2013: A year of protests, conflicts of interest and lingering mysteries
It was a year when people were fed up. With pipelines in Canada. Fracking in the UK. Coal trains along the Columbia River. A crematorium and an oil refinery in the San Francisco Bay Area. A waste recycling plant in Ohio. Fluoride in Portland, Ore.
A movement to regulate GMOs and pesticide use is spreading from Kauai to other Hawaiian islands.
While there's nothing new about civil disobedience and other environmental protests, in 2013 they seemed to intensify and spread globally. Grassroots protests attracted large numbers of local and native people who worry about their environmental health but don't consider themselves activists.In Romania, two proposals – opening Europe's largest open-cast gold mine and drilling for shale gas – drew thousands of protesters. In China, people protested not just the deadly smog that blankets their northern cities but also the government's inadequate flood-relief plans and proposals to build a refinery and uranium processing plant. In Nepal, locals staged a sit-in at a wire factory. In Malaysia, tribespeople blockaded the construction site of a new dam. In rural Mexico, wind farms drew demonstrations from native people.
On the lush island of Kauai, the public's environmental concerns spurred a landmark ordinance. Large farms must disclose their use of pesticides and genetically modified crops. The movement is now spreading to other Hawaiian islands. Will it reach the mainland in 2014? Stay tuned. So far, efforts in other states have focused on requiring labels on genetically modified foods. Scientists are divided about the need to label GMOs: There is little scientific evidence of health or ecological threats, but many uncertainties remain.
2013 also brought revelations of conflicts of interest between industries and regulators. An investigation by Environmental Health News revealed that scientists who have criticized plans in Europe to regulate endocrine-disrupting chemicals have past or current ties to regulated industries. Meanwhile, in Canada, conflict-of-interest allegations surround the environmental assessment of TransCanada Corp.’s proposed Keystone XL pipeline. And in Australia, the environment minister is investigating claims that members of a board responsible for protecting the Great Barrier Reef have financial ties to companies that could benefit from a major port expansion.
