Great Need to Avoid Soil Pollution

Dr. Bakul Rao and Mr. Srinivas, Environment Policy Research Institute, explain students the phenomenon of soil and suggest remedies.

Student: We now hear that even soil can get polluted. What is the scientific definition of soil?

Mr. Srinivas: The top portion of the earth is called soil. It is a product of disintegration of rocks.

Over several thousands years, the rocks get emaciated, then break and over a long

period time reduce to a powder state which can be called soil. It is as important as

water and air.

Student: What does it contain?

Dr. Bakul Rao: It contains sand, pieces of rocks and whatever nutrients the parent rock

contained.

Student: Now tell us, how does soil get polluted?

Mr. Srinivas: There are two types of soil pollution. One is the natural process – the degradation

of soil over millions of years. Seawater infiltration in coastal region, acidification of

soil, and soil erosion are the natural process of degradation of soil.

The second one is man-made pollution. Deforestation is a major factor of man-

made pollution of soil. Sewage can pollute the soil. Use of inorganic manure and

pesticides can pollute the soil.

Student: What happens to soil when we throw plastic materials?

Dr. Bakul Rao: Plastics are non-biodegradable objects that do not decompose and merge with

the soil. They prevent aeration of soil that kills useful bacteria. Some of them are

cancer-causing chemicals, which severely affect the soil.

Student: Thank you very much for the vital information.

Unit 7

Environmental Organizations

“He who knows what sweets and virtues are

in the ground, the waters, the plants, the heavens,

and how to come at these enchantments,

is the rich and royal man.”

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Warm up

An environmental organization is an organization that seeks to protect, analyze or monitor the environment against misuse or degradation or lobby for these goals.

In this sense the environment may refer to the biophysical environment, the natural environment or the built environment. The organization may be a charity, a non-governmental organization or a government organization. Environmental organizations can be global, national, regional or local.

Some of the environmental issues that are of interest to environmental organizations are pollution, waste, resource depletion and climate change.

- What environmental organizations do you know?

1. Read about some of the environmental organizations and say:

What are their goals?

Intergovernmental organizations

European Environment Agency (EEA)

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)

UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme)

Earth System Governance Project

There are also environmental intergovernmental organizations that group governments at the regional and local level, as distinguishable from the national level. Examples are the network of regional governments for sustainable development, the ICLEI-Local governments for sustainability and the Partnerships in Environmental Management for the Seas of East Asia (PEMSEA). These organizations use the method of open coordination to share policy best practice and provide assistance and counsel to partners on issues related to environmental development following the UN Millennium Agenda. These networks can be seen as international organizations and have observer status in the different UN environmental organizations.

Australia Canada

Bush Heritage Australia ECO Canada

Ireland New Zealand

Environmental Protection Agency (Ireland) Department of Conservation

England United States

English Heritage United States Environmental

Protection Agency

Private Organizations (Environmental NGOs)

These organizations are involved in lobbying, advocacy, or conservation efforts:

Friends of Nature (international abbreviation: NFI, for German: Naturfreunde International) is an international movement with a background in the Social Democratic movement, which aims to make nature accessible to the wider community by providing appropriate recreational and travel facilities. The organization began in Austria in 1895 as Naturfreunde. The movement spread and it now has 600,000 members, 3500 groups and runs some 1000 houses mainly in Europe. The International Friends of Nature (IFN), based in Vienna, is the umbrella organization of the national Friends of Nature federations. The work of the Friends of Nature rests on the conviction that people's opportunities of personal development are inextricably linked with the protection of nature and the conservation of natural resources. Hence, the Friends of Nature takes a stand for the conservation of an environment worth living in, for peace and international understanding, for the social and democratic rights of all people, and for a meaningful organization of leisure time.

Friends of the Earth International (FOEI) is an international network of environmental organizations in 77 countries.

Friends of the Earth International are the world's largest grassroots environmental network and they campaign on today's most urgent environmental and social issues. They challenge the current model of economic and corporate globalization, and promote solutions that will help to create environmentally sustainable and socially just societies. FOEI is assisted by a small secretariat (based in Amsterdam) which provides support for the network and its agreed major campaigns. The executive committee of elected representatives from national groups set policy and oversee the work of the secretariat. Friends of the Earth considers environmental issues in their social, political and human rights contexts. Their campaigns stretch beyond the traditional arena of the conservation movement and seek to address the economic and development aspects of sustainability.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is an international organization dedicated to natural resource conservation. The stated goal of the organization is to help the world find pragmatic solutions to the most pressing environment and development challenges. The group publishes a "Red List" compiling information from a network of conservation organizations to rate which species are most endangered. The first Director General of UNESCO, (Sir Julian Huxley), wishing to give UNESCO a more scientific base, sponsored a congress to establish a new environmental institution to help serve this purpose.

At that first congress (held at Fontainebleau, France), on 5 October 1948, 18 governments, 7 international organizations, and 107 national nature conservation organizations all agreed to form the institution and signed a "constitutive act" creating an International Union for the Protection of Nature.

From this beginning, the overriding strategy and policy of the institution has been to explore and promote mutually beneficial conservation arrangements that suit those promoting development as well as assisting people and nations to better preserve their flora and fauna.

The International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) is a professional association that works for the conservation and protection of cultural heritage places around the world. ICOMOS was founded in 1965 as a result of the Venice Charter of 1964 and offers advice to UNESCO on World Heritage Sites. ICOMOS currently has over 7500 members. With rare exceptions, each member must be qualified in the field of conservation, and a practicing landscape architect, architect, archaeologist, town planner, engineer, administrator of heritage, art historian or archivist. Its international headquarters are in Paris.

Greenpeace is a non-governmental environmental organization with offices in over 40 countries and with an international coordinating body in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Greenpeace states its goal is to "ensure the ability of the Earth to nurture life in all its diversity". Greenpeace uses direct action, lobbying and research to achieve its goals. The global organization does not accept funding from governments, corporations or political parties, relying on more than 2.8 million individual supporters and foundation grants.

Greenpeace evolved from the peace movement and anti-nuclear protests in Vancouver, British Columbia in the early 1970s. On September 15, 1971, the newly founded Don't Make a Wave Committee sent a chartered ship, Phyllis Cormack, renamed Greenpeace for the protest, from Vancouver to oppose United States testing of nuclear devices in Amchitka, Alaska. The Don't Make a Wave Committee subsequently adopted the name Greenpeace.

Today Greenpeace focuses on world wide issues such as global warming, deforestation, overfishing, commercial whaling and nuclear power. Greenpeace is known for its direct actions[ and has been described as the most visible environmental organization in the world. Campaigns of Greenpeace have raised environmental issues to public knowledge and influenced both the private and the public sector but Greenpeace has also been a source of controversy. Its motives and methods have received criticism and the organization's direct actions have sparked legal actions against Greenpeace activists.

Greenpeace consists of Greenpeace International (officially Stichting Greenpeace Council) based in Amsterdam, Netherlands, and 28 regional offices operating in 45 countries.

The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) is an international non-governmental organization working on issues regarding the conservation, research and restoration of the environment, formerly named the World Wildlife Fund, which remains its official name in the United States and Canada. It is the world's largest independent conservation organization with over 5 million supporters worldwide, working in more than 90 countries, supporting around 1300 conservation and environmental projects around the world. It is a charity, with approximately 60% of its funding coming from voluntary donations by private individuals. 45% of the fund's income comes from the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands.

The group says its mission is "to halt and reverse the destruction of our environment". Currently, much of its work focuses on the conservation of three biomes that contain most of the world's biodiversity: forests, freshwater ecosystems, and oceans and coasts. Among other issues, it is also concerned with endangered species, pollution and climate change.

Green Russia (Зеленая Россия) is a coalition of 18 green political organizations in Russia. However, it is not the most prominent green party.

History

Green Russia was formed in 1995 as an alliance of the Russian Green Party, the Public Ecological Foundations Union, the All-Russian Environment Protection Society, the Ecological Academy, the Ecological Assembly of Women and the Federation of Independent Trade Unions, and many others.

The Green Party of Russia has more than a 10 year long history.

First it emerged as “Kedr” constructive ecological movement of Russia in 1992 when a group of scientists and ecologists decided to combine their efforts to protect environment and human beings from negative aspects of civilization. Soon the movement got wide support from the population in many regions of Russia and became a national political stream.

Today the Green Party of Russia has its branches in 58 regions of the country and numbers more than 12 thousand members.

Major aims and goals of the party are clear to any Russian citizen:

-to lay the legislative basis for environmental protection in Russia;

-to provide decent conditions of living for all Russian peoples, to establish advanced health system and social security;

-to ensure ecological studies and education;

-to start implementing recently adopted Ecological Doctrine of Russia in all its aspects;

-to protect animals, birds, rare species from extinction;

-to introduce energy saving and other high technologies in industry and agriculture;

-to organize proper cooperation between state institutions and public organizations in ecological projects, public health and security.