Agrochemicals might be big business, but they are a bad deal for the environment and human health. Israeli firm, Makhteshim-Agan Industries, believes that there is a bright future for chemical pesticides. It has just bet $1 billion dollars on this hope, buying out the Albough chemical manufacturer in a move which, according to Ha’aretz, will […]
Ambika, a research analyst who specializes on Middle East environment issues including conflict and water, reports on her trip to Sweden, where she finds grassroots solutions like the Peepoo Bag – ones that could impact the developing world. Along the banks of the beautiful Lake Siljan, in the idyllic town of Leksand, Sweden, over 1600 […]
Estimates of 15 million bags per day consumed in Damascus alone! Moshe uncovers news in Arabic – that Syrians are launching a campaign to “say no to plastic bags.” Where bags litter highways, byways and in a region where camels choke on plastic bags, Syria is joining other countries in the Middle East, such as Lebanon, […]
New agriculture projects feed Libya, thanks to the Great Man Made River. The artificial irrigation project, the most expensive in history, is good while it lasts. BENGHAZI, Libya — Greg Cunningham is a long, long way from home. Since early 2004, the Colorado agribusiness consultant has lived in eastern Libya — growing wheat and corn […]
As major oil companies pull out of Iran, analysts differ over the import of new economic sanctions. By all objective standards, this week Iran is facing some version of a moment of truth. Responding to the impending imposition of beefed-up United Nations economic sanctions, French oil company Total announced publicly that it was suspending oil […]
“Smoked pigs” decompose slower than those that don’t smoke. (They were actually injected with nicotine). With smoking rampant in the Middle East, and rates in children increasing all the time, a new CSI study, using pigs of all creatures has found that those injected with nicotine decompose slower than those pigs which weren’t injected, reports […]
Shimon Peres, Shari Arison and other notables toast water to Israel’s latest desalination plant, dubbed the largest of its kind in the world. With news of new business in China this week, IDE launches its third desalination plant in Israel: Champagne glasses containing the finest fresh water were raised in a toast last month to […]
Put down your matkot and take a tour of Greenpeace’s flagship, the Rainbow Warrior, this week. Beachgoers on Tel Aviv and Haifa’s shores will be seeing something a little different over the next days, in the form of Greenpeace International’s famous flagship – the Rainbow Warrior. The most famous of all of Greenpeace’s eco-activist ships, […]
Profitability + altruism + saving the planet? Yosef I. Abramowitz from Arava Power, Kibbutz Ketura Israel – one of the latest ventures in clean tech launched from an Israeli kibbutz. The Kibbutz Movement celebrated its centenary in 2010, but the last decades of the 20th Century were not kind to Israel’s collective settlements. The shift in […]
Israel’s solar, water and other cleantech companies showcased their products this week at an exhibition in Tel Aviv. (Image via Israel Export Institute) In his keynote address at the Cleantech 2010 Expo in Tel Aviv yesterday, the governor of Israel’s central bank, Stanley Fischer, emphasized the potential of cleantech as a growth engine for Israel […]
If you like to beguile the slow, hot summer hours with a good food book, you will love this one. Author Peter Mayle, famous for his series of books on life in Provence as a British ex-pat, traveled left Provence to get a better taste of food festivals in other regions. He sat down at […]
I have quite a taste for post-apocalyptical fantasies myself (such as Cormac McCarthy’s chilling ‘The Road’, reviewed here earlier on GP), so I picked up ‘Everyone Can Be A Hero’ with some eagerness. It is a novel for teenagers set in a Britain devastated by a nuclear accident, where the remaining population is forced to […]
For many mothers in the Middle East, breastfeeding in public is an issue because of modesty. In my post on breastfeeding in hijab, I mentioned Muslim women who use nursing covers. In this post I’ll explain what a cover does and how to choose one that is functional, comfortable and “green.”
Libyan pivot irrigation at Al KHufrah Oasis: These are not crop circles or part of an Alien movie plot! Libya, in North Africa, now drilling for oil with BP is a country that is not exactly known for having ample quantities of fresh water let alone enough water to be used to any extent in agriculture. […]
Jonathan Gilben, co-founder of GoEco, talks about his passion for eco-tourism. (Jonathan pictured at the center of this photograph and in the video clip below.) A few weeks ago we wrote about GoEco, an organization founded by Jonathan Gilben and Jonathan Tal in 2005 that has pioneered bringing the concept of volunteer eco-tourism to Israel. […]