Earth Matters

Don't mention the emergency? Reassessing climate messaging. This week we bring you a talk given by Jane Morton about the psychology of climate messaging, recorded at the Melbourne Sustainable Living Festival in February this year. Guest: Jane Morton (Darebin Climate Action Now)Earth Matters #1161 was produced by Teishan Ahearne.

30 Knitting nanas are in action, dressed in black and yellow with placards “No New Coal” on the verge of busy road; Industrial Drive in Newcastle, right next to the massive Newcastle coal export terminal.  They sing and wave; cars honk encouragement. This is just one of the Knitting Nanas adventures Nanas Gally and Carol tell of. Find out about the national Knitting Nana phenomena and how to join...

On this weeks’s show, as the November Victorian state election approaches we discuss the dire situation of native forests in Victoria, and some wins on legal and economic fronts. First up, we hear from Lidia Thorpe, Member for Northcote and the first Aboriginal woman elected to Victorian parliament. Reflecting on what logging means for the state treaty process with First Nations in Victoria. Regul...

Anthony Too and Margie Pestorius are with ten others from Stop Adani Cairns outside the Cairns convention centre where a conference for superannuation trustees is being held. They are waiting in cars for the call to converge at the building’s entrance to perform a surprise street theatre skit where a fake trustee is arrested by a fake policeman for failing to take climate risks into account.  Hear...

Meet Ingrid Marker from Mission Beach  Queensland who lived alongside endangered cassowaries becoming known as a cassowary whisperer. Horribly, all the cassowary families she knew were killed by dogs. Now Ingrid calls for new laws to control roaming dogs. The campaign to save the cassowary is part of the Place You Love Alliance, which asks for a new generation of national laws that work to protect...

This week we hear about a landmark case in the United States that found that glyphosate, the active ingredient in the common pesticide RoundUp, causes cancer. Also this week: A new week, a new Prime Minister. But what about the Great Barrier Reef, and that odd cash splash to a little know private foundation? Guests: Peter McCallum (Mackay Conservation Group); Bob Phelps (Gene Ethics).Interviews co...

There is a long history of resistance to old growth forest logging in Western Australia's South West. In this week's show I speak with Jess Beckerling, Convener for Western Australia Forests Alliance or WAFA, to learn more about that history and as well as current campaigning. I caught up with Dom about the Forests for Life campaign (www.forestsforlife.org.au) and later Claire who spoke about her...

Who were the first bread makers? Bruce Pascoe; Author of “Dark Emu “ has found ample evidence of Aboriginal bread making disputing  the myth that aboriginal people were unsophisticated hunter gatherers.  The evidence shows that Aboriginal people were using domesticated plants, sowing, harvesting, irrigating and storingBruce is yarning at the annual Frontier Wars Story telling camp at the Aborigina...

Annette and Bruce Currie are a farming couple in Central Queensland who found that their farm water is threatened by multiple proposed coal mines. Their lives were turned upside down when they took on the proposed Alpha and Kevin’s Corner coal mines in court. Annette describes her family’s deep connection to their farm "Speculation" and the stressful impact of the court cases on family life. Bruce...

Today we hear from American biologist and author Sandra Steingraber, giving the keynote address to the Permanent People’s Tribunal Session on Human Rights, Fracking and Climate Change. Sandra takes a lyrical look at the interconnections between molecules, organisms, ecosystems, logistics and capitalism in the story of fracking. This is an edited extract of Sandra Steingraber’s keynote address to t...

This show features Zac Romagnoli-Townsend, coordinator with SEED, Australia’s first Indigenous youth climate network. He is talking about organising for the future in the climate justice movement, and provides interesting and thoughtful insights from his experience on community organising. This talk was given as part of the final plenary of the Students of Sustainability Conference 2018, held in J...

How to win against fossil fuelsBuild our movement; Make political change, Divest MoneySam La Rocca, Deputy Director of The Sunrise Project talks on courage, organising and building a movement to beat fossil fuels and win. Rachel Deans from Market Forces  explains how to switch your bank and super fund to one that does not invest in coal, oil or gas. Isaac Astill analyses our sucessful divestment c...

In June 2018 a federal court found that Adani  has  been negotiating with the wrong traditional owner group and that  the Juru people  not The Kyburra Munda Yalga Aboriginal Corporation are the correct group that Adani  should be negotiating with about cultural heritage at Abbott point where the company has its coal loading port.   Regardless of this  Adani has not allowed the Juru Traditional own...

Green bans, red union. An archival interview with Jack Mundey [encore broadcast] This week we’re delving into 3CR’s rich archive to bring you an interview with trade unionist Jack Mundey. Jack talks about the tumultuous era of the Green Bans, and how rank-and-file unionists in the Builders Labourers Federation (BLF) took control of their union and forged links with the broader community. Guests: J...

This week's show is about the Djapwurrung Embassy, established to protect sacred trees threatened with destruction, north of Ballarat in Victoria. The state government want to cut down over 3000 trees as part of the Western Highway duplication project, including trees sacred to the Djapwurrung first nation. There has been a strong resistance with three camps set up to stop the road works and prote...

Dissent and protest are being criminalised and suppressed around the world. The Australian government is seeking to introduce new foreign interference and espionage laws that threaten our democracy. We breakdown what this means and why the laws needs to be stopped. In Indonesia, May Day protests were met by swift repression by the police. With 69 people arrested in Yogyakarta and 4 in Bogor. This...

The moratorium on fracking in the Northern Territory has been lifted. Join experts who describe the impacts this will have on the ecology, sacred sites, clean water and methane emissions. Stand beside Micklo Corpus; the traditional owner near Broome, Western Australia who sits at the gate of a frack field on his own land to remind the gas exploration company that he says “No” to fracking. Hear fro...

La ZAD "Against the airport and its world."This week we’re hearing about the ZAD. An autonomous zone of resistance in rural France. It is the site of a 40 year struggle against a proposed airport. But it is also so much more than that. The ZAD became an autonomous zone of social experimentation. A place to create coalitions, imagine new ways of living together and meeting collective needs, and an...

Changing the world is difficult, especially when you’re up against institutions that enjoy major political and financial power. Direct tactics of protest have played a major role in catalyzing change throughout history. We talk with six activists about non-violent direct actions that they’ve been involved in and why, from disrupting coal plants in WA to blockading the G8 summit in Germany, to stop...

This week on Earth Matters - Saving the Murray Darling Part 2 and Kerri-Lee is joined by guests Nicole McKay a passionate environmentalist from Nyah and Elder William Brian Bates (also known as Badger Bates_ and a Barkindji Traditional Owner and both Nicole and Badger are both passionate about saving country and the Murray and the Darling Rivers. In this show we are in conversation on the Murray-D...

For many centuries the nightscape was the moon and stars.  Now we have many sources of artificial light such as street lighting, roadway lighting, stadiums, parking lots, landscaping, residential, buildings pedestrian and bicycling pathways. In this edition we find out why too much light at night is harmful to animals and humans. The new LED lighting that is currently replacing more orange lights...

A history of the world in seven cheap things "It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism" - Mark Fisher Imagining the end of capitalism, that's our task on this 200th anniversary of the birth of Karl Marx, the most influential theorist of capitalism. On today’s show, Raj Patel helps us un-pack the history of capitalism, and how it has radically altered the ecology of th...

Earth Matters looks at contemporary issues with coal mining in the Illawarra region, south of Sydney on Dharawal land. Long-wall mining, subsidence, slag heaps and polluted creeks are some of the local problems, with broader impacts on Sydney's water supply and global impacts on climate. Despite a long history of mining in the area, locals are getting organised and the tide of public opinion is tu...

This week on Earth Matters a conversation on climate change and the environment; A Sunburnt Country a new book release on climate change in Australia with program guest Joelle Gergis an award winning climate scientist and writer from the University of Melbourne. A Sunburnt Country by Joelle Gergis is out now and available through Melbourne University Press (MUP) check out MUP the website  www.mup....

The Australian frontier wars were a series of conflicts fought between Indigenous Australians and white settlers during the Brittish colonisation of Australia. Hear from two activists who decided eight years ago  to make banners that remember the frontier war conflicts and join the Anzac march on Anzac day in Canberra to be met by a police line. Now the march has become an annual event attended by...