Haiti is so “last month.” 

But of course, it is anything but.

WE ARE THE WORLD – NON-CELEB EDITION

This music will make you feel connected and hopeful for the future.  If you don’t have time to watch, just listen in the background.

THE CHARCOAL PROJECT

Haiti is 98% deforested.  It’s sort of like what happened on Easter Island, whose population (not having C-130 transport planes to fly in supplies) went extinct.  The estimable James Musters draws our attention to two inspiring links, each with an approach to cooking that would seem to go a long way to solving Third World problems.

First, consider this remarkable 2006 TED Conference presentation by Amy Smith, and visit her Charcoal Project to see where things stand now.

Next, check out the Darfur Stoves Project, which could presumably work just as well in Haiti. 

(“The Berkeley-Darfur Stove® is an innovative appropriate technology that requires only one quarter the amount of firewood needed to cook using traditional three-stone fires.  Because of its fuel efficiency, use of the Berkeley-Darfur Stove® limits the amount of time women in Darfur need to spend outside the safety of the displaced persons camps to gather fuel for cooking.  This decreases exposures to violence for Darfuri women while also limiting deforestation and the release of toxic indoor smoke.”)

VANCOUVER

Steve Jewett:  “Philip Steenkamp is the president and CEO of The 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Secretariat, a B.C. Government agency, within the Ministry of Healthy Living, responsible for overseeing the government's financial commitment to the 2010 Olympics, and as such has no direct input in the actual running of the 2010 Olympics here in British Columbia.”

☞  Oops.  I misunderstood his title.  Sorry.