From ABC Rural:

The United Nations has hailed the potato as a potential solution to solving the looming global food shortage.

With wheat and rice supplies declining, the UN is encouraging low-income countries to grow more potatoes to cover the food shortfall.

It's also declared 2008 as the International Year of the Potato to try and raise awareness of how important the humble spud is to agriculture and the economy.

The International Year of the Potato also happens to have a fantastic website, from which I learned many facts dispelling my previous assumption that the potato consisted simply of "empty carbs." For instance,

They have the highest protein content (around 2.1 percent on a fresh weight basis) in the family of root and tuber crops, and protein of a fairly high quality, with an amino-acid pattern that is well matched to human requirements. They are also very rich in vitamin C - a single medium-sized potato contains about half the recommended daily intake - and contain a fifth of the recommended daily value of potassium.

Nutritious, delicious, and potentially life-saving.

by Dan Shepard, Information Officer, UN DPI

It was one day late but countries achieved a major breakthrough on international climate change action at 2:31pm Bali time on Saturday. It was not without high drama featuring plenty of twists and turns along the way on a day when many delegates had planned to catch flights home.

It even took the special intervention of Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yodhoyono and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to exhort delegates to complete what seemed like hopelessly deadlocked talks.

Yodhoyono called on countries to complete "the most difficult mile," of an "exhaustive marathon." He told delegates that we could not allow "the human race and the planet to crumble because we cannot find the right words."

The Secretary-General, who returned to Bali after a visit to Timor-Leste, said he was reluctant to speak again to the conference but that he was disappointed in the progress that had been made. "The hour is late. It is time to make a decision." He appealed to delegates not to "risk everything you have achieved so far."

After a morning of false starts and false hopes, mis-communications and misunderstandings, countries agreed on a roadmap to launch negotiations toward a global, comprehensive agreement to address climate change. The Bali decision sets out an agenda that frames the discussions that will take place over the next two years and sets a deadline of 2009 to complete the negotiations.

After agreement was reached, the Secretary-General issued a statement strongly welcoming the outcome and saying that the Bali Roadmap achieved all three of the main objectives. "The Bali Roadmap that has been agreed is a pivotal first step toward an agreement that can address the threat of climate change, the defining challenge of our time."

But the agreement did not come painlessly. On a key provision, concerning the obligations of developing countries in the future negotiations, India, speaking for developing countries, said that alternate wording had been agreed to during the night. And then Bangladesh said that language concerning the least developed countries and small island states had been omitted. The Philippines said the phrase "on the basis of equity" had been omitted. And then the United States said it could not accept the formulation that was put forward but offered to keep working until an agreement could be found.

Then South Africa, responding to the US, said developing countries had voluntarily moved to accept new obligations for their national actions on climate change that were "measurable, reportable and verifiable," a concession that only a year ago, he said, "would have been unthinkable." South Africa asked the US to reconsider its position.

Then an avalanche of countries took the floor in support of the developing country position, many asking the US to state their reservations separately and not block a consensus.

US Under Secretary of State Paula Dobriansky took the floor again and said the US wanted a roadmap and wanted to be part of the roadmap.

"We are very committed to long-term greenhouse gas emission reductions," and she said the US would work with other large emitters to halve global emissions by 2050. And then she said the US "will go forward and join the consensus," which was followed by a thunderous ovation.

"It feels like we are in a movie with lots of plots," said the delegate from Egypt.

After full adoption by the plenary, countries thanked the US for joining the consensus and thanked the secretariat of the Climate Change Convention and the Indonesian government for hosting the Conference.

By Curtis Moore, Independent Consultant and a Former Counsel, Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works

It is Thursday of the second week of the climate negotiations in Bali, which is the traditional day to reach agreement--or not--at international global warming negotiations. But do not confuse an agreement -- if there is one, and there almost certainly will be--with a solution. A Bali roadmap may be a great accomplishment, but it is not a solution, nor will it lead to one. A solution is what is desperately needed because the peril posed by global warming is far more grave and imminent than all but a few realize.

The Earth is approaching--some believe it may have already passed--a half dozen tipping points. These are infinitesimally small changes that trigger sudden, often violent and irreversible change. Because of the extended delay from the development of science until its restatement by the IPCC, none of these considerations is before negotiators in Bali. But one government in the world has considered these facts, then adopted the most comprehensive, multifaceted and aggressive program to combat global warming in the world. That government, which will come as no surprise to many, is California.

One of the great flaws in the negotiations process is that policies are developed on science as expounded by the 2,000 participants in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It, in turn, reaches its conclusions considering only studies published in "peer reviewed" literature, meaning they have been scrutinized closely by expert scientists. This means the science elaborated by the IPCC is rock solid, but three to five years old, so when negotiators from throughout the world gather annually to craft policies, they may be utterly ignorant of the newest science, even if has profound implications. That is certainly the case in Bali.

In the last five years, thanks in part to improved super computers and new information, but also due to the inspiration of some, scientists looking for answers to troubling and unexplained environmental changes, serious shortcomings in the assumptions on which the negotiating process is based have been revealed.

First, scientists knew that a variety of pollutants excluded from the Kyoto Protocol tropospheric ozone, or smog, for example, and carbon monoxide the colorless, odorless gas emitted by every tailpipe and smokestack--cause global warming. But because they had short lifetimes--meaning they are destroyed by a variety of chemical reactions in the atmosphere or by other means--they were thought to be much less important than the so called "long lived" gases. But in fact, it is now clear the majority of today's warming is due to these short-lived pollutants.

Second, some pollutants were not then known to be significant causes of warming. Black carbon, like the soot emitted by diesels, for example was not seriously considered for inclusion in the Protocol. It now turns out, however, that it is a major cause of warming, especially where it darkens snow and ice, thus increasing the absorption of sunlight. Moreover, black carbon now appears to not only cause melting by warming areas like Greenland, Alaska and Siberia, but also by actually changing the way that snow melts, accelerating the process. This may account for the fact that while warming in the Arctic is roughly what computer models predict, melting is much, much faster, perhaps twice the speed of predictions.

Third, some pollutants and sources were excluded from coverage because, in theory, they are subject to other international agreements, but also because the true magnitude of their contribution to global warming was not accurately known. Ships, for example, are excluded. But recent estimates place are that they account not for a small amount of pollution, but an immense quantity: between 15 and 30 percent of global emissions of oxides of nitrogen, a pollutant that helps form smog, for example. Indeed emissions from ships are roughly equal to those of the continent of either Europe or North America. Aircraft are also excluded, even though they injects immense amounts of carbon where it can be most dangerous, at high altitudes and over the Arctic.

Negotiators also left chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), the industrial chemicals like DuPont's Freons that destroy stratospheric ozone, out of global warming coverage, supposedly because they were subject to another international regime, the Montreal Protocol to Protect the Ozone Layer. Chemicals subject to Montreal are regulated, however, solely to address their impacts on stratospheric ozone. As a result, the chemical–again, one made by DuPont–now used as a chilling agent in the air conditioners of cars and trucks was allowed on the market as a CFC replacement even though it was known at the time to be a powerful cause of global warming.

Perhaps worst of all, the true atmospheric lifetime of the chemical that will be the single largest contributor to global warming, carbon dioxide--created when carbon-rich fuels like coal, oil and wood are burned--was greatly underestimated. Although there was some uncertainty as to CO2's lifetime, there was a consensus that one century was about right. Instead, it is now known that after even 1,000 years, one third of CO2 being emitted now will still be in the system.

The upshot of this miscalculation of CO2's lifetime is that even if emissions were to cease this instant, it would be over a century before the full cooling benefit would be realized. These are grim realities, but as is often the case, there are solutions, if only policy-makers will address them.

Because the lifetimes of the short-lived pollutants range from a few days to weeks to a few years, reducing them can produce near-term cooling. HFC-134a, the DuPont chemical used in car air conditioners, has 3,400 times the warming power of CO2 on a molecule-to-molecule basis, and a lifetime of about 12 to 15 years. Thus, if the entire world were to ban use of the chemical in automotive air conditioners, as Europe is doing starting in 2011, there would be cooling benefit before children born today graduated from high school.

For the other short-lived pollutants that cause global warming, the health payback would be immense. Black carbon kills and ozone both kills and causes asthma. The global annual total surely is in the hundreds of thousands of deaths and tens of millions of illnesses. Reduce them, and needless sickness and death would be avoided--and reduce them we must.

One Government realizes this: California.

It was in California that the link between cars and smog was first established, where the first pollution control technologies were mandated and the first statewide regulatory program for air pollution was installed. It was California that gave birth to solar photovoltaic cells to generate electricity from sunlight, where turbines to generate electricity were installed in huge numbers and where the most aggressive and effective energy conservation requirements in the world were developed.

After reviewing new science and examining what regulations and new technologies could achieve, the California legislature adopted not one law, but an entire suite. They deal with the near, mid and long term; cover transportation, electricity generation, and industrial processes as well as residential and commercial activities. They require reductions right away -- "early actions," they're called–and other cuts that must be the "maximum technologically feasible, cost effective" reductions.

They encourage the deployment of solar and wind power, and the adoption of new, tougher conservation requirements. They require reductions in not only carbon dioxide and the other pollutants covered by international global warming law, but also black carbon, ozone and its precursors and the industrial chemicals like DuPont's 134a.

There are some gaps in the California Suite, but the legislature is working to close them, so that when they are finished the final product will be a solution -- not just agreement. To see the California Suite become the symphony played worldwide would be, pardon the pun, sweet music indeed.

by Zach Swank, a SustainUS youth delegate

Today the high-level segment of the conference began with statements that contained the energy and leadership that has been missing throughout the conference. After almost a week and a half of insincere commitment to the purpose of these negotiations by many of the leading country delegations, it was incredibly heartening to hear these uplifting words. After all of the science and press about climate change this year, one has to wonder exactly what it will take to finally have all delegations approach the negotiations with the intention of agreeing to the commitments needed to avoid the worst affects of climate change. Petty and short sighted national interests are simply no longer a legitimate excuse to hide behind.

By Curtis Moore, Independent Consultant and a Former Counsel, Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works

Negotiators in Bali are in theory supposed to produce a "roadmap" to future agreement to succeed the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012. What might emerge instead, however, is a roadmap to a confrontation of historic proportions, a rematch between George Bush -- or, at least, his surrogates -- and his opponent in the 2000 campaign for the Presidency, former Vice President Al Gore.

The two could not be further apart on an issue than they are on global warming. Bush is casual and sanguine, Gore urgent and demanding. Bush’s emissaries to Bali, to their credit from their perspective, have thus far succeeded beyond all expectations in obstructing and slowing negotiations. The result has been, in the words of one journal that specializes in covering the proceedings, a "shift" in tone, with parties "already casting blame for the apparent failure of talks" in one arena.

Ten years ago negotiations reach a similar stage in Kyoto, when they seemed hopelessly bogged down. Then Gore, whose signature issues even then were the threats of global warming and stratospheric ozone depletion, arrived unexpectedly on a White House jet. In a matter of about 13 hours he forged the consensus that became the Kyoto Protocol.

For the past several days Gore has been in Oslo, Norway to accept the Nobel Prize for Peace for his work to raise public concern over global warming. By all accounts his talks have been stemwinders, with an "almost historic aura," according to one observer.

Thursday, Gore arrives in Bali where the situation today is much the same as 10 years ago in Kyoto. But on this occasion, those who have created the logjam are representatives of the United States.

Say what you like about the Bush's appointees, there can be no doubt that some of them -- at least judging from their work in Bali -- are geniuses at negotiation. Bush's second term as President expires in January, 2009, so in theory, decisions about international policy on global warming after that should be the responsibility of the person elected President in November, 2008. But Bush appointees in Bali have maneuvered themselves into a position that could freeze the current status quo, or something close to it, until as late as 2012.

So far, U.S. negotiators have:

-- Refused to allow any reference to scientific evidence that rich nations should cut greenhouse gas emissions by 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020, saying that would "prejudge" the outcome of negotiations.

-- Demanded striking draft language in the draft calling for "sufficient, predictable, additional and sustainable financial resources" to help poor nations adapt to climate change, saying it is vague.

-- Opposed asking the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the scientific body that asses global warming sciences and makes recommendations for action, for an updated report prior to the 2009 climate meeting. James L. Connaughton, who chairs the White House Council on Environmental Quality and is in Bali, said it was too much, "a huge amount of work for the IPCC."

-- Rejected requests by developing nations such as China and India for industrialized countries to provide more money to ease the transfer of clean energy technology overseas and by poor nations to help them slow deforestation. American representatives said that while the United States endorses the goals in principle, it opposes specifying how much money developed countries should contribute.

Some of these are deal killers. Compelled in part by the Byrd-Hagel Resolution, passed in 1997 95-0 by the Senate demanding reductions by developing nations as a prerequisite to American participation in a global warming agreement, Bush's negotiators have insisted on "measurable and reportable national mitigation actions" by the poorer countries. But for China, the price of agreeing to this is technology transfer. Thus, by refusing to agree to technology transfer, U.S. negotiators guarantee China will reject America's demands for emission reductions by developing nations. That in turn, triggers the terms of the Byrd-Hagel resolution, allowing the White House to blame, at least in part, a Democrat, Sen. Robert C. Byrd.

Similarly, China refuses to agree to curb its emissions unless developed nations will commit to specific numeric reductions, which the U.S. rejects.

Thus, when Gore steps off the plane, he will arrive at a situation remarkably similar to that in Kyoto ten years ago. But there is one critical difference.

Then, the American public seemed barely aware of global warming, much less concerned. Now, two-thirds of Americans want action on global warming, and they want it now.

Then, there had not been a Hurricane Katrina, films of polar bears adrift on ice floes, record-setting heat waves throughout not merely the United States, but the entire world.

In Oslo, Gore could hardly have been more passionate. Saying that "our world is spinning out of kilter" and that "the very web of life on which we depend is being ripped and frayed," he warned that "we, the human
species, are confronting a planetary emergency -- a threat to the survival of our civilization that is gathering ominous and destructive potential even as we gather here." But, he added, "there is hopeful news as well: we have the ability to solve this crisis and avoid the worst -- not all -- of its consequences, if we act boldly, decisively and quickly."

Surely, few would have predicted a year ago–even a few months ago -- that Bali might be where George Bush and Al Gore -- or at the least, their respective values -- would once again confront each other. And perhaps that confrontation will never transpire. But if it does, its outcome would determine exactly what sort of roadmap to the future is produced.

John Kerry, Senator from Massachusetts in the United States, came to Bali today representing Congressional leaders. Still wearing a stiffly pressed suit while everyone else in Bali is dressed more casually, the Senator called for the Bali conference to result in a "strong mandate based on science."

"We believe that there is a significant transformational effort now taking place in the US. The US is going to lead." New legislation under consideration in the Senate, he says, would implement a cap and trade system that would contribute to greenhouse gas emissions of 65-70 per cent by 2020.

Kerry was adamant that developing countries fully participate in any new process on climate change, adding that the lack of an adequate process to bring in developing countries doomed the chances of joining the Kyoto Protocol. "This has to be achieved globally." Rich countries have to help, through technology transfer and technical assistance, but developing countries have to take on best practices and avoid the mistakes we made since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution."

Part of Bali is about the negotiations between countries on how to move forward on climate change. But Bali is also a big carnival of ideas and there are all sorts of organizations with booths lining the halls of the Bali Conference Center dispensing advice and information on what should be done.

There is, for example, a booth explaining Pyrolysis Technology, a system, they say, that takes agricultural waste and turns part of it into energy and part into a form of carbon, which can be used to enrich the soil while keeping the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

And then there is the Swiss private sector-led initiative, "Ecodriving," that advises that simply by driving smarter, companies can realize major savings in fuel and greenhouse gas emissions. Ecodriving could save a company, they say between U.S.$1,900-3,800 a month depending on size.