Solutions

CLICK HERE - The Great Green Wall for the Sahara and the Sahel Initiative as an opportunity to enhance resilience in Sahelian landscapes and livelihoods

goodnewsnetwork.org - by McKinley Corbley - Mar 31, 2019

More than 20 African countries have joined together in an international mission to plant a massive wall of trees running across the continent – and after a little over a decade of work, it has reaped great success.

The tree-planting project, which has been dubbed The Great Green Wall of Africa, stretches across roughly 6,000 miles (8,000 kilometers) of terrain at the southern edge of the Sahara desert, a region known as the Sahel.

The region was once a lush oasis of greenery and foliage back in the 1970s, but the combined forces of population growth, unsustainable land management, and climate change turned the area into a barren and degraded swath of land . . . 

Zunum Aero plans a range of aircraft, including a 100-seat airliner by around 2020 (Credit: Zunum Aero)

bbc.com - by Stephen Dowling - August 22, 2018

. . . Battery-powered aircraft have made the leap from fantasy to drawing board to production. But it’s just the start . . .

. . . By 2040, Norway intends all short-haul flights leaving its airports to be on aircraft powered by electricity.

It’s one of the most far-reaching promises yet to cut down on aviation’s contribution to greenhouse gas emissions.

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A man helping strangers remove flood-damaged items from their home in a suburb of Townsville, in the Australian state of Queensland, on Thursday.  Credit Dan Peled/EPA, via Shutterstock

nytimes.com - by Livia Albeck-Ripka - February 7, 2019

. . . Community support is the biggest predictor of how well people recover from disasters, “over and above the horrors of the trauma” . . .

As climate change makes it likely that disasters will become more intense and frequent, researchers are studying how communities respond, and what they need to be resilient. Being part of a community response can be “protective” . . .

. . . the real danger zone is six to 12 months after a disaster strikes. It is then, experts agree, when the news coverage fades and others seem to move on, that residents who are still struggling with practical issues, like insurance claims, and emotional trauma, can feel abandoned.

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submitted by Carrie La Jeunesse

Growing up working class gives people social skills that help broaden their perspective during conflicts. NICOLAS HOIZEY/UNSPLASH

CLICK HERE - STUDY - Social class and wise reasoning about interpersonal conflicts across regions, persons and situations

sciencemag.org - by Michael Price - December 20, 2017

There’s an apparent paradox in modern life: Society as a whole is getting smarter, yet we aren’t any closer to figuring out how to all get along. “How is it possible that we have just as many, if not more, conflicts as before?” asks social psychologist Igor Grossmann.

The answer is that raw intelligence doesn’t reduce conflict, Grossmann asserts. Wisdom does. Such wisdom—in effect, the ability to take the perspectives of others into account and aim for compromise—comes much more naturally to those who grow up poor or working class, he says.