Conservation

EcoPeace Middle East: Environmental Peacemaking for transboundary water management in Israel, Palestine, and Jordan

Citizens of Israel, Palestine, and Jordan know about borders. Crossing between these regions requires rigorous checkpoints and determination. However, the waterway shared between these neighbors, the Jordan River, knows no political boundary. Recently, the Jordan River Basin has experienced massive declines in quality –93 percent of its original flow has been diverted by neighboring states; it is also affected by pollution from sewage, agricultural runoff, and fish pond effluent [...]

Anna Kusmer2017-03-02T17:30:58+00:00community, Conservation, Integrated social-environmental, Social-Ecological Seeds|Comments Off

Super Coral

Can humans enable organisms to adapt to new conditions in the Anthropocene? What are the longterm implications of this? Can marine life and habitats adapt to the increasing temperatures and acidity of the ocean? Scientists at the research centre on Hawaii’s Coconut Island are hoping to save the coral reefs off the island of Oahu from permanent degradation. Ruth Gates and her team’s mission is to create coral that can [...]

ciararh2016-02-05T15:30:12+00:00Conservation, Technology|Comments Off

GIVEWATTS

Can aid that focuses on decreasing reliance on traditional energy sources be a sustainable solution? GIVEWATTS is a non-profit organisation / Social Enterprise bringing clean and safe energy to people in developing countries, starting with East Africa. GIVEWATTS distributes solar lamps and efficient stoves in places that would otherwise rely on daylight, firewood and kerosene. The GIVEWATTS vision is to make renewable energy available to all households across the off-grid [...]

ciararh2015-12-02T21:10:50+00:00climate change, community, Conservation, Education, health, infrastructure, Integrated social-environmental, sustainable living, Technology|Comments Off

Project Tamar

Project Tamar is a marine conservation centre in Brazil that is internationally recognised marine conservation programme that involves coastal communities directly in its socio-ecological research and activities. The primary mission of the Tamar, is research, conservation and management of the five species of sea turtles that occur in Brazil, all threatened with extinction. It protects about 1 100km of turtle habitat in 25 locations across 9 Brazilian states. Project Tamar was [...]

Laura Pereira2015-10-01T15:45:00+00:00Brazil, Conservation|Comments Off

Svalbard Global Seed Vault

Building a more resilient world requires redundancy. The Svalbard Global Seed Vault is a secure seed bank located in the remote Norwegian Svalbard archipelago that aims to provide a backup to other seed banks and global biodiveristy. Wars, natural disaster, and conflict have destroyed seed banks in the past. This project help promote sustainable agriculture and prevent agro-biodiversity loss by maintaining the genetic diversity necessary to restore and enhance agricultural crops. The Svalbard Global Seed Vault provides [...]

Garry Peterson2015-09-30T14:00:00+00:00Conservation, Food|Comments Off

Cape Flats Nature Project

How can people care for biodiversity amidst urban poverty and inequity, when the social, ecological and institutional worlds are fragmented? The Cape Flats Nature project was a project that aimed to reconnect people and nature in South Africa, to slow biodiversity loss and enhance the availability of urban biodiversity. Cape Flats is a plain on the edge of Cape Town that has rapidly urbanized, in which both ecosystem, society, and institutions are fragmented. Apartheid era South [...]

Garry Peterson2015-09-30T13:51:42+00:00community, Conservation, Integrated social-environmental, Social-Ecological Seeds|Comments Off

Health In Harmony

Is addressing basic human needs the key to successful biodiversity conservation? Health in Harmony, a Portland-based nonprofit founded in 2005, works in Indonesia to address human health and deforestation. Health in Harmony partners with Alam Sehat Lestari in Indonesian Borneo to provide low-cost health care to marginalized communities in exchange for a commitment to protect natural resources and reduce deforestation. In the past five years, their collaborative effort led to a 68 percent [...]

ciararh2015-09-21T09:45:09+00:00Conservation, health, Social-Ecological Seeds|Comments Off

The Leap Manifesto

Can a formal appeal to human decency and traditional national values cause a massive uprising that might impact how a country is governed? And can celebrities help the cause? The Leap Manifesto is a call to arms to create a Canada based on caring for the Earth and each other. The Manifesto outlines a set of demands ranging from implementing rights for indigenous peoples, to a complete shift to green energy, to national childcare [...]

ciararh2015-09-15T20:14:14+00:00Conservation, Skills Development, Social Seeds, transport system|Comments Off

Trees for Life: Rewilding Scotland Forests

Trees for Life is a rewilding project that aims to restore the wildness to ecosystems and the human spirit. Doing this requires it to work to change how people view what is natural and possible in Scottish nature and it has done this by building a broad effective coalition to achieve a long term task. The project works with extensively with volunteers to combine landscape transformation with education.

Garry Peterson2015-09-11T11:00:00+00:00Conservation, Education, europe, Social-Ecological Seeds|Comments Off

High Line Park, New York City

Can biodiversity and love of nature be promoted in the world's densest urban areas? The High Line is an elevated freight rail line transformed into a public park on Manhattan’s West Side. It is owned by the City of New York, and maintained and operated by Friends of the High Line. Founded in 1999 by community residents, Friends of the High Line fought for the High Line’s preservation and transformation [...]

ciararh2015-08-03T19:42:35+00:00Conservation, Social-Ecological Seeds|Comments Off

Seeds are existing initiatives which hold potential to shape the future. They are likely not widespread nor well-known. They can be social initiatives, new technologies, economic tools, or social-ecological projects, or organisations, movements or new ways of acting that have that appear to be making a substantial contribution towards creating a future that is just, prosperous, and sustainable.

We gather seeds from diverse research disciplines, communities of practice, and individuals that have different world-views, values, and problems. This diversity means that not everyone will agree on the importance or value of every seed.