Tunya Nethithammakul, director general of the Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation, told CNN Tuesday that the island had been closed to visitors “indefinitely,” due to the severe deterioration of its ecosystem. The problems included litter and food waste, gasoline from tour boats leaching into the water and damage to coral, he said,…
Tag: conservation
Africa’s Elephants Are Being Slaughtered in Poaching Frenzy
Like blood diamonds from Sierra Leone or plundered minerals from Congo, ivory, it seems, is the latest conflict resource in Africa, dragged out of remote battle zones, easily converted into cash and now fueling conflicts across the continent. Some of Africa’s most notorious armed groups, including the Lord’s Resistance Army, the Shabab and Darfur’s janjaweed,…
Is it time to kill off the phone book?
Over at Sightline, Clark Williams-Derry is declaring war on the white pages. You remember the white pages, right? Those thick phone books that thud onto everyone’s doormat each year. In the age of Google and unlisted cell phones, phone books are used less and less: One Gallup survey found that, in 2008, just 11 percent…
California’s Green Economy Doubled Performance of Total Economy
A new report from the non-partisan environmental think tank Next 10 shows that between 2009 and 2010, the “core green economy” in California — comprised of companies that provide products or services to cut natural resource use, re-purpose waste, and reduce global warming pollution — experienced half the number of job losses seen in the…