Corporations have a responsibility to be mindful of their impact on social, environmental and human health issues impacted by their policies and products. Our finite planetary resources are fast dwindling and destroying the very fabric of life. #CSR #Sustainability #SocioEconomics #GDP #EcoEconomics #Brands #Environment #ClimateChange #
Article advocating business doing more for health and wellbeing in their communities. Unusually it recognises that small businesses often do this best than large ones.
DR. VANDANA SHIVA: "RIGHTS OF NATURE" TRIBUNAL PRESIDENT presents closing statement at the first Ethics Tribunal in Quito January 2014. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3Tl02_bcbw
▶ BOLIVIA: FIRST COUNTRY TO GIVE LEGAL RIGHTS TO THE EARTH. Bolivia pilots new social and economic model based on protection of and respect for nature. Bolivia is to become the first country in the world to give nature comprehensive legal rights in an effort to halt climate change and the exploitation of the natural world, and to improve quality of life for the Bolivian people. http://sco.lt/83jybZ
ERADICATING ECOCIDE
WHY BUSINESS LEADERS MUST STEP UP TO THE CHALLENGE
Pambazuka, July 24. 2014 -▶ FOOD SOVEREIGNTY: WHICH WAY AFRICA? African governments are under intense pressure from within but also from big agribusiness and Western governments to embrace GMOs. Governments must resist all forms of arm-twisting and food colonialism and make their biotechnology choices based on the factshttp://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/features/92594
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Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh and Pope Francis
-▶ ONLY LOVE FOR MOTHER EARTH CAN SAVE US FROM CLIMATE CHANGEhttp://sco.lt/57JX0L
-▶ INDIA IS THE FIRST COUNTRY TO PASS A CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY LAWrequiring larger companies to spend 2 percent of each year's profit on those kinds of initiatives. The law kicks in for companies with a profit of at least $80 million over the past three years.... The law requires large Indian firms to spend a portion of their profits on sustainability initiatives, such as solar panels.http://www.greenbiz.com/blog/2013/08/20/india-passes-worlds-first-corporate-responsibility-law
Forbes, April 18, 2014 -▶ CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY : SHOULD IT BE LAW?
India is the first country to have corporate social responsibility (CSR ) legislation, mandating that companies give 2% of their net profits to charitable causes. Innovative? Perhaps on a policy level. But some small-medium size enterprises within India have already embedded social impact into their company ethos.
ICSRWire, April 04, 2014 -▶ THE BIRTH OF A NEW ECOSYSTEM: INDIA'S MANDATORY CSR RULE BECOMES A REALITY. India’s new CSR law, which requires a mandatory spend of two percent of net profits went into effect this week. It is estimated that $3 billion of capital will be generated annually through the money spent by 16,000 companies on CSR. The Companies Act mandates CSR activities for both Indian companies and foreign companies registered in India. In addition, the new rule also requires involvement of senior level staff as well as mandatory disclosure of these activities and the creation of:http://www.csrwire.com/blog/posts/1290-the-birth-of-a-new-ecosystem-india-s-mandatory-csr-rule-becomes-a-reality
TriplePundit, December 16th, 2013 -▶ INDIAN GOVERNMENT COMMITS TO CSR WITH COMPANIES ACT.This legislation requires companies to take action, make investments, and report against a number of metrics related to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). PwC India has now released a Handbook on Corporate Social Responsibility in India, providing guidelines to help industry to comply with the regulationhttp://www.triplepundit.com/2013/12/indian-government-commits-csr-companies-act/
Sustainable Business.com, April 15, 2014 -▶ EUROPE PASSES HISTORIC LAW: BIG CORPORATIONS MUST REPORT ON SUSTAINABILITY.This is a historic day in Europe, where a new law will require its biggest companies to include sustainability factors as part of their annual financial report. In a 599-55 vote, the European Parliament passed the law, which applies to publicly-traded with more than 500 employees. They must address "policies, risks and results" in relation to "social, environmental and human rights impact, diversity and anti-corruption policies" in their annual report.http://www.sustainablebusiness.com/index.cfm/go/news.display/id/25651
... auch wenn es nur 2% sind und für Unternehmen gilt, die mindestens 80 Mio $ Gewinn in den letzten 3 Jahren gemacht haben gilt, es ist ein Anfang ...
Wouldn't it be great if there were a competition among nations to be the most sustatinable, with the most corporate responsibility, and the most governmental responsibility.
"That's the standard technique of privatization : defund, make sure things don't work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital"...Noam Chomsky
ANIMATED VIDEO 'OUTSOURCING AMERICA EXPOSED' Across the country, for-profit companies are engaged in a hostile takeover of our schools, roads, prisons, drinking water — even government itself. In this animated video created by Mark Fiore for the Center for Media and Democracy’s “Outsourcing America Exposed” project, Outsourcing Eddie shows us the many ways in which America is for sale... http://billmoyers.com/2013/09/30/outsourcing-america-exposed/
Institute for Policy Studies, March 18, 2015 ▶ PRIVATIZING PUBLIC SERVICES. The taxes we pay should bankroll quality public services, not corporations and overpaid CEOs http://www.ips-dc.org/privatizing-public-services/
▶ CORPORATE FACES BEHIND PRIVATIZED PUBLIC SERVICES PAID BY YOUR TAX DOLLARS.America's Highest Paid Government Workers, a group of private corporate executives across the country have increasingly pushed for the privatization of public services while maneuvering high-paying contracts with the government "and then pay themselves and other executives eye-popping salaries with your tax dollars."http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2014/02/20-5
Common Dreams, May 16, 2014 ▶ PRIVATIZATION IS THE PROBLEM, NOT THE SOLUTION. The solution to the crisis of the day, or decade, is a freedom-sounding word called "privatization." This, the free-marketeers tell us, will solve our problems. Furthermore, the crises being addressed are often manufactured for the express purpose of rolling out a parasitical regime of corporatization that profits from calamity, even as its "host," the public, is fleeced.http://www.commondreams.org/view/2014/05/16-7
EXPOSE
Corporate Accountability International, December 05, 2014 BEHIND THE WORLD BANK'S SPIN
Truthout, December 07, 2014 - ▶ ENCLOSING THE AQUATIC COMMONS IN BRAZIL - AQUACULTURE: THE PARTITIONING OF BRAZIL'S OCEAN AND RIVERS THREATENS SMALL-SCALE FISHING FAMILIES. The federal government has implemented a plan for privatizing water resources that can then be used by private companies for fish farming, and its objective is to produce 20 million tons of fish annually through aquaculture. Privatizing the water in this way enables companies to intensively produce one type of fish in an area, without the fish having to compete with other species for food and space. Raising fish through aquaculture, however, requires the use of countless chemicals and has led to the displacement of small-scale fishermen and women. http://truth-out.org/news/item/27824-the-partitioning-of-brazil-s-ocean-and-rivers-threatens-small-scale-fishing-families
EXPLOSIVE REPORT:
▶ 'ALEC' PROVIDE CORPORATIONS AND STATE LEGISLATURES PLATFORM FOR US-WIDE ASSAULT ON EDUCATION, HEALTHCARE, INCOME TAX AND ENVIRONMENT
Conservative groups and State Legislatures across the US are planning a co-ordinated assault against public sector rights and services in the key areas of education, healthcare, income tax, workers' compensation and the environment, documents obtained by the Guardian reveal. http://sco.lt/6dyHEf
Naked Capitalism, December 28, 2014 -▶ DON QUIONES: HOW THE TRADE IN SERVICES AGREEMENT LETS BIG BROTHER GO GLOBAL. If signed, the treaty would affect all services ranging from electronic transactions and data flow, to veterinary and architecture services. It would almost certainly open the floodgates to the final wave of privatization of public services, including the provision of healthcare, education and water. Meanwhile, already privatized companies would be prevented from a re-transfer to the public sector by a so-called barring “ratchet clause” – even if the privatization failed.
UNDP, December 09, 2013 -▶ ANTI-CORRUPTION:Corruption undermines human development and democracy. It reduces access to public services by diverting public resources for private gain. When public money is stolen for private gain, it means fewer resources to build schools, hospitals, roads and water treatment facilities. When foreign aid is diverted into private bank accounts, major infrastructure projects come to a halt. Corruption enables fake or substandard medicines to be dumped on the market, and hazardous waste to be dumped in landfill sites and in oceans. The vulnerable suffer first and worst."http://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/ourwork/democraticgovernance/focus_areas/focus_anti-corruption/
-▶ WALL STREET, CORPORATIONS BUYING UP AMERICAN, FOREIGN FARMLAND, THREATENING FUTURE OF U.S. AND WORLD AGRICULTUREhttp://sco.lt/8mcmbR
VIDEO REPORT DW.DE June, 08, 2013 THE GERMAN PRIVATIZATION OF HOSPITALS
More and more hospitals in Germany are being privatized and have to be run at a profit. It's a balancing act for doctors and nurses: they are supposed to care for patients, but also to keep time and costs to a minimum. Made in Germany reports on the cost pressures German hospitals face. .. http://www.dw.de/made-in-germany-the-business-magazine-2013-08-06/e-16953561-9798
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PRIVATIZATION ON A ROLL
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-▶ WORLD BANK AND UN REDD CARBON OFFSET SCHEME 'COMPLICIT' IN PRIVATIZATION GENOCIDAL LAND GRABShttp://sco.lt/65afqb
Guardian, July 05, 2014 -▶ BRITAIN'S PRIVATE FINANCE INITIATIVE (PFI) IS A DEBT TIME BOMB AND WILL ULTIMATELY COST TAX PAYERS £300bn
"We're sitting on a PFI debt time bomb, and the sheer scale of the burden paints a seriously grim picture for the future of our public services." The 717 PFI contracts currently under way across the UK are funding new schools, hospitals and other public facilities with a total capital value of £54.7bn, but the overall ultimate cost will reach £301bn by the time they have been paid off over the coming decades.http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2012/jul/05/pfi-cost-300b
VIDEO REPORT
The Real News, April 29, 2014
BALTIMORE RESIDENTS & WORKER VOICE OUTRAGE OVER PLANS TO PRIVATIZE PUBLIC HOUSING
PND Philanthropy Digest, March 18, 2014 -▶ BILLIONAIRES PRIVATIZING U.S. SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH:"The practice of science in the twenty-first century is becoming shaped less by national priorities or by peer-review groups and more by the particular preferences of individuals with huge amounts of money."http://philanthropynewsdigest.org/news/billionaires-privatizing-u.s.-scientific-research
The Guardian, March 12, 2014
-▶ THE TRUTH ABOUT LOBBYING: 10 WAYS BUSINESS CONTROLS GOVERNMENTS. Whether facing down a threat to profits from a corporate tax hike, or pushing for market opportunities – such as government privatisations – lobbying has become another way of making money. Here are the 10 key steps that lobbying businesses will follow to bend government to their will.http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/mar/12/lobbying-10-ways-corprations-influence-government
Why the End of Poverty Requires the End of Violence
Gary Haugen and Victor Boutros's "The Locust Effect: Why the End of Poverty Requires the End of Violence" focuses on the central role of violence in perpetuating poverty, and shows that if any headway is to be made, this issue has to become a top priority for policymakers. Simply put, if people aren't safe, nothing else matters. Shipping grain to the poor, helping them vote, or assisting their efforts to start a farm is irrelevant. Whatever material improvements we provide will simply wash away in the face of the corrupt police forces, out-of-control, armies, private militias, organized criminals, and — not least — failed justice systems that plague poor countries.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JY0FRy4JLYo
▶ "The Locust Effect"
UNCOVERING THE HIDDEN PLAGUE THE WORLD HAS MISSED. Far below the headlines, a plague of hidden, everyday violence — like rape, trafficking, and police brutality — is devastating the developing world and undermining our efforts to end poverty.http://www.thelocusteffect.com/
▶ THE STEALTH PRIVATIZATION OF PENNSYLVANIA'S BRIDGES Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett's administration has decided to sign a 40-year contract to privatize the state's crumbling bridges, but there has been little to no media coverage of the deal and what it will mean for two generations of Pennsylvanianshttp://www.truth-out.org/news/item/21513-the-stealth-privatization-of-pennsylvanias-bridges
-▶ THE DARK SIDE OF THE 'GREEN ECONOMY' - THE WHOLESALE PRIVATIZATION OF NATUREhttp://sco.lt/7hix0r
▶ SLEEPWALKING TO EXTINCTION: CAPITALISM AND THE CONSUMER ECONOMYhttp://sco.lt/9EPNkf
CORPORATIZING OUR FOOD
▶ FARM-AGEDDON -▶
No birds. No bees. Our countryside laid waste. And billions of animals that never see a blade of grass http://sco.lt/7ztQbB
pdjmoo's insight:
It makes one wonder if the current trend is to weaken local, state governments financial tax-base and regulations, resulting in deterioration of public education, utilities, infrastructure until the only option is to desperately reach out to the corporate sector, using taxpayer money to feed them, selling our souls along with it.
This is a global trend in countries that are in severe financial straits and I would hazard a guess that the banks and investment sectors are circling like sharks to take over the operations of any country, leaving the public at the mercy of their rates as the rewrite laws in their favor.
Public/Private are like Oil/Water -- they don't mix. "Private" denotes profit-making and quarterly bottom-lines and can hire and fire at will. "Public" denotes taxpayer monies that are not tied to the profit motive, and also creates stable jobs. The "private" aspect will cut corners and even bankrupt themselves if the public monies supporting them or profits begin to dry up.
Rights also come into the negotiating arena, water/resource rights in particular. and we should not be trading these away out of financial duress.
The public/partnership idea is riddled with dangerous potholes for a long-term fair rate for the general public and leaves us depending upon corporations for our public services and well-being which, we can see from the present financial states, is very tentative.
Guardian Environment, March 18, 2014 ▶ THE GLOBAL TRANSITION TIPPING POINT HAS ARRIVED: VIVE LA REVOLUTION. What we are seeing, as I've argued in detail before, are escalating, interconnected symptoms of the unsustainability of the global system in its current form. While the available evidence suggests that business-as-usual is likely to guarantee worst-case scenarios, simultaneously humanity faces an unprecedented opportunity to create a civilisational form that is in harmony with our environment, and ourselves. http://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2014/mar/18/transition-tipping-point-revolution-doom
Guardian Environment, March 18, 2014 ▶ CLIMATE CHANGE IS PUTTING WORLD AT RISK OF IRREVERSIBLE CHANGES, SCIENTIST WARN. The world is at growing risk of “abrupt, unpredictable and potentially irreversible changes” because of a warming climate, America’s premier scientific society warned on Tuesday. In a rare intervention into a policy debate, the American Association for the Advancement of Science urged Americans to act swiftly to reduce greenhouse gas emissions – and lower the risks of leaving a climate catastrophe for future generations... http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/mar/18/climate-change-world-risk-irreversible-changes-scientists-aaas
The Guardian, March 17, 2014 ▶ TOXIC TRAIL: HOW A LANDMARK SUPERFUND CLEANUP PROGRAM LEAVES ITS OWN TOXIC LEGACY.
Below some of the world’s most expensive real estate, in the heart of Silicon Valley, pipes and pumps suck thousands of gallons of contaminated water every hour from vast underground toxic pools.
Giant industrial filters trap droplets of dangerous chemicals at the surface, all in the hope of making the water drinkable again and protecting the workers of tech giants such as Google and Symantec from toxic vapors. Often the original mess is almost untreatable. In Silicon Valley’s case, it would take 700 years of continuous treatment to make the groundwater drinkable. http://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2014/mar/-sp-toxic-waste-silicon-valley-trail
I don't give a lot of energy to speaking about 'the collapse' of our civilization as I try to connect with people not from fear but from creativity. Yet I post this study as it came out from NASA and its pretty grounded in regards to the state of the environment.
Takepart, May 16, 2014 - ▶ TO SAVE ENDANGERED SPECIES, EVERYONE HAS A ROLE TO PLAY . One-fourth of Earth’s species could be driven to extinction by 2050, just as a result of climate change. That’s not even counting the ones threatened by habitat eradication, toxins, and other plagues we have wrought on those with whom we share our home. Solving these problems will take a global village. Every sector has some role to play, including the private sector, which has until recently been cast primarily as the problem, not part of the solution. http://www.takepart.com/article/2014/05/16/endangered-species-day-everyone-has-role-pla
WATCH "INSIDE THE GARBAGE OF THE WORLD" (80 min) We're living on a beautiful planet and as a human race we've been here for thousands of years. Our planet didn't need to be protected; life was flourishing on its own, with its own agenda. However for the past 100 years we've made a tremendous impact with our footprint due to the growth of world population and the industrialization of our everyday life. Economy, profit and capitalization became more important than respecting our planet and an ancient knowledge to advance a new way of life. http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/inside-garbage-world/
Common Dreams, May 06, 2014
-▶ HUMANITY'S DESTRUCTION OF EARTH'S CLIMATE IN NINETY SECONDS . Data visualization that compresses thousands of years of historic atmospheric data presents frightening prospects for humanity's future... http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2014/05/06
▶ HEALTHY ECOSYSTEMS, HEALTHY PLANET: HOW BIODIVERSITY COULD SAVE YOUR LIFE http://sco.lt/7Uk10D
Mongabay, May 08, 2014 NEW HOLISTIC 'ONE HEALTH' CONNECTS HUMANS, ANIMALS AND ECOSYSTEMS. Recently, the dilemma of human–wildlife conflict has created great opportunity to solve some of the world’s most pressing problems for both people and ecosystems. The emerging holistic “One Health” movement explicitly recognizes the inextricable connections between human, animal, and ecosystem health, and is leading not only to new scientific research but also to projects that help people rise out of poverty, improve their health, reduce conflicts with wildlife, and preserve ecosystems, such as Bwindi’s tropical montane forest. http://news.mongabay.com/2014/0501-nicole-sri-ehp-one-health.html
▶ BIODIVERSITY IS VITAL TO MAINTAINING ECOSYSTEMS AND HUMAN HEALTH http://sco.lt/4u4JhR
▶ MASSIVE DESERTIFICATION, EPIDEMIC ILLNESSES COMING WITH GLOBAL WARMING, MELTING WORLD http://sco.lt/5cPnrF
Lowell Bergman investigates the hidden reality of rape on the job for immigrant women working in America’s fields, farms and factories For the women who pick and process the food we eat every day, getting sexually assaulted, and even raped, is sometimes part of the job. Frontline and Univision partner to tell the story of the hidden price many migrant women working in America's fields and packing plants pay to stay employed and provide for their families. This investigation is the result of a yearlong reporting effort by veteran correspondent Lowell Bergman, the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley and the Center for Investigative Reporting.... http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/rape-in-the-fields/
VIDEO Los Angeles Times, December 07, 2014 PRODUCT OF MEXICO: HARDSHIP, SLAVERY IN MEXICO'S FARMS, A BOUNTY FOR U.S. TABLES. American consumers get all the salsa, squash and melons they can eat at affordable prices. But a Los Angeles Times investigation found that for thousands of farm laborers south of the border, the export boom is a story of exploitation and extreme hardship (Part 1 of 4) http://graphics.latimes.com/product-of-mexico-camps/
-▶ THE BENEFIT CORPORATION: THE UNLIKELY HERO OF A SUSTAINABLE ECONOMY?
Imagine, if you will, a paradigm shift to a sustainable global economic system in which all corporations act as responsible global citizens. The unlikely hero at the center of this transformation? It’s the newest evolutionary form of a business firm—the benefit corporation.
The prevailing belief that corporations exist solely to maximize profit for shareholders is the single biggest impediment to creating a sustainable economic system. In the current paradigm, it is morally acceptable for corporations to externalize as many of the negative consequences of their behavior on society and the environment as is legally permissible. Corporations have no inherent social and environmental conscience.... http://thehumanist.com/magazine/may-june-2014/features/the-benefit-corporation
-▶ HOW DO YOU RECONCILE SOCIAL MISSION WITH A BOTTOMLINE? DO YOU REALLY NEED A B CORPORATION? Lynn Stout, a professor of corporate and business law at Cornell Law School, says the purpose of a corporation, she wants to make clear, is not to maximize shareholder profits. "It turns out the purpose of the corporation is to do, and I’m taking this right from what the vast majority of corporate charters say," she says, "they say the purpose of the corporation is to do anything lawful.” Stout says we don't need benefit corporations. "I don’t think we do," she says, "if what you want to do is create legal space for managers to run companies in a socially responsible fashion.".. http://www.marketplace.org/topics/business/cookie-factory-balances-profit-progress
Documentary with Interview with Filmmaker Robert May (50:11) TheLipTV
REPORT, INTERVIEW AND FILM Published on Jun 2, 2014 KIDS FOR CASH documents the Pennsylvania scandal of selling children into the prison system at the hands of corrupt Judge Mark Arthur Ciavarella, Jr. How Ciavarella got embedded with the privatized prison system, how children were profited off of, and the plight of the imprisoned minors is shared with clips, the trailer, and in depth discussion with director Robert May in this uncensored Media Mayhem ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVzSe2TQ3d0
VIDEO REPORT The Real News Network, January 15, 2015 BALTIMORE STUDENTS STAE DIE-IN TO PROTEST SCHOOL-TO-PRISON PIPELINEBaltimore City Public School students are demanding comprehensive policy changes on police interaction with youth, school funding, and the city school's curriculum - http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=13009
VIDEO REPORT PBS Newshour, February 21, 2014 Center For Investigative Reporting QUESTIONING TEENS IN SOLITARY CONFINEMENT At Rikers Island, New York City’s main jail complex, about a quarter of the under aged teenagers who are awaiting trial are in solitary confinement, spending 23 hours a day in a 6 by 8 ft cell. Daffodil Altan of the Center for Investigative Reporting takes a look at concern from city officials and others about the psychological effects of isolation on young inmates. This week, New York State announced that it will ban the practice in its prison system.http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/questioning-solitary-confinement-adolescents-rikers-island/
Mother Jones, March 24, 2014 - ▶ SCIENTISTS CONDEMN NEW FDA STUDY SAYING BPA, ENDROCINE DISRUPTER, IS SAFE: "BORDERS ON SCIENTIFIC MISCONDUCT"In contrast to the FDA's recent paper, roughly 1,000 published studies have found that low-level exposure to BPA—a synthetic estrogen that is also used in plastic, cash register receipts and the lining of tin cans—can lead to serious health problems, from cancer and insulin-resistant diabetes to obesity and attention-deficit disorder. In some cases, the effects appear to be handed down, with the chemical reprogramming an individual's genes and causing disease in future generations.http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2014/03/scientists-slam-fda-study-bpa
The sperm count of French men fell by a third between 1989 and 2005, a study suggests. The semen of more than 26,600 French men was tested in the study, reported in the journal Human Reproduction. Dr Joelle Le Moal, an environmental health epidemiologist, said: "This constitutes a serious public health warning." Something in our modern lifestyle, diet or environment like chemical exposure, is causing this.”....http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-20593467
-▶ FROGS FEMINIZED BY PESTICIDE "ALTRAZINE".Atrazine, one of the most widely used farm pesticides in the United States, has feminized male frogs and other animals in some scientific studies. But research examining potential effects in people is relatively sparse. http://www.environmentalhealthnews.org/ehs/news/2013/atrazine-health
Philly.com, July 16, 2014 -▶ RIVER CHEMICALS ARE FEMINIZING MALE FISHMale fish with signs of feminization, including the development of eggs, have been discovered in Pennsylvania’s Delaware, Ohio, and Susquehanna river basins. The find is a sign of hormone-disrupting chemicals in the water, possibly from mixtures of pesticides, pharmaceuticals, and personal care products, like cosmetics and antibacterial soaps, seeping into the rivers, Philly.com reports. The state’s Department of Environmental Protection has begun sampling river systems to learn which exact compounds are present, and if they could possibly affect humans... http://www.philly.com/philly/news/science/20140716_Intersex_fish_indicate_chemical_problems_in_Pa__rivers.ht
▶ MONSANTO ROUNDUP: THE IMPACTS OF GLYPHOSATE HERBICIDE ON HUMAN HEALTHThe foodstuffs of the Western diet, primarily grown by industrial agriculture, are increasingly being produced using a two-part system of engineered plant seeds and toxic chemical application. Consequences are most of the diseases and conditions associated with a Western diet, which include gastrointestinal disorders, obesity, diabetes, heart disease, depression, autism, infertility, cancer and Alzheimer’s disease. http://www.globalresearch.ca/monsanto-roundup-the-impacts-of-glyphosate-herbicide-on-human-health-pathways-to-modern-diseases/5342520
ROUNDUP - THE ULTIMATE KILLING MACHINE
New Charges Against Monsanto's "Pesticide" Roundup
TOP US HEALTHCARE GIANT, KAISER PERMANENTE SPEAKS OUT:
▶ GMOs MAY LEAD TO AN INABILITY IN ANIMALS TO REPRODUCE":In a recent newsletter, the Kaiser Permanente company discussed the numerous dangers of GMOs in a recent newsletter and how to avoid them."Despite what the biotech industry might say, there is little research on the long-term effects of GMOs on human health. Independent research has found several varieties of GMO corn caused organ damage in rats. Other studies have found that GMOs MAY LEAD TO AN INABILITY IN ANIMALS TO REPRODUCE"...http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/14767-focus-top-us-healthcare-giant-gmos-are-devastating-health
▶ FEDERAL LAW MAKES IT PRACTICALLY IMPOSSIBLE TO BAN HAZARDOUS CHEMICALS - The 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act, the only major environmental law that hasn't been updated since it was enacted, allows chemical manufacturers to skip evaluating the safety of their products before putting them on the market.http://www.scoop.it/t/agriculture-gmos-pesticides?q=chemicals+in+your+body/
-▶ A LOOPHOLE FOR PESTICIDES PUTS PUBLIC AND ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH AT RISK - the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has approved roughly 11,000 pesticides intended for use in agriculture, inside homes, on lawns, in hand soaps, on clothing and other consumer goods with little or no safety tests, according to a multi-year investigation by the Natural Resources Defense Council.http://www.ewg.org/enviroblog/2013/03/loophole-pesticides-risks-public-health
-▶ BEE-KILLING CHEMICALS LURK INSIDE YOUR FOOD: AGROCHEMICALS THREAT TO WILD BEES, FOOD SECURITY AND BIODIVERSITY http://sco.lt/8mGvg1
On April 2, the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality approved a widely-protested plan that would allow the snack company Nestlé to pump 250 GALLONS 0F WATER A MINUTE from White Pine Springs (For Almost FREE) which the company will then bottle, brand like Nestlé Pure Life Purified Water or Ice Mountain 100% Natural Spring Water, and sell (at least in New York) for about $2.50 a pop.
The timing brings to the forefront an issue of increasing international importance: the privatization of water.
La Paz in Bolivia, Cape Town in South Africa, and numerous other cities are hitting the rocky bottom of their natural aquifers and glacial reserves.
The companies that bottle water often do so cheaply, which means companies are pocketing the vast majority of those billions, instead of sharing them with the cities from which they take water. In the case of Nestlé’s operations in Michigan, the company was paying just $200 in extraction fees, according to a 2017 investigation by Bloomberg
The Truth about Nestlé's Business with Water (Documentary)
To be able to sell and make money from water, you first have to own it. The Swiss film "Bottled Life" documents the booming business with bottled water, by focusing on the global leader in this lucrative multi-billion dollar market – namely, the Nestlé corporation in Switzerland. Nestlé currently controls more than 70% of the world's bottled water brandshttp://www.bottledlifefilm.com/index.php/the-story.html
EurActive, December 06, 2012 - ▶ PLANT-BASED PLASTIC BOTTLE NO PANACEA. Food and drinks companies are engaged in a global race for leadership on plant-based renewable plastics. SPECIAL REPORT
To be able to sell and make money from water, you first have to own it. The Swiss film "Bottled Life" documents the booming business with bottled water, by focusing on the global leader in this lucrative multi-billion dollar market – namely, the Nestlé corporation in Switzerland. Nestlé currently controls more than 70% of the world's bottled water brandshttp://www.bottledlifefilm.com/index.php/the-story.html AND http://en.bottledlife.tv/
DailyKoz, April 13, 2015 - ▶ NESTLE HAS BEEN PUMPING WATER FROM A CALIFORNIA NATIONAL FOREST WITH AN EXPIRED PERMIT FOR OVER 25 YEARS
- ▶ NESTLE, ARROWHEAD TAPPING WATER FREE FROM CALIFORNIA'S MORONGO RESERVATION. The Companies are exporting a seriously limited resource with no oversighthttp://ow.ly/zd4DX
- ▶ NESTLE POLAND SPRING BOTTLED WATER. The people who live in Fryeburg, Maine can only access their local spring water by buying it in a plastic bottle. That’s because this small town’s spring water is currently controlled by Nestlé, and Nestlé wants to lock up its control over the town’s water with a massive 45-year contract -- children in the town will be grandparents before they are able to challenge it.http://act.storyofstuff.org/page/s/nestle-poland-spring-bottled-water
MintPress News, March 20, 2015 - ▶ NESTLE CONTINUES STEALING WORLD'S WATER DURING DROUGHT. Nestlé is draining California aquifers, from Sacramento alone taking 80 million gallons annually. Nestlé then sells the people's water back to them at great profit under many dozen brand names. http://www.mintpressnews.com/nestle-continues-stealing-worlds-water-during-drought/203544/
Documentary 1:15:09 Examines the role of the bottled water industry and its effects on our health, climate change, pollution, and our reliance on oil. The documentary is well structured and presents an overwhelming amount of evidence which will change the way anyone thinks about bottled and municipal water.http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/tapped/
July 12, 2013 Slate
-▶ YOU ARE PAYING 300 TIMES MORE FOR BOTTLED WATER THAN TAP WATERhttp://ow.ly/mX2oR
FastCoExist, August 26, 2014 IN BEIJING YOU CAN PAY FOR TRAIN RIDES WITH PLASTIC BOTTLES. Across the world, there are many ways to encourage recycling. Tax breaks, virtual points, deposit payments--there's no shortage of ideas. Recently, we even came across a machine in Istanbul that gives out dog food in return for a bottle or two. Beijing is now taking its own approach by giving free train rides and mobile phone top-ups to people redeeming used plastic. Machines in 34 locations take bottle deposits and calculate their worth, issuing a credit to the person's mobile account or transit pass. Sensors scan the bottle's weight and composition, then prompt users to choose their option.http://www.fastcoexist.com/3034720/in-beijing-you-can-pay-for-train-rides-with-plastic-bottles
Throughout the meeting, a misleading notion was continually raised that using private capital to fund water systems somehow constitutes an innovative approach to financing. This couldn’t be further from the truth....http://ecowatch.com/2013/will-public-water-be-privatized/
WATCH "FLOW: FOR LOVE OF WATER" 93 min Irena Salina's award-winning documentary investigation into what experts label the most important political and environmental issue of the 21st Century - The World Water Crisis. Salina builds a case against the growing privatization of the world's dwindling fresh water supply with an unflinching focus on politics, pollution, human rights, and the emergence of a domineering world water cartel.http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/flow-for-love-of-water/
June 17, 2013 Guardian Global Development - John Vidal - ▶ A VOICE FOR THE POOR: LA VIA CAMPESINA, WORLD'S LARGEST POLITICAL MOVEMENT, TO CHALLENGE MULTI-NATIONALS ON POVERTY AND INEQUALITY
- ▶ INNOVATION FOR A COMPLEX WORLD - PROMOTING THE WELL-BEING OF HUMANITYhttp://sco.lt/5Z51bV
July 16, 2013 Nation of Change
- ▶ ACHIEVING THE GREEN ECONOMY - CAPITAL HOMESTEADING
Capital Homesteading, which is based on binary economics, offers a way out of the quandary, which pits concern for the environment against immediate needs, desires, convenience, and the profit interests of powerful corporations.
As Capital Homesteading takes hold, Americans would not only become stronger consumers and "customers with money" but also gain stronger property interests in the environment and be better able to afford the greener choice.... http://www.nationofchange.org/achieving-green-economy-1373980790
- ▶ ECO-SPIRITUALITY: TOWARDS A VALUES-BASED ECONOMIC STRUCTUREhttp://sco.lt/7tcgQj
- ▶ INSTEAD OF TRYING TO FEED THE WORLD, LET'S HELP IT FEED ITSELF A Woman's POVhttp://sco.lt/5Oc5Jp
- ▶ A DREAM FORECLOSED: AS OBAMA TOUTS 'RECOVERY', RACIST ROOTS OF HOUSING CRISIS AND WALL STREET BUYBACKS AT FIRESALE PRICES REVEALEDhttp://sco.lt/8gXZYX
▶ WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WALL STREET OWNS THE NEIGHBORHOOD? MEET YOUR NEW LANDLORDhttp://sco.lt/5SjIVl
Article Highlights:Social Entrepreneurship has changed the way social change takes place.The change has three primary differentiating features: the blurring of the demarcation of profit and non-profit; the emphasis on impact and efficacy; and the sense of urgency and need to scale.
Whether there is a profit motive or not, the notion that business has a role to play in addressing societal issues is at the heart of today’s discourse on social entrepreneurship. Defining what social entrepreneurship is as well as the difference between it and traditional non-profit management as well as philanthropy is a flourishing discourse.,,, http://skollworldforum.org/2013/01/07/social-entrepreneurship-a-fundamental-game-changer/
Social Enterprise Buzz, February 03, 2014 -▶ EUROPEAN COMPANIES GET SERIOUS ABOUT SOCIAL INTRAPRENEURSHIP. A new project by CSR Europe http://www.csreurope.org/ a membership-funded organization of European companies sharing best practices in corporate social responsibility: “We decided to launch the European Social Intrapreneurship Programme (ESIP) in order to learn more in terms of what the companies are doing to foster social innovation inside their own organizations,” said project manager Alice Pedretti. “It’s still not very well-known and mainstream the concept of promoting the innovation coming from your own employees: employee-driven innovation.”
-▶ THE YOUNG SOCIAL ENTREPRENEURS WHO ARE CHANGING THE WORLD. - CHARITY AND BUSINESS
The easiest option in business is to take the path of least resistance, which in our current culture is to maximise profits and remain blinkered to the consequences of our actions. It therefore takes determination and self-awareness to be able to create an enterprise that integrates doing good with doing well, or – on a deeper level – merging heart and mind. http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/young-social-entrepreneurs-changing-the-world
NewsHour, PBS VIDEO REPORT -- START-UP-LAND: IRISH NOT WAITING AROUND FOR JOBS: PULLING YOURSELF UP BY YOUR BOOTSTRAPS - IRELAND CLIMBS OUT OF RECESSION ONE CHIP AT A TIME
Stanford Social Innovation Review ENTREPRENEURIAL EDUCATION - A new resource aims to nurture the next generation of social entrepreneurs and support them in their efforts to create social value in innovative ways. http://www.ssireview.org/blog/entry/entrepreneurial_education
- ▶ STRATASYS UNVEILS WORLD'S FIRST MULTI-COLOR, MULTI-MATERIAL 3D PRINTER
While Star Trek replicators still don't exist, we just moved a little closer to the dream, thanks to a new kind of 3D printer. 3D-printing manufacturer Stratasys just debuted the Objet500 Connex3, the world’s first 3D printer that can produce multi-color, multi-material objects at the same time...http://mashable.com/2014/01/27/stratasys-3d-printer/
University of Southern California - Viterbi School of Engineering -
- ▶ 3D PRINTING A BUILDING IN 24 HOURS. Behrokh Khoshnevis, professor of industrial and systems engineering as well as civil and environmental engineering, is creating a machine that will construct full-scale civil structures within hours -- that is, 3D-printing an entire building. Khoshnevis, also the Director of the Center for Rapid Automated Fabrication Technologies (CRAFT), is developing the technology that will make building a house within 24 hours possible, including conduits for electrical, plumbing, and air-conditioning.http://viterbi.usc.edu/news/news/2014/3d-printing-a.htm
- ▶ OFFICIAL WEBSITE: USC VITERBI - "CONTOUR CRAFTING" CC http://ow.ly/u0DGM
TED VIDEO, 11:59
Professor Behrokh Khoshnevis, USC, Viterbi School of Engineering
A professor at The University of Southern California has created a 3d printer that extrudes 1-inch lines of cement that is currently capable of constructing single walls, he intends to create a larger machine that is capable of creating a 2000 square foot house in 24 hours.
Sadhbh Walshe interviews founder of the Chipotle Mexican Grill, Steve Ells, about his mission to provide fast food with integrity.
Is it possible to be a profitable restaurant chain and still live up to your goal of serving "food with integrity" to an ever expanding customer base? Those who decry the dismal state of modern farming practices will say it's not. Steve Ells, CEO and founder of Chipotle Mexican Grill is trying to prove them wrong....http://www.guardian.co.uk/sustainable-business/chipotle-fast-food-integrity
We all have our opinions, principles and philosophies about life and we must be very careful about infringing on those of others. Every person should be able to follow that inner voice without external influences constantly telling them they’re wrong. However there is one choice we could all make right now that would transform our world to benefit all living things and the Earth itself.
That is, choosing nature and each other above all else. So many of us have been deschooled on this concept that it may take decades for the scales to tip so that we all start respecting our world again.
-▶ ECO-SPIRITUALITY: TOWARDS A VALUES-BASED ECONOMIC STRUCTUREhttp://sco.lt/92y1Ef
A TED VIDEO Louie Schwartzberg: TED.com "HIDDEN MIRACLES OF THE NATURAL WORLD" We live in a world of unseeable beauty, so subtle and delicate that it is imperceptible to the human eye. To bring this invisible world to light, filmmaker Louie Schwartzberg bends the boundaries of time and space with high-speed cameras, time lapses and microscopes. http://www.ted.com/talks/louie_schwartzberg_hidden_miracles_of_the_natural_world
-▶ KEEPING NATURE IN OUR FUTURE: HEALTHY ECOSYSTEMS ESSENTIAL FOR ECONOMIC AND PLANETARY SURVIVALhttp://sco.lt/99SfhJ
Marxist philosopher Slavoj Žižek discusses the ‘naturalization’ of capitalism and how ecology became a new field of capitalist investment. He also argues that the ultimate consequence of recent developments in biogenetics will be the ‘end of nature’ – anyone cares to introduce the good man into nextnature thinking? According to Žižek ecological apartheid will divide our urban society. Capitalism is not in control of nature and due to techno-scientific interventions the essence of the ecological order will be lost.http://www.nextnature.net/2009/02/ecology-a-new-opium-for-the-masses/
It does not take a Ph.D for commonsense to tell us that without Nature We Do Not Exist. If we were to foster, nurture and respect our natural world providing Her with Her needs, instead of focusing on ravishing Her for our wants, desires and profits - we would have a much more balanced world emotionally, psychologically and spiritually. To the degree the natural world is out of balance and "sick" so are we. To the degree we humans degrade and abuse Her, we degrade and abuse our own human race and all other species within the great web of life.
Let us return to simplicity of reconnecting to the source of our sustenance every moment of every day and let Nature teach us the path back to commonsense and sensibility
Multinational companies have been encouraged by the Indonesian Government to seize and deforest land owned by the indigenous peoples.. "The presence of palm oil plantations has spawned a new poverty and is triggering a crisis of landlessness and hunger. Human rights violations keep occurring around natural resources in the country and intimidation, forced evictions and torture are common," said Sarigih. "There are thousands of cases that have not surfaced. Many remain hidden, especially by local authorities," he says....
June 17, 2013 Guardian Global Development - John Vidal -▶ LA VIA CAMPESINA, WORLD'S LARGEST POLITICAL MOVEMENT, TO CHALLENGE MULTI-NATIONALS ON POVERTY AND INEQUALITY, LAND GRABS AND DEFORESTATION
Pambazuka, April 08, 2014 ▶ BRICS: THE SCRAMBLE FOR AFRICA. The BRICS are united in their drive for foreign direct investment, a thirst for natural resources and poor environmental regulation. A closer examination of the predatory capitalist penetration of each BRIC nation reveals multi-national companies carving up Africa in a similar way the countries of the 1884 Berlin conference did to Africa http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/features/91298
VIDEO:
FOREIGN CORPORATIONS DESTROYING ECOSYSTEMS, INDIGENOUS LIVELIHOODS, NULLIFYING LAND RIGHTS, CREATING A CULTURE OF DEPENDENCYhttp://sco.lt/4l725B
▶ MEGA MINING, FOREIGN LAND GRABS DESTROYING LOCAL COMMUNITIES, ENVIRONMENT AND ECOSYSTEMShttp://sco.lt/8nJQf3
-▶ DEFORESTATION, MINING RISES AGAIN IN BRAZIL'S AMAZON IMPACTING ECOSYSTEMS, CLIMATE AND INDIGENOUS LIVELIHOODS http://sco.lt/4ha4y9
ERADICATING ECOCIDE
WHY BUSINESS LEADERS MUST STEP UP TO THE CHALLENGE
HOW UK AND USA GOVERNMENTS SUPPORT FOR BIG AGRIBUSINESS IS FUELING POVERTYhttp://sco.lt/6UGd17
WATCH
SHORT VIDEO: RESOURCE RIGHTS
Grassroots International
Big business wants to control our resources--grabbing land, privatizing water, patenting seeds, and trying to squeeze out anyone who gets in the way of their profits. Fortunately, there is an alternative that places the rights of people and communities ahead of corporate interests--resource rights. http://www.grassrootsonline.org/issues/resource-rights
▶ WALL STREET, CORPORATIONS BUYING UP AMERICAN AND FOREIGN FARMLAND, THREATENING FUTURE OF U.S. AND WORLD AGRICULTUREhttp://sco.lt/8U908P
=========================
-▶ SHOULD COMPANIES COMPENSATE SOCIETY FOR ENVIRONMENTAL DESTRUCTION FROM WHICH THEY PROFIT?http://sco.lt/72Hsf3
Common Dream, April 22, 2014 -▶ CORPORATE COLONIALISM: PROTESTERS SLAM TRANS PACIFIC PARTNERSHIP.These secretive trade pacts are really about restoring global U.S. military power and economic dominancehttp://www.commondreams.org/headline/2014/04/22-3
▶ OBAMA'S SECRETIVE TRADE PACTS MOVING US TOWARDS CORPORATE GOVERNANCE AS CSR AND SOVEREIGN RIGHTS NEGOTIATED AWAYhttp://sco.lt/6JnpS5
=========================
▶ WEST PAPUA : 226 THOUSAND HECTARES OF VIRGIN FOREST WILL BE CLEARED FOR CORPORATE PALM OIL, DESTROYING ALL LIFE WITHIN IT AND INDIGENOUS COMMUNITIEShttp://sco.lt/5rAELZ
Intercontinental Cry Magazine, June 27, 2014 ▶ NICARAGUA'S MAYAGNA PEOPLE AND THEIR RAINFOREST COULD VANISH. More than 30,000 members of the Mayagna indigenous community are in danger of disappearing, along with the rainforest which is their home in Nicaragua, if the state fails to take immediate action to curb the destruction of the Bosawas Biosphere Reserve, the largest forest reserve in Central America and the third-largest in the world. http://intercontinentalcry.org/nicaraguas-mayagna-people-rainforest-vanish-24439/
-- WATCH -- VIDEO REPORT
"It is better to die from bullets than from hunger" September 15, 2013 The Real News
Mongabay, March 14, 2014 -▶ INDONESIAN SUGAR CORPORATION POISED TO DESTROY HALF OF ISLAND NATURAL FORESTS ON INDONESIA'S REMOTE ARU ISLANDSThe impacts on Aru's legendary biodiversity — on land and in the surrounding marine ecosystems — would be devastating. "The concessions in question takes away the rights of indigenous communities over their territories," Abdon said. "The livelihoods of local communities depend closely on existing natural resources and tenure security, and both will be destroyed.http://news.mongabay.com/2014/0315-aru-sugar-plantations.html
Mongabay, November 7, 2013 -▶ PALM OIL COMPANIES IGNORING COMMUNITY RIGHTS, NEW STUDY SHOWS,Members of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) are violating the rights of local communities in tropical forests and failing to live up to social and environmental commitmentshttp://news.mongabay.com/2013/1107-dparker-palm-oil-rights.html?n3ws1ttr
-▶ MASSIVE PALM OIL PLANTATION WILL "CUT THE HEART OUT" OF CAMEROON'S RAINFOREST, DESTROY INDIGENOUS COMMUNITIES AND WILDLIFE HABITAThttp://sco.lt/8lmMBF
-▶ THE PALM OIL HOLOCAUST: AND WE STAND BY AND ALLOW CORPORATE ECOCIDE?http://sco.lt/5wsAPh
-▶ INDONESIA:THE RAPE AND PILLAGE OF SUMATRAN TIGERS' LAST STRONGHOLDhttp://sco.lt/62jf3h
Mongabay, August 11, 2014 -▶ INDONESIA'S CHILDREN SEE RAVAGED ENVIRONMENT IN THEIR FUTURE. A generation ago, Borneo was one of the wildest places on the planet, a stronghold for species like orangutan, pygmy elephants, Sumatran rhinos, and clouded leopards among tens-of-thousands of other. But decades of logging and oil palm plantations has changed the landscape of Borneo forever: in fact a recent study found that the island has lost 73 percent of its intact lowland forest and 30 percent of its total forest cover since 1973. In the face of this large-scale environmental destruction, a new study in PLOS ONE finds that Indonesian Borneo's children have a pessimistic view of their future, predicting rising temperatures, wildlife declines, and continued destruction of the island's great rainforests.http://news.mongabay.com/2014/0811-hance-kalimantan-children.html
-▶ AN ECONOMY OF ENOUGH: A BETTER PLAN THAN ENDLESS GROWTH
To build a successful economy of enough, we would first need to eliminate the "growth imperative"—...
.....The thinking is that if we could just get people to produce and consume more stuff, then we could also pay off the debt, create jobs, eradicate poverty, and maybe even have some money left over to clean up the environment.
It's tempting to believe this economic fairy tale. But if growth is the cure to all of our ills, why are we in such a bind after sixty years of it? Even though the U.S. economy has more than tripled in size since 1950, surveys indicate that people have not become any happier. Inequality has risen sharply in recent years, and jobs are far from secure. At the same time, increased economic activity has led to greater resource use, dangerous levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, and declining biodiversity. There is now strong evidence that economic growth has become uneconomic in the sense that it costs more than it's worth.
Guardian Sustainable Business, January 02, 2014 ▶ 2015 WILL BE THE YEAR BRANDS TAKE A PUBLIC STAND ON SOCIAL ISSUES. WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SUSTAINABLE AND PRO-SOCIAL BRANDING?Pro-social brands are the next step for companies looking to morally engage with consumers. Driven by marketers who are moving beyond claims of sustainability and into strong stands on relevant social issues, this trend picked up momentum in 2014. It will be positively explosive in 2015.http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2015/jan/02/2015-social-justice-race-equality-rights-climate-business-marketing
InterPress Service, November 28, 2014 ▶ IS THE IDEA OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT BASED ON A FALSE CONSENSUS. The term sustainable development rapidly gained wide-scale acceptance, with the U.N. Commission on Sustainable Development just one of the many (inter)governmental or top-down bodies that have set up in the past three decades to include environmental goals in planning and policy.. The idea of sustainable development is based on a false consensus. Once this term and its underlying situations are properly deconstructed, Demaria tells IPS, “we discover that sustainable development is still all about development. And that is where the problem lies.” http://www.ipsnews.net/2014/11/down-with-sustainable-development-long-live-convivial-degrowth/
OnePlanet, May 27, 2014 -▶ MONBIOT: THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF GROWTH: To succeed is to destroy ourselves. To fail is to destroy ourselves. That is the bind we have created. The trajectory of compound growth shows that the scouring of the planet has only just begun. As the volume of the global economy expands, everywhere that contains something concentrated, unusual, precious will be sought out and exploited, its resources extracted and dispersed, the world’s diverse and differentiated marvels reduced to the same grey stubble. http://oneplanet-sustainability.org/2014/05/28/monbiot-how-you-measure-the-depth-of-our-problem-by-our-inability-even-to-discuss-it/
-▶ COMPANIES MUST STEP UP TO INCLUDE SOCIAL GOALS IN CORPORATE DECISIONShttp://sco.lt/5Far6P
Our politicians are hung up on keeping the growth curve rising. But does GDP really tell us all we need to know about a country's wealth and well-being? In this new RSA Short, Kate Raworth makes a powerful argument to look beyond economic growth alone for a true measure of prosperity and progress. Kate Raworth is a renegade economist teaching at Oxford University, and is focused on the rewriting of economics to make it a fit tool for addressing the 21st century's social and ecological challenges. She blogs on Doughnut Economics at http://www.kateraworth.com and tweets @KateRaworth
-▶ DO WE NEED RELENTLESS, ENDLESS ECONOMIC GROWTH? Critics question desirability of relentless economic growth. Ecologists warn that economic growth is strangling the natural systems on which life depends, creating not just wealth, but filth on a planetary scale. Carbon pollution is changing the climate. Water shortages, deforestation, tens of millions of acres of land too polluted to plant, and other global environmental ills are increasingly viewed as strategic risks by governments and corporations around the world. "The physical pressure that human activities put on the environment can't possibly be sustained," said Stanford University ecologist Gretchen Daily, who is at the forefront of efforts across the world to incorporate "natural capital," the value of such things as water, topsoil and genetic diversity that nature provides, into economic decision-making. ...http://www.sfgate.com/default/article/Critics-question-desirability-of-relentless-5114217.php
Guardian April 08, 2014, George Monbiot -▶ HOW HAVE THESE CORPORATIONS COLONIZED OUR PUBLIC LIFE?Power is shifting: to places in which we have no voice or vote. Domestic policies are forged by special advisers and spin doctors, by panels and advisory committees stuffed with lobbyistshttp://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/08/corporations-public-life-unilever
-▶ ON THE BACKS OF THE POOR : 2012 CORPORATE PROFITS HIT RECORD HIGH WHILE WORKER WAGES HIT RECORD LOW http://sco.lt/64Y1Tt
New York Times, February 25, 2014 -▶ RETHINKING OUR 'RIGHTS' TO DANGEROUS BEHAVIOURS. In the last few years, it’s become increasingly clear that food companies engineer hyper-processed foods in ways precisely geared to most appeal to our tastes. This technologically advanced engineering is done, of course, with the goal of maximizing profits, regardless of the effects of the resulting foods on consumer health, natural resources, the environment or anything else. But the issues go way beyond food, as the City University of New York professor Nicholas Freudenberg discusses in his new book, “Lethal but Legal: Corporations, Consumption, and Protecting Public Health.” Freudenberg’s case is that the food industry is but one example of the threat to public health posed by what he calls “the corporate consumption complex,” an alliance of corporations, banks, marketers and others that essentially promote and benefit from unhealthy lifestyles.http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/26/opinion/bittman-rethinking-our-rights-to-dangerous-behaviors.html?smid=fb-share&_r=0
HUGE INCREASE IN DIABETES, STROKES, HEART ATTACKS ON A GLOBAL SCALE -- THE AMERICAN DIET AND CONTEMPORARY FOOD PRODUCTIONhttp://sco.lt/80rmld
VIDEO REPORT PBS Newshour, February 26, 2014 MARKETING OF UNHEALTHY FOOD IN SCHOOLS U.S. Administration Unveils New Rules That Ban Marketing of Unhealthy Food in Schools to eliminate trans fats and limit the size of sodas and other sugary drinks. http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/younger-children-reducing-obesity-rates/
REWILD THE CHILD
If Children Lose Contact With Nature They Won't Fight For It
- ▶ REWILD THE CHILD: If Children Lose Contact With Nature, They Won't Fight For ithttp://sco.lt/5qndez
MORE, BIGGER, FASTER :
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT FACTORY FARMING YOUR ANIMAL FOOD:Anti-Whistle-blower Ag Laws Want To Keep You From Knowing How Your Food is "Produced"http://sco.lt/5n7fqD
SOUNDING AN ALARM ON ECONOMIC DYSFUNCTON BY PRACTICING SUSTAINABLE LIVING. Paul Solman profiles Chris Martenson, a former neuro-science professional who gave up his large home, high-status job with all the perks for life in rural Massachusetts. From there he began expressing his deep dissatisfaction with the way the U.S. economy works, rejecting the concept of chasing money and endless Economic Growth Itself and redefines "wealth: How Many Times Can The World Be Twice As Big? https://www.econedlink.org/resources/making-sene-with-paul-solman-sounding-an-alarm-on-economic-dysfunction-by-practicing-sustainable-living/
Guardian April 08, 2014, George Monbiot -▶ HOW HAVE THESE CORPORATIONS COLONIZED OUR PUBLIC LIFE? Power is shifting: to places in which we have no voice or vote. Domestic policies are forged by special advisers and spin doctors, by panels and advisory committees stuffed with lobbyists http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/08/corporations-public-life-unilever
New York Times, March 11, 2014 AGRITOPIA: FARM-TO-TABLE TAKES ROOT. The neighborhood is called Agritopia, and it’s one of a growing number of so-called agrihoods, residential developments where a working farm is the central feature, in the same way that other communities may cluster around a golf course, pool or fitness center. The real estate bust in 2008 halted new construction, but with the recovery, developers are again breaking ground on farm-focused tracts. At least a dozen projects across the country are thriving, enlisting thousands of home buyers who crave access to open space, verdant fields and fresh food... http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/12/dining/farm-to-table-living-takes-root.html?_r=0
Guardian, April 07, 2014 ▶ TURNING THE GLOBAL ECONOMY INTO LOCAL CONNECTED COMMUNITIES. "We no longer know where our food comes from when it ends up on our plate or where the waste goes when we finish a meal," observes Michelle Long, founder and chief executive of Balle .. Repairing the broken relationships wrought by the combination of economic globalization and corporate giantism is essential. And not only for our economy, which she argues will become more resilient and more productive as it becomes more local (ie boasting shorter supply chains, greater local ownership, closer proximity to the environment, higher socially inclusivity and so forth). But the more connected as individuals we are, she maintains, the happier and more fulfilled we'll be as human beings. http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/global-economy-connected-communities-local
- ▶ ACHIEVING THE GREEN ECONOMY - CAPITAL HOMESTEADING
Capital Homesteading, which is based on binary economics, offers a way out of the quandary, which pits concern for the environment against immediate needs, desires, convenience, and the profit interests of powerful corporations.
As Capital Homesteading takes hold, Americans would not only become stronger consumers and "customers with money" but also gain stronger property interests in the environment and be better able to afford the greener choice.... http://www.nationofchange.org/achieving-green-economy-1373980790
Fast Company, February 2, 2014 ▶HOW PATAGONIA IS INCREASING PROFITS WHILE SAVING THE WORLD. Since Rose Marcario joined Patagonia six years ago, the badass-by-nature company has tripled its profits. And no, it hasn't sold its soul.
- ▶ THE CIRCULAR ECONOMY. COULD IT PRESENT A NEW WAY OF DOING BUSINESS?http://sco.lt/8plSHx
- ▶ REWILD THE CHILD: IF CHILDREN LOSE CONTACT WITH NATURE, THEY WON'T FIGHT FOR IT http://sco.lt/5qndez
▶ A GREEN, COMMONS-BASED GOVERNANCE: THE RIGHT TO A CLEAN AND HEALTHY ENVIRONMENT FOR ALL SPECIEShttp://sco.lt/8qokwj
WATCH DOCUMENTARY (88 min) "SEEDS OF PERMACULTURE" - ECOLOGICAL FARMING People are becoming less and less self-sufficient around the world, these local communities that were previously growing everything themselves and knew how to build their own houses out of natural materials are completely dependent on big foreign powers and import from other countries. ... http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/seeds-permaculture/
- ▶ ECONOMIC SUCCESS ALONE IS NOT ENOUGH TO IMPROVE OUR WELL BEINGhttp://sco.lt/7J7VnF
- ▶ A 21st CENTURY COOPERATIVE WAY TO A FLOURISHING FUTURE: SELF-SUFFICIENT COMMUNITIEShttp://sco.lt/8roT21
- ▶ BUSINESS SHOULD CONTRIBUTE TO SOCIAL HEALTH AND WELL BEING OF THEIR LOCAL COMMUNITIEShttp://sco.lt/5Ktuuf
- ▶ THE GREAT AMERICAN CORPORATE GIVEAWAY: OUR PUBLIC WILDLIFE PRESERVES: DESTROYING OUR FORESTS FOR "GREEN" ENERGY AND BIG AGRICULTUREhttp://sco.lt/7gfXAv
▶ DEADLY PRE-TREATED PESTICIDE SEEDS/PLANTS SOLD AS 'BEE FRIENDLY' INTO CONSUMER MARKET -- UNLABELEDhttp://sco.lt/93qJaj
Nightly Business Report, March 09, 2015 ▶ BIG PHARMA RIPPING US OFF - AGAIN - OBAMACARE Spending on specialty medicines, such as those for inflammatory diseases, multiple sclerosis and cancer—as well as hepatitis C—rose an unprecedented 31 percent http://nbr.com/2015/03/10/specialty-drug-spending-sees-record-increase/
NBR, July 15, 2014 ▶ HEPATITIS C DRUG SOLVADI DRAW A RECORD $2.27 BILLION IN REVENUE IN ITS FIRST QUARTER ON THE MARKET. PUTTING IT ON PACE FOR THE FASTEST DRUG LAUNCH OF ALL TIMEhttp://nbr.com/2014/07/15/the-next-hepatitis-c-nash/
Smithsonian, March 05, 2015 ▶ U.S. HEROIN OVERDOSE RATE NEARLY QUADRUPLES AS PRESCRIPTION PAIN KILLERS BECOME MORE DIFFICULT TO ABUSE
THE MASSIVE U.S. PRESCRIPTION OPIOID DRUG ADDICTION PBS Newshour, January 06, 2015
The United States is in the midst of a severe epidemic of prescription opioid addiction and overdose deaths. According to the CDC, this is the worst drug epidemic in United States’ history...there are more Americans dying from painkiller overdoses who are getting these medications from doctors than young people who we now see switching to heroin.
VIDEO REPORT Democracy Now, October16, 2014 AN UNPROFITABLE DISEASE: IN THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF EBOLA.Ebola is not profitable for the pharmaceutical industry. "I think we need to begin to ask whether capitalism itself is not pathogenic, whether neoliberalism is not pathogenic."http://www.democracynow.org/2014/10/16/an_unprofitable_disease_in_the_political
Alternet, November 13, 2014 ▶ THE MOST POPULAR DRUG IN AMERICA IS AN ANTIPSYCHOTIC AND NO ONE REALLY KNOWS HOW IT WORKS. Pharma marketers have devised ways to market drugs like Abilify to the whole population, not just people with severe mental illness. Only one percent of the population, after all, has schizophrenia and only 2.5 percent has bipolar disorder. Here are some of the ways Big Pharma made antipsychotics everyday drugs.http://www.alternet.org/most-popular-drug-america-antipsychotic-and-no-one-really-knows-how-it-works
▶ BIG PHARMA SPENDS $65.4 MILLION ON LOBBYING IN Q1 OF 2014.It's an astronomical amount for any industry to spend on winning over politicians and special interest groups. http://ow.ly/wXCfN
Bloomberg, February 06, 2014 ▶ BREAKING THE BOND OF HEROIN AND PAINKILLERS. "Many individuals who have become addicted to prescription painkillers (a group that includes OxyContin, Vicodin, Percocet and Roxicodone) at some point realize that, depending on where they live, heroin, which is pharmacologically similar, is cheaper and easier to get."http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-06/heroin-and-painkillers-come-together.html?alcmpid=view
VIDEO REPORT PBS Newshour, February 03, 2014 WHY MORE AMERICANS ARE GETTING HIGH
Knowledge Ecology International, January 22, 2014 ▶ BAYER CEO, MARJIN DEKKERS: NEXAVAR PATENTED CANCER DRUG IS FOR "WESTERN PATIENTS WHO CAN AFFORD IT"http://keionline.org/node/1910
- ▶ LEGALIZATION OF MARIJUNA A BIG PHARMA BONANZA: THE CORPORATIZATION OF MARIJUANA IN THE USAhttp://sco.lt/4xaV4T
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OBAMA'S AFFORDABLE CARE ACT
NO CAPS ON PHARMACEUTICAL OR MEDICAL DEVICE PRICING
A BONANZA FOR CORPORATIONS
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Naked Capitalism, December 5, 2013 ▶ "OBAMACARE' S DRUG COVERAGE MINEFIELD - Obamacare is a stealth handout to insurers and Big Pharma. It is intended to force more healthy individuals who went uninsured into the pool, and it also allows insurers to fatten their profit margins from pre-Obamacare rules. Big Pharma benefits from a prohibition on drug re=importation... http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2013/12/obamacares-drug-coverage-minefield.html
▶ SENATORS PRESS MEDICARE FOR ANSWERS TO DRUG PROGRAM - ProPublica reporters, using Medicare’s own data, identified scores of doctors whose prescription patterns within the program bore the hallmarks of fraud. The cost of medications prescribed by one Miami doctor jumped from $282,000 to $4 million in one yearhttp://www.propublica.org/article/senators-press-medicare-for-answers-on-drug-program
▶ HOW BIG PHARMA MARKETS TO, AND PROFITS FROM, A 'CAN'T-PAY-ATTENTION NATION'A twenty-year marketing campaign has made highly powerful stimulants into household names... and they're just getting startedhttp://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/12/16-0
July 21, 2013 The Guardian ▶ BIG PHARMA MOBILISING PATIENTS IN BATTLE OVER DRUG TRIAL DATA:The pharmaceutical industry has "mobilised" an army of patient groups to lobby against plans to force companies to publish secret documents on drugs trials BEFORE going to markethttp://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2013/jul/21/big-pharma-secret-drugs-trials
Australian Broadcasting Corporation ▶ NEGOTIATING OUR HEALTH AT TRANS PACIFIC PARTNERSHIP TALKSThe leaked text, dated August 30, 2013, shows that the United States is continuing to push for extreme intellectual property privileges that would expand and prolong patent monopolies at the expense of affordable access to medicines. Keeping medicines under patent for longer means paying more for drugs. But who would bear this cost?
DETROIT A 'SPECTACULAR FAILURE' OF A SYSTEM THAT REDISTRIBUTES PAY FROM BOTTOM TO TOPhttp://sco.lt/4ijjLF
Cutting off water to those who can’t afford it has roots in a long-standing, inequitable pricing scheme
Thomson Reuters Foundation, November 13, 2014 ▶ REPORT: SOARING WATER BILLS SEE PRIVATISED WATER SERVICE HANDED BACK TO PUBLIC SECTOR - Soaring water bills, a lack of transparency and under investment have persuaded governments worldwide to give back control of privatised water services to the public sector,http://www.trust.org/item/20141113171925-yvddq/?source=leadCarousel
Food & Water Watch, March 06, 2013 THE STRUGGLE FOR WATER IN THE AMERICAS
Truthout, August 01, 2014 - ▶ BIG PLAYERS PROMOTE WATER PRIVATIZATION. Americans used to take water for granted, but the water shutoff in Detroit has taught us all-important lessons. We now know that the private sector is willing to be ruthless in denying access to the most basic needs of living beings, and we also know that even those who have the least resources can also have power - if they are organized.http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/25308-big-players-promoting-water-privatization
WATCH Democracy Now, June 24, 2014 WATER IS A HUMAN RIGHT: DETROIT RESIDENTS SEEK U.N. INTERVENTION AS CITY SHUTS OFF TAPS TO THOUSANDS. Activists say Detroit is trying to push through a private takeover of its water system at the expense of basic rights.http://www.democracynow.org/2014/6/24/water_is_a_human_right_detroit
Guardian Environment, September 18, 2014 ▶ INVESTORS CALL FOR CLIMATE CHANGE DEAL.Ahead of a UN climate summit in New York next week, Institutional investors managing £15tn of assets have called for an ambitious global climate deal to give them certainty to invest in clean technology. ...the investors are also calling on governments to phase out subsidies for fossil fuels, an estimated £370bn worldwide a year, five times the £60bn paid in renewables subsidies.http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/sep/18/investors-call-for-climate-change-deal
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WALL STREET SPEAKS OUT
New York Times, June 21, 2014
"WE CAN PREVENT A 'CLIMATE CRASH' WITH A CARBON TAX
OpEd by Henry M. Paulson Jr., Fmr. US Treasury Secretary
"THERE is a time for weighing evidence and a time for acting. And if there’s one thing I’ve learned throughout my work in finance, government and conservation, it is to act before problems become too big to manage.
For too many years, we failed to rein in the excesses building up in the nation’s financial markets.
When the credit bubble burst in 2008, the damage was devastating. Millions suffered. Many still do.
We’re making the same mistake today with climate change. We’re staring down a climate bubble that poses enormous risks to both our environment and economy. The warning signs are clear and growing more urgent as the risks go unchecked.
"We are building up excesses (debt in 2008, greenhouse gas emissions that are trapping heat now). Our government policies are flawed (incentivizing us to borrow too much to finance homes then, and encouraging the overuse of carbon-based fuels now). Our experts (financial experts then, climate scientists now) try to understand what they see and to model possible futures. And the outsize risks have the potential to be tremendously damaging (to a globalized economy then, and the global climate now)"http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/22/opinion/sunday/lessons-for-climate-change-in-the-2008-recession.html?_r=0
VIDEO - CNN FMR. U.S. TREASURY SECY. RUBIN ON CLIMATE CHANGE:
"THE RISK HERE IS CATASTROPHIC".
CNN’s FAREED ZAKARIA GPS features an interview with the former U.S. Treasury Secretary under George W. Bush, Henry Paulson, and the former U.S. Treasury Secretary under Bill Clinton, Robert Rubin. Paulson and Rubin speak with Fareed about their new report on the future of our environment if Americans do not start taking preventative measures against climate change, the cost of inaction, and the limitations to progress posed by Washington. http://cnnpressroom.blogs.cnn.com/2014/06/29/fmr-u-s-treasury-secy-rubin-on-climate-change-the-risk-here-is-catastrophic/?iref=allsearch
-▶ MONBIOT: THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF GROWTH:To succeed is to destroy ourselves. To fail is to destroy ourselves. That is the bind we have created. The trajectory of compound growth shows that the scouring of the planet has only just begun. As the volume of the global economy expands, everywhere that contains something concentrated, unusual, precious will be sought out and exploited, its resources extracted and dispersed, the world’s diverse and differentiated marvels reduced to the same grey stubble. http://oneplanet-sustainability.org/2014/05/28/monbiot-how-you-measure-the-depth-of-our-problem-by-our-inability-even-to-discuss-it/
▶ WORLD BANK PRESIDENT: CLIMATE CHANGE AND INEQUALITY IS BREWING GLOBAL SOCIAL UPHEAVALhttp://sco.lt/88cdJR
EcoWatch, July 08, 2014 ▶ David Suzuki : THE ECONOMICS OF GLOBAL WARMING AND CLIMATE DENIAL
In failing to act on global warming, many leaders are putting jobs and economic prosperity at risk, according to recent studies. It’s suicidal, both economically and literally, to focus on the fossil fuel industry’s limited, short-term economic benefits at the expense of long-term prosperity, human health and the natural systems, plants and animals that make our well-being and survival possible. Those who refuse to take climate change seriously are subjecting us to enormous economic risks and foregoing the numerous benefits that solutions would bring...http://ecowatch.com/2014/07/08/economics-of-global-warming/
▶ HOW RIGGED IS THE FOSSIL FUEL MARKET? UNEARTHING THE TRUE COST OF FOSSIL FUELShttp://sco.lt/97hfX7
PRICING CARBON & CARBON CAPTURE
A FAILED STRATEGY THAT WON'T SAVE THE CLIMATE OR PLANET
Lucy Siegle: Multinational companies do have the power to make things better and perhaps they are beginning to show it
Guardian Sustainable Business, June 21, 2014
▶ WHY DOES BIG BUSINESS WANT TO SAVE THE WORLD? Can we trust the Earth's future to capitalists?
Multinational companies do have the power to make things better and perhaps they are beginning to show it. Consumers, stand by to feel increasingly uplifted and guilt-free! The foremost means of "empowering global consumers",
The Global Consumer Goods Forum, Boring old corporate social responsibility has turned into a muscular version of values-led capitalism, filling a political vacuum. "If hundreds of the world's most powerful companies can agree to get behind an ambitious call for any type of political action, world leaders should pay attention," said Winnie Byanyima, executive director of Oxfam International.
-▶ THE OPEN SOURCE REVOLUTION IS COMING AND IT WILL CONQUER THE 1% - EX CIA SPY.
Today's capitalism, he argues, is inherently predatory and destructive: "Over the course of the last centuries, the commons was fenced, and everything from agriculture to water was commoditised without regard to the true cost in non-renewable resources. Human beings, who had spent centuries evolving away from slavery, were re-commoditised by the Industrial Era."
Open source everything, in this context, offers us the chance to build on what we've learned through industrialisation, to learn from our mistakes, and catalyse the re-opening of the commons, in the process breaking the grip of defunct power structures and enabling the possibility of prosperity for all.
"Sharing, not secrecy, is the means by which we realise such a lofty destiny as well as create infinite wealth.
Based on original research into public documents, the film describes the tax system employed by multinational companies in Africa and the global system.
Rüschlikon is a village in Switzerland with a very low tax rate and very wealthy residents. But it receives more tax revenue than it can use. This is largely thanks to one resident - Ivan Glasenberg, CEO of Glencore, whose copper mines in Zambia are not generating a large bounty tax revenue for the Zambians. Zambia has the 3rd largest copper reserves in the world, but 60% of the population live on less than $1 a day and 80% are unemployed https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNYemuiAOfU
Why We Can't End Poverty Until We Change the Justice System
Gary Haugen and Victor Boutros's "The Locust Effect: Why the End of Poverty Requires the End of Violence" focuses on the central role of violence in perpetuating poverty, and shows that if any headway is to be made, this issue has to become a top priority for policymakers. Simply put, if people aren't safe, nothing else matters. Shipping grain to the poor, helping them vote, or assisting their efforts to start a farm is irrelevant. Whatever material improvements we provide will simply wash away in the face of the corrupt police forces, out-of-control, armies, private militias, organized criminals, and — not least — failed justice systems that plague countries, especially poor countries. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JY0FRy4JLYo
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The only thing Businesses need to give to all is the letter of acceptance articulated through the presence of an open and inviting door.
Article advocating business doing more for health and wellbeing in their communities. Unusually it recognises that small businesses often do this best than large ones.
YOU ARE INVITED TO FOLLOW MY NEWS AGGREGATES
▶ OUR OCEANS NEED US http://www.scoop.it/t/our-oceans-need-us
▶ CLIMATE CHANGE WILL IMPACT US ALL http://www.scoop.it/t/changingplanet
▶ CORPORATE "SOCIAL" RESPONSIBILITY http://www.scoop.it/t/environmental-and-human-health
▶ BIODIVERSITY IS LIFE http://www.scoop.it/t/biodiversity-is-life
▶ YOUR FOOD, YOUR HEALTH http://www.scoop.it/t/agriculture-gmos-pesticides