Once again, we're presenting y'all with a video that has a message. But the message from this one comes at the very end, so watch it all the way through if you want to get it. It'll go fast though, since it's a gorgeous animation and a really soulful song. Although it's a courtship song, the artist who did the animation definitely kicked it up a  notch.



We don't want to blow the end for you, but we will tell you this:  It took us 2 years to get this video!  We saw it and knew we wanted it for Link TV, but desiring and getting are two very different things. It's not that easy to communicate with China and we had to try many different vectors before we found the person who could actually deliver the video to us in broadcast format.

We're linking you to a news story again, too. Take a minute to read the story and then think about the video. After you put it all together let us know what you think. The images may be bright and beautiful in the video, but the issue is as serious as the survival of our species.

Watch more music videos at LinkTV.org/worldmusic.

China has major power in Khartoum*, and in just TWO WEEKS President Obama will be meeting with the leader of China, President Hu Jintao.

*The capital of Sudan, where funding is funneled in and then used to fund the janjaweed, a military group who is comitting genocide in Darfur.



What does this mean?

We need to
tell President Obama that GENOCIDE is a priority,
and make sure Sudan comes up in this conversation.

SIGN THIS PETITION

to let President Obama know our priorities!

To learn more about why China is a key link to ending the genocide in Sudan, CLICK HERE 

 

With the upcoming school year, this can be a great time to help involve your peers in causes that you care about.  I wanted to highlight just a few of the many student organizations that you could use to help start a club or a program at your school for an issue that you care about :)

 

 

1. Darfur Dream Team 

    This organization creates a "sister school" program between your school and students in Darfuri refugee camps.  You can talk to a teacher about this, and have a classroom be involved, or simply start a club! You'll be able to communicate with these students, and raise funds for their school. It's a great way to raise awareness for the crisis in Darfur, as well as be able to relate to the people you're acting on behalf of.

 

 

2.STAND

   STAND="Students Against Genocide".  STAND is an awesome example of an incredibly strong, organized, student run group that is making a very real difference in this world.  They can help you start a club at your school, give you ideas of how you can help raise awareness, fund, and help end genocide. There are people to guide you through everything you need to start an amazing club at your school that will be able to make a huge difference. [They also host an incredible national conference in November that I was so lucky to be able to attend last year.  I learned so much, and completely reccomend it!]

 

3.Students for a Free Tibet

    Another great organization if you're looking to start a club!  This organization is working to raise awareness for the issues surrounding China's control of Tibet, and you can help by starting a chapter at your school. They have a ton of great ideas for gaining support and helping to bring freedom and justice to the people of Tibet.

 

I hope this has inspired you to take some action this school year, and if you have any questions, please ask! Also, there are a ton of other student organizations, these are really just the tip of the iceberg.  So if you'd like to know how you can involve your school in another cause, just ask!  :)

 

There are sufficient reasons why China gets a bad reputationin regards to its environmental policy, yet there is cause to be optimisticabout the future of ecological conservation in China.  Professor Lu Zhi’s lecture at UC Berkeley entitled “SeekingSolutions to China’s Environmental Crisis”, presented the ways that China ismeeting the growing environmental demands of outside entities as well asrealizing its own interest in conserving the country’s valuable biodiversityand ecosystems. 

 

            LuZhi is a professor of conservation biology and Executive director of the Centerfor Nature and Society at Peking University, in Beijing.  She is also the founder of theShan-Shui Conservation Center, a Chinese NGO that demonstrates approaches onhow Chinese society can live with nature. She spent most of her career living and researching the GiantPanda.  Zhi’s role at theuniversity is to conduct the research that then hopefully will be implementedinto conservation policy. 

 

            Chinacontains about 10% of the world’s biodiversity, and still has significantportions of pristine nature in its Western regions.  China contains four ecological “hotspots”, out of the 34spots designated worldwide.  Also,due to its portions of the Himalayan Mountains and the Tibetan plateau, it alsoholds the watershed that serves most of Asia.

 

            Thiswealth of environmental diversity and resources has suffered significant damagein the last 30 years of China’s fast-paced development.  Water sources face over-exhaustion andpollution.  The country also facesdesert encroachment, increased erosion due to logging, agricultural soilpollution, as well as severe air pollution problems.  Mostly due to its large population, China’s ecologicalfootprint has been far exceeding the country’s bio-capacity since the 1970s.           

 

Many Chinese still to hold thebelief that they should have the luxury of unrestricted development, asdeveloped nations had before them. The government, for the most part, thinks that the environment can onlybe dealt with after the country gets richer.

 

Beginning in 1985, Zhi conductedabout 11 years worth of work studying the Giant Panda and viable conservationmethods.  The rumors of the GiantPanda’s problems with mating are not true in the wild; this issue only occursin captivity. Zhi said that it turns out, “The problem is not the panda, it’sus”.  It’s the logging of theforests in Southern China that was propelling the Panda close toextinction.  When the free market openedup in the 90s, profit became more powerful than existing regulations, and thePanda’s habitat was being rapidly destroyed.

 

 The logging only finally stopped when it sparked massiveerosion problems, flooding of many people’s homes, and taking numerouslives.  It was only with thisaddition of the human element into the equation that the government began toregulate logging and subsidize reforestation.  This program turned out to not only help out the loggers,but the Giant Panda as well.  Thiscoupled with imposing the death penalty to Panda poachers, has saved the GiantPanda from extinction. 

 

It is these kinds of economicincentives that have proved to have a big impact in changing China’senvironmental issues.  These marketschemes look at the value of Earth’s ecosystems in monetary terms, which fitswith the capitalistic mindset in China. Mechanisms like carbon trading could have a very big influence inprotecting habitat and biodiversity in rural Chinese villages.  If the local communities receivedadditional income from planting trees, they would be improving their economicsituation, as well as saving the forest. To reach a win-win solution, Zhi believes that one has to take law,policy, and market all into account together.

 

Zhi cited the city of Lijiang as anexample of market incentives in regards to its experience with water use andagriculture.  The city is marked asa cultural heritage town, attracting many tourists to its freshwater canals andwaterways running throughout the city. This water was originally provided by the glacier melt above the city,but recently the glacier has almost all but melted, and the water has beencoming from a nearby lake.  Thelake, however, is located next to agricultural lands and contains great amountsof pesticide traces, hurting the cities’ reputation as a clean water haven, aswell as the people’s health.  Asolution was reached where the tourists pay a very small amount of money uponvisiting Lijiang, and this money goes toward assisting local farmers to switchto more sustainable organic agricultural methods.  This creative and collective approach benefits the touristindustry, the farmers, and the health of the local people

 

Lu Zhi also discussed the role ofTibetan sacred lands, containing large portions of China’s pristine wildernessareas. One third of the land in Tibet is viewed as sacred, thus these lands arebeing protected by the local people without market incentives, but rather bytraditional belief systems.  Localorganizations, like the volunteer-based “Friend of the Wild Yak” organizationtake great pride in protecting wild species.  The members of this group are local Tibetans that realizedthe importance of the wild yak for grazing and making fertile grasslands, thusset out to voluntarily protect the Wild Yak. This method of conservation iseffective and cheap.  The problemis that the Chinese still look at the Tibetans as backwards andpoverty-stricken, because they live by traditional religious beliefs. Rather,it is the case that the Chinese have something to learn from the Tibetans invaluing the land intrinsically, not merely for its monetary value.

 

In the topics of Giant Pandaconservation, market incentives, and Tibetan sacred lands, Zhi expressed greatoptimism for the future of conservation in China.  Yet there are still loads of issues the government must dealwith.  The national policyframework is changing, from an emphasis on rapid development, to developmentthat will create a more sustainable, viable country.  The problem lies in that change is slow in a country withover a billion people.  Theenvironment does not know borders, however, and “China’s dilemma is the world’sdilemma”, Zhi said.  It is theresearch and ideas in the academic world, as well as raising public awareness,that will influence smart growth and policy in China, and worldwide.