http://www.earth-policy.org/ srasmussen@earthpolicy.org Copyright 2012 2012-05-02T12:59:54+00:00 May 02, 2012 http://www.earth-policy.org/data_highlights/2012/highlights28 The Arab countries in the Middle East and North Africa make up only 5 percent of the world’s population, yet they take in more than 20 percent of the world’s grain exports. Imports to the region have jumped from 30 million tons of grain in 1990 to nearly 70 million tons in 2011. Now imported grain accounts for nearly 60 percent of regional grain consumption. With water scarce, arable land limited, and production stagnating, grain imports are likely to continue rising. For full report, visit the EPI website. April 24, 2012 http://www.earth-policy.org/plan_b_updates/2012/update102 More than a quarter of all the meat produced worldwide is now eaten in China, and the country’s 1.35 billion people are hungry for more. In 1978, China’s meat consumption of 8 million tons was one third the U.S. consumption of 24 million tons. But by 1992, China had overtaken the United States as the world’s leading meat consumer—and it has not looked back since. For full report, visit the EPI website. April 11, 2012 http://www.earth-policy.org/book_bytes/2012/wotech13_ss1 Moving the global economy off its current decline-and-collapse path depends on reaching four goals: stabilizing climate, stabilizing population, eradicating poverty, and restoring the economy’s natural support systems. These goals—comprising what the Earth Policy Institute calls "Plan B" to save civilization—are mutually dependent. All are essential to feeding the world’s people. It is unlikely that we can reach any one goal without reaching the others. The key to restructuring the economy is to get the market to tell the truth through full-cost pricing. For full report, visit the EPI website. April 04, 2012 http://www.earth-policy.org/data_highlights/2012/highlights27 A new picture is emerging in the U.S. power sector. In 2007, electricity generation from coal peaked, dropping by close to 4 percent annually between 2007 and 2011. Over the same time period, nuclear generation fell slightly, while natural gas-fired electricity grew by some 3 percent annually and hydropower by 7 percent. Meanwhile, wind-generated electricity grew by a whopping 36 percent each year. For full report, visit the EPI website. March 27, 2012 http://www.earth-policy.org/data_highlights/2012/highlights26 In 1994, the International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo, Egypt, recognized reproductive health and family planning as fundamental human rights. Delegates committed to making voluntary family planning services universally available by 2015. Now just three years from that deadline, at least 215 million women want to prevent or delay pregnancy but are not using effective contraception. Contraceptive prevalence was increasing until 2000, but growth has stalled since then. For full report, visit the EPI website. March 21, 2012 http://www.earth-policy.org/book_bytes/2012/wotech10_ss4 During the past two summers, Pakistan was hit with catastrophic floods. The record flooding in the late summer of 2010 was the most devastating natural disaster in Pakistan’s history. The media coverage reported torrential rains as the cause, but there is much more to the story. When Pakistan was created in 1947, some 30 percent of the landscape was covered by forests. Now it is 4 percent. Pakistan’s livestock herd outnumbers that of the United States. With little forest still standing and the countryside grazed bare, there was scant vegetation to retain the rainfall. For full report, visit the EPI website. March 14, 2012 http://www.earth-policy.org/indicators/C49/wind_power_2012 Wind energy developers installed a record 41,000 megawatts of electricity-generating capacity in 2011, bringing the world total to 238,000 megawatts. With more than 80 countries now harnessing the wind, there is enough installed wind power capacity worldwide to meet the residential electricity needs of 380 million people at the European level of consumption. For full report, visit the EPI website. March 07, 2012 http://www.earth-policy.org/data_highlights/2012/highlights25 U.S. meat consumption has peaked. Data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture show that meat eating across the country fell from the 2004 high point of 184 pounds (83 kilograms) per person to 171 pounds in 2011. Early estimates for 2012 project a further reduction in American meat eating to 166 pounds, making for a 10 percent drop over the eight-year period. For full report, visit the EPI website. February 16, 2012 http://www.earth-policy.org/indicators/C53/economy_2012 The global economy grew 3.8 percent in 2011, a drop from 5.2 percent in 2010. Economists had anticipated a slowdown, but this was even less growth than expected, thanks to the earthquake and tsunami in Japan, unrest in oil-producing countries, the debt crisis in Europe, and a stagnating recovery in the United States. As richer economies struggle to recover from the financial crisis of 2008–09, poorer countries are facing high food prices and rising youth unemployment. Meanwhile, growing income inequality and environmental disruption are challenging conventional notions of economic health. For full report, visit the EPI website. January 31, 2012 http://www.earth-policy.org/indicators/C51/temperature_2012 The global average temperature in 2011 was 14.52 degrees Celsius (58.14 degrees Fahrenheit). According to NASA scientists, this was the ninth warmest year in 132 years of recordkeeping, despite the cooling influence of the La Niña atmospheric and oceanic circulation pattern and relatively low solar irradiance. Since the 1970s, each subsequent decade has gotten hotter—and 9 of the 10 hottest years on record have occurred in the twenty-first century. For full report, visit the EPI website.