Replies to post #324039 on Tornado Alley (PROG)

[Homebrew]

Hamburger-eaters look in the mirror for Amazon-Burning reason. They want more grazing land for cattle (hamburgers etc...)

G7 leaders unite over efforts to extinguish Brazil's burning Amazon, where over 41,000 fires rage

The Amazon is about one-half the size of Europe. It supplies about 20% of earth's oxygen and absorbs about
25% of global emissions. On entering office Bolsonaro vowed to put the economy above everything else.

[fuagf]

As Trump Swerves on Trade War, It’s Whiplash for the Rest of the World

"G7 leaders unite over efforts to extinguish Brazil's burning Amazon, where over 41,000 fires rage"


President Trump at the close of the Group of 7 summit meeting in Biarritz, France. Erin Schaff/The New York Times

By Peter Baker

Aug. 26, 2019, 7:04 p.m. ET

BIARRITZ, France — Remember when President Xi Jinping of China was the “enemy” ..

....My only question is, who is our bigger enemy, Jay Powell or Chairman Xi?

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 23, 2019

? That was so Friday. As of Monday, according to President Trump, Mr. Xi was “a great leader” and a “brilliant man.”

What about that edict by Mr. Trump, who “hereby ordered” .. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/23/business/china-tariffs-trump.html?module=inline .. American companies to leave China? Three days later, he was positive he would get a trade deal and, if so, then firms should “stay there and do a great job.”

Mr. Trump spent the weekend in France insisting that he was not having a debate with his fellow world leaders, but at times it seemed like he was having a debate with himself. Day by day, even hour by hour, his approach to the trade war with China, the most consequential economic conflict on the planet, veered back and forth, leaving much of the world with geopolitical whiplash.

If he seemed all over the map, he made clear on Monday, as he wrapped up days of diplomacy, that the world would just have to get used to it. He likes leaving negotiating partners, adversaries, observers and even allies off balance.

“Sorry!” he told reporters, sounding anything but apologetic. “It’s the way I negotiate. It’s the way I negotiate. It’s done very well for me over the years, and it’s doing even better for the country.”

The way he negotiates at times involves facts that may not be facts, statements that may not have been said and episodes that may not have occurred. And at times, he denied saying what he had said.

On Sunday, he said he had “second thoughts” .. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/25/world/europe/trump-offers-contradictory-signals-on-china-trade-war.html?module=inline .. about escalating the trade war with China, only to have staff members later insist that his only regret was not escalating it more. By Monday morning, he was ratcheting back the rhetoric and predicting a deal with Mr. Xi, whom he pronounced a “great leader” four times.

To explain his renewed optimism, he cited two phone calls he said the Americans had received from the Chinese seeking to resume official negotiations. China, however, failed to confirm any phone calls, and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin then said the administration had been communicating with Beijing’s top negotiator “through intermediaries.”

More - https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/26/world/asia/trump-g7-meeting.html

Mining out the 1% of Trump's shameless utterances which could be true is not a welcome task.

[fuagf]

Marijuana cultivation whittling away Madagascar’s largest connected forest

"G7 leaders unite over efforts to extinguish Brazil's burning Amazon, where over 41,000 fires rage"

by Edward Carver on 29 May 2020

Mongabay Series: Forest Trackers

* Northern Madagascar contains the largest block of connected forest left in the country.

* Tsaratanana Reserve is supposed to protect a large portion of this forest. However, satellite data and imagery show Tsaratanana is being cleared at a rapid rate.

* Local officials say slash-and-burn agriculture for marijuana cultivation is to blame. The Madagascar National Parks agency helped organize military deployments to the Tsaratanana area in 2014 and 2017, and is planning another intervention this year.

* Scientists say that if this deforestation continues, it will fragment the reserve’s well-connected forests and threaten the animals that live there — many of which are found nowhere else in the world.

Between the cacao fields of northwest Madagascar and the vanilla of the northeast, a chain of rainforests bob along the highland interior. Tsaratanana Reserve, home to the country’s highest peak, has long been a key link in the chain, with abundant primary forest mostly undisturbed by human activity. Yet the reserve now faces threats on an unprecedented scale.

Primary and secondary forest in Tsaratanana Reserve is being cleared at a rapid rate, according to satellite data from the University of Maryland visualized on Global Forest Watch (GFW). Local officials say slash-and-burn agriculture for marijuana cultivation is to blame. Scientists say that if this deforestation continues, it will fragment the reserve’s well-connected forests and threaten the animals that live there — many of which are endemic, which means they’re found nowhere else in the world.

[...]


A leaf-tailed gecko. Image by Charles J. Sharp via Wikimedia Commons (SS BY-SA 4.0).

[...]


Tsaratanana is home to endangered aye-ayes (Daubentonia madagascariensis), which are the world’s
largest nocturnal primates. While they may look a little nightmarish, aye-ayes are peaceful
creatures that use their long fingers to fish grubs out of holes in trees.
Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay.

Vences said the new satellite data spells bad news for the forest. “Certainly, this extensive deforestation will be a serious threat to many of the endemic species in Tsaratanana and entire northern Madagascar,” he wrote in an email. He said he was not surprised to see that most of the clearing was in the north of park, given its proximity to coastal communities that rely more on shifting cultivation.

Malagasy officials say that people are clearing the reserve’s forest to grow marijuana.

https://news.mongabay.com/2020/05/marijuana-cultivation-whittling-away-madagascars-largest-connected-forest/