THE NEXT BIG THING: DARING THE WORLD TO SAVE THE PLANET

As the largest environmental event in history, Earth Hour today , February 14, launched its 2012 campaign “I Will If You Will” to showcase how everyone has the power to change the world they live in.

For the first time, Earth Hour, being held on 31 March, is taking a giant leap from its annual lights out event to offer a further opportunity for its communities to be part of the world’s environmental solution.

Earth Hour began as a one city initiative in 2007, and has since grown to be a 5,251 city strong global movement, reaching 1.8 billion people in 135 countries across all seven continents.

The “I Will If You Will” digital platform created by global ad agency Leo Burnett, is the result of a collaboration with YouTube, therefore bringing together the world’s biggest social video platform with the ‘world’s largest action for the environment’.

The “I Will If You Will” campaign uses the YouTube video platform to empower people to share a personal dare with the world by asking, “What are you willing to do to save the planet?”

Earth Hour Co-Founder and Executive Director, Andy Ridley says “I Will If You Will” is the obvious next stage in the environmental campaign’s evolution.

“I Will If You Will gives every individual the opportunity to inspire their friends, colleagues and neighbours to take sustainability actions not just on the hour but beyond the hour,” said Ridley.

The concept of “I Will If You Will” centres around providing a social contract for two parties – connecting one person, business or organisation to a promise and their friends, family, customers or members to a challenge – uniting them behind the common goal of creating a positive environmental outcome.

The Earth Hour YouTube platform hosts a global library of “I Will If You Will” challenges, and encourages people to share their “dare” publically through Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and email. Friends can be invited to participate and accept each challenge using these popular social networks.

The simple promise can range from recycling, to switching to energy efficient light bulbs, turning off your mobile charger, or signing up for paperless banking.

Earth Hour in Nigeria has the support of First City Monument Bank Plc,The Abuja Environmental Protection Board, The Lagos Environmental Protection Agency, The Federal Road Safety Commission, The Peace Corps of Nigeria, The Nigeria Television Authority, Zakudia Lounge, Lead British International School, Abuja Capital International College, Capville Schools, Best International School, Nature Cares, Nigerian Youth Climate Change Coalition and many more.

Earth Hour Global has already received I Will If You Will challenges from a number of corporate companies and community groups, including, CBRE and children’s character Pocoyo.

Earth Hour 2012 will take place at 8.30pm – 9.30pm on Saturday 31 March

**Interviews are available with Andy Ridley, Co-Founder and Executive Director of Earth Hour**

Visit the Earth Hour YouTube platform here

View Images here

Media Contact:

Rebecca George, Earth Hour Global, Rebecca@earthhour.org +61 421 988 035

Benjamin Vozzo, Earth Hour Global, Benjamin@earthhour.org +61 415 194 219

"This is an Official Press Release from Earth Hour Global"

AN OUTCRY FROM THE RIVER BASIN: AFRICA AND THE UNFCCC CLIMATE TALKS

As African nations join all other countries at another round of international talks on Climate Change at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) in Durban, South Africa, it still remains clear that the continent will be the worst hit by the effects of climate change that it contributed the least to. Perhaps, one could have agreed that the Kyoto agreement was signed by the Conference of Parties (COP) all because of developing countries, and in particular - Africa.

The Kyoto agreement which was to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 5% will come to an end by 2012, which suffice it to say that for Africa to get a good deal in Durban, there must be a new agreement, and a new round of greenhouse gas emission cut, if not as much as 30%. But with reports filtering in, most of the world's leading economies now privately admit that no new global climate agreement will be reached before 2016 at the earliest, and that even if it were negotiated by then, they would stipulate it could not come into force until 2020.

Even as the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) reports that levels of carbon dioxide have reached 389 parts per million, a 39 percent increase since the beginning of the industrial era in 1750.“This is primarily because of emissions from combustion of fossil fuels, deforestation and changes in land-use,” the WMO bulletin states. Nevertheless, Africa must be ready to adapt and mitigate the effects of climate change in order to reduce the impacts that have been felt in the course of the year.

While growing up in the south western part of Nigeria might be challenging, it is quite glaring that there has been a change in the climate and weather patterns. During the year, we have seen sea level increase from the Ogun River, the River Niger, and the Ogunpa River resulting into thousands of deaths, Internally Displaced People (IDPs), and building collapse.

Moving up north to Sudan, it’s been a dry year with the Sahara Desert advancing more and rainfall down 30-40% in few decades, and still they struggle with the ruins of war; to the East has been the drought that has continued to ravage the horn of Africa, especially Somalia, the third in ten years, threatening half of the population. In other African communities, agriculture has been affected by low rainfall or extreme weather conditions, thus, generating much talk about food security in Africa.

To show how crucial the climate talks will be for the future generation of Africa, there has been an African Youth Climate Justice Caravan movement from Nairobi to Durban, to help sensitize and create awareness about issues surrounding climate change, and much need to listen to youth’s plight as it concerns environmental sustainability and climate change mitigation.

The African continent is faced with more challenges than it could have been able to handle - with Leadership problems being the bane of development, it cannot afford to allow the deeds of external forces or bodies to affect her poise for a sustainable society. African delegates must be able to negotiate for a fair deal, and initiate an agreement for an ambitious greenhouse gas emission cuts; an outcry for accessible and effective Global Climate funds and technology transfer for mitigation and adaptation to climate change effects must shake the city of Durban, Africa and the world at large.

Nevertheless, Africa still needs a plan, not to change the climate, but to slow the rate of change and enable those already affected to adapt to the new world, which they didn’t choose; and to kick start a new path to prosperity-sustainable development-where people who have yet to make poverty a distant memory can leapfrog into a low carbon future.

THE AGE OF OPEN DATA IN AFRICA

From Johannesburg to Lubumbashi, Lagos to Bamako, Algiers to Djibouti, Mogadishu to Nairobi, one of the greatest challenges in researching lessons, monitoring and evaluation of human development in these and other African states is the lack of available quantitative and qualitative data, due to challenges of security and access, along with low statistical capacity. As reiterated in the World Development Report 2011, Institutional transparency and legitimacy still remains the key to stability - before basic institutions can be transformed in Africa,there is much need to restore public confidence in basic collective action by the principal government and MDAs by giving free access to data.

while technological advancements have produced radical shifts in the ability to reproduce, distribute, control and publish information, the Internet in particular has radically changed the economics and ease of production of data. Generating and sourcing for data costs are now much lower for both the rights holders (content owners) and infringers- journalists, public analysts, hackers, and coders in Africa and the world at large.

One consequence is an erosion of what were once the natural barriers to infringement, such as the expense of reproduction, and the decresing quality of successive generations of data using the traditional media.In Africa, the penetration of mobile technologies have also radically changed the distribution of data, with transmission speeds approaching a billion characters per second, enabling sending of information worldwide, cheaply and almost instantaneously.

In recent times there has been an uprising of Journalists, Public Analysts, Systems Analysts that are becoming interested in data from different government of the world. The Open Knowledge Foundation remains the greatest stakeholder in the campaign for Open Data, however, its prescence in Africa is still yet to be far-fetched. As Transforming institutions emerges in trickles in few African countries, initiatives like "Where does my money go", "Weaving History", Localocracy, Earmarkwatch.org, OpenCongress.org, Punch Clock Map and the Open Government Data Camp in Warsaw, Poland should be emulated by collaborative, inclusive - enough coalitions. Perhaps, if governments in Africa decides to still make data elusive from the public, then the public will make it available, might be the age of citizen investigation and reporting.

SOCIO-ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT AND THE NIGERIA SAT-II AND SAT-X LAUNCH INTO SPACE

As Nigeria establish its prescence in the Space technology world again, by lauching its Nig-Sat II and NigSat-X Satellites on August 17, 2011 at 7.15 GMT in Yasni, Russia; so much question lingers in the mind of every Nigerian on how much benefit these Satellites in outer space could bring to the man on the streets of Nigeria, perhaps to Africans at Large.

The Nigeria SAT-II has a resolution of 2.5m (panchromatic), 32m (compatible with DMC) and 5m (multispectral) at 700km; has a swath of 300km and mass of 286kg; its application areas include land resources, water resources,the environment and monitoring of disaster prone areas in Nigeria and neighbouring countries. The Nigeria SAT-X built by Nigerian Engineers from the National Space Research Development Agency (NASRDA) is an Earth Observation satellite with resolution of 22m at 700km, has a swath of 600km with a mass of 88.1kg; application areas will include mapping, agriculture, urban planning etc

Space technology as always been finding increasing application and relevance in daily life, to the point where, nowadays, space applications are an indispensible part of the modern information society. With Insecurity and Natural Disasters been prevalent in Nigeria, and the Sub Saharan Africa, one of the potentials of these Satellites is the ability to address issues of National Insecurity by protecting lives, properties and the environment, Allow for early warning systems in Disaster Preparedness; co-ordinates Emmergency Response,and stimulates industrial and economic development.

In some developing countries that are operating satellites of their own - Venezuela, Brazil, Belarus, Saudi Arabia, Greece, Algeria, Turkey, South Africa, Malaysia and a list of others, space applications include its use for urban planning and transportation, water resources and agriculture, addressing issues of air pollution and energy, disaster and natural resource management, positioning and navigation, Health issues, education and communication.

Nevertheless,in Nigeria, these space applicatons still remain vague owing to the fact that education and capacity building initiatives have not been encouraged to develop the requisite human capital to support activities of National Space Agencies in the country, which includes development of space applications products and services. However,with the launch of these two satellites, our decision makers and policy makers should be able to set up SpaceAid resources - which could be delivered by the media - web, TV, mobile, radio, prints that includes availability of space-based products - remote sensing, mapping, geo-datas, geo-links and databases, satellite imageries, pre and post-disaster imageries, and early warning systems.

CITIZEN REPORTING AND THE LAGOS TRAFFIC CROWDMAP

Lagos state, the smallest in Nigeria, has a population of 17 million out of a national estimate of 150 million. The UN estimates that at its present growth rate, Lagos state will be third largest mega city the world by year 2015 after Tokyo in Japan an Bombay in India.

Out Of the overwhelming population, Metropolitan Lagos, an area covering 37% of the land area of Lagos State is home to over 85% of the State population. The state has become the economy center of Nigeria.

Current demographic trend analysis revealed that the State population growth rate of 8% has resulted in its capturing of 36.8% of Nigeria’s urban population (World Bank, 1996) estimate at 49.8 million people of the nation’s million population. The implication is that whereas country population growth is 4/5% and global 2%, Lagos population is growing ten times faster than New York and Los Angeles with grave implication for urban sustainability and especially traffic in the state.

The Lagos Traffic Map hopes to account for the appalling situation that inhabitant and motorists go through everyday; helps to give out early warnings to air, water and road users; and helps emergency managers in coordinating and managing mishaps. The Lagos Traffic Map is a two months pilot project that is been coordinated by the ihumanitarian group in Nigeria and some SBTF members in Nigeria. The ihumanitarian group are volunteers from Nigeria that uses the internet, their laptop and mobile phones to help co-ordinate emergencies and help disseminate early warning

THE LAGOS FLOOD AND BEYOND: GETTING IT RIGHT IN DISASTER PREPAREDNESS AND EMERGENCY RESPONSE

In the wake of July 10, 2011, Lagos was greeted with a torrential rainfall of about 300m that resulted into flood of about 1000mm to 1200mm. Still battling with that, the Calabar Flood struck, displacing thousands of people. All were forecasted by the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NIMET);that became the beginning of Lagos floods and became a disaster when it claimed the lives of no fewer than 31 persons (as reported by Vanguard, July 15, 2011) including a 5year old that was drown.

Most definitely, this will not be the last of disasters we will be experiencing in Lagos, and perhaps, some other vulnerable states in Nigeria. Even as the unverified news of a 20-meter high tide tsunami heading towards the coast of Lagos, Lome and Accra, following an offshore quake in Malabo circulates round the disaster risk response world.

Consequently, We might need to ask ourselves, if we are prepared for natural disasters in Nigeria? and if we are, how fast do we respond to all these disasters, we call emergency management. With the head of the senate recently reiterating the need for emergency response managers to quickly and hastenly develop disaster response techniques - Perhaps, its time to take a cue from the Haiti Earthquake, the Negris Cyclone, the Alabama Tornadoe, the Pakistan Flood, and the recent Japan Earthquake.

Analytically, the world is changing, and we now live in a "state where a traditional framework and several experimental approaches existed in parallel — a period when the explanatory power of the old system wanes while some inchoate new system explores and codifies the methods that are strong enough to begin replacing the old ones" as Thomas Kuhn defined Paradigm Change in the Structure of Scientific Revolutions. The working tools that are now been deployed before, during and after disaster is the growing Virtual Technology Communities (VTCs) that we call "humanitarian technologists".

These new breeds are experts who are most often technical professionals with deep expertise in geographic information systems,mapping, web development and database management, social media, and/or online campaigns - they apply their skills to some of the hardest elements of disaster risk communities. They include the international Network of Crisis Mappers, Google Map Maker, Ushahidi, The Global Earth Observation - Catastrophe Assesement Network (GEO-CAN), The SBTF ( Stand by Task Force), Crisis Commons, Random Hacks of Kindness RHoK.

Quite notably, is the fact that VTCs will never replace the current institutional

frameworks of Nigerian Meteorological Agency(NIMET), National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) and its state agencies,and other humanitarian organizations, but crisis response and other elements of the disaster risk management cycle are approaching a state resembling a shift in paradigm. It is pertinent for these organizations to start bulding capacity in this vein, and look for ways to collaborate with professionals that uses this technology, those in Nigeria and in diaspora. Because the penetration of Internet and Mobile Technology is escalating everyday in our Country, it will be a shift to a new direction to leverage on their potentials, for which these new technologies are been used.

EMERGENCY/CRISIS MANAGEMENT AND CROWDSOURCE MAPPING IN NIGERIA

Emergency management (or disaster management) is the coordination and integration of all activities necessary to build, sustain and improve the capability for disaster prevention, mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery. It is the continuous process by which all individuals, groups and communities manage hazards in an effort to avoid or ameliorate the impact of disasters resulting from the hazards. And, effective emergency management relies on thorough integration of emergency plans at all levels of government and non-government involvement.

Nigeria has continued to witness a series of embarrassing disasters and emergency situations that are largely human-induced from post-election violence, youth militancy, communal clashes, religious conflicts, fire outbreaks, road accidents, kidnapping and robberies. The magnitudes of the carnage usually overwhelm response agencies responsible for tackling and mitigating the situations.

The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) as the coordinating organ for response agencies becomes the major attraction, even when its staffs on humanitarian duties survives attacks from warring parties, cases which have been seen during the Jos ethnic crisis, communal clashes between villages. It could be said that with NEMA in place in Nigeria, we have had the problem of coordination with local disaster management, during pre and post emergencies and disasters and because disasters are always localized, all the five phases of emergency management – prevention, mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery depend on local structures, which are not effective, to succeed.

Nevertheless, emergency management and coordination has shifted from grounds men to the use of technology to co-ordinate emergencies and humanitarian services. In recent years, advancements in technologies have made it possible for virtual communities such as OpenStreetMap, Ushahidi, Sahana, CrisisMappers, Virtual Disaster Viewer, Google MapMaker and INSTEDD to provide increasing support to disaster preparedness and emergency response efforts. A feat that has helped in managing crisis in Libya using the Libya Crisis Map, was used in co-ordinating humanitarian affairs in Haiti and in the Alabama Tornadoes and a list of others.

With disasters been prevalent in Africa, it is most important that we begin to look at leveraging on these technologies, thus leading to capacity building in this area, which in some months will start, no thanks to crisismappers members that are resided in Nigeria. Our Strength lies in the number of Nigerians that uses mobile technologies in communication escalating every day. We hope to create crisis camps in each state, which might comprise of disaster emergency officers, especially in states, Information Technology professionals, social entrepreneurs and volunteers.