By Digoy Fernandez
IN my last post, I took a swipe at the callous indifference of many urban dwellers who view trees as pesky leaf shedders or as green fodder that must be cut down whenever and wherever. While a single tree felled by a villager may seem to be of no consequence in the worldwide scheme of things, the fact is that we don’t only have a few trees going down each year. Countless numbers of trees are felled or burned down to make way for concrete or new planting ground. The earth’s greenbelt is fast fading, and the carbon sink that these trees are, fail to make up for the increasing amount of carbon dioxide being spewed into the atmosphere.
Last Sunday, during our regular weekly breakfast meeting of friends from our village, our soon to be retired high official from the ADB mentioned that their agency recently had to reassess their environmental programs because of alarm bells being sounded by their European counterparts. It seems that these agencies are truly worried about the effect of rising carbon levels and the effect these have on the melting of glaciers and the big snowy areas like that in Greenland. The net effect, of course, has been a steady rise in sea levels from 2 mm – 3 mm a year. A seemingly insignificant figure, once again, but truly alarming when one considers that the sea has risen by about a meter since turn of the last century. And the pace is picking up rather than slowing.
In practical terms, rising sea levels would mean flooding of many parts of Metro Manila, especially those that were low-lying swampy areas to begin with. At least a third of the Metro area would be under water, with pressure to go inland toward the mountain areas. Now, those mountain areas have been much abused in the past until the present, with clear cutting resulting in denudation and the lack of topsoil and decent forest cover. Increased inland migration would put further stress on these already fragile and overdeveloped habitats.
A substantial number of our 7,100 islands would probably go under for good, and provide good coral reef starting habitats. Good for the fish and other sea-life forms, bad for us. People who live in coastal areas and who make a living from the sea will be forced inland, and will have to adjust accordingly. The many creatures that find their beginnings in the mangrove and riverine areas will probably take another generation to replenish themselves as their old habitats end up in deeper waters.
To think that the preservation or planting of a single tree can make such a difference, especially if millions of people all over the world thought the same way!
Rising Sea Levels: A Consequence Of Global Warming
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It is good to have people like you who continually educate people regarding the state of the environment. I believe,the home is where simple things pertaining to the environment be taught and observed.
As simple as the 3R's. My grade 6 daughter, simply makes me proud when she proposed to her school science teacher and to the Principal and to the GPTA leadership to have a wrapper free christmas gift giving during the party. Making a slogan"Save a tree! Give gifts wrapper free". She fully undertands that in her simple way, that would be a fitting gift to mother nature.
You have my sympathies. We need to think differently now. Here in the UK, Portsmouth is at significant risk of flooding as well, especially if Greenlands ice melts and ends up in the seas.
Dear Sirs:
It is true that trees are felled or burned .It is true that our seas are destroyed.It is true that our lakes and waterways polluted.It is true that man is involved.
In Iloilo province illegal logging activities go on in the mountains of Maasin.Janiuay,Lambunao,Bengawan and Calinog yet no one shout to high heavens on what is going on because more and more local officials and politicians are involved in this illegal act.
We have so many evidence to point that illegal loggers are themselves politicians and being helped by local officials in Iloilo.
With the help of corrupt DENR Iloilo regional officials many have become rich and flashy nowadays plus the fact that they can send their children to expensive schools and open businesses in Iloilo City .
Perhaps we can do a research on this when the time is ripe.
Very truly yours,
Oswaldo Sarrosa
I fail to understand the commotion behind all of these "global warming" and changes in climate. Sounds like this is a bunch of
baloney being churned up by the elites because they have nothing else to do.
Look, these things have happened many times, nay millions of times before. The seasons come and go, the weather warms and cools, the p0lar caps melt and freeze, the sea levels rise and fall, species perish and replenish, the land bridges vanish and reappear, what is the big deal about them? Those are just the consequences of the fact that nature operates in cycles and obeys the laws of circular motion.
So the 7100 islands get reduced to 1700, what is the beef about them, if only 500 or 600 of them really count? OK, livelihoods are disrupted, some tribes and animals vanish as a result. Who has made a tabulation of the number of tribes and islands that have gone extinct in the 4-5 billion years that the earth itself has existed? You might as well leave Earth and relocate to some pristine asteroid or planet so you can run things the way you like.
Why make such a big deal out of this? To get a grant by scaring policy makers into channeling more resources into favored causes so their favorite cottage industries can thrive, also perhaps to slow down growth because "growth" consumes resources?
This is so totally wacky I just can't believe that these nail biting elites would have to spend their lives scaring themselves stiff about things which they can do nothing about.
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We should be more concerned about man-made disasters which is becoming more common. Our enchanting forest are reducing in size and our environment becoming a poisonous haven due to mine explorations and other activities. As long as we do not encourage afforestation natural calamities are bound to often repeat. I read an article about an American company which follows a paperless concept,all the informations are saved in the laptops. I found this concept very innovative.
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