Workout only a part of wellness at work. Companies that focus on wellness programs without changing their business culture to care about their employees’ overall well-being won’t have engaged workers. And that hinders productivity, causes higher turnover and puts people at higher health risks, said Rosie Ward, a health management services manager with Marsh & McLennan Agency in Minneapolis. She addressed dozens of business people Wednesday at a conference held as part of the city’s Live Well Sioux Falls initiative, now in its second year. | The Argus Leader | argusleader.com

Workout only a part of wellness at work | The Argus Leader | argusleader.com: "“We’re looking more at the emotional, the occupational, the spiritual, the financial, the environmental,” said Kandy Jamison, account executive for health and wellness at Howalt McDowell. “We’re trying to look at that total well-being.” As a result of the change from mostly an activity-based wellness program, more of the 90-plus employees are participating, she said. They’re realizing wellness doesn’t always mean losing 50 pounds and going to the gym daily.Howalt McDowell isn’t measuring the financial savings by having healthier employees just yet. But healthier, happier people are typically more productive, Jamison said.“I think if it’s the culture and the right thing to do and you do care about your employees … and if a value can be documented, then you’re a winner.”" CLICK LINK TO READ FULL ARTICLE

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Australia's Carbon Tax Under Fire As New Government Takes Control. Australia's new government prepared to take control of the nation Sunday, with Prime Minister-elect Tony Abbott vowing to immediately scrap a hated tax on carbon polluters and implement a controversial plan to stop asylum seekers from reaching the nation's shores. Abbott met with bureaucrats to go over his border security plans and said his first priority would be to repeal the deeply unpopular carbon tax on Australia's biggest industrial polluters.

Australia's Carbon Tax Under Fire As New Government Takes Control: "Abbott's conservative Liberal Party-led coalition won a crushing victory in elections Saturday against the center-left Labor Party, which had ruled for six years, including during the turbulent global financial crisis. Labor was ultimately doomed by years of party instability and bickering, and by its decision to renege on an election promise by implementing the carbon tax, which many Australians blame for steep increases in their power bills.

The Australian Electoral Commission's latest count Sunday had the coalition likely to win a clear majority of 86 seats in the 150-seat House of Representatives. Labor appeared likely to secure 57."

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Philippines Urged to Take Leadership Role on Climate Change. The Philippines has an outsize stake in uniting the world on climate-change commitments, the European Union Commissioner for Climate Action says. Connie Hedegaard told a news briefing on Friday in Manila that the Philippines should take a leadership role in prodding larger, wealthier nations to agree to a plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The country has a lot at stake, as the third-most vulnerable country on the planet to extreme weather and rising sea levels. Speaking between meetings with local officials, Ms. Hadegaard said the EU and the Philippines share some views on how to “inject some ambition” into the 2015 talks on a new deal to replace the Kyoto Protocol. Both are parties to the Kyoto Protocol, the international treaty binding industrialized countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to forestall, if not reverse, global warming. The U.S. signed the Kyoto Protocol but didn’t ratify it, while Canada withdrew from it two years ago. Commissioner Hedegaard said frequent floods in Manila in recent years, including the flooding caused by the typhoon-intensified monsoon last month, puts the country in a “very interesting role” to help convince large producers of greenhouse gases on the need to act decisively on climate change agreements. “I’m extremely impatient…with a world that says it wants to address these issues but at a phase that is modest, too modest. That is why we want to inject some sense of urgency in the 2015 conference,” Ms. Hedegaard told The Wall Street Journal. “The challenge is to move a bit faster because that is what we need to do.” The WorldRiskReport 2012 of the United Nations University Institute of Environment and Human Security identified only Vanuatu and Tonga as more vulnerable thatn the Philippines to extreme weather events and increases in sea levels. An archipelago of more than 7,000 islands, the Philippines is situated between the Pacific Ocean and the South China Sea and is battered every year by around 20 typhoons. Since the Philippines passed the Climate Change Act in 2009, the country’s climate change policy agenda has shifted from mitigation to adaptation and disaster-risk reduction. - Southeast Asia Real Time - WSJ

Philippines Urged to Take Leadership Role on Climate Change - Southeast Asia Real Time - WSJ: "Ms. Hedegaard said the E.U. is committed to reducing greenhouse gases by at least 20% by 2020, adding that one-fifth of the bloc’s budget for the next seven years will be spent for projects to address climate change.

She said that Europe believes that “intelligent way forward would be to solve our economic issues, our growth problems…the job and social aspects and the environment and climate change at once. In the end, it is about how we are creating the growth in the future,” she added.

The E.U. has been helping the Philippines by extending assistance to protect its forests, while European companies have invested in renewable energy projects in the Southeast Asian country."

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The World's Largest Solar-Powered Boat | Crew members of the Turanor PlanetSolar, the world's largest solar-powered boat, arrive in the port of Monaco after completing the first around-the-world trip using solar energy

The World's Largest Solar-Powered Boat | The World's Largest Solar-Powered Boat - Yahoo! News Philippines: "Crew members of the Turanor PlanetSolar, the world's largest solar-powered boat, arrive in the port of Monaco after completing the first around-the-world trip using solar energy, May 4, 2012. (REUTERS/Eric Gaillard)"

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