politics

Strong Climate Change Law Passes in Mexico

- Adam Clare

Of the three countries in NAFTA, Mexico seems to care the most about the environment. The country just passed a strong law that will product the environment and aim to cut carbon emissions.

The new law contains many sweeping provisions to mitigate climate change, including a mandate to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide by 30% below business-as-usual levels by 2020, and by 50% below 2000 levels by 2050.

Furthermore, it stipulates that 35% of the country’s electricity should come from renewable sources by 2024, and requires mandatory emissions reporting by the country’s largest polluters. The act also establishes a commission to oversee implementation, and encourages development of a carbon-trading scheme. Although there was initial resistance from Mexico’s steel and cement industries, the bill passed with bipartisan support.

Read more in Nature.

Get Fourth Wall on Tour and Online

- Adam Clare

Dave Meslin is a Toronto based awesome dude that wants to make Toronto a better place, and now he and the Fourth Wall team want to bring something cool to your town. The Fourth Wall exhibit was a project that looked at ways to get people more engaged in their local civic life. It was really great and puts on display some easy low-resistance ways that cities can get people better involved in improving the city.

Here’s a TEDx talk that Meslin gave that explores his inspiration for Fourth Wall:

For three months in 2011, “The Fourth Wall” exhibit explored 36 ideas about how to make city politics more accessible, inviting, relevant & participatory.

The response to the show was overwhelming.  Now the the exhibit is on tour, and we need funds for transportation and installations!  The exhibit also needs an online home complete with downloadable PDFs, videos, tour schedule, media links, scorecard, photo gallery etc,

Contribute at RocketHub

Ontario Chooses to Protect Old-Growth Forest

- Adam Clare

In northern Ontario there is a region called Temagami and it is absolutely stunning as it holds Ontario’s oldest old-growth forest and is the home to a diverse wildlife. In a tradition of profiteering, some people want to destroy the area and plans were set in motion in place to permit that – until now. The province has decided to commit to protecting the area from destruction.

Check the video below to see the region:

Wolf Lake from Rob Nelson on Vimeo.

The decision is a victory for the 300-year-old red pine trees, said Ontario’s environment commissioner, Gord Miller. He said the plan would have allowed logging of the ecologically treasured trees if the mining intensified.

“The essence of the ecological dispute in that area is whether or not we should preserve the red pine old-growth system,” Miller said.

“The trees are the key issue. The government has reconsidered and that means the trees stay, which is critical in the long term.”

Read more at the Star.

India to Produce 97% Cheaper Anti-Cancer Drugs

- Adam Clare 1 Comment

India has announced that they will be using a specialized law to produce generic anti-cancer drugs. This will lower the price of these drugs by 97% and increase the efficiency of health care delivery in the country. It’ll also make the poor better able to survive certain cancers because treatment will be more affordable.

In the first-ever case of compulsory licencing approval, the Indian Patent Office on Monday cleared the application of Hyderabad’s Natco Pharma to sell generic drug Nexavar, used for renal and liver cancer, at Rs 8,880 (around $175) for a 120-capsule pack for a month’s therapy. Bayer offers it for over Rs 2.8 lakh (roughly $5,500) per 120 capsule. The order provides hope for patients who cannot afford these drugs.

The approval paves the way for the launch of Natco’s drug in the market, a company official told TOI, adding that it will pay a 6% royalty on net sales every quarter to Bayer. The licence will be valid till such time the drug’s patent is valid, i.e. 2020. As per the CL (compulsory licence) order, Natco is also committed to donating free supplies of the medicines to 600 patients each year.

Read more at the Times of India.

Victory for Chickens in Europe

- Adam Clare

Being a chicken who’s sole purpose is egg-laying can be hard because of the horrible living conditions. Too many animals, in this case chickens, are held in enclosures that don’t allow for movement. This is starting to change for chickens in Europe as they have now been granted better enclosures thanks to some ethical activists!

On the first day of 2012, keeping hens in such cages became illegal, in all 27 countries of the European Union. Hens can still be kept in cages, but they must have more space, and the cages must have nest boxes and a scratching post. Last month, members of the British Hen Welfare Trust provided a new home for a hen they named “Liberty”. She was, they said, among the last hens in Britain still living in the type of cages we had opposed.

In the early 1970s, when the modern animal-liberation movement began, no major organisation was campaigning against the battery cage. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, the mother of all animal-protection organisations, had lost its early radicalism long before. It focused on isolated cases of abuse, and failed to challenge well-established ways of mistreating animals on farms or in laboratories. It took a concerted effort by the new animal radicals of the 1970s to stir the RSPCA from its complacency towards the battery cage and other forms of intensive animal rearing.

Read Europe’s ethical eggs-ample.

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