Take the strange, scary case of the Bellinger River snapping turtle (Myuchelys georgesi). A few years ago, an estimated 4,500 of these colorful critters swam the waters of the Australian water system for which they were named, a 44-mile river in the state of New South Wales, about six hours north of Sydney. They were probably never a populous species, and they faced a few problems from egg-eating predators, but otherwise these turtles hung on just fine.

Then disaster struck.

In 2015 canoeist Rowan Simon and a friend were paddling down the Bellinger River when they noticed a turtle sitting on a rock. It should have jumped back into the water as they approached. It didn't. They got closer and found a shocking sight its eyes "were grown over with this disease," as Simon recounted to the Sydney Morning Herald last year. They found another sick turtle 20 minutes later.

That was the first sign of a disease that, in under two months, would wipe out more than 90% of the species. In addition to blindness, the virus reportedly caused inflammatory lesions and internal organ failure.

Today as few as 150 Bellinger River snapping turtles remain, making them one of the world's 25 rarest turtle or tortoise species. Australia has declared them critically endangered and devoted hundreds of thousands of dollars toward the species' conservation.

Photo by Dr. Ricky Spencer, courtesy NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment

Virus-plus?

The researchers also examined several hypotheses about how a previously unknown and still unidentified virus could have killed so many turtles so quickly.

They didn't find much.

"It's all a bit of a mystery," Chessman says. "There's still so much we don't know. We know it's a reptile type of virus, but we have no idea where it came from, how long it's been in the Bellinger River, or how it managed to apparently spread upstream rather than downstream at a rate of up to a kilometer a day, which is really quite bizarre."

Previous research had suggested that some additional contributing factor perhaps abnormal water temperatures, pollution or malnutrition may have magnified the effects of the virus so that it caused so many fatalities. Current research, however, has found no specific evidence to support those hypotheses at least, not yet.

"We can't rule out that some sort of unusual environmental conditions in the preceding months were related to it somehow, but we don't really have the information to understand what that was or what it may have been," says Chessman. "Unfortunately, there isn't that much information about what happened in the river until these sick and dead turtles started showing up in February 2015."

The Bellinger River in September 2019. Photo: Michael Coghlan (CC BY-SA 2.0)

The Last Chance Leads to the Next Generation

After his first warnings reportedly fell on deaf ears, Rowan Simon and another friend returned to the river, where they gathered up 50 dead and dying turtles and presented them to the local council.

The collection process "was pretty horrific," Rowan told the Sydney Morning Herald.

That confrontation finally motivated action. But by then just two months after the first signs of the disease very few turtles were left.

At the last minute, conservation teams rescued 17 healthy mature and immature Bellinger River snapping turtles from an upper stretch of the river the disease hadn't yet reached. They soon became the core of a captive-breeding population at Sydney's Taronga Zoo. Another 19 immature turtles (also healthy) were collected in November 2016 and sent to Symbio Wildlife Park to start a second captive-assurance population.

A recent hatchling identified with a unique dab of paint. Photo courtesy NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment

So far the released turtles appear to be healthy, and their survival rate remains quite high. As of this past March, 17 of the released turtles were still being tracked; one turtle had died, while two more had disappeared after their tracking devices failed. That month 16 of the released hatchlings were collected, tested and rereleased. Gerry McGilvray, co-lead of the Bellinger River turtle conservation program for the NSW government, told The Guardian that the youngsters "appear to be in good health and there's no evidence of exposure to the virus."

That makes the Bellinger River snapping turtle an interesting parallel to the current COVID-19 pandemic: The virus seems to have caused greater mortality levels in adults than in immature turtles, for as-yet-unknown reasons.

"The older ones seemed more susceptible than the younger ones, which of course is true with coronavirus as well," says Chessman.

A Long Road Ahead

Of course, you need to produce a huge number of hatchlings to make up for losing 90% of a species. That will take time a lot of it and the effort faces some very strict physical limitations.

For one thing, very few mature females remain just 5% of the total wild population. On top of that, 88% of the remaining turtles are immature, meaning they won't reach breeding age for several years another 10-12 years in the case of the released hatchlings.

Two Bellinger River snapping turtle hatchlings. Photo courtesy NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment

Extinction Inspiration

Although we don't know much about the river basin's water quality before the turtles got sick, we know a lot more about it now because this near-extinction has motivated the community.

Soon after news of the virus and mass turtle deaths emerged, a group of citizens banded together to form Bellingen Riverwatch (named after the nearby town with a slightly different name than the river itself). Now community volunteers, schools and other organizations conduct monthly water-quality tests across three rivers, a process that's continued even amid the pandemic.

The results have been mostly good, with a few concerns. Elevated phosphate levels have shown up several times. Tests for February and March found that several sites that, at certain moments, failed to meet guidelines for dissolved oxygen established by the Australian and New Zealand Environment and Conservation Council, indicating unsafe conditions for "aquatic life and the macroinvertebrates that our turtles love to eat." The water's oxygen content is potentially important for the Bellinger River turtle, a butt-breathing species that takes in some oxygen through its cloaca while it's underwater. If a turtle can't get enough oxygen from the water, it must come to the surface, putting it at increased risk of predation. Although concerning, there's no indication this is currently a threat to the species.

Bellingen Riverwatch uses an icon of the critically endangered Bellinger River snapping turtle in its logo.

Swimming Forward

Although many questions remain, the Bellinger River snapping turtle appears to have been saved from extinction for now.

Of course, the threat of another potential outbreak still looms large as it does for other wildlife species and even people around the world.

"Situations like this are of course unpredictable and could in theory happen anytime and anywhere kind of like COVID," says biologist Craig Stanford, the lead author of a new study about the threats faced by the world's turtle and tortoise species. What's happening with the Bellinger River turtle, he says, "concerns all of us, but it's hard to take lessons from it to prevent something like this from happening in the future."

But there's one lesson from the Bellinger River that we can all carry forward: If you see a turtle or other animal that's displaying signs of illness or unusual behavior, raise the alarm. It could be the start of something catastrophic and an opportunity to bring a coalition and a community together to fight for a good cause and make a difference.

John R. Platt is the editor of The Revelator. An award-winning environmental journalist, his work has appeared in Scientific American, Audubon, Motherboard, and numerous other magazines and publications. His "Extinction Countdown" column has run continuously since 2004 and has covered news and science related to more than 1,000 endangered species. He is a member of the Society of Environmental Journalists and the National Association of Science Writers. John lives on the outskirts of Portland, Ore., where he finds himself surrounded by animals and cartoonists.

Reposted with permission from The Revelator.

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15 Inspiring Quotes and Questions to Guide the Food System Forward - EcoWatch

The sixth webinar in the series

The sixth edition of ETF Streams webinar series, ETF Ecosystem Unwrapped, explored one of the biggest trends in finance, environmental, social and governance (ESG) investing.

The conversation began with Ashley Fagan, global head of ETF, indexing and smart beta strategic clients & UK/Ireland development for Amundi, highlighting the three key drivers for the increase in ESG investing. This included investor awareness such that investors and stakeholders are demanding greater transparency over where the money is being invested, and as a result, they are opting for more sustainable strategies.

Second, regulators are providing more guidance, according to Fagan. Since October 2019, UK pension funds have an explicit responsibility to integrate ESG issues into their investment approach.

Finally, the performance of ESG factors can positively impact the risk and return for investors. Fagan highlighted the SRI, ESG leaders and ESG universal versions of the MSCI All Country World index have all outperformed the parent index over the year-to-date, three- and five-year periods.

Damien Lardoux, head of impact investing at EQ Investors, added ESG strategies will simply become common sense investing.

You want to avoid investing in a poorly governed company as you can see some examples, such as BP and Volkswagen where their share prices can fall by 20% in a single day when the scandalous news becomes public, Lardoux said.

One of the benefits of using index funds when investing in ESG strategies is the 100% transparency of the holdings, Alan Miller, founding partner and chief investment officer at SCM Direct, explained.

He said there is a large element of trust when typically investing with mutual funds because you can only see the top 10 holdings which typically account for just 45% of the portfolio.

Everybodys view on what is an ESG stock and what is not is different between investors and between ESG data providers with often conflicting ESG methodologies, Miller added. I am not saying one is better than the other, but they can definitely be significantly different.

It is suggested that investors are broadly happy with these strategies, however, as ESG ETFs saw net positive flows in March just as the global markets were impacted by the coronavirus outbreak.

ESG ETFs have shown a real resilience during the coronavirus crisis as it was the only category within equities that maintained positive flows, Fagan said.

She highlighted some of the reasons behind the resilience including the defensiveness of ESG strategies as they overweight sectors such as healthcare and technology, which have performed well, and underweight sectors that have underperformed during the crisis, like energy and transport.

Furthermore, there is a possibility that investors are showing greater loyalty to their ESG investments which make them less sensitive to market declines.

One issue regarding the ESG ETF market in Europe is that there are too few products available, according to Lardoux.

He said: The issue we have seen with the product providers is that they have been focusing on reducing fees rather than product innovation.

SCM Direct: Unwrapping the ESG investing trend

Areas that Miller would like to see more products available include factor tilted ESG products such as value and growth as well as currency hedged and fixed income ESG ETFs.

He continued by explaining the importance of being transparent when constructing an ESG portfolio for investors.

With our ESG portfolios, we publish the underlying holdings on a monthly basis so the clients can see in full what is inside the portfolio, Miller added

Everybody will have a different view on certain stocks, like Tesla for example, so the investor can know in advance and judge it before they invest.

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ETF Ecosystem Unwrapped: Analysing the explosion of ESG ETFs - ETF Stream

By David Peck, Henderson

Friday, July 17, 2020 | 2 a.m.

Hunting and fishing are the oldest and largest participation sports in America, and the most expensive. They bring billions of dollars and millions of jobs to local economies every year.

It can take years to draw a tag. Some are one per lifetime. When sportsmen arent successful, the camaraderie continues by accompanying another. They keep their skills sharp that way and more funds pour in. Billions support our state wildlife and the Department of the Interior.

Environmental awareness starts early out West. We endorse scouting, school programs, hunter safety courses and familial relationships. Wildlife managers know what animals a territory can support. They monitor disease, birth rate density, predators and even weather patterns. Revisions are constant, ecosystems fragile. We use catch-and-release on fish and hunting lotteries for game.

We could ignore all that experience and let animals overpopulate, then see them slaughtered on highways like back east.

A fly in the ointment is often the rookie that brings out a contagious pet or introduces his pet fish into our waterways. If opponents to Americas oldest sporting challenge spent more time embracing our heritage and knowledge, and joined in our efforts, perhaps we wouldnt be expending valuable resources on errant fires like our Spring Mountains just experienced. If being there is the best thing, then having been there must be the next best thing.

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Hunters are part of the ecosystem - Las Vegas Sun

Written by Tora Agarwala, Edited by Explained Desk | Guwahati | Updated: July 19, 2020 11:43:14 am A one-horned rhinoceros along with her baby stands in floodwater inside Kaziranga National Park, in Golaghat district, Thursday, July 16, 2020. (PTI Photo)

As a fresh wave of floods ravages Assam, killing 73 and affecting nearly 40 lakh people across the state, 85 per cent of the Kaziranga National Park and Tiger Reserve (KNPTR) remains submerged. On Thursday, Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal visited the park to take stock of the situation. So far, 125 animals have been rescued and 86 have died, including rhinos, deer and wild boar, in the sixth worst flood since 1988.

Yet, the annual deluge is considered essential for the survival of the UNESCO World Heritage Site. We explain the role of floods in Kazirangas ecosystem, how increasing high floods can become a problem, and what can be done to keep it in check.

Assam is traditionally flood prone, and the 1,055 sq km KNPTR sandwiched between the Brahmaputra river and the Karbi Anglong Hills is no exception. Among experts there is a consensus that floods are necessary for Kaziranga by virtue of its ecosystem. It is a riverine ecosystem, not a solid landmass-based ecosystem, said P Sivakumar, Director, KNPTR, The system wont survive without water. The entire area of Kaziranga formed by alluvial deposits from the Brahmaputra and its tributaries is centred around the river.

According to Uttam Saikia, Honorary Wildlife Warden of Kaziranga, this floodplain eco system has not only been created by floods but also feeds off it.

The regenerative nature of floods helps replenish Kazirangas water bodies and maintain its landscape, a mix of wetlands, grasslands and semi-evergreen deciduous forests. Saikia said the floodwaters also function as a breeding ground for fish. The same fish are carried away by the receding waters into the Brahmaputra in a way, the park replenishes the rivers stock of fish too, he said.

The waters also help get rid of unwanted plants such as water hyacinth which collect in huge masses in the landscape. In a herbivore-dominated area like Kaziranga, it is important we maintain its grassland status. If it were not for the annual floods, the area would become a woodland, said Sivakumar.

Many also believe that floods are a way of natural selection. A number of animals especially the old, weak cannot survive the floods. Only the ones with superior genes survive, said Rabindra Sarma, Wildlife Research Officer at KNPTR since 1998.

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Earlier, a big flood would come once in ten years, said Rathin Barman, who heads the Centre for Wildlife Rehabilitation and Conservation (CWRC), which takes in injured and orphaned wild animals of the park. Now, they happen every other year, he said, adding that massive deforestation in catchment areas or release of waters by dams upstream may be contributory factors. Climate change models, too, predict that floods will become increasingly devastating with each year.

Barring 2018, the years between 2016 and 2020 have all featured high floods (or floods which submerge more than 60 per cent of the park) killing and injuring hundreds of animals.

Animals adapt naturally to floods but when the waters hit a certain level, they gravitate towards safer, higher ground in the Karbi Anglong hills.

In pictures | Lakhs displaced in Assam floods, national parks hit

While in the past, Kaziranga and Karbi Anglong were part of the same landscape, the animals now have to cross the bustling National Highway 37 which cuts across the park. Over the years, the highway is getting increasingly tough to cross. A few of the nine wildlife corridors on the highway Panbari, Haldibari, Bagori, Harmati, Kanchanjuri, Hatidandi, Deosur, Chirang and Amguri are choked by traffic, said Dr Naveen Pandey, Deputy Director and Veterinary Advisor, The Corbett Foundation, Kaziranga. Mushrooming of hotels, restaurants, shops, and ancillary structures of the tea industry has not helped either.

Editorial | Assams flood problem cannot be entirely blamed on vagaries of nature. It needs to jettison outmoded flood control measures

As a result, animals that venture out of the park, die either under the wheels of speeding vehicles on the highway, or are killed by poachers who take advantage of their vulnerability. In recent years, due to vigilant patrolling, these numbers have decreased. Those that remain in the park often young or the very old die by drowning, entangled in the debris under water as they try to swim.

According to Dr Varun Goswami, Senior Scientist at Conservation Initiatives, an Assam-based organisation that works in the Kaziranga landscape, wildlife in KNPTR have adapted to the natural flood regime by finding refuge on higher ground south of the park. If their safe passage is not ensured, major floods can cause serious losses.

This year four rhinos as well as a number of boar and deer have drowned, and 14 hog deer have died in road accidents so far. The authorities will be able to ascertain the actual number of deaths only once the waters recede.

As per Sarma, at least 25 out of 75 fringe villages on the southern periphery of the park are affected by the floods. Fleeing floodwaters, animals stray from the boundary of the park, and there is an increased interaction between humans and wildlife, at times leading to conflict. Rhino calves get separated from their mothers, tigers swim and take refuge inside homes, deer amble into villages, said Sarma. Even so, most villagers, along with the frontline staff of the forest department and other organisations such as Wildlife Trust of Indias CWRC, are part of the tough rescue operations during the floods guiding strayed animals to safer ground, treating those injured and generally keeping a strict vigil round the clock.

Also read | Through rain and floods, Assams community workers battle pandemic

Preparedness begins a month before floods hit. The authorities keep a track of updates from the Central Water Commission, and monitor water levels of the Brahmaputra tributaries upstream in Arunachal Pradesh.

According to Dr Pandey, the civil administration, park authority, NGOs, and local communities work together to tackle the floods. To avoid disease outbreaks, a door-to-door vaccination is organised every year pre-floods, he said, Thereafter, camps are organised to create awareness against poaching and harming wild animals that are rendered vulnerable during the floods.

Moreover, when the floods hit, Section 144 is imposed along NH-37, speed limits are enforced and fines levied. Barricades are also placed to help animals cross over to Karbi Anglong. The efforts of the forest departments frontline staff become crucial during the season.

Over the years, another mitigation measure has been artificial highlands (111 in the Nineties, 33 in 2016-17) built inside the park for wild animals to take refuge in during the flood.

While these highlands have helped a fair bit in reducing the number of animal casualties during floods, some feel that it is not a permanent solution.

Animals do take refuge there especially rhino and swamp deer but it is not viable to build more highlands since such constructions will ruin the natural ecosystem, said Sarma, terming the highlands a temporary refuge. These 33 highlands cannot accommodate all animals of Kaziranga, and the older ones are more or less dilapidated, he said.

According to Honorary Wildlife Warden Saikia, some animals do not take to the highlands naturally. They have been migrating to natural highlands of Karbi Anglong for centuries; suddenly these artificial constructions do not inspire confidence, they do not find it secure, he said.

Experts believe that emphasis needs to be put on securing animal corridors and ensuring a safe passage to the Karbi hills.

To that end, a 35-km-long flyover constructed over NH-37 was proposed by the Centre in September 2019.

While this flyover will help, 35 km is a lengthy stretch and might take time to build, said Sivakumar, So the focus should be on doing it quickly, using modern technology that will cause minimal disturbance to the animals during construction.

In April 2019, the Supreme Court banned all types of mining and related activities along the parks southern boundary and in the entire catchment area of the rivers that originate in the Karbi Anglong hill ranges and flow into Kaziranga, as well as new construction activities in private lands on nine animal corridors.

Apart from facilitating safe and unhindered wildlife movement, Dr. Goswami of Conservation Initiatives recommends the need for a landscape-scale conservation approach that recognises the value of the Karbi Anglong hills to the south. Kaziranga, with its rich grassland habitats has a primary role to play in supporting these wildlife populations, but the highlands of Karbi Anglong, where these animals take refuge, are the lifeline of the park during the floods, he said.

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Explained: Why annual floods are essential for the survival of Kaziranga National Park - The Indian Express

HARIPUR: Due to lack of implementation of relevant laws, pollution caused by factories in the Hattar Economic Zone continues to harm the ecosystem of Haripur.

The concern was voiced by district president of Pakistan Tehreek-i-Inafs labour wing and general secretary Hazara Labour federation Tahir Amin, while talking to mediapersons here on Friday.

He said over 250 functional industrial units of the estate had been wreaking havoc with the ecosystem of the district, once known for its greenery, fertile land and orchards.

He said the Environmental Protection Agency was unmoved by constant air, water and noise pollution caused by chicken feed, cement, steel, ghee, marble factories, chipboard and batteries manufacturing units.

PTI leaders flay EPAs inaction against such factories in Hattar Economic Zone

Mr Amin while referring to different studies said the smell of chicken feed factories, affluent discharged by the units and flying particles in the dust had increased different respiratory, kidney, stomach and eye diseases both among the industrial workers and the residents living in the areas falling in the five kilometres radius of the industrial estate.

He accused the officials of EPA of giving free hand to the industrialists to play with the lives of over 40,000 industrial workers and the residents of the neighbouring areas.

Tahir Amin also pointed out labour laws violations in the HEZ, saying the industrialists had formed and got registered their industrial association, but workers of the 250 industrial units were not allowed to form labour unions. As a result, he said hiring of workers through private contractors was allowed in violation of labour laws.

The PTI leader said factory workers were forced to work overtime at less than the government-fixed wages. He said the industrial relation ordinance, social security law, Employees Old Age Benefits, Workers Welfare Fund ordinance and other laws guaranteeing the rights of industrial workers were being flagrantly violated, but the officials of department concerned were the silent spectators.

He also criticised the role of management of Hattar Economic Zone formerly known as Sarhad Development Authority and accused them of turning the department into a property-dealing shop.

When contacted, deputy director labour Faizullah Khan said his department had time and again warned the industrialists of legal action if any of them were found violating the labour laws. He claimed that institution of over 120 labour laws violations during the last three months was proof that the labour department was taking all out efforts for curbing violations of the relevant laws.

He urged the workers to approach his office with complaints of labour laws violations.

None of the officials from the local EPA office was available for comments.

Safeer Akhtar Awan, senior vice-president Hattar Industrialists Association, while commenting on the situation, said the association had been calling upon the entrepreneurs to ensure respect to the laws, especially those dealing with labour rights and environmental protection.

Published in Dawn, July 18th, 2020

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Industrial pollution wreaking havoc on Haripur's ecosystem - Newspaper - DAWN.com

Roland Berger, a European management consultancy, has added artificial intelligence software firm Stradigi AI to its global network of partners Terra Numerata.

Based in Montreal, Stradigi AI offers a software-as-a-service machine learning program Kepler which enables non-technical business users to gain insight from their data to improve customer experience, grow revenue, and boost efficiency. The machine learning platform uses thousands of high-performing algorithms to predict, forecast, optimize, and provide insights from ingested tabular data, images, and text classifications.

The partnership will combine Stradigi AIs cutting-edge software with Roland Bergers global network of 2,400 consulting professionals in 35 countries. Based in Munich, Roland Berger has 50+ years of experience advising clients on complex projects, with particular expertise in the automotive, manufacturing, and financial services industries.

"Partnering with Roland Berger allows a broader set of customers to benefit from advanced machine learning to gain efficiencies and drive competitiveness," said Per Nyberg, chief commercial officer at Stradigi AI. "Our AI SaaS offering, Kepler, solves business use cases in industries where Roland Berger has extensive experience and demonstrated value. Together, our organizations will be able to strategically support global clients through combined capabilities.

Roland Bergers Terra Numerata global partnership network launched in 2014 is composed of 90+ digital players, including startups, tech providers, data science specialists, and design thinking agencies. Partners are selected based on their quality of service, technical competencies, international track record, and geographical coverage.

Last year the partners and Roland Berger conducted more than 20 joint projects, including a redesign of a European regions digital strategy.

"Adding Stradigi AI to our Terra Numerata global partner network will be an exciting collaboration," said Axelle Lemaire, Terra Numerata global head. "Terra Numerata helps companies with their transformation to new digital business models. Stradigi AI's Kepler platform fills a gap in our ecosystem to address the needs of companies who can benefit from machine learning, but often lack the necessary resources to get started.

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Roland Berger adds Stradigi AI to its partner ecosystem - Consulting.ca

A herd of wild bison will be released in southern England for the first time in 6,000 years to help restore an ancient habitat and its surrounding wildlife, according to conservationists.

The move is part of a 1m project ($1.2 million) led by Kent Wildlife Trust and the Wildwood Trust, which aims to restore Blean Woods a former pine wood plantation near Canterbury.

The animals will be welcomed to their new home in the spring of 2022, with conservationists planning to first set free one male and three females to form the core of the new herd, according to the Guardian. The animals will be imported from Poland and the Netherlands countries where previous releases have proven successful.

Conservationists hope that the move will help secure the future of the endangered species and that Europe's largest land mammal will also help naturally regenerate the area.

Wild bison fell trees by eating their bark or rubbing up against them. This will create wide and sunny clearings, which in turn will help native plants to thrive.

"TheWilder Bleanproject will prove that a wilder, nature-based solution is the right one to tackle the climate and nature crisis we now face," Paul Hadaway, of Kent Wildlife Trust said, according to the BBC.

"Using missing keystone species like bison to restore natural processes to habitats is the key to creating bio-abundance in our landscape." What the Trust calls "ecosystem engineering."

The European bison is the closest living relative to the ancient steppe bison, which existed in the UK 6,000 years ago before it was killed off due to hunting.

A team of conservationists will be working over the next 18 months to create a fenced enclosure within a wider 150 hectare (370 acres) area.

The public will be able to visit the area with rangers once the wild animals are settled."This will allow people to experience nature in a way they haven't before," Hadaway said.

Over the centuries, Britain has lost many of its keystone species. But there is a growing re-wilding movement advocating for the reintroduction of large mammals and birds of prey driven to extinction by hunting and habitat loss.

Beavers, last recorded in the 16th century, were successfully reintroduced in 2009 and several populations now thrive around the country.

A Lynx UK Trust has been set up and wants to release the Eurasian lynx into forests in Scotland and the north of England to help keep down deer numbers.

The return of the wolf is perhaps the most controversial suggestion. Plans to release two packs withing a fenced range in Britain's wildest region in northern Scotland have been greeted with horror by walkers and farmers alike.

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Wild bison to roam England's woodlands for the first time in 6,000 years as 'ecosystem engineers' - Insider - INSIDER

In mild of an industry-wide shift away from racially-insensitive terminology, Apple has introduced that it, too, is working to exchange non-inclusive language throughout its developer ecosystem. The adjustments will probably be carried out inside Xcode, platform APIs, documentation and open supply initiatives, the corporate mentioned.

These changes began on June 22 with the beta software and developer documentation released at WWDC20. (We are) moving to terms such as allow list and deny list, and main as the default SCM branch in Xcode 12, the corporate wrote in a weblog publish on Thursday. Developer APIs with exclusionary phrases may even be eliminated. The firm says it plans to introduce replacements throughout inside codebases and public APIs. It may even be relevant to open supply initiatives, akin to WebKit and Swift.

Apples announcement follows an identical choice from fellow Silicon Valley tech behemoth, Google. The search large, final month, introduced plans to drop gender-insensitive and racially-demeaning phrases from its codebase. According to the corporates code model information, its going to change phrases akin to blacklist and whitelist with blocklist and allowlist.

Meanwhile, Linus Torvalds has additionally introduced his choice to abolish phrases like master/slave within the Linux kernel. The group has reportedly formulated a brand new coverage that goals to exchange racially insensitive terminologies with impartial options.

The developments come within the wake of widespread protests in opposition to racism and police brutality within the US. Ever for the reason that protests in opposition to police brutality within the US broke out after the killing of George Floyd, a number of corporations together with Google, Twitter, GitHub have taken steps to make the event neighborhood extra racially-inclusive and gender-neutral.

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Apple Working to Remove Non-Inclusive Terms Across its Eco-System - Enter21st

According to the latest report published by PMR, the TD-LTE Ecosystem market is anticipated to grow at a steady pace over the forecast period (2019-2029). The report sheds light on the various trends and restraining factors that are expected to shape the growth of the TD-LTE Ecosystem in the upcoming years. The report ponders over the various parameters that are expected to impact revenue generation, sales, and demand for the TD-LTE Ecosystem in the various regional markets.

According to the study, the TD-LTE Ecosystem market is likely to attain a market value of ~US$ XX by 2019 and grow at a CAGR of ~XX% during the assessment period. The market study introspects the competition landscape of the TD-LTE Ecosystem market and highlights the key developments and technological innovations witnessed in the current TD-LTE Ecosystem market landscape.

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TD-LTE Ecosystem Market Segmentation

The report dissects the TD-LTE Ecosystem market into different segments to provide a fair understanding of the different aspects of the TD-LTE Ecosystem market.

The regional analysis of the TD-LTE Ecosystem market sheds light on the growth prospects of the TD-LTE Ecosystem market in different regions. The current market trends, the impact of regulatory policies, market share, size, and value of each regional market are presented in the report supported by easy-to-understand graphs and tables.

the top players

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TD-LTE Ecosystem Market Evenly Poised To Reach A Market Value Of US$ By 2015 2021 - Jewish Life News

Written by Tora Agarwala, Edited by Explained Desk | Guwahati | Updated: July 19, 2020 8:28:41 am A one-horned rhinoceros along with her baby stands in floodwater inside Kaziranga National Park, in Golaghat district, Thursday, July 16, 2020. (PTI Photo)

As a fresh wave of floods ravages Assam, killing 73 and affecting nearly 40 lakh people across the state, 85 per cent of the Kaziranga National Park and Tiger Reserve (KNPTR) remains submerged. On Thursday, Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal visited the park to take stock of the situation. So far, 125 animals have been rescued and 86 have died, including rhinos, deer and wild boar, in the sixth worst flood since 1988.

Yet, the annual deluge is considered essential for the survival of the UNESCO World Heritage Site. We explain the role of floods in Kazirangas ecosystem, how increasing high floods can become a problem, and what can be done to keep it in check.

Assam is traditionally flood prone, and the 1,055 sq km KNPTR sandwiched between the Brahmaputra river and the Karbi Anglong Hills is no exception. Among experts there is a consensus that floods are necessary for Kaziranga by virtue of its ecosystem. It is a riverine ecosystem, not a solid landmass-based ecosystem, said P Sivakumar, Director, KNPTR, The system wont survive without water. The entire area of Kaziranga formed by alluvial deposits from the Brahmaputra and its tributaries is centred around the river.

According to Uttam Saikia, Honorary Wildlife Warden of Kaziranga, this floodplain eco system has not only been created by floods but also feeds off it.

The regenerative nature of floods helps replenish Kazirangas water bodies and maintain its landscape, a mix of wetlands, grasslands and semi-evergreen deciduous forests. Saikia said the floodwaters also function as a breeding ground for fish. The same fish are carried away by the receding waters into the Brahmaputra in a way, the park replenishes the rivers stock of fish too, he said.

The waters also help get rid of unwanted plants such as water hyacinth which collect in huge masses in the landscape. In a herbivore-dominated area like Kaziranga, it is important we maintain its grassland status. If it were not for the annual floods, the area would become a woodland, said Sivakumar.

Many also believe that floods are a way of natural selection. A number of animals especially the old, weak cannot survive the floods. Only the ones with superior genes survive, said Rabindra Sarma, Wildlife Research Officer at KNPTR since 1998.

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Earlier, a big flood would come once in ten years, said Rathin Barman, who heads the Centre for Wildlife Rehabilitation and Conservation (CWRC), which takes in injured and orphaned wild animals of the park. Now, they happen every other year, he said, adding that massive deforestation in catchment areas or release of waters by dams upstream may be contributory factors. Climate change models, too, predict that floods will become increasingly devastating with each year.

Barring 2018, the years between 2016 and 2020 have all featured high floods (or floods which submerge more than 60 per cent of the park) killing and injuring hundreds of animals.

Animals adapt naturally to floods but when the waters hit a certain level, they gravitate towards safer, higher ground in the Karbi Anglong hills.

In pictures | Lakhs displaced in Assam floods, national parks hit

While in the past, Kaziranga and Karbi Anglong were part of the same landscape, the animals now have to cross the bustling National Highway 37 which cuts across the park. Over the years, the highway is getting increasingly tough to cross. A few of the nine wildlife corridors on the highway Panbari, Haldibari, Bagori, Harmati, Kanchanjuri, Hatidandi, Deosur, Chirang and Amguri are choked by traffic, said Dr Naveen Pandey, Deputy Director and Veterinary Advisor, The Corbett Foundation, Kaziranga. Mushrooming of hotels, restaurants, shops, and ancillary structures of the tea industry has not helped either.

As a result, animals that venture out of the park, die either under the wheels of speeding vehicles on the highway, or are killed by poachers who take advantage of their vulnerability. In recent years, due to vigilant patrolling, these numbers have decreased. Those that remain in the park often young or the very old die by drowning, entangled in the debris under water as they try to swim.

According to Dr Varun Goswami, Senior Scientist at Conservation Initiatives, an Assam-based organisation that works in the Kaziranga landscape, wildlife in KNPTR have adapted to the natural flood regime by finding refuge on higher ground south of the park. If their safe passage is not ensured, major floods can cause serious losses.

This year four rhinos as well as a number of boar and deer have drowned, and 14 hog deer have died in road accidents so far. The authorities will be able to ascertain the actual number of deaths only once the waters recede.

As per Sarma, at least 25 out of 75 fringe villages on the southern periphery of the park are affected by the floods. Fleeing floodwaters, animals stray from the boundary of the park, and there is an increased interaction between humans and wildlife, at times leading to conflict. Rhino calves get separated from their mothers, tigers swim and take refuge inside homes, deer amble into villages, said Sarma. Even so, most villagers, along with the frontline staff of the forest department and other organisations such as Wildlife Trust of Indias CWRC, are part of the tough rescue operations during the floods guiding strayed animals to safer ground, treating those injured and generally keeping a strict vigil round the clock.

Also read | Through rain and floods, Assams community workers battle pandemic

Preparedness begins a month before floods hit. The authorities keep a track of updates from the Central Water Commission, and monitor water levels of the Brahmaputra tributaries upstream in Arunachal Pradesh.

According to Dr Pandey, the civil administration, park authority, NGOs, and local communities work together to tackle the floods. To avoid disease outbreaks, a door-to-door vaccination is organised every year pre-floods, he said, Thereafter, camps are organised to create awareness against poaching and harming wild animals that are rendered vulnerable during the floods.

Moreover, when the floods hit, Section 144 is imposed along NH-37, speed limits are enforced and fines levied. Barricades are also placed to help animals cross over to Karbi Anglong. The efforts of the forest departments frontline staff become crucial during the season.

Over the years, another mitigation measure has been artificial highlands (111 in the Nineties, 33 in 2016-17) built inside the park for wild animals to take refuge in during the flood.

While these highlands have helped a fair bit in reducing the number of animal casualties during floods, some feel that it is not a permanent solution.

Animals do take refuge there especially rhino and swamp deer but it is not viable to build more highlands since such constructions will ruin the natural ecosystem, said Sarma, terming the highlands a temporary refuge. These 33 highlands cannot accommodate all animals of Kaziranga, and the older ones are more or less dilapidated, he said.

Editorial | Assams flood problem cannot be entirely blamed on vagaries of nature. It needs to jettison outmoded flood control measures

According to Honorary Wildlife Warden Saikia, some animals do not take to the highlands naturally. They have been migrating to natural highlands of Karbi Anglong for centuries; suddenly these artificial constructions do not inspire confidence, they do not find it secure, he said.

Experts believe that emphasis needs to be put on securing animal corridors and ensuring a safe passage to the Karbi hills.

To that end, a 35-km-long flyover constructed over NH-37 was proposed by the Centre in September 2019.

While this flyover will help, 35 km is a lengthy stretch and might take time to build, said Sivakumar, So the focus should be on doing it quickly, using modern technology that will cause minimal disturbance to the animals during construction.

In April 2019, the Supreme Court banned all types of mining and related activities along the parks southern boundary and in the entire catchment area of the rivers that originate in the Karbi Anglong hill ranges and flow into Kaziranga, as well as new construction activities in private lands on nine animal corridors.

Apart from facilitating safe and unhindered wildlife movement, Dr. Goswami of Conservation Initiatives recommends the need for a landscape-scale conservation approach that recognises the value of the Karbi Anglong hills to the south. Kaziranga, with its rich grassland habitats has a primary role to play in supporting these wildlife populations, but the highlands of Karbi Anglong, where these animals take refuge, are the lifeline of the park during the floods, he said.

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Explained: Why annual floods are essential for survival of Kaziranga National Park - The Indian Express

JEREMY Clarkson has spent a hefty portion of his life traversing the globe in some of the most gas-guzzling machines ever made. If you were to calculate his carbon footprint, you can imagine it would be more bigfoot than ballerina.

This must have been weighing on his mind of late, because he has dedicated sizeable portions of his time (and you would imagine, money) doing things that benefit the environment.

A couple of weeks ago he wrote in The Sunday Times Magazine about his attempts to improve the health of the forest that forms part of his farm, and last week he wrote about his noble goal tosave the rapidly declining population of bees, by purchasing a quarter of a million of them and encouraging them to pollinate.

This week, hes gone a step further and created an entirely new ecosystem. Its his contribution to what is becoming a global environmental movement: wilding.

When a tree falls over you leave it there for the beetles, he instructs. When an animal dies you put a clothes peg on your nose and wait for the body to be devoured by birds. And you learn to love thistles and brambles and nettles to such an extent that you will sell your lawnmower for scrap. It is now considered to be the tool of the Luddite.

Various human attempts at meddling with ecosystems have had, to put it mildly, mixed results. Clarkson notes an attempt in the 1940s by the Argentinian government to introduce beavers to Tierra Del Fuego, an archipelago at the southern end of the South American continent. The ambition of the government was to environmentally enrich the Patagonian province, as well as to provide fodder for a potential fur industry.

What happened was that the ten pairs of beavers flown in from Canada bred like a similarly buck-toothed animal, and before the government knew it, a plague of more than 100,000 beavers had run riot and all but destroyed the woodland area. There is now a widespread effort to eradicate the beavers, Clarkson says, with some guides bringing tourists to the island to hunt and eat the animals. The beavers effect on Tierra Del Fuego has been classified by experts as the biggest change to a subantarctic forest since the last ice age.

Weve seen this sort of thing before, notes The Grand Tour presenter. When America created Yellowstone National Park, experts reckoned that visitors would not want to be eaten. So it was decided to get rid of the wolves. But with no wolves, elks flourished to such an extent that all the aspen and willow trees were eaten, and the effects of that wiped out countless other species, including the beaver.

With all this at the back of his mind, Clarkson set about trying to create a bog on Diddly Squat farm. However, as weve come to realise over the course of his farming columns in The Sunday Times Magazine, the government keeps a hawk-like eye on everything farmers do, and therefore you need permission from a man in a Vauxhall all government officials have Vauxhalls if you want to change the bank, dredge, build a culvert, change a mooring, build a dam, create a weir, take a fish or park a boat.

After a mouse-related hiccup, however, Clarkson got the all clear and proceeded, as has been the case in many of his farming escapades, to get hold of a big piece of machinery and go to town. Fairly soon, the whole area look[ed] like Sam Mendes was filming a sequel to 1917 1918, perhaps.

Due to his incapability in operating the digger, the ecosystem that he finally created could be more accurately classified as a pond than a bog. The hole Id dug was deeper than an Australian uranium mine, and that meant the earth bank that was being erected from the spoil was larger than the Three Gorges Dam in China. It certainly wasnt what the man in the Vauxhall had given me permission to create.

However, a pond is still an ecosystem, and after Clarkson introduced some reeds, bulrushes and trouts to the party, life began to appear. Since he created the pond, he has spotted otters, herons and cormorants, and while the various interventions hes had to make mean that the scene doesnt feel wild, as such, hes fairly happy with the results.

To read more about Clarksons attempt at wilding, grab a copy of this weeks Sunday Times Magazineor read it online at The Sunday Times website.

Jeremy Clarkson has bought 250,000 bees

Jeremy Clarkson kills some trees to save a forest

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Jeremy Clarkson has been getting to grips with wilding on his farm - Sunday Times Driving

In light of an industry-wide shift away from racially-insensitive terminology, Apple has announced that it, too, is working to replace non-inclusive language across its developer ecosystem. The changes will be implemented within Xcode, platform APIs, documentation and open source projects, the company said.

These changes began on June 22 with the beta software and developer documentation released at WWDC20. (We are) moving to terms such as allow list and deny list, and main as the default SCM branch in Xcode 12, the company wrote in a blog post on Thursday. Developer APIs with exclusionary terms will also be removed. The company says it plans to introduce replacements across internal codebases and public APIs. It will also be applicable to open source projects, such as WebKit and Swift.

Apples announcement follows a similar decision from fellow Silicon Valley tech behemoth, Google. The search giant, last month, announced plans to drop gender-insensitive and racially-demeaning terms from its codebase. According to the companys code style guide, it will replace words such as blacklist and whitelist with blocklist and allowlist.

Meanwhile, Linus Torvalds has also announced his decision to abolish terms like master/slave in the Linux kernel. The organization has reportedly formulated a new policy that aims to replace racially insensitive terminologies with neutral alternatives.

The developments come in the wake of widespread protests against racism and police brutality in the US. Ever since the protests against police brutality in the US broke out after the killing of George Floyd, several companies including Google, Twitter, GitHub have taken steps to make the development community more racially-inclusive and gender-neutral.

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Apple Working to Remove Non-Inclusive Terms Across its Eco-System - Beebom

ATLANTA, July 16, 2020 /PRNewswire/ --SmartPM Technologies, Inc., a leading project analytics company for the construction industry, has teamed up with AXA XL's North American Construction insurance business. With SmartPM, both AXA XL and its clients will be able to improve visibility and transparency into project performance, risk and delays resulting in less cost overruns, schedule impacts and resultant claims.

"By combining the traditional construction risk engineering experience with the power of SmartPM's project scheduling analytics, our team is able to achieve greater operational insight enabling us to provide our clients with more focused service and benchmarking data than ever before," said Rose Hall, AXA XL strategic operations manager for risk engineering.

SmartPM was recently chosen by AXA XL as a new data-driven technology to support its next-generation construction risk engineering strategy. Over the coming months, SmartPM Technologies will provide comprehensive system training to prepare AXA XL's construction risk engineers to use the technology with clients in the field. "Starting with SmartPM's analysis of schedule-related performance risks, we then bake in our risk engineers' deep construction experience to provide tailored and targeted feedback to our customers on how best to mitigate and manage their unique risks," said Rose Hall, AXA XL strategic operations manager for risk engineering.

In addition, SmartPM will be featured in AXA XL's Construction Ecosystem, the first digital platform of its kind that will help clients manage and reduce risk with curated innovative construction technologies. The Construction Ecosystem leverages these technologies to monitor and aggregate data that provide contractors, developers and owners with unique insights and risk management tools.

"AXA XL is leading the charge in identifying the best-in-class solutions for managing risk in the construction industry, and we are excited to join their ecosystem as a top choice in project analytics," said Michael Pink, CEO of SmartPM Technologies. "Not only will the SmartPM schedule analytics platform be made available to its client base at a discounted rate, but it will be deployed to AXA XL's internal underwriting, risk and claims management teams."

Construction Ecosystem is available to select AXA XL customers, with wider access scheduled for later in 2020.For more information about AXA XL, visithttp://www.axaxl.com.

About SmartPM Technologies SmartPM Technologies was designed by industry experts with one mission in mind: to provide stakeholders with the tools necessary to effectively control cost and schedule and keep projects off the path toward disputes. SmartPM provides the only cloud-based, project analytics software solution designed specifically for the construction industry. It is a first-of-its-kind, full-service project analytics system that extracts information from other project management platforms and converts it into meaningful insights, which ultimately minimizes risk of cost exposure related to delays and overruns.For more information, please visithttps://smartpmtech.com.

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SmartPM Technologies to Deliver Advanced Schedule Analytics to AXA XL's Construction Ecosystem and Risk Engineering Team - PRNewswire

15 July 2020 | The story of our warming planet can be told by degrees. The global thermostat has gone up 1 degree Celsius since the Industrial Revolution, and rivers of meltwater are now coursing off Greenlands glaciers. Two degrees could mean crop failures and 500,000 deaths from malnutrition a year. Three degrees would be a hotter world than our species has ever experienced: The last time the temperatures rose that high was 2 million years before the evolution of homo sapiens.

Creep up another 2 degrees, and it could lead to the greatest mass extinction in earths history. To paraphrase Ron Burgundy, things escalate quickly.

If you are like most people, you have a sense that climate change is bad, but would be hard-pressed to explain the exact consequences of each additional degree of heat. A few degrees of warming doesnt sound that bad, maybe no more dangerous than nudging up your thermostat. So at what point do sweaty summers and mild winters turn into extinction and the collapse of civilization?

A new book fills that knowledge gap: Our Final Warning: Six Degrees of Climate Emergency by Mark Lynas, an influential environmentalist in England. Lynas is known for his ability to spin stultifying scientific evidence into compelling prose and for conducting long-simmering public debates with other public intellectuals. Back in 2007, Lynas published another book, Six Degrees: Our Future on a Hotter Planet, but in the intervening years the climate changed so rapidly that he decided it needed not just an update, but a top-to-bottom rewrite.

As of 2015, a world warmed by 1 degree is reality, not a speculative future. Sea levels have climbed 6 centimeters, and evidence that fossil-fuel emissions are amplifying hurricanes has solidified. Theres so much new evidence that Lynas had to start over and write an entirely new book built on the same structure as the old one.

Lynas recently spoke with Grist about how much has changed in the last 15 years, how the COVID 19 pandemic resembles climate change, and how he manages to live happily while carrying the knowledge of looming doom.

Q.There was a similar magazine piece to your book that got a lot of attention in the States by David Wallace Wells, which came under criticism for conflating the worst-case scenarios with the likeliest future. How did you deal with the tension between telling a gripping story and being rigorous about facts?

a.The beauty of using 6 degrees of warming as a framing is you can have it both ways. Its a grippingly terrifying story because youve got a strong narrative going from the relatively moderate 1-degree world up to the utterly terrifying 6-degree world, and you can read it almost like a novel as those worlds unfold. Im not saying that we will ever see 6 degrees; thats a product of decisions we have yet to make. I just think its useful to get outside these polarized debates about what the future will bring, because thats not actually the question. The question is: What will happen if we do X? I dont have to address the question of how likely it is, thats a collective decision humanity will make over the next few decades.

Q. One of the scariest things you mention is the positive feedbacks, where, for instance, a world with 4 degrees of warming melts the Arctic permafrost, which could release enough methane to bump us up to 5 degrees.

a.Yeah, and thats probably what David Wallace Wells would point to. Even if we are not going to quadruple our coal consumption, we still face the possibility of crossing these tipping points which make the global heating process unstoppable. Perhaps Im more nuanced on that than I was in the first book: Some people thought that it was saying that if we crossed 2 degrees it would trigger a tipping point which would get you to 3, and then a tipping point which takes you to 4 like a line of dominoes. Its not quite like that because we are not sure where the tipping points are, and because it takes time for them to play out. That Arctic permafrost is meters thick, it takes decades to melt, rot, and hit the atmosphere, and then decades more for that to turn into warming and then melt more permafrost.

On a lot of these tipping points, we are talking about centuries. For instance, I think we have already crossed the tipping point where the melting of Greenland has become irreversible, but it will still take centuries to unfold.

a.Im a pretty strong climate hawk I would say. If we want to save even a semblance of the worlds coral reefs, we have to stay on a 1.5 degree pathway, even 2 degrees leads to the bleaching of something like 99 percent of coral reefs. The saddest things for me are the annihilation of our biological inheritance rainforests, coral reefs, the Arctic. You can argue that humans can survive perfectly happily for the first couple of degrees. But for me, its nonetheless profoundly important, and something Im quite happy to spend my entire life advocating on.

Q What about the scenarios that might not lead to the collapse of civilization but that would create mass suffering among people without access to air conditioning in, say, South Asia?

a.The date at which we make parts of the world uninhabitable because of extreme heat keeps coming forward. The first research on this put that date within a 5-degree scenario. Its now between 3 and 4 degrees. Weve already been close to conditions that make it lethal to stay outside in some parts of the Persian Gulf just about touched it for a few hours. It wasnt supposed to happen for another 2 or 3 degrees. That suggests its going to come more quickly. In terms of human consequences, the two issues that stand out are extreme heat and food production. Im not confident that we can adapt the worlds breadbaskets to survive even 2 degrees warming.

Q. How does this grim knowledge make you feel day to day? Does it make you depressed, energized, or what?

a.Ive been through all that stuff. Ive had my periods of depression and profound sense of loss. To be honest, Im so used to it, I dont find it difficult to cope. Im quite good at compartmentalizing. And these arent immediate things its not the same as a war or pandemic, so you can actually forget about it for a bit.

Q. Do you see a parallel with the COVID pandemic?

a.The pandemic is like climate change on warp speed. The cause and effect are much more closely linked.

The lockdown is also a bit like the need to change our lifestyles to reduce carbon. So we stopped the flying, we change our diets, we make the sacrifices needed to bend the [carbon] curve. And then in the longer term, youve got the prospect of a vaccine. The climate parallel is technology substitution: You can replace dirty power with clean power, you can find ways to do zero-carbon travel. Those all take time, so in the short term, yes, we need to stop flying, but you cant maintain lockdown forever, either for this virus, or for climate change.

Q. It sounds like you see both a need to live more simply, and embrace technology?

a.Well, the living simply thing isnt going to work in the long run. The part of the world that is living simply, namely sub-Saharan Africa and other places way below the poverty line, dont want to stay in that condition. Its not a viable argument in a practical or even moral sense. Yes, its a lifestyle choice for certain people, but to pretend even for an instant that its a climate solution is insane.

Q. Wait, but you just mentioned flying less, dont you think the richer world must make sacrifices?

a.I do, but only in the short term. Remember you can only sustain things by moral exhortation for a short period of time, and then people tire of it and move on. Like with the lockdowns, its a matter of months really. I think the same thing will apply to climate. Look, there are technologies available that would allow us to decarbonize and continue to grow prosperity, especially in the developing world.

Q. But in this book you are just laying out the consequences. You dont propose solutions.

a.I just thought, fuck that, I wrote that book five years earlier, called Nuclear 2.0 Its got a whole strategy mapped out for a transition to renewable energy and nuclear, etcetera, etcetera. Plus, Id never be able to sell the book in Germany if I mentioned the N word. I would rather have a book that could be read by a wider group of people and allow them to then investigate solutions in whatever way they want.

This interview has been edited for length, accuracy, and clarity.

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This Really is our Final Chance to Act on Climate - Ecosystem Marketplace

Zurich, 17 July 2020 - The innovative online platform key4 was recently launched in Switzerland as a central part of UBS's digital strategy in Switzerland. It is the logical continuation of UBS's platform business, initiated three years ago with the 'UBS Atrium' credit platform in the investment property sector.

With the investment in Houzy, UBS is entering into a strategic partnership with the dynamic start-up, thereby expanding its offering for homeowners. Houzy is a comprehensive platform offering digital services and an expert network for homeowners in Switzerland. The start-up offers useful tools associated with home ownership and will complement the open ecosystem of key4.

Martha Bckenfeld, Head Digital Platforms & Marketplaces: 'The partnership with Houzy is a significant step towards building our ecosystem around key4 and creates targeted added value for homeowners. This strategic cooperation will enable all house and apartment owners to rely on key4 to provide answers and solutions to the various complex questions they may be asking themselves about home ownership, and to obtain information thanks to relevant tips, recommendations and the provision of services.'

Stefan Schrer, CEO Houzy: 'We are very pleased to be entering into this strategic partnership with key4, UBS's new digital real estate platform. This will help us in the next step of Houzy's expansion phase by providing our users and key4 clients with centralized information and tools on topics such as renovation needs, price development, costs and much more.'

About Houzy

Houzy makes home ownership easy. The online platform intelligently links data and derives individual recommendations for each homeowner. For example, it tells them when their heating system should be renovated and how much money they should set aside for the purpose. The start-up is developing the leading platform for homeowners with a wealth of expert knowledge (500 professionals from ten sectors) and a rapidly growing community (more than 15,000 registered users).

UBS Switzerland AG

Disclaimer

UBS Group AG published this content on 17 July 2020 and is solely responsible for the information contained therein. Distributed by Public, unedited and unaltered, on 17 July 2020 07:50:04 UTC

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UBS : acquires stake in Houzy, thereby expanding the key4 ecosystem - Marketscreener.com

Residential buildings have a major impact on energy use globally and are second only to industry energy use. Despite this fact, the home ecosystem is siloed between smart home and extended home ecosystems with very little overlap, finds Lux Research.

In the report Delivering Smart Home Energy Management, Lux Research outlines what can be done to connect the two and deliver a better solution to aid in the transition to clean energy.

Today, there are no smart home/energy management offerings that deliver on all home ecosystem capabilities, explains Jessica Hernandez, Analyst at Lux and lead author of the report.

Read more aboutSmart homesEnergy management

The home ecosystem is currently broken down into two siloed parts: the smart home ecosystem, which covers aspects of security, convenience, and comfort, and the extended home ecosystem, which covers on-site energy generation, energy storage, and electric vehicle charging. The only area of overlap between these two ecosystems is in home energy management (HEM), which will be key to uniting the home ecosystem, Hernandez continues.

More than $5 billion has been invested in the HEM space since the beginning of the new century, with $3.2 billion in venture investments in the past five years alone. These investments show a strong innovation interest, as attention is coming from incumbents in the space such as electric utility companies and appliance manufacturers but also smart home solution developers, energy service providers, energy storage solution developers, and automotive OEMs.

Up to this point, service providers and appliance manufacturers have focused on unique smart home use cases, leaving room for an integrator that takes the middle ground approach to unifying it all, Hernandez states.

Energy management is the only area that the smart home and the extended home have in common, and so far, this connection has remained relatively ignored by companies focusing on either branch of the home ecosystem.

In order to move forward, energy providers and smart home developers need to develop partnerships that enable unification across the entire home ecosystem. Service providers should partner with players offering a high amount of flexibility in enabled capabilities.

Lux Research encourages emerging players in the extended home space to focus on developing smart home solutions that deliver both energy management and comfort to appeal to the needs of consumers.

Access the full report for more detail.

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Smart home ecosystems must be connected to aid energy transition - Smart Energy

2020 has started strongly for Xiaomi. The Beijing-headquartered tech company recorded solid growth across all its business segments in Q1 2020 its total revenue in the quarter amounted to RMB49.7 billion (US$7 billion), representing a 13.6% YoY increase.

In June 2020, management consultants the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) ranked the company at 24th place among the 50 most innovative 2020 companies in the world.

While it remains to be seen if Xiaomi held out well during the quarters preceding the worst of the Covid-19 pandemic, it is not resting on its laurels when it comes to announcing new products.

Xiaomi just announced new inclusions to its IoT-connected smart hardware range, and has something for both those who are forced to stay indoors and those gearing up to venture outdoors. New fitness trackers and additions to their electric scooters (pic, above)! And, more interestingly, an evolution to their Android TV boxes.

For the indoors

The Mi TV Stick (pic, left) is what happens when you take an Android TV box (such as Xiaomis own Mi Box range) and squeeze it down into a Chromecast-sized device. Like the Mi Box, the Mi TV Stick is powered by Android TVTM, offering access to thousands of content titles as well as apps and games via Google Play, but its now merely something you stick into the HDMI slot of your TV.

It provides 1080p resolution content and Dolby and DTS support. Users gain instant access to Google Assitant, Netflix and Prime audio using the dedicated buttons on the remote control. It can also double as a device to cast content from the smartphone and tablet, as it has built-in Chromecast functionality.

The Mi TV Stick is priced at 39.99 (US$45.6) globally. Theres no Malaysian price just yet, but Xiaomi has assured us that local sales info and pricing will be announced once the product is available.

Xiaomi didnt announce a new TV to go with the Stick, but it did announce something for gamers. The Mi Curved Gaming Monitor 34-inch boasts a WQHD 3,440 x 1,440 resolution display at 21:9 ultra-wide aspect ratio and 144hz refresh rate.

The screen has a 1500R curvature, meant to perfectly contour to the human field of view. It also sports 121% sRGB wide colour gamut. The global recommended retail price of Mi Curved Gaming Monitor 34-inch is 399 (US$455).

Xiaomi also launched the Mi True Wireless Earphones 2 Basic (pic), which offers 5 hours of uninterrupted play from full charge, as well as a total battery life of 20 hours from the three additional charges from its case.

This wireless earphones set uses dual-mic environmental noise cancellation tech to filter background noise and provide clear sound. Removing one ear piece will pause audio, thanks to its in-ear detection feature. Double tapping on the earphone will allow users to pause or play music, pick up calls and access voice control.

The Mi True Wireless Earphones 2 Basic supports both SBC and AAC codecs. Global price lists it at 39.99.

For the outdoors

For those who cant wait to get their outdoor steps counted, Xiaomi has also unveiled the Mi Smart Band 5 (pic, below), the latest in their line of fitness trackers. The device has been revamped with a 1.1-inch high-resolution AMOLED display the extra viewing space allows the Band 5 to not only display more real-time stats, but also allow users to personalise the band display with more than 65 theme options and customisable function modules.

It also has an optimised PPG sensor. Xiaomi claims that it features more accurate heart rate tracking for 11 exercise types, including rowing, yoga, elliptical, jump rope and more (so its also good indoors!). Theres also a host of new features, including stress level detection, breathing exercises, female health tracking and PAI health matrix.

The Mi Smart Band 5 has also made charging simpler a new magnetic charger snaps easily to the back of the band, which means you can now charge the device without removing the strap. According to Xiaomi, one full charge will support the device up to 14 days.

The global price for the Mi Smart Band 5 is 39.99.

If you dont want to clock more steps outdoors, though, Xiaomi has also introduced the Mi Electric Scooter Pro 2. The new e-scooter can reach speeds of up to 25km/h and cover up to 45km on a single charge.

The 300W brushless DC motor is claimed to make 20% incline slopes an effortless climb for the scooter. Theres also a built-in LCD monitor for users to keep an eye on their real-time speed, riding modes and battery levels.

The new scooter is equipped with 8.5-inch pneumatic tires, which apparently helps absorbs shocks from bumps in the road. As far as safety measures go, it has a dual braking system alongside front, rear and side reflectors, plus a 2W headlight for when youre out riding at night.

The Mi Electric Scooter Pro 2 is crafted from lightweight materials and is weighed at 14.2kg. It can apparently be folded up in less than three seconds, which sounds like a great companion for transit.

The Pro 2 scooter is priced at 499. Theres a cheaper alternative in the Mi Electric Scooter 1S, which has a similar max speed of 25km/h but can only travel up to 30km on a single charge. This version features a 250W brushless motor that helps riders climb 14% inclines more easily.

It also has a double braking system and reinforced pneumatic tyres. Its lighter as well, at 12.5kg, and can be folded. The Mi Electric Scooter 1S prices at 399.

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Xiaomi's new 2020 ecosystem products has something for those cooped up indoors, and those craving to venture out - Digital News Asia

LONDON and ARMONK, N.Y., July 17, 2020 /PRNewswire/ --EY and IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announce an enhanced, global multi-year alliance designed to help organizations accelerate digital transformation and improve client outcomes, including leveraging the hybrid cloud capabilities of Red Hat OpenShift, as well as IBM Watson, IBM Blockchain and IBM's 5G and edge technologies. Together, IBM and EY professionals will focus on helping clients modernize and transform their businesses.

Carmine Di Sibio, EY Global Chairman and CEO, says:

"The EY-IBM Alliance is built on providing differentiating and transformational business value for clients. As organizations learn how to adapt to today's new normal, leveraging the cloud, AI, analytics and other technologies have become increasingly important. IBM is a proven leader in hybrid cloud and AI, and together we're developing innovative solutions to help provide the sustainability and resiliency that assist clients to operate and lead today, and in the years to come, as they reframe their future amidst an unpredictable and rapidly evolving environment."

EY and IBM teams will provide additional joint consulting and systems integration capabilities to help deliver long-term value to clients. The combination of EY market leading strategy and global business consulting services, and dedicated EY professionals with broad experience across IBM's leading technologies, alongside IBM's premier consulting technology practice and powerful hybrid cloud and AI capabilities, will help clients address significant business challenges.In addition, the alliance will continue to support multiplefunctional areas comprising M&A, finance, HR, legal, tax, risk and compliance, supply chain and asset management to assist clients in business and workforce transformations, and cloud strategies.

Arvind Krishna, IBM Chief Executive Officer, says:

"Expanding this global alliance bolsters our ability to bring our hybrid cloud and AI capabilities to clients. The EY organization is a leader in driving large and complex client transformations. Combining EY teams' breadth of industry and regulatory knowledge, technology capabilities and longstanding strategy and business consulting leadership, with IBM's powerful technology and Red Hat OpenShift's open hybrid cloud portfolio, will play a key role in accelerating our clients' journeys to the cloud."

The expanded collaboration with IBM is a key component of the EY commitment to growing and strengthening its diversified, connected and intelligent ecosystem of alliances. EY professionals help clients orchestrate their own ecosystem relationships and provide insight and trusted intelligence from EY alliances. As a global leader in driving large scale, complex client transformations, EY Consulting also helps clients focus on facilitating innovation, driving digital transformation and utilizing advanced technology. Working with IBM will include the creation of joint offerings with the EY developer ecosystem and provides access to IBM's leading enterprise technologies to help drive results for clients.

The expanded alliance also marks EY professionals' access to the IBM public cloud ecosystem. The new initiative supports global system integrators and independent software vendors to help their clients modernize and transform mission-critical workloads with RedHat OpenShift for any cloud environment, including IBM public cloud. The IBM public cloud's security leadership, enterprise-grade capabilities and support for open source technologies are designed to differentiate and extend on hybrid cloud capabilities for enterprise workloads.

Joanna HardyEY Global Media Relations+1 212 773-4473[emailprotected]

Lowell EschenIBM Media Relations+1 303 913 2569[emailprotected]

SOURCE IBM

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Written by Tora Agarwala, Edited by Explained Desk | Guwahati | Updated: July 17, 2020 7:19:18 pm A one-horned rhinoceros along with her baby stands in floodwater inside Kaziranga National Park, in Golaghat district, Thursday, July 16, 2020. (PTI Photo)

As a fresh wave of floods ravages Assam, killing 73 and affecting nearly 40 lakh people across the state, 85 per cent of the Kaziranga National Park and Tiger Reserve (KNPTR) remains submerged. On Thursday, Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal visited the park to take stock of the situation. So far, 125 animals have been rescued and 86 have died, including rhinos, deer and wild boar, in the sixth worst flood since 1988.

Yet, the annual deluge is considered essential for the survival of the UNESCO World Heritage Site. We explain the role of floods in Kazirangas ecosystem, how increasing high floods can become a problem, and what can be done to keep it in check.

Assam is traditionally flood prone, and the 1,055 sq km KNPTR sandwiched between the Brahmaputra river and the Karbi Anglong Hills is no exception. Among experts there is a consensus that floods are necessary for Kaziranga by virtue of its ecosystem. It is a riverine ecosystem, not a solid landmass-based ecosystem, said P Sivakumar, Director, KNPTR, The system wont survive without water. The entire area of Kaziranga formed by alluvial deposits from the Brahmaputra and its tributaries is centred around the river.

According to Uttam Saikia, Honorary Wildlife Warden of Kaziranga, this floodplain eco system has not only been created by floods but also feeds off it.

The regenerative nature of floods helps replenish Kazirangas water bodies and maintain its landscape, a mix of wetlands, grasslands and semi-evergreen deciduous forests. Saikia said the floodwaters also function as a breeding ground for fish. The same fish are carried away by the receding waters into the Brahmaputra in a way, the park replenishes the rivers stock of fish too, he said.

The waters also help get rid of unwanted plants such as water hyacinth which collect in huge masses in the landscape. In a herbivore-dominated area like Kaziranga, it is important we maintain its grassland status. If it were not for the annual floods, the area would become a woodland, said Sivakumar.

Many also believe that floods are a way of natural selection. A number of animals especially the old, weak cannot survive the floods. Only the ones with superior genes survive, said Rabindra Sarma, Wildlife Research Officer at KNPTR since 1998.

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Earlier, a big flood would come once in ten years, said Rathin Barman, who heads the Centre for Wildlife Rehabilitation and Conservation (CWRC), which takes in injured and orphaned wild animals of the park. Now, they happen every other year, he said, adding that massive deforestation in catchment areas or release of waters by dams upstream may be contributory factors. Climate change models, too, predict that floods will become increasingly devastating with each year.

Barring 2018, the years between 2016 and 2020 have all featured high floods (or floods which submerge more than 60 per cent of the park) killing and injuring hundreds of animals.

Animals adapt naturally to floods but when the waters hit a certain level, they gravitate towards safer, higher ground in the Karbi Anglong hills.

In pictures | Lakhs displaced in Assam floods, national parks hit

While in the past, Kaziranga and Karbi Anglong were part of the same landscape, the animals now have to cross the bustling National Highway 37 which cuts across the park. Over the years, the highway is getting increasingly tough to cross. A few of the nine wildlife corridors on the highway Panbari, Haldibari, Bagori, Harmati, Kanchanjuri, Hatidandi, Deosur, Chirang and Amguri are choked by traffic, said Dr Naveen Pandey, Deputy Director and Veterinary Advisor, The Corbett Foundation, Kaziranga. Mushrooming of hotels, restaurants, shops, and ancillary structures of the tea industry has not helped either.

As a result, animals that venture out of the park, die either under the wheels of speeding vehicles on the highway, or are killed by poachers who take advantage of their vulnerability. In recent years, due to vigilant patrolling, these numbers have decreased. Those that remain in the park often young or the very old die by drowning, entangled in the debris under water as they try to swim.

According to Dr Varun Goswami, Senior Scientist at Conservation Initiatives, an Assam-based organisation that works in the Kaziranga landscape, wildlife in KNPTR have adapted to the natural flood regime by finding refuge on higher ground south of the park. If their safe passage is not ensured, major floods can cause serious losses.

This year four rhinos as well as a number of boar and deer have drowned, and 14 hog deer have died in road accidents so far. The authorities will be able to ascertain the actual number of deaths only once the waters recede.

As per Sarma, at least 25 out of 75 fringe villages on the southern periphery of the park are affected by the floods. Fleeing floodwaters, animals stray from the boundary of the park, and there is an increased interaction between humans and wildlife, at times leading to conflict. Rhino calves get separated from their mothers, tigers swim and take refuge inside homes, deer amble into villages, said Sarma. Even so, most villagers, along with the frontline staff of the forest department and other organisations such as Wildlife Trust of Indias CWRC, are part of the tough rescue operations during the floods guiding strayed animals to safer ground, treating those injured and generally keeping a strict vigil round the clock.

Also read | Through rain and floods, Assams community workers battle pandemic

Preparedness begins a month before floods hit. The authorities keep a track of updates from the Central Water Commission, and monitor water levels of the Brahmaputra tributaries upstream in Arunachal Pradesh.

According to Dr Pandey, the civil administration, park authority, NGOs, and local communities work together to tackle the floods. To avoid disease outbreaks, a door-to-door vaccination is organised every year pre-floods, he said, Thereafter, camps are organised to create awareness against poaching and harming wild animals that are rendered vulnerable during the floods.

Moreover, when the floods hit, Section 144 is imposed along NH-37, speed limits are enforced and fines levied. Barricades are also placed to help animals cross over to Karbi Anglong. The efforts of the forest departments frontline staff become crucial during the season.

Over the years, another mitigation measure has been artificial highlands (111 in the Nineties, 33 in 2016-17) built inside the park for wild animals to take refuge in during the flood.

While these highlands have helped a fair bit in reducing the number of animal casualties during floods, some feel that it is not a permanent solution.

Animals do take refuge there especially rhino and swamp deer but it is not viable to build more highlands since such constructions will ruin the natural ecosystem, said Sarma, terming the highlands a temporary refuge. These 33 highlands cannot accommodate all animals of Kaziranga, and the older ones are more or less dilapidated, he said.

Editorial | Assams flood problem cannot be entirely blamed on vagaries of nature. It needs to jettison outmoded flood control measures

According to Honorary Wildlife Warden Saikia, some animals do not take to the highlands naturally. They have been migrating to natural highlands of Karbi Anglong for centuries; suddenly these artificial constructions do not inspire confidence, they do not find it secure, he said.

Experts believe that emphasis needs to be put on securing animal corridors and ensuring a safe passage to the Karbi hills.

To that end, a 35-km-long flyover constructed over NH-37 was proposed by the Centre in September 2019.

While this flyover will help, 35 km is a lengthy stretch and might take time to build, said Sivakumar, So the focus should be on doing it quickly, using modern technology that will cause minimal disturbance to the animals during construction.

In April 2019, the Supreme Court banned all types of mining and related activities along the parks southern boundary and in the entire catchment area of the rivers that originate in the Karbi Anglong hill ranges and flow into Kaziranga, as well as new construction activities in private lands on nine animal corridors.

Apart from facilitating safe and unhindered wildlife movement, Dr. Goswami of Conservation Initiatives recommends the need for a landscape-scale conservation approach that recognises the value of the Karbi Anglong hills to the south. Kaziranga, with its rich grassland habitats has a primary role to play in supporting these wildlife populations, but the highlands of Karbi Anglong, where these animals take refuge, are the lifeline of the park during the floods, he said.

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Explained: Why annual floods are essential for the survival of Kaziranga - The Indian Express

New-gen consoles are closing in for an official release date. The gaming community is on the edge of their seats to hear the exciting news. However, both companies are taking different routes with their products. Xbox has a new way of looking at the market.

Microsofts Executive Vice President of Gaming and Xbox Chief Phil Spencer was in an interview with GamesIndustry where he addressed some rumored setbacks.

Frankly, held back is a meme that gets created by people who are too caught up in device competition. I just look at Windows. Its almost certain if the developer is building a Windows version of their game, then the most powerful and highest fidelity version is the PC version. You can even see that with some of our first-party console games going to PC, even from our competitors, that the richest version is the PC version. Yet the PC ecosystem is the most diverse when it comes to hardware when you think about the CPUs and GPUs from years ago that are there.

What Spencer said has been a long-debate in the world of gaming. PC is indeed a more powerful platform when compared to consoles. Spencer was of the opinion that players should applaud load times, frame rate, and input latency but all of that should not exclude people from being able to play.

The Xbox Chief also stated that the idea that developers dont know how to build games that work across different platforms do not hold any truth. He further says that the capability of PC to run any game and rival any platform is the proof for the said statement.

The experience while using the new Xbox Series X will no doubt be different. Spencer highlighted that people need to applaud the SSD, audio, frame rate, and other areas that everyone is working on.

We should applaud the work that is going on with the SSD, and the work that is going on with audio, to pick some of the areas that Jim [Ryan] and Mark [Cerny] and the stuff that [PlayStation] is focused on. We should applaud load times and fidelity of scenes and framerate and input latency. And all of these things that weve focused on with the next generation. But that should not exclude people from being able to play. Thats our point. How do we create an ecosystem where if you want to play an Xbox game, were going to give you a way to go play it?

The way that PC and Xbox platform works are totally different. But Spencer wants the community to understand how the market operates. The next-gen consoles will be a different landmark in gaming.

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PC Ecosystem Is the Most Diverse- Xbox Chief Phil Spencer - Essentially Sports