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TED Talk by David Titley (retired US Navy)

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David Titley: How the military fights climate change

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Military leaders have known for millennia that the time to prepare for a challenge is before it hits you, says scientist and retired US Navy officer David Titley. He takes us from the humanitarian catastrophe in Syria to the icy shores of Svalbard to show how the military approaches the threat of climate change, in a refreshingly practical, nonpartisan take on climate preparedness.

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Let's go all-in on selling sustinability

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Let's go all-in on selling sustinability

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TED Talk by Steven Howard (IKEA)

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Steve Howard: Let's go all-in on selling sustainability

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The big blue buildings of Ikea have sprouted solar panels and wind turbines; inside, shelves are stocked with LED lighting and recycled cotton. Why? Because as Steve Howard puts it: "Sustainability has gone from a nice-to-do to a must-do."

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Global Oneness Project (photo essay)

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Setting the Stage

Show students a map of Southeast Asia, indicating Myanmar, the location of this story. Explain to students that they will be viewing a photo essay that depicts the human costs to local villages from palm oil production.

Explain to students that palm oil is a very common ingredient in products used by many of us every day. It is used in almost half of all packaged goods, according to Rainforest Action Network (RAN), and can be found in the following processed foods: ice cream, cookies, crackers, cereals, breakfast bars, potato chips, baby formula, as well as dry and canned soups.

Ask students: What do you know about palm oil? Introduce students to this interactive resource, "From rainforest to cupboard: the real story of palm oil," from The Guardian. Explore this resource with students to get an overarching understanding of palm oil from its origins in the rainforest, to plantations, to the marketplace, and, finally, to the consumer's home.

Engaging with the Story

Explain to students that they will now examine the impacts of palm oil production, through the lens of a photo essay that depicts individuals and communities living on a palm oil plantation in Myanmar.

Ask students to read Taylor Weidman's photographer statement and view the photo essay, taking note of the impacts that palm oil production has on the environment and the indigenous peoples that live and work in the villages. While students examine the photos, ask them to make a list of observations. What are the human impacts, the causes and effects, of the palm oil plantations on individuals and local communities? In what ways have their lives changed?

Delving Deeper

After viewing the photo essay, lead a discussion with such questions as:

As noted in Taylor Weidman's photographer's statement, what year did the Myanmar government lay out a roadmap for the development of palm oil? How quickly has development expanded since then?

Using Weidman's photos and captions as evidence, what are the negative impacts of palm oil production? How are the people that live and work on the palm oil plantations affected environmentally, culturally, and socially? (Some answers include: environmental destruction and species loss, low wages, lack of proper healthcare and educational facilities, human trafficking, and land grabs, etc.)

A Burmese woman, shown in one of the photographs, works at Southern Youth community service organization; she educates local communities about the issues of land grabs. To answer the question, "What's a land grab?" Oxfam America provides the following definition: "Imagine waking up one day to be told you're to be evicted from your home-being told you no longer have the right to remain on land that you've lived on for years. And then, if you refuse to leave, being forcibly removed. For many communities in developing countries, this is a familiar story." Using the photos as evidence, how are land grabs impacting the individuals in this photo essay? Do you think land grabs might influence an individual's identity, livelihood, and security? If so, how?

Zaw Myo Htike is a migrant worker in the photo essay (photograph #6). In an interview for PRI, he said, "At the time, I regretted my decision to come here and work. I was also angry towards the agent for lying to me. But because I was already here, I decided to stay." Can learning from a personal experience, like Htike's, allow one to develop empathy about a global issue on the other side of the world? If so, how?

The Guardian reports that global land grabs are "the next human rights challenge for business." One solution, stated in the article, is for investors to "engage, not evict, the locals, and invest in their future. The results will be not only a more fair and humane policy, but prosperity for everyone who has a stake in these lands." What do you think about this solution? Do you think investors/corporations have a moral responsibility to respect the local communities and their lives? Why or why not?

"Man sometimes thinks he's been elevated to be the controller, the ruler, but he's not. He's only part of the whole. Man's job is not to exploit, but to oversee, to be a steward. Man has responsibility, not power," said Oren Lyons, a Native American Faithkeeper of the Turtle Clan of the Seneca Nations of the Iroquois Confederacy and Indigenous rights advocate. A "steward" can be defined as someone who takes responsibility to care for something, like a farmer would be a "steward" of the land. What do you think Lyons means by this statement? Compare this statement to what you witnessed in the photo essay. What are some similarities?

According to a farmer from the Taunggyi Township, Shan State in Myanmar, "Land is our life as well as our prestige. It's the food for us to survive, the home for us to live, and the place of unity for our family. Also, land is our precious inheritance throughout the generations," For those villagers who have been displaced from their ancestral land, what might be lost?*

Do you think the general public should be more aware of palm oil production? Why? Do you think this will make a difference in peoples' purchasing habits? Why or why not?

Reflecting and Projecting

Give students one of the following reflective writing prompts to demonstrate their understanding of the story. (Note for teachers: Just as quotes from a book or text are used to prove an analytical thought, students use the photo essay to justify their reasoning.)

1. The organization One Green Planet lists six organizations dedicated to restoring the damage done by the palm oil industry. Visit one of the organizations listed on their website and describe, in a few paragraphs, one potential solution described. How does this solution, big or small, aid in restoring the impacts of the palm oil industry? Why do you think people should care about the solution you chose? (C3.D2.Geo.2.9-12)

2. The video, " Indigenous Peoples' rights under threat from palm oil plantations in Tanintharyi, Myanmar," from the Tenasserim River & Indigenous People Networks (TRIP NET), gives a voice to the local villagers living in Myanmar who have been impacted by palm oil production. In a peaceful protest, one villager held up a sign that read, "When the rich rob the poor, it's called business. When the poor fight back, it's called violence." In 2-3 paragraphs, describe your interpretation of this quote. How might this quote be applied to another situation you've witnessed in your life-either in the news, in literature, or personally? (CCSS.ELA.SL.9-10.5 and SL.11-12.5)

3. Due to public outcry and advocacy from concerned citizens and environmental organizations, there is a growing voice supporting a "zero deforestation" policy in palm oil production so that critical rainforests can remain.

Supporters of this view are pushing for a clear labeling system, which would clarify for customers which products meet the sustainability requirements set out by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil and consumer choice. According to National Geographic, the following companies are making commitments to use only sustainable palm oil in their products.

Choose one of the following companies that make a product that you currently use or have used in the past:

Hershey

L'Oréal

Kellogg's

Colgate-Palmolive

General Mills

Mars

Procter & Gamble

Johnson & Johnson

PepsiCo

Kao Group

J.M. Smucker

Agricultural giant Cargill

Dunkin' Brands and Krispy Kreme Doughnuts

Research the company to find a consumer department and write a convincing letter to a manager or administrator; congratulate them on this choice and encourage them to stick to their commitment to using only sustainable palm oil. Indicate your appreciation for the product but state you will stop using/enjoying it if they fail to comply with sustainable criteria, as set out by the Round Table on Sustainable Palm Oil. Use the photo essay to support your point of view.* (NGSS.HS-LS2-7)

Resources

Taylor Weidman, " The human cost of palm oil production in Myanmar." Aljazeera, January 4, 2017.

Ben Bloch, " Oil Palm Industry Takes Land, Promises Livelihood." Worldwatch Institute.

Laurel Neme, " Endangered Orangutans Gain from Eco-Friendly Shifts in Palm Oil Production." National Geographic, October 11, 2014.

(Organization Website) Rainforest Action Network (RAN).

Laura Paddison et al., " From rainforest to your cupboard: the real story of palm oil - interactive." The Guardian, November 10, 2014.

" Why indigenous and community land rights matter for everyone." OXFAM International.

(Organization Website) Say No to Palm Oil.

" The Meaning of Land in Myanmar." Transnational Institute, January 28, 2016.

(Organization Website) " Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO).

Corrine Henn, " Has the Deforestation Caused by Palm Oil Got You Down? These Organizations Have Our Backs." One Green Planet, January 13, 2015.

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Show students a map of Southeast Asia, indicating Myanmar, the location of this story. Explain to students that they will be viewing a photo essay that depicts the human costs to local villages from palm oil production. Explain to students that palm oil is a very common ingredient in products used by many of us every day.

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Global Oneness Project (article)

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The Narmada Valley Sardar Sarovar Big Dam Project is the largest of 30 planned large dams on the Narmada River and it has inspired twenty-two years and three generations of protests, making it, and all big dams, one of the most important and controversial social issues of modern India.

In Delhi, at Jantar Mantar-the section of town where organized protests are held-we sat surrounded by thousands of rural farmers from all over India. They had gathered to sit, sing, chant, and march in protest over land rights and against further construction of the Sardar Sarovar Dam, and others like it.
Big Dams are a guaranteed way of taking a farmer's wisdom away from him. They're a brazen means of taking water, land and irrigation away from the poor and gifting it to the rich. Their reservoirs displace huge populations of people, leaving them homeless and destitute. Ecologically, they're in the doghouse. They lay the earth to waste. They cause floods, water-logging, salinity, and they spread disease...
--Arundhati Roy, author of The God of Small Things
As we walked into the crowd with our camera, we looked at faces filled with resolve and the power of cooperative action, and into the desperate eyes of so many suffering from the humiliation of displacement. The farmers had assembled into a convincing symbol of unity-enduring the elements night after night with little food and water-but the truth is many didn't have a home to return to.

We had come to the protest, called 'Action 2007', in order to interview Medha Patkar, social activist and advocate for peoples vulnerable to massive dam projects in India. Medha is the leading voice of Narmada Bachao Andolan, a grassroots NGO organization mobilizing indigenous and tribal peoples, farmers and environmentalists in opposition to the Sardar Sarovar Project. She is also the founder of the collective 'National Alliance of People's Movements', an alliance of groups in India committed to a non-violent path toward social and political justice and ecological protection, and the recipient of numerous awards, including the Right Livelihood Award, and the M.A. Thomas National Human Rights Award.

"There are people who are asserting a right to life and livelihood because the development paradigm is going against the majority of the people," says Medha. She claims India needs an alternative economic and political perspective, not just Western models of development, which have been imposed on Indians and are not sustainable. Closer to the point, she declares, "No one eats dollar notes!"

So what is all the controversy about? The Sardar Sarovar dam project proposes providing hydroelectricity to people in three states and irrigation and drinking water to drought-prone areas. Those in support of the dam claim it will supply 30 million people with water and will irrigate crops to nourish 20 million. It is an image of growth, developmental progress, and a source of political pride and leverage for the Indian government.

But those in opposition, like Medha Patkar and Arundhati Roy and others at the protest, tell of the millions negatively affected by the development, which is displacing thousands, falsely promising resettlement and rehabilitation with cultivable lands, submerging homes and forest farmland, disrupting fisheries and natural habitats, salinizing land alongside the miles of canals and rendering them useless, and spreading disease. In fact, already the project has managed to make areas prone to flooding and drought worse than ever before, and has pushed many thousands into slums and extremely tough living conditions. Such controversy and widespread effect has attracted international attention and brought all big dams into question.

Among the suffering are the rural farmers. In the last twenty years Indian farmers have been committing suicide at an alarming rate due to rising economic difficulty, global change in demands and standards, and a general lack of support to villages by the government, which previously had been available. Now, due to the Sardar Sarovar dam project, hundreds of thousands of farmers have lost their land, many of them poor tribal communities relying on natural resources.

Ultimately, however, the movements against the Project have failed, as the Sardar Sarovar big dam is slowly and steadily nearing completion. But protests like 'Action 2007' and leaders like Medha Patkar, and authors like Arundhati Roy have brought considerable attention to important issues surrounding controversial big dam projects and to the rising water concerns around the world.

Despite the limited success of community organized movements, which sometimes have little impact on government policy, author and activist Arundhati Roy still believes in them:
We have to support our small heroes. We have to fight specific wars in specific ways. Who knows? Perhaps that's what the twenty-first century has in store for us. The dismantling of the Big. Big bombs, big dams, big ideologies, big contradictions, big countries, big wars, big heroes, big mistakes. Perhaps it will be the Century of the Small.
And the small are attracting the attention of the world-thanks to the Internet and documentary films, albeit slowly.

Sitting with Medha Patkar, I am impressed. With long silver hair and in her 50's, she has slept in the street for nights without complaint and is in good spirits. She has given speeches, brought many different people together, and has sat in support for long days and well into the nights. The farmers believe in her. And despite all her responsibilities, she found the time to give articulate and heartfelt responses to our questions.

After two days at the protest, we had heard the call of 'Action 2007', advocating for a new paradigm of development that has a wholistic view and uses smaller, localized water harvesting techniques that are designed according to local communities and environments, and for self-reliance. Most importantly, it asks that the world consider people and diversity as well as modernization.

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The Narmada Valley Sardar Sarovar Big Dam Project is the largest of 30 planned large dams on the Narmada River and it has inspired twenty-two years and three generations of protests, making it, and all big dams, one of the most important and controversial social issues of modern India.

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TED Talk by Vicki Arroyo (environmental policy)

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Vicki Arroyo: Let's prepare for our new climate

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As Vicki Arroyo says, it's time to prepare our homes and cities for our changing climate, with its increased risk of flooding, drought and uncertainty. She illustrates this inspiring talk with bold projects from cities all over the world -- local examples of thinking ahead.

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The Guardian (interactive). View videos under "community".

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From rainforest to your cupboard: the real story of palm oil - interactive

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You wash with it, you brush with it, you toast it, it’s in 50% of what you buy – but what’s the real story of palm oil? Use the interactive below to trace the journey of palm oil from the rainforest through to your kitchen cupboard

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Global Oneness Project (film)

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Sign up or log in to save your favorite stories and lessons, create custom collections, and share with others.

Environmental leader Vandana Shiva asserts that because survival, not money, comes out of water harvesting, governments are not preparing for the potentially catastrophic consequences of climate change.

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Sign up or log in to save your favorite stories and lessons, create custom collections, and share with others. Environmental leader Vandana Shiva asserts that because survival, not money, comes out of water harvesting, governments are not preparing for the potentially catastrophic consequences of climate change.

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Global Oneness Project (film)

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Sign up or log in to save your favorite stories and lessons, create custom collections, and share with others.

Medha Patkar, social activist and advocate for peoples vulnerable to massive dam projects in India, asks why India should follow a Western paradigm of development. She asks why disrupting traditions of land use in exchange for non-renewable resources that are unsuitable for India's population is acceptable-when alternative technologies that support local communities are available. Most importantly, says Medha, India must tap into the most remarkable form of power: the human power of democratic, cooperative action.

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Sign up or log in to save your favorite stories and lessons, create custom collections, and share with others. Medha Patkar, social activist and advocate for peoples vulnerable to massive dam projects in India, asks why India should follow a Western paradigm of development.

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climste change is an issue because it causes the earth to heat up melting the polar icecaps and making the oceans rise causing flooding and drimatically changing the climate and enviorment it also can increase the tenssions in the world. climate change is caused by co2 being released in to the atmosphere and causeing an effect known as the green house effect.

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Water conservation continues to be a problem in the every day lives of many societies. Water demand keeps rising and becoming more prominent. Because of this, aquifers are being depleted, and the aging infrastructure continues to destroy systems worldwide. In India specifically, many rural farmers are struggling due to the rising economic difficulty, global change in demands and standards, and the general lack of support to villages by the government, a big part of which is water. The Indian government uses most of that water for the big cities instead of the rural farms. In conclusion,  India has a massive population with not enough resources, such as water, to fully support the people and their land.

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Sustainability is extremely important as it can really help the world in climate change and global warming and help the world survive longer. Sustainability can help businesses grow as new products are created. Making the prices affordable can let the people in the world promote sustainability and the world can survive longer. It’s also something every business can do even if it’s small.

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The dismantling of the Big. Big bombs, big dams, big ideologies, big contradictions, big countries, big wars, big heroes, big mistakes. Perhaps it will be the Century of the Small. - Arundhati Roy

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“Designers have envisioned ways to better integrate the natural and built environment with climate change in mind”

“It’s up to us to look at our homes and our communities to find ways to not just survive but thrive. It’s up to us to plan and prepare and call our government leaders and require them to do the same.”

“Climate change is effecting our homes, our communities, and our way of life. We should be preparing at every scale and at every opportunity.”

“When enough people care enough the politions, most of whom won’t lead on this issue, but they will be led, that will change this.”

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1. “Medha, India must tap into the most remarkable form of power: the human power of democratic, cooperative action”.

2. “They had gathered to sit, sing, chant, and march in protest over land rights and against further construction of the Sardar Sarovar Dam, and others like it”.

3. “a wholistic view and uses smaller, localized water harvesting techniques that are designed according to local communities and environments”.

4. “unfortunately the government is definitely not preparing, and not allowing for the people to be aware of the consequences”.

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1. What is one reason why water conservation can help generations to come?
2. Is there an alternative resource other than water?
3. What could be the reason for the extent of water problems in rural areas?
4. How long will it take for humans to be self-sustained without fully needing water as a resource?

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Palm oil manufacturers “put profit before social and ethical responsibility’s”. Since majority of the workers are migrants they are forced into low paying jobs with little to know rights because of their migrant status, so some of the producers engage in child labor and gender discrimination. Palm oil manufacturers also engage in the destruction of natural habitat which further admits pollution into the earth’s atmosphere.

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can we fix climate change or do we have to adapt to it
how do we redouse our carbon foot print while mass producing eco freindly products

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How will climate change, change in the future if it does?

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“Cooperation commitment to profit can sometimes undercut other responsibilities towards humans and the environment”
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“ palm oil manufacturers put profit before social and ethical responsibilities”
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"Human rights abuses against migrant farmers are not uncommon, as men, women, and children have been trafficked—coerced against their will—into low paying jobs with no rights due to their immigrant status."
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How long will it take for humans to be able to sustain themselves? What do we have to do?
How many people right now have no access to sustained environments?

Why haven't more major companies become more sustainable yet?

How long will it take for humans to create an unsustainable environment?

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How can palm oil manufacturers maintain their business while minimizing environmental damage, allowing for improved sustainability?
How do palm oil manufacturers contribute to developing unsustainable environments?
What alternatives for palm oil are more sustainable?

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Why are we as a society allowing this abuse to happen?
What was can we help the workers in the palm oil business?

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Why haven’t more businesses gone 100% sustainable

Does everyone have access to sustainable materials ?

What sustainability challenges does a organization face?

How long will it take for humans to be able to sustain themselves? What do we have to do?
How many people right now have no access to sustained environments?

Why haven't more major companies become more sustainable yet?

How long will it take for humans to create an unsustainable environment?

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Will there be major conflicts between countries caused by climate change?

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How long have there been conflicts over water in history?

Is control of water a major concern for big corporations?

How many villages and cities have been displaced due to location of dams?

What criteria constitutes a water crisis?

What measures can be taken to reduce the effects of a water crisis?