over 210 million people in the region.

A new report on the importance of the Third Pole as a vital resource as well as a potential cause of crisis in Asia has just been released by ChinaDialogue.net. 

The Waters of the Third Pole: Sources of threat, sources of survival  is the joint effort of China Dialogue, University College London, King’s College London and the Australian National University.

The report highlights the various natural and man made stresses to this valuable ecosytem.

Natural stresses:

HKH region already faces several natural hazards such as seismic activity, glacial melting, extreme weather, windstorms, droughts, wildfires, and sea-level rise.  This affects the region’s glaciers, rivers, wetlands, grasslands and coasts.

Man made stresses:

There are a plethora of man-made stresses leading to unsustainable use of water, arising from dam constructions, diversion of rivers, floods, ground-water contamination, and water shortages.

The pressures are created by huge and rapidly growing populations. Urbanisation and globalisation lead to heavy demand on resources.

The policy responses and approaches are short-term, with governments trying to increase agricultural productivity and electricity generation, without adequate regard to the environmental consequences.

The number of people being displaced is rising. These environmental migrants or refugees number in millions, moving away due to larger dams, diversion projects, and degradation of farmland or fisheries.

A Common Ecosystem

There is little co-operation between countries and regions, with long standing disputes over decreasing water resources.

Due to the lack of a “systems” perspective and co-ordinated research, there is no understanding of the region as a whole as one common ecosystem, each element of which is interconnected and interdependent.

An example quoted by the report:

‘…large water management projects have created social, ecological, and economic problems, the repercussions of which cannot be immediately gauged. For instance, China has initiated massive infrastructural projects in Tibet, where many major Asian rivers originate. Industrialisation upstream in China has led to soil erosion, deforestation, and landslides, whose impacts are felt in the lower riparian states of Bangladesh and India. That these countries are part of a common ecosystem was made tragically clear by the flash floods that ravaged northeast India in 2000 caused by a landslide in Tibet.’

 
HKH region is already facing a crisis, affecting millions of people. The effects are likely to continue, increasing the likelihood of mass displacement and environmental migrantion, disease and conflict. Short term thinking of various governments and the lack of effective water management is constraining the preparedness for catastrophes.
 

Led Zeppelin once said “Then as it was, then again it will be, and though the course will change sometimes, rivers always reach the sea.”  For this to continue to hold true and to ensure the rivers can sustain present and future generations, a new kind of thinking, a shared understanding of the precious rivers of the Third Pole is the urgent order of the day.

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Eco WALK the Talk summarises various environmental reports that may be technical or usually accessible to those in academia or research, to make the public more aware of important larger issues facing the environment. For various past report summaries, please click here. 

Reuters: Rivers a source of rising tensions

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The term “waste water” or “sick water” refers to water in which all kinds of waste, both dissolved and suspended have been thrown in : domestic effluents (black and grey water), effluents from industries and businesses, storm water, and agricultural effluents. 

UNEP has released a report on 22nd March 2010, for World Water Day entitled Sick Water which can be downloaded here. The objective is to highlight the global crisis in water quality and the efforts required to improve it.

Here is the introductory video to this report explaining the meaning of Waste Water and the issues surrounding it:

According to the Press Release:

Transforming wastewater from a major health and environmental hazard into a clean, safe and economically-attractive resource is emerging as a key challenge in the 21st century. 

It is a challenge that will continue to intensify as the world undergoes rapid urbanization, industrialization and increasing demand for meat and other foods unless decisive action is taken says a new United Nations report .

Urban populations are projected to nearly double in 40 years, from current 3.4 billion to over six billion people – but already most cities lack adequate wastewater management due to aging, absent or inadequate sewage infrastructure. 

Conversely, a recent report by the UNEP Green Economy Initiative underlined the economic benefits of investing in this resource. It argues that every dollar invested in safe water and sanitation has a pay back of $3 to $34 depending on the region and the technology deployed.

The new report, called Sick Water?, says some two million tons of waste, estimated to equal two or more billion tons of wastewater is being discharged daily into rivers and seas spreading disease to humans and damaging key ecosystems such as coral reefs and fisheries. 

Wastewater is a cocktail of fertilizer run-off and sewage disposal alongside animal, industrial, agricultural and other wastes. 

The report says that the sheer scale of dirty water means more people now die from contaminated and polluted water than from all forms of violence including wars. Dirty water is also a key factor in the rise of de-oxygenated dead zones that have been emerging in seas and oceans across the globe. 

Yet many of the substances that make wastewater a pollutant – for example nitrogen and phosphorus- can also be useful as fertilizers for agriculture. Wastewater can also generate gases to fuel small power stations or be used for cooking. 

The report notes that already some 10 per cent of the world’s population is being supplied with food grown using wastewater for irrigation and fertilizer and with better management and training of farmers this could be increased substantially. 

The report, launched to coincide with World Water Day, goes so far as to say that the concentration of nutrients in wastewater “could supply much of the nitrogen and much of the phosphorous and potassium normally required for crop production. Other valuable micro-nutrients and organic matter contained in the effluent would also provide benefits”.

 Some Solutions

The report underlines that reducing the volume and concentrations of wastewater will require multiple actions ranging from reducing run-off from livestock and croplands to better treatment of human wastes. 

Some solutions may involve water recycling systems and multi-million or multi-billion dollar water sewage treatment works: the report cites the success of those installed in the Bali coastal resort of Nusa Dua in Indonesia. 

Others may involve investing and re-investing in nature’s natural purification systems which include wetlands, mangroves and salt marshes. 

Studies in the Mississippi valley of the United States indicate that the value of a restored wetland may be as high as over $1,000 a hectare if its full range of services, from water filtration to recreational use, is factored in. 

Establishing markets and economic instruments for such services could offer the kind of financial incentives that favour conservation and restoration over draining wetlands for farmland. Other solutions can be small-scale: The report cites the coral coast of Fiji where it was estimated that up to 40 per cent of harmful nutrients being discharged into the marine environment were from pigs, which produce three times more concentrated nitrogen waste  than humans.

Sawdust beds which soak up the liquid run-off from pig pens have now been introduced, and soiled sawdust is shipped to nearby farms as fertilizer. Emissions to coastal waters have been cut and the farmers are pleased too. 

This is because the more comfortable sawdust beds seem to make the pigs happier and thus bigger, so farmers have more meat to sell.

Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary General and Executive Director of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), said: “If the world is to thrive, let alone to survive on a planet of six billion people heading to over nine billion by 2050, we need to get collectively smarter and more intelligent about how we manage waste including wastewaters“.

 ”The facts and figures are stark – pollution from wastewater is quite literally killing people, indeed at least 1.8 million children die annually as a result of contaminated water. The impacts on the wider environment and in particular the marine environment are also sobering,” he added.

 ”But the report also points to the abundant Green Economy opportunities for turning a mounting challenge into an opportunity with multiple benefits. These include the savings from reduced fertilizer costs for farmers and, incentives for conserving ecological infrastructure such as wetlands alongside new business and employment opportunities in engineering and natural resource management,” Mr Steiner said. 

Mrs Anna Tibajuka, Executive Director of UN-Habitat, said: “Urban and industrial wastewater composed of sediment, nutrients, organic matter, trace metals and pesticides, among others, adversely affects the entire food chain and thus human health”.

 ”Many water and sanitation utilities, especially in developing countries, are forced to spend more financial resources in water treatment due to increased pollution. Excess nutrients and wastewater can also lead to uncontrolled growth of algae and aquatic plants such as water hyacinth which cause practical problems for marine transportation, fishing and at intakes for water, hydro power and irrigation schemes,” she added.

“It is my hope that activities taking place globally today will raise public awareness of the water quality challenges facing humanity, and the need to commit to concrete remedial actions at all levels,” said Mrs Tibajuka.

 Christian Nellemann, a lead author on the report, added: “Some estimates suggest that around 2 million tons of waste are spilled into sewage systems every day: this may be producing well over two billion tons of polluted water every single day, 365 days a year, right into our freshwaters and oceans”.

 The Rapid Response Assessment, entitled “Sick water? The central role of wastewater management in sustainable development“, has been compiled by a special taskforce consisting of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the UN Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT), and the UN Secretary General’s Advisory Board on Water and Sanitation (UNSGAB).

It has also involved experts from UN Water and UNEP’s GRID Arendal in Norway and was launched today at UNEP headquarters and at the World Urban Forum in Rio de Janeiro in support of this year’s World Water Day with the theme Clean Water for a Healthy World.

The report shows that the impact of poor wastewater management and degrading sewage systems is not only costing billions of dollars and degrading ecosystems, it is also challenging the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals, sustainable development, jobs, labour productivity and the health of hundreds of millions of people worldwide.

 Some Facts and Figures from the Report 

 
• At least 1.8 million children under five years-old die every year from water related disease, which is one child every 20 seconds.   
• It is estimated that close to 90 per cent of diarrhoea cases, killing some 2.2 million people every year, is caused by unsafe drinking water and poor hygiene.  
• Over 50 per cent of malnutrition cases globally are associated with diarrhoea or intestinal worm infections. Diarrhoeal diseases come second after respiratory infections in terms of labour productivity lost due to illness.   
• Over half the world’s hospitals beds are occupied with people suffering from illnesses linked with contaminated water. 
• Almost 900 million people currently lack access to safe drinking water, and an estimated 2.6 billion people lack access to basic sanitation. South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa have the highest proportion, with around 221 million and 330 million respectively living without basic sanitation.   
• 90 per cent of the wastewater in developing countries discharged daily is untreated. 80% of all marine pollution is land based – most of it wastewater, damaging coral reefs and fishing grounds.  
• Each day each one of us uses – and discards – some 150-600 litres of water: 60-150 litres per person per day in developing countries to 500-800 litre per person per day in the industrialized world.  
• People in the industrialized world generate 5 times more wastewater per person than in developing countries – but treat over 90% of the wastewater compared to only a few percent in developing countries.  
• Improved wastewater management has resulted in significant environmental improvements in many European rivers, but dead zones in the oceans are still spreading worldwide. 
• Agriculture accounts for some 70-90% of all water consumed, mainly for irrigation. But large amounts also return to rivers in terms of run-off – near half of all organic matter in wastewater comes from agriculture.  
• Industrial wastes, pesticides from agriculture and tailings from mining also create serious health risks and threats to water resources, costing billions of dollars to monitor, much more to clean.   
• Use of bottled water is increasing, but it takes 3 litres of water to produce one litre of bottled water – and in the USA alone an additional 17 million barrels of oil. 
• Worldwide 200 000 million litres of water are produced every year, creating also an enormous waste problem from spent plastic bottles.  
• 20 million tons of phosphate is mined to fertilize crops, and there are concerns that natural phosphate may become scarcer over the coming decades.   
•  Nearly half of the agricultural phosphate applied is washed away and ends up rivers and oceans where it plays a part in triggering algae blooms that in turn damage ecosystems and fish stocks.  
• The area of dead zones – locations of reduced or absent oxygen levels – has now grown to cover 245,000 km2 of the marine environment including in North America; the Caribbean, Europe and Asia.   
• Wastewater also generates methane, a climate gas 21 times more powerful than C02. It is also generating nitrous oxide which is 310 times more powerful than C02.   
• It is estimated that wastewater-linked emissions of methane and nitrous oxide will rise by 25 per cent and 50 per cent respectively in just a decade.   
• Climate change may aggravate the problem with droughts concentrating wastewater pollution in rivers and lakes and increased flooding overwhelming ageing sewage infrastructure in cities and towns. 

 The report provides six major recommendations: 

• Countries should adopt a multisectoral approach, including ecosystem management, to cope with rising wastewater production 
• Countries must establish national plans from water source to ocean and create national to local strategies. Over 70% of the water is consumed by agriculture for irrigation. 
• Financing and investment are urgently needed and must address design, ecosystem restoration, construction, operation and maintenance of waste water infrastructure. Public management of the water supply and wastewater management have provided best results for broad public benefit, with private sector mainly beneficial in improving operation and maintenance 
• Communities and nations should plan for increasing incidents of extreme weather and rising urbanization in the future. 
•  For effective waste water management, social, cultural, environmental and economical aspects must be carefully considered 
• Education has a crucial role to play in water and wastewater management, helping to ensure water, nutrients and future opportunities for employment and development are not wasted  

Other links you may be interested in:

CNN Opinion: ‘We need to evolve a new attitude to our seas’ by Achim Steiner, Under-Secretary, UNEP

GoodMagazine Video called Water

Good infograph : Make the right choices to reduce your water footprint

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