" I heard it through the AgLine"

December 8, 2009

 

 

·        Meat-eating plants more common than you think

·        Monsanto CEO takes a pay cut to $12.7 million

·        Greenies attack California ag water contracts

·        Peanut shells, corn stalks: China’s coal alternative

·        Top US negotiator slams ‘climategate’ scandal

 

 

Meat-eating plants more common than you think

 

(Wire Services) – Scientists from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and the Natural History Museum believe that carnivorous behaviour in plants is far more widespread than previously thought, with many commonly grown plants - such as petunias and tomatoes - at least part way to being "meat eaters".

 

A review paper, Murderous plants: Victorian Gothic, Darwin and modern insights into vegetable carnivory, is published in the Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society.

 

Carnivorous plants have caught the imagination of humans since ancient times, and they fitted well into the Victorian interest in Gothic horrors. Accounts of man-eating plants published in 19th century works have long since been discredited, but they continue to appear in different media including films (Audrey II in Little Shop of Horrors) and books (Tentacula in the Harry Potter series). Even popular Japanese cartoon Pokémon includes some characters based on carnivorous plants (Bellsprout, Weepinbell and Victreebell).

 

Carnivorous plants fascinated Charles Darwin, and he and his friend Sir Joseph Hooker (Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew at that time) had an extensive correspondence concerning them. Darwin's book Insectivorous Plants played a critical role in the idea that plants could eat animals being generally accepted. Before this, many botanists (including Linnaeus) had refused to accept that this could be the case.

 

Since Darwin's time, several groups have been generally recognised as carnivorous plants (including sundews, Venus flytraps and pitcher plants). Various other plants have been suggested as possible carnivores by some authors, but wide acceptance of these has failed to materialise. Defining what constitutes carnivory in plants is a challenge, and authors include or exclude groups of plants on the basis of different sets of criteria. Professor Mark Chase and co-authors from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and the Natural History Museum contend that carnivory and non-carnivory should not be treated as a black and white situation, and they view plants as being on a sliding scale between those that show no carnivorous characteristics and those that are real "meat eaters" such as the Venus flytrap.

 

Plants like petunias and potatoes have sticky hairs that trap insects, and some species of campion have the common name catchfly for the same reason. However, some of the commonly accepted carnivores have not been demonstrated to have the ability to digest the insects they trap or to absorb the breakdown products. In their paper, Chase et al. review each of the groups of potential carnivores.

 

Professor Mark Chase, Keeper of the Jodrell Laboratory at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew says, "Although a man-eating tree is fictional, many commonly grown plants may turn out to be cryptic carnivores, at least by absorbing through their roots the breakdown products of the animals that they ensnare. We may be surrounded by many more murderous plants than we think."

 

Vaughan Southgate, President of the Linnean Society of London says, "This scholarly, beautifully illustrated, review of carnivorous plants and the different levels of carnivory that exist in the plant world by botanists at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and the Natural History Museum makes for fascinating reading."

 

Source: Wiley-Blackwell

 

Return to Top

 

 

Monsanto CEO takes a pay cut to $12.7 million

 

ST. LOUIS (AP) - Monsanto Co. Chairman and Chief Executive Hugh Grant's compensation package slid about 3.5 percent to $12.7 million in 2009, from $13.1 million the previous year, according to a regulatory filing Monday.

 

Grant's pay cut came in a year when the world's biggest seed maker saw its stock price tumble more than 23 percent amid the global recession and lower profit.

 

According to a proxy statement the company filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Grant received a base salary of $1.4 million, stock options worth $9.7 million and a performance-related cash bonus of about $1.1 million. All other perks, including use of the company aircraft, deferred compensation, home security costs and club dues, amounted to $564,214.

 

The Associated Press executive compensation formula is designed to isolate the value the company's board placed on the executive's total pay package during the fiscal year. It includes salary, bonus, performance-related bonuses, perks, above-market returns on deferred compensation and the estimated value of stock options and awards granted during the year on the date they were granted.

 

The calculations don't include changes in the present value of pension benefits, and they sometimes differ from the totals companies list in the summary compensation table of proxy statements, which reflect the size of the accounting charge taken for the executive's compensation in the previous fiscal year.

 

Monsanto's profit rose 4.2 percent to $2.1 billion, or $3.80 per share, during the fiscal year that ended Aug. 31, on sales of $11.7 billion. In 2008, the company's profit had doubled from to $2 billion, or $3.62 per share.

 

Return to Top

 

 

Greenies attack California ag water contracts

 

(Daily Democrat) SAN FRANCISCO -- Environmental groups filed a legal challenge to water rights of some of Northern California's oldest agricultural water users, stating that contracts for use of Sacramento River water for the next 40 years violate the Endangered Species Act.

 

The suit goes to the federal 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, and seeks to revisit 40-year water contracts approved in 2005 between the federal Bureau of Reclamation and water districts including Glenn-Colusa Irrigation District in Willows, Princeton-Codora-Glenn Irrigation District, Provident Irrigation District, Anderson-Cottonwood Irrigation District, city of Redding, M&T Chico Ranch, and others.

 

Also named in the suit are 25-year contracts with water districts in the San Joaquin Valley, which get water from the delta.

 

The water agencies are known as "settlement contractors," who had water rights before the Central Valley Project was completed, with some water rights dating back to the 1880s.

 

In the early 1960s, these water contractors entered into 40-year water rights settlement contracts with the Bureau of Reclamation. These contracts recognized the water users' pre-existing water rights, according to a document provided by water attorney Andy Hitchings, of the firm Somach Simmons & Dunn, which represents several water districts in the suit.

 

Last week, environmental groups including the Natural Resources Defense Council, San Francisco Baykeeper and Earthjustice, filed an appeal stating that the contracts renewed in 2005 relied on a flawed biological opinion on the Delta smelt. Through court proceedings, that biological opinion from 2005 has now been thrown out by a federal court.

 

The suit states that the water contracts need to be re-evaluated with the most recent science.

 

"These water contracts must be revised to reflect a reasonable level of water diversions, require sensible conservation measures, and protect the collapsing delta if we are going to fix California's broken water system and restore healthy fish populations," said Kate Poole, lead attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council in a press release.

 

The groups state that growers, mostly rice farmers, have received 100 percent of their water supplies for the past three years, while fish populations and wildlife in the state are in dire straits.

 

In April of this year, Judge Oliver Wanger reaffirmed the water districts' claim to the water, stating that those deals were worked out 45 years ago and included contract compromises that allowed the Central Valley Project to proceed and avoided prolonged legal battles.

 

Trent Orr, an attorney with Earthjustice in the Bay Area, said the appeal has to do with "water in the Sacramento Valley, and probably anywhere. There's not enough of it to go around."

 

"Their theory is that they are absolutely owed every drop of water" in the contracts, Orr said.

 

But from "the environmental and fisheries side, there are other uses for the water," Orr said.

 

"What this case is about is we maintain that before the Bureau of Reclamation renews contracts for another 40 years on exactly the same terms, they need to look at the effects on various listed species," he said.

 

The water districts in the suit have access to more than 2 million acre-feet of water, Orr said.

 

The Central Valley Project is California's largest water supplier, delivering more than 7 million acre-feet of water a year, primarily for agriculture. It includes 20 dams, including Shasta Dam.

 

Attorneys for the water districts and the California Rice Commission make the point that water used in Northern California for rice provides habitat for 5-7 million migratory waterfowl and that 40 percent of the water used to grow rice is returned to waterways.

 

Hitchings said the case will likely take until the middle of 2010 or the end of next year to resolve.

 

Return to Top

 

 

Peanut shells, corn stalks: China’s coal alternative

 

Beijing, China (CNN) -- Mountains of peanut shells are spread out across Shengchang Bioenergy's property on the outskirts of Beijing. Local farmers drive in and out, unloading dried corn stalks in exchange for a small fee.

 

The peanut shells, corn stalks and even tree bark are dried, ground and re-purposed. The end result: Biomass pellets that can be used as a replacement for coal.

 

Shengchang Bioenergy also makes a line of stoves and boilers in which the pellets can be burned. The company says the stoves are up to five times more energy efficient than traditional coal boilers and are slightly cheaper to operate.

 

"Our stoves mean a lot to rural villagers because they heat more effectively," said the company's general manager, Fu Youhong. "They're very accessible and we're planning to expand with the government."

 

Just down the street from the factory, Bi Hongjun, a bus driver for the city of Beijing, has received a new stove as part of a test project with Shengchang Bioenergy and the Ministry of Agriculture.

 

"It's very easy to use," Bi said as he demonstrated how to load the energy-saving stove with the pellets. "It's not like the old-style cumbersome boiler which is difficult to light."

 

The Shengchang boilers are one small-scale example of how China can make a large-scale transition to becoming a low-carbon economy.

 

China, the world's largest emitter of greenhouse gases, relies on dirty coal for 70 percent of its energy.

 

But the Chinese government has recently made some commitments to change that. The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) -- China's top economic planner -- has pledged to cut carbon intensity 40 to 45 percent below 2005 levels by 2020. Carbon intensity is the amount of carbon released per unit of gross domestic product.

 

Last week Xie Zhenhua, vice minister of the NDRC, vowed that China would meet these goals.

 

"China will not repeat traditional path of growth of developed nations of high emissions, high energy consumption and high pollution," Xie said.

 

Analysts say this means China's emissions will still continue to rise significantly -- though at a slower pace. While China is not capping emissions absolutely, most argue it is a significant step in the right direction.

"China will not repeat traditional path of growth of developed nations of high emissions, high energy consumption and high pollution."

--Xie Zhenhua, vice minister of the National Development and Reform Commission

 

"Chinese leadership is very clear that China has to improve its environmental performance," said Bjorn Stigson, president of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development. "It's really driven from a strong feeling that China needs to reduce its energy, reduce its pollution, to be able to provide a good future and quality of life."

 

Stigson was among a team of experts recently invited by the Chinese government to develop a plan to help transform China's energy-intensive economy. He personally met with Premier Wen Jiabao, who will represent China at Copenhagen.

 

In a November 2009 report entitled "China's Pathway Towards a Low Carbon Economy," Stigson outlined various steps China could take to "go green," including low-carbon industrialization, developing renewable energies and educating residents about how to live sustainably.

 

Stigson also indicated that China's rapid development gave the Asian giant the potential to implement green technology more quickly, perhaps bypassing the high polluting growth model of Western countries.

 

"Because China is building so much new capacity, China can leapfrog with solutions," Stigson said. "That will be the platform for the next phase of economic growth, which will probably, hopefully, clean up their resources and make them more efficient."

 

According to state-run news agency Xinhua, 80,000 households in downtown Beijing have done away with coal heating this winter, the Beijing Electric Power Company said.

 

The courtyards homes located in a historic section of Beijing have replaced the polluting coal stoves with electric heaters, a culmination of a seven-year program to eliminate coal heating in 160,000 homes in downtown Beijing, Xinhua reported.

 

But projects on the local level will not be enough to address the steep challenge in the country of 1.3 billion.

 

Hundreds of millions of rural Chinese citizens will still rely solely on coal to keep their families warm through the heating season that ends on March 15 of next year.

 

Shengchang Bioenergy has manufactured 12,000 stoves since opening in 2006. Many of them now belong to low-income families in the neighborhood around the plant outside Beijing, but many more are needed throughout China.

 

"It is understandable ... that China has gone through this focus on economic growth," Stigson said. "But now, you can, as a country, take this more holistic approach. You have to do it, because the consequences are beginning to be seen, in the form of local pollution, in the form of impacts on water, in the form of impacts on rural areas."

 

Return to Top

 

 

Top US negotiator slams ‘climategate’ scandal

 

(AFP via New Straits Times) – COPENHAGEN: A top US negotiator at the Copenhagen climate conference on Monday slammed the controversy over emails stolen from prominent climate scientists, dubbed Climategate, as “opportunistic”.

 

“It just happens to be the topic of the moment,” said Jonathan Pershing, the deputy head of the US delegation at the December 7-18 UN talks. “It is a misrepresentation of the robustness of science. What we end with is that our understanding of the issues is not different... I look at this and I think to myself, it’s opportunistic.”

 

The emails, seized on by climate skeptics as evidence that scientists have distorted data to dramatise the threat of global warming, have provoked a firestorm of controversy, especially in the United States.

 

“It has sucked up all the oxygen,” said James Overland, an Arctic specialist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), in Copenhagen Monday to open a US-sponsored science centre.

 

Some of the thousands of emails purloined from scientists at Britain’s East Anglia, a top centre for climate research, expressed frustration at the scientists’ inability to explain what they described as a temporary slowdown in warming.

 

They also discussed ways to counter the campaigns of climate naysayers. The controversy has fueled debate in blogs, chatrooms and now the mainstream media.

 

“The IPCC has released some new information talking about their process...

making very clear that there is no change in our understanding,” Pershing said, referring to the Nobel-winning UN Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC).

 

“There are many data sets and they all show the same true type of change, significant damages,” he said. The Copenhagen meeting, which will end with a December 17 summit of more than 100 heads of state, including US President Barack Obama, is tasked with forging a deal to tame global warming and help poor countries cope with its consequences.

 

Return to Top

 

End Transmission