En el Día Mundial del Agua: 10 hechos que debes conocer

ORIGINAL: Greenpeace España

Tianjie Ma

marzo 22, 2013

Vivimos en un planeta de agua. Sin agua no seríamos capaces de sobrevivir. Sin embargo, a pesar de este preciado recurso, en lugares como China, donde yo vivo, industrias como las textiles están vertiendo un cóctel de productos químicos tóxicos al agua. Tan solo tienes que ver las fotos que te muestro abajo para que te hagas una idea de la gravedad de esta situación.

En Greenpeace, estamos trabajando para evitar la contaminación de nuestras aguas señalando a las marcas que se abastecen de instalaciones contaminantes. Y además, estamos poniendo de manifiesto los graves impactos que suponen las sustancias químicas peligrosas en nuestras aguas.

Por todo esto, en este Día Mundial del Agua, es importante compartir contigo 10 hechos que seguramente no sabes y que es fundamental que conozcas:

10 hechos que debes saber sobre la contaminación del Agua

Original: The Economist

1. La gran mayoría de nuestra agua está en los océanos. Solo un 2,5% del agua disponible del planeta es agua dulce. (Y de ella sólo el 0.4 está en la superficie)
2. Solo en China, 320 millones de personas carecen de acceso a agua potable limpia.
3. El 40% de agua de superficie de China está contaminada.
4. Un 20% de las aguas subterráneas que se utilizan como agua potable en las zonas urbanas de China están contaminada. A veces contiene sustancias químicas que son cancerígenas.
5. En las investigaciones de Greenpeace en las que se realizaron análiticas a determinadas marcas de ropa, revelaron que la mayoría de los artículos de ropa de grandes marcas de moda como GAP, Vero Moda y Calvin Klein contenían sustancias químicas peligrosas. 
6. Algunos de estos tóxicos se descomponen formando sustancias que son disruptores hormonales e incluso que son cancerígenos cuando se liberan en los ríos de todo el mundo.
7. Cada año se fabrican en todo el mundo alrededor de 80 mil millones prendas, lo que equivale a unas 11 prendas al año por cada habitante del planeta. 
8. Se estima que cada persona (hombre, mujer e incluso en la fase fetal del embarazo) contiene cientos de sustancias químicas sintéticas en sus cuerpos incluyendo algunas que podrían estar relacionados con la industria textil.
9. Greenpeace está reclamando a las marcas mundiales de moda que hagan una moda sin tóxicos, así como tener una cadena de suministro transparente que haya eliminado todos los productos químicos peligrosos de sus procesos productivos para 2020.
10. Muchas grandes marcas ya escuchan. Marcas como Zara, Victoria Secret, Benetton y Valentino, han acordado eliminar las sustancias químicas peligrosas de sus productos y procesos de producción para 2020. 

Lamentablemente, otras marcas vinculadas a la contaminación tóxica del agua todavía no han tomado partido ni responsabilizado de este problema tan grave.

Aquí entras tú. Necesitamos tu voz para que nos ayudes a persuadir a otras grandes marcas como Tommy Hilfiger, GAP, Armani y Metersbonwe para conseguir que no contaminen nuestras aguas con tóxicos.

Únete a nosotro/as para pedir a la industria de la moda que proteja nuestra agua, nuestro cuerpo, nuestros niños y niñas, nuestras comunidades y en última instancia, nuestro futuro. (Firma aquí) 

La contaminación del agua con tóxicos es una realidad cotidiana para muchas personas que viven en China y en otras partes del hemisferio sur. Celebremos este Día Mundial del Agua junto con todas esas personas que luchan contra la injusticia y para la protección del medio ambiente.

Juntos podemos amplificar sus voces.

Tianjie Ma, responsable de la Campaña de Tóxicos de Greenpeace en Asia Oriental

Manifiesto, moda Detox

Somos un grupo de amantes de la moda, activistas, diseñadores, bloguero/as, unidas por la creencia de que la moda no puede contaminar nuestras aguas. Queremos que la ropa que llevamos sea tan estilosa y auténtica como somos nosotros.

First ever family tree for all living birds reveals evolution and diversification

ORIGINAL: Sheffield

30 October 2012

The world’s first family tree linking all living birds and revealing when and where they evolved and diversified since dinosaurs walked the earth has been created by scientists from the University of Sheffield.

Experts used the family tree to map out where the almost 10,000 species of birds live to show where the most diversification has taken place in the world.

Researchers, from the University of Sheffield, Yale University, University of Tasmania and Simon Fraser University, say the creation of new species has speeded-up over the last 50 million years. Surprisingly, species formation is not faster in the species rich tropics, but was found to be faster in the Western Hemisphere compared to the Eastern Hemisphere as well as on islands.

As well as being the first time scientists have created a family tree for birds, it is hoped the research could help prioritise conservation efforts in a bid to save the most diverse species from extinction.

Dr Gavin Thomas, of the University of Sheffield’s Department of Animal and Plant Sciences, said: "We have built the first ever family tree showing the evolutionary relationship among the species of birds. We used fossils and genetic data to estimate the ages of all the different branches of the bird tree so that we could assess how diversity has accumulated through time. Our work is indebted to researchers from museums and universities who have collected astounding amounts of genetic data from birds around the world."

Despite major steps forward in modern super computers it has still taken the researchers almost five years to analyse the millions of year’s worth of fossil data, DNA, maths and maps, to create this never-before-snapshot of how the thousands of birds alive made it to where they are today.

To even enable the scientists to calculate which species were more or less diverse they had to create a new 'species rate' measure.

Dr Thomas added: "Diversification is the net outcome of new species arising, called speciation, and existing species going extinct. We combined this data with existing data on the geographic ranges of all living bird species so that we could map diversification across the world.

"This 'phylogeny' is important because it is the first that includes all living birds. It means we can ask questions about biodiversity and evolution on a global scale and gain new insight into how diversity has changed over millions of years as well as understand those changes. More widely, one way in which the phylogeny can be used, and which may not be obvious, is in helping to prioritise conservation efforts.

"We can identify where species at greatest risk of extinction are on the tree and ask how much distinct evolutionary history they represent. Some species have many close relatives and represent a small amount of distinct evolutionary history whereas others have few close relatives and their loss would represent the disappearance of vast amounts of evolutionary history that could never be recovered. Environmental change has very likely affected diversification over time. Climate change could be a part of that through its effects on the extent of different types of habitat."

The paper - titled 'The global diversity of birds in space and time' - is published in the journal Nature.

Additional information

The University of Sheffield

With nearly 25,000 students from 125 countries, the University of Sheffield is one of the UK’s leading and largest universities. A member of the Russell Group, it has a reputation for world-class teaching and research excellence across a wide range of disciplines. The University of Sheffield has been named University of the Year in the Times Higher Education Awards for its exceptional performance in research, teaching, access and business performance. In addition, the University has won four Queen’s Anniversary Prizes (1998, 2000, 2002, and 2007).

These prestigious awards recognise outstanding contributions by universities and colleges to the United Kingdom’s intellectual, economic, cultural and social life. Sheffield also boasts five Nobel Prize winners among former staff and students and many of its alumni have gone on to hold positions of great responsibility and influence around the world. The University’s research partners and clients include Boeing, Rolls-Royce, Unilever, Boots, AstraZeneca, GSK, ICI, Slazenger, and many more household names, as well as UK and overseas government agencies and charitable foundations.

The University has well-established partnerships with a number of universities and major corporations, both in the UK and abroad. Its partnership with Leeds and York Universities in the White Rose Consortium has a combined research power greater than that of either Oxford or Cambridge.

Project Sunshine

A major focus of Science research in Sheffield is on meeting the increasing food and energy needs of the world’s population in the context of an uncertain climate and global environment change. This challenge is being met through Project Sunshine, which unites scientists across the traditional boundaries in both the pure and applied sciences. 

Contact

For further information please contact:

Paul MannionMedia Relations Officer

The University of Sheffield

0114 222 9851

p.f.mannion@sheffield.ac.uk