Spreading manure on crops recycles the nutrients, but as it decomposes it releases methane. And lots of it. Agriculture is the largest source of methane emissions globally. Each year, methane from livestock manure has the warming equivalent of 240 million tons of carbon dioxide, or the same as the annual emissions from 52 million cars.

“50 years ago, 20 million young people protested about the damage to our Earth. Over the past 5 decades, a lot has happened. Our ozone layer is healing, renewable energy is booming worldwide, environmental awareness has never been higher. But some risks are even more acute than before,” said Denis Hayes, coordinator of the first Earth Day and founder of Earth Day Network, in a video message at a recent Wilson Center event commemorating the 50th Earth Day. 

It helps to think of collaboration as a skill to develop, rather than a value to impart, said Francesca Gino, Professor and Unit Head of Negotiation, Organization and Markets at Harvard Business School, at a recent Wilson Center virtual event on the importance of cross-sectoral collaboration. Many organizations make collaboration one of their values, she said. However, this has no substantial effect. “It could be a first step, but on its own it doesn’t create a culture where all of a sudden people are collaborating effectively,” Gino said.

“You might know what to do,” said Rachel Kleinfeld, a Senior Fellow for Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “But if you don’t think about how to do it, your reform isn’t going to move forward.” She spoke at a recent Wilson Center virtual event on how to think and work politically while supporting biodiversity conservation goals. It may sound counterintuitive, she said, but undertaking what’s considered the best intervention may not be the best approach.

Our collective development objectives will not be achieved if they come at the expense of biodiversity and natural resource management, said Jeff Haeni, Acting Deputy Assistant Administrator in the Bureau for Economic Growth, Education, and Environment at USAID. He spoke at a recent Wilson Center virtual event, co-hosted with USAID, that explored the links between conservation and public health with examples from USAID’s BRIDGE project, which aims to build the evidence base for integrating biodiversity conservation considerations into policy discussions and decision-making across sectors. “The ability of societies around the world to develop and thrive is dependent on the health of the forests, fisheries, and natural systems around them,” he said.

Weeks before most of the world began to take the spread of COVID-19 seriously, Africa was already threatened by another plague, the biggest locust outbreak in the last 70 years. Locusts swarmed into Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Uganda, and South Sudan in January and February this year. Those hordes of voracious locusts laid eggs, and now the second wave, 20 times the size of the first group, is arriving. According to Locust Watch, “The current situation in East Africa remains extremely alarming as more swarms form and mature in northern and central Kenya, southern Ethiopia, and probably in Somalia.”

COVID-19 isn’t the only problem going viral. Economic insecurity is driving gold prices to record highs around $1,700 per ounce, causing levels of global mercury pollution to rise too. In the United States coal-fired power plants drive mercury pollution, but globally, the leading cause is small-scale ‘artisanal’ gold mining. Roughly 30 million men, women, and children in poor countries depend on mining for subsistence incomes. Unfortunately, the cheapest and easiest way to mine gold uses mercury, a highly toxic heavy metal the United Nations is striving to eliminate.