An unfortunate mix of drought, failed harvests and rising food prices have brought severe food shortages to the east and the Horn of Africa. The severe food crisis is already affecting around 10 million people in parts of Kenya, Ethiopia, Djibouti and Somalia. Rains have failed over two seasons, with a strong La Niña event having a dramatic impact across the east coast of Africa. Now that this year’s wet season has officially ended, there is little prospect of rain or relief before September.
Charities have launched the biggest ever campaigns to tackle what they call a ‘creeping disaster’ in Kenya, Somalia, Uganda, Ethiopia. For Somali refugees arriving in neighbouring Ethiopia, rates of severe malnutrition are as high as 23%, according to Oxfam. A 4% incidence normally constitutes an emergency.
Up to 1,000 Somalis a day are also streaming across the Kenyan border to Dadaab, already the largest refugee settlement in the world, with 367,000 residents. Some 2.5 million people require food aid in Somalia, but access is tough, particularly in the south, where an Islamist insurgency has made it nearly impossible, for aid groups to operate. To the west, in Ethiopia, 3.2 million people require humanitarian assistance. Pastoralist communities there have seen 80% of their livestock die in some places, according to Oxfam, with the lost income making it extremely difficult for people to buy food.
In Uganda 600,000 people need assistance, and in Djibouti 120,000. But the greatest number of people in need, 3.5 million, are in Kenya’s arid northern regions, whose marginalisation by the government has magnified the effects of the increasingly frequent droughts. In Turkana malnutrition rates are more than twice the emergency level.
“High food prices, fluctuating rainfall, a rising population and ever dwindling natural resources have created the perfect storm,” said Leigh Daynes, director of communications for Plan, in the UK.
Aevia — Consider the Source

Dr. William Carey, Auburn University Professor, outlines a ten point system to help improve forest tree seedling survival. At a meeting, sponsored by International Forest Company, Dr. Carey explains his planting techniques and insists you give seedlings “tender loving care” from the time they leave the nursery until planted in the field.
Commandment Number One –
Do not allow seedlings to dry out. – Ample moisture is the key factor in seedling survival; seedlings must never be allowed to dry out from the nursery to planting. Plant immediately in the field. Remember “if they dry, they die”.
Commandment Number Two –
Transport seedlings carefully. – Rough handling can damage root systems and predispose seedlings to stress.
Commandment Number Three –
Avoid temperature extremes. – Fluctuations in temperature, especially excessive heat, during storage and transport can result in seedling trauma during outplanting.
Commandment Number Four. –
Plant promptly. – Once seedlings are lifted, minimize storage time, especially early in the season and avoid extended transport time.
Commandment Numbr Five. –
Do not trim or prune seedling roots. – Seedlings need every single tiny root to absorb moisture and nutrients from the ground. The more root surface, the better the growth.
Commandment Number Six. –
Do not wash or shake gel from seedling roots. – Gel applied to roots at the nursery prevents drying out during transport, decreases planting shock, and improves acclimation to the planting site.
Commandment Number Seven. –
Plant bareroot seedlings after October, preferably after December 15 and before April. – Cooler temperatures are more conducive to seedling survival and healthy growth.
Commandment Number Eight. –
Plant seedlings deeply. – Greater exposure to the soil and its water content – even one-half inch of added depth of planting – significantly improves survival rates.
Commandment Number Nine. –
Use mechanical planting, if possible. – Although slightly more expensive, planting mechanically yields better results and is an investment that pays off.
Commandment Number Ten –
Do not attempt to plant seedlings that have frozen in the pack. – Freezing irreversibly damages the root system, leading to seedling death.
Aevia — Consider the Source

In Australia, Aurora Algae opened its demonstration facility in Karratha, Western Australia, where the Company’s algae-based biomass is being harvested for products in the nutraceutical, pharmaceutical, aquaculture and renewable energy markets.
“This would not have been possible with a U.S.-based production facility,” said Greg Bafalis, CEO of Aurora Algae, “where we believe the climatic conditions are not economically viable to produce large-scale, cost-competitive algae products.” The company’s open-pond production method, and proprietary pale green cultivar algae strains, utilize dry, arid climates with large amounts of CO2 and seawater as feed stocks.
Aevia — Consider the Source

World food prices rose to a record in December 2010 on higher sugar, grain and oilseed costs. In the coming decades, there are going to be many more hungry mouths to feed, and as food crop prices rise dramatically, agriculture will become a more lucrative business, encouraging countries to switch economic focus.
Kurdistan has the two primary ingredients to form a successful agricultural economy: Plentiful water from the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, and hectares upon hectares of fertile land that can produce crops. These natural resources have yet to be used efficiently. The water is largely not used; much of it is wasted instead of being dammed and channeled to irrigate agricultural land. With the lack of proper statistics it’s difficult to be accurate, but it’s a fair estimate to say that only around 20 percent of the land is being used for farming. There are many incentives for Kurdistan to make use of its abundant water and fertile land.
Biofuel is going to be only one aspect of a Kurdish agricultural economy. FAO has estimated that global food production will have to rise 70 percent by 2050 as the world population expands by 2 billion.
Aevia — Consider the Source

Price Charles spoke at a food conference hosted by the Washington Post. on May 4, 2011 at Georgetown University. In his speech, he criticized government subsidies for large-scale agriculture, and spoke against industrial pollution and global dependence on oil.  ✂ Transcript

Journey to Forever has established an online biofuels library with a wide variety of books and articles available at no charge.
Consider the Source: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel_library.html

LS9’s bugs are single-cell organisms, each a fraction of a billionth the size of an ant. They start out as industrial yeast or nonpathogenic strains of E. coli, but LS9 modifies them by custom-de-signing their DNA.
Using genetically modified bugs for fermentation is essentially the same as using natural bacteria to produce ethanol, although the energy-intensive final process of distillation is virtually eliminated because the bugs excrete a substance that is almost pump-ready.
The closest that LS9 has come to mass production is a 1,000-litre fermenting machine, which looks like a large stainless-steel jar, next to a wardrobe-sized computer connected by a tangle of cables and tubes. It has not yet been plugged in. The machine produces the equivalent of one barrel a week and takes up 40 sq ft of floor space.
AEVIA Reveals the Source