globalbriefs


News and resources to inspire concerned citizens to work together in building a healthier, stronger society that benefits all.


Cut Abuse Government Steps In to Curb Greenwashing


The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has issued updated green marketing guidelines intended to stop advertisers from making deceptive or unqualified claims about products being environmentally beneficial or eco-friendly, called “greenwash- ing”. The FTC said that few products deliver the far-reaching environmental benefits that consumers associate with such claims, and they are nearly impossible to substantiate. The revision is the first since 1998, when phrases like “carbon footprint” and “renewable energy” were relatively new. Using input from consumers and industry groups, new sections address the use of carbon offsets, “green” certifications and seals, and renewable energy and renewable materials claims. Marketers are warned not to make broad, unqualified assertions that their products are environmentally benign or eco-friendly. Arthur Weissman, president and CEO of Green Seal Inc., a nonprofit environ- mental certification organization based in Washington, D.C., says, “We hope that there will be enforcement to help rid the marketplace of the many less-than-credi- ble seals and greenwashing that exist.” The new guidelines are not rules or regulations, but general principles that describe the types of environmental claims the FTC may find deceptive. They do not address use of the terms “sustainable”, “natural” and “organic”.


Source: The Christian Science Monitor


Shell Game Turtles Facing Extinction Get Help


The Turtle Survival Alliance Foundation (TSA) is opening a facility to house some of the world’s most endangered freshwater turtles and tortoises near Charleston, South Carolina. The 50-acre Turtle Survival Center will maintain living groups, or assurance colonies, of many species facing an uncertain future in the wild. The center will house 20 species of fresh-


water turtles and tortoises ranked “critically endangered” by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. Nine are also on the Turtle Conservation Coalition list of the world’s most endangered tortoises and freshwater turtles. According to TSA President Rick Hudson, “No group of animals is under greater threat or faces a higher risk of extinction than freshwater turtles and tor- toises.” The center will focus on species that have little chance of being recovered in nature because of habitat loss and intensive hunting pressures. Some species have undergone such dramatic declines that without interven- tion, their extinction is imminent. It’s hoped that offspring born at the center will eventually repopulate their ancestral habitats.


Contribute to the TSA Turtle Survival Center capital campaign to help at TurtleSurvival.org.


Dirty Pool Great Lakes Under Siege by Global Warming


Don Scavia, director of the University of Michigan Graham Sustainability Institute, stated in a regional leaders’ conference that climate change is aggravating the effects of devastating algae blooms in the Great Lakes by increasing the intensity of spring rains that wash phosphorus into the water. Rampant algae levels degrade


water quality because as algae decompose, oxygen levels can drop low enough to kill fish. After the United States and Canada signed the initial Great Lakes Water Qual- ity Agreement in 1972, many local governments banned detergents containing phosphorus and the algae problem faded, but it has returned in the past decade.


Analysts note that while the


practice of planting crops without plowing the ground may help prevent erosion, it leaves high concentrations of fertilizer phosphorus in the up- per layers of soil, where it easily runs off into waterways. A task force of academic and government experts has recommended more than 50 helpful practices, including providing funding and technical assistance for phospho- rus reduction projects; authorizing state regulators to require pollution reduction measures in stressed water- sheds; and working with farmers and equipment manufacturers to develop fertilizer application methods that avoid runoff.


Source: EarthKnowledge.net natural awakenings January 2013 11


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