Even though, perversely for a landscape photographer, I tend to seek out uglier-than-average places, this possibly wins the prize for one of the least glamorous locations I’ve photographed. It’s a very sizable field of human excrement on the road from Sharjah to Dhaid in the United Arab Emirates. It’s part of the excellent work being […]
Lebanese don’t usually need an excuse to party but they might need an incentive to recycle. Albeit one of the only countries at the COP18 climate change negotiations to commit to reducing their greenhouse gas emissions, Lebanon has a shoddy recycling record – mostly because it lacks the necessary infrastructure. Which is why the NGO […]
There are nearly 8 million people crammed into Israel and most of them like a little A/C in the summer. But only 74, 520 families separate their organic and inorganic waste. What does that have to do with anything, you ask? Well, it turns out that the Ministry of Environment has recently committed just over […]
Step in for this wonderful list of 12 easy ways to green your 2012. image via maliny The folks over at Nourishing the Planet have come up with a stellar list of simple steps that every person can take to green their lives. Although it is written with an American audience in mind, each of […]
Composting with your teens in an educational family project. Waste not, want not is something that can be taught by making compost. I’ve confess I’ve never much cared whether my vegetables are organic or bought at the neighborhood supermarket. I’ve always thought that the term “organic” is just a marketing ploy targeting a particular group […]
Yair Teller is one Arava Institute alumni who is improving quality of life for Palestinians living in Susya, South Hebron. Despite the relative luxury of Tel Aviv and parts of Jerusalem, many people throughout Israel and the Palestinian territories continue to eek out a meager living with no access to basic amenities such as water, […]
The Environmental Protection Ministry’s New Campaign Urges Israelis “To Start Thinking Green.” It is certainly one of our pet peeves in Israel: Friday shoppers buying bag after plastic bag chock full of food. And on the market sidelines food waste piling up, rotting. Most of this then lands up in the landfill, instead of in […]
Will it smell? Can I save money? And will it create fertilizer? Flushing our waste down the toilet is not the ideal way of utilising our precious and very limited water sources here in the Middle East. Moreover, the pollution that we are causing to our rivers and seas is becoming an increasing concern. Like […]
Good ideas deserve to be shared. The reCYCLISTS in Victoria, B.C., cycle organic waste to a central facility, where the compost is eventually sold. There is nothing like the internet for sharing good ideas. Every so often a good one that originated outside of the Middle East is too good not to share. Like buying […]
Maybe blondes really do have more fun, and more fun composting too. It’s easier to get Israelis excited about blondes than about composting, but if you get their eco-attention using a blonde? That’s a different story. Atar Friedman, a beautiful young Israeli blonde with a mission, has been trying to get Israelis more conscious about […]
By 2020, Morocco plans to install a solid waste treatment plant in every one of the country’s urban centers. I knew a woman who had questionable hygiene and eventually became chronically depressed. At first her car and home had the odd coke bottle and junk food wrapper tossed on the floor, but in time, both […]
Hey, are you gonna use that? Israeli residents may soon be able to put their banana peels to good use. Organic waste – such as vegetable and fruit peels, egg shells, pits, etc. – constitutes a significant part of any household garbage bin, but it doesn’t have to. These materials are valuable stuff, which could […]
There will be no green tech conference at this un-conference in Israel. With the Alice in Wonderland craze in full force now, an “unconference” might sound like something the Mad Hatter would organize. If he celebrated unbirthdays, we wouldn’t put it past him to organize an unconference. But alas, no. The green unconference coming up […]
New disturbing news about the McDonald restaurant chains that have found themselves in practically every Middle Eastern country except for Syria and Iran: With plans to set up a worldwide composting program, the Mc-company canned its plans after learning that its food scraps simply will not decompose. Well, not for the next 500 or 1,000 […]