Combating Desertification and Drought

An Empty Table at Doha Climate Talks

By Stephen Leahy
United Nations climate talks are on the edge of collapse Thursday, according to a coalition of civil society and representatives from half of the world's countries.

A Storm Brews in Doha

By Stephen Leahy
While the Philippines copes with the aftermath of powerful super-typhoon Bopha, which killed more than 300 people this week, tempers flared at the U.N. climate summit here.

From Doha to Dakar, Food Insecurity is the Norm

By Mantoe Phakathi

Qatar may be one of the richest countries in the world, but it has something in common with its African counterparts – food insecurity.

OP-ED: Loss and Damage from Climate Change Must Not Become the “New Normal”

By Sam Bickersteth
As United Nations climate talks get underway this week in Doha, Qatar, they show a subtle, unsettling shift in the global climate change debate.

Deep Emissions Cuts Urged at Climate Summit

By Stephen Leahy
Extreme weather disasters, including floods and droughts intensified by climate change, have totalled many billions of dollars in damages this year.

Planet on Path to Four C Warming, World Bank Warns

By Stephen Leahy
Coal, oil and gas companies and their backers in the financial and investment industry must stop putting billions of dollars into finding and extracting new sources of fossil fuels. If they don't shift their investments, temperatures will soar four to 10 degrees C higher, devastating many parts of the world, the World Bank said Monday.

Worms, Termites, Microbes Offer Food Security

By Manipadma Jena
Worms and termites are not likely to win hearts and minds, but they, along with lichens and microbes, are vital to food security, say biodiversity specialists who attended this month’s United Nations conference on the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in this south Indian city.  

Shadow Over Aichi Biodiversity Targets

By Manipadma Jena
With negotiations to mobilise resources for preservation of biodiversity at a major United Nations conference going nowhere, the Group of 77 and China have hinted at  possible suspension of the ‘Aichi targets’  under the Nagoya Protocol.

Funds Crunch Skews Aichi Targets on Biodiversity

By Keya Acharya
The United Nations 11th Conference of the Parties  to the Convention on Biological Biodiversity (COP 11 CBD), underway in this southern Indian city, is lost on where to garner the billions of dollars needed to implement the ‘Aichi targets,’ due to be met by 2020.

Donors Must Seize 2013 Opportunity in Sahel, U.N. Urges

By Carey L. Biron
Reporting that the worst of the food crisis in the Sahel region of Africa appears to have been averted, the United Nations’ top official on the area, David Gressley, warned on Wednesday that the potential passing of the immediate emergency should not divert international attention from what needs to be done in 2013, which he calls a critical year for building resilience in the region.

Climate Change Takes a Bite Out of Global Food Supply

By Stephen Leahy
Humanity's ability to feed itself is in serious doubt as climate change takes hold on land in the form of droughts and extreme weather, as well as on the world's oceans.

Water for Phosphate, Not People

By Ihsan Bouabid

Gafsa region in the south of Tunisia was once an oasis; today the phosphate industry has plunged it into a water crisis.

Laissez-Faire Failing World’s Dwindling Water Resources

By Stephen Leahy
Growing water shortages in many countries are a major threat to global security and development and should be a top priority at the U.N. Security Council, a panel of experts said in a new report.

China Puts Up a Green Shield Against Sandstorms

By Manipadma Jena
The setting sun is still streaming in through the poplars along the shelter belts, but Horquin Lianjun is done with farm work for the day. The desert wind has turned bone chilling.

Kashmir’s Melting Glaciers May Cut Ice With Sceptics

By Athar Parvaiz
Jowhar Ahmed, an air-conditioner dealer in Srinagar, is pleased at a spurt in business this summer caused by temperatures soaring over 35 degrees Celsius - unusual in this alpine valley ringed by snow-capped mountains.

Whose Timber is it Anyway?

By Zofeen Ebrahim
With Pakistan’s last major stands of deodar (cedar) threatened by a ‘timber mafia’, the local people in the Chitral district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province are resorting to direct action to stop the denudation of their picturesque alpine homeland.
Courtesy of Per Bertilsson

Q&A: Water and Food Security Are Inseparable

By Thalif Deen
With the U.N. ominously warning of an impending food crisis following severe droughts in farmlands in the United States, Brazil, Russia and at least two rain-deprived states in India, the world will once again turn its attention to a finite natural resource: water.

Food Activists See Portents of New and Deeper Hunger Crisis

By Haider Rizvi
Food rights activists from around the world will descend on the coastal U.S. state of Florida next week to protest homelessness and hunger facing millions of people in the United States and across the globe.

U.S. Drought Exposes “Hydro-Illogical” Water Management

By Carlota Cortes
The historic drought withering much of the United States this summer has revealed a need for strategies to better manage water supplies that could remain under severe pressure both this year and in the longer term.

Record Aid Shortfall Abandons Millions to Their Fate

By Kim-Jenna Jurriaans
Global funding for humanitarian aid interventions saw the biggest shortfalls in 10 years in 2011, according to a new report, raising questions about the international community’s ability to meet a 20-percent greater need for 2012 driven by drought and conflict.

Crops Failing as U.S. Simmers in Record Heat Wave

By Coralie Tripier
The United States is suffering one of its most severe droughts in decades, leading to both widespread crop failures and increased public concern about the impacts of climate change.
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