http://www.voicesforourplanet.com Solutions For Earth Tue, 07 Feb 2012 16:03:01 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en February 2nd, as well as being Groundhog Day, is World Wetlands Day. It’s an important day in Canada partly because there are more wetlands in Canada than in any other country in the world. Canada is home to about one quarter of the world’s wetlands, covering 14% of our country. Wetlands ... http://www.voicesforourplanet.com/2012/02/07/happy-world-wetlands-day-2/ There has (rightly so) been a considerable amount of media buzz recently about the Canadian National Women's Soccer Team winning entry to the 2012 Summer Olympic Games in London.  Congratulations! Hopefully some people also noticed that the Team was also demonstrating their commitment to girls’ issues and rights by wearing magenta ... http://www.voicesforourplanet.com/2012/02/01/because-i-am-a-girl/ More than 130 scientists across North America have just signed a declaration calling for permanent protection of Clayoquot Sound’s remaining intact old-growth rainforests. But that might not be enough to protect the area. The B.C. government has received an application for logging in the old growth rainforest of Flores Island in ... http://www.voicesforourplanet.com/2012/01/30/new-risk-to-clayoquot/ The Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS) is cheering the January 11th announcement that a large area of Manitoba's Boreal Forest will be protected. The vast area on the east side of Lake Winnipeg is home to the Bloodvein First Nation. They worked with the province to develop a land use ... http://www.voicesforourplanet.com/2012/01/19/manitoban-boreal-forest/ On January 16th, the World Bank and Google announced an agreement aimed at improving the ability of developing countries to access a web-based community mapping tool and data to help better monitor public services, and improve disaster and humanitarian response efforts. The World Bank suggests that most developing countries lack basic local data ... http://www.voicesforourplanet.com/2012/01/17/world-bank-and-google/ In 1969, Vancouver Island grew 70% of its own food. Today, they grow less than 5%, according to the Wilderness Committee. And this week the Wilderness Committee will present an opportunity to help stop that number from shrinking even further. The municipality of North Saanich is deciding what to do with land ... http://www.voicesforourplanet.com/2012/01/09/vancouver-island-meeting/ One major environmental issue left over from 2011 is that Canada stepped out of the Kyoto Protocol. This might lead people to move ahead without the federal government, and handle the related climate change issues on a more local level. According to the David Suzuki Foundation, in December 85 British Columbia ... http://www.voicesforourplanet.com/2012/01/04/bc-climate-change-letter/ Just as people sometimes adjust their tone of voice to be heard in cities, researchers have found that songbirds do as well. In a study published in November’s issue of Behavioral Ecology, researchers from the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute’s Migratory Bird Center analyzed how songbirds are affected by both general noise ... http://www.voicesforourplanet.com/2011/12/05/bird-songs-in-the-city/ The Wilderness Committee just sent out a press release stating that Timberwest's contract to buy logs from Nanoose Bay Forest -- one of the last remaining parcels of rare, endangered Coastal Douglas-fir forests -- appears to exceed the licence issued by the province. BC Supreme Court documents filed last week, obtained by the ... http://www.voicesforourplanet.com/2011/12/01/nanoose-bay-forest-logging/ Today 50 Greenpeace UK activists blocked their Department for Transport with two immobilised cars parked in front of the entrances and a giant handshake. This is because the UK government is trying to scuttle legislation that will block tar sands oil from being sold at UK petrol pumps. Next week, officials ... http://www.voicesforourplanet.com/2011/11/28/uk-and-tar-sands-oil/