The PBD

This morning, the Financial Times ran an article highlighting calls from Andreas Utermann (CEO of Allianz Global Investors) and Anne Richards (Chief Executive of Fidelity International) for a shift away from the relentless pursuit of economic growth which lies at the heart of modern capitalism.  It may well be time to consider alternative economic models…

Shortly before David Attenborough’s new series Dynasties hit the screens in the UK, the veteran broadcaster/presenter was the subject of a targeted article by environmental activist and Guardian columnist George Monbiot.  Monbiot, whose piece proved unsurprisingly controversial, claimed that Attenborough has “betrayed the living world he loves” by “downplaying our environmental crisis” and generating “complacency,…

Tips on how to encourage wildlife to thrive in our gardens

Books and articles to get stuck into over the summer!

Hi all! You’ll notice this is my first article for some time.  I’ve been very busy getting a sustainability-focused business project off the ground, but that’s no excuse for slacking. So the PBD returns with another book review (following my April 2017 article on Keith Somerville’s Ivory: Power and Poaching in Africa). Just in time for a last-minute…

A wise man once said that “humanity is like an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty”. But just how dirty have the Earth’s oceans become? Greenpeace hit the headlines in London a few weeks ago, as activists placed a striking sculpture – “Plasticide” – outside…

Something slightly different today – a book review. But I’ve not reviewed a book since…well, I can’t remember… So let’s start with a quote to get us going: “The elephant is the most harassed of all African mammals…Its reduction in numbers is still progressing, and special measures may become necessary in order to save it from extinction” Perhaps…

From six o’clock on Thursday, several hundred people gathered at the Royal Institute of Great Britain in London’s Mayfair for an event organised by UK-based charity, Helping Rhinos. The evening, “Wonderful World of Rhinos”, was in aid of the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in central Kenya, a reserve officially established in 2004, and now home to the last three…

For last week’s Conservation Success Story, we looked at the black robin, whose recovery from the brink of extinction was a quite remarkable feat of endurance, both from the robins themselves and the team of New Zealand conservationists who worked day and night through the 1980s to sustain a healthy population. While we’re over in…