The last Orang-Utans get killed

Jardine Matheson Holdings

Jardine Matheson Holdings Limited (SGX: J36, LSE: JAR) often referred to as Jardines, is a multinational corporation incorporated in Bermuda and based in Hong Kong. While listed on the London Stock Exchange and the Singapore Exchange, the vast majority of Jardines shares are traded in Singapore.[1][2] One of the original Hong Kong trading houses or Hongs, as of December 2010, 41% of the company's profits were still earned in China.[3] With roots that can be traced back to the opium trade, today, Jardines is a Fortune Global 500 company[4] that consists of Jardine Pacific, Jardine Motors Group, Jardine Strategic, Dairy Farm, Hongkong Land, Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group, Jardine Cycle & Carriage and Astra International.[5][6][7] It also owns 42% of Jardine Lloyd Thompson Group and has an investment (21%) in Rothschilds Continuation Holdings, the merchant banking house.[3]
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The firm of Jardine, Matheson and Co. began in Canton, China on 1 July 1832 by Scottish doctor William Jardine and Edinburgh University graduate James Matheson.[8] With the cessation of Hong Kong under the 1842 Treaty of Nanking, the firm set up its headquarters on the island and grew rapidly. Initially trading in opium, tea and cotton, Jardines soon diversified into other areas including insurance, shipping and railways. By the turn of the 19th century, the company had become the largest of the ‘’hongs’’ or foreign trading conglomerates with offices in all the important Chinese cities as well as Yokohama, Japan.[9][10]

In the early decades of the 20th century, Jardines built cotton mills, a press packing plant and a brewery in Shanghai while expanding into Africa, America and Australia. When war came to China in 1937, the firm suffered heavily both in Hong Kong and in mainland China.

After the 1949 foundation of the People’s Republic of China, trading conditions for foreign companies under the new Communist regime became increasingly difficult.[11]

Stop Biofuelling Deforestation: How your fuel bills are subsidising deforestation - and what you can do about it!

Demand for agricultural land is at the heart of the mass destruction of the world's forests. The main cause of forest loss in Indonesia, and the greatest threat to the continued survival of orangutans in the wild, is the conversion of forests to oil palm plantations.

Orangutans share their forest home with countless other critically endangered species, including Sumatran tigers, elephants, and rhinos. Agricultural expansion is also linked to other causes of biodiversity decline including hunting, poaching, human-wildlife conflict, illegal logging, and forest fires. Tropical forests are also crucial carbon sinks, so losing these habitats would be catastrophic in terms of the global fight to prevent dangerous climate change.

Yet, shockingly, the UK government is considering offering subsidies to power stations to burn biofuels - including palm oil - for heat and power. And what's more, this is being funded through our fuel bills! These subsidies, called Renewable Obligation Certificates (ROCs) are the government's way of supporting renewable energy technologies, as part of plans to reduce the country's greenhouse gas emissions. Nobody would deny that we need more investment in renewables, but, as well as supporting clean technologies such as wind farms, ROCs also finance electricity generation from the burning of bioliquids such as palm oil.

On top of the threat that this increase in demand for fuel crops poses to tropical forests and biodiversity, some biofuels have been shown to actually lead to an increase in greenhouse gas emissions!

Norway-Indonesia REDD+ Partnership - Frequently asked questions

Since the new partnership on reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation between Norway and Indonesia was signed last Thursday, the Royal Norwegian Embassy has received a number of questions on how the partnership will work and why Norway chose to work with Indonesia. Read the answer to these and many other questions in our new FAQ sheet below.

Originally posted by Wrabbit2000
Where are all those people and why can't they be bothered to so much as raise a voice in serious anger about the raping and obliteration of our Environment? Not global warming or all that vague concept stuff...but THIS. Generations that haven't even been born yet will cry over the loss of what goes up in smoke and we're all too busy rooting for the death of Assad or the spectacle of Gadaffi being murdered in the street to even notice...the IMPORTANT stuff is burning right before our very eyes and we scream over trivia and the fates of mortal men.