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Labor's plan to save threatened species is an improvement – but it's still well short of what we need

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Wednesday, October 5, 2022

Australia’s dire and shameful conservation record is well established. The world’s highest number of recent mammal extinctions – 39 since colonisation. Ecosystems collapsing from the north to the south, across our lands and waters. Even species that have survived so far are at risk, as the sad list of threatened species and ecological communities continues to grow. During the election campaign, Labor pledged to turn this around. On Tuesday, federal Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek announced what this would look like: a new action plan for 110 threatened species. The goal: no new extinctions. “Our current approach has not been working. If we keep doing what we’ve been doing, we’ll keep getting the same results,” Plibersek said. But is this really a step change? Let’s be clear. This plan is a welcome improvement – especially the focus on First Nations rangers and Indigenous knowledge, clearer targets, better monitoring and the goal of protecting 30% of Australia’s lands and seas within five years. But the funding is wholly inadequate. The A$225 million committed is an order of magnitude less than what we need to actually bring these threatened species back from oblivion. The grim reality is this plan is nowhere near enough to halt the extinctions. Here’s why. There’s nowhere near enough funding Conservation costs money. Recovering threatened species takes effort. Tackling the threats that are pushing them over the edge, from feral cats to land clearing, is expensive. “Measures of last resort”, such as captive breeding, creation of safe havens and translocations, takes more still. How much is enough? Estimates put it at A$1.7 billion per year. This is around one-seventh of the money Australian governments spent on fossil fuel subsidies last financial year. If there’s funding for that, there should be funding for wildlife. Make no mistake – starving conservation of adequate funding is a choice. For decades, Australia’s unique environment and wildlife have been thrown consolation crumbs of funding – even though they are our collective natural heritage, fundamental to human survival, wellbeing and economic prosperity, and a major draw card for tourists and locals. You can see the results for yourself: more extinctions and many more threatened species. Picking winners means many species will lose Labor’s plan is focused on arresting the decline of 110 species, and 20 places such as the Australian Alps, Bruny Island and Kakadu and West Arnhem Land. Unfortunately, that’s a drop in the ocean. Combined, we now have more than 2,000 species and ecological communities listed as threatened. Picking species to survive betrays our remarkable, diverse and largely unique plants, animals and ecosystems. It suggests – wrongly – that we have to choose winners and losers, when in fact we could save them all. The plan assumes recovering priority species may help conserve other threatened species in the same areas and habitats. This is questionable, given only around 6% of listed threatened species are slated to receive priority funding, and how much the needs of different species can vary even in the same habitats and ecosystems. Different species respond very differently to fire regimes, for instance. Policies and laws are essential Funding by itself isn’t enough. Unless all levels of governments enact and enforce effective policies aimed at conserving species and their homes, the situation will worsen. Australians are still waiting to see what reforms actually emerge from Graeme Samuel’s sweeping review of the main laws governing biodiversity and environmental protection. Alignment of policies is vital. What’s the point of saving a rare finch from land clearing if you’re simultaneously opening up huge areas to fracking, polluting groundwater and adding yet more emissions to our overheated atmosphere? Despite Labor’s rhetoric on threatened species and climate change, they are still committed to more coal and gas. Similarly, native vegetation clearing and habitat loss is barely mentioned in the threatened species plan. Yet these are leading causes of environmental degradation, as the 2021 State of the Environment Report makes clear. If you want to save the critically endangered western ringtail possum and endangered black cockatoos, why would you approve the clearing of habitat vital to their existence? The Labor government did just that in July. Conserving more land isn’t a panacea Protecting 30% of Australia’s lands and oceans by 2030 sounds great. But protecting degraded farmland is not the same as protecting a biodiverse grassland or wetland. And establishing protected areas is not the same as effective management. To get this right, the new areas must add to our existing conservation estates by adding species and ecological communities with little or no representation. They must help species move as they would have before European colonisation, by connecting protected areas separated by human settlement or farms. And there must be enough money to actually look after the land. There’s no point protecting ever-larger tracts of degraded, weed-infested, rabbit, deer, horse, pig, fox and cat-filled land. Protecting degraded land shouldn’t be the goal. Shutterstock The 50 million hectares of land and sea to be added by 2027 is supposed to come almost entirely from Indigenous Protected Areas. But again, where’s the funding? Right now, these land and sea areas get a pittance – a few cents per hectare per year. It’s also important to support conservation on private land, where many threatened species live and where significant gains can be made. Maintaining wildlife on private land can also help farmers and landholders through pollination and seed dispersal as well as broader ecosystem health. We need laws with teeth If you liked it, you should have put a law around it. If the federal government is serious about ending extinctions, it should be enshrined in legislation. As it stands, “zero extinctions” is a promise with no clear way for us to see who is responsible or how the promise will be kept. Too cynical? Alas, there’s a very real trend here. Successive governments have avoided accountability for losing species doing exactly this. They release strategies on glossy paper which note we all have a role to play in conservation – but strangely omit the part about who is responsible when a species dies out. If you want to save species, make human careers depend on species staying alive. We know strong legislation and billions rather than millions of dollars are needed to stop extinctions. So far, the new government has announced inadequate funding, a non-binding strategy with an aspirational goal, and a seemingly rushed idea of a biodiversity market, dubbed “green Wall Street”, which made conservationists including the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists very concerned. Tossing breadcrumbs to conservation is what we’ve done for decades. It’s a major reason why our unique species are in this mess. Time’s up. Euan G. Ritchie is the Chair of the Media and Communications Working Group of the Ecological Society of Australia, Deputy Convenor (Communication and Outreach) for the Deakin Science and Society Network, and a member of the Australian Mammal Society.Megan C Evans receives funding from the Australian Research Council through a Discovery Early Career Research Award and has previously been funded by the Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment, WWF Australia, and the National Environmental Science Program's Threatened Species Recovery Hub.Yung En Chee receives funding from the Australian Research Council and the Melbourne Waterway Research-Practice Partnership.

Yes, the new threatened species plan is better. But it’s nowhere near enough to actually prevent Australian species from dying out

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How Rapa Nui Lost a Tree, Only to Have It Sprout Up Elsewhere

Before the toromiro disappeared from the island, at least two men grabbed seeds from the last remaining plant and brought them home

The tree that goes by toromiro has been a fragile expat for more than a half-century. Little Sophora toromiro, is far from home, no longer present on Rapa Nui, the Pacific island where it evolved. Also known as Easter Island, or Isla de Pascua in Spanish, Rapa Nui is a speck of land in the Pacific, 2,200 miles from the west coast of Chile. The tiny island encompasses just 63 square miles, and it is quite flat, with a maximum elevation of less than 1,700 feet. The last date of the toromiro’s tenure on Rapa Nui is uncertain. Some accounts say it went extinct in the wild in 1960. Others say that it was gone by 1962, when Karl Schanz, a German meteorologist, clambered down to see the tree in the crater where it had last been spotted, and it was gone. Was it removed? Did it die, tip over and return to the earth? We will never know. Although the toromiro is gone from Rapa Nui, it survives elsewhere through luck—and pluck. Over the past century, the intermittent collecting of the toromiro’s seeds and their replanting in mainland locations have given the species purchase elsewhere. Each tree is a member of a small diaspora, with only a handful surviving in about a dozen different public and private botanical gardens around the world. This is a story of survival, persistence and, perhaps in some ways, dumb luck—a tree in decline that was rescued and whose seeds were sent to other places. Mention Easter Island to almost anyone, and if they’ve heard of it, they’ve likely heard of its statues. Imprinted in the popular imagination are its enigmatic, massive stone sculptures, or moai. Curious investigators have speculated for more than two centuries about how more than 900 of these mysterious statues—the largest being more than 30 feet tall and weighing over 80 tons—might have been moved to locations around the island, traveling miles from the site where they were quarried. The toromiro, though, is an invisible tree on the island, its story known to very few, and its existence marked more by its absence than its presence. The tree does have many close relatives. The Sophora genus is speciose, as biologists say—a crowded taxon consisting of some 60 different species, including a dozen closely related oceanic ones scattered across the Pacific. The toromiro is more of a shrub than a tree, and none of its close relatives is large—at least from descriptions recorded over the past century. The northernmost outpost for the Sophora genus is in Hawaiʻi, where Sophora chrysophylla is the primary food source for the palila, a critically endangered honeycreeper. Without S. chrysophylla, known as mamane in Hawaiian, the palila would not have survived the last century as its range dwindled. The subterranean pollen record reveals that the toromiro was abundant across much of Rapa Nui, where many other now-extinct plants also thrived. Paleobotanical evidence shows that the tree’s presence on the island dates back at least 35,000 years. Its seeds are both buoyant and salt-resistant, and they probably first arrived by water, floating onto the island, probably from another Pacific island, and then it did what species do: continued its evolutionary journey in a new place to become the tree we know today. But even before the toromiro disappeared from the island, it had been without a lot of endemic companions. Fewer than 30 indigenous seed-bearing plant species have survived on Rapa Nui to the present day, and weeds, along with naturalized, cultivated shrubs, are now the main plants growing there. The toromiro did not disappear precipitously but experienced a protracted decline. Humans arrived in Rapa Nui around the 12th century, probably not long after Polynesians reached the Hawaiian archipelago. Some hundreds of years after humans’ arrival, the island experienced a painful drop in biodiversity, and its carrying capacity plummeted as the native palm forests disappeared, replaced by grasslands. Food grew scarce, and occupants fled, thinning down to around 100 Rapa Nui at one point in the 19th century. In his deterministic 2005 book Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed, Jared Diamond claimed the occupants were lousy land managers. His analysis of why Rapa Nui became denuded of its plant life is now out of date, as later studies have revealed the island’s complexities. To sketch the story of the weakening grip of native plant life on Rapa Nui as a predictable story of human arrogance intersecting with a small, remote and evolutionarily vulnerable spit of land is tempting, but the tale is more nuanced than that. Natives there recorded centuries-old histories of careful but intermittent conservation strategies. Some scholars have asserted that the Little Ice Age stressed resources on the island between the 16th and 19th centuries, leading to the disappearance of palms and other important contributors to the islanders’ activities and well-being. Others have pointed to prolonged droughts, while still others have continued to argue that humans were highly complicit in the island’s declining biodiversity. Were groves of palm trees decimated to create systems for rolling the giant stone carvings from quarry to coastline, where most of them have sat for many hundreds of years? Perhaps. However the palms disappeared, their loss seems to have been a factor in the tumbling downturn of the island’s other trees, including the toromiro. The palms had made up the great majority of Rapa Nui’s tree cover, some 16 million trees that blanketed about 70 percent of the island. Some controversy remains about what particular species of palm flourished, but many believe it was Paschalococos disperta, the Rapa Nui palm. Jaime Espejo, a Chilean botanist who’s written extensively about the toromiro, noted that it probably lived in the undergrowth of the palm, lodged in an ancient ecosystem that no longer exists. Paleobotanists and archaeologists studying the island spotted the widespread loss of the palms in their investigations. At the same time, they found that the number of fish bones found in waste middens around the island dropped as fishing boats could no longer be constructed in large numbers from trees. The loss of access to fish must have been a devastating turn, because the human residents’ main proteins came from the sea. Soil erosion, likely exacerbated by deforestation and agriculture, led to further losses of the tree. Hooved animals, arriving with European explorers in the 18th century, were also certain culprits in the toromiro’s decline and disappearance. In Hawaiʻi, sheep consume that archipelago’s species of Sophora. Another creature implicated in the destruction of much of both Rapa Nui’s and Hawaiʻi’s plant life was the Polynesian rat (Rattus exulans), as well as the bigger ship rat (Rattus rattus) and Norwegian rat (Rattus norvegicus). These rats, landing on new island homes and able to reproduce quickly, found abundant food in the form of native seeds, plants and invertebrates—and no predators. They laid waste to plant life with shocking speed. An aerial view of a toromiro in Barcelona, Spain Daderot via Wikimedia CC0 Early European accounts and pollen records tell us that by about 1600, forests in the island’s craters had disappeared, and, with that, the toromiro declined into long-term scarcity and then extirpation. The New Zealand anthropologist Steven Fischer has noted that the last forest was probably cut for firewood around 1640, making wood the most valuable commodity on the island. Driftwood became precious. So scarce was wood, Fischer observes, that the pan-Polynesian word rakau, meaning “tree,” “timber” or “wood,” came to mean “riches” or “wealth” in the old Rapa Nui language—a meaning not present in any other use of the word elsewhere in Polynesia, including in Tahiti, Tonga, Hawaiʻi and New Zealand. It’s ironic that after the deforestation of the island’s trees, new linguistic meanings sprouted out of the island’s impending botanical doom. Amid these centuries-long difficulties, but long before the toromiro disappeared, a wood-based culture thrived. The Rapa Nui had a particular passion for carving; beyond their giant stone statues, they favored the toromiro for its durable and fine-grained wood and reddish hue. Although primarily used for ritual objects, the toromiro was also serviceable for building material in houses, household utensils, statuettes and paddles. These artifacts survive in museums around the world. Some of them are hundreds of years old, and they might provide unexpected addenda to our understandings of the tree’s deeper history, offered up through dendrochronological analysis. Studying the annual growth rings in the wood could provide details we lack: the pace of growth of the wood, environmental pressures acting on the tree, its ultimate size and many of the other clues revealed through laboratory work with wood specimens. Part of our lack of knowledge about the tree’s wood is because it has always been uncommon on the island, at least since Western contact. Rapa Nui came with inherent geographic disadvantages for plant survival, including few sheltered habitats with steep hillsides or deep ravines in which toromiro could remain hidden away from humans. The three volcanic craters on the island are the only such hiding places. In 1911, the Chilean botanist Francisco Fuentes noted that the toromiro was rare, only to be found in Rano Kau, the largest of the craters. The Swedish botanist Carl Skottsberg, who also worked on Hawaiian flora, visited Rano Kau in 1917 and found only a single specimen. A compelling global exploration of nature and survival as seen through a dozen species of trees. The final contact with the tree on its native soil occurred when the Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl collected seeds from the last surviving example. This was likely the same tree that Skottsberg had found in the shelter of Rano Kau. The egg-shaped crater is about a mile across and has its own microclimate, largely out of the winds and weather, and protected from grazing ungulates by a rock formation. Foot traffic remained down in the last century, as little else lives in the crater that can be harvested or cut down. Innumerable swampy pockets of water make the area difficult to traverse. A beautiful, multicolored, shallow lake of open water and floating mats of peat cover much of the bottom of the crater. There, the tiny toromiro held on. Heyerdahl, who had already been traveling around the Pacific Ocean in the 1940s, became famous, or infamous, for floating a radical new theory: that the islands in the Pacific had been populated initially by American Indians from the mainland of South America, rather than by people from Asia or from other Polynesian islands. In 1947, he launched an expedition with a primitive raft named Kon-Tiki and made a 5,000-mile journey, heading west from Peru. What’s often lost in the voluminous writings about Heyerdahl and his oceanfaring obsessions was his interest in Rapa Nui. Björn Aldén, a Swedish botanist with the Gothenburg Botanical Garden, became friends with Heyerdahl and has worked to return the toromiro to its native land. In a letter to Björn, Heyerdahl decried the “tankelöse treskjaerere,” or “thoughtless woodcutters.” He noted how good it felt to have helped to save the species by collecting a handful of seeds that hung from the tree’s sole remaining branch. Heyerdahl couldn’t recount the exact date, or even the year, but thought it was sometime in late 1955 or early 1956. Heyerdahl handed the seeds off to paleobotanist Olaf Selling in Stockholm. They went to Gothenburg from there. Locals have a strain of national pride in Gothenburg for their role in the tree’s cultivation and survival. But recently, researchers in Chile discovered that another botanist preceded Heyerdahl in getting seeds off the island. Efraín Volosky Yadlin, an Argentinian-born immigrant, participated in the first agronomic studies on Rapa Nui. Sent there by the Chilean Ministry of Agriculture in the early 1950s, Volosky Yadlin collected seeds, apparently from the same tree that Heyerdahl would come upon a few years later, and proceeded to carry out his own propagation tests on the toromiro. Now the tree remains far afield, surviving in about a dozen locations around the world, mostly in botanical gardens including in Chile, in London and in southern France. Ultimately, researchers want to return the toromiro to Rapa Nui. But the tree still confronts challenges to surviving on its native ground, including a lack of genetic diversity and degraded soil on Rapa Nui. Past efforts to reestablish the tree have failed, but botanists are doing their best to overcome these hurdles. More studies will help researchers understand just what it will take to help the tree take root back on Rapa Nui and successfully end a long and difficult voyage. Excerpted from Twelve Trees: The Deep Roots of Our Future by Daniel Lewis. Published by Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster. Copyright © 2024. All rights reserved. Get the latest Science stories in your inbox. A Note to our Readers Smithsonian magazine participates in affiliate link advertising programs. If you purchase an item through these links, we receive a commission.

Disruptive innovation is the key to plastics sustainability

Plastic plays a critical role in virtually all industries, from agriculture and construction to healthcare and manufacturing. Time magazine has called plastic one of the four materials (along with cement, steel, and ammonia) without which modern societies would not be possible. However, as global production of this cheap, lightweight, and highly versatile material doubled during the past two decades, plastic consumption grew even faster, according to the OECD, creating significant sustainability challenges. Meeting those challenges will require disruptive innovation from companies both large and small. “Many companies are under significant pressure from employees, customers, regulators, and investors to show progress toward sustainability goals,” says Paige Marie Morse, sustainability lead at AspenTech, an industrial software provider. “For the companies that make plastics, they also feel a responsibility to meet the increasing demand for resources among a growing population, but without sacrificing sustainability.” KEY TRENDS EMERGING Three noteworthy trends in the plastics sustainability movement are legislation and mandates for increased use of recycled content in manufactured products and elimination of single-use plastics, efforts to make packaging more easily recyclable, and growing recognition that mechanical recycling alone will not be enough to meet the growing demand for recycled raw materials, says Kevin Quast, global  business lead for Honeywell’s plastics circularity business. Honeywell UOP, which develops technology and processes for the petrochemical industry, has been an innovator for more than a century. “We have been known for helping our customers transform and transition as society, technology, and regulatory environments have evolved,” Quast says. “We are not just focused on plastics circularity, we are investing in and commercializing solutions for energy storage, clean hydrogen and carbon sequestration, as well as green and renewable fuels, bioplastics, and other areas related to circularity, sustainability, and environmental improvement.” Quast notes that about 60% of Honeywell’s research and development (R&D) budget goes toward creating sustainability solutions, such as its UpCycle Process Technology. This new technology expands the types of plastics that can be recycled and creates recycled polymer feedstock (RPF), which is then used to make recycled plastics with a lower carbon footprint. SIZE DOESN’T MATTER  Plastics circularity is on the radar of most companies these days, regardless of size or where on the plastics chain they reside. Jay Baker, CEO of Jamestown Plastics, a contract packaging business based in Brocton, New York, is responding to sustainability trends by proactively assuming responsibility, before regulation demands it, he says. For example, he recently developed a circularity option to keep the plastic trays used by one of his customers out of the landfill. “We collect the old trays, grind them up, and send them back to the extruder,” Baker explains. “The extruder then makes ‘new’ recycled material, and we use that material to form recycled plastic trays for this customer and keep those expended trays out of the waste stream for as long as possible.” Across the country in Palo Alto, California—and at the other end of the size spectrum—HP is taking multiple steps to improve its plastics circularity. “The elimination of unnecessary plastic is the first priority when it comes to our circularity strategy,” says James McCall, HP’s chief sustainability officer. “As of 2021, we achieved a 44% reduction in single-use plastic packaging, towards our 2025 goal of a 75% reduction compared to 2018.” Additionally, HP has committed to a goal of using 30% post-consumer recycled plastic across its personal systems and print product portfolio by 2025, and it aims to achieve 75% circularity for its products and packaging by 2030. WORLDWIDE CONCERN Plastics sustainability is a global challenge requiring global solutions, of course. Braskem, an international petrochemical company headquartered in Sao Paulo, Brazil, is working with other innovation leaders around the world to do just that. “We believe that the transition from a linear to a circular economy is key to driving sustainable development in the plastics production chain,” says Antônio Queiroz, vice president of innovation, technology, and sustainable development. “Promoting sustainable development in our operations is in our DNA. We are consistently focused on developing sustainable solutions that improve people’s lives through chemicals and plastics.” Braskem has committed to a 15% reduction in its greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and to becoming a carbon neutral company by 2050. It was the first company in the petrochemical industr y to develop a large-scale biopolymer from sugar cane, and it develops partnerships focused on both mechanical and advanced recycling. It has multiple ventures underway in its home country, the latest being Cazoolo, an innovation hub to help customers, brands, designers, startups, and universities develop more sustainable packaging in an effort to improve plastics circularity and reduce environmental impact. Braskem is also partnering with like-minded enterprises around the world in its push for plastics sustainability. Its investment in U.S.-based Nexus Circular, an advanced recycling company, is part of its effort to expand its circular polymer portfolio. Such collaborations have helped in Braskem’s development of two new polypropylene grades with post-consumer recycled (PCR) content that can be used in a wide range of FDA food contact applications. BETTING ON INNOVATION “We know that in order to achieve real sustainability, we also need to bet on innovation when creating new business,” says Queiroz. Braskem increased its R&D budget by 50% this year, and it maintains multiple centers for disruptive innovation in Brazil and the U.S. It has partnered with Danish company Topsoe to develop a greener version of MEG, a component for producing PET plastic bottles that is widely used in plastics manufacturing. Derived directly from sugars, this green MEG has the potential to disrupt the polyethylene value chain as it significantly improves its carbon footprint. “We believe transformation is everywhere,” says Queiroz. “It’s time to use our potential to establish a new relationship with our ecosystem and tackle climate change as our planet’s greatest challenge. We understand that the more people and organizations are engaged, the more we can do to build a better world for current and future generations.”

Plastic plays a critical role in virtually all industries, from agriculture and construction to healthcare and manufacturing. Time magazine has called plastic one of the four materials (along with cement, steel, and ammonia) without which modern societies would not be possible. However, as global production of this cheap, lightweight, and highly versatile material doubled during the past two decades, plastic consumption grew even faster, according to the OECD, creating significant sustainability challenges. Meeting those challenges will require disruptive innovation from companies both large and small. “Many companies are under significant pressure from employees, customers, regulators, and investors to show progress toward sustainability goals,” says Paige Marie Morse, sustainability lead at AspenTech, an industrial software provider. “For the companies that make plastics, they also feel a responsibility to meet the increasing demand for resources among a growing population, but without sacrificing sustainability.” KEY TRENDS EMERGING Three noteworthy trends in the plastics sustainability movement are legislation and mandates for increased use of recycled content in manufactured products and elimination of single-use plastics, efforts to make packaging more easily recyclable, and growing recognition that mechanical recycling alone will not be enough to meet the growing demand for recycled raw materials, says Kevin Quast, global  business lead for Honeywell’s plastics circularity business. Honeywell UOP, which develops technology and processes for the petrochemical industry, has been an innovator for more than a century. “We have been known for helping our customers transform and transition as society, technology, and regulatory environments have evolved,” Quast says. “We are not just focused on plastics circularity, we are investing in and commercializing solutions for energy storage, clean hydrogen and carbon sequestration, as well as green and renewable fuels, bioplastics, and other areas related to circularity, sustainability, and environmental improvement.” Quast notes that about 60% of Honeywell’s research and development (R&D) budget goes toward creating sustainability solutions, such as its UpCycle Process Technology. This new technology expands the types of plastics that can be recycled and creates recycled polymer feedstock (RPF), which is then used to make recycled plastics with a lower carbon footprint. SIZE DOESN’T MATTER  Plastics circularity is on the radar of most companies these days, regardless of size or where on the plastics chain they reside. Jay Baker, CEO of Jamestown Plastics, a contract packaging business based in Brocton, New York, is responding to sustainability trends by proactively assuming responsibility, before regulation demands it, he says. For example, he recently developed a circularity option to keep the plastic trays used by one of his customers out of the landfill. “We collect the old trays, grind them up, and send them back to the extruder,” Baker explains. “The extruder then makes ‘new’ recycled material, and we use that material to form recycled plastic trays for this customer and keep those expended trays out of the waste stream for as long as possible.” Across the country in Palo Alto, California—and at the other end of the size spectrum—HP is taking multiple steps to improve its plastics circularity. “The elimination of unnecessary plastic is the first priority when it comes to our circularity strategy,” says James McCall, HP’s chief sustainability officer. “As of 2021, we achieved a 44% reduction in single-use plastic packaging, towards our 2025 goal of a 75% reduction compared to 2018.” Additionally, HP has committed to a goal of using 30% post-consumer recycled plastic across its personal systems and print product portfolio by 2025, and it aims to achieve 75% circularity for its products and packaging by 2030. WORLDWIDE CONCERN Plastics sustainability is a global challenge requiring global solutions, of course. Braskem, an international petrochemical company headquartered in Sao Paulo, Brazil, is working with other innovation leaders around the world to do just that. “We believe that the transition from a linear to a circular economy is key to driving sustainable development in the plastics production chain,” says Antônio Queiroz, vice president of innovation, technology, and sustainable development. “Promoting sustainable development in our operations is in our DNA. We are consistently focused on developing sustainable solutions that improve people’s lives through chemicals and plastics.” Braskem has committed to a 15% reduction in its greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and to becoming a carbon neutral company by 2050. It was the first company in the petrochemical industr y to develop a large-scale biopolymer from sugar cane, and it develops partnerships focused on both mechanical and advanced recycling. It has multiple ventures underway in its home country, the latest being Cazoolo, an innovation hub to help customers, brands, designers, startups, and universities develop more sustainable packaging in an effort to improve plastics circularity and reduce environmental impact. Braskem is also partnering with like-minded enterprises around the world in its push for plastics sustainability. Its investment in U.S.-based Nexus Circular, an advanced recycling company, is part of its effort to expand its circular polymer portfolio. Such collaborations have helped in Braskem’s development of two new polypropylene grades with post-consumer recycled (PCR) content that can be used in a wide range of FDA food contact applications. BETTING ON INNOVATION “We know that in order to achieve real sustainability, we also need to bet on innovation when creating new business,” says Queiroz. Braskem increased its R&D budget by 50% this year, and it maintains multiple centers for disruptive innovation in Brazil and the U.S. It has partnered with Danish company Topsoe to develop a greener version of MEG, a component for producing PET plastic bottles that is widely used in plastics manufacturing. Derived directly from sugars, this green MEG has the potential to disrupt the polyethylene value chain as it significantly improves its carbon footprint. “We believe transformation is everywhere,” says Queiroz. “It’s time to use our potential to establish a new relationship with our ecosystem and tackle climate change as our planet’s greatest challenge. We understand that the more people and organizations are engaged, the more we can do to build a better world for current and future generations.”

‘Earth To Beer’: Oregon, US breweries join project to brew a beer with environment in mind

The Portland-born effort asks breweries to source environmentally responsible ingredients for a beer then donate to a local environmentally focused nonprofit. Also in this beer news roundup, North Portland's Mayfly throws a three-day party this weekend for its fifth anniversary.

Editor’s note: This is a re-publication of the Oregon Brews and News weekly beer and cider newsletter, written by Oregonian/OregonLive beer writer Andre Meunier. To subscribe to have the newsletter delivered every Thursday at noon to your email inbox, go to oregonlive.com/newsletters and sign up.***Eric Steen is a brewing industry renaissance man. From marketing, to media relations, to event planning, to beer expert TV appearances, he does it all. And, more importantly, he’s a great human who cares about people.One of Steen’s passions is conservation and environmentalism, and in the past he has brought his interests together with projects like Cheers to the Land, The Oregon I Am, and Beers Made By Walking. Now, Steen is organizing Earth To Beer, a national movement with a goal for participating breweries to create a packaged beer that’s better for the planet. The initiative asks breweries to intentionally source environmentally responsible ingredients for their beer, then donate a portion of proceeds to a local environmentally focused nonprofit.Steen’s work is highly recognized and respected in the brewing world, so it’s no surprise that more than 35 breweries are on board, including Oregon names like Hopworks, Steeplejack, Little Beast, Level and Ferment. They will begin releasing beers starting on April 1, and continue through Earth Day on April 22.“We created Earth To Beer to advance the conversation about the importance of sourcing sustainable ingredients and supporting good agriculture,” Steen said. “While this is a national campaign in terms of the range of breweries involved and the audience we’re trying to connect with, it’s very much a local initiative in terms of the very real impacts we expect and hope to see.”Each brewery picks its own style to make, based on what sustainable ingredients they choose to use and what beer they know their fans will want. They also receive a unique, eye-catching label, created by Earth To Beer and designed to align with individual brewery’s branding while employing a common Earth to Beer layout supporting the movement’s overall look and feel.The project also offers scholarships — funded by Earth To Beer sponsor Arryved — to BIPOC-owned and newly opened breweries to cover costs.“Because beer is an agricultural product, I’ve been inspired by the relationship between conservation and craft beer for years,” Steen said. “It just feels like a really organic pathway to make some real change and work with a lot of people who often have the passion to make more sustainable choices but need help establishing a jumping off point.”Cheers to the project and to Eric. Start looking for Earth To Beer cans soon, and get a full list of participating breweries and sponsors at earthtobeer.com.Mayfly buzzing at 5 years oldRyan Born opened Mayfly Taproom & Bottle Shop nearly a year to the day before COVID-19 shut the city down, making its first year — always tough for a new business — even harder.“Pivot after pivot, the roller coaster ride is real,” Born says. “My original manager Morgan talked about it not being the kind of roller coaster you ride at a big theme park, but the kind at a state fair that they just assembled and is being operated by some 17-year-old kid who got just a few hours of training. It feels like it might all come crumbling down any minute.”Well said, Ryan and Morgan, but the crew at the excellent North Portland beer bar has made it to five years, and they’re ready to party for three days this weekend, from Friday through Sunday.“We made it to 5 thanks to our ridiculously amazing community,” Born says. Here are all the details:Friday: The day will feature “our friends Taylor and Kailin from Steward’s Valley Farm,” Born says. “They are amazing folks with a great little family farm in Oregon City.” The first feature will be a special one-off keg of Babi from Living Häus Beer Co., a Czech-style black lager that is easy drinking and refreshing with just a touch of roast character and a toasty malt bill. It’s been infused with a Steward’s Valley roasted coffee from Guji, Ethiopia. The second feature will be part of Little Brother PDX’s pop-up menu, featuring some overwintered kale as well as dried beans and chilies from last year’s harvest. Their full menu consists of their “Looper Burger,” house bratwurst, braised kale and beans, and banana bread with chocolate chips and hazelnuts.Saturday: Champs Burgers will be debuting a new burger grind made from 50-day dry-aged NY strips, Drag Bingo with Peachy Springs, and Yovu Beer from Nate Yovu, a North Portlander who brewed up a special batch of what he’s calling a “White Lager” —  a sort of Cold IPA/Hazy hybrid. It’s called Ghostman and clocks in at 5%.Sunday: This is Mayfly’s fifth year partnering with Yoga+Beer, so what better way to start its sixth year with a morning practice. Tickets available here. Machetes.PDX makes psychedelic looking marbled “quesadillas.” This Mexico City street food is a long tortilla (shaped like a machete blade) that you can fill with up to four guisados (braised or stewed meats, vegetables, etc).“The road to 5 hasn’t been easy,” Born says, “but treating Mayfly (and our plaza) as a community space to host pop-ups, book clubs, makers markets and many other events has allowed us to support so many additional small/tiny businesses in our community, and the relationships that have been formed have helped us get to where we are today.“We look forward to hosting many more of these events and continuing to bring people together over a good pint, and a great plate of food,” he says.Noon-10 p.m. Friday-Saturday, noon-9 p.m. Sunday. 8350 N. Fenwick Ave.Best of Craft Beer Awards heldThe Best of Craft Beer Awards were just held in Redmond, and the competition, billed as “one of America’s fastest growing beer awards,” featured 389 breweries that submitted almost 2,000 entries in 55 categories. Over 100 judges sampled the offerings over three days, then awarded 169 gold, silver, and bronze medals to 123 breweries located around the world. The highlights:2024 Large-Sized Brewery of the Year: Breakside Brewery & Taproom of Milwaukie2024 Medium-Sized Brewery of the Year: Best Day Brewing of Sausalito, California2024 Small-size Brewery of the Year: McMenamins Old Saint Francis School of BendGet all the results here.Sports Bra snub not appreciatedMy colleague Lizzy Acker is, like me, a fan of The Sports Bra, the women’s sports themed bar on Northeast Broadway. So Lizzy, a trending and arts reporter, was not pleased this week when a list of the country’s best sports bars came out and listed one particular Portland sports bar but not another particular sports bar. Read her entertaining take here to learn more.Beer of the WeekBier Wulf Bavarian IPA by Double Mountain Brewery & CideryCourtesy of Double Mountain Brewery & CideryBier Wulf Bavarian IPA, Double Mountain Brewery & Cidery: The Hood River brewery describes its newest seasonal release as a “testament to the Bavarian IPA style but with a twist. It unifies the earthy tones of German hops with the vibrant citrus notes of American counterparts. The German malts provide a complementary foundation, allowing the hops to take center stage. While the use of Hygge yeast lends a clean ferment with light fruit esters, resulting in a dry finish and a pleasantly bready mouthfeel.” Brewery notes: “Notes of ripe citrus, grapefruit pith, and spicy evergreen howling across the palate. The appearance of Bier Wulf is akin to “Sunshine in Brugge,” while its aroma evokes images of wildflowers, bright citrus, and sticky fruit. With a medium bitterness on the tongue and a dry, crisp finish complemented by hints of pineapple, orange, lemon, and pine, Bier Wulf promises an exploration of all of your inner wolf senses.” Bier Wulf also comes with an accompanying Spotify playlist curated by the brewers — scan the code on the bottle with Spotify to access the playlist. Bier Wulf now available for purchase in 500ml refillable bottles and on tap at all Double Mountain locations and in retail throughout the Northwest.What to do, what to do?Upright Brewing 15th anniversary: I’ll be writing more in depth on this soon, but mark the date on Saturday, April 6, when Upright will throw down to celebrate 15 trips around the sun. Founder and head brewer Alex Ganum hosts the bash at the brewery’s main location, 240 N. Broadway, with collabs and a new Upright release. This party, from 1-9 p.m., is sure to draw the who’s who among the Portland brewing community to celebrate this cherished brewery. See you there.Tualatin Valley’s Tap Season: Launched by Explore Tualatin Valley, the destination marketing organization that markets Tualatin Valley as a travel destination, Tap Season is a promotion for beer and cider lovers that includes exclusive event and specials, as well as the re-launch of the successful Tualatin Valley Ale Trail Mobile Passport — a digital passport where beer connoisseurs will earn points for prizes by checking in to any of the 37 participating producers, including Breakside, Ancestry, Bull Run Cider, Cooper Mountain, Golden Valley and Portland Cider.Events include:Alpaca Happy Hour 1: Noon-3 p.m., Hillsboro Downtown Station, 320 S.E. Baseline St., Hillsboro. Come to the food carts at Hillsboro Downtown Station and snap a pic with the alpacas, enjoy happy hour specials on some of your favorite Tualatin Valley beers and ciders, and hang out with the Tap Season Street Team, which will be handing out free swag)Alpaca Happy Hour 2: 4-6 p.m., Stickmen Brewing’s Tualatin Beer Hall, 19475 S.W. 118th Ave., Suite 1, Tualatin. The Beer Hall is also hosting an alpaca happy hour. Meet the alpacas while you enjoy happy hour specials on some of your favorite Tualatin Valley beers and ciders. The Tap Season Street Team will hand out free Tap Season swag again.Hood River Hard-Pressed Cider Fest: Now in its ninth year, this annual event, held this year on April 27, invites seasoned and novice cider enthusiasts to sample ciders from Columbia River Gorge and Pacific Northwest hard cidermakers. It offers over 60 ciders on tap from more than 30 cideries. Held at the Port of Hood River Event Site, this year the event expands its footprint to provide beachfront access to the Columbia River and the option for attendees to bring their own glass, contributing to what organizers call an “immersive and sustainable Hood River experience.” Beyond cider sampling, the daylong event boasts artisan food, art vendors, music and a children’s play area. For more information or tickets, visit hoodriverciderfest.com. For more information on Hood River, or to book a stay at one of Hood River’s lodging options visit visithoodriver.com/stay.New Releases of NotePaloma Sour, Migration BrewingColby SchlickerPaloma Sour, Migration Brewing: This beer, released for the second time on Wednesday, won the Experimental Beers category at the Best of Craft Beer Awards. This gently tart, golden soured ale was fermented before being inoculated with Migration’s house lactobacillus culture, then was aged in Reposado Tequila barrels before being blended with ample amounts of grapefruit puree, lime juice and zest. A dusting of Hawaiian sea salt was added to round out this Paloma-style cocktail sour. Brewery notes: “Hints of oak complement delicate tequila and citrus notes, while gentle acidity and light salinity combine for a complex refreshing beer that resonates with beer and cocktail drinkers alike.”Farm-to-Market Hazy Imperial IPA, Laurelwood Brewing and Zupan’s Markets: The 28th installment in Zupan’s Farm-to-Market beer series, which began in 2015, is this hazy double IPA with the Northeast Portland brewery — the second between the two. Brewery notes: “Smooth, resiny grapefruit flavor with a tropical, dank citrus aroma, set against a backdrop of rosy straw-orange haze and a light yellow-orange tan head. The beer is crafted from a blend of premium malts and a diverse selection of hops for a complex yet balanced profile.” Available exclusively at Zupan’s Markets in 16-ounce cans.Fresh Squeezed Non-Alcoholic IPA, Deschutes Brewery: The Bend and Portland brewery’s latest release is a nonalcoholic version of its No. 1 selling IPA, Fresh Squeezed. Deschutes has invested heavily in NA over the past five years, and NA Fresh Squeezed is crafted in-house through a partnership with Sustainable Beverage Technologies and uses the company’s patented BrewVo® technology in combination with Deschutes’ proprietary brewing methods. Brewery notes: “Brilliantly balanced and features the same Citra and Mosaic hops as the original, delivering refreshing notes of bright citrus and tropical fruit, with less than 0.5% ABV.” Fresh Squeezed NA comes on the heels of Deschutes’ first packaged non-alcoholic beer, Black Butte Non-Alcoholic, which quickly became the brewery’s highest rate-of-sale six-pack. Both are available nationwide at select retailers, bars, and restaurants. Use the “beer finder” to find the closest retailer or here to purchase the new non-alcoholic options online.McMenamins Hard Seltzer – Lemon Raspberry, McMenamins West Linn Brewery: The brewery group is the latest to enter the “seltzer space,” as industry lingo calls it. McMenamins says it plans to have different flavors of its Hard Seltzer in the future, but as a tribute to its well-known Ruby Ale, Raspberry is the first. Brewery notes: “Light and refreshing, this low calorie sipper delivers delicious flavors of raspberry and a hint of lemon for a crisp and effervescent experience.” Now available on draft at McMenamins locations and in cans starting Friday, March 29.— Andre Meunier has been writing about Northwest beer and breweries since 2016; reach him at 503-221-8488 or ameunier@oregonian.com, and sign up for his weekly newsletter, Oregon Brews and News. Instagram: @oregonianbeerguy

Organic farms seem to trigger more pesticide use on conventional farms

Insects tend to be more abundant on organic farms than conventional ones, which may cause the pests to spill over into neighbouring fields, prompting these farmers to increase their pesticide use

Organic farms appear to inadvertently cause greater pesticide use on surrounding fields with conventional agricultural practicesDanielle Balderas/Shutterstock Organic farmers dedicate their working lives to producing food with minimal help from pesticides, but in curbing the use of chemicals on their own land, they may unwittingly be triggering a spike in pesticide use over their neighbour’s fence. Ashley Larsen at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and her colleagues assessed land-use and pesticide data across 14,000 fields in Kern County, California. This is one of the largest crop-growing counties in the state, with produce including almonds, grapes, carrots and pistachios. The team found that when organic farmland is surrounded by conventional agriculture, the neighbouring farmers seem to increase their pesticide use, with a 10 per cent rise in organic cropland being linked to a 0.3 per cent increase in total pesticide use on conventional fields. Most of this is driven by increased use of insecticides, the researchers found. This may be because more insects – pests or otherwise – tend to be present on organic land and “spill over” into neighbouring conventional farmland, prompting these farmers to increase their pesticide use. “Pests arrive and seed a new outbreak, and they [farmers] increase pesticide use,” Larsen told reporters during a press briefing. The effect appears to be strongest when neighbouring fields are within 2.5 kilometres of the organic “focal field”. Conversely, the researchers noted that the presence of organic farmland is linked to a reduction in pesticide use on neighbouring organic fields, with a 10 per cent increase in the area of surrounding organic cropland being associated with a 3 per cent decrease in total pesticide use on organic focal fields. This may be because the larger area of organic farmland allows for a bigger and more stable community of beneficial insects. Organic agriculture only covers about 2 per cent of land globally, but in Kern County, about 5.5 per cent of the agricultural area is organic. When organic agriculture makes up a high proportion of farmland – perhaps 20 per cent or more – net pesticide use decreases regardless of where the organic fields are sited, say the researchers. But when relatively small areas of organic farmland – such as in Kern County – are evenly dispersed through the landscape, net pesticide use may in fact be higher than when no organic farmland is present. “Our simulations suggest that at low levels of organic agriculture in the landscape, we can actually see an increase in net insecticide use,” said Larsen. However, this impact can be entirely mitigated by clustering organic farmland together to minimise potential pest spillover, she said. “It might be worth considering, at the policy level, how to incentivise spatial clustering of new organic fields to basically leverage the pest control benefits of organic and limit any potential costs of organic on conventional growers.” This could include subsidy payments for farmers to convert more of their land in certain areas to organic practices, or even the creation of buffer zones between organic and non-organic land. Robert Finger at ETH Zurich in Switzerland says the findings demonstrate the need for policy-makers to consider land-use policy at the “landscape scale” to maximise the environmental benefits of organic farming. “Fundamentally, just thinking about single fields or single farms is not enough,” he says.

“An Astounding 20 Feet Long”– Scientists Discover New Species of Giant Snake in the Remote Amazon

A team of scientists on location with a film crew in the remote Amazon has uncovered a previously undocumented species of giant anaconda. Professor Bryan...

Scientists have discovered a new species of giant anaconda, the northern green anaconda, in the Ecuadorian Amazon. The discovery was made during an expedition invited by the Waorani people. The team’s findings highlight the genetic uniqueness of the species and the ecological threats facing the Amazon, underscoring the urgent need for conservation efforts. Credit: Jesus RivasA team of scientists on location with a film crew in the remote Amazon has uncovered a previously undocumented species of giant anaconda.Professor Bryan Fry from The University of Queensland led a team which captured and studied several specimens of the newly named northern green anaconda (Eunectes akayima), located in the Bameno region of Baihuaeri Waorani Territory in the Ecuadorian Amazon.“Our team received a rare invitation from the Waorani people to explore the region and collect samples from a population of anacondas, rumored to be the largest in existence,” Professor Fry said. “The indigenous hunters took us into the jungle on a 10-day expedition to search for these snakes, which they consider sacred. We paddled canoes down the river system and were lucky enough to find several anacondas lurking in the shallows, lying in wait for prey. The size of these magnificent creatures was incredible – one female anaconda we encountered measured an astounding 6.3 meters (20.7 feet) long. There are anecdotal reports from the Waorani people of other anacondas in the area measuring more than 7.5 meters (24.6 feet) long and weighing around 500 kilograms (1100 lbs).” A northern green anaconda. Credit: Bryan FryProfessor Fry said the northern green anaconda species diverged from the southern green anaconda almost 10 million years ago, and they differ genetically by 5.5 percent.“It’s quite significant – to put it in perspective, humans differ from chimpanzees by only about 2 percent,” he said. “This discovery is the highlight of my career.”Collaboration and Conservation ConcernsThe new anaconda species was found while filming with National Geographic for their upcoming Disney+ series Pole to Pole with Will Smith, on which Professor Fry, a National Geographic Explorer, was the expedition’s scientific leader.“Our journey into the heart of the Amazon, facilitated by the invitation of Waorani Chief Penti Baihua, was a true cross-cultural endeavor,” he said. “The importance of our Waorani collaborators is recognized with them being co-authors on the paper.”A Eunectes akayima breeding ball. Credit: Jesus RivasThe scientists also set out to compare the genetics of the green anaconda with specimens collected elsewhere by world-leading anaconda expert Dr Jesus Rivas from New Mexico Highlands University, and use them as an indicator species for ecosystem health.Professor Fry said the Amazon continues to face alarming ecological threats.“Deforestation of the Amazon basin from agricultural expansion has resulted in an estimated 20-31 percent habitat loss, which may impact up to 40 percent of its forests by 2050,” he said. “Another increasing problem is habitat degradation from land fragmentation, led by industrialized agriculture and heavy metal pollution associated with spills from oil extraction activities. Forest fires, drought, and climate change are also notable threats. These rare anacondas, and the other species that share this remote ecosystem, face significant challenges.”Professor Fry said his next research project would focus on heavy metal pollution in the Amazon.“It’s not only these gigantic snakes that are facing environmental threats, but almost all living things in the region,” he said. “The discovery of a new species of anaconda is exciting, but it is critical to highlight the urgent need to further research these threatened species and ecosystems. Of particular urgency is research into how petrochemicals from oil spills are affecting the fertility and reproductive biology of these rare snakes and other keystone species in the Amazon.”Reference: “Disentangling the Anacondas: Revealing a New Green Species and Rethinking Yellows” by Jesús A. Rivas, Paola De La Quintana, Marco Mancuso, Luis F. Pacheco, Gilson A. Rivas, Sandra Mariotto, David Salazar-Valenzuela, Marcelo Tepeña Baihua, Penti Baihua, Gordon M. Burghardt, Freek J. Vonk, Emil Hernandez, Juán Elías García-Pérez, Bryan G. Fry and Sarah Corey-Rivas, 15 February 2024, Diversity.DOI: 10.3390/d16020127

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