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Latest News Release
At last we are moving towards addressing the causes of drought and famine. Recent events in Somalia and Ethiopia could have been avoided if the U.N. And the World Food Programme had listened when first approached about the need to restore coastal forests to bring the rains in from the ocean, This was the reasoning behind Operation OASIS and the sole reason for which it was conceived.
Our communications project is aimed at collating and disseminating information about the causes of desertification, soil degradation, poor farming, and water management practices, and famine which are currently transforming arable land into unproductive baron moonscapes at an unprecedented rate. The project will offer solutions which involves everyone. If soil degradation is allowed to continue unchecked it will not only be the peoples of Africa that go hungry. World crops are failing on a global scale, and we in the over developed countries are beginning to see the impacts of high food and water prices.
We need to draw a line in the sands for our children’s sake, and not with a stick, but with countless billions of sticks with roots on them to reforest the deserts and convert our excess carbon emissions into food, fuel, energy, medicine and timber resources, achieved by re-using the water we all discharge into the sewers in order to provide renewable energy and gas from anaerobic digestion and abandon the practice of discharging the treated wastewater into the ocean when there is an economically viable option to reverse and roll back the deserts with a carpet of biodiverse forests to supply food, fuel and valuable timber commodities and in doing so bring rains to fall upon the parched lands.
I have fought most of my life to deliver Operation OASIS (Overseas Arid Soil Irrigation Solution) to countries affected by deserts, desertification, famines and drought. Thanks to the Fredome Visionary Trust, the fight has grown into a battle to save our planet that must be won!
OASIS is supported by eminent scientists with International University Backing and financial input through our join E.U. Communications bid. This is a major step in the right direction towards restoring baron desertified lands and I have been overwhelmed and humbled by the dedication and commitment shown by all involved.
Operation OASIS is a project to restore arid coastlines in the Mediterranean regions using treated waste water and is progressively moving forward to achieving its objectives: to induce fog capture by trees and vegetation to restore more regular rainfall in areas subject to desertification and water scarcity.
E.U. Life Plus Communications Funding Application.
The submission of E.U. bid in partnership with Liverpool John Moores University, Cranfield University, University of Seville, Green Europe and the City of Santa Pola which is situated on the arid coastline of Southern Spain and already Identified as a prime location for the implementation of the Operation OASIS Pilot Project, is a major step forward: We are all very excited by the joint multi-university backing to communicate OASIS, and initiate A Pocket Full Of Acorns- which involves the community in gathering, propagating and planting tree saplings to form biodiverse tree belts on the arid Spanish coastline. We are already communicating this sustainable model and a possible designated area has been suggested near Santa Pola.
U.K. Example
We are also planning to engage land owners and East Anglia Water to connect the coastline to an East Anglia reservoir with a line of trees supplied and planted by the public to stimulate fog and rainclouds to move inland from the coast more frequently by using the A Pocket Full Of Acorns approach. East Anglia has been subject to the removal of most of its hedgerows and trees and this action along with intensive grain cropping and reliance on chemical fertilizers has reduced the soil to near desert conditions through erosion, due to overgrazing, monoculture cash crops and human activity.
Wildlife has inevitably declined in this region of the U.K due to habitat loss. Hedgehogs for instance are in decline as more British hedgerows are uprooted to create bigger fields.
Fortunately the Government’s Set Aside Policy rewards the farming community for designating a percentage of their land to reintroduce native tree and plant species. We hope to encourage a broader use of this policy to connect the coastline to a reservoir catchment area to help prevent drought.
Andrew K Fletcher
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Operation OASIS Newsletter
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This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Tel: +44 1803524117
Skype: andrewkfletcher
Website:
http://operationoasis.com
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Campaign
Executive Summary
Converting carbon emissions into forests, fuel and food crops.
Rivers lakes and the ocean are used as a convenience for our sewerage systems. Treated and raw effluent pollute our coastlines and feeds algal and seaweed growth, while we dine on the fish that swim in someone else’s faeces and urine.
Carbon dioxide levels up 40%. Humanity is consuming carbon-based resources at an unprecedented rate. Around 3,6 billion of the world’s 5.2 billion hectares of useful dryland for agriculture is affected by erosion and soil degradation. In more than 100 countries, 1 billion of the 6 billion world population is affected by desertification, which is degrading over 20,000 square miles of useful land worldwide every year. 50 million square kilometres of the world’s land is expanding desert.
The solution is to tanker anaerobically treated waste-water from Europe to the desert coastlines in order to irrigate and restore the arid sands to their former rich fertile moisture retaining soils, capable of supporting forestry, fuel and food crops to the point of them becoming self sustaining. Carbon Cycling brings together multinational partnerships in sustainable land and soil management. Many countries are currently engaged in using their own waste water for forestry and crops.
Potential benefits
Countries providing waste water for irrigation, will find a twenty-fold or greater reduction in the cost of sewage treatment, the removal of pollution from their shores, stimulating additional tourism, an estimated annual xxx kWH of renewable methane that can be fed directly into the gas grid or converted into heat and electricity, reduced demand for additional power stations, creation of employment, economic regeneration, a reversal of the decline of the shipping industry, offsetting shipping's carbon footprint, attraction of foreign investment, improved foreign economic relations, Pioneering an exciting environmentally attuned industry, traffic reduction through removal of waste road tankers. A reduced need for incinerators, improved air quality, reduced pressure on landfill, an environmentally sound outlet for excessive slurry from intensive farming, Orders for generators and infrastructure.
Recipient countries benefit from seeding self-sustaining forestry & agriculture, creation of arable land to serve their populations and for exported produce, the strengthening of developing economies, useful employment, expanded habitats for endangered species, the assembly of an infrastructure for power generation and indigenous organic waste application to land. Investment Opportunities as fertility leads to development and the building of communities and new coastal towns.
Potential global benefits include stimulation of peaceful international trading relations, initial improvement of localised micro-climates to eventual balancing unevenly distributed rainfall and reduction of extreme weather events, which when scaled up will begin to address climate change.
Experts and practitioners in the tanker & shipping industries, and ambassadors & water commissioners from recipient countries have already reacted favourably. Aviation data confirms that coastal vegetation and large land/sea temperature differentials form storm clouds and strong on-shore breezes. The greening of Ascension Island by Charles Darwin, confirms that trees can attract water from clouds and vegetation will spread as a result.
Setting the plausibility of these vast benefits against the current onset of austerity, there is a strong impetus for prompt decisive steps to explore this option. Immediate recommended steps include meetings with senior ministers of key departments, such as employment, environment and energy. If local employers can be encouraged to outsource opportunities as assignments to redundant staff working part-time for virtual resource agencies attached to the project – this would enable a more equitable distribution of paid work, reduce the state benefit bill and create a huge human resource for negotiation with water companies, diplomacy with potential recipient nations, detailed project planning/specification and application for substantial EU/UN funding earmarked for this purpose, yielding payment for participants’ philanthropic work and providing optional new careers in a ground-breaking market. Once underway, both the transfer and utilisation of organic material will be revenue-generating so that expansion of land reclamation will be self-sustaining to the point where reforestation will have a major beneficial impact on the macro-climate.
Additionally, communication of realistic optimism can be supported by high-profile regular reporting by the media, a mainstream scientific advisory board needs to be convened and a follow-on APPCCG event is recommended to assess progress in a year’s time.
This document summarises not only the practical and economic case for Carbon Cycling, but also the social and systemic aspects, as they have led humanity into its current situation, and corresponding changes can contribute significantly to enabling the solution and ensuring a fair and equitable implementation.
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Who supports Operation OASIS?
The aims and vision of Operation OASIS are supported by the FREdome Visionary Trust, a community group of volunteers based in Hertfordshire.
The Trust was founded in 2005 by social entrepreneur Greg Peachey, and aims to connect the ingenuity, good will and good sense of people to what happens in society. Here is their latest press release, issued on 22 August 2011:
The future of mankind lies beneath our feet - campaign to raise awareness of the importance of coastal soils seeks 1m Euro funding
The ‘OASIS MEDia’ coastal soil improvement project is driven by the FREdome Visionary Trust, a Hertfordshire volunteer group which harnesses ingenuity and goodwill within society to facilitate positive change. This project aims to support countries affected by drought and famine by raising awareness of how desert coastal soil can be transformed into a viable and sustainable habitat for trees and plants.
Long-term, the team hope to facilitate the transportation of billions of tonnes of nutrient rich-treated waste water to desert shores around the world, using the return ballast capacity of Supertankers and other bulk shipping. Currently, empty tankers are filled with seawater on their return journeys which adds significantly to the price of oil, transfers invasive microbes to foreign ecologies and is widely considered to be unsustainable.
As the EU reviews traditional ballast practices, the OASIS project offers a safe alternative, helping to restore arid coastlines, induce rainfall and potentially mitigate the effects of drought and famine. If the bid is successful, it will enable FREdome to work with local communities in Andalucia, Southern Spain to trial the viability of the project and build links with scientific bodies in other countries.
At a local level, residents in Andalucia and East Anglia will be encouraged to nurture saplings in plastic bags of soil in their own gardens, ready to be transplanted to increase rainfall at the arid Spanish coastline and in a line connecting the East Anglian coast to an inland reservoir, as permitted by authorities and under the direction of scientists.
Greg Peachey, Director of the FREdome Visionary Trust, said:
“This bid is a real opportunity to embrace change and support countries where arid landscapes have a negative impact on local communities. This bid will ensure our proposal is considered at the highest level and I look forward to the Commission’s response.”
The project is supported by a number of eminent partners including Liverpool John Moores University, who have taken on the co-ordinating role, together with the University of Seville, Green Europe and City of Santa Pola, with Cranfield University soil science department as a potential expert sub-contractor.
The OASIS MEDia communications project has been pioneered by scientist and inventor, Andrew K Fletcher. He said:
“I have been striving to deliver this project for most of my life, to help countries affected by water scarcity and desertification, who are long term sufferers of drought and famine. Thanks to FREdome and all of the other partners that we have pulled together, this funding application is a major step in the right direction and I am delighted that we have secured €500k matched funding from our partners and university backing for our bid.”
The European Commission will announce successful bids in March 2012. For more information about Operation OASIS visit www.operationoasis.com
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