African water ministers meet in Ethiopia. Beginning Monday, November 22, African Water Week, held in the nation’s capital Addis Ababa brought together ministers from more than 20 countries to discuss sustainable utilization of the continent’s water resources.
According to the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), eight countries are on course to fulfill the 2015 Millennium Development Goal of reducing by at least half the populations still in need of basic water and sanitation systems.
These include Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, South Africa, Angola and Botswana. Another key aspect of the meeting was the distribution of the newly-released “Africa Water Atlas” prepared by UNEP, which consolidates information about the role of water in Africa's economies and development.
Detailed mapping and other images in the 326-page document show how rainwater conservation and irrigation projects in drought-prone regions such as Kenya, Senegal and Sudan are improving food security.
At the same time, the atlas also describes predicaments that have been created by events such as oil spills, deforestation and climate change.
These are noted to be creating vulnerabilities in the continent’s source water regions and could jeopardize key supplies if their causative conditions continue.
Our heartfelt thanks for your concerned interest and commitment to the African people, African Water Week participants and United Nations Environment Program.
May your meeting be the basis for initiatives that bring abundant supplies of clean water for the gracious people of Africa.
During an October 2009 videoconference in Formosa (Taiwan), Supreme Master Ching Hai emphasized the need to conserve this precious resource, while also highlighting another action that would increase the water available to all beings.
Supreme Master Ching Hai: There are also good ways to harvest the rainwater，by guiding the rain into the soil to be used by the trees and the plants. They use these water-conserving techniques in dry parts of Africa and India and，as a result，
the water level rises more than they take out from their wells.
But even these water losses pale in comparison to the incredible amount of water that is wasted for animal production. It takes approximately ４，６６４ liters of water to produce just one serving of beef，but an entire vegan meal can be produced with only ３７１ liters of water. People are dying from droughts，people are leaving their villages，their hometowns because they don’t have any more water to drink.
Just because where I am sitting，I am lucky to still have water，doesn’t mean tens of millions of other people are as lucky. Water means everything to our existence. We must conserve the water; we must do everything we can. And the first step to begin is to be vegan.
http://www.namnewsnetwork.org/v2/read.php?id=140381 http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=36872&Cr=evironment&Cr1= http://www.france24.com/en/20101126-africa-fall-short-water-millennium-goals-un
Eco-friendly Austrian project uses grass for fuel. Sponsored by some of the nation’s large energy providers, a pilot project in the state of Lower Austria has successfully produced natural gas as a fuel source without a loss in food production.
To achieve this goal, participating farmers first harvested their primary food crops in late July or early August, then sowed the fields with grasses that served as secondary bio-fuel crops to be harvested in late October.
The biogas fuel from the crops was then refined so that it could be introduced into the existing natural gas network. The results of the pilot test have shown that Austria has the potential to sustainably provide for nearly all of her natural gas needs through this bio-fuel.
In addition to the energy benefits, the secondary planting has also been noted to benefit the soil, as the grass cover crop helps retain moisture, and its by-products can be spread on the field as an excellent natural fertilizer that retains a high proportion of total nitrogen.
Bravo, entrepreneurs and Austria for your work to introduce sustainable bio-fuels while protecting food security.
May your endeavors continue to be graced with success, yielding abundant energy supplies in harmony with nature for all.
http://derstandard.at/1289608908098/Biosprit-Tank-und-Teller-Lebensmittel-und-Gas-von-einem-Feld US scientists, many who now report first-hand experiences such as observing polar bears waiting on the Arctic tundra for delayed ice to form, warn of more and more extreme effects if conditions of global warming continue.
http://www.france24.com/en/20101118-scientists-warn-more-rain-heat-hurricaneshttp://www.mmm.ucar.edu/people/holland/
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