The Human Agreement

06/11/2018

Do you know how coffee is produced? 🌱☕️ And did you know that Brazil, the biggest coffee producer in the world, still employs slave labor on certain plantations? Or, alternatively, that coffee is threatening the health of Central America’s freshwater supplies? Behind every single cup of coffee you drink, there is a story: a farmer, a fruit picker, a factory worker, all fighting for their human rights and a decent wage; similarly, there are rivers and rainforests whose own basic rights of existence and protection are violated daily. With 400 billion cups of coffee consumed annually throughout the world, it is impossible to close our eyes on the injustices brewing in the coffee production industry, especially when there exists so many solutions ⭐️💧

With this post, we are hoping to change your perspective of coffee, and incite you to seek out coffee that is produced both in accordance with nature and its people. A few pointers: try and favor coffee that is dried rather than washed in order to reduce your water and CO2 footprint; in addition, buying fair trade labelled coffee will ensure you that the workers who produced your coffee are paid a set price per pound, regardless of market fluctuations, which can be drastic and detrimental from one year to the next. Lastly, if you want to go the extra mile, I encourage you to seek out “direct trade coffee” providers. These roasters—aka coffee shops, buy the coffee straight from the growers and thereby cut out the middleman, as well as favor the growth of mutually beneficial relationships between grower and buyer.

📸&📝: @ Finca Dos Jefes, Boquete, Panama

30/10/2018

Orcas, the majestic yin yangs of the Northwest Pacific ocean, need your help. Insanely intelligent and socially sophisticated apex predators, one wouldn’t think that these creatures couldn’t possibly need any help from us naked apes. But for the last three years, not one calf in the southern resident population has been born. Seven orcas and one of the youngest calves recently died of malnutrition, dwindling their numbers down to just 74 orcas left in the Pacific Northwest. Why are they starving? Where has their food gone? Dams on the lower Snake river have blocked millions of fish from entering the Columbia basin (including the fatty king salmon which was formerly the orcas’ most consistent source of food). If each one of us takes action, we have the power to make a change and help prevent these beautiful, intelligent creatures from starving to death. Please consider clicking the link below to sign a petition to Senator Patty Murray and Governor Jay Inslee to let these dams be breached, let this ecosystem return to its natural balance, and save these orcas from being dammed to starvation.

https://www.change.org/p/senator-murray-governor-inslee-dammed-to-extinction-southern-resident-orcas-are-starving-time-is-running-out

12/10/2018

"Earlier this year I moved to New York, and quickly came to realize that while I had moved to what many regard as the greatest city in the world, it is also, veritably, a city of garbage" An honest testimony of an environmentalist living her life in a big city, attempting to make a positive difference both for the planet and for her city. Very proud of this piece! Thank you Megan Embrey for being vulnerable with us and sharing your experience on this platform.

Earlier this year I moved to New York, and quickly came to realize that while I had moved to what many regard as the greatest city in the world, it is also, veritably, a city of garbage.

05/10/2018

Happy weekend everyone!! Here are some flamingo fun facts for your Friday: Flamingos’ brains are smaller than their eyeballs, their beaks are shaped upside down in comparison to all other birds, their knees bend backwards, and their scaley legs enable them to withstand toxic waters up to 107 degrees Fahrenheit! Feeders of algae and small crustaceans, flamingos are critical to maintaining the ecosystems they inhabit. Not-so-fun-fact of the day: there are currently more plastic flamingos than real flamingos on our planet. While flamingos are incredible creatures, plastic is a non-biodegradable material that is a devastating source of pollution for marine animals. Why is our culture like this; why will we pay money to have a plastic representation of a bird while the real ones go extinct? While plastic is a convenient material and has become ubiquitous at most dining institutions, the time has come for our society to quit our plastic addiction. Here at human tagreement, we just want to try and foster a culture of conscientious and informed individuals. Let’s take the time to ask ourselves: does it really make sense to prioritize convenience and aesthetics over the long term health of our shared home? Sorry plastic, but it’s time for you to (flamin)go 🌊❤🐣

10/09/2018

When most people think about wildlife, they think about lions and giraffes of the African safari. But did you know that corals are actually animals too? The “coral” consists of a calcium carbonate skeleton, within which thousands of little animals called polyps live, like people living in an apartment building together. How do these polyps get their food? They can’t leave their “apartment” to go grocery shopping or postmate a Chipolte burrito. It turns out they’ve hired their own little personal chefs: a little photosynthetic algae called Zooxanthelae! Zoozanthelaes are amazing little chefs that cook up all the energy these polyps need to survive. They come in many different varieties and therefor have different color pigments; the Zooxanthelae’s different pigments are what create the spectacular rainbow of colors you see when snorkeling on a coral reef. Despite their amazing capabilities, Zooxanthelae are sensitive and if it gets too hot in the kitchen and if they undergo heat stress, they throw a temper tantrum and release toxic amounts of hydrogen peroxides.The polyps of the coral apartment don’t want any of this hydrogen peroxide, so they kick out the Zooxanthelae, and thus the corals also lose their beautiful pigment. This gives the coral the appearance of becoming “bleached.” This does not just have aesthetic consequences; when polyps lose their personal chefs, Zooxanthelae, they can quickly starve to death within a few weeks. Unfortunately, coral bleaching is a devastating and increasingly frequent trend. Due to the burning of fossil fuels and the emission of greenhouse gases, our planet’s global temperature is on the rise. One of the major consequences of this is the heat stress on Zooxanthelae, and their subsequent eviction from their homes with coral polyps. Coral reefs take up less than 1% of the ocean floor but provide essential homes to a plethora of marine life. Coral reefs promote tourism, protect coastal cities from storm waves, and are critical to the most biodiverse ecosystem on our planet. We hope that now when you next hear about coral bleaching on the news, you will understand a little more about the cause of this “bleaching.”

19/03/2018

Extinctions aren’t only losses for the present — they are innumerable and inconceivable losses for the future of the natural world. Every species that disappears also represents the loss of infinite evolutionary processes that created the world we see today. Consider how all birds evolved from one ancestor that lived millions of years ago. If this ancestor had not existed, none of todays’ thousands of bird species would exist. Some of the most striking examples of species undergoing diversifying evolution can be found in the most surprising places, such as British Columbia’s sea wolves. These wolves that live along the Great Bear Rainforest’s coastline survive almost completely on food from the ocean. They swim for miles between islands, and have become a genetically distinct population from more land-based wolves. Canada’s sea wolves are effectively a group of wolves on its way to becoming a new species — one that is more aquatic than current wolves. Protecting them, along with every other species on earth, is protecting the seeds of evolution 📸: Grégoire Bertaud 📝: Gabriel Silva Collins

16/02/2018

Today marks the seventh annual World Pangolin Day; day during which we celebrate the existence of this incredible mammal and raise awareness on its status of conservation. These animals are one of the most trafficked mammals in Asia and, and increasingly in Africa. Pangolins are in high demand in countries like China and Vietnam where their scales are used for traditional medicine and their meat, considered as a delicacy. There is currently no evidence to support claims regarding medicinal properties of pangolin scales or any other part of the pangolin. So today take a minute to support organizations which are working to protect pangolins such as WWF and savepangolin.org. You can also make sure to request full enforcement of laws and penalties for smuggling pangolins from your policy makers 📝: Anna Chahuneau

01/02/2018

Renewables, what do they mean and what can they bring to the future - The words clean energy, green energy, renewables are very trendy these days, but what exactly do they mean? Could you cite more than 3 sources of clean energy? Wind and solar seem to be obvious answers; yet, there exists many other forms of renewable energies. Water, geothermal, biomass, hydrogen, and the oceans are additional sources of clean energy whose potential has long been left underfunded. Today the United States still heavily relies on coal, oil and nature gas to respond to its energy needs; that being said, these sources of energy are finite and will eventually dwindle. In the United States, about 29 percent of global warming emissions come from our electricity sector. Most of those emissions come from fossil fuels like coal and natural gas. In contrast, most renewable energy sources produce little to no global warming emissions.The comparison becomes clear when you look at the numbers. Burning natural gas for electricity releases between 0.6 and 2 pounds of carbon dioxide while wind, on the other hand, is responsible for only 0.02 to 0.04 pounds of released carbon dioxide 📝: Anna Chahuneau 📸:

28/01/2018

Today, a focus on the Amur Leopard, a critically endangered species. People usually think of leopards as Savanna dwellers but this rare subspecies has adopted life in the Russian Far East temperate forest. The Amur can run at a speed up to 37 miles per hour and leaps more than 19 horizontally. Due to extensive habitat loss and human conflict, only 60 individuals remain in the wild. Extinction; however, is not certain. A distant cousin, the Amur tiger, recovered from a precarious state of fewer than 40 individuals about 60 years ago. With enhanced and sustained conservation practices, the Amur tiger sustain in the future landscape 📝: Anna Chahuneau 📖: WWF 📸: .pict

26/12/2017

Cities are some of the planet’s most manmade landscapes. They are “urban jungles” with endless rows of cement, asphalt, and steel. But cities around the world also hide surprising pieces of biodiversity that are a testament to nature’s adaptability. Amongst its twelve and a half million people, Mumbai hosts dozens of wild leopards that walk along city streets and hunt between apartment buildings. In the United States, New York City has one of the world’s highest concentrations of peregrine falcons – the fastest animal in the world. Urban spaces across the planet are home to seals, hyenas, monkeys, hawks, and many other species. Plants also thrive in urban spaces: residing in Tule, Mexico, the Árbol del Tule has the widest trunk of any tree in the world, measuring 42 meters (137.8 feet) in circumference. As more and more places around the world become urbanized, conservation efforts must work to make cities greener, in addition to preserving wild spaces. Through small actions such as planting native species in backyards or putting out birdfeeders, urban residents can transform concrete jungles in to green ones 🏤🏡🌳🍃🏨 Author: Gabriel Silva Collins //Photography: Andrew Britt

24/12/2017

Happy holidays from the Human Agreement! For a more eco friendly festive spirit, be sure to think of reducing your waste, both paper and food. As crazy as it sounds, an unbelievable 1.5 billion Christmas cards are thrown away by United Kingdom households each year, according to Imperial College researchers. In terms of food, Last year, 4.2 million Christmas dinners were wasted across the United Kingdom, according to Unilever. The figure is the equivalent to 263,000 turkeys; 7.5 million mince pies; 740,000 slices of Christmas pudding; 17.2 million Brussels sprouts; 11.9 million carrots and 11.3 million roast potatoes (you could also consider going vegetarian this season!) So remember to recycle and give your leftovers to food banks; so many people out there also deserve a holiday meal 🎅🏼❄️❤️🍰