Green Issues

Hey Citizens of the Green World!

Last week, I was discussing with some students of mine about "Green Issues", how green they think they are and stuff we could all do to be a little bit greener. There were many "confessions", for example, most of us still use plastic bags when we go shopping... Sorry, planet! It's on my resolution list 2011 to quit using plastic bags!

Well, anyway, I think the most insteresting and controversial topic about this is the construction of the Complexo Hidrelétrico do Madeira, a.k.a. the Belo Monte dam. It's a gigantic project and it will also affect Bolivia and its inhabitants who depend on those rivers to survive.

I became familiar with this documentary because a student of mine is a Forest Engineer and she brought it to class for discussion. I was immediately shocked, principally because it's not in the media... Hm... I wonder why!

You can check the video: http://www.amazonia.org.br/noticias/noticia.cfm?id=345936

Here's a summary of it:

The Madeira River Complex

The enormous Madeira River Complex, in the tri-border region of Peru, Bolivia, and Brazil is one of the Integrated Regional Infrastructure for South America's (IIRSA) anchor projects. It would transform the Madre de Dios-Beni-Mamoré-Itenez-Madeira river system into a major corridor for energy production and raw material export. The proposal includes the construction of four hydroelectric dams, most importantly the Santo Antônio and Jirau dams in Rondônia, Brazil. Together, these two dams would produce a projected 6,450 megawatts of hydroelectricity, totaling eight percent of the Brazilian energy matrix. By comparison, this is equal to half of the electricity produced by Itaipu dam in the Brazilian state of Paraná, the world’s largest hydroelectric power plant.

The Madeira project would also increase the capacity for transporting soybean, timber, and minerals to Pacific ports through the installation of navigation locks and dredging to open the river channel, and to connect with highways being built in the Peruvian and Bolivian Amazon. The project would result in a potential 500 percent growth of soybean transport from the current annual seven million tons to 35 million tons exported.¹ Brazilian agribusiness companies such as Grupo André Maggi, the largest soybean producer in the world, have already helped build the Itacoatiara port downstream from Manaus, which is a major distribution center for soy export. The company received a loan from the International Finance Corporation, of the World Bank, in 2004 of US$30 million to expand soybean production, which is arguably the leading cause of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon.

The Madeira Complex may also turn into an investor's nightmare, due to the enormous cost and technical challenges. Potential environmental and social impacts – including displacement, threats to food security, increased exposure to disease, pressure on already weak social services, risks to biodiversity, and deforestation leading to greenhouse gas emissions – make the Madeira Complex a "development" disaster in the making.

source: www.amazonwatch.org

James Cameron (the director of Titanic and Avatar) came to Brazil last March and he's joined this organization called Amazon Watch.

http://www.amazonwatch.org/

Well, watch these videos, practice your listening, and be shocked...

SAA 7- National Day Against Tobacco

Hey citizens of the world,

Today's posting is about this assignment done by Márcio Theodoro.

Brazilians who were born in the 80's started smoking at 17

Research done by INCA (National institute of Cancer) shows that a family composed of a couple of smokers spend an average of R$ 1495,20 (around US$898,00) in one year with the purchase of cigarettes

Important Facts:

• Rio de Janeiro celebrates the National Day Against Tobacco with an increase of people who want to quit smoking
• More radical federal law would decrease the number of smokers in Brazil, even more INCA
• Women have more difficulty quitting smoking than men, says the institute
• In Brazil, the National Day Against Tobacco is celebrated this Sunday (August 29)
• Search for anti-smoking treatments doubles in hospitals in Sao Paulo
• 5 million people per year, die in Brazil as a result of smoking.
• 20% of pregnant women smoke Brazil
• Smokers spend an average of 10% of their salary on cigarettes

Data from the Special Survey on Smoking (PETab) shows that the generation of Brazilians born in the 80's, that is, who are now 30 years old, begins to smoke, on average, at 15.
The PETab research was made in more than 51,000 households, interviewing smokers, nonsmokers and former smokers. The work, which is the most comprehensive research about smoking in Brazil, was also performed in 13 other countries. Internationally, research is known as the Global Adult Tobacco Survey.

Also according to the PETab, of all people 15 years or older, 96.1% believed that smoking could cause serious illness. Another point highlighted is the high perception of the relationship between smoking and lung cancer: 95% of interviewed people, 91% were smokers, and 96% nonsmokers.
Smoking is the leading cause of preventable malignancies, as explained by the thoracic surgeon and director of the Cancer Hospital, Paulo de Biasi. 90% of patients with lung cancer in the INCA are smokers.

Another serious problem is the passive smoking. The sooner a person is exposed to smoke in rooms with smokers, the greater chance of eventually developing cancer in adulthood, according to Biasi.

PASSIVE SMOKING X LUNG CANCER

The main clinical manifestations in adult passive smokers are respiratory symptoms in healthy patients, increased rate of cardiovascular mortality (25 to 35%), lung cancer, and developing more than 10 other types of cancer.

In my opinion, the passive smokers are those who suffer the most. These laws certainly came to help in the fight against tobacco, but this is still a long way. The authorities should continue to take this issue more seriously.

Sources:
www.g1.com.br
Jornal do Centro (newspaper – Campinas)

Márcio Theodoro- chemist

Here are some links to the videos Márcio has indicated.

Let me tell you in advance that these videos are very shocking... I myself could not see, only listen... But for the braver ones, it's worth taking a look!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4JQOpvQZAQ&feature=player_embedded

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaHZLKvL7EE&feature=player_embedded

"It can't get any worse"- Tiririca's victory around the world...

Oh my GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!

Tiririca is now international news, not surprisingly....

Here are some links for your "delight"... What I find more interesting, though, are the comments, which are usually posted by Brazilians living abroad. The opinions are very controversial, as you can imagine...

time.com-

http://newsfeed.time.com/2010/10/04/clown-campaign-victory-wouldn%E2%80%99t-you-elect-this-guy-as-federal-deputy-too/

My favorite line in this article is "You don't have to speak Portuguese to appreciate the ads"

the Economist

http://www.economist.com/blogs/americasview/2010/10/brazils_presidential_election_0

CBS news- my favorite headline:

"Brazil Elects Non-Metaphorical Clown to Congress"- because, of course, there are many metaphorical clowns there, but this is the first and official REAL CLOWN! How crazy is that?!?!?!

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/10/04/ap/strange/main6925513.shtml

BBC news

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-11465127

ABC news

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/10/06/3030802.htm?section=justin

Bloomberg Business Week

This is interesting... It's saying that the "Clown may stop laughing"...

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-09-29/brazilian-clown-may-stop-laughing-after-likely-election-victory.html

So, citizens of the World...

should we laugh or cry?!!?!?!?!?!!?!?!?!?!?

SAA 6 "INGRID BETANCOURT "

Hi everyone!

This amazing assignment was done by Michelle and she chose to talk about the heroine Ingrid Betancourt.

A LITTLE ABOUT INGRID BETANCOURT AND HER SOME BITTER LESSONS IN LIFE

Ingrid Betancourt was born in Colombia on December 25, 1961 and grew up in Paris, France. She returned toColombia in 1989 and became a Senator in 1998. She was kidnapped by the rebel group FARC (Revolutionary

Armed Forces of Colombia) in February 2002, while campaigning to become president. She was rescued six and a half years later in July 2008 with other 14 hostages.

In July 2008, I read about her rescue in Epoca magazine and I was very impressed about her suffering and courage to support all the torture during those years and the doubt of not knowing when it would end. Since then, I started to read everything that was published about her.

So, I read that she wrote a book called “Even Silence has an end”, in Portuguese “Não Há silêncio que não termine”. In this book, she recounts how she was repeatedly beaten, humiliated and threatened with death while being kept prisoner in Colombia's jungle.

I heard an interview in BBC website that she talks about it and she started with:

“The first and most important of all is that we are all captives of something in our free life. We always justify what we do or how we behave because we’ve had this problem or this other. I came to the conclusion that you can be deprived of all kinds of freedom – the freedom to eat, or to drink or to speak to somebody or to move or even to choose to go pee or not to pee, very basic things... But they cannot deprive you from the freedom of being and of choosing who you want to be.”

In this interview, she recounts about the difficult process of writing the book:

“And then, once I was confronted to the blank paper, and I just unleashed the memory, I was there in the jungle again. It was emotionally very, very stressing”.

But, I also found some bad things about her. Some of her fellow hostages wrote unflattering accounts of being held captive with her. Three US military contractors say in their book that she was selfish and one of them says that she was even worse that the FARC guards. Mr. Stansell accuses her of telling their Farc guards that the Americans were CIA agents and they were almost killed because of this.

Mr Gonsalves says Ms Betancourt put pressure on Farc commanders to keep the Americans out of her shelter. However, he wrote that his opinion of her changed after she agreed to share her radio with him. "Maybe she was not the person we thought she was. Maybe Ingrid has a far more complicated and multi-dimensional person than she'd allowed us to believe." Mr. Gonsalves developed a close friendship with Ms Betancourt, he says, and came to admire the former Colombian presidential candidate. "She's a tough woman. She used to give those guerrillas a hard time."

She ends the interview saying: “I think we are in a world where we tend to strive for stupid things… in that striving for stupid things – money, fame, all those kind of glittering stupid things – we forget the essential. We are so frightened to feel pain that we don’t want to look to the pain of others. And we are like the world, we want to forget that there are people suffering”.

I read a comment and I have to agree with this: Ingrid Betancourt remains as an enigma. But, I will read the book and try to discover the mystery because I think she is a strong woman and must be heard or, in this case, read.

Links:

Interview with Ingrid Betancourt: http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9015000/9015751.stm

Comments from three fellow hostages: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7914287.stm

Interview at Oprah part 1:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uS42aH3q-d8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjert3Q7lpU&NR=1

by Michelle- Executive Assistant