Environment

Germany’s Climate Envoy Talks Partnerships with SIDS; Urges G20 Nations to Step Up Emissions Reductions

By Alison Kentish
Germany’s State Secretary and Special Envoy on International Climate Action, Jennifer Morgan, has emphasized the need for urgent climate action and called on G20 nations to do more to curb greenhouse gas emissions. The G20 comprises 19 developed and developing nations, the European Union and, since 2023, the African Union. It represents the world’s biggest economies, totaling 85 percent of the global GDP.

The World Bank Must Double Its Fund for the Poorest Nations like Mine to Tackle Hunger Crisis

By Simplex Chithyola Banda
After El Niño-induced floods and devastating drought, roughly two in five people in Malawi – a country of some 20 million people – are now facing the looming prospect of acute hunger by the end of the year.

Peoples’ Climate Vote Shows Global Support for Stronger Climate Action

By Tanka Dhakal
The global public opinion research on climate change reveals that 80 percent, or four out of five, of people globally want their governments to take stronger action to tackle the climate crisis.

Fiscal Policy Can Help Broaden the Gains of Artificial Intelligence to Humanity

By Era Dabla-Norris and Ruud de Mooij
New generative-AI technologies hold immense potential for boosting productivity and improving the delivery of public services, but the sheer speed and scale of the transformation also raise concerns about job losses and greater inequality. Given uncertainty over the future of AI, governments should take an agile approach that prepares them for highly disruptive scenarios.

Climate Change, Ethnicity and Neglect Fuel Violence in Nigeria’s Kaduna State

By Promise Eze
Lami Kwasu, a farmer in the village of Kafanchan in Kaduna State, north-central Nigeria, was at home one evening in October 2020 when the sound of sporadic gunshots filled the air. Gunmen, suspected to be Fulani nomadic herders, had surrounded the village, shooting from different angles.

Transforming African Food Systems from the Ground Up

By Inga Jacobs-Mata, Maya Rajasekharan, Namukolo Covic and Moses Odeke
All news is local, they say. The same is true of innovations—those many new technologies, policies, and practices that steadily stream from research to enhance our lives.

Sustainable Development of 39 Small Island Developing States – No Time to Wait

By Palitha Kohona
Today Small Island Developing States (SIDS) and the environmental threats they confront require our urgent attention ---and the global spotlight needs to be trained deliberately and maintained consistently on their concerns, in particular, climate change, marine biological diversity loss and sustainable development goals (SDGs).

UN’s Development Goals: Rich Nations Lead While World’s Poor Lag Far Behind

By Thalif Deen
When the 193-member UN General Assembly adopted a landmark resolution, back in September 2015, the goals were highly ambitious: to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger, eliminate inequalities, protect human rights, promote gender empowerment and ensure economic, social and environmental development—and much more. The deadline for achieving these targets was set for 2030.

Land Grabs Squeeze Rural Poor Worldwide

By Jomo Kwame Sundaram
Since 2008, farmland acquisitions have doubled prices worldwide, squeezing family farmers and other poor rural communities. Such land grabs are worsening inequality, poverty, and food insecurity.

Fake Climate Solutions Spread Across Latin America

By Humberto Márquez
Government and private initiatives and programmes to address the climate crisis in Latin America and the Caribbean are in fact a vast array of fake solutions, according to a new regional map made by environmental organisations in several of its countries.

Sawantwadi’s Traditional Handmade Toys Struggle for Survival

By Rina Mukherji
Sawantwadi in Maharashtra, on the western coast of India, bordering Goa, has always been known for its wooden toys. A picturesque town amid hills and lush greenery, Sawantwadi retains an old-world charm to this day.  The regal Sawantwadi Palace holds pride of place, with colleges, schools, and temples cloistered around the periphery of the lake, which was once an extension of the royal grounds.  In the centre of the town is the Ubha Bazaar, or Hanging Market, which houses rows of shops selling the iconic wooden toys that are a hallmark of Sawantwadi.

African Activists Call on the West to Finance Climate Action

By Isaiah Esipisu
As the technical session of the global climate negotiations enters the final stretch in Bonn, Germany, climate activists from Africa have expressed fears that negotiators from the developed world are dragging their feet in a way to avoid paying their fair share to tackle the climate crisis. “I think we will be unfair to the snail if we say that the Bonn talks have all along moved at a snail pace,” quipped Mohammed Adow, the Director, Power Shift Africa.

Rage, Rage Against the Dying of the Light

By Yasmine Sherif
Few will disagree with the nearly universal concern that we – the human family – are once more faced with an era of darkness. An era whose burdens are mainly carried on the tiny shoulders of crises-affected children and adolescents, their teachers and families, all left furthest behind.

A River’s Contrasts and Inequalities in the Arid Lands of Brazil

By Mario Osava
Osmir da Silva Rubez refuses to join the drip system, and is the only one among the 51 families living in the Mandacaru Public Irrigation Project in Juazeiro, a municipality in the state of Bahia, in the Northeast region of Brazil, to maintain the furrows that carry water to their crops.

Indignity, Disease, Death—The Life of a Sewer Worker in Pakistan

By Zofeen Ebrahim
A dark head emerges, followed by the torso. The balding man heaves himself up, hands on the sides of the manhole, as he is helped by two men. Gasping for breath, the man, who seems to be in his late 40s, sits on the edge, wearing just a pair of dark pants, the same color as the putrid swirling water he comes out from.

Turning the Tide: Health Community Turns to UNFCCC for Inclusivity

By Friday Phiri
There is a rapid realization that climate change is impacting health, which is why the recently adopted World Health Organization's Climate Change and Health Resolution is considered pivotal.

Climate Finance: The Planet is Speaking, Listen and Respond with Justice

By Joyce Chimbi
As the planet groans under record-breaking temperatures and extreme weather events, Africa, which is responsible for only two to three percent of global emissions, stands out disproportionately as the most vulnerable region in the world.  António Guterres, the United Nations Secretary-General’s special address on climate action titled ‘A Moment of Truth’ said 2024 was the hottest May in recorded history, and that this marks twelve straight months of the hottest months ever. For the past year, every turn of the calendar has turned up the heat.

Lawmakers Deliberate on ICPD30, Water Security at Tajikistan Conference

By IPS Correspondent
It's been 30 years since the International Conference on Population and Development Programme of Action (ICPD30) was adopted in Cairo, transforming policy and thinking on population and development issues.

Climate Change, Pollution Push Karnaphuli Fishers Out of the Profession

By Rafiqul Islam
Jishuram Das, a sexagenarian who was born in Jelepara, located in Chattogram, has been catching fish from the Karnaphuli River since his childhood. But nowadays, he often sits idle without going to catch fish, as their catches have drastically fallen.

Let’s play!

By Heike Kuhn
For the first time ever, we will commemorate the joy of playing with an International Day of Play“ on June 11, 2024. On their website, the UN state that this „marks a significant milestone in efforts to preserve, promote, and prioritize playing so that all people, especially children, can reap the rewards and thrive to their full potential“. But why ist playing so important?

Explainer: What You Need to Know About Climate Change and Blue Carbon

By Aishwarya Bajpai
The area where land meets the sea, known as coastal ecosystems, could be the key to reducing the effects of climate change. What is blue carbon? Blue carbon refers to the carbon dioxide (CO2) stored within marine or coastal ecosystems worldwide. These ecosystems include coastal plants such as mangroves, seagrasses, and salt marshes, which trap CO2 in their seabeds.
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