In this issue

	ECOS Issue 163

Features

*Is Tilapia* the new cane toad?** Northern Australian waterways are facing a new environmental threat. Tilapia mariae, a highly invasive fish that can tolerate and adapt to a range of environmental conditions, is rapidly expanding its range. Learn more

Urban agriculture: it’s a veggie-roots movement
As a child, I was lucky to learn food growing skills that have stayed with me ever since – including through a long career in finance and technology. I often wonder how many of today's adults could grow their own food if they had to. My vision is for organic gardening to be built into the national curricula from early childhood centres upwards.
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Renewable energy sector to benefit from wind-speed research While some recent international studies have shown a decrease in wind speeds in several parts of the globe, including Australia, more recent results from CSIRO show that Australia's average wind speed is actually increasing. Learn more

The OECD cuts a green path ahead With the world currently in the grip of an economic slowdown, the OECD's Green Growth Strategy describes how innovation driven by ‘green' economic policy can provide vibrant new sources of growth and employment worth trillions of dollars by 2050. Learn more

Providing Australia’s tree species knowledge to the world
The Australian Tree Seed Centre (ATSC) was established in the 1960s with funding from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization to widely disseminate the seed of Australian tree species. It had become apparent that Australian trees – widely adaptable and especially suited to challenging and degraded environments – could help alleviate some of the unsustainable pressure that human population growth was placing on natural forests.
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Climatic tolerances: an Australian story How will Australia's native species survive climate change? Observed distributions are the main source of information drawn upon to answer this question, but they need to be interpreted cautiously. In particular, we need to put aside assumptions based on northern hemisphere evidence. Learn more

Carolyn Steel's Hungry City
As an architect, Carolyn Steel used to think about the city through its built environment. Now, the author of Hungry City thinks about it through food: and urges us all to do the same. She wants us to envision cities that have food at their centre, literally and metaphorically. For Steel, this is one of the most urgent tasks facing our increasingly urbanised world, in which by 2030, nearly five billion (61 per cent) of Earth's 8.1 billion people will live in cities.
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Australia in 2050 Welcome to 2050, ladies, gentlemen and children. You'll notice a few changes in how we Australians do things, compared with the turn of the century – all for the better, once we had shed the anxieties that were holding us back. Please accompany me on this brief tour of the new Terra Australis. Learn more

Conserving Thailand’s whales, dolphins and porpoises The first detailed study of whales, dolphins and porpoises in Trat Province, along the eastern coast of the Gulf of Thailand, will provide critical information on their abundance and distribution, and management and conservation needs. Learn more

Business leaders review Asia’s green growth milestones Asian countries and companies are activating broad sustainable development commitments in their pursuit of robust low-carbon economies. Australian industry and business leaders have recently been reviewing Asia's progress. Learn more

Climate change bulletin: current research highlights Fire is one of nature's primary carbon-cycling mechanisms. Under a warming climate, fire frequency and severity will likely increase, according to CSIRO researcher Dr Melita Keywood. Learn more