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Volunteer Tourism | Earth Wise

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Spending vacation time in a disaster zone seems like a crazy idea, but so-called volunteer tourism can actually be a big help to communities trying to recover from natural disasters.  It can also be a unique and rewarding experience for the volunteers.

Such volunteer tourism should not be confused with “disaster tourism”, the unfortunate practice of rushing to the scene of a calamity to gawk.  That is certainly no help to anyone.

When disaster strikes a destination usually frequented by tourists, people naturally tend to stay away, leaving communities to deal with the loss of tourism income on top of the costs of repair and recovery.

A study by UTS, a technology university in Sydney, Australia, looked at the effects of volunteer tourism in the wake of the April 2015 earthquake in Nepal.  They found that when it is done in an ethical matter than takes into account local conditions and the affected community, volunteer tourism can aid recovery and resilience.

In the months following the earthquake, most relief organizations asked international volunteers not to come unless they had specific expertise, such as medical skills, building skills, or emergency response experience.  Eventually, Nepal relaxed conditions to include volunteers to help rebuild homes and schools, to intern in hospitals, and to support NGOs and to re-establish sustainable agriculture.

According to the Nepal Association of Tour and Travel Agents, almost one third of the tours booked to Nepal in the two years after the earthquake comprised groups who combined tourism with volunteering or philanthropy.

Volunteer tourism isn’t for everyone and for every situation, but for places that rely on tourism for their economy, building volunteer tourism into the recovery process can be a good strategy.

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Volunteer tourism can aid disaster recovery

Photo, posted July 2, 2015, courtesy of the World Humanitarian Summit via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Lake George Health Report

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The Offshore Chemistry Program, run by the Darrin Fresh Water Institute at RPI, has been monitoring the deep waters of Lake George in New York for 40 years.  Lake George, nicknamed the Queen of American Lakes, is famed for the transparency of its water and a new report on the health of the lake reveals that it is doing rather well.

According to the report, although concentrations of chemicals and pollutants like salt and nutrients have increased in the deep waters of Lake George, they are still too low to harm the ecosystem at those depths.

The Offshore Chemistry Program studies the lake as part of a collaboration between RPI, IBM Research, and the FUND for Lake George that is called the Jefferson Project.  This long-term commitment provides a wealth of information over time matched by few lake studies in the world.

The recent results show that levels of salt, the nutrient orthophosphate, and chlorophyll have increased substantially over time, but none are yet at a level that will cause harm.

Orthophosphate occurs naturally, but most likely the higher levels are due to improperly functioning septic systems, failing wastewater treatment systems, and stormwater runoff.  The orthophosphate most likely triggered the increase in chlorophyll, which probably is associated with increased density of chlorophyll in individual algal cells, rather than an increase in total algal mass in the lake.

Overall, the results demonstrate the continuing resilience of Lake George to a growing array of stressors.  In nearly 40 years of human activities, the lake has changed in a number of ways, but the changes have so far been relatively small.  With such careful monitoring, we can hope to keep them that way.

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Four Decades of Data Sounds Early Warning on Lake George

Photo, posted September 24, 2009, courtesy of GPA Photo Archive via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

The Cost Of Rising Seas

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Coastal cities in the United States are grappling with the need for extensive infrastructure projects to protect against rising seas and worsening storms.  The cost of these projects will be enormous, and it is unclear how to pay to them.

Boston has many neighborhoods in low-lying areas, and it is estimated that $2.4 billion will be needed to protect the city from flooding.  The city abandoned plans to build a harbor barrier that would have cost $6 to $12 billion because it was economically unfeasible.

Charleston, South Caroline needs $2 billion to reduce flooding that occurs regularly during high tides.  The Houston, Texas area needs $30 billion to provide protection against a 100-year flood.  Hurricane Harvey caused $125 billion in damages in Texas in 2017.  New York City is considering a $10 billion storm surge barrier and floodgates to shield parts of the city from rising waters.

Florida faces the greatest exposure to flooding with an estimated $76 billion in costs to address some of its problems.

At the federal level, multiple agencies represent potential funding sources, but none offer the kind of money required to address the need.  This places a heavy burden on state and local governments.  Various states have passed legislation related to shoreline resiliency and flood abatement, but relatively little funding has been approved.  Some bond measures have passed, but the totals are small compared with what is needed.

Educating people about the costs of not doing anything or not doing enough soon enough is essential.  As Hurricane Katrina demonstrated, not spending a large amount of money on resilience can result in having to spend a colossal amount of money on recovery.

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Who Will Pay for the Huge Costs of Holding Back Rising Seas?

Photo, posted December 26, 2013, courtesy of Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Is There Hope For Coral Reefs?

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News about the world’s coral reefs has been relentlessly bad for a number of years.  Warming, acidifying oceans have wreaked havoc with coral reefs leading to enormous losses.  Nowhere have things been more dire than in Australia’s Great Barrier Reef.  Coral bleaching events have been increasingly common and severe over the past two decades.  In fact, only 7% of the Great Barrier Reef has escaped bleaching entirely since 1998.

While the future of the world’s coral reefs is very much uncertain as global heating continues, there is a recent bit of hopeful news.   According to a study published in Nature Climate Change, the response of the Great Barrier Reef to the extreme temperatures in 2017 was quite different from that of the previous year in the aftermath of back-to-back bouts of coral bleaching.

Surprisingly, corals that bleached in 2016 but managed to survive were more resistant to the recurrence of hot conditions in 2017.

Many corals don’t survive bleaching events at all and, of course,those corals don’t bleach for a second time. But the surviving corals from the 2016 bleaching event were tougher species.   As a result of bleaching, the mix of coral species on the reef is changing very rapidly.  The net result was that there was less bleaching in 2017 even though the temperatures that year were even more extreme than in 2016.

There have now been four mass bleaching events on the Great Barrier Reef over the past 20 years and it is only a matter of time before another one occurs triggered by the next marine heatwave. Almost half of the corals on the northern two-thirds of the reef have been killed.  But at least some of the reef is showing impressive survival skills.

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A glimmer of hope for the world’s coral reefs

Photo, posted November 29, 2012, courtesy of Robert Linsdell via Flickr. 

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

WAMC Northeast Public Radio

WAMC/Northeast Public Radio is a regional public radio network serving parts of seven northeastern states (more...)