Sustainable recession:As Ireland moves into recession, local authorities need to rethink poor and wasteful decisions such as stretching water supply to once-off houses, organising road maintenance, public lighting and other services to areas of low population.
So said Prof Frank Convery, chairman of Comhar Sustainable Development Council, at the Comhar national conference in Dublin earlier this week."While the idea of sustainable communities throughout Ireland should be attainable, the reality is that our local authorities often take actions that are contrary to sustainable development," he added. He urged those standing for local elections in 2009 to think beyond clientelism and instead to consider how they can create a better, more environmentally friendly and cost-effective lifestyle with good services for all. Also, speaking at the conference, John Vidal, environment editor of the Guardian newspaper, said sustainability was unavoidable for the cities and towns of the future, while the Minister for the Environment, John Gormley, said, "We are living beyond our environmental means". Current policies were not sufficient to reduce the State's ecological footprint, he added. See also www.comharsdc.ie
Planning for cities
"The 21st century will be an urban century and we need to get the planning for cities right if they are to be good places for people and nature," said Richard Forman, professor of landscape ecology at Harvard University, at the Green Infrastructure conference in Malahide, Co Dublin, last week. Prof Forman suggested that we need to "mould the land so that people and nature thrive". About 250 people from local authorities, State agencies, and planning and architecture offices, heard how large productive agricultural landscapes, agriculture nature parks, wetlands parks and interconnected networks of green spaces are the way forward. "People want to access nature close to where they live," said Gerry Clabby, heritage officer at Fingal County Council. "The green infrastructure approach can help us solve so many problems such as flooding, water quality, the provision of recreational amenities and compliance with the EU Birds, Habitats and Water Framework directives all at once," said Clabby. See www.fingalcoco.ie for conference papers.
The poetry of landscape
The links between rocks, landscape, nature and people will be explored through poetry and image at the Geological Survey of Ireland, Beggars Bush, Haddington Road, Dublin, on Friday, November 28th at 6pm (doors open at 5.30pm). Poets, including Michael Longley, will participate in the event, which is part of the 2008 International Year of Planet Earth. Admission is by ticket only and free tickets are available at 048-90388462 or e-mail gsni@detini.gov.uk. See also www.yearofplanetearth.org and www.planetearth.ie
Importance of forestry
A new report from Coford, the National Council for Forest Research and Development, stresses the importance of forestry as a way of removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and thus reducing the impact of climate change. The report, Forests, Carbon and Climate Change, also deals with international perspectives on climate change. See www.coford.ie
