The EcoEnterprises Fund offers a new twist on venture capital by targeting environmentally responsible and conservation-minded businesses. The fund will invest an average of $100,000 to $200,000 in small start-up ventures in Latin America and the Caribbean. The fund, also known as Fondo EcoEmpresas, is a joint effort of the Inter-American Development Bank and theContinue reading “Green Venture Capital”
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Bats In The Stadium
Last spring, thousands of Brazilian free-tail bats found a home at the New York Mets training facility in Port St. Lucie, Fla. About the size of a man’s thumb with a wingspread of four inches, these little fellows are harmless, but certainly not tidy. In the evening, they would pour out of the crevices inContinue reading “Bats In The Stadium”
Ragweed To Riches
As many midwestern farm families struggle to make a living off the land, the Jones family of Afton, Iowa, has found a new source of revenue growing in their pastures. For two summers, the family has been picking the flowers off the ragweed plants that flourish in their fields and corrals. The flowers are groundContinue reading “Ragweed To Riches”
Treetop Walkway
High above West Africa’s Upper Guinean rain forest, tourists on gently swaying walkways stroll cautiously through the forest canopy. It is a nature experience still rare even in the realms of eco-tourism. Kakum National Park, the 140-square-mile preserve where the walkway is located, is home to several endangered species including the forest elephant. It isContinue reading “Treetop Walkway”
Looks Like Wood
The picnic table, the park bench and the boardwalk look like wood, but they are actually made from plastic. Impervious to water, salt, oil, chemicals, and insects, the building material comes from chipped and melted milk jugs and detergent bottles. This new use for high-density polyethylene is making profits for outdoor furniture manufacturers and checkingContinue reading “Looks Like Wood”
To Preserve It, Buy It
Tacoma News Tribune August 13, 1998 By Matthew Brown and Jane S. Shaw Chaining yourself to a tree in the forest just doesn’t work any more. Environmentalists who want to save forests have found a less confrontational way to achieve their goals–and a more effective one, too. They reach for their checkbooks. Abandoning court battlesContinue reading “To Preserve It, Buy It”
Rangers On Tour
While ecotourism has been touted as a way to save everything from tigers to sea turtles, it might also prove an economic boon to the financially beleaguered U.S. Forest Service. Heritage Expeditions is part of the user-fee demonstration program that allows federal land management agencies to charge fees for recreation on public lands. A recentContinue reading “Rangers On Tour”
Make Forest Service Pay Its Own Way
Rocky Mountain NewsJune 7, 1998 By Terry L. Anderson The threat of budget cuts for the Forest Service is some of the best fiscal and environmental news yet out of this congress. Angered by years of declining timber sales, Western conservatives are threatening to wield the budget ax. The net result could be a breathContinue reading “Make Forest Service Pay Its Own Way”
Entertainment Farming
Family farms and ranches have found that entertainment is a cash crop that can keep them in business, even when more traditional fruit and vegetable crops cannot. Small family farms struggling to keep up with rising costs and compete with large commercial operations have turned to corn mazes, petting zoos, and hayrides. Farmers who beganContinue reading “Entertainment Farming”
Corporate Appleseeds
American companies have discovered that planting and preserving trees can reap a wealth of benefits. It can help the environment, it can boost their corporate image, and ultimately it could help the bottom line. American Electric Power is preserving trees by purchasing a chunk of Bolivian jungle which it plans to donate to an adjoiningContinue reading “Corporate Appleseeds”