amudu

Friday, March 22, 2013

Roads could protect nature

James Cook University

More than 95% of all the forest destruction and wildfires occur within 10 km of roads.

Image: Iakov Kalinin/Shutterstock

Two leading ecologists say a rapid proliferation of roads across the planet is causing irreparable damage to nature, but properly planned roads could actually help the environment.
“The current situation is largely chaos,” said Professor William Laurance of James Cook University in Cairns, Australia. “Roads are going almost everywhere and often open a Pandora’s Box of environmental problems.”
“Just look at the Amazon rainforest,” Professor Laurance said, “over 95 per cent of all forest destruction and wildfires occur within 10 km of roads, and there’s now 100,000 km of roads criss-crossing the Amazon.”
Professor Andrew Balmford of the University of Cambridge, UK, agrees: “Loggers, miners and other road builders are putting roads almost everywhere, including places they simply shouldn’t go, such as wilderness areas. Some of these roads are causing environmental disasters.”
But the researchers say it does not have to be like this.
“Roads are like real estate,” Professor Laurance said. “It’s ‘location, location, location’. In the right places, roads can actually help protect nature.”
The secret, say the scientists, is to plan roads carefully, keeping them out of wilderness areas and concentrating them in areas that are best-suited for farming and development.
“In such areas,” Professor Balmford said, “roads can improve farming, making it much easier to move crops to market and import fertilizers. This can increase farm profits, improve the livelihoods of rural residents, enhance food security and draw migrants away from vulnerable wilderness areas.”
This will be crucial in the future, say the scientists, given that global farming production will need to double in the coming decades to feed up to 10 billion people.
Writing in the journal Nature, the researchers say a global mapping program is needed, to advise on where to put roads, where to avoid new roads, and where to close down existing roads that are causing severe environmental damage.
“It’s all about being proactive,” Professor Laurance said. “Ultimately, local decision makers will decide where to put roads. But by working together, development experts, agriculturalists and ecologists could provide badly needed guidelines on where to build good roads rather than bad roads.”

Editor's Note: Original news release can be found here.

The dangers of soft drinks

The University of Sydney

Children will consume more sugar-sweetened drinks if these are available in their homes. New research urges parents to limit their children's access to sugar-sweetened drinks, as these can lead to weight gain and dental caries, among other health problems.

Image: LI CHAOSHU/Shutterstock

Primary and secondary school students are five times as likely to be high consumers of sugar-sweetened drinks, such as soft drinks, if these drinks are available in their homes, according to a University of Sydney study published in the journal Preventive Medicine.
The study, which used data from the 2010 New South Wales Schools Physical Activity and Nutrition Survey (SPANS), found alarming levels of soft drink consumption in school aged children, especially those with easy access to these drinks.
Half (52 percent) of the 8058 students surveyed were boys and 59 percent were high school students. The authors of the study found students were more likely to be high consumers of soft drinks if they were from a lower socio-economic background or were boys.
Lead author and accredited practising dietitian, Lana Hebden from Sydney Medical School said the study indicated strong associations between school students' access to soft drinks at school or in the home and increased consumption. "We also found students who drank soft drink with meals at home were almost 10 times as likely to be high consumers of these drinks," she said.
"Parents need to consider what is stored in their cupboards or fridge and what their children have access to."
The authors also found students who usually purchased soft drinks from their school canteen were three times as likely to be high consumers.
"While there is a mandate from 2007 that schools should not sell sugar-sweetened drinks, such as soft drinks, at school, this policy is not monitored or policed," Ms Hebden said.
"Primary and secondary schools should be supported and encouraged to follow policy guidelines in their state regarding bans on the sale of sugar-sweetened drinks from the school canteen and vending machines.
"Reducing consumption of soft drinks has been a focus of public health nutrition strategies internationally. These drinks provide substantial kilojoules/calories, but little further nutrition. Consumption of these drinks has been associated with body weight gain in youth, dental caries in young children and elevated blood pressure, insulin resistance and lower bone mineral density in adolescents."
The study authors call for clear information to be made available to parents on limiting their children's access to sugar-sweetened drinks at home. This includes only buying these drinks for special occasions, not keeping them in the fridge or pantry, not offering them to children with their meals regularly, and replacing them with more nutritious drink options, such as water or reduced fat milks. Other strategies such as taxes on sugar sweetened drinks may also help to discourage the consumption of these drinks.

Editor's Note: Original news release can be found here.