Big companies shamed for over-packaging

Monday Feb 5 21:15 AEDT

A Victorian green group has dumped on retail giants Coles, Woolworths and a host of manufacturers, alleging they damage the environment by using too much packaging.

Environment Victoria's annual DUMP awards, now in their third year, name and shame the companies the green group says harm the environment with unnecessary and damaging product packaging.

The awards are judged by an independent panel of experts from academia, local government and the community sector, DUMP awards report author Jenny Henty said.

Woolworths/Safeway and Coles jointly won the people's choice award for "needlessly packing fruit and vegetables, particularly organic products, on polystyrene trays and covering them with cling wrap".

Toymaker Fisher Price's Interactv toy won the award for excessive use of material for its "copious" packaging that included a separate recorded advertisement, powered by three batteries, that the company advises should be discarded despite the fact the toy also requires three batteries.

Beverage companies who packaged drinks in plastic or glass bottles that were then covered with non-recyclable printed plastic sleeves won the award for poor recycling design.

The misleading labelling award went to snack manufacturer Smith's for its Stax chips packaging, which Ms Henty said displayed three different and "confusing" disposal messages.

The Seakist Lunch Kit packaging was named "most likely to be littered" because its packaging contained seven small parts that were likely to be thrown away carelessly or dumped in the bin because no recycling instructions were provided.

The "going backwards" award went to Nescafe for its Short Black coffee jar, which would be rejected for recycling because of its smoky colour and its non-recyclable lid and tamper-proof seals.

Ms Henty, Environment Victoria's zero waste campaign director, said the award winners were "the tip of the iceberg" of companies ignoring the food industry's own environmental guidelines.

"Manufacturers would be hard-pressed to come up with worse products for reuse, easy recycling or waste minimisation if they tried," Ms Henty said.

"Australian consumers are trying to do the right thing at the supermarket, such as reusing green bags and embracing recycling, but are not being helped by excessive packaging, poor design and misleading recycling instructions."

Internationally, retail giants including Walmart, Marks and Spencer and Tesco were responding to criticism with action to significantly reduce waste but Australian supermarkets lagged behind badly.

Nature's voice Attenborough to retire

Monday Feb 5 20:36 AEDT
Sir David Attenborough, the voice of the television nature documentary, has announced he is retiring. A sequel to the highly successful BBC series Planet Earth is being planned, but Sir David has indicated he will not narrate the new show, called Life.

"If I go to a network controller and say that I want to make a three-year series, then they'll rightly be concerned about their investment," Sir David, who will be 83 when Life is screened in 2009, told Britain's Times newspaper. "They'd say, 'It's lovely to hear from you, but are you sure you'll be standing by the end?'"

Sir David joined the BBC as a Cambridge natural sciences graduate in 1952.

He intends to retire after completing his latest series, called Life in Cold Blood, about reptiles and amphibians, which he said would complete my survey of all the major animal groups.

Possible successors include Bill Oddie, the co-creator of the 1970s and 80s comedy series, The Goodies, who has become an accomplished television presenter with his own documentaries focusing on birds. Sir David said he had also been impressed by the work of zoologist Charlotte Uhlenbroek. Alastair Fothergill, Sir David's collaborator in the BBC's Natural History Unit, is the insiders' tip, according to The Times. Fothergill caused a stir in Australia when he branded the late Steve Irwin a showman more interested in stardom than the animal kingdom.

His comments came shortly after Irwin was killed when a stingray barb pierced his chest while filming a program last September.

Last Update: Monday, February 5, 2007. 7:10am (AEDT)

Scientists say under their plan, residents could profit from their water savings. (ABC TV)

Water trade would prevent restrictions: scientists

Three of Australia's leading water scientists want a water trading system to be introduced for metropolitan users.

They say it should be similar to one used by river irrigators.

Scientists from the CSIRO, Land and Water Australia and the University of Adelaide have put their name to the proposal.

They say their plan would prevent the need for water restrictions by allowing those who reduce their water use to sell water to big users.

The University of Adelaide's Professor Mike Young says the cost of water would increase by up to 700 per cent under the proposal but some people could make a profit from their water savings.

"People are telling us that it's very hard to cope with urban water restrictions and there's an alternative way of doing it, which is to have a system where we give all Australians a choice as to how much water we use and if they can afford it can trade to solve their problem and escape water restrictions," he said.

Climate report fails to highlight extent of global warming, Flannery says

Tim Flannery says findings by the UN are conservative. (File photo) (ABC)

ABC-Online -Climate report fails to highlight extent of global warming, Flannery says

The Australian of the Year, scientist Tim Flannery, says a new report on climate change grossly underestimates the speed at which global warming is effecting the planet.

The report from the United Nations Climate Panel will officially be released in Paris tonight and is expected to find that it is very likely humans are responsible for climate change.

But Professor Tim Flannery says the report's findings are conservative and the real impact of global warming will be felt much sooner.

"The actual trajectory we've seen in the arctic over the last two years if you follow that, that implies that the arctic ice cap will be gone in the next five to 15 years," he said.

"This is an ice cap that's been around for 3 million years."

It is expected to forecast catastrophic consequences from the increase in global temperatures this century.

Professor Flannery says the consequences could last for 1,000 years.

"There's a 10 per cent chance of truly catastrophic rises in temperatures, so we're looking there at 6 degrees (Celsius) or so, that would be a disaster for all life on earth," he said.

"We will lose somewhere between two out of every 10 and six out of every 10 species living on the planet, at that level of warming."