Biodiversity encompasses the full variety of life – all genes, species and ecosystems – and it is in danger, which means we are too. As this article explains, a major conference in December 2022 could have a big impact on our collective fate by helping to end biodiversity loss and restore nature. Continue reading
Author: mike shanahan
Meat still missing from national climate change commitments

In April 2021, Fox News issued a rare correction to its viewers after repeatedly reporting that President Biden’s climate change plans would force US consumers to cut their intake of red meat by 90%. The initial reporting sparked outrage among conservatives who claimed that Biden was coming for their burgers. But as Fox News later confirmed, none of this was in Biden’s plan.
Continue readingWill 30×30 reboot conservation or entrench old problems?

When governments meet next year to finalise a global deal to halt loss of the biodiversity on which human wellbeing depends, “30 by 30” will be one phrase on everybody’s lips. The target – to protect at least 30% of Earth’s land and sea by 2030 – is part of a package being negotiated under the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) for the next decade and beyond.
Continue readingNew recipe needed to make food systems better for people and planet
From a fig tree of antiquity to hundreds of interconnected artworks created in a pandemic

On a quiet day in June 2020, a stranger on a distant shore contacted me and blew my mind. He asked me to keep a secret until this day.
Continue readingA prescription for our sick planet
Scientists warn of rising denial of extinction and biodiversity loss

[Reposting my story for Mongabay.com]
Biodiversity scientists are being urged to “fight the creeping rise of extinction denial” which has spread from fringe blogs to influential media outlets and even into a US Congressional hearing. The call-to-arms came in a paper published in Nature Ecology & Evolution last month by Alexander Lees, senior lecturer in conservation biology at Manchester Metropolitan University, and colleagues.
Continue readingHow to stop your pension fund from fuelling climate change and deforestation
What if there was a way to fight climate change, improve society and protect nature with no costs, no sacrifices and pretty much zero effort? Would you join in? Continue reading
The coronavirus backlash against bats is a bad idea
In March 2020, hundreds of bats hung crowded in cages in a market in the Indonesian city of Surakata. They waited wide-eyed to be killed and sold as meat. But Covid-19 was spreading, and people in Indonesia and elsewhere were soon blaming bats. The city authorities decided the bats could not be sold and, rather than release them into the wild, they gassed them and threw them into a fire pit, cages and all. Continue reading
Demand for meat is driving jaguars towards extinction
The emblematic top predator of South and Central America — the jaguar — is sliding towards extinction because of rising demand for meat around the world. Researchers say a “drastic reduction” in meat consumption both inside and outside the jaguar’s range will be essential to protect the species. Continue reading