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‘It was like the wild west’: meet the First Nations guardians protecting Canada’s pristine shores

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Thursday, May 30, 2024

It’s Delaney Mack’s first time pulling crab traps and she is unsure what to do. Mack, the newest member of the Nuxalk Guardian Watchmen, has had months of training for the multifaceted job, which might on any given day include rescuing a kayaker, taking ocean samples or monitoring a logging operation. But winching crabs up 100ft from the sea floor was not in the manual.Soon, however, the four-person operation is humming along. The crab survey is a vital part of their work as guardians of this Indigenous territory in the Canadian province of British Columbia. It was started more than 15 years ago in response to heavy commercial crab fishing in an area where the federal government had done little independent monitoring to determine if a fishery was sustainable.It is the quintessential guardian assignment: remote monitoring work of immediate importance to a small community, far beyond the gaze of administrators at understaffed government agencies.Drone footage of Bella Coola, British ColumbiaThe watchmen are the eyes and ears of their First Nation community on the lands and water of their territory, which spans about 18,000 sq km (7,000 sq miles, roughly the size of Kuwait) on the central coast of British Columbia around the town of Bella Coola, 430 mountainous kilometres northwest of Vancouver.For Mack, being chosen to join the guardians was a godsend. “I had no idea what I was going to do with my life,” she says.Indigenous guardianship goes back millennia, but in recent decades has become more formally enshrined and recognised. Today there are about 1,000 guardians in 200 Indigenous communities across Canada, according to the Indigenous Leadership Initiative, a national guardian advocacy group.A new layer has been added to the guardians’ authority: park ranger badges. As part of a pilot project launched last summer, five of the Nuxalk guardians and six of the Kitasoo/Xai’xais guardians to the north-west have been granted the power to issue tickets for offences such as poaching and illegal logging on their territory.The programmes are about much more than creating jobs, although these are welcome in communities that are often remote and can be extremely impoverished. The teams carry out monitoring projects such as the crab survey; environmental DNA collection; and distress call responses that could take hours if left to distant authorities. This all reinforces the community’s own connection to, and claim on, its traditional territory.Mack wears her uniform with pride, the only female full-time (albeit seasonal) member of the team. She says her father, who raised her with frequent trips out on the land, was proud to see her sign up. “When I showed up a few weeks ago with my brand new uniform, he congratulated me; he seemed very stoked,” she says. “He felt that it was very important work.”‘I just want my daughter to enjoy all of this’After the team pull up six crab traps, the first two prized Dungeness crabs show up. One, a huge male, has recently moulted – which Mack’s colleague, Charles Saunders, identifies by gently squeezing part of its carapace. While a third crewmate takes notes, Saunders rattles off a few other metrics, noting its size and approximate age, and then Mack tosses the impressive crab back into the ocean. Three more traps to go.When it’s time for the guardians’ break, they’re still on the water, and Saunders reaches for a fishing pole.Saunders and Mack are the same age, and went to school together. But while Mack took her time finding her way to the guardians, Saunders was quick to join up – though he maintains he was “tricked into this job” by his late mother, a skilled medicine woman who wanted him to have job security. She got what she hoped for: this year is his eighth as a guardian.Delaney Mack returns a Dungeness crab to the ocean after taking measurements to ascertain its approximate age, size, sex, and condition It’s not long before Saunders pulls up a big rockfish and puts his hook back in the water. It’s not for him, though. Later, on the way home, he runs into a home on the reserve and drops two fresh fish off with an Elder.“She hadn’t had rockfish in, like, 20 years,” he says. “She doesn’t have anybody to go out and get those things for her.”Saunders points out that it wasn’t long ago that most Nuxalk had access to boats. Villages were scattered up and down the nearby fjords, connected primarily by water, with rich tidal flats providing an abundance of foraging and hunting opportunities. After colonisation and its associated epidemics devastated the local populations, the Nuxalk became concentrated in Bella Coola, which sits at the head of a long sheer-sided fjord.The town is only accessible by one road, which rises sharply from the humidity of the valley to an arid plane north-east of the mountains. The primary Nuxalk reserve is at the mouth of the river, where signs warn fishers not to throw entrails back into the slow-moving waters lest they attract grizzly bears.The depopulation of so much of the area, on top of its remoteness from government power centres, has made it vulnerable. Douglas Neasloss, the chief of the Kitasoo/Xai’xais First Nation, had to confront this while working as an ecotourism guide at the start of the 2000s. “There were so many illegal activities in our part of the world: illegal hunting, illegal fishing – we even caught one guy doing illegal forestry.”The Kitasoo/Xai’xais territory is directly adjacent to that of the Nuxalk, and both suffer from the same neglect by federal and provincial authorities.“In the 90s, anybody knew that there was no law enforcement agencies up in this part of the world. We’re extremely remote, only accessible by boat or plane. And you will never see [provincial or federal government representatives],” he says. “It was like the wild west.”Neasloss started the Kitasoo/Xai’xais Guardian Watchmen programme in 2010, funded by a combination of private and government money. The programme has grown to the point where it has five boats on the water doing everything from resource stewardship to coastguard operations – and Neasloss credits it with bringing illegal activities down to near zero.Even in the pilot project here on the coast, guardians have yet to issue a single ticket. That’s fine with Neasloss. “I hope our guys never write a ticket, you know, and we focus a lot on the education piece.” It’s about getting results, not racking up fines, he says.For Saunders, the way the guardians have tamped down the “wild west” mentality means they’re preserving what the Nuxalk depend on.“I just want my daughter to enjoy all of this that I get to enjoy,” he says. “I want her to swim in the river [and] be able to harvest everything off the land.”‘This uniform is the best one I have worn’Some days are easier than others. Today, for instance, Roger Harris is on the water with his boss, Ernie Tallio, driving a boat in circles. The older of the guardians’ two boats has just had new engines installed, and they need to be broken in with two hours’ worth of running time, so Harris is at the helm, putting the boat through its paces.Harris was raised outside the Nuxalk community by non-Indigenous parents and used to struggle with his identity. “I used to be ashamed of being a First Nations child,” he says.He became a paramedic, then a Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer and saw up close some of the problems in his community. Like his first call as a police officer, in which he responded to a classmate’s death by suicide. Or a young community member’s horrific car accident. In these cases, he had to set aside his identity and become the uniform he was in.But the Nuxalk Guardian Watchmen uniform is “the best one I’ve ever worn”, he says.That does not mean the job is without sharp edges. Another watchman, John Sampson, explains. “We’ve been called ‘native fish cops’ before,” he says, as we drive down toward the wharf. Indigenous and non-Indigenous people have sometimes responded to guardians’ interventions with hostility, derision or indifference.But the role is directly beneficial to their communities. Harris, for example, regularly volunteers to patrol the community late into the night. Cruising slowly around the reserve in a white truck, pointing his spotlight into back yards, he could be mistaken for his former police officer self, but in fact he is looking for the grizzly bears that tend to be attracted by the fish-smoking shacks common in people’s gardens.Men and women with badges and insignias can be triggering to local people who associate authority with oppression. There is a long history of disrespectful and demeaning things being done to Indigenous people in Canada, and a long trail of supreme court cases resulting from some of those interactions.While there are no official plans yet, negotiations are under way with Fisheries and Oceans Canada to expand the guardians’ authority, giving them the power of federal fisheries officers. That would come with a much greater geographical area of responsibility beyond parks and conservancies – and, it could mean they would need to carry firearms and wear bulletproof vests.For Neasloss, the potential Fisheries and Oceans Canada powers are part of a bigger plan, another step toward the ultimate goal of First Nations being able to enforce their own laws.“I would love to see a First Nations recognised level of authority,” he says. “You know, as First Nations we say we have it – we’ve always had it, a stewardship responsibility – we’ve never surrendered that.”

From crab monitoring and bear patrols to rescue operations, the watchmen are the official eyes and ears of indigenous communitiesIt’s Delaney Mack’s first time pulling crab traps and she is unsure what to do. Mack, the newest member of the Nuxalk Guardian Watchmen, has had months of training for the multifaceted job, which might on any given day include rescuing a kayaker, taking ocean samples or monitoring a logging operation. But winching crabs up 100ft from the sea floor was not in the manual.Soon, however, the four-person operation is humming along. The crab survey is a vital part of their work as guardians of this Indigenous territory in the Canadian province of British Columbia. It was started more than 15 years ago in response to heavy commercial crab fishing in an area where the federal government had done little independent monitoring to determine if a fishery was sustainable. Continue reading...

It’s Delaney Mack’s first time pulling crab traps and she is unsure what to do. Mack, the newest member of the Nuxalk Guardian Watchmen, has had months of training for the multifaceted job, which might on any given day include rescuing a kayaker, taking ocean samples or monitoring a logging operation. But winching crabs up 100ft from the sea floor was not in the manual.

Soon, however, the four-person operation is humming along. The crab survey is a vital part of their work as guardians of this Indigenous territory in the Canadian province of British Columbia. It was started more than 15 years ago in response to heavy commercial crab fishing in an area where the federal government had done little independent monitoring to determine if a fishery was sustainable.

It is the quintessential guardian assignment: remote monitoring work of immediate importance to a small community, far beyond the gaze of administrators at understaffed government agencies.

Drone footage of Bella Coola, British Columbia

The watchmen are the eyes and ears of their First Nation community on the lands and water of their territory, which spans about 18,000 sq km (7,000 sq miles, roughly the size of Kuwait) on the central coast of British Columbia around the town of Bella Coola, 430 mountainous kilometres northwest of Vancouver.

For Mack, being chosen to join the guardians was a godsend. “I had no idea what I was going to do with my life,” she says.

Indigenous guardianship goes back millennia, but in recent decades has become more formally enshrined and recognised. Today there are about 1,000 guardians in 200 Indigenous communities across Canada, according to the Indigenous Leadership Initiative, a national guardian advocacy group.

A new layer has been added to the guardians’ authority: park ranger badges. As part of a pilot project launched last summer, five of the Nuxalk guardians and six of the Kitasoo/Xai’xais guardians to the north-west have been granted the power to issue tickets for offences such as poaching and illegal logging on their territory.

The programmes are about much more than creating jobs, although these are welcome in communities that are often remote and can be extremely impoverished. The teams carry out monitoring projects such as the crab survey; environmental DNA collection; and distress call responses that could take hours if left to distant authorities. This all reinforces the community’s own connection to, and claim on, its traditional territory.

Mack wears her uniform with pride, the only female full-time (albeit seasonal) member of the team. She says her father, who raised her with frequent trips out on the land, was proud to see her sign up. “When I showed up a few weeks ago with my brand new uniform, he congratulated me; he seemed very stoked,” she says. “He felt that it was very important work.”

‘I just want my daughter to enjoy all of this’

After the team pull up six crab traps, the first two prized Dungeness crabs show up. One, a huge male, has recently moulted – which Mack’s colleague, Charles Saunders, identifies by gently squeezing part of its carapace. While a third crewmate takes notes, Saunders rattles off a few other metrics, noting its size and approximate age, and then Mack tosses the impressive crab back into the ocean. Three more traps to go.

When it’s time for the guardians’ break, they’re still on the water, and Saunders reaches for a fishing pole.

Saunders and Mack are the same age, and went to school together. But while Mack took her time finding her way to the guardians, Saunders was quick to join up – though he maintains he was “tricked into this job” by his late mother, a skilled medicine woman who wanted him to have job security. She got what she hoped for: this year is his eighth as a guardian.

  • Delaney Mack returns a Dungeness crab to the ocean after taking measurements to ascertain its approximate age, size, sex, and condition

It’s not long before Saunders pulls up a big rockfish and puts his hook back in the water. It’s not for him, though. Later, on the way home, he runs into a home on the reserve and drops two fresh fish off with an Elder.

“She hadn’t had rockfish in, like, 20 years,” he says. “She doesn’t have anybody to go out and get those things for her.”

Saunders points out that it wasn’t long ago that most Nuxalk had access to boats. Villages were scattered up and down the nearby fjords, connected primarily by water, with rich tidal flats providing an abundance of foraging and hunting opportunities. After colonisation and its associated epidemics devastated the local populations, the Nuxalk became concentrated in Bella Coola, which sits at the head of a long sheer-sided fjord.

The town is only accessible by one road, which rises sharply from the humidity of the valley to an arid plane north-east of the mountains. The primary Nuxalk reserve is at the mouth of the river, where signs warn fishers not to throw entrails back into the slow-moving waters lest they attract grizzly bears.

The depopulation of so much of the area, on top of its remoteness from government power centres, has made it vulnerable. Douglas Neasloss, the chief of the Kitasoo/Xai’xais First Nation, had to confront this while working as an ecotourism guide at the start of the 2000s. “There were so many illegal activities in our part of the world: illegal hunting, illegal fishing – we even caught one guy doing illegal forestry.”

The Kitasoo/Xai’xais territory is directly adjacent to that of the Nuxalk, and both suffer from the same neglect by federal and provincial authorities.

“In the 90s, anybody knew that there was no law enforcement agencies up in this part of the world. We’re extremely remote, only accessible by boat or plane. And you will never see [provincial or federal government representatives],” he says. “It was like the wild west.”

Neasloss started the Kitasoo/Xai’xais Guardian Watchmen programme in 2010, funded by a combination of private and government money. The programme has grown to the point where it has five boats on the water doing everything from resource stewardship to coastguard operations – and Neasloss credits it with bringing illegal activities down to near zero.

Even in the pilot project here on the coast, guardians have yet to issue a single ticket. That’s fine with Neasloss. “I hope our guys never write a ticket, you know, and we focus a lot on the education piece.” It’s about getting results, not racking up fines, he says.

For Saunders, the way the guardians have tamped down the “wild west” mentality means they’re preserving what the Nuxalk depend on.

“I just want my daughter to enjoy all of this that I get to enjoy,” he says. “I want her to swim in the river [and] be able to harvest everything off the land.”

‘This uniform is the best one I have worn’

Some days are easier than others. Today, for instance, Roger Harris is on the water with his boss, Ernie Tallio, driving a boat in circles. The older of the guardians’ two boats has just had new engines installed, and they need to be broken in with two hours’ worth of running time, so Harris is at the helm, putting the boat through its paces.

Harris was raised outside the Nuxalk community by non-Indigenous parents and used to struggle with his identity. “I used to be ashamed of being a First Nations child,” he says.

He became a paramedic, then a Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer and saw up close some of the problems in his community. Like his first call as a police officer, in which he responded to a classmate’s death by suicide. Or a young community member’s horrific car accident. In these cases, he had to set aside his identity and become the uniform he was in.

But the Nuxalk Guardian Watchmen uniform is “the best one I’ve ever worn”, he says.

That does not mean the job is without sharp edges. Another watchman, John Sampson, explains. “We’ve been called ‘native fish cops’ before,” he says, as we drive down toward the wharf. Indigenous and non-Indigenous people have sometimes responded to guardians’ interventions with hostility, derision or indifference.

But the role is directly beneficial to their communities. Harris, for example, regularly volunteers to patrol the community late into the night. Cruising slowly around the reserve in a white truck, pointing his spotlight into back yards, he could be mistaken for his former police officer self, but in fact he is looking for the grizzly bears that tend to be attracted by the fish-smoking shacks common in people’s gardens.

Men and women with badges and insignias can be triggering to local people who associate authority with oppression. There is a long history of disrespectful and demeaning things being done to Indigenous people in Canada, and a long trail of supreme court cases resulting from some of those interactions.

While there are no official plans yet, negotiations are under way with Fisheries and Oceans Canada to expand the guardians’ authority, giving them the power of federal fisheries officers. That would come with a much greater geographical area of responsibility beyond parks and conservancies – and, it could mean they would need to carry firearms and wear bulletproof vests.

For Neasloss, the potential Fisheries and Oceans Canada powers are part of a bigger plan, another step toward the ultimate goal of First Nations being able to enforce their own laws.

“I would love to see a First Nations recognised level of authority,” he says. “You know, as First Nations we say we have it – we’ve always had it, a stewardship responsibility – we’ve never surrendered that.”

Read the full story here.
Photos courtesy of

Thirsty future: Australia’s green hydrogen targets could require vastly more water than the government hopes

To make green hydrogen, take water and split it into hydrogen and oxygen. It sounds simple – but the government’s water-use figures may be a drastic underestimate.

totajla/ShutterstockGreen hydrogen is touted by some as the future – a way for Australia to slowly replace its reliance on fossil fuel exports. The energy-dense gas has the potential to reduce emissions in sectors challenging to decarbonise, such as steelmaking and fertiliser manufacturing. The Albanese government wants it to be a massive new export industry and has laid out a pathway through its National Hydrogen Strategy. Unfortunately, there’s a real gap between rhetoric and reality. Despite ambitious plans, no green hydrogen project has yet succeeded in Australia. The technology’s most prominent local backer, billionaire miner Twiggy Forrest, has dialled down his ambition. Globally, just 7% of announced green hydrogen projects are up and running. Economic viability is one problem. But there’s a much larger issue flying under the radar: water. Hitting the 2050 target of 15 million to 30 million tonnes of hydrogen a year would use 7–15% of the amount Australia’s households, farms, mines and black coal power plants use annually. That’s simply not sustainable. Splitting water Green hydrogen uses renewable energy to power electrolyser machines, which split water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen. On the surface, this is an appealing use of clean energy, especially during solar peak periods. But what the government hasn’t properly accounted for is the water cost for green hydrogen. The strategy states water use is likely to be “considerable but not prohibitive”. This is questionable. For every kilogram of hydrogen produced through electrolysis, nine litres of water are directly consumed. That’s not all. The water needed to make hydrogen has to be extremely pure. Salt water has to be desalinated, and even fresh water needs purification. Equipment also needs cooling, which consumes even more water. All these processes incur substantial indirect water losses, such as the water used for industrial processes and cooling. The volumes used are highly uncertain. They can be up to 20 times greater than the direct water use. A key input value for the government’s hydrogen strategy modelling is taken from a 2015 report by the Argonne National Energy Laboratory in the United States, which assumes each kilogram of green hydrogen produced requires just over 30 litres of water. The Australian hydrogen strategy suggests 30 litres per kilogram of hydrogen would cover “all system losses including purification processes and cooling water required”. But it’s not clear if this figure covers other uses of water in making hydrogen, such as water treatment. Green hydrogen could help industrial sectors transition from fossil fuels. The problem is the water use. Audio und werbung/Shutterstock How much water would this use? According to the government’s modelling, making 15 million tonnes would require 740 billion litres of water. That would be about 7% of the 10,450 billion litres used by all of Australia’s households, farms, mines and black coal power plants. The government’s National Hydrogen Strategy shows the water use by major industries. Their total water use is 10,450 gigalitres annually. Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water That’s substantial. One and a half Sydney Harbours worth, every year. But it might be a major underestimate. After all, estimates on indirect water use differ widely. The government’s figures are at the very bottom of the range. For instance, the latest research gives water consumption figures of about 66 litres per kilogram – more than twice as large. Other sources give values between 90 and 300 litres per kilogram of hydrogen – three to ten times higher. Uncertainty in modelling is normal. But the wide research suggesting much higher water use should give rise to real concern. If we take a middle-of-the-range figure of 95 litres per kilogram, this would mean that making 15 million tonnes of green hydrogen would use up 22% of the 10,450 billion litres used by households, farms, mines and black coal power plants annually by 2050. If hydrogen was even thirstier at 310 litres per kilogram, that would translate to 72% of that figure. These estimates are enormous. Even under the most optimistic scenario, the draw on Australia’s scarce freshwater resources would simply be too much. Where would this water come from? Farmers? Groundwater? Environmental flows from rivers? As the Queensland Farmers Federation pointed out in its response to the hydrogen strategy, the figures on water use “beg the question if they are in fact sustainable”. The Water Services Association of Australia has called for much greater attention to the water demands of green hydrogen, which it says are “often seriously underestimated”. What about saltwater? Australia has no shortage of oceans. The problem here becomes energy and wastewater. Desalination is still very energy intensive. Converting saltwater to fresh also produces large volumes of super-salty brine, which must then be managed as waste. Which way forward? Does this mean green hydrogen is a non-starter? Not necessarily. Improved electrolyser technology might offer ways to slash water use, while circular economy approaches such as resource recovery from brine could also reduce losses. But these concerns about water must be front and centre in future discussions about the shape and size of the industry in Australia. Madoc Sheehan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Only three people prosecuted for covering up illegal sewage spills

Employees of water firms who obstruct investigations into spills could face jail, as new rules come into force on FridayWater company bosses have entirely escaped punishment for covering up illegal sewage spills, government figures show, as ministers prepare to bring in a new law threatening them with up to two years in prison for doing so.Only three people have ever been prosecuted for obstructing the Environment Agency in its investigations into sewage spills, officials said, with none of them receiving even a fine. Continue reading...

Water company bosses have entirely escaped punishment for covering up illegal sewage spills, government figures show, as ministers prepare to bring in a new law threatening them with up to two years in prison for doing so.Only three people have ever been prosecuted for obstructing the Environment Agency in its investigations into sewage spills, officials said, with none of them receiving even a fine.Officials said the data shows why the water regulator has found it so difficult to stop illegal spills, which happen when companies dump raw sewage during dry weather. The Environment Agency has identified hundreds of such cases since 2020.Steve Reed, the environment secretary, said: “Bosses must face consequences if they commit crimes – there must be accountability. From today, there will be no more hiding places.“Water companies must now focus on cleaning up our rivers, lakes and seas for good.”Water companies dumped a record amount of sewage into rivers and coastal waters last year, mostly because wet weather threatened to wash sewage back into people’s homes.Data released last month by the Environment Agency revealed companies had discharged untreated effluent for nearly 4m hours during 2024, a slight increase on the previous year.But companies have also illegally dumped sewage during dry weather. Data released to the Telegraph last year under freedom of information rules shows regulators had identified 465 illegal sewage spills since 2020, with a further 154 under investigation as potentially illegal spills.Britain’s polluted waterways became a major issue at last year’s election, with Labour promising to end what it called the “Tory sewage scandal”.Government sources say one reason illegal spills have been allowed to continue is that regulators have faced obstruction when investigating them.In 2019, three employees at Southern Water were convicted of hampering the Environment Agency when it was trying to collect data as part of an investigation into raw sewage spilled into rivers and on beaches in south-east England.The maximum punishment available in that case was a fine, but none of the individuals were fined. Several of the employees said at the time they were told by the company solicitor not to give data to the regulator.Two years later, Southern was given a £90m fine after pleading guilty to thousands of illegal discharges of sewage over a five-year period.New rules coming into force on Friday will give legal agencies the power to bring prosecutions in the crown court against employees for obstructing regulatory investigations, with a maximum sanction of imprisonment.Directors and executives can be prosecuted if they have consented to or connived with that obstruction, or allowed it to happen through neglect.The rules were included in the Water (Special Measures) Act, which came into law in February. The act also gives the regulator new powers to ban bonuses if environmental standards are not met and requires companies to install real-time monitors at every emergency sewage outlet.Philip Duffy, the chief executive of the Environment Agency, said: “The act was a crucial step in making sure water companies take full responsibility for their impact on the environment.“The tougher powers we have gained through this legislation will allow us, as the regulator, to close the justice gap, deliver swifter enforcement action and ultimately deter illegal activity.“Alongside this, we’re modernising and expanding our approach to water company inspections – and it’s working. More people, powers, better data and inspections are yielding vital evidence so that we can reduce sewage pollution, hold water companies to account and protect the environment.”

Indians Battle Respiratory Issues, Skin Rashes in World's Most Polluted Town

By Tora AgarwalaBYRNIHAT, India (Reuters) - Two-year-old Sumaiya Ansari, a resident of India's Byrnihat town which is ranked the world's most...

BYRNIHAT, India (Reuters) - Two-year-old Sumaiya Ansari, a resident of India's Byrnihat town which is ranked the world's most polluted metropolitan area by Swiss Group IQAir, was battling breathing problems for several days before she was hospitalised in March and given oxygen support.She is among many residents of the industrial town on the border of the northeastern Assam and Meghalaya states - otherwise known for their lush, natural beauty - inflicted by illnesses that doctors say are likely linked to high exposure to pollution.Byrnihat's annual average PM2.5 concentration in 2024 was 128.2 micrograms per cubic meter, according to IQAir, over 25 times the level recommended by the WHO.PM2.5 refers to particulate matter measuring 2.5 microns or less in diameter that can be carried into the lungs, causing deadly diseases and cardiac problems."It was very scary, she was breathing like a fish," said Abdul Halim, Ansari's father, who brought her home from hospital after two days.According to government data, the number of respiratory infection cases in the region rose to 3,681 in 2024 from 2,082 in 2022."Ninety percent of the patients we see daily come either with a cough or other respiratory issues," said Dr. J Marak of Byrnihat Primary Healthcare Centre. Residents say the toxic air also causes skin rashes and eye irritation, damages crops, and restricts routine tasks like drying laundry outdoors."Everything is covered with dust or soot," said farmer Dildar Hussain.Critics say Byrnihat's situation reflects a broader trend of pollution plaguing not just India's cities, including the capital Delhi, but also its smaller towns as breakneck industrialisation erodes environmental safeguards.Unlike other parts of the country that face pollution every winter, however, Byrnihat's air quality remains poor through the year, government data indicates.Home to about 80 industries - many of them highly polluting - experts say the problem is exacerbated in the town by other factors like emissions from heavy vehicles, and its "bowl-shaped topography"."Sandwiched between the hilly terrain of Meghalaya and the plains of Assam, there is no room for pollutants to disperse," said Arup Kumar Misra, chairman of Assam's pollution control board.The town's location has also made a solution tougher, with the states shifting blame to each other, said a Meghalaya government official who did not want to be named.Since the release of IQAir's report in March, however, Assam and Meghalaya have agreed to form a joint committee and work together to combat Byrnihat's pollution.(Reporting by Tora Agarwala; Writing by Sakshi Dayal; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

UK government report calls for taskforce to save England’s historic trees

Exclusive: Ancient oaks ‘as precious as stately homes’ could receive stronger legal safeguards under new proposalsAncient and culturally important trees in England could be given legal protections under plans in a UK government-commissioned report.Sentencing guidelines would be changed under the plans so those who destroy important trees would face tougher criminal penalties. Additionally, a database of such trees would be drawn up, and they could be given automatic protections, with the current system of tree preservation orders strengthened to accommodate this.In 2020, the 300-year-old Hunningham Oak near Leamington was felled to make way for infrastructure projects.In 2021, the Happy Man tree in Hackney, which the previous year had won the Woodland Trust’s tree of the year contest, was felled to make way for housing development.In 2022, a 600-year-old oak was felled in Bretton, Peterborough, which reportedly caused structural damage to nearby property.In 2023, 16 ancient lime trees on The Walks in Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, were felled to make way for a dual carriageway. Continue reading...

Ancient and culturally important trees in England could be given legal protections under plans in a UK government-commissioned report.Sentencing guidelines would be changed under the plans so those who destroy important trees would face tougher criminal penalties. Additionally, a database of such trees would be drawn up, and they could be given automatic protections, with the current system of tree preservation orders strengthened to accommodate this.There was an outpouring of anger this week after it was revealed that a 500-year-old oak tree in Enfield, north London, was sliced almost down to the stumps. It later emerged it had no specific legal protections, as most ancient and culturally important trees do not.After the Sycamore Gap tree was felled in 2023, the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs asked the Tree Council and Forest Research to examine current protections for important trees and to see if they needed to be strengthened. The trial of two men accused of felling the Sycamore Gap tree is due to take place later this month at Newcastle crown court.The report, seen by the Guardian, found there is no current definition for important trees, and that some of the UK’s most culturally important trees have no protection whatsoever. The researchers have directed ministers to create a taskforce within the next 12 months to clearly define “important trees” and swiftly prepare an action plan to save them.Defra sources said ministers were evaluating the findings of the report.Jon Stokes, the director of trees, science and research at the Tree Council, said: “Ancient oaks can live up to 1,000 years old and are as precious as our stately homes and castles,” Stokes explained. “Our nation’s green heritage should be valued and protected and we will do everything we can to achieve this.”Currently, the main protection for trees is a tree preservation order (TPO), which is granted by local councils. Failing to obtain the necessary consent and carrying out unauthorised works on a tree with a TPO can lead to a fine of up to £20,000.The Woodland Trust has called for similar protections, proposing the introduction of a list of nationally important heritage trees and a heritage TPO that could be used to promote the protection and conservation of the country’s oldest and most important trees. The charity is using citizen science to create a database of ancient trees.The report’s authors defined “important trees” as shorthand for “trees of high social, cultural, and environmental value”. This includes ancient trees, which are those that have reached a great age in comparison with others of the same species, notable trees connected with specific historic events or people, or well-known landmarks. It could also include “champion trees”, which are the largest individuals of their species in a specific geographical area, and notable trees that are significant at a local scale for their size or have other special features.Richard Benwell, the CEO of the environmental group Wildlife and Countryside Link, said: “Ancient trees are living monuments. They are bastions for nature in an increasingly hostile world and home to a spectacular richness of wildlife. We cannot afford to keep losing these living legends if we want to see nature thrive for future generations. The government should use the planning and infrastructure bill to deliver strict protection for ancient woodlands, veteran trees, and other irreplaceable habitats.”Felled ancient trees In 2020, the 300-year-old Hunningham Oak near Leamington was felled to make way for infrastructure projects. In 2021, the Happy Man tree in Hackney, which the previous year had won the Woodland Trust’s tree of the year contest, was felled to make way for housing development. In 2022, a 600-year-old oak was felled in Bretton, Peterborough, which reportedly caused structural damage to nearby property. In 2023, 16 ancient lime trees on The Walks in Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, were felled to make way for a dual carriageway.

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