Websites

1. Easy Living Green — A site that contains a forum and discussions on light bulbs, car-buying guide and earth-friendly power.
2. GivingPal — GivingPal is a free and easy way for charitable-minded shoppers to make an impact. When you shop at partner stores through GivingPal store links, a portion of your purchases are automatically donated to the cause of your choice - at no additional cost.
3. Consumer TreeHouse — Your source for unsolicited product reviews from green living to health and fitness, to outdoor products.
4. On the commons — The commons consists of gifts of nature such as air, oceans and wildlife as well as shared social creations such as libraries, public spaces, scientific research and creative works.
5. Green Line Index — A list of green services.
6. Go Green Seed — Created by a university student who wanted to create a community of other students to help each other go green.
7. Eco Fashion World — The first website of its kind, Eco Fashion World aims to be the number one resource for sustainable style, with all the latest NEWS, an inspiring MAGAZINE and a fast-growing international GUIDE of all the eco fashion designers out there and the stores that sell them.
8. The Daily Green — The consumer’s guide to the green revolution.
9. Punah — A design firm based in India.
10. Jamblemag — “Green travel without the mudhuts, world music without the panpipes”.
11. Ecobites — A community where eco conscious minded people can visit, interact and share their interest in all things healthy.

Blogs

1. Saga of the green lady — Greening NYC one step at a time.
2. Eco-Friendly America — We love this planet. We recycle, commute on foot, and try to do our share. This blog is inspired by Lauren Blair, Content Director for Internet Brands.
3. Green Human Environmental Blog — An environmental blog site for, by and about green products, people and ideas that affect Seattle, Washington State and the Pacific Northwest.
4. The Lohasian — News, insightful commentary and the best in product reviews in Natural/organic lifestyles, green building, alternative transportation, ecotourism, alternative energy and humanitarian outreach.
5. Daily Home Renovation Tips — Our plan for this site is to add a renovation tip a day, every day, based on our own personal experiences. Each tip comes from our own personal experiences. We are not contractors. We are not renovation professionals.
6. Mauka to Makai — This blog covers environmental topics related to inland and coastal areas and everything in between.
7. Greenest Site Ever — A place where green info meets humour.
8. Trying to be greener — Safer eco-living, one day at a time.

Business-related

1. Eco-Fy Store — A socially and environmentally responsible company where 100% of the profits from the website are donated to National and Global Organizations that directly support environmental activism, social justice, art, and education.
2. Strada Verde — The concept for Strada Verde was born from a desire to provide beautiful apparel, fashion accessories, gifts and art to earth conscious consumers.
3. Inspired American — A website that takes pride in creating exclusively designed furniture, gifts and decor items which embrace the environment and Go Green movement.
4. OrganicBeautySource.com — Shopping for the best organic cosmetics and skin care can be tricky with many brands claiming to be safe and natural. We have read the labels and tried and tested many products in an effort to provide the premiere online directory of only the safest and highest quality organic beauty and personal care products.
5. Alterna Botique — Clothes are made using eco-friendly fabrics: organic cotton, bamboo, soy and hemp.
6. After Organic — The designs highlight your baby’s natural beauty with simple, elegant lines and fresh, nature-inspired colors. Designed by Kate Quinn, former Hollywood Stylist, and certified organic from seed to packaging, the apparel was created to be both fashionable and environmentally friendly.
7. Natural Fine Furnishings — An eco-friendly company that sells a line of “green” sustainable wood furniture that is unique, 100% natural and created by skilled craftsmen.
8. Vitalized Water Products — A company that sells the only environmentally friendly water softener/conditioner on the market. No filters to throw into landfills, no salt added to kill plants. No running (electricity) costs.
9. Barrel Boys — A rainwater harvesting company supplying rain barrels and services.
10. The Naked Hippie — The Naked Hippie believes in clothing that isn’t artificially processed and minimizing our imprint on the earth because they believe in leaving nature as untouched as possible while living a fun and free lifestyle.

I hope you have enjoyed the list. I have because I found myself subscribing to the feeds every one in three websites. I will still list your green websites if you continue sending me the links. And if you liked the list, please consider stumbling this post so that word gets around, OK? :D

1 Comments

• At November 7, 2008, Krista wrote:

  Hi

  Have you heard of Dr Joeann and her kitchen waste/garbage enzyme movement? She was featured in the news a few months ago. Her blog teaches how to make this enzyme to save mother nature...www.enzymesos.blogspot.com

One of the 8 development goals being steered by the Millennium Development Goals is eradicating poverty and hunger. This goal has 2 main objectives:

1. Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people whose income is less than one dollar a day.
2. Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people who suffer from hunger.

So what efforts are being done around to make the 2015 a reality? Plenty. But first, lets take a look at where we stand currently.

From the UN MDG report:

New estimates released by the World Bank in August 2008 show that the number of people in the developing world living in extreme poverty may be higher than previously thought. Using a new threshold for extreme poverty now set at $1.25 a day (purchasing power parity) in 2005 prices, the Bank concludes that there were 1.4 billion people living in extreme poverty in 2005.

Based on these data, poverty rates are estimated to have fallen from 52% in 1981 to 42% in 1990 and to 26% in 2005. Over a 25-year period, the poverty rate in East Asia fell from nearly 80% to under 20%. In sub-Saharan Africa, the poverty rate remained constant at around 50%.

So while the number of people living in poverty around the globe is still high (approx. 1.4 billion), the poverty rates have declined, and this is evident in eastern Asia. I suspect the liberalization of the Chinese economy that happened over the last 20 years has made a significant difference in reducing poverty. This is also evident based on the MDG report which futher comments on China and Southern Asia :

Eastern Asia, notably China, was successful in more than halving the proportion of underweight children between 1990 and 2006. In contrast, and despite improvements since 1990, almost 50% of children are underweight in Southern Asia. This region alone accounts for more than half the world’s undernourished children.

While there have been positive and encouraging signs in Asia, the same can’t be expressed for the poorer Asian countries and the sub-Saharan African countries. The report illustrates the average earnings of the sub-saharan individual:

Employed persons living in a household where earnings are less than $1 per person a day are considered the ‘working poor’. In sub-Saharan Africa, over half the workers fall into this category.

Nearly half of the people if the affected countries live below poverty line and almost 50% of children in South Asia are underweight.

While the situation is grim, there have been efforts made by the international community. MDG Monitor.Org shares a couple of success stories on how farmers in Africa have benefited from New Rice for Arfica (NERICA) and how Micro credit has helped jump start many small businesses in Nepal:

NERICA

Rice production in sub-Saharan Africa was being outstripped by rapid population growth by the mid-1990s. The resulting rice imports were taxing foreign reserves by nearly US$1 billion annually. Worse still, most rice producers were facing the unenviable choice between a high-yield species poorly adapted to African conditions (the Asian rice) and a well-adapted but low-yield species (the African rice). Enter NERICA, or New Rice for Africa – a hybrid between the Asian and African rice – a high-yielding, drought resistant and protein-rich variety that has contributed to food security and improved nutrition in several countries on the continent, including Congo Brazzaville, Cote d’Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Guinea, Kenya, Mali, Nigeria, Togo and Uganda. Today, 12 years after the debut of NERICA, some 18 varieties of the hybrid species have been made available to rice farmers across sub-Saharan Africa. For the first time, many farmers were able to produce enough rice to feed their families and turn a profit at the market. Diversification into other products has become a reality for many, and long-sought-after conveniences such as indoor plumbing, beds and mobile telephones have been made possible thanks to the proceeds of NERICA.

The Microenterprise Development Programme

The proportion of Nepalese living in poverty dropped from 42% between 1995/1996 and 2003/2004. Despite this improvement, poverty alleviation remains a priority of the Government of Nepal because eight million of its 30 million people still live in poverty and the gap between the haves and the have-nots is widening. Micro-credit has helped jumpstart small businesses, providing decent livelihoods for Nepal’s marginalized citizens. With UNDP support, for example, 23-year old Surya Lama now operates a small mushroom farm in the basement of his home. The UNDP-backed Microenterprise Development Programme is striving to market these products better. There are already some quick wins: almost 60% of the 14,000 people who had launched their businesses were from traditionally excluded groups, average family incomes improved by 56%, and to date, only 3% of the cooperatives have folded.

An excerpt from The UN MDG Report shows us how Malawi’s local farmers are gaining from it’s Fertilizer and Seeds voucher programme:

For the past two years, Malawi’s voucher programme for fertilizers and seeds has helped double its agricultural productivity, turning the country into a net food exporter after decades of famine as a perennial food importer. Malawi needs 2.2 million tons of maize a year to feed itself. Before the subsidy programme began, the 2005 harvest fell to a low of 1.2 million tons of maize. The implementation of the National Input Subsidy Programme resulted in a dramatic increase to 3.2 million tons of maize in 2007, according to the Ministry of Agriculture. The bumper harvests resulting from the programme are helping poor farmers to earn more income.

While there are encouraging efforts being undertaken to help the underprivileged come out of poverty, more needs to be done, and there are ways where even ordinary people like you and I can help contribute to eliminating poverty.

Wanna know how you can help? My next entry will focus on ways we can chip in to help MDG reach is 2015 objective.

The uncannyman is part of this year’s Blog Action Day. For a long time he has lived in an oblivious state, assuming that poverty is somebody else’s problem and it’s been taken care of by the international committee. However his current readings and studying on poverty are starting to prove otherwise. There is still a lot of work left to do and he wants to educate the masses on the dire state the world is in and what we can do to help. He blogs at uncannyphilosophy.

On September 25th 2008, just a few days from today, world leaders will come together in New York on for a high level event, convened by the UN Secretary-General and the President of the UN General Assembly to renew their commitments to achieving the Millennium Development Goals by 2015 and to set out concrete plans and practical steps for action.

Now maybe some of us are aware of the Millennium Development Goals, maybe some of us aren’t. I for one willingly admit I had no clue about the MDG until very recently when I started reading more about poverty and on the work being committed by leaders around the world to address it and a number of other serious issues plaguing our world today.

It’s important for you to know, in case you haven’t known or heard already, what the MDG Plan is all about.

The MDG was signed sometime in September 2000. It’s primary objective was to achieve 8 international development goals by 2015 which include:

1. Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
2. Achieve universal primary education
3. Promote gender equality and empower women
4. Reduce child mortality
5. Improve maternal health
6. Combat AIDS/Malaria and other diseases
7. Ensure environmental sustainability
8. Develop global partnership for development

As you can see from the goals above, almost half of the problems that are affecting our world today has its roots in poverty. From AIDS, to degrading maternal health and child mortality and poor accessibility to education, all these issues can be traced back to the obvious problem of poverty.

In my next entry, I will further elaborate and discuss on how far the MDG has progressed in terms of eradicating poverty and hunger.

But I shall leave you with some facts to ponder on:

1. Recent increases in the price of food have had a direct and adverse effect on the poor and are expected to push many more people – an estimated 100 million – into absolute poverty.
2. New estimates released by the World Bank in August 2008 show that the number of people in the developing world living in extreme poverty may be higher than previously thought. Using a new threshold for extreme poverty now set at $1.25 a day (purchasing power parity) in 2005 prices, the Bank concludes that there were 1.4 billion people living in extreme poverty in 2005.
3. Over a 25-year period, the poverty rate in East Asia fell from nearly 80% to under 20%. In sub-Saharan Africa, the poverty rate remained constant at around 50%.

While there may be a few encouraging signs, the overall look is still grim, yet efforts are being made to help mitigate this problem; more on the next entry.

The uncannyman is part of this year’s Blog Action Day. For a long time he has lived in an oblivious state, assuming that poverty is somebody else’s problem and it’s been taken care of by the international committee. However his current readings and studying on poverty are starting to prove otherwise. There is still a lot of work left to do and he wants to educate the masses on the dire state the world is in and what we can do to help. He blogs at uncannyphilosophy.

Commit your blog

If you haven’t signed up to be a part of this life-changing event, I urge you to do so NOW. In fact, signing up as a participant is the first and easiest thing that you can do to support the event. On October 15th, participants will put up a blog post or a video or a podcast about poverty. Participants are adviced to try to keep their posting related to their regular blog topic so that posts are individual, suited to their audience and look at the issue in many different lights.

Donate your day’s earnings

If you make money on your blog from advertising, affiliate earnings, donations, or product sales — I am sure a lot of us do these days — you are encouraged to donate the money you generate on Blog Action Day to a poverty-related charity or organization.

Promote Blog Action Day

Blog Action Day requires mass participation to work. The more participants, the better.

Following are several ways you can promote Blog Action Day:

1. Post on Your Blog — It will only take you 15 minutes to write a short post on your blog promoting Blog Action Day. Who knows, your readers will sign up after reading your post, and in the next 15 minutes, they will be promoting it to their readers (hint: remember MLM?)
2. Post the Blog Action Day video — Simply click “get code” on the video player on the Blog Action Day website, copy and paste the code onto your site and you’ll be promoting the event without typing a single word! And trust me, the video is AWESOME.
3. Add a Banner to Your Site — There are a number of badges, banners and graphics that you can use to let your readers and visitors know about your participation.
4. Tell Someone! — Send an email, or a tweet or update your status on Facebook or your MySpage or Friendster site, or better yet simply tell someone about Blog Action Day. After all there’s nothing like one-one communication to do some convincing!
5. Get Blog Action Day in the Press — Got a press contact? Blog Action Day has plenty of people for them to talk to, and let’s face it, what’s better than a feel-good, new technology story for the news? So send them to the Press Department.

Translate Blog Action Day website

Blog Action Day is an international event, so the more languages our message goes out in, the better. If you are fluent in both English and another language, you could volunteer to help translate the international landing page and registration facilities into your language. Send an email to central@blogactionday.org for more information.

I haven’t mentioned that I have signed up for Blog Action Day which will be on October 15th, 2008. The theme for this year’s conversation is “poverty”. Currently, some 4,309 sites have registered to participate, reaching out to some 8,986,766 readers worldwide.

Check out the promo video for this year’s Blog Action Day (it’s a must-see!):

As usual, the organizers have put together a list of general resources and some ideas to get you started and some badges, banners and graphics that you can put on your blog/site.

I have initially planned to organize a month-long blogging campaign on poverty leading to up Blog Action Day, but I was caught up with other commitments on Sept 15th. Plus, I forgot to make an announcement calling for bloggers to join me.

Anyway, I am still going ahead and doing it here, on Giving Hands. I will be writing 2 to 3 posts per week on poverty and if you are also doing it on your blog (you are most welcome to do it here if you wish), do drop me a link and I will publish a list that contains all your posts on October 15th :D

Together, we can make a difference.