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1000 results for “Chispa”
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Painting on paper, 20 x 30 cm: Ambiguous impulses for your mental cinema!
#kunst #analogueArt #painting #mentalCinema #contemporaryArt #rubberStamp #reliefPrinting #acrylicColours #climateActionNow #saveBioDiversity #systemChange #endFossilFuels #makeArtNotWar #NoRacism #noAFD #NoFascism #tightRopeWalking #artist #acrobat #topper #balancing #equilibrium #umbrella #monkey #chimpanzee #skateBoard #skater #littleBirds #flyingBirds #kolibris #freedom -
Painting on paper, 20 x 30 cm: Ambiguous impulses for your mental cinema!
#kunst #analogueArt #painting #mentalCinema #contemporaryArt #rubberStamp #reliefPrinting #acrylicColours #climateActionNow #saveBioDiversity #systemChange #endFossilFuels #makeArtNotWar #NoRacism #noAFD #NoFascism #tightRopeWalking #artist #acrobat #topper #balancing #equilibrium #umbrella #monkey #chimpanzee #skateBoard #skater #littleBirds #flyingBirds #kolibris #freedom -
Painting on paper, 20 x 30 cm: Ambiguous impulses for your mental cinema!
#kunst #analogueArt #painting #mentalCinema #contemporaryArt #rubberStamp #reliefPrinting #acrylicColours #climateActionNow #saveBioDiversity #systemChange #endFossilFuels #makeArtNotWar #NoRacism #noAFD #NoFascism #tightRopeWalking #artist #acrobat #topper #balancing #equilibrium #umbrella #monkey #chimpanzee #skateBoard #skater #littleBirds #flyingBirds #kolibris #freedom -
Painting on paper, 20 x 30 cm: Ambiguous impulses for your mental cinema!
#kunst #analogueArt #painting #mentalCinema #contemporaryArt #rubberStamp #reliefPrinting #acrylicColours #climateActionNow #saveBioDiversity #systemChange #endFossilFuels #makeArtNotWar #NoRacism #noAFD #NoFascism #tightRopeWalking #artist #acrobat #topper #balancing #equilibrium #umbrella #monkey #chimpanzee #skateBoard #skater #littleBirds #flyingBirds #kolibris #freedom -
🩸 Die KI-Lieblinge werden gerade abgeschlachtet
$MU fiel um fast 5 %, und $SNDK brach um über 8 % ein. 📉
Die Story hat sich gedreht —
von „KI-Wachstum“ hin zu Rezessionsängsten.
Wenn ehemalige Marktführer plötzlich im Zentrum des Abverkaufs stehen,
weiß man, dass große Investoren um jeden Preis aussteigen. 💸Selbst $NVDA konnte sich dem makroökonomischen Sturm nicht entziehen. 💾🌪️
#Nvidia #Micron #Halbleiter #KI #Aktienmarkt #Trading #Rezession #ChipAktien
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Catrina’s Caravan : Catharsis Available January 1
#horror – #horrorcomics – #comicbooks – #CatrinasCaravan – @ChispaComics – #HectorRodriguez – #CynthiaPelayo – #VCastro – #DavidBowles – #ElianaFalcón – #GuillermoVi…
#ad #Catrina'sCaravan #Chema(Illustrator) #Comics #CynthiaPelayo(Author) #DavidBowles(Author) #ElianaFalcón(Illustrator) #GuillermoVillarreal(Illustrator) #HectorRodriguez(Author) #horror #Releases #V.Castro(Author)
https://horrornerdonline.com/2024/11/catrinas-caravan-catharsis-available-january-1/
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El movimiento #15M fue la chispa con la que pasamos de la indignación a la acción. Una explosión de democracia, participación, cuidados y feminismo 💜. Su huella está presente en múltiples colectivos y personas, que siguen trabajando día a día para conseguir una sociedad mejor.
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Painting on paper, 20 x 20 cm: Ambiguous impulses for your mental cinema!
#kunst #contemporaryArt #mentalCinema #analogArt #painting #rubberStamp #reliefPrinting #saveBioDiversity #climateActionNow #systemChange #endFossilFuels #makeArtNotWar #noAFD #NoRacism #NoFascism #fatMan #adiposity #obesity #businessMan #businessSuit #briefcase #blackHeart #screamingLoud #screamingHeads #screamingMen #despair #monkey #chimpanzee #poster #monkeywithposter -
https://www.europesays.com/ie/348602/ Chimpanzees astonished the world by learning sign language. Now only two are left. #asl #chimp #chimpanzee #Éire #IE #Ireland #JaneGoodall #KokoTheGorilla #loulis #NimChimpsky #RogerFouts #Science #SignLanguage #TalkingAnimals #tatu #washoe #Wildlife
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Research: Small room for compromise between oil palm cultivation and primate conservation in Africa
Research by the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission found that although oil palm cultivation represents an important source of income for many tropical countries, its future expansion is a primary threat to tropical forests and biodiversity.
#Research: Along with the dramatic effects of #palmoil cultivation on #biodiversity in #Asia, reconciling a large-scale #oilpalm growth in #Africa with #primate #conservation will be a great challenge #Boycottpalmoil 🌴⛔️#Boycott4Wildlife @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2022/02/03/research-small-room-for-compromise-between-oil-palm-cultivation-and-primate-conservation-in-africa/
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterIn this context, and especially in regions where industrial palm oil production is still emerging, identifying “areas of compromise,” that is, areas with high productivity and low biodiversity importance, could be a unique opportunity to reconcile conservation and economic growth. The team applied this approach to Africa, by combining data on oil palm suitability with primate distribution, diversity, and vulnerability.
“We found that such areas of compromise are very rare throughout the continent (0.13 Mha), and that large-scale expansion of oil palm cultivation in Africa will have unavoidable, negative effects on primates.”
Small room for compromise between oil palm cultivation and primate conservation in Africa (2018) Giovanni Strona, Simon D. Stringer, Ghislain Vieilledent, et. al. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Aug 2018, 115 (35) 8811-8816; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1804775115
https://twitter.com/Cleve_Hicks/status/1484118025125175296?s=20
“Despite growing awareness about its detrimental effects on tropical biodiversity, land conversion to palm oil continues to increase rapidly as a consequence of global demand, profitability, and the income opportunity it offers to producing countries.”
Small room for compromise between oil palm cultivation and primate conservation in Africa (2018) Giovanni Strona, Simon D. Stringer, Ghislain Vieilledent, et. al. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Aug 2018, 115 (35) 8811-8816; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1804775115
Although most industrial oil palm plantations are located in Southeast Asia, it is argued that much of their future expansion will occur in Africa. The team assessed how this could affect the continent’s primates by combining information on oil palm suitability and current land use with primate distribution, diversity, and vulnerability.
They also quantified the potential impact of large-scale oil palm cultivation on primates in terms of range loss under different expansion scenarios taking into account future demand, oil palm suitability, human accessibility, carbon stock, and primate vulnerability.
Mountain Gorilla mum and babyThey found a high overlap between areas of high oil palm suitability and areas of high conservation priority for primates. Overall, we found only a few small areas where oil palm could be cultivated in Africa with a low impact on primates (3.3 Mha, including all areas suitable for oil palm).
“These results warn that, consistent with the dramatic effects of palm oil cultivation on biodiversity in Southeast Asia, reconciling a large-scale development of oil palm in Africa with primate conservation will be a great challenge.”
Small room for compromise between oil palm cultivation and primate conservation in Africa (2018) Giovanni Strona, Simon D. Stringer, Ghislain Vieilledent, et. al. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Aug 2018, 115 (35) 8811-8816; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1804775115
Small room for compromise between oil palm cultivation and primate conservation in Africa (2018) Giovanni Strona, Simon D. Stringer, Ghislain Vieilledent, et. al. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Aug 2018, 115 (35) 8811-8816; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1804775115
Primatologist Dr Cleve Hicks warns about how palm oil is poised destroy primate populations in Africa and why he believes the #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife is the answer
Dr Cleve Hicks – Primatologist on palm oil and chimpanzee culturesPrimatologist Cleve Hicks on Chimpanzee cultures, Palm Oil deforestation
Dr Hicks speaks with Palm Oil Detectives about his chimpanzee research, veganism, deforestation, palm oil and what consumers can do to help the endangered animals of Africa.
Boycott the brands causing deforestation for palm oil, soy and meat by joining the #Boycott4Wildlife
Join the #Boycott4Wildlife#Africa #Asia #biodiversity #bonobo #Boycott4wildlife #BoycottPalmOil #BoycottpalmoilTweet #ChimpanzeePanTroglodytes #conservation #deforestation #EasternGorillaGorillaBeringei #humanWildlifeConflict #Mammal #monkey #MountainGorilla #oilpalm #PalmOil #palmOilDeforestation #palmoil #Primate #primates #research #WesternGorillaGorillaGorilla
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Pueblos originarios de #México y #Canadá denuncián a la canadiense TC ENERGY por ignorar el derecho de consulta. 👉 https://avispa.org/?p=117625 🐝
#trenmayaavanza #corredorinteroceánico #AMLOLujoDePresidente #ClaudiaSheinbaum #mexico #Veracruz #oaxacamexico #Istmo #Tabasco #Yuacatán #chiapasmexico #Campeche
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Saw Better Man (the Robbie Williams biopic) at Cinema Nova today with @NarrelleMHarris. What a great movie, lots of excellent cinematography and the seemingly strange idea of depicting Williams as a chimpanzee works really well. Recommended.
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📌Comunidades protestan contra #palmaaceitera en la #SelvadeChiapas
Las #procesadorasdepalma aceitera provocan contaminación y graves afectaciones a la salud de las comunidades fronterizas de #Chiapas
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Chimpanzees once helped African rainforests recover from a major collapse
Most people probably think that the rainforest of central and west Africa, the second largest in the world, has been around for millions of years. However recent research suggests that it is mostly just 2,000 or so years old. The forest reached roughly its modern state following five centuries of regeneration after it was massively fragmented when the dry season suddenly became longer some 2,500 years ago. Help #chimpanzees to survive and #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife every time you shop
Interesting fact: Seed dispersers like #chimpanzees in the #Congo kicked off rainforest growth only 2000 years ago 🦍🙉🩷 Now they face #extinction from #mining WE SAY NO to #mining in #DRC! #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2022/07/03/chimpanzees-once-helped-african-rainforests-recover-from-a-major-collapse/
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterWeird fact: DRC #Congo #rainforests are not ancient. Just 2000 years ago #chimpanzees and other seed dispersers led to rainforest growth. Now – we MUST protect them from #mining and #palmoil! #Boycottpalmoil 🌴🩸🔥💀❌ #Boycott4Wildlife @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2022/07/03/chimpanzees-once-helped-african-rainforests-recover-from-a-major-collapse/
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterThis process was not linked to humans. The forest recovery was instead made possible by seed dispersers including chimpanzees, which helped spread the slower-growing rainforest tree species. However, dispersers such as chimpanzees are now threatened by deforestation and hunting, often for bushmeat. When combined with climate change, the resilience of the rainforests seems less guaranteed for the future.
I began thinking about natural processes in African forests back in 1993, when I was with my wife-to-be trying to follow wild chimpanzees next to Jane Goodall’s famous group at Gombe, in Tanzania. We were inspired by one of the directors of research at Gombe, Anthony Collins, who suggested that the chimpanzees might be influencing the composition of the forest for their own nutritional needs, by what fruits they pooed out and where. A kind of “proto gardening”.
And then unexpectedly I had to leave the chimpanzees after I succeeded in getting a small grant to study past vegetation change using fossilised pollen, but in the Andes.
A few years later, I found myself giving lectures at Cambridge on human impacts over the past 10,000 years, and suddenly “returning” not only to the tropical rainforests of Africa, but their history. At the time, scientists thought humans were largely responsible for the collapse of the forests from 3,000 years ago.
The first few scientific papers I read used the abundance of pollen from the oil palm tree, preserved in the dated layers of lake muds, as an indicator of human activity. The oil palm is the same species often planted on a massive industrial scale in the tropics today, and since it’s always been an important source of nutrition for people in the region, scientists had assumed it indicated the presence of humans.
Shortly after, I began working in a pollen laboratory in Montpellier in southern France which had a long-term focus on African forest history. There, my simplified view of fossilised oil palm pollen equalling the presence of humans was totally overturned.
Rainforest history records were being amassed that indicated the near-decimation of rainforests some 2,500 years ago in the Congo Basin and across a huge expanse stretching from modern-day Senegal to Rwanda. As there was only very limited archaeological evidence of thinly dispersed human populations, humans could not have been responsible for the almost synchronous destruction on such a huge scale.
Africa hosts the world’s second largest rainforest
Tropical rainforests (dark green) still cover much of central and west Africa. Vzb83 / wiki, CC BY-SASo what did cause these rainforests to collapse? It turns out the answer was not humans, but climate change.
In a paper recently published in the journal Global Planetary Change, my colleagues Pierre Giresse, Jean Maley and I use the many vegetation records available across central and west Africa to show that approximately 2,500 years ago, the length of the dry season increased. Rainforests became highly fragmented, and savanna vegetation – grasses, scattered shrubs and trees – moved in.
In the centuries that followed, the forests regenerated spontaneously, including with species such as the oil palm. The oil palm demands a lot of light and so thrives in open areas or in the gaps created in forests when the canopy opens up rather than in the dense centre. Thus it often acts as a “pioneer species” allowing the forest to regrow.
But the oil palm’s large seeds are too heavy to be blown in the wind. They therefore need to be dispersed in the poo of animals such as chimpanzees which are able to swallow the large seeds and for whom the bright orange flesh can be an important part of the diet. And this is how chimps and other seed-dispersers played a crucial role in regenerating Africa’s rainforests.
Oil palm fruit swallowed and deposited in faeces by chimpanzee at Gombe National Park. D Mwacha A Collins / Jane Goodall Institute, Author providedSeed dispersers under threat
When we began this research, we could not see how relevant it would become during the current pandemic. Now climate change, deforestation and hunting are all heavily impacting those same forests. The bushmeat market is contributing to removing keystone species such as chimpanzees. Without animals to move seeds around – especially the largest and heaviest seeds – the natural composition and regeneration of forests is threatened.
At the turn of the 20th century there were around 1 million chimpanzees, but today only an estimated 172,000-300,000 remain in the wild. Chimps and other seed-dispersing species provide a valuable service and must be better protected in order to protect the forests themselves, and prevent further unforeseen impacts.
Cusano, an alpha male in Gombe, Tanzania, was among those who died in the 1996 respiratory outbreak. Alex Chepstow-Lusty, Author providedFor example, the transmission of diseases to humans has also been linked to the bushmeat trade. And transmission is not necessarily one way. In June 1996, three years after my wife and I left the chimps at Mitumba in Gombe National Park, possibly up to half the group died within a few days of a respiratory disease outbreak that was likely transmitted to them by humans.
Perhaps there is a lot more resilience in these tropical forest ecosystems than we can predict. But without chimpanzees and other animals as dispersers, the emptier forests that may eventually grow back would be a sad replacement. Maybe we need to consider the true value of chimp poo, and those that produce it.
Alex Chepstow-Lusty, Associate Researcher, Quaternary Palaeoenvironments Group, University of Cambridge
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Boycott the brands causing deforestation for palm oil, soy and meat by joining the #Boycott4Wildlife
Join the #Boycott4Wildlife#Africa #AfricanNews #amazingAnimals #animalExtinction #Ape #apes #Boycott4wildlife #Boycott4WildlifeTweet #BoycottPalmOil #ChimpanzeePanTroglodytes #Chimpanzees #Congo #CriticallyEndangeredSpecies #DRC #extinction #intelligence #Mammal #mining #Notomining #palmoil #Primate #primates #primatology #rainforests #SeedDispersers
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Spiny-headed Tree Frog Triprion spinosus
Spiny-headed Tree Frog Triprion spinosus
Red List Status: Near Threatened
Extant (resident): Costa Rica (Costa Rica (mainland)); Honduras (Honduras (mainland)); Mexico (Chiapas, Oaxaca, Puebla, Veracruz, Tabasco); Panama
Possibly Extant (resident): Nicaragua
The Spiny-headed Tree Frog Triprion spinosus is a stunning small frog species hanging on to survival in fragmented patches of forest in #CostaRica, #Panama, #Honduras, #Mexico. They have many common names including the spiny-headed tree frog, spiny-headed tree #frog, spinyhead treefrog, coronated treefrog, and the crowned hyla. These elusive an shy, arboreal frogs are rarely seen and they live out their lives quietly in bromeliads and other tropical plants. However palm oil, timber, soy and meat deforestation along with a fungal disease are grave threats. Help them to survive and be #Vegan #BoycottPalmOil #Boycott4Wildlife
Tiny and cute #frogs in #Panama 🇵🇦 #Honduras 🇭🇳 Spiny-headed Tree Frogs 🐸💚 are Near Threatened from #palmoil and #soy #deforestation. Help them and use your wallet as a weapon #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife 🌴🪔🔥🧐🙊⛔️ @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2023/04/02/spiny-headed-tree-frog-triprion-spinosus/
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterSpiny-headed Tree #Frogs 🐸💚💌 of #Mexico 🇲🇽 #CostaRica 🇨🇷 are Near Threatened by #PalmOil #deforestation. Males make a “boop…boop” sound when calling females. Fight for their survival, be #Vegan and #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2023/04/02/spiny-headed-tree-frog-triprion-spinosus/
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterAppearance & Behaviour
They lack vocal sacs or slits however their loud “boop-boop-boop” call can be heard from up to 100 meters away.
A shy, arboreal species, Spiny-headed Tree Frogs are rarely seen and they live out their lives quietly in bromeliads and other tropical plants. They can be found in the subtropical forests of mountain ranges. They prefer intact forest and secondary growth forest. They have on occasion been observed living in coffee plantations.
They are light brown with darker brown markings and a black belly. It takes them between 60 to 136 days to morph from tadpole to mature frog depending on the number of surviving tadpoles and the competition for food. Their life span is 10 to 15 years.
Threats
As breeding takes place in the watery hollows of plants and trees, Spiny-headed Tree Frogs face enormous threat from deforestation.
This beautiful tiny frog faces several anthropogenic threats
- Chytridiomycosis: An infectious fungal disease that is capable of causing sporadic deaths in some amphibian populations and 100% mortality in others.
- Deforestation: for timber, soy and palm oil throughout their region.
- Deforestation: for livestock grazing across their range.
A captive “insurance population” is bred and maintained by the El Valle Amphibian Conservation Center, Panama, Atlanta Botanical Garden, United States, and a few AZA zoos.
Spiny-headed Tree Frog Triprion spinosus – #Boycott4WildlifeSpiny-headed Tree Frog Triprion spinosus – ThreatsHabitat & geographic range
Human-related threats constrict their ecological range and there are now fragmented populations in Costa Rica, Honduras, Panama and Mexico. Like many frogs they are nocturnal and most active at night time.
Diet
They prefer to eat insects and small arthropods and worms. Tadpoles will eat unfertilised eggs that are deposited by their mothers.
Mating and breeding
Males have a distinctive “boop..boop…boop” sound and call to females from within the water-filled hollows and crevices of bromeliad rosettes and bamboo internodes.
Females approach the calling males and clasp them immediately and together pair dive into the water. The female will lay between 50 to 300 eggs and then the male fertilises them. Only one in 25 eggs will hatch, which takes around a week to occur.
The watery catchment where female lays her eggs is safe sanctuary away from potential predators. Developing tadpoles will eat unfertilised eggs laid by the mother. The mother will return to visit egg laying locations to lay more unfertilised eggs for the tadpoles to feed on. Tadpoles will prompt their mother to do this by nibbling on her belly.
Support Spiny-headed Tree Frog by going vegan and boycotting palm oil in the supermarket, it’s the #Boycott4Wildlife
Spiny-headed Tree Frog Triprion spinosus – #Boycott4WildlifeSupport the conservation of this species
This animal has no protections in place. Read about other forgotten species here. Create art to support this forgotten animal or raise awareness about them by sharing this post and using the #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife hashtags on social media. Also you can boycott palm oil in the supermarket.
Further Information
IUCN SSC Amphibian Specialist Group. 2020. Triprion spinosus. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2020: e.T55296A3028482. https://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2020-3.RLTS.T55296A3028482.en. Accessed on 31 October 2022.
Spiny-headed Tree Frog Triprion spinosus on Wikipedia
Spiny-headed Tree Frog Triprion spinosus on Animalia.bio
Spiny-headed Tree Frog Triprion spinosus – ThreatsHow can I help the #Boycott4Wildlife?
Take Action in Five Ways
1. Join the #Boycott4Wildlife on social media and subscribe to stay in the loop: Share posts from this website to your own network on Twitter, Mastadon, Instagram, Facebook and Youtube using the hashtags #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife.
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Join 1,392 other subscribers2. Contribute stories: Academics, conservationists, scientists, indigenous rights advocates and animal rights advocates working to expose the corruption of the palm oil industry or to save animals can contribute stories to the website.
Mel Lumby: Dedicated Devotee to Borneo’s Living Beings
Anthropologist and Author Dr Sophie Chao
Health Physician Dr Evan Allen
The World’s Most Loved Cup: A Social, Ethical & Environmental History of Coffee by Aviary Doert
How do we stop the world’s ecosystems from going into a death spiral? A #SteadyState Economy
3. Supermarket sleuthing: Next time you’re in the supermarket, take photos of products containing palm oil. Share these to social media along with the hashtags to call out the greenwashing and ecocide of the brands who use palm oil. You can also take photos of palm oil free products and congratulate brands when they go palm oil free.
https://twitter.com/CuriousApe4/status/1526136783557529600?s=20
https://twitter.com/PhillDixon1/status/1749010345555788144?s=20
https://twitter.com/mugabe139/status/1678027567977078784?s=20
4. Take to the streets: Get in touch with Palm Oil Detectives to find out more.
5. Donate: Make a one-off or monthly donation to Palm Oil Detectives as a way of saying thank you and to help pay for ongoing running costs of the website and social media campaigns. Donate here
Pledge your support#Amphibian #amphibians #animals #Boycott4wildlife #BoycottPalmOil #CostaRica #CostaRica #deforestation #ForgottenAnimals #Frog #Frogs #herpetology #Honduras #Mexico #NearThreatenedSpecies #PalmOil #palmOilDeforestation #palmoil #Panama #SouthAmericaSpeciesEndangeredByPalmOilDeforestation #soy #SpinyHeadedTreeFrogTriprionSpinosus #vegan #VulnerableSpecies
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Research: Certifying Palm Oil as “Sustainable” Is No Panacea
Newly published research led by the University of Michigan reveals that despite the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) certification system being influential, its effectiveness in reducing deforestation has so far for decades, been an illusion. The study used remote sensing to analyse deforestation caused by oil palm plantations in Guatemala, a major palm oil supplier to global markets.
The results of the paper show that these plantations were responsible for 28% of the region’s deforestation, and RSPO-certified plantations did not significantly reduce deforestation. The study links this deforestation to the supply chains of major brands: Pepsico, Mondelēz International, and Grupo Bimbo, who rely on RSPO-certified palm oil supplies.
As a consumer you can make a difference every time you shop, use your wallet as a weapon and #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife
@UMich #research finds “sustainable” #RSPO #palmoil sourced in #Guatemala 🇬🇹 NOT sustainable, yet it’s sold this way to consumers, despite links to #humanrights abuses 🧺🩸 #deforestation. Fight back! #Boycottpalmoil 🌴⛔️ #Boycottpalmoil @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2023/07/26/palm-oil-deforestation-in-guatemala-certifying-products-as-sustainable-is-no-panacea-university-of-michigan/
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterSo-called “sustainable” #palmoil certified by #RSPO originating in #Guatemala 🇬🇹 is strongly connected to #deforestation and #ecocide finds @UMich study. Help #rainforests and fight #extinction #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife 🌴🪔🔥☠️🚫 @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2023/07/26/palm-oil-deforestation-in-guatemala-certifying-products-as-sustainable-is-no-panacea-university-of-michigan/
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterThis media release entitled “Palm oil plantations and deforestation in Guatemala: Certifying products as ‘sustainable’ is no panacea” was issued by The University of Michigan on July 20, 2023. The study on which it is based is available to read here
Cheap, versatile and easy to grow, palm oil is the world’s most consumed vegetable oil and is found in roughly half of all packaged supermarket products, from bread and margarine to shampoo and toothpaste.
But producing palm oil has caused deforestation and biodiversity loss across Southeast Asia and elsewhere, including Central America. Efforts to curtail the damage have largely focused on voluntary environmental certification programs that label qualifying palm-oil sources as “sustainable.”
However, those certification programs have been criticised by environmental groups as greenwashing tools that enable multinational corporations to claim fully “sustainable” palm oil, while continuing to sell products that fall far short of the deforestation-free goal.
Findings from a new University of Michigan-led study, published online in the Journal of Environmental Management, support some of the critics’ claims—and go much further.
“Environmental certification does not effectively mitigate deforestation risk, and firms cannot rely on—or be allowed to rely on—certification to achieve deforestation-free supply chains,”
Study senior author Joshua Newell, a geographer and a professor at the School for Environment and Sustainability.
Key findings
- RSPO-certified plantations, comprising 63% of the total cultivated area assessed, did not produce a statistically significant reduction in deforestation and appear to be ineffective at reducing encroachment into ecologically sensitive areas in Guatemala.
- Despite their RSPO membership and pledges to source palm oil from certified plantations, several multinational corporations predominantly sourced palm oil from noncertified mills in Guatemala.
- Even RSPO-certified palm oil plantations and mills are contributing to deforestation in Guatemala.
The U-M case study focuses on Guatemala, which is projected to become the world’s third-largest palm-oil producer by 2030 after Indonesia and Malaysia, and an influential environmental certification system called the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil, or RSPO.
“Our results indicate the supply chains of transnational conglomerates drove deforestation and ecological encroachment in Guatemala to support U.S. palm oil consumption,” said study lead author Calli VanderWilde, a doctoral student at the U-M School for Environment and Sustainability who did the work for her dissertation.
“In addition, we found no evidence to suggest that RSPO certification effectively protects against deforestation or ecological encroachment. Given that oil palm expansion is predicted to increase significantly in the coming years, this pattern is likely to continue without changes to governance, both institutionally and to supply chains.”
The U-M-led research team tracked palm oil sourced from former forestland, and other ecologically critical areas in Guatemala, by several large transnational conglomerates that sell food products made from the oil in the United States. The corporations are members of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil and have RSPO commitments and sourcing policies in place to ensure the sustainability of their palm oil supplies.
The study used satellite imagery and machine learning to quantify deforestation attributable to palm oil plantation expansion in Guatemala over a decade, 2009-2019. In addition, the researchers used shipment records and other data sources to reconstruct corporate supply chains and to link transnational conglomerates to palm oil-driven deforestation.
The study found that:
- Guatemalan palm oil plantations expanded an estimated 215,785 acres during the study period, with 28% of the new cropland replacing forests.
- As of 2019, more than 60% of the palm oil plantations in the study area were in Key Biodiversity Areas. KBAs are sites that contribute significantly to the global persistence of biodiversity in terrestrial, freshwater and marine ecosystems.
- RSPO-certified plantations, comprising 63% of the total cultivated area assessed, did not produce a statistically significant reduction in deforestation and appear to be ineffective at reducing encroachment into ecologically sensitive areas in Guatemala.
- Despite their RSPO membership and pledges to source palm oil from certified plantations, several multinational corporations predominantly sourced palm oil from noncertified mills in Guatemala.
- Even RSPO-certified palm oil plantations and mills are contributing to deforestation in Guatemala.
Guatemala is divided into 22 administrative districts called departamentos. The study focused on a 20,850-square-mile region in the three departamentos (Alta Verapaz, Izabal and the lower half of Petén) responsible for 75% of Guatemala’s palm oil production.
The researchers used high-resolution satellite imagery to assess land-use change between 2009 and 2019, and a machine learning algorithm enabled them to distinguish between forests and monoculture plantations.
They found that oil palm expansion is encroaching on, and causing deforestation in, seven Key Biodiversity Areas and 23 protected areas.
Among the areas impacted, the Key Biodiversity Areas with the largest palm extent include the Río La Pasión, Caribe de Guatemala and Sierra de las Minas Biosphere Reserve. The Río La Pasión is an especially rich area for endemic fish species, making it an important area for conservation.
Oil palm encroachment on the Sierra de las Minas Biosphere Reserve threatens animals such as the quetzal, Guatemala’s national bird. Known as the jewel of Guatemala, the reserve is an irreplaceable gene bank for tropical reforestation and agroforestry and supports the livelihoods of more than 400,000 people.
The researchers identified 119 RSPO-certified plantations and 82 non-RSPO plantations. During the study period, 9% of the RSPO-certified plantation expansion resulted in, or contributed to, forest loss, compared to 25% of the noncertified plantation expansion.
“Environmental certification does not effectively mitigate deforestation risk, and firms cannot rely on—or be allowed to rely on—certification to achieve deforestation-free supply chains,”
Study senior author Joshua Newell, a geographer and a professor at the School for Environment and Sustainability.
By reconstructing the supply chains of the three conglomerates, the researchers revealed connections to palm oil-driven deforestation. Of the 60,810 acres of palm oil-driven deforestation across the study period, more than 99% was traced to plantations supplying palm and palm-kernel oil to mills used by two multinational conglomerates. Seventy-two percent of the palm and palm-kernel oil was linked to the subset of plantations supplying a third corporation’s mills.
- Greenwashing ecocide – Agropalma & Orangutan Land Trust
- 8. Certification provides opportunities for greenwashing and increases vested interests in and corporate power over natural resources.
- 100 NGOS sign a public statement denouncing the RSPO and “sustainable” palm oil as a fake solution that does not stop deforestation
- Spoiled Fruit: landgrabbing, violence and slavery for “sustainable” palm oil
- 10 Tactics of Sustainable Palm Oil Greenwashing – Summary
“Palm oil has attracted attention for its ties to widespread forest and biodiversity loss across Southeast Asia. However, the literature has paid minimal attention to newer spaces of production and issues of corporate supply-chain traceability,” VanderWilde said.
“As it stands, environmental certification makes unjustified claims of ‘sustainability’ and fails to serve as a reliable tool for fulfilling emerging zero-deforestation requirements.”
The authors recommend reforms to RSPO policies and practices, robust corporate tracking of supply chains, and the strengthening of forest governance in Guatemala.
In addition to VanderWilde and Newell, authors of the study are Dimitrios Gounaridis of the U-M School for Environment and Sustainability and Benjamin Goldstein of McGill University. Funding for the study was provided by U-M’s Rackham Predoctoral Fellowship Program.
Calli P. VanderWilde, Joshua P. Newell, Dimitrios Gounaridis, Benjamin P. Goldstein,
Deforestation, certification, and transnational palm oil supply chains: Linking Guatemala to global consumer markets, Journal of Environmental Management,
Volume 344, 2023. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2023.118505Deforestation, certification, and transnational palm oil supply chains: Linking Guatemala to global consumer markets
Abstract
Although causal links between tropical deforestation and palm oil are well established, linking this land use change to where the palm oil is actually consumed remains a distinct challenge and research gap. Supply chains are notoriously difficult to track back to their origin (i.e., the ‘first-mile’). This poses a conundrum for corporations and governments alike as they commit to deforestation-free sourcing and turn to instruments like certification to increase supply chain transparency and sustainability. The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) offers the most influential certification system in the sector, but whether it actually reduces deforestation is still unclear. This study used remote sensing and spatial analysis to assess the deforestation (2009–2019) caused by oil palm plantation expansion in Guatemala, a major palm oil source for international consumer markets. Our results reveal that plantations are responsible for 28% of deforestation in the region and that more than 60% of these plantations encroach on Key Biodiversity Areas. RSPO-certified plantations, comprising 63% of the total cultivated area assessed, did not produce a statistically significant reduction in deforestation. Using trade statistics, the study linked this deforestation to the palm oil supply chains of three transnational conglomerates – Pepsico, Mondelēz International, and Grupo Bimbo – all of whom rely on RSPO-certified supplies. Addressing this deforestation and supply chain sustainability challenge hinges on three measures: 1) reform of RSPO policies and practices; 2) robust corporate tracking of supply chains; and 3) strengthening forest governance in Guatemala. This study offers a replicable methodology for a wide-range of investigations that seek to understand the transnational linkages between environmental change (e.g. deforestation) and consumption.
This media release entitled “Palm oil plantations and deforestation in Guatemala: Certifying products as ‘sustainable’ is no panacea” was issued by The University of Michigan on July 20, 2023. The study on which it is based is available to read here
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Read more about deforestation and greenwashing associated with “sustainable” palm oil
Family Ties Expose Deforestation and Rights Violations in Indonesian Palm Oil
An explosive report by the Environment Investigation Agency (EIA) details how Indonesia’s Fangiono family, through a wide corporate web, is linked to ongoing #deforestation, #corruption, and #indigenousrights abuses for #palmoil. Calls mount for…
Corporate Control of Food Harms Us All
Around 800 million people in our world go hungry each day. Yet around the globe we have enough food to go around. So why the discrepancy? Market concentration and corporate monopoly of our…
MSC and RSPO Absolutely Untrustworthy, Greenpeace Report
Greenpeace report reveals severe failures of ecolabel RSPO certifying palm oil and FSC certifying seafood. Consumers are being greenwashed. Boycott palm oil!
Guaranteeing Ecocide: The Green Lie of Palm Oil Certification
For decades, the palm oil industry, backed by the RSPO, has misled consumers with the false promise of “sustainable” palm oil. Behind this green façade lies a brutal reality of deforestation, human rights…
How Brands Exploit “Green” Certification
Brands and businesses may be tempted to exploit “green” certifications to garner a larger market share at the expense of integrity.
August 19th is #WorldOrangutanDay
Although #WorldOrangutanDay falls on the 19th of August, every day deserves to be World Orangutan Day! So here is an infographic that you can download, print and share however you please. All three…
Palm Oil Greenwashing Poised to Destroy Protected Biosphere in Chiapas, Mexico
Situated on Mexico’s lush and biodiverse Pacific coast is La Encrucijada Biosphere Reserve – One of Mexico’s most spectacular natural treasures. Now the government and palm oil businesses are trying to sieze vast…
PalmWatch: A Tool to Hold Palm Oil Greenwashers to Account
A groundbreaking open-source tool by the University of Chicago called PalmWatch, shines a light on the darkest parts of the palm oil industry.
PalmWatch is a free web-based tool that reveals links between…
Air Pollution from Palm Oil: A Human Rights Issue
Forest-fire haze from Indonesian palm oil deforestation is a crisis! Learn how toxic air pollution is a human rights issue affecting all of Southeast Asia
UK Pressuring Forests For Palm Oil and Beef
Urgent call to action! 🌍 #UK’s heavy use of #palmoil #soy & #beef fuels global #deforestation. Demand stricter regulations & transparency. Make every purchase count and #Boycottmeat #BoycottPalmOil #Boycott4Wildlife, learn more: https://wp.me/pcFhgU-78V
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Mel Lumby: Dedicated Devotee to Borneo’s Living Beings
Anthropologist and Author Dr Sophie Chao
Health Physician Dr Evan Allen
The World’s Most Loved Cup: A Social, Ethical & Environmental History of Coffee by Aviary Doert
How do we stop the world’s ecosystems from going into a death spiral? A #SteadyState Economy
3. Supermarket sleuthing: Next time you’re in the supermarket, take photos of products containing palm oil. Share these to social media along with the hashtags to call out the greenwashing and ecocide of the brands who use palm oil. You can also take photos of palm oil free products and congratulate brands when they go palm oil free.
https://twitter.com/CuriousApe4/status/1526136783557529600?s=20
https://twitter.com/PhillDixon1/status/1749010345555788144?s=20
https://twitter.com/mugabe139/status/1678027567977078784?s=20
4. Take to the streets: Get in touch with Palm Oil Detectives to find out more.
5. Donate: Make a one-off or monthly donation to Palm Oil Detectives as a way of saying thank you and to help pay for ongoing running costs of the website and social media campaigns. Donate here
Pledge your support#BoycottPalmOil #Boycott4wildlife #BoycottPalmOil #deforestation #ecocide #Environmental #EnvironmentalJustice #extinction #greenwashing #Guatamala #Guatemala #HumanRights #PalmOil #palmOilDeforestation #palmoil #rainforests #research #RSPO #RSPOGreenwashing
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Yucatán Black Howler Monkey Alouatta pigra
Yucatán Black Howler Monkey Alouatta pigra
Endangered
Belize; Guatemala; Mexico (Quintana Roo, Campeche, Chiapas, Tabasco, Yucatán)
Yucatán Black Howler Monkeys are best known for their overpowering howl which can be heard up to 3 miles away. Morning and evening howling sessions can go on for over an hour. They are the largest #monkey in Latin America and keep a watchful presence in densely forested primary and secondary forest, mangroves and other human disturbed landscapes.
Their range is being rapidly destroyed for palm oil and sugar cane deforestation and mining. They are also facing human persecution and hunting pressures. Yucatán Black Howler Monkeys have been classified as endangered since 2004. Help them every time you shop and #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife
Yucatán Black Howler #Monkeys 🐵🐒🩷 are endangered from #palmoil #deforestation in #Guatamala 🇬🇹#Mexico 🇲🇽 Their loud communal howling can be heard 5km away 🎶 Help them to survive when you #Boycottpalmoil 🌴🚫 #Boycott4Wildlife @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2021/03/22/yucatan-black-howler-monkey-alouatta-pigra/
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterThe Yucatán Black Howler #Monkey is endangered by #palmoil #deforestation and mining in #Guatamala, #Mexico. Their loud communal howling can be heard for up to 5km away. Don’t let the forests go silent! #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife https://palmoildetectives.com/2021/03/22/yucatan-black-howler-monkey-alouatta-pigra/ via @palmoildetect
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterYucatán Black Howler Monkeys prefer to live in a variety of forests and spend their days high up in the boughs of trees in evergreen and semi-evergreen forests, deciduous and semi-deciduous broad-leaved forests, mangroves, swamps eucalyptus plantations and agricultural plantations.
The main threats for black howler monkeys are accelerated deforestation rate across its distribution and the direct extraction of individuals for pet trade. In Guatemala a high rate of deforestation has been associated with the rapid expansion of the agriculture frontier due to megaprojects such as African palm oil and sugar cane, and the destruction of forest due to open mining (Foucart 2011).
IUCN red list
Behaviour
The howling of these monkeys is loud enough to be heard three miles away. A study in 2014 revealed just why Alouatta pigra and other howlers call out so loudly.
Our findings suggest that loud calls in black howler monkeys are multifunctional, but most frequently occur in the defense of major feeding sites. These calls also may function in the defense of infants and mates during encounters with extragroup males.
Van Belle, S., Estrada, A., & Garber, P. A. (2014). The function of loud calls in black howler monkeys (Alouatta pigra): Food, mate, or infant defense? American Journal of Primatology, 76(12), 1196–1206. https://doi.org/10.1002/ajp.22304
Support the conservation of this species
Further Information
Cortes-Ortíz, L., Rosales-Meda, M., Marsh, L.K. & Mittermeier, R.A. 2020. Alouatta pigra. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2020: e.T914A17926000. https://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2020-3.RLTS.T914A17926000.en. Downloaded on 05 March 2021.
Van Belle, S., Estrada, A., & Garber, P. A. (2014). The function of loud calls in black howler monkeys (Alouatta pigra): Food, mate, or infant defense? American Journal of Primatology, 76(12), 1196–1206. https://doi.org/10.1002/ajp.22304
How can I help the #Boycott4Wildlife?
Take Action in Five Ways
1. Join the #Boycott4Wildlife on social media and subscribe to stay in the loop: Share posts from this website to your own network on Twitter, Mastadon, Instagram, Facebook and Youtube using the hashtags #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife.
Enter your email address
Sign Up
Join 1,392 other subscribers2. Contribute stories: Academics, conservationists, scientists, indigenous rights advocates and animal rights advocates working to expose the corruption of the palm oil industry or to save animals can contribute stories to the website.
Mel Lumby: Dedicated Devotee to Borneo’s Living Beings
Anthropologist and Author Dr Sophie Chao
Health Physician Dr Evan Allen
The World’s Most Loved Cup: A Social, Ethical & Environmental History of Coffee by Aviary Doert
How do we stop the world’s ecosystems from going into a death spiral? A #SteadyState Economy
3. Supermarket sleuthing: Next time you’re in the supermarket, take photos of products containing palm oil. Share these to social media along with the hashtags to call out the greenwashing and ecocide of the brands who use palm oil. You can also take photos of palm oil free products and congratulate brands when they go palm oil free.
https://twitter.com/CuriousApe4/status/1526136783557529600?s=20
https://twitter.com/PhillDixon1/status/1749010345555788144?s=20
https://twitter.com/mugabe139/status/1678027567977078784?s=20
4. Take to the streets: Get in touch with Palm Oil Detectives to find out more.
5. Donate: Make a one-off or monthly donation to Palm Oil Detectives as a way of saying thank you and to help pay for ongoing running costs of the website and social media campaigns. Donate here
Pledge your support#Belize #Boycott4wildlife #BoycottPalmOil #deforestation #EndangeredSpecies #ForgottenAnimals #Guatamala #Mammal #Mexico #monkey #monkeys #palmoil #Primate #SouthAmericaSpeciesEndangeredByPalmOilDeforestation #sugar #sugarCane #sugarcane #YucatánBlackHowlerMonkeyAlouattaPigra
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Apes Enjoy Joking and Teasing Each Other
New research finds that it’s not only human babies who love to playfully tease each other. Researchers reasoned that since language is not required for this behaviour, similar kinds of playful teasing might be present in non-human animals such as chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas and orangutans. Now cognitive biologists and primatologists have documented playful teasing in four species of great apes. Like joking behaviour in humans, ape teasing is provocative, persistent, and includes elements of surprise and play. Because all four great ape species used playful teasing, it is likely that the prerequisites for humour evolved in the human lineage at least 13 million years ago.
#News: Great #apes tease and prank each other 🤡😛🦍🦧🐵🐒 just as humans do. Including body-slamming, hair-pulling and waving objects in front of each other’s faces – new #research study finds #sentience #primatology #primates #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife https://wp.me/pcFhgU-7gR
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterMedia release from Science Alert, February 13, 2024. Research: Laumer I.B., Winkler S, Rossano F, Cartmill EA. Spontaneous playful teasing in four great ape species. Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 2024 DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2023.2345
Joking is an important part of human interaction that draws on social intelligence, an ability to anticipate future actions, and an ability to recognize and appreciate the violation of others’ expectations. Teasing has much in common with joking, and playful teasing may be seen as a cognitive precursor to joking. The first forms of playful teasing in humans emerge even before babies say their first words, as early as eight months of age. The earliest forms of teasing are repetitive provocations often involving surprise. Infants tease their parents by playfully offering and withdrawing objects, violating social rules (so-called provocative non-compliance), and disrupting others’ activities.
In a study, scientists from the University of California Los Angeles, the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior, Indiana University, and the University of California San Diego (Isabelle Laumer, Sasha Winkler, Federico Rossano, and Erica Cartmill, respectively) report evidence of playful teasing in the four great ape species: orangutans, chimpanzees, bonobos and gorillas. “Great apes are excellent candidates for playful teasing, as they are closely related to us, engage in social play, show laughter and display relatively sophisticated understandings of others’ expectations,” says Isabelle Laumer, a post-doctoral researcher at the University of California Los Angeles and the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior.
The team analyzed spontaneous social interactions that appeared to be playful, mildly harassing, or provocative. During these interactions, the researchers observed the teaser’s actions, bodily movements, facial expressions, and how the targets of the teasing responded in turn. They also assessed the teaser’s intentionality by looking for evidence that the behavior was directed at a specific target, that it persisted or intensified, and that teasers waited for a response from the target.
Teasing to provoke a response
The researchers found that orangutans, chimpanzees, bonobos and gorillas all engaged in intentionally provocative behavior, frequently accompanied by characteristics of play. They identified 18 distinct teasing behaviors. Many of these behaviors appeared to be used to provoke a response, or at least to attract the target’s attention. “It was common for teasers to repeatedly wave or swing a body part or object in the middle of the target’s field of vision, hit or poke them, stare closely at their face, disrupt their movements, pull on their hair or perform other behaviors that were extremely difficult for the target to ignore,” explains UCLA and IU professor Erica Cartmill, senior author of the study.
https://youtu.be/7NyiBuEfdGI?si=PBS_Fy4CEVOW3lzI
Although playful teasing took many forms, the authors note that it differed from play in several ways. “Playful teasing in great apes is one-sided, very much coming from the teaser often throughout the entire interaction and rarely reciprocated,” explains Cartmill. “The animals also rarely use play signals like the primate ‘playface’, which is similar to what we would call a smile, or ‘hold’ gestures that signal their intent to play.”
Similarity with human behaviour
Playful teasing mainly occurred when apes were relaxed, and shared similarities with behaviours in humans. “Similar to teasing in children, ape playful teasing involves one-sided provocation, response waiting in which the teaser looks towards the target’s face directly after a teasing action, repetition, and elements of surprise,” Laumer explains.
The researchers noted that Jane Goodall and other field primatologists had mentioned similar behaviours happening in chimpanzees many years ago, but this new study was the first to systematically study playful teasing. “From an evolutionary perspective, the presence of playful teasing in all four great apes and its similarities to playful teasing and joking in human infants suggests that playful teasing and its cognitive prerequisites may have been present in our last common ancestor, at least 13 million years ago,” explains Laumer. “We hope that our study will inspire other researchers to study playful teasing in more species in order to better understand the evolution of this multi-faceted behaviour. We also hope that this study raises awareness of the similarities we share with our closest relatives and the importance of protecting these endangered animals.”
Media release from Science Alert, February 13, 2024. Research: Laumer I.B., Winkler S, Rossano F, Cartmill EA. Spontaneous playful teasing in four great ape species. Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 2024 DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2023.2345
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Learn about other animals endangered by palm oil and other agriculture
Global South America S.E. Asia India Africa West Papua & PNGTanimbar Eclectus Parrot Eclectus riedeli
Malayan Flying Fox Pteropus vampyrus
Mountain Cuscus Phalanger carmelitae
Brazilian three-banded armadillo Tolypeutes tricinctus
Sumatran Tiger Panthera tigris sondaica
Learn about “sustainable” palm oil greenwashing
Read more about RSPO greenwashing
Lying Fake labels Indigenous Land-grabbing Human rights abuses Deforestation Human health hazardsA 2019 World Health Organisation (WHO) report into the palm oil industry and RSPO finds extensive greenwashing of palm oil deforestation and the murder of endangered animals (i.e. biodiversity loss)
Read moreTake Action in Five Ways
1. Join the #Boycott4Wildlife on social media and subscribe to stay in the loop: Share posts from this website to your own network on Twitter, Mastadon, Instagram, Facebook and Youtube using the hashtags #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife.
Enter your email address
Sign Up
Join 1,395 other subscribers2. Contribute stories: Academics, conservationists, scientists, indigenous rights advocates and animal rights advocates working to expose the corruption of the palm oil industry or to save animals can contribute stories to the website.
Mel Lumby: Dedicated Devotee to Borneo’s Living Beings
Anthropologist and Author Dr Sophie Chao
Health Physician Dr Evan Allen
The World’s Most Loved Cup: A Social, Ethical & Environmental History of Coffee by Aviary Doert
How do we stop the world’s ecosystems from going into a death spiral? A #SteadyState Economy
3. Supermarket sleuthing: Next time you’re in the supermarket, take photos of products containing palm oil. Share these to social media along with the hashtags to call out the greenwashing and ecocide of the brands who use palm oil. You can also take photos of palm oil free products and congratulate brands when they go palm oil free.
https://twitter.com/CuriousApe4/status/1526136783557529600?s=20
https://twitter.com/PhillDixon1/status/1749010345555788144?s=20
https://twitter.com/mugabe139/status/1678027567977078784?s=20
4. Take to the streets: Get in touch with Palm Oil Detectives to find out more.
5. Donate: Make a one-off or monthly donation to Palm Oil Detectives as a way of saying thank you and to help pay for ongoing running costs of the website and social media campaigns. Donate here
Pledge your support#animalBehaviour #AnimalBiodiversityNews #animalCommunication #apes #BonoboPanPaniscus #BorneanOrangutanPongoPygmaeus #Boycott4wildlife #BoycottPalmOil #ChimpanzeePanTroglodytes #cognition #deforestation #EasternGorillaGorillaBeringei #greatApes #News #primates #primatology #research #sentience #SumatranOrangutanPongoAbelii #TapanuliOrangutanPongoTapanuliensis #WesternGorillaGorillaGorilla
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Primates are facing an impending extinction crisis – but we know very little about what will actually protect them
From lemurs to orangutans, tarsiers to gorillas, primates are captivating and sometimes unnervingly similar to us. So it’s not surprising that this group of more than 500 species receives a great deal of research and conservation attention.
60% of primates 🦍🦧🐒🐵 are threatened by #extinction 🙊🙈😿 Without direct action, the number of endangered #primates will grow and more species will disappear forever. #BoycottPalmOil #Boycott4Wildlife and be #vegan! @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2022/06/05/primates-are-facing-an-impending-extinction-crisis-but-we-know-very-little-about-what-will-actually-protect-them/
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterBut despite this effort, more than 60% of primate species are threatened with extinction mainly due to human activities, such as palm oil habitat loss, hunting, illegal trade, climate change and disease.
This extinction crisis makes effective conservation actions vital. There are many different possible conservation actions for primates, like anti-poaching patrols, relocating animals, publicising conservation issues and reintroducing primates into their habitats. But our new study shows that very little is known about what actually works to protect primates.
I’m part of a team of expert primatologists and conservationists from 21 countries who examined the evidence for 162 primate conservation actions to see if they actually work. We found there wasn’t any research published testing the effectiveness of more than half of the actions. This lack of evidence means it’s impossible to know whether these actions work or not.
Peruvian Yellow-tailed Woolly Monkey Lagothrix flavicaudaEven when studies on the effectiveness of a conservation action have been published, we found it was still difficult to draw valid conclusions about whether the action worked, due to problems with the design of the studies. This was even true for some actions that have been studied 20 to 30 times.
These huge gaps in knowledge are worrying, because without adequate information, researchers can’t learn from experience and can’t prioritise efforts and funding to best protect our primate relatives. Indeed, without access to evidence, conservationists might apply actions that are ineffective or even damaging to the animals they seek to protect.
Missing species
Crested Capuchin Sapajus robustusThe studies we reviewed only cover about 14% of the more than 500 primate species and just 12% of threatened primate species. And they mainly focus on the great apes and some of the larger monkey species.
Worryingly, some whole families are completely left out of the studies we reviewed. There are, for example, no studies of the tarsiers of south-east Asia in our database, or of the night monkeys of Central and South America. This is a problem, because we can’t assume that an action that works for one primate species will work for another species, due to each species’ unique behaviour and ecology.
We also found that South America and Asia are underrepresented in current conservation research on primates. This is particularly worrying because both are home to a high number of threatened primate species.
Why is this happening?
Faced with limited budgets and time, competing priorities and the urgency of many conservation scenarios, it’s easy to understand why conservationists might not focus on evaluating their actions.
The question, “Does this conservation action improve the long-term future of a population?” may seem simple, but it’s particularly difficult to answer for many primates. This is because many primate species live in dense tropical forest, with poor visibility and difficult access, making it extremely tough to count them. If researchers can’t get a good idea of how many primates there are, they can’t find out if the numbers are decreasing, stable, or increasing. And without seeing the animals themselves, we can’t assess their wellbeing.
Without action, the number of endangered primates will grow and more species will disappear forever. Pexels/Nitin SharmaConservationists also need to monitor primates for a long time to measure the effect of any action taken, because they live a long time and reproduce very slowly. In a short study, for example, it might be easy to confuse the long life of the last few individuals with a persistent population. It’s also important to be confident that any effects seen are related to the specific conservation action taken, rather than coincidence.
Beyond these challenges, publishing a study is difficult. Worse, the pressure to publish in prestigious journals favours publication of success stories, rather than actions that didn’t work, meaning that published studies may give a biased picture of the real situation.
Improving the evidence
Now that the scale of the problem is known, the gaps need to be identified to ensure research focuses on threatened species and understudied regions, and that actions with insufficient evidence are evaluated.
Funding organisations should dedicate resources to evaluating conservation actions. Meanwhile, experts like the Primate Specialist Group can contribute by developing guidelines on how to test actions rigorously.
Academic scientists can also collaborate with conservationists to design appropriate studies. Evidence databases like the one we assessed provide easily-understood summaries of actions and their effectiveness, as well as a place to report findings – and partially address the problem of publication.
Conservationists also need to be cautious as it’s clear that in many instances it’s not yet known if an action is effective or not. This is important because primates and their habitats face ominous threats and urgent effective conservation measures are needed to protect them. But by adopting an evidence-based approach to the conservation of primates, we can ensure they continue to enchant us in the future.
Jo Setchell, Professor of Anthropology, Durham University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
#AnimalBiodiversityNews #animalExtinction #animals #Ape #apes #BonoboPanPaniscus #BorneanOrangutanPongoPygmaeus #Boycott4wildlife #BoycottPalmOil #ChimpanzeePanTroglodytes #deforestation #EasternGorillaGorillaBeringei #ecology #extinction #ForgottenAnimals #monkey #Primate #primates #Primatologist #primatology #SumatranOrangutanPongoAbelii #TapanuliOrangutanPongoTapanuliensis #vegan #WesternGorillaGorillaGorilla
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Bonobos can inspire us to make our democracies more peaceful
#Bonobos, sometimes called the “forgotten #ape” due to their recent discovery and small numbers, titillate the democrat’s imagination. Before the 1970s, certain primatologists thought bonobos were strange #chimpanzees because females govern in this primate society.Frans de Waal, the primatologist and popular writer, has done much to explain the fascinating lives of these “peace-loving #apes” and how they are changing the story of human evolution. Bonobos are unique among apes for how they settle day-to-day conflicts. Personalities and social standing are evident in their society. Squabbles are frequent within or between groups. Bonobos defuse the potentially violent tension in these conflicts through quick bursts of sex, mutual grooming, hugs and kisses, and mimicking the sounds each other makes. Help these remarkable intelligent beings survive when you #BoycottPalmOil #Boycott4Wildlife
Blissful #bonobos resolve conflict in (mostly) peaceful ways. Maybe they can inspire #human #democracies to be fairer, kinder and more just? Help these remarkable beings to survive #Boycottpalmoil 🌴🔥🩸🚜❌ #Boycott4Wildlife #apes #primates @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2022/02/20/bonobos-can-inspire-us-to-make-our-democracies-more-peaceful/
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterWe can see reflections of ourselves – the good, the bad and the ugly – in bonobos, and in other apes too.
The trick is to use intimate, gentle, genuine techniques to find common ground with one’s opponent. It’s the bonobos’ way to say “it’s alright” and to repair any emotional sores from the dispute. It doesn’t always happen this way, especially between rival groups, but violence is the exception to the rule.
Inspirations
We value peace today, so the discovery of the bonobo gives us hope that Homo sapiens aren’t naturally sadistic terrors kept in check only by the power of authority or the divine, the fear of the afterlife.
Bonobo mother and babyGorillas, another close relative, offer inspiration too. While a very large male protects most small groups, he’s more bodyguard than despot. Gorillas reach decisions through co-operation between the sexes.
Baboons also offer a counter view to our supposed nasty and brutish inner nature. In a troop of hamadryas or olive baboons you’d soon be able to spot the stronger individuals. And you might assume they simply call the shots: only they don’t.
Baboons have a more delicate form of collective decision-making. This involves sitting in the right place and waiting to see where a majority develops. In this way, more than a few individuals share leadership.
Now we come to chimpanzees, the species that has been most influential in how we picture the earliest human behaviour. They are patriarchal, hierarchical, constantly scheming to get ahead in rank and sometimes shockingly violent. Yet, if the times are good (food’s abundant), they can be consensual, mellow and peaceful.
Like the bonobos, chimps try to repair emotional damage after a fight because the group has to work or else everyone’s survival is at risk.
Zoologist Dr George McGavin joking with a bonobo while filming Monkey Planet for the BBCThat said, bonobos, gorillas, baboons and chimpanzees aren’t a reflection of our past. As Frans de Waal and science journalist Virginia Morell observe, these species have been evolving alongside us since we all split from our common ancestor. Looking at them isn’t the same as looking back.
However, we can relate to the behaviours in these species – we can see ourselves in them. Perhaps, we wonder, we’ve always had the capacity for peace and violence; we’ve always lived in the political spectrum between violent autocracy and peaceful democracy.
Our species is certainly trying to strengthen the latter now. Perhaps the bonobos, or the other apes, can help us do better by inspiring us to think differently.
Imagine if we could stop being violent to one another. The violence that democrats living in democracies commit online or in person, often in public among strangers, limits if not wastes our capacity to be peaceful in our everyday lives.
Let’s say a fight starts over a parking space. You saw it first, had your blinker on to “claim it”, when that omfg no-you-didn’t creature of a moron steals it. I’ve reason to believe that, when slighted in this way, most of us want to punch this stranger in the face or trash their car.
Trying to find common ground with them then and there seems bizarre. Stranger still is to entertain the thought that maybe you and the spot-thief might then give each other a hug or a smooch, mount each other for a while, run your fingers through one another’s hair and say: “You know what, it’s all right, have a nice day”.
I play to the absurd here because I’m not arguing that we should try to perfectly replicate the way bonobos avoid violence. Echoing a point that Laurence Whitehead once made, we shouldn’t confuse inspiration with replication.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9BFjr_x0vU
We should rather try to draw inspiration from the bonobos to enrich our own practices, to enhance today’s human democracies. We might do equally well to dream about rhesus monkeys and their aversion to inequality, or spider monkeys and their patient if not wondrously just lives.
These primates place emphasis on avoiding violence and inequality because peace keeps them working together. It helps them survive.
And that’s important for us: peace and social cohesion are the legs our democracies strive to stand on.
The opposite, violence and social division, beckons to the Beetlejuice of regimes: benevolent authoritarianism, that hated but necessary stabiliser of states when times are bad.
It’s crucial to remember that avoiding violence builds trust and confidence in the group and between groups. It’s what the bonobos do so well. Yet in our societies we’re still struggling to use words and care instead of fists, guns, mines and bombs.
Political theorist John Keane once alluded: the future if not quality of democracy depends on our ability to exchange violence for peace. For the sake of our democracies, we need to be able to make this exchange, from those everyday moments in the carpark to those times in the lives of nations when diplomacy gives way to conflict.
Lessons
It’s not simply the normative visions of a democracy changed that the examples of non-human life offer. We can learn from the down-to-earth, concrete and special techniques that non-humans use to make decisions.
The process of evolution creates replicating systems – ones that work. It happens simply through the genes that survive millions of years of trial and error. As a result, the lives of many non-humans may offer more than a few masterclasses in social success.
In Honeybee Democracy, Thomas Seeley explains how bees decide as a group on the best site for a new hive. Princeton University PressTake the European honeybee, for example. In his book, Honeybee Democracy, Thomas Seeley explains how bees make the life-or-death decision on where to build their next hive.
Once a hive reaches capacity – no room is left for making more bees or honey – the existing queen and most of the bees move out. They must start a new hive.
It’s down to the oldest forager bees, which usually account for 3% to 5% of the worker bees (talk about representation), to get more than half their family – potentially upwards of 30,000 individuals – out of the hive. Once this massive swarm is out, the elder bees direct it to cluster somewhere around the queen until they find a suitable site for the new hive.
At this point, the 1000 or so elder bees, who’ve swapped from food foragers to house scouts, travel several kilometres in all directions. They’re looking for that perfect site.
Bees are choosy. The hive site must satisfy several criteria. These include the location and diameter of the entrance (it’s important no rain can get in and that there is only one entrance); whether it faces the sun (this keeps the hive warmer in winter); the height above the ground (the higher the better to deter predators); if it’s in a tree (trees are preferred); and the available space. If it’s too big, the bees will freeze in winter. Too small, and they won’t have enough food to last through the cold months.
Choosing the wrong hive site might mean the human equivalent of a small town dying.
Honeybees evolved decision-making techniques because so much is riding on the decision elder bees make on behalf of the whole. Seeley thinks we should be studying and learning from these techniques.
Christian List and Thomas Seeley believe studying how honeybees make decisions together can help us make better decisions. flickr/US Department of Agriculture, CC BY-NCWhen a scout bee returns to the swarm after finding a site that ticks all the boxes she lets the freak out in her waggle dance. Her dance tells other scout bees she’s on to something good.
However, rather than accepting the force of her presentation (charisma you might say), each scout flies off to the site that got the scout dancing with excitement to independently verify her claim.
If it really is the promised land, each scout returns to replicate the dance of the first. If not, the scouts will see who else is dancing, independently verify their claim, and potentially follow their dance.
Once around 70% of the scouts are broadcasting the same site, the other scouts stop advertising alternatives and join the majority.
So the decision’s made. It’s time to rouse the 30,000 into the air and for the scouts to direct the swarm to the agreed site.
The independent verification bees use to make high-quality decisions speaks directly to the problems we face in democratic assemblies. The ability of charismatic speech to sway others without proving the evidence in the speaker’s argument, the entrenchment of factions around shared values and not evidence, the capitulation of younger or less knowledgeable individuals confronted by older experts, and so on, all point to our difficulties in using evidence-based decision-making. https://www.youtube.com/embed/JnnjY823e-w?wmode=transparent&start=0 Tom Seeley explains how swarming honeybees choose a new home.
Obviously we’re not bees. We’re value-laden and sometimes irrational primates with our own host of problems specific to our species.
Even if we perfectly executed the bees’ independent verification technique, a person could very well say: “No, regardless of the evidence I’ve just verified which is contrary to my original position, I will maintain that wind mills sour cow’s milk, or that my kids don’t need vaccinating, or that climate change isn’t a threat.”
In fact, majority decision-making is, out of all the available democratic decision-making systems, the least preferable for many of us. People like reaching consensus and they like proportionality because it’s fair. And a lot of the decisions assemblies make aren’t questions of life or death, so we don’t really feel like there’s that much at stake.
That said, seeking to learn from bees, and to reflect on what they do so well and what we don’t do that well, generates space for tinkering with the “how”. It creates an opportunity to alter our democratic procedures for the better. We could do this, for example, by establishing a standard practice of independent verification – one that works for us – before an assembly makes a decision.
“Enrolling in nature’s masterclasses”, provided free to us by evolution, doesn’t put our human democracies to question. Rather, it gives us the chance to strengthen them, refine them, make them better.
Analogies
Lastly, by drawing comparisons between non-human and human life we can make analogies about democracy’s issues.
Look, for instance, to the parasites found in nature. There are blood-suckers of blood-suckers (a midge that drinks the blood from a mosquito that just drank it from you), wasps that inject their eggs into other insects, body-snatching fungi, mind-altering protozoans and murderously dishonest amoebas. They might remind democrats of the perils of individuals who manipulate and use democracy for their own ends.
The strangleweed, Cuscuta pentagona, is a parasitic plant. From the moment its seed has sprouted, the seedling “feels” around for a different plant. It’s going to live off this plant.
Once in range, the strangleweed takes a gentle hold of its victim and pierces the host’s stem with a haustorium (effectively a pointy green syringe). It does this not only to drink the host’s sugars but also to swap genetic information (RNA) with it.
Researchers think that C. pentagona reads the host’s genetic information to gain an understanding of its victim’s condition. But the strangleweed also sends its own genetic information to the host, like a Trojan horse designed to keep the victim from realising it’s being used.
Remind you of anyone? The parasitic Cuscuta pentagona, or strangleweed (light green), in action. Phys.orgSince at least the times of usurious monarchs or the entrenchment of transnational capital, democrats have made the point about parasitic elites.
The transnational capitalist class roam this world looking for the best hosts to do their business with. They find their way past barriers to take information from sovereign states, send reassurances to them, and then begin the process of extracting wealth from them to maintain their status as this world’s first global oligarchs.
I think here in particular of the dealings between mining companies and small cash-poor states. Like the strangleweed’s initial wandering tentacle, the company sends its agents to find where it can get a grip on the host.
The company uses charm offensives, lobbyists and sometimes bribes to transfuse information between it and the host. The two become a hybridised one. The company releases public relations information to keep the host satiated if not to massage it into accepting that the company is here to stay – that is, until the sugars run out.
The relationship between a multinational company and a sovereign state can be, like the relationship between the strangleweed and its victim, asymmetrical. On both sides of the analogy the parasite lives at the expense of the host, which is left almost powerless to defend itself.
Now, we should recognise that this baldly polemical interpretation of multinational companies and their governors doesn’t mean they’re no different from a parasitic plant, nor do they function for the same reason as the strangleweed, whose aim is reproduction.
What we get from this analogy is, instead, a reflection from reality’s broken mirror. Looking at the strangleweed and then to the transnational capitalist class creates a snapshot perception, an imperfect but still handy image, for the democrat to use.
Extinction, the death of possibilities
As writer Elizabeth Kolbert says in her own way: with each extinction of a non-human species we see ourselves further ruined.
Earth is home to at least one million species, and likely more. Many species make collective decisions, solve problems together and survive as a group. Losing a living species to extinction also means, from a selfishly human perspective, losing a potential opportunity to improve today’s democracies by the inspirations, lessons and analogies that only the evolution of other life forms can impart to us.
Non-humans evolved their own techniques and behaviours – which we can make sense of using words from the vocabulary of democracy – because they work for them. It’s 100% pragmatic. Nature’s tool chest, you might say.
Admittedly, these tools may not be fit for our purposes. After all, we aren’t bonobos, bees or parasitic plants. But it’s also fair to say that we’d be rash not to try to find help in them, especially if enriching our democratic practices in this way could help solve some of the problems confronting us.
Here we can say that our destruction of non-humans is destroying a part of ourselves, of our democracies’ hope of reaching their fuller potential. Perhaps, out of respect for their existence and our own, it’s time to include non-humans in that all-too-human affair we call democracy.
You can read parts one and two of the essay here.
Jean-Paul Gagnon, Assistant Professor in Politics, University of Canberra
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
#animalBehaviour #AnimalBiodiversityNews #animalCommunication #animalExtinction #animalIntelligence #animalRights #Ape #apes #bonobo #Bonobos #Boycott4wildlife #BoycottPalmOil #Chimpanzees #democracies #democracy #human #Mammal #Primate #primates #Primatologist #primatology #sentience
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Humans and Bonobos Share Contagious Yawn Behaviour
Most of us have experienced the overwhelming urge to yawn in response to another person yawning – but we’re not the only species to do this. Research published in PeerJ shows that bonobos – our closest evolutionary cousins – also experience “yawn contagion”. Similarly to how yawning occurs in human beings, the effects of yawn contagion in bonobos is influenced by the quality of relationships shared between individuals.
The tendency for humans to mirror the behaviours and emotions of another – sometimes referred to as “emotional contagion” – is also thought to reflect our heightened capacity for empathy. Help all non-human primates to survive extinction and be #Vegan #BoycottPalmOil #Boycott4Wildlife.
Humans mirror behaviour of others e.g. with yawning 🥱 💤 This is ’emotional contagion’ and #Bonobos and other #primates do this too. We’re closer than we think! We must protect our cousins #Boycottpalmoil 🌴🩸💀❌ #Boycott4Wildlife @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2022/01/30/contagious-yawns-show-social-ties-in-humans-and-bonobos/
Share to BlueSky Share to Twitter Contagious yawns show social ties in humans and bonobos Image: PxFuelThis research challenges the view that emotional contagion is more pronounced in humans than in other species. It suggests that variation in empathy between humans and bonobos is influenced by the quality of relationships shared by individuals – but experts warn we must be careful to avoid anthropomorphising.
In the first cross-species study of its kind, Elisabetta Palagi, Ivan Norscia and Elisa Demuru from the Natural History Museum at the University of Pisa used levels of “yawn contagion” as a tool for measuring differences in empathy between humans and bonobos over a five-year period.
The ability of an individual to perceive and feel others’ emotions is hard to quantify, which has made measuring empathy in an objective way difficult.
“Empathy is extremely difficult to study,” said Dr Palagi. “The only possibility was to explore the most basal layer of empathy – emotional contagion – and ‘yawn contagion’ is a good candidate to measure emotional contagion.”
Yawn contagion doesn’t only occur in humans. Kevin Jaacko/Flickr, CC BY-NCIn humans and bonobos, the researchers compared levels of “yawn contagion” in weakly-bonded individuals with those occurring in strongly-bonded individuals, revealing important similarities and differences between the two species.
The strength of emotional bonding between individuals was found to be important in stimulating an empathic response only in close friends or kin, with strongly-bonded humans exhibiting a greater level of emotional contagion than strongly-bonded bonobos. A similar level of “yawn contagion” occurred between humans and bonobos in weakly-bonded subjects, reflecting shared empathic foundations between the two species.
Bonobo mother and baby“We found that the two species differed in the level and latency of yawn response only when the subjects involved were good friends,” said Dr Palagi. “When the two subjects did not share a particular bonding the two species showed a strong similarity in the frequency of yawn contagion, thus suggesting that both species react in a very similar way to emotional contagion solicitation.”
According to Dr Palagi, monitoring bonobos was a lot easier than monitoring human subjects, as the “yawn contagion” effect is easily disturbed in humans if subjects are conscious of it. Because of this, all people involved in the study were unaware of being observed.
“We calculated how many times each perceived a yawn spontaneously emitted by a another individual and counted how many times he or she responded to that yawn,” she said.
A window into our social past
A yawning Pygmy Marmoset
Pygmy Marmoset Cebuella niveiventris and Cebuella pygmaeaMark Elgar, professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Melbourne, said the cross-species approach of the study produced some interesting results.
But he said we should exercise caution in attributing “yawn contagion” to empathic behaviour, since the evolutionary function of yawning behaviour itself remains a mystery.
“My nagging concern is that we don’t really understand why yawn contagion exists, especially since it can be triggered by at least two ‘emotive’ states – boredom and embarrassment – and one physiological state – tiredness,” Professor Elgar said. “What is the evolutionary significance of yawning?”
Darren Curnoe, associate professor in human evolution from the University of New South Wales, said the research helps us to better understand the “gap” between humans and other species – what it is that makes us unique.
Contagious yawns show social ties in humans and bonobos Image: PxFuel“This fascinating research demonstrates at once how similar, and yet, how different we are to our chimpanzee and bonobo cousins,” he said.
He said the study also sheds light on the origin of human social behaviour.
“The desire to yawn, when we see it in others, is a reflection of our emotional connection to them and our brain sharing what they do,” he said. “It’s a result of our strong empathy with people whom we share strong bonds, we can’t help but imitate them. It has a very deep evolutionary origin back to our ape ancestors from millions of years ago.
“What’s unique though about our human form of emotional empathy is its intensity – we show a deeper form of empathy and bonding than chimpanzees or bonobos do. This is something that changed during our evolution and must reflect a difference in the way our ancestors behaved and organised themselves socially compared to chimps and bonobos.”
Penny Orbell, Editor, The Conversation
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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Weird Marketplace Find of the Day. Various objects made from uranium glass. My grandmother had the green bowls for her mixer. Does that mean that they glowed like that too?
#WeirdMarketplace #UraniumGlass #Green #Glow #DepressionGlass -
Bonobos enjoy pretend tea parties and chimps think rationally: why apes are more like us than we ever thought https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/apr/23/apes-behaviour-bonobo-chimpanzee-humans-science-aoe #EndangeredSpecies #Environment #Animals #Conservation #Wildlife #WorldNews #Science #Primatology #AnimalBehaviour #Biology
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Wild chimpanzees recorded waging ‘civil war’ with coordinated attacks between two groups https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/apr/09/civil-war-chimpanzee-group-closer-to-human-condition-aoe #Primatology #GlobalDevelopment #Environment #Uganda #Animals #Africa #Science #EndangeredSpecies #Wildlife #WorldNews #AnimalBehaviour #Biology
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Uganda chimp group splits into rival factions, unleashing deadly coordinated attacks that resemble human warfare patterns. https://english.mathrubhumi.com/news/world/uganda-chimpanzee-civil-war-kibale-forest-aqm5dolk?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=mastodon #ChimpanzeeWar #UgandaWildlife #AnimalBehavior #NatureShock
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#Europas erster eigener #Prozessor landet bei #TSMC
#SiPearl hat das Design seines 80-Kerners #Rhea1 fertiggestellt und an den #Chipauftragsfertiger #TSMC geschickt. Ein #Supercomputer wartet schon.
Lange hat's gedauert, jetzt scheint es in großen Schritten bei #SiPearls erstem #Prozessor #Rhea1 voranzugehen: Die Firma berichtet, dass sie vor Wochen ihr #CPU_Design an den Chipauftragsfertiger TSMC nach Taiwan geschickt hat – der sogenannte Tape-out-Prozess.
https://www.heise.de/news/Europas-erster-HPC-ARM-Prozessor-landet-bei-TSMC-10483227.html
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I'm not sure what's going on with the battle against #PinyonPlainUranuimMine, but I'll look into it...
This from @centerforbiodiv
For Immediate Release, June 27, 2024
17,000 Petition Signatures Delivered to Gov. Hobbs Urging Her to Shut Down #PinyonPlain #UraniumMine
PHOENIX— "Local and national public-interest groups, as well as #Havasupai Tribe members, delivered more than 17,000 petition signatures to Gov. Katie Hobbs today urging her to use her authority to close the Pinyon Plain uranium mine that threatens the waters of the #GrandCanyon and the Havasupai Tribe.
"This comes after the groups, scientists and many others sent a letter to the governor in January outlining the threats posed by this mine and asking for her assistance with its closure.
"'The Havasupai Tribe, other Tribal leaders, and those who care about protecting Grand Canyon and its waters have fought the Pinyon Plain uranium mine for decades because it threatens the waters of Grand Canyon and the Havasupai,' said Sandy Bahr, director for #SierraClub’s Grand Canyon (Arizona) Chapter. 'Gov. Hobbs can and should help shut down this mine as once the mine contaminates the groundwater, there is no way to clean it up. The best way to protect Grand Canyon and the people who depend on its waters is to move forward with closure of this mine.'
"The Pinyon Plain mine, which began extracting uranium ore on Jan. 8, [2024] is seven miles south of Grand Canyon National Park and inside the newly designated Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni – Ancestral Footprints of the Grand Canyon National Monument. Although President Biden’s national monument designation permanently bans new mining claims and development inside the monument, it exempts preexisting claims with valid existing rights like the Pinyon Plain uranium mine.
"'Neither industry nor regulators can guarantee that the Pinyon Plain uranium mine won’t irretrievably damage aquifers that feed Grand Canyon’s precious springs,' said Taylor McKinnon, Southwest director at the Center for Biological Diversity. 'That’s not a risk worth taking. At the Center we stand with the Havasupai Tribe asking Gov. Hobbs to close the mine now.'
"The petitions delivered to the governor by groups including the Sierra Club, Center for Biological Diversity, National Parks Conservation Association, #WildArizona, #ChispaArizona, and #HaulNo!, along with Tribal members, request that she 'do everything [she] can to help protect the waters of Grand Canyon, the new national monument, and these waters that are essential to the existence of the Havasupai people. This mine should be closed before it creates irreversible harm.'"
Read more:
https://biologicaldiversity.org/w/news/press-releases/17000-petition-signatures-delivered-to-gov-hobbs-urging-her-to-shut-down-pinyon-plain-uranium-mine-2024-06-27/
#NoUraniumMining #NoUraniumMiningWithoutConsent #NoMiningWithoutConsent #NoNukes #NoWar #NoNuclearWeapons #GrandCanyonNationalMonument #WaterIsLife #EnergyFuels -
#Protests Against #GrandCanyon #UraniumMine Continue
Saturday, August 24, 2024
Coalition statement, via #CensoredNews
GRAND CANYON, #Arizona — "#Conservation advocates will join Tribal leaders and members Saturday, Aug. 24, to demand the closure of the #PinyonPlain uranium mine that threatens the waters of the Grand Canyon and the #Havasupai Tribe.
What: Protest near #RedButte and the Pinyon Plain Uranium Mine calling on #GovHobbs and federal officials to close the mine.
When: 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., Saturday, Aug. 24.
Where: Junction of Highway 64 and Forest Service Road 320, 10.5 miles north of Grand Canyon Junction (Valle, Arizona). Here is a map.
Who: Staff and members of the #CenterForBiologicalDiversity, #SierraClub, #ChispaArizona, #WildArizona, National Parks Conservation Association [#NPCA] and other groups will join Havasupai Tribal leaders and members of other Tribes in solidarity and will be available for interviews.
"The mine, which began extracting uranium ore on Jan. 8, is 7 miles south of Grand Canyon National Park, at the foot of sacred Red Butte (Wii'i Gdwiisa in Havasupai), and inside the newly designated Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni – Ancestral Footprints of the Grand Canyon National Monument.
"Saturday’s protest will come after weeks of recent actions opposing the mine and the hauling of radioactive #UraniumOre across the #NavajoNation, which has called the transportation of uranium across its land an infringement on Tribal sovereignty.
"Earlier this month Navajo Nation President #BuuNygren issued an executive order banning shipments of uranium from the mine across the Nation; hauling is now paused. Soon after Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes called for an updated environmental study on the mine, warning of potential risks of allowing the mine to proceed under the authority of a nearly 40-year-old Environmental Impact Statement.
"In June, Tribal members and conservation groups delivered a petition with more than 17,000 signatures urging Gov. Hobbs to use her authority to close the mine. In January, 80 groups and scientists called on her to do the same. New research indicates that the best way to protect the waters of the region is to shut down the mine."
https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2024/08/protests-against-grand-canyon-uranium.html
#HaulNo #NoMiningWithoutConsent #NavajoNation #PinyonPlainUraniumMine #ReaderSupportedNews #WaterIsLife #BlackMesa #NoUraniumMining #Navajo #InformedConsent
#EnvironmentalRacism #ShutDownPinyonPlain #ProtectTheSacred #Diné #Dinébikeyah #dinetah #NoUraniumMiningWithoutConsent -
Weird Marketplace Find of the Day. Traditional Tepee, teepee or tipi. #WeirdMarketplace #TeePee #Tepee #Tipi #indigenous #BuyAndSell
