SEARCH

North Korea, a mountainous nation of 25.7 million people with a land area of 120,410 sq/km, had 80% tree coverage in 1945. By 2000, tree coverage dropped to 30% or 5.1 million ha (around 20,000 square miles). Tree coverage loss continued for two decades, shrinking by 248,259 ha (958 square miles) by 2022. Recorded tree cover loss was highest in 2019, with 27,492 ha or 106 square miles of loss. Scientific American reported that the North Korean government “acknowledges that forest cover shrank sharply during a famine in the 1990s, going from 8.3 million hectares to 7.6 million hectares in just a few years.” The same report cited a 2014 study showing that North Korean forests were “becoming more fragmented, with less contiguous tree cover.” Sources: https://www.jstor.org/stable/43908904, https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/with-widespread-deforestation-north-korea-faces-an-environmental-crisis/ https://rainforests.mongabay.com/deforestation/archive/North_Korea.htm

On February 24, 2022, the Russian military invaded Ukraine, causing “the most rapid forced population movement within Europe since World War 2.” Researchers addressed the humanitarian and environmental impacts of the war in a new study in The Lancet. As of Aug. 10, 2022, 12,867 civilian casualties were reported in Ukraine, including 5,401 deaths. According to the UN, 972 of those deaths were children. Over 6 million people became registered refugees in Europe alone. Some 6 million people have been internally displaced, and this number could be closer to 8 million. War has devastated Ukraine's infrastructure, causing disruption to vital services such as waste management and agriculture. It has caused environmental contamination that includes toxic chemical releases from damaged industrial facilities. Ukraine’s fifteen reactors at four operational nuclear power plants raises grave concerns, as do radioactive sources at other sites. Source: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(22)01739-1/fulltext

COVID-19 stay-at-home measures inspired an uptick in home gardening in the US, according to an article in the consumer advocate publication Consumer Affairs. Researchers at the University of Georgia surveyed more than 4,200 households about their gardening activities prior to, during, and after the COVID-19 pandemic. The UG researchers found a new interest in gardening but warned the gardening industry that the trend may not last. Almost 35% of the survey respondents reported taking up gardening because they were spending more time at home. Over 40% of respondents reported an increase in their usual gardening habits. This included an increase in garden-related purchases. Some 62% of respondents said they intended to return to pre-pandemic purchasing levels. The remaining 38% intended to maintain their post-pandemic purchasing levels. Millennials and those born in 1985 or after were more likely to have started gardening during the pandemic. Millennials and younger respondents were also more likely to discontinue gardening once things returned to normal. Sources: https://journals.ashs.org/horttech/view/journals/horttech/32/1/article-p32.xml https://www.consumeraffairs.com/news/covid-19-pandemic-sparked-increase-in-gardening-sales-study-finds-032222.html

Very Likely, Some Experts Say During his tenure as Britain’s longest-serving Prince of Wales, Prince Charles consistently championed environmental causes that included devoting landscapes and architecture to carbon capture. Amid speculation about whether the newly crowned King Charles III will continue his environmental activism, a new media report suggests that he will. In a September 15 report by ABC News, Prof. David Victor of the University of California, San Diego's School of Global Policy and Strategy, noted that King Charles “is taking the crown very late in age, and everybody knows what he stands for—and for a whole range of topics.” Previously, King Charles “used his position to raise awareness, not just in the UK but around the world. He has, for a long, long time, probably earlier than many politicians, understood the importance of this issue,” said Bob Ward, a scholar at The London School of Economics and Political Science's Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment. "He was talking about this before it was cool,” Alden Meyer, a senior associate at E3G, a London-based think tank on climate policy, told ABC News. What King Charles has said about the environment wasn’t always popular, but these actions now bolster confidence that he will continue his advocacy. As recently as 2021, when the UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow (COP26) convened, the monarch said that young people feel “frustration” regarding the environment and that leaders should take note. ABC News cited King Charles’ estate, Highgrove House, as evidence that he has already applied his passion for the environment to his personal life. Purchased in 1980, the estate’s grounds have organic gardens and a “wild garden” that serves as a wildlife habitat. The estate also features solar panels and a “natural sewage system.” Following its September 15 report, ABC News stated in an October 2 report that the new king “has decided not to attend the international climate change summit in Egypt next month, fueling speculation that the new monarch will have to rein in his environmental activism now that he has ascended the throne.”

Canada’s most southerly polar bear population—that of the Western Hudson Bay polar bear—is easy to count as it passes through the town of Churchill, Manitoba every autumn en route to sea ice. Canadian government calculations, as reported by Reuters in Arctic News, show a decline in the polar bear population of 27% in a mere five years. Even with the possibility that some of the bears may have moved, “the number of adult male bears has remained more or less the same. What’s driven the decline is a reduced number of juvenile bears and adult females,” said Stephen Atkinson, a wildlife biologist who led the Canadian government’s research. In addition, the government of the northern Canadian territory of Nunavut reported that only 618 bears remained in 2021, a drop of about 50 percent since the 1980s. A separate count of the bears in 2012 found 1,013 individuals, said the Nunatsiaq News, noting that local hunters harvest a few dozen polar bears a year. The plunging polar bear numbers have been attributed to climate change, particularly to melting sea ice. Sea ice allows the bears to hunt seals by lurking over seal breathing holes. Arctic News reports that Hudson Bay seasonal sea ice is melting out earlier in spring and forming later in autumn, forcing bears to go hungry for longer periods of time. Sources: https://www.arctictoday.com/canadas-hudson-bay-polar-bear-population-plummets-as-climate-change-warms-the-arctic/ https://nunatsiaq.com/stories/article/65674new_nunavut_survey_shows_abundant_and_healthy_polar_bear_population/

The Earth &I Interview with Architect Vincent Callebaut Vincent Callebaut is a Belgian architect based in Paris. Since founding his studio in 2008, he envisions and executes projects addressing both the ecological and societal challenges of global warming. As an advocate of “archibiotics,” or architecture with forms and functions inspired by natural species’ behaviors, he has been named Green Practitioner of the Year 2021 by The European Centre for Architecture and The Chicago Athenaeum Museum of Architecture and Design. The Earth &I contributor Élodie Bitsindou spoke with him about his visionary work. Can you guide us through your design process? What are the key parameters of your work? I am a Belgian architect based in Paris for the past twenty years. My studio, Vincent Callebaut Architecture, is known for its biomimetic projects. This growing architectural trend takes its inspiration from the forms, structures, and interactive cycles found in nature in order to build symbiosis between man and environment. Hyper-industrialization and globalization have led us into the current climate crisis. Rather than relying on human-developed high-tech, we analyze how species have survived during the past 3.8 billion years without producing any waste, pollution, or debt. Our leitmotiv: to consider the city as an ecosystem, the neighborhoods as forests, and the buildings as inhabited trees, capable of producing their own energy and transforming waste into resources. With biomimicry, we are reviving the circular economy, which is regenerative by nature. Previous generations have lived by the linear economy, which produces, consumes, and throws way, producing debt and pollution by using nonrenewable fossil fuels. As the new generation, we want to make sure that everything produced and consumed is recycled in a virtuous spiral. Urban life is central to your work. To what extent do your creations combine or integrate existing structures? Do you think that contemporary cities can be rehabilitated with ecological structures? The horizontal urban sprawl, such as in Paris, is pushing the poorest populations further away from the city center. Some statistics predict that by 2050, the world will have 9 billion inhabitants, with 70% in urban areas. After having built city upon city with horizontal urban sprawl, we are working to return nature back to the heart of the city while increasing population density in the city center. We are now in the third era of global urbanization. After having built cities upon nature and horizontal urban sprawl, we are working to return nature back to the heart of the city while increasing population density in the city center. The concept of the "Quarter-Hour City," theorized by Carlo Morello, aims for all social classes to have easy access to all services within fifteen minutes of one's home, including work, nursery, schools, gyms, supermarkets, and leisure activities. We would spend less energy on travel, as well as reduce the energy consumed from heating and cooling. Unlike a single-family home, an urban apartment is surrounded by an average of nine other apartments, which can keep each other warm and reduce the carbon footprint. My parents' generation's dependence on the automobile caused greenhouse gas emissions in city centers to skyrocket, increasing air pollution, from which there are nearly 250,000 deaths per year in Paris. Previous generation’s dependence on the automobile caused greenhouse gas emissions in city centers to skyrocket, increasing air pollution. In 2016, we were commissioned by Anne Hidalgo and the Paris City Hall, as well as the Urban Ecology Department, to develop the Paris Smart City 2050 plan. The project was presented to all district councils of Paris to implement high-rise buildings in Paris, address the systemic housing crisis on one hand, and fight against the gentrification of the central cities, and turn them into a kind of museum. We developed eight prototypes of vertical villages based on a concept of energy solidarity. Today, by taking the best of both low-tech and high-tech, contemporary architecture grafted onto Haussmannian (typical Parisian architecture) buildings, [we] can produce the electrical, calorific, and food energy necessary to meet the needs of inhabitants of the 21st century with a low carbon cost. We have been working on La Petite Ceinture, a former railroad beltway around the city, which we would like to open up to "Pariculturists"—Parisians who grow their own organic food through urban farm space. In contrast to The High Line (public park) in New York, our dream would be to create a Low Line for Paris, which could house mushroom farms, supermarkets, gyms, swimming pools, and nightclubs. In your work, you seem to prioritize the big picture, grand scale approach. How does this affect your archibiotic design? How can such projects affect users in their daily lives? Our love for a grand scale comes from considering the city as an ecosystem in a comprehensive way, including its habitat, biodiversity, management of the flow of materials, food, and building materials. I graduated in June of 2000, at a time that Yann Arthus-Bertrand, Nicolas Hulot, and Al Gore were already warning us about climate change. The inertia and disinterest of politicians frightened me. As a young architect, I chose to develop answers to the questions that nobody was asking. One of our flagship projects was LILYPAD, a biomimetic floating city that could help accommodate the 350 million climate refugees expected by 2050, following the rise of the oceans and the salinization of agricultural land. It is this type of thinking that has led us to large-scale solutions. This approach also allows us to optimize monetary resources without scattering ourselves in micro-projects. From the fundamental research that is done in scientific laboratories and universities, we experiment with these innovations, both high-tech and low-tech, by first manifesting them on paper in the architectural design and then later onsite, where the architecture comes to life. Our mission as architects is, above all, to produce architecture that is as beautiful as it is comfortable and easy to use. That's why we are so fond of hanging gardens. It offers outside living space right in the heart of the city. We prefer to work on housing, rather than museums or great architectural gestures, because everyone needs a good home. I think this is the cornerstone of contemporary architecture. A major challenge in your work is to convince financiers to invest in an innovative and ecological project rather than in the security of traditional construction. In what ways do you design architecture that is a profitable environmental investment? This is the big question facing us all today. How do we move away from the old model of a linear economy to the new model of the circular economy for as many people as possible? Our answer is, “to think comprehensively about the life cycle of a building. How is it built, lived in, inhabited, and operated? How can it be dismantled to assign new functions?” This is the case of the Belgian Pavilion at the Dubai World Expo 2020, designed as a giant Meccano (structure of bolted metal parts). The more we want to integrate biosourced or geosourced materials and renewable energy, construction costs increase by as much as 10% to 15%. A well-insulated house that also produces all or part of the energy it needs reduces operating costs by 70% to 80%. In five or six years, the initial upfront cost is offset. It’s only necessary to think beyond the short term and to the medium term. Today, the under-forty generation has integrated this into their approach. Our choice to promote new architectural and economic visions attracts young dynamic promoters who, like us, are highly conscious of climate change. In the DRAGONFLY vertical farm project on New York's Roosevelt Island, you bring together livestock, crops, irrigation, waste, and human activities in one urban structure. Are similar "vertical farms" feasible for any urban area? DRAGONFLY is a prototype designed with Dickson Despommiers (MIT professor and inventor of the vertical farm concept) for the purpose of feeding 50,000 New Yorkers. Vertical fields of permaculture vegetable gardens are built in levels to produce up to twenty-five kilograms of fruits and vegetables per year per square meter cultivated. The idea of locating it on Roosevelt Island is to create a floating market distributing all the food to Brooklyn and Manhattan, from producer to consumer, without intermediaries. Producing locally also eliminates the losses due to import-export flow. This mixed-use tower houses apartments and office spaces to create a real neighborhood just like Little Italy or Tribeca. Instead of being horizontal, it is vertical. It includes interior streets for the different flows intrinsic to the life of a neighborhood. This summer’s drought reminds us that water resources are at risk. DRAGONFLY works in a virtuous loop. Water flows down by gravity from the top floor to the ground floor and then back to the top. Ninety percent of the water resources needed for intensive agriculture are saved. This is achieved through permaculture, which consists of mixing plant species, without artificial chemical products. The building is part of the locavore (locally-grown and sourced) approach, offering seasonal products endemic to each city. In the Paris 2050 project, we collaborated with AgroParisTech, part of Paris- Saclay University, to integrate vertical farms at each gate of Paris. They would have produced organic food for 30% of Parisians. The TAO ZHU YIN YUAN spiral tower is one of your most important projects. Can you tell me about its implementation? The Taiwan Tower is the project that really established the firm in 2010. I won the competition against Zaha Hadid and Fernando Menis by demonstrating that it is possible to build a 50,000-square-meter residential tower that cuts its greenhouse gas emissions in half during construction and reduces its energy consumption by 70% during operation. Our highly sculptural architectural proposal, according to the client's wishes, integrates all the principles of biomimicry and bioclimatic architecture. The tower is designed to follow the solar trajectory and the prevailing wind direction. It integrates passive wind chimney systems, inspired by termite mounds. The hot exterior air (40 °C or 104 F in summer in Taiwan) is conducted under the foundations, where the thermal inertia of the earth, constant all year round in all countries of the world, maintains a temperature of 16 °C or 60.8 F. The air is returned to the apartments by a natural draft system. By lowering the temperature this way means that it is not necessary to reduce the air’s temperature from 40 °C to 24 °C but from 26 °C to 24 °C. The energy consumption is thus 70% lower than any other tower in Taipei. The tower is resilient, built to withstand earthquakes measuring up to 9.0 on the Richter scale. Constructed without a single gram of concrete, its ultra-high performance Japanese steel structure minimizes the amount of materials used, as nature does. Like a reed that grows but does not break, the tower rests on a ball bearing system that stabilizes it in the event of an earthquake. The Tao Zhu Yin Yuan spiral tower is built to withstand earthquakes measuring up to 9.0 on the Richter scale. Acting as a carbon sink, the tower is covered with more than 23,000 plants, shrubs, and trees that absorb up to 135 tons of CO2 per year in the atmosphere through photosynthesis. It is the first building in Southeast Asia to be awarded the diamond label of Carbo-Absorbent Building. This vertical forest project is made possible by easy maintenance. The vegetation is planted in traditional substrate containers accessible directly from the balconies. Access points allow gardeners to maintain the balconies without entering the apartments. The growing areas are held in common with costs paid by the co-ownership association. You have just published visuals of your new project OCEANIUMS. Can you tell me more about its conception? OCEANIUMS was not commissioned but is the result of the agency's concerns following our experience in Dubai, where the construction environment is potentially dangerous for workers. We observed how many architectural projects for big sports events become obsolescent. We came up with the idea of floating stadiums on the sea that can be nomadic. The stadium would go to the fans, and fans would no longer go to the stadium. It would move from city to city, thanks to the natural ocean currents. We now have the opportunity to work, not only with BIM (Building Information Modeling) but with artificial intelligence. By combining 3D modeling and AI, we want to take advantage of this architectural revolution to make construction sites safer. This project illustrates a philosophical vision: We live on a planet called Earth, but it is a blue planet, with 70% of its surface area covered by oceans. Rather than sedentary “Earthlings,” why not create a society of nomadic “Sea-lings?” Architects of the past designed buildings that reflected the beliefs and aspirations of their time: cathedrals, palaces, places of learning. You yourself have designed a proposal for the reconstruction of the roof and spire of Notre-Dame de Paris. Where does the notion of ideal fit into your work? The cathedral of Notre-Dame has undergone four centuries of evolution in construction techniques. Rebuilding the identical roof that was destroyed by fire is the opposite of the direction of history. By proposing a new architectural concept, we presented the vision of religion that reinvents itself. As in all of our projects, the structure would have produced the energy that the cathedral needed and would have taken on a new function as a shelter, especially for the homeless. Why use solid oak, when we have mastered the technique of cross-laminated wood which, thanks to steel cables, allows us to use a minimum of material, as nature does in all its living structures? What kind of world do we live in, and more importantly, what kind of world do we want? Our society lives in hyper-instantaneity, the opposite of the medium-term vision that I mentioned. The younger generations have practices that are opposed to it. We travel a lot, we fly a lot, we are hyper-technophiles, and we have difficulty taking the necessary actions to repair the planet. These reflections are those of the citizen that I am, and through architecture—what I know best—I try to bring some answers. [To find out more about Vincent Callebaut, go to VINCENT CALLEBAUT ARCHITECTURES PARIS.] Élodie Bitsindou is a PhD candidate in architectural history at Paris Sorbonne University. Interested in cultural transfers between France and the United States, she is currently writing her thesis on the influence of Levitt and Sons on French suburban sprawl.

A new study from Georgetown University Medical Center (GUMC) supports healthcare practitioners who want to recommend “mindfulness meditation” to treat patients with anxiety disorders. According to the GUMC study, published in JAMA Psychiatry in November, “mindfulness-based stress reduction was a well-tolerated treatment option” compared to the anti-depressant drug, Escitalopram. The study’s authors note that meditation is both popular—about 15% of the American public tried meditation in 2017—and recognized for its ability to “reduce anxiety.” However, this is the first time that “standardized mindfulness-based interventions, such as mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR),” were compared in a clinical trial to anti-anxiety drugs, they said. The trial—Treatments for Anxiety: Meditation and Escitalopram [TAME]—involved 276 adult patients diagnosed with anxiety from three urban US academic medical centers. Some 208 patients completed the eight-week trial. Participants were randomly offered either Escitalopram or MBSR. The latter was given via two-and-a-half-hour weekly in-person classes, a day-long weekend class during the fifth or sixth week, and forty-five-minute daily home practice exercises. Participants’ anxiety symptoms were reassessed at the end of the trial, along with assessments at twelve and twenty-four weeks after enrollment. The clinician-evaluators did not know which treatment the participants received. They found that both treatment groups saw around a 30% drop in the severity of their anxiety. The study indicates that mindfulness-based stress reduction can be recommended as an effective treatment for anxiety disorders, said Prof. Elizabeth Hoge, MD, director of the Anxiety Disorders Research Program at Georgetown and the study’s first author. MBSR’s advantages include no drug side effects, easy access to the treatment, and economic benefits. “Mindfulness meditation…doesn’t require a clinical degree to train someone to become a mindfulness facilitator,” said Prof. Hoge. “Additionally, sessions can be done outside of a medical setting, such as at a school or community center.” Sources: https://scitechdaily.com/effectively-reducing-stress-and-treating-anxiety-disorders-without-antidepressant-drugs/ https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/article-abstract/2798510

A recent study led by Durham University's Fetal and Neonatal Research Lab, UK, used 4D ultrasound scans of pregnant women to see how unborn babies would respond to carrot and kale flavors after their mothers ate the two vegetables. Which taste did they seem to prefer? Carrots, which are sweet, received more "laughter-face" responses from the fetuses, whereas kale, chosen for its bitter quality, drew more "cry-face" responses. These responses may not be surprising, but what they say about an unborn baby’s future taste preferences and eating habits could be significant, according to the lead researcher of the study, published in the journal Psychological Science. Lead researcher, Beyza Ustun, thinks that “repeated exposure to flavors before birth could help to establish food preferences post-birth.” The researchers are following up their study, using the same now-newborns, to understand how the flavors the babies “experienced” in the womb might affect their acceptance of various foods. They think their findings could support guidance given to mothers about the importance of consuming healthy and tasty foods during pregnancy. Ustun said the study had some highlights for the researchers. “It was really amazing to see unborn babies' reaction to kale or carrot flavors during the scans and share those moments with their parents." Source: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/09/220922103255.htm

Our editors at The Earth & I sat down for a virtual interview with John Kempf, regenerative agriculture advocate, educator, and entrepreneur. John shared with us his vision for soil health and its potential impact on human health and the environment. The Earth & I: John, what is regenerative agriculture all about? John Kempf: From my perspective, there is no officially agreed-upon definition today of what regenerative agriculture is, other than from a very high-level, principles-perspective, which is to say that we're regenerating the ecology and so forth. E&I: It’s a term you hear a lot today. JK: I think the regenerative farming sector of agriculture is having its moment in the sun as a next-step-up in consciousness from sustainable agriculture which was trending ten, fifteen, twenty years ago. At that time, I asked the question, “Why would we choose to sustain where we are today, using a form of agriculture that is degrading the environment? It's degrading ecosystems; we have declining yields; we have declining nutritional quality, and we have systemic disease and insect susceptibility and growing weed problems. Why would we want to sustain that?” E&I: I think I see what you’re saying. Regeneration comes before sustainability? JK: In order to have a truly sustainable ecosystem, an agrarian ecosystem, we first need to regenerate soil health. We need to regenerate plant health, so that plants are completely resistant to diseases and insects. We need to regenerate livestock health and, ultimately, the health of the human population, as well. When we have reached a much higher plateau of performance, where we no longer need outside inputs, constant fertilizer applications and constant pesticide applications; it’s only then that we can have a true conversation about sustainability. When we have reached a much higher plateau of performance, where we no longer need outside inputs, constant fertilizer applications and constant pesticide applications; it’s only then that we can have a true conversation about sustainability. When we consider regeneration, there is a need to regenerate rural communities and the human aspect of regenerating agriculture, but, fundamentally, the first purpose of agriculture is to produce food, and to a lesser degree, fiber. When food production is the first purpose of agriculture, that means that the first purpose of regenerative agriculture should be to regenerate the quality of our food supply. It is possible to grow plants that have such robust immune systems that they can be completely resistant to all diseases and all insects. When plants have robust immune systems, they also have the capacity to transfer that immunity to the people who consume these plants as food and, when that is achieved, for the first time, we can have a legitimate conversation about growing food as medicine. This is what regenerative agriculture should be all about. E&I: I appreciate you bringing in the human-health aspect, John. JK: Today in the developed Western civilizations around the world, where there's been the adoption of a westernized diet, we have an epidemic of degenerative illnesses—dementia, Alzheimer's, diabetes, heart disease, stroke, cancer, and so forth—affecting the majority of our adult and youth populations. From my perspective, these degenerative illnesses are not a medical system problem; they are fundamentally an agricultural problem. If we believe it to be true that we are what we eat, then perhaps we should take a closer look at what defines the quality of the food that we are eating. It is possible to grow plants that have such robust immune systems that they can be completely resistant to all diseases and all insects. When plants have robust immune systems, they have the capacity to transfer that immunity to the people who consume them as food. Look at what is happening with autoimmune diseases and degenerative illnesses. I looked at data not long ago and saw where autoimmune disease is on the rise in children. We live in a world today where, in round numbers, 50% of the adults who are living today are expected to have cancer in their lifetimes. How did we come to a place where we consider that to be normal or acceptable? I think this is not just an agricultural problem because there are other environmental considerations, such as electromagnetic pollution, and pollution from industrial pollutants in our atmosphere, and pollutants in the water that we drink. Our health is about more than just the food that we eat. It's not just that we are what we eat. We are also what we drink. We are what we breathe. We are what we think and what we believe and the emotions that we feel. All of those are contributing elements to our collective disease as a society, as a civilization. However, agriculture and the nutritional integrity of our food supply is still a foundational cornerstone that influences all the rest of these pieces affecting our bodies. E&I: Can you tell us, John, about how you became a regenerative farmer? JK: I started down the pathway of being a regenerative farmer by first being a degenerative farmer. I grew up on a farm where we used pesticides very intensely. I was a licensed pesticide applicator when I was sixteen. We were the first people in our region to try all the latest and greatest cocktails and make recommendations to our customers and tell people how well these products were working for us. We had some interesting experiences in the early 2000s. In 2002, 2003, and 2004, we had three consecutive years in which we lost greater than 70% of our crops to a variety of diseases and insects that we were not successful in managing or controlling with pesticides. In 2004, we began renting a field from a neighboring farm that had not had historical pesticide exposure. We planted a crop of cantaloupe directly across the field border on both our soil—that had a prior decade of pesticide application—and the new, rented soil which had no such history. At harvest time, the soil with the history of continuous pesticide applications grew plants that had 80% of their leaves infected with powdery mildew. On the rented soil there were no plants with powdery mildew. That caught my attention! Here was the same crop from two different fields, the same variety, planted the same day, managed the same way, but with two completely different outcomes. I wanted to know what allows one plant to be resistant to mildew when the next plant, a meter away, is susceptible. Here was the same crop from two different fields, the same variety, planted the same day, managed the same way, but with two completely different outcomes. I wanted to know what allows one plant to be resistant to mildew when the next plant, a meter away, is susceptible. E&I: I suppose it was your natural curiosity and I suppose it was an economic concern, as well? JK: It was an economic survival issue for the farm. Pesticides were being completely ineffective and we had to develop different solutions. And what we learned is that plants have an immune system much the same way that we do. And in order for that immune system to function, it needs to be supported with the right nutrition and at the right microbiome, just as our bodies need to be supported with the right nutrition and with the right microbiome. E&I: What is your vision for regenerative agriculture? JK: My personal mission is to have regenerative agriculture become the status quo, the standard, globally, against which everything else is measured, by 2040, and that means 80% of all the agricultural acres around the world will be using regenerative agriculture product-modeling systems in 20 years. I believe this is a very realistic and achievable goal. In fact, I think we're well on the pathway to achieving this goal. E&I: From an international perspective, are people in touch with you about your experience, the science behind your work, your products? JK: We are getting many inquiries from around the world from agronomists and from farmers and commercial growers. We're doing some international work, but the majority of our work at this point is in North America—the US, Canada, and Mexico. We're starting to do a lot more work in parts of South America, and we hope to do a lot more international work in the near future, but at this point we're not there yet. When I say “we're not there yet,” I’m speaking of our commercial enterprise, Advancing Eco Agriculture (AEA), doing consulting and supplying inputs. In terms of our educational efforts and outreach, everything that we learn about plant nutrition and how to manage different diseases and insects and so forth, we share very freely on my blog and on our YouTube channel and the podcast. That information is universally accessible. I think we have listeners to the podcast from every country on the globe at this point. E&I: I can certainly attest to how freely you share your information. I think that is what “best practices” should be about. JK: What I have been intrigued to discover on my journey, as I've learned about growing really healthy plants and about regenerative agriculture ecosystems, is that “we,” humanity as a whole, already have the knowledge that we need to implement regenerative agriculture systems on scale. There are many farmers and agronomists and scientists who have had incredible experiences and who have very important and interesting pieces to contribute to the puzzle, and if we simply bring all this knowledge and information together, we already know everything we need to know. We don't need any new information, or any new science. Now, certainly there are additional things that would be interesting to know and that we can dig further into, the nuances and the details, but, from a very big systems-perspective, we already know everything we need to know to successfully deploy a regenerative agriculture system on a global scale. There is nothing holding us back except the collective and individual will to act.

Having just passed through Earth’s hottest July on record and with summer skies thick with smoke from massive forest fires burning through parts of Siberia, Greece, and California, humanity is in urgent need of solutions to its global wildfire problems. It is crucial to take on the broader anthropogenic causes of forest fires, such as climate change, but, when disasters are already at your door, it is necessary to look for solutions to mitigate one problem without adding to another. A recent study in the western US has demonstrated success over the past four years in slowing the spread of rangeland wildfires through the utilization of ‘targeted grazing,’ thus bringing new focus to a tactic that has been studied with increased interest over the past couple of decades. In light of the study’s success, a story with a familiar cast— environmentalists, fragile ecosystems, invasive species, ranchers, and the like—could be due for a new chapter. Has the plot been thickened with enough smoke to get everyone on the same page? The study, conducted by researchers from the US Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service (ARS), is an attempt at establishing ‘fuel breaks’ to help contain wildfires while avoiding typical grazing-related damage to rangelands. After four years under development, the project has achieved some verified successes. Targeting Grazing Method is Put to the Test By using cattle-grazing to create firebreaks in open spaces of land invaded by what is known as cheatgrass—an invasive species to the US—the project has contained three rangeland wildfires in four years in the Great Basin region of northwestern US. As recently as July 18, 2021, the latest success contained the huge Welch wildfire near Elko, Nevada. The cattle used in the ARS study graze in the early spring on large areas of highly flammable cheatgrass. They eat the cheatgrass down to two- to three-inch stubble in strategically chosen places. This method greatly reduces what researchers call the ‘fuel load’ that would likely turn a smaller fire into a megafire within hours. ARS research scientist Pat Clark, with the Northwest Watershed Research Center in Boise, Idaho, directs the project. "These fuel breaks are intended to slow a fire's rate of spread, make it less intense, and provide time and space for firefighters to arrive and more safely attack and contain the fire," Clark explained. "That's just what appears to have happened for the Welch fire." As it burned its way to the project’s grazed fuel break, the Welch fire was producing flames two to four feet tall and was spreading at a rate of about 1300 feet per hour, according to the official fire report. Once it reached and began to burn its way through the fuel break, the Welch fire’s flames dropped to below two feet, and its spread slowed to less than 300 feet per hour. The rapid slowdown gave firefighting resources enough time to arrive and take on the fire. If the fuel break had not been in place and winds had been stronger, the fire could have burned through tens of thousands of acres of the South Tuscarora Range, according to the report. The ARS study targets nine sites across Nevada, Idaho, and Oregon with extensive, highly-flammable cheatgrass infestations. The three real-life tests of the study’s fire break method, including the one from the Welsh fire, have all occurred in Nevada. A 2020 fire was contained by the fire breaks to only fifty-four acres from what would probably have been thousands. Fire breaks spared a habitat for sage-grouse fowl from a 2018 fire that was limited to about one thousand acres. Promising Results Lead to Further Questions Through this study, ARS researchers are trying to determine just how much the fuel load is being reduced by sending cows out to graze on the cheatgrass in early spring—when it is preferable to the cattle—and if those reductions can be sustained until the fire season begins in July. They are also trying to monitor the effects of grazing on the environment, a point of contention for some environmentalists. They argue that the short-term benefits of grazing for fire-mitigation are outweighed by its longer-term effects on biodiversity through such stressors as trampling. Soil is degraded by trampling, is the argument, and water is fouled, affecting birds and other species. There are also concerns that grazing, if not managed properly, can actually contribute to the spread of cheatgrass or other weeds, at the expense of the Great Basin’s 24 million acres of fragile native sagebrush. Why did the ARS choose the Great Basin for its study? To begin with, the Great Basin is actually a large area made up of many smaller basins. It includes most of Nevada, half of Utah, and sections of Idaho, Oregon, and California. Wildfires in the Great Basin usually surpass forest fires in acreage destroyed. In addition, according to the ARS, cheatgrass covers more than 100 million acres of Great Basin lands. Cheatgrass covers more than 100 million acres of the Great Basin and serves as fuel for wildfires. Managing cheatgrass is important for reducing wildfire risks. Though targeted grazing has been accused of trampling its way across fragile ecosystems, defenders describe trampling as part of an eco-friendly grazing technique that can accomplish several objectives. As opposed to traditional grazing for meat and dairy production purposes, targeted grazing is used primarily for exfoliation or targeted elimination of undesired plants. Contrary to arguments that trampling reduces biodiversity, defenders describe targeted elimination as a way to increase biodiversity through the elimination of dominant invaders. To address the concerns of animal rights activists, defenders advocate the use of fencing or herding to focus grazing on targeted areas and to protect cattle from predators. The strategic placement of supplements also assists with animal control and helps to keep the animals healthy. Targeted grazing also compares favorably to chemical or mechanical exfoliation in terms of costs and sustainability and for that reason is used widely in wildfire mitigation in Mediterranean forests where wildfires pose a serious risk to ecosystem services and human life. Many wildfire-prevention programs in southern Europe use the services of local grazers, including the long-standing Andalusian RAPCA program that works with over two hundred local shepherds who establish fire breaks with their flocks in the region’s public forests. Should Targeted Grazing Even Be Extended Through the Winter? The US Bureau of Land Management (BLM) which regulates grazing on public lands had limited grazing to the spring and summer months through several administrations based in part on a concern for the effects of overgrazing on biodiversity. However, this practice has come under scrutiny for having a possible role in the development of dangerous fuel loads. Therefore, targeted winter grazing has been studied as a way of further lowering fuel loads. One study investigated dormant season grazing by cattle in the northwestern US for five years, comparing grazed areas with those that had not been grazed. Results showed that winter grazing decreased fuel loads and increased fuel moisture, thereby reducing flame height and depth, spread rate, and total area burned. Winter-grazed areas also emitted lower maximum temperatures during fires than did un-grazed areas, thereby decreasing the overall mortality of important plant groups. In the absence of effective climate mitigation strategies, targeted and strategic livestock grazing, if done with care, is probably the most and perhaps the only feasible fuel load reduction strategy at this time that can be applied at the scale required to influence wildfire spread and intensity across Earth’s vast rangeland ecosystems.

World Environment Day 2021 was celebrated by individuals, groups, and governments around the world on June 5, with a central event held in Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan – this year’s co-host along with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). The United Nations established World Environment Day (WED) in 1974 to raise awareness of environmental issues. Though WED has not always enjoyed the recognition of Earth Day, the UN has built a foundation around the day that was evident at this year’s events. “The degradation of the natural world is already undermining the well-being of 3.2 billion people–or 40% of humanity,” said UN Secretary-General António Guterres. “Luckily, the Earth is resilient. But she needs our help. We still have time to reverse the damage we have done. That is why, on this World Environment Day, we are launching the United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration. This global movement will bring together governments, businesses, civil society and private citizens in an unprecedented effort to heal the Earth. By restoring ecosystems, we can drive a transformation that will contribute to the achievement of all the Sustainable Development Goals.” Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan said: “The world has to correct its course. It's a clash between our greed on the one side and humanity on the other; there needs to be a balance between the two. When this balance is disturbed and consumerism, consumption and greed reach such a level, this always leads to disastrous consequences for humanity.” Pakistan recently planted its billionth tree under its 10 billion-tree drive, and launched its first green bond, seeking $500 million for environmentally friendly projects to enhance clean energy. Inger Andersen, executive director of UNEP, said, “If we work hard in four areas–to get finance flows in tune with nature; to protect those that manage land; to make our cities green; and to restore the blue planet–we will heal nature and make everybody’s lives better.” According to UNEP, pledged commitments in support of WED’s goals already include “over £8 million in new funding from the UK to protect rare wildlife; an 8.5 million euro commitment by Dove and Conservation International to protect and restore 20,000 hectares of forest in North Sumatra, Indonesia; and an announcement by Germany that it would be the first country to provide funding–€14 million–to the Multi-Partner Trust Fund for the Decade on Ecosystem Restoration. Working together with the Chinese social media platform TikTok, UNEP asked platform users to share their ecosystem restoration actions using the #GenerationRestoration hashtag, with total video views already surpassing the 40 million mark. This article is based on the following press release by UNEP: https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/press-release/world-environment-day-boosts-growing-global-movement-restore-damaged

A new study reports coastal marine species at home and thriving on the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre, estimated to be the largest ocean debris patch on the planet. How did they get there? They “rafted” their way to the massive site aboard ocean debris, much of it plastic. In fact, scientists already knew of hundreds of coastal Japanese marine species that had “rafted” their way to Hawaii and the US west coast aboard debris from the East Japan Tsunami—products of “the largest ocean rafting event known in scientific literature to date,” according to the study’s authors. These coastal marine residents were able to survive, grow and reproduce for years on the open ocean, surprising scientists’ expectations of how well they could survive at sea. On their way from Japan to the US, many found themselves trapped in the massive Pacific gyre. The study’s researchers describe what surprised them when they examined the gyre: “Our new observations in this gyre reveal that coastal species are not only present but are common on floating plastic debris, including objects that have been newly colonized at sea and are not from coastal sources, such as derelict fishing gear lost on the high seas. These observations, coupled with prior at sea records, reveal a picture of persistent coastal marine biodiversity on the high seas, sustained by plastic pollution and altering the long-held assumption that rafting coastal species reflected temporary ocean passage.” The researchers introduced the word neopelagic to describe this newly identified community of species. The neopelagic community is made up of species that have historically traveled temporarily across oceans via such vehicles as surface bubbles or larger animals, and the emerging community of rafters—such as barnacle and mollusk species—who make their way aboard enduring plastics to live at sea on their hosts indefinitely.