WASHINGTON — World food production faces a serious decline within the century due to global warming emissions. World food production faces a serious decline within the century due to global warming emissions. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) www.fao.org held a special session in Rome, Italy, [September 10-12] to discuss the impact of climate change on world food security. Experts say that if industrial emissions continue to rise as predicted, the warming temperatures, increased rainfall, droughts and floods resulting from global warming threaten to disrupt farming systems around the world, with developing nations expected to fare the worst. In Washington this week, a new country-by-country analysis describes in detail the impact climate change is likely to have on global agriculture. By the end of this century, if current trends continue, world agriculture will be in serious trouble, according to economist William Cline, senior fellow with the Center for Global Development and the Peterson Institute for International Economics. His new study, Global Warming and Agriculture finds that global agriculture potential could fall by about five to 15 or 20 percent as a result of global warming, if nothing is done by the 2080s. But, he says, that […]
Edward Mazria wants people to know how rising sea levels made worse by global warming will affect residents along U.S. coastlines. Goodbye, Hollywood, Fla. So long, Boston. New Orleans? Forget about it. ‘We’re not talking about South Sea islands and Bangladesh here,’ Mazria said. ‘We’re talking about the U.S. being physically under siege with a very small increment of sea level rise.’ Mazria isn’t a climatologist. He’s not even a scientist. He’s an architect who gave up running his company in January to devote his time to a nonprofit group he founded several years ago. Called Architecture 2030, the organization tries to bring attention to the amount of greenhouse gas emissions that the building sector contributes to global warming through inefficient electricity use, lighting, heating and cooling. ‘The building sector is responsible for close to half of all energy consumption in this country and close to half of all greenhouse gas emissions,’ he said. Buildings are the single largest contributor to global warming, he said, emitting more than even automobiles. To demonstrate Mazria’s point, Architecture 2030 has compiled a report that features images depicting the dramatic effects of sea level rise […]
Punishing prisoners for sexual misconduct by making them wear pink places them in peril, a South Carolina inmate says in a lawsuit against the state’s penal system. The suit is the latest development in a nationwide effort by prison and jail officials to tap the power of pink to subdue criminals. In the South Carolina case, Sherone Nealous claims that forcing inmates to wear pink is discriminatory and makes them more likely to be assaulted by other inmates. Nealous is serving time at the Allendale Correctional Institution for assault and battery with intent to kill, aggravated assault and assault and battery on a police officer. ‘When the inmate population views an inmate wearing a pink jumpsuit, it is known that the clothing was assigned by (the Department of Corrections) as punishment for sexual misconduct,’ states a legal memorandum filed by the department. It ‘conveys no suggestion that the inmate wearing the jumpsuit is a willing participant in homosexual activity or otherwise vulnerable to ¦ assault.’ Jon Ozmint, director of the South Carolina Department of Corrections, and Russell Harter, an attorney representing the prison system, declined to comment further because of the ongoing litigation. Court documents […]
Considering Greg Bass has completed two Ironman Wisconsin races, you’d figure health insurers would love to cover the fit and trim 46-year-old. Well, not exactly. Bass is facing a staggering 30 percent hike in premiums from Physicians Plus Insurance Corp. for himself and fellow employees at Park Printing in Verona. As third generation owner of the family business, Bass prides himself on providing competitive benefits to his skilled, albeit graying, workforce. But the cost of a top-quality health plan with limited co-pays and deductibles is a benefit the small business can no longer afford, he said. Bass said he’s used to annual double-digit increases in insurance costs, which are split 80/20 with employees. The latest hike, however, may send printing professionals looking for another job or just dropping coverage entirely. ‘I don’t want to sound like the alarmist …. but the situation is about as desperate as it could be,’ he said. While the Park Printing situation is extreme, there’s no shortage of horror stories when it comes to the nation’s health care situation. The costs are staggering, with America spending twice as much per capita on health care as most other nations. […]
They dreamt of love, marriage and children. But, as a new book reveals, the Great War robbed two million women of the men they would have married, leading many into relationships which could only be whispered about… One hazy morning in 1917 the senior mistress of Bournemouth High School For Girls stood up in front of the assembled sixth form and announced to her hushed audience: ‘I have come to tell you a terrible fact. ‘Only one out of ten of you girls can ever hope to marry. This is not a guess of mine. It is a statistical fact. ‘Nearly all the men who might have married you have been killed. You will have to make your way in the world as best you can. ‘The war has made more openings for women than there were before. But there will still be a lot of prejudice. You will have to fight. You will have to struggle.’ Long terms statistics show that 35 per cent of women failed to marry during their ‘reproductive’ years Sitting in the assembly hall among her shocked and silent schoolfellows was 17-year-old Rosamund Essex. She was never to […]
Remote Viewing the Year 2060
