Lynn Johnson, Author at Nature Needs More

Would You Let Your Home Decay Around You?

By Lynn Johnson|2023-11-11T09:13:45+11:00June 9th, 2022|The Fly|

Would You Let Your Home Decay Around You? No - Are you sure? Lynn Johnson 9 June, 2022 As rational animals we believe we wouldn’t live in a home obviously decaying around us and not do something about it if we could. But this is exactly what we have done, and continue to do, with the only real home we have. The interesting question is why we can compartmentalise what we do so easily. An example of this compartmentalisation became apparent in the recent Australian federal election. Many of the suburbs who voted out Liberal Party MPs, in some municipalities for the first time in the party’s history, did so [...]

Yet ‘Another’ One-Off Ivory Sale Requested – Why It Shouldn’t Be Allowed

By Lynn Johnson|2022-06-08T07:44:23+10:00June 5th, 2022|Blog|

Zimbabwe has indicated that it is planning to present a case to CITES, CoP19 in Panama later this year, to allow (another) one-off sale of its ivory stockpile. The country is also rallying its allies (Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, Tanzania and Zambia) to support the push to open up the ivory trade. This, together with a recent image of Japan’s ambassador to Zimbabwe photographed holding a large elephant tusk in Harare, has understandably caused concern for those opposed to such one-off sales. Nature Needs More believes that CITES should be a conservation-based convention, where the precautionary principle is used (in the form of a reverse listing process) as a basis for making any decisions about the legal trade. [...]

The Long Read: Fishing Industry Lobbies Against CITES Modernisation – Here’s Why

By Lynn Johnson|2022-05-18T20:46:43+10:00May 17th, 2022|Blog|

Over the last two years, Nature Needs More has continued to meet with politicians and government agencies in our push for modernising CITES. During this time, it has become clear that the fishing industry is a key obstructionist to the urgent need to modernise the regulator of the global trade in endangered species. So, why is this the case? The solution Nature Needs More proposes to modernise the global regulator would expand CITES remit over the fishing industry (and forestry) and currently this industry and the global fishery management authorities have too much power. Most recently, in March 2022, this was highlighted with the collapse of negotiations on the treaty to protect the high seas [...]

Broken Chains

By Lynn Johnson|2022-05-08T15:08:29+10:00May 8th, 2022|The Fly|

Broken Chains Lack of supply chain control laid bare. Lynn Johnson 8 May, 2022 The global pandemic has laid bare how international free trade relies on fragile and poorly understood supply chains. These supply chains are optimised solely for efficiency and just-in-time availability and, as a result, lack both transparency and resilience. Supply chains started to break down almost immediately at the beginning of the pandemic, causing basic items to be rationed in supermarkets. Adding to the strain, international, online shopping exploded. As lockdowns have ebbed and flowed in countries around the world, production and distribution in this global trade system has buckled. The scale of the current disruption due to lockdowns [...]

Greenwashing: Don’t Aid ‘False Solutions’ And Undermine Real Progress

By Lynn Johnson|2022-04-20T08:09:52+10:00April 19th, 2022|Blog|

It is time for conservation organisations to stop lending their brands to industry greenwashing. There are many examples of this, but since it is in the news, let’s focus on the illegal online trade in endangered species. Launched in 2018, the Coalition to End Wildlife Trafficking Online has three conservation organisations, WWF, TRAFFIC and IFAW, who are stated to be the convenors of the coalition. The group includes Facebook (Meta), Google, ebay, Etsy, Instagram, Microsoft, TikTok, Alibaba and many more: Early after its launch, the coalition stated its goal was to cut the illegal online trade by 80% by 2020. Their 2021 progress report states that, as a group, they removed 11 million posts and [...]

The Sustainability Game: Creatives, Keep The Blood Off Your Hands

By Lynn Johnson|2022-04-11T08:48:09+10:00April 10th, 2022|The Fly|

The Sustainability Game: Creatives, Keep The Blood Off Your Hands Because, if you are helping to sell it, then you are helping to kill and exploit it. Lynn Johnson 10 April, 2022 That much business behaviour today is neither ethical nor sustainable in any industry is hardly news to observers of corporate conduct. Faced with a situation where we are already exceeding planetary boundaries, any push for ‘more’ (growth, consumption, sales, profit) has to be considered not just unethical and unsustainable, but suicidal. And yet, everlasting economic growth remains official government policy everywhere and is the default premise of any business operating under capitalism. Given the profit and growth driven ideology [...]

Broken Systems – A Corporate Criminal Justice System Has Never Existed

By Lynn Johnson|2022-05-08T10:20:36+10:00March 21st, 2022|The Fly|

Broken Systems A Corporate Criminal Justice System Has Never Existed Lynn Johnson 21 March, 2022 Over recent years there has been an ever-growing dialog about how to deal with the transnational, organised crime associated with the trade in endangered species and environmental goods. As the legal and illegal trade in endangered and exotic species are so intertwined that they are functionally inseparable, some time ago I found myself exploring why so few inroads have been made in dealing with this transnational organised crime. One question I started considering more-and-more was, could the reality be that there is just too big an overlap between transnational organised crime and white-collar/corporate crime for [...]

Garbage In – Garbage Out: But The New CITES Wildlife TradeView Website Isn’t Totally Useless.

By Lynn Johnson|2022-10-08T20:03:06+11:00March 15th, 2022|Blog|

If you have been following the recent CITES Standing Committee meeting (held in Lyon, France. 07 - 11 March 2022) you may have noticed the launch of a new website, CITES Wildlife TradeView. Anyone who has tried to penetrate the CITES trade database, who doesn’t use the system regularly as a part of their research or job, will know that it isn’t the most transparent trade data source to navigate around. In 2019, Nature Needs More even asked a group of trade analytics experts to navigate the CITES trade database. So what was their feedback? - That the CITES trade database was the worst designed and most impenetrable trade data source they have ever come across. The new [...]

Run For Their Lives

By Lynn Johnson|2022-03-12T11:36:40+11:00March 12th, 2022|WGFW|

Run For Their Lives Don't just run for your life, run for their lives too! Too often we read that yet another bird or animal is now threatened with extinction. This can cause a feeling of futility, but if you are a runner (or do any other sport for that matter) you CAN do something. All you need to do is give a day of your running schedule to wildlife. Every day, around the world people are literally on the run. They run around parks, in clubs, corporate groups, in fun runs, marathons and more. Now, World Games For Wildlife is putting out a call to ask people to run to help save endangered species. [...]

Birthday Party Games For Wildlife

By Lynn Johnson|2022-02-11T07:40:31+11:00February 7th, 2022|WGFW|

Birthday Party Games For Wildlife #Mybirthdaywishforwildlife While you may not be the sporty type, why not consider asking your family and friends to donate to World Games For Wildlife for your birthday? Currently, only 3% of non-government donations go to the environment & animals, and only a small amount of this goes to conserving wild animals and their habitat. World Games For Wildlife has been created because we need more people to help change this. So this year, why don’t you ask people to donate to the World Games For Wildlife instead of buying you a present? Over-consumption is the biggest driver of the extinction crisis. So wouldn’t it be fantastic to celebrate your [...]

About Lynn Johnson