22-01-2019

DEVELOPMENT
TUESDAy,
JANUARy 22, 2019
5
Indigenous people contribute most
in protecting world’s biodiversity
Fatima Arkin
Indigenous peoples will
have a chance to share
their traditional
knowledge on the
environment and play a role
in the implementation of the
2015 Paris Agreement to
combat climate change and
build a sustainable low
carbon future.
Although indigenous
people form less than five
per cent of the world's
population, they protect 80
per cent of global
biodiversity, according to
the UN. Selection processes
are currently underway to
nominate 14 members to a
working group of the Local
Communities and
Indigenous Peoples
Platform (LCIPP), which
was created by the Paris
Agreement in 2017, with the
Indigenous people to have say in UN climate policy.
final group expected to hold
a first meeting in June,
according to Ghazali
Ohorella, a member of the
Indigenous Global Caucus.
Half of the final group will
comprise indigenous
peoples, with government
representatives making up
the other half. The group will
be tasked with developing a
work plan for the full
implementation of the
functions of the LCIPP on
the basis of equality and
partnership.
"Full, effective, direct, and
meaningful input from
indigenous peoples will
likely result in better policies
Photo: Stuart Freedman
as it would ensure
sustainable strategies and
increase the level of
expertise," Ohorella tells
SciDev.Net. "The platform is
more than a learning and
knowledge-sharing platform
- it has the ability to
collaborate with entities
both under and outside the
UN Framework Convention
on Climate Change
(UNFCCC)."
Terence Hay-Edie, who
works with indigenous
peoples as part of the UN
Development Programme,
tells that it is both
interesting
and
encouraging to see the
"somewhat rapid"
acceleration of the LCIPP
in the UNFCCC processes.
"The Convention on
Biological Diversity (CBD)
has allowed indigenous
peoples and local
communities to actively
participate in negotiations
and, in 2014, the term
'Indigenous Peoples and
Local Communities' was
formally adopted," says
Hay-Edie.
But the platform and its
facilitative working group
face challenges, such as the
lack of consensus among
countries that are party to
the Paris Agreement on
what the term "local
communities" means.
"For me, the 'bridge'
between indigenous
peoples and local
communities under both
UNFCCC and CBD comes
down to demonstration of
the value and applicability
of traditional knowledge
for
biodiversity
conservation, adaptation
and mitigation," says Hay-
Edie. "Most indigenous
cosmologies do not make
these artificial distinctions
and call for a more holistic
approach."
World's first gene-edited babies
spark controversy
Crispin Maslog
The world's first gene-edited babies, twin girls Lulu
and Nana (not their real names), whose birth was
announced only two months ago (November
2018) by a young Chinese scientist who 'created' them,
have sparked fierce debate in the world science
community.
Is their creator, He Jiankui, justified in creating geneedited
human life if the motive is to find a cure for a
disease? He announced the controversial birth of the
babies on the eve of the second International Summit
on Human Genome Editing in Hong Kong on 28
November 2018 and formally presented his research at
the Summit.
The 28-year-old scientist from the Southern
University of Science and Technology in Guangdong
told the Summit that Lulu and Nana's parents were one
of seven couples recruited from a group of patients with
HIV. He added that at least one more woman from the
group is pregnant with a third gene-edited baby.
In a video, he said his team had altered genes to make
them resistant to the HIV virus. This genetic tweaking
was done on embryos in a lab dish and later implanted
in the mother's womb using the CRISPR-Cas9 genomeediting
technique to modify the CCR5 gene. He admits
that his work has not yet been published in a scientific
journal, and other researchers have had no access to any
data or DNA samples to confirm his claim.
The scientist said a paper about the work will be
published in an unspecified journal. However, Chinese
laws on genetic resources prevent publication of the
gene sequences of either the parents or children. So
other scientists would still find it difficult to verify his
claims. The reaction from the science community was
immediate, unanimous and negative - the equivalent of
a resounding scientific slap on the face.
"Even if the modifications are verified, the procedure
was irresponsible and failed to conform to international
norms," the organising committee of the Hong Kong
Summit said sharply in a statement on 29 November,
the day after the Summit.
Media reports say many of the 700 scientists and
researchers at the Summit were unconvinced about the
evidence He presented to show his editing was
successful. They suggest that in similar experiments
some cells in embryos may be damaged, incompletely
edited or escape editing entirely. He did not show up
after his talk to answer questions from other scientists
or the media.
Many scientists expressed outrage, saying that the
science behind this procedure is too new to ensure it is
safe. Some said the move could be seen as the first step
in making 'designer babies' - children made-to-order
selecting for desirable traits such as intelligence or
beauty.
One of them, Annie Chai Wai Yeeng, project leader of
Cancer Research Malaysia, tells that she and her
colleagues heard of He's babies for the first time only a
few days before the Summit when she was visiting the
University of Hong Kong, her alma mater.
In an interview, Chai says, "It was a surprise to me and
all my colleagues…We went through He's videos
describing his research on YouTube and debated among
ourselves (on its ethics). I would say the majority of us
do not totally agree with the rationale he used to justify
his work and were quite mad at this rogue scientist."
Chai adds that ethics aside, He's choice of the
CRISPR-Cas9 approach to gene editing isn't surprising.
"The technology that He used was a pretty easy
approach that many scientists in the field have the
capability to do."
The Summit participants' reaction can be summed
up with the words of Jennifer Doudna, who
pioneered the CRISPR-Cas9 genome-editing tool:
"The thought I kept having was the potential for
rogue scientists to use this in unethical ways. It's a
real risk," said Doudna, a biochemist at the
University of California, Berkeley, in an interview
with David Cyranoski for Nature.
The wafer is more palatable for Asian children than other therapeutic foods.
Photo: UNICEF
Fish protein wafers to ease acute
malnutrition in children
Development Desk
Asnack based on fish proteins, is
expected to help the Cambodian
government reach its goal of
treating at least 25,000 children for
severe acute malnutrition every year.
Eventually, production of this snack
could be expanded to help over five
million children under the age of five in
East Asia and the Pacific who are
affected by severe acute malnutrition
annually, according to Arnaud Laillou,
a nutrition specialist at UNICEF
Cambodia. Laillou points to the Lao
PDR and Myanmar as countries in the
region that could readily adopt the
product.
Acutely malnourished children are
nine times more likely to die than wellnourished
children, according to
UNICEF. Typically, they have severe
muscle wasting and swollen feet, face
and limbs and need emergency care,
including therapeutic food, to survive.
The new snack, called Nutrix, offers a
locally produced alternative to imported
therapeutic foods that are usually made
with peanut and milk powder.
Approximately 2.6 per cent of children
in Cambodia suffer from severe acute
malnutrition while another eight per
cent have moderate to acute
malnutrition. Home-based, ready-touse
therapeutic foods are often
prescribed for an estimated 60,000 to
90,000 Cambodian children who need
specialised medical treatment annually,
according to UNICEF. The organisation
also notes that local research has shown
low uptake of existing products in
Cambodia's healthcare facilities.
Nutrix presents a viable alternative. It
is 20 per cent cheaper than imported
counterparts. Cambodian children also
find it more palatable, according to
efficacy studies conducted by UNICEF.
Additionally, fish is a staple in Asia-
Pacific diets; the region provides almost
90 per cent of the world's fish supply,
according to the UN's Food and
Agriculture Organization (FAO).
"Nutrix came about after five years of
research and hard work," Laillou tells.
"The final tests of the product were
essential as Cambodia is one of the first
countries to use fish protein in
therapeutic food." To create the Nutrix
wafer, UNICEF partnered with the
French National Research Institute for
Sustainable Development. Copenhagen
University and Danish Care Foods Corp.
(DCF) also worked on Nutrix. DCF is
slated to produce the wafer and a lighter
version called Num Trey for the
Cambodian ministry of health.
DCF's partner company, Vissot Co.,
has a Bill and Melinda Gates grant to
Global brine production 50 per cent higher than previous estimates.
train workers in five local communities
where the fish are caught to sort, clean
and pack the fish for transport to their
factory in Phnom Penh, says Shakuntala
Thilsted, a research programme leader
at WorldFish, an international nonprofit.
Thilsted says by using native
Cambodian fish instead of dairy like in
other ready-to-use therapeutic foods,
there is a higher likelihood of creating a
system that fits the local supply. The
optimised supply chain is predicted to
reduce production costs by 60 per cent.
However, expanding the production
and distribution of Nutrix to other
countries present several challenges,
says Derek Headey, a senior research
fellow at the International Food Policy
Research Institute (IFPRI). "Child
stunting really accelerates very quickly at
six months, exactly the time when kids
should be introduced to nutrient-dense
complementary foods. But it can be
tough for nutrition programs to reach
parents at six months (unlike prenatal or
neonatal care)," Headey tells.
"Even if these foods are designed to fit
local tastes and cultural feeding
practices, there's still a novelty factor to
them," Headey says, adding that there's
an issue of consumers trusting the
product and the "inevitable debate about
whether the product would be delivered
free through the health system".
Photo: RDR
Brine creating ecological imbalance
in marine environment
He Jiankui at the second International Summit on Human Genome Editing. Photo: VOA
Hazem Badr
The increased number of
desalination plants around the
world threatens the sustainable
use of the technology, a study warns. The
UN-backed study, published in the
journal Science of The Total
Environment online, cautions that the
disposal of leftover brine into the sea is
expensive, harms the environment and
threatens the future use of sea water in
desalination.
It estimates that globally, nearly 16,000
desalination plants currently produce 95
million cubic meters of fresh water per
day. With each litre of fresh water, 1.5
litres of brine is produced ? and amounts
to brine at around 142 million cubic
meters per day, about 50 per cent higher
than previous estimates.
The research team, from the UN
University's Institute for Water,
Environment and Health at Wageningen
University, The Netherlands, and the
Gwangju Institute of Science and
Technology, Republic of Korea,
produced the new estimates by analysing
the latest data to come up with what they
say is the most comprehensive study of
leftover brine to date.
Manzoor Qadir, a researcher at the
United Nations University Institute, and
one of the study's authors, told
SciDev.Net that he believes the study will
raise awareness about the risks of brine
production, and potentially lead to more
effective management to maintain the
benefits of desalination. "We see
governments in water-scarce countries
mainly look at the supply side of
providing desalinated water," he says.
Almost half the world's current
production of desalinised water lies in the
Middle East and North Africa (MENA)
region, at 48 per cent of the global total.
The major producer, the Kingdom of
Saudi Arabia, produces 15.5 per cent,
followed by the United Arab Emirates at
10.1 per cent and then Kuwait at 3.7 per
cent. The region with the second-largest
share of global desalinisation operations
is East Asia and Pacific region, which
produces 18.4 per cent, followed by
North America (11.9 per cent), China (7.5
per cent) and the United States (11.2 per
cent). These figures correspond to the
amount of leftover brine. According to
the study, 55 per cent of the brine
produced globally can be found in four
countries: Saudi Arabia (22 per cent), the
United Arab Emirates (20.2 per cent),
Kuwait (6.6 per cent) and Qatar (5.8 per
cent). Four in five desalination plants are
located 10 kilometres from the coastline,
and the brine they produce is disposed
directly into the marine environment.
This poses a high risk to marine
ecosystems, according to the authors,
because brine significantly increases
water salinity and pollutes water with
toxic elements such as copper and
chlorine.
Among the suggested solutions is using
brine in aquaculture and the irrigation of
plants that tolerate high salinity
conditions. One economic opportunity
noted in the study is the recovery of
minerals from brine ? such as sodium,
magnesium, calcium, potassium, and
lithium ?