Environment

Southern Africa Shows the Way With Water

By John Fraser
Water remains a key component in development policy. And, as the Southern African Development Community discusses how best to develop the region, the effective management of watercourses will be key, says Professor Anthony Turton, one of the foremost experts on water policy in southern Africa and a trustee of the Water Stewardship Council of Southern Africa.

Caribbean Economies Battered by Storms

By Jewel Fraser
The Caribbean is in danger of becoming “a region of serial defaulters” with respect to international debt obligations, according to one expert, and this may partly be due to its economies suffering frequent shocks from natural disasters.

Ecological Cuban Recipes Boost Sustainable Agriculture

By Ivet González
Vilda Figueroa and her husband, José Lama, live in Marianao on the outskirts of Havana, where they share hundreds of recipes based on Cuban-grown foods and sun-drying, along with other ecological food preservation methods.

Opponents of Fracking Seek to Thwart Shale Gas Finance

By Emilio Godoy
Non-governmental organisations are putting pressure on multilateral financial institutions not to finance production of shale gas by hydraulic fracturing or fracking because of the high environmental costs they say are associated with this method.

‘Deserts Can Save Forests’

By Manipadma Jena
It may take development of the deserts to save forests, say experts, who stress that desert ecology needs to be preserved and enhanced.

Critics Push to Stall New Obama “Social Cost of Carbon” Calculations

By Carey L. Biron
The U.S. Department of Energy has announced it is accepting a petition from a conservative advocacy group critical of a recent substantial increase to official calculations of the so-called “social cost of carbon”.

Despite Two Bans, Styrofoam Trash Still Plagues Haiti

By Correspondents
Despite two government decrees making their import and usage illegal, styrofoam cups and plates are used and littered all over the capital, as well as bought and sold, wholesale and retail, completely out in the open.

Kashmiri Farmers Unprepared for Drought

By Athar Parvaiz
Zareena Bano has had to skip school 17 times this year to help out on her family’s farm in Tangchekh village in the northern Indian state of Kashmir.

A Stark Choice: Extreme Heat or Dirty Fuels

By Stephen Leahy
Two reports released Wednesday reveal the dangerous gap between science and politics. New climate research shows that extreme events such as the severe heat wave in the U.S. last year will double in 2020, increase 400 percent by 2040, and then get far worse without significant carbon reductions.

Mental Health an Overlooked Casualty of Disaster

By Lucy Westcott
Although Hurricane Sandy made her final sweep through the Northeastern United States nearly 10 months ago, for many people the stress caused by the storm lingers.

Study Finds Many “Bee-Friendly” Plants Laced with Pesticide

By Carey L. Biron
Major U.S. retailers are selling garden plants that are billed as “bee-friendly” but laced with pesticides known to be toxic to bees, according to a preliminary study, the first on the issue, released Wednesday.

When Disaster and Disability Converge

By Lucy Westcott
Like many people living in the path of Hurricane Sandy last fall, Lauren Scrivo needed more battery power. Despite a call offering help from the mayor of Fairfield, New Jersey, where Scrivo lives with her family, her concerns went far beyond extra water bottles and flashlights.

Saving an Overburdened River

By Brendon Bosworth
Over the course of a 28-day trek down South Africa’s Umgeni River, which flows from the pristine wetlands of the Umgeni Vlei Nature Reserve to the Durban coastline, Penny Rees, a coordinator for the Duzi uMngeni Conservation Trust, witnessed the polar opposites of river health.

Highway through National Park Sparks Protest in Brazil

By Alice Marcondes
Environmental groups have appealed to UNESCO to help stop the reopening of Caminho do Colono, a stretch of highway in southern Brazil that crosses through Iguaçu National Park, declared a World Heritage site by the UN agency in 1986.

Ivory Course Runs From Africa to Malaysia to China

By Baradan Kuppusamy
A distance of nearly 9,000 kilometres separates Malaysia from Africa, but that hasn’t stopped the Southeast Asian nation from becoming a key staging post in the illegal trade of ivory from Africa to China.

India and China Oil Palms Dangerously

By Sudeshna Sarkar
When there is feasting in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, there could just be a connection between the celebrations and the fires on Indonesia’s Sumatra Island that trigger frequent transboundary smog.

Lahore Going Back To Its Old Ways

By Irfan Ahmed
Zahid Husain, 25, is a salesman in the Pakistan city Lahore. He sits idly on the pavement of a clothes shop and plays a game on his cell phone, oblivious to the changes in the city all around him.

Hurricane Sandy Raised Risk Awareness in Eastern Cuba

By Patricia Grogg

Nine months after Hurricane Sandy, the worst disaster to hit this city in eastern Cuban in decades, local residents say they are now better prepared for catastrophes.

Slum Farmers Rise Above the Sewers

By Miriam Gathigah
Tucked deep in Kenya’s sprawling Kibera slum is the shanty that Alice Atieno calls home. It is just one among many small, badly-lit shacks built close together in this crowded slum where an estimated one million people live on about 400 hectares.

Mining Industry Plans Massive Use of Seawater in Arid Northern Chile

By Marianela Jarroud
The arid climate in northern Chile has forced mining companies to seek out new sources of water. The main source is seawater from the Pacific Ocean, whose use is expected to increase significantly in the coming decade despite the high costs of extraction and transport.

Cameroonians See REDD

By Monde Kingsley Nfor
Uncertainty over property rights and access to forest land is potentially a major stumbling block for implementing the United Nations collaborative initiative on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation in Cameroon.
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