The world's first comprehensive assessment of land health, released last week, should prompt global leaders and residents alike to take concerted action to address the "critical" condition of land degradation.The report, the result of a three-year assessment by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, deserves special attention in the age of social media era, where celebrity gossip and political scandals often steal the spotlight from real issues.The intergovernmental platform, a global scientific group with 129 members including China, brought together more than 100 scientists to prepare the assessment for "better-informed policy making".China, which suffers from land degradation, is going all out to reverse the damaging trend as it rams up building an "ecological civilization".In its latest move, approved by the top legislature last month, China has set up a State Administration of Forestry and Grassland to strengthen the protection of forests, grasslands, wetlands and wild life.One of the most unnerving findings of the report is that land decay, caused by unsustainable farming, mining, pollution, and urbanization, threatens to increase mass human migration to larger swathes of areas, raising the chances of conflicts.Land degradation is already affecting the well-being of 40 percent of the global population, and in just over three decades, an estimated 4 billion people will be forced to live in arid areas, the report said."By then it is likely that land degradation, together with the closely related problems of climate change, will have forced 50 million to 700 million people to migrate," said Robert Scholes, an ecologist from South Africa and co-chair of the assessment.Declining land productivity also makes societies more vulnerable to social instability - particularly in aid areas, where "years with extremely low rainfall have been associated with an increase of up to 45 percent in violent conflict," Scholes said.Land degradation exposes more people to hazardous air, water and land pollution, particularly in developing countries. But despite the "critical" land degradation, there is a widespread lack of awareness of the problem, as many of those who benefit from overexploitation of natural resources are among the least affected by the direct negative impacts of land degradation, the intergovernmental platform report said. They therefore have the least incentive to take action.Action, however, is not only urgent, but will also be cost-effective if taken early. On average, the benefits of restoration, such as higher employment, are 10 times higher than the costs. For regions like Asia and Africa, the cost of inaction will be at least three times higher than the cost of immediate action.China is among at least 112 countries that agreed by last September to make the UN Sustainable Development Goal of achieving land degradation neutrality by 2030 a national target for action, said a release from the UN Convention to Combat Desertification.The report also gives proven ways to stop and reverse land degradation. It urges governments, the private sector, international organizations and individuals all to play a part. For example, it identifies the high-consumption lifestyles in the most developed economies, combined with rising consumption in developing and emerging economies, as the underlying drivers of land degradation. custom rolex braceletmake custom bracelets onlineimprinted rubber braceletssilicone wristbands onlineblank wristbands
A Chinese medical worker prepares to vaccinate a young kid at a hospital in Shanghai, China, March 20, 2016. [Photo/IC] Thirty-three people are being held accountable after 145 babies in Jinhu county, Jiangsu province, were given expired polio vaccine, local authorities announced on Sunday. The Huaian city government, which has jurisdiction over the county, said on its website that Gu Kun, a vice-mayor of the city, and Sun Banggui, director of its health commission, have been given administrative warnings. Zhang Zhiyong, the Party secretary of the county, and Xu Yaping, who heads the government, have been given serious Party warnings. Wang Hong, head of the Licheng Health Center, where the vaccinations were given, has been detained on suspicion of duty-related crimes. Six people directly involved in the incident, including Liu Zhibing, deputy head of the center, have been dismissed from their posts and the Party. Liu has been transferred to judicial authorities for prosecution. The babies received expired polio vaccine at the health center in the county's Licheng township from Dec 11 to Jan 7. The incident came to light in early January, after a father who is a medical worker took his son to the center to get the vaccine. When he checked the batch number printed in the boy's vaccination record book he found it had expired. The provincial government sent a special team to investigate the incident. Examinations of the babies conducted by medical experts found that none had acquired abnormal health conditions related to the expired vaccine. The operations of the health center in Licheng have been corrected, and it has reopened for vaccinations, the city government website said. The provincial government ordered Jinhu county to conduct in-depth reviews and apologize to the provincial and city governments. The city government and the provincial health commission have also been told to conduct reviews and apologize to the provincial government. The province is formulating a plan to improve the vaccine management system and clarify the responsibilities of local governments, regulatory authorities and medical institutions. The safety of vaccines became a hot topic last year when Changchun Changsheng, one of the country's major vaccine producers, was found to have fabricated production records and to have used expired materials from 2014 in the production of rabies vaccine. It also produced a substandard DTaP vaccine, which protects against diphtheria, tetanus and whooping cough.
