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What is regenerative leadership?
By Roberta Attanasio The world is up for re-invention—complexity, ambiguity and uncertainty call for innovative models of leadership. We’re all here to be leaders, we all need to embrace new aspects of leadership, and we all need to step into unique roles that allow our gifts and talents to shine while contributing to a life-honoring present and future. Shared leadership and purpose-driven leadership provide up-to-date paradigms aligned with current needs, which are shaped—among others—by climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic, and civil unrest. Shared leadership is group-based. It empowers group members by giving them leadership responsibilities—individuals within a group lead each other to achieve successful outcomes. Think in these terms: two…
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Farmed Salmon Develop Ear Deformities All Around the World
By Roberta Attanasio Salmon farming is the fastest growing food production system in the world—accounting for 70 percent (2.4 million metric tons) of the market. Increasing demand is leading to the gradual development of responsible practices to minimize its negative impacts on the environment. Indeed, salmon farming is known to pollute the oceans, use toxic pesticides to control the spread of sea lice, foster diseases caused by viruses and bacteria, allow escapees, and deplete the stocks of forage fish—depending on the production region, 1.5 – 8 kilograms of wild fish are needed to produce one kilogram of farmed salmon. However, despite the development of the open and transparent production practices…
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Circular Economy: Turning Waste into Resources
By Roberta Attanasio We take, we make, we dispose — in this daily process, we deplete irreplaceable natural resources and generate not only massive waste, but also extensive environmental and health hazards. Our current economy — or linear economy — is based on the take-make-dispose approach. However, this approach is not sustainable. We need to ask ourselves a crucial question: how can we generate clean prosperity today, while preserving resources and ecological functions for use by future generations? In other words, how can we build a sustainable economy? The answer is: we can do so by adopting a new approach, one based on the so-called circular economy. According to the…
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Neonicotinoid Pesticides: Bad for Bees, Bad for Many Other Species
By Roberta Attanasio Do neonicotinoid pesticides harm bees? According to scientific evidence, the answer is “yes”. Indeed, scientific evidence for the toxic effects of neonicotinoid pesticides on bees is accumulating at an increasing pace. And, on the basis of scientific evidence, the European Commission banned in 2013 the use of three neonicotinoids — clothianidin, imidacloprid and thiamethoxam — on flowering plants. The ban was motivated by findings from the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA); these findings were based on the evaluation of the scientific studies available at the time. Now, a report from the European Academies Science Advisory Council (EASAC) emphasizes that bees are not the only species affected by…
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Clean Air: The Effects of U.S. Power Plant Carbon Standards on Human Health
By Roberta Attanasio A little more than a year ago, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported that in 2012 around 7 million people died — accounting for one in eight of total global deaths — as a result of exposure to air pollution. These estimates more than doubled the previous ones, and confirmed that air pollution is now the world’s largest single environmental health risk. The WHO concluded that reducing air pollution globally could save millions of lives. But, what policy changes would be most effective at saving lives? The answer comes from a new study published in the journal Nature Climate Change (May 4, 2015.) The study, (US power plant…
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Global Threats: Contamination of Surface Waters by Agricultural Insecticides
By Roberta Attanasio The use of agricultural insecticides — toxic substances developed to target and kill insects that damage crops — has sparked controversy since the dawn of the “chemical age”, which started in the 1950s. The benefits of agricultural insecticides — for example, increased food production — are undeniable. Unfortunately, along with benefits, there are considerable unwanted effects. Ideally, insecticides must be lethal to the target insects, but not to non-target species. However, these toxic substances do not target only insects — they target many more organisms, including man. Thus, the toxic brew of agricultural insecticides threatens the ecological integrity of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. Indeed, agricultural systems play a…
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Small Predator Diversity Plays a Significant Role in the Spread of Infectious Diseases
By Roberta Attanasio Biodiversity is a term coined to describe the diversity of all living things, from human beings to microorganisms. A New York Times editorial published almost two decades ago aptly describes the importance of the biodiversity concept: “Biodiversity is a hugely important concept that stresses the coherence and interdependence of all forms of life on earth and a new willingness to appraise the meaning of that interdependence, not just for humans but for every one of life’s component parts.” The editorial goes on to illustrate the alarming effects of biodiversity loss: “Biodiversity is a way of talking about what scientists have long understood and a way of reminding…
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Climate Change: A Key Driver of the Syrian Conflict?
By Roberta Attanasio Climate change is happening here and now, with significant damage to natural systems and society. The shrinking of the Arctic sea ice, the melting of the Greenland and Antarctica ice sheets, the acidification of the oceans, the sea level rise, the shifting patterns of precipitation, and the amplified threat of wildfires, are some of its well-recognized effects. There are also significant concerns related to the consequences that climate change could have on freshwater availability and agricultural productivity worldwide — resulting in increasing poverty and further weakening of fragile governments. Indeed, climate change has been identified as a “threat multiplier” — it can exacerbate political instability in the…
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Nanoparticles and Sunscreen Products: Toxicity to Sea Life in Coastal Waters
By Roberta Attanasio The debate on the safety of titanium dioxide (TiO2) and zinc oxide (ZnO) nanoparticles contained in sunscreen products is still on. Some scientists have raised concerns about the negative impact that these tiny particles — generally between one and 100 nanometers (between one and 100 billionths of a meter) across — may have on human health. Due to their small size, nanoparticles might do harm to humans by seeping through the skin and into the bloodstream. A few months ago, despite the widespread safety concerns, Paul Wright (a toxicology expert at RMIT University) told The Guardian that sunscreen nanoparticles don’t get past the outermost dead layer of human skin cells. In contrast, Paul Westerhoff (a professor at Arizona…
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Ivory Poaching Drives the Global Decline of African Elephants
By Roberta Attanasio Poaching — the illegal killing of wild animals — is responsible for the death of tens of thousands of African elephants a year. Poachers kill elephants to hack off the tusks, which are then sold to make valuable ivory trinkets, mostly for Asian markets. In 2012, Jeffrey Gettleman wrote in the New York Times that Africa is in the midst of an epic elephant slaughter. How many African elephants, then, are slaughtered every year for their ivory? Results of a new study (Illegal killing for ivory drives global decline in African elephants) published a few days ago in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences show…
