Environmental groups in Honduras are protesting a project being debated in Congress to regulate the fishing industry. The activists say it would give transnational companies greater freedom to exploit the country's waters.
Some 18,500 Guatemalan farmers received training this year in 716 workshops conducted by the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock, ministry spokesman Nery Calvillo told Tierramérica.
Argentine ecologists applauded the passage this month of a sustainable fisheries law for the northeastern province of Santa Fe, which holds the country's greatest freshwater fish stocks.
The Peruvian government will defend biological diversity, genetic resources and indigenous knowledge of natural medicines through a Register of Native Crops and Plants -- and diplomatic and legal actions abroad.
Colombia's National Center for Cleaner Production is offering as of this month a line of credits financed by the Swiss government, available to companies that carry out environmentally sustainable projects.
Environment ministers from Latin America and the Caribbean for the first time agree to standardize their "green" indicators. Concrete information is expected to be available in 2004 for regional management of resources.
The United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) has extended until mid-December the nomination period for the new award, Champions of the Earth, aimed at recognizing environmental leaders and activists.
The U.S. Senate blocked a package of 31-billion-dollar reforms that would have given the energy industry almost free rein, to the great detriment of the environment. It is unlikely a new bill will be passed on this touchy issue in 2004, an election year.
A 769-hectare nature park enclave on the northern Cuban coast is one of the main ecological tourism attractions this Caribbean country is promoting this year for Canadian and European visitors.
MTBE, a gasoline additive, was at the center of the energy reform debate in the United States. Opposition groups conditioned the bill´s approval in the Senate to the repeal of a provision that protected the producers of MTBE from lawsuits arising from contamination.
- An environmentalist group in southern Chile won an agreement from the authorities to change the route of a highway in order to protect areas that are valuable in terms of eco-tourism and biological conservation.
The enthusiasm of a group of hikers was the impulse behind a plan to restore the 8,500-km network of roads created by the Incas more than 500 years ago. Experts say it is a creation comparable to that of the routes laid by the Roman Empire.
- Sustainable development is among the thematic pillars of the World Social Forum III, which is expected to draw 100,000 people from more than 100 countries to the southern Brazilian city of Porto Alegre, Jan 23-28.
The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) gets underway on Dec. 10 in Geneva. Eight thousand people are expected to take part in deliberations on how to bridge the digital divide and reduce the imbalance in knowledge -- which are seen as the main obstacles on the road to sustainable development in the new economy.
Defenders of animal rights in the world's fashion capital say that behind every fur coat is a story of suffering and death.
The Mexican cities of Cancún and Puebla will host the negotiations of the World Trade Organization and the Free Trade Area of the Americas this year, and progress continues apace. But where is the Latin American Agenda?
The World Social Forum, in its third annual meeting, January 23-28, will proclaim its central message with renewed energy: "another world is possible". And the host city is once again the southern Brazilian city of Porto Alegre, which expects tens of thousands of people to converge on this "open meeting space".
Informal waste collectors from throughout Latin America will hold their first congress Jan 20-23 in Brazil, ending as the World Social Forum gets under way in the southern city of Porto Alegre, drawing tens of thousands of activists from around the world.
Some 3,000 Cuban technicians are being trained in alternative technologies and best practices in refrigeration as part of a national program to reduce and eliminate substances that deplete the Earth's ozone layer.
The ExpoSaludable health fair, to take place Feb 5-9 in the central Chilean city of Quillota, 100 km northwest of Santiago, will be a showplace for foods and other products of "clean technology", in the context of quality standards established in the country's free trade accords.
Former miners and retired workers in the town of Canto de Agua, 700 km north of the Chilean capital, are growing organic oregano in the middle of the desert, joining the ranks of the expanding mode of farming that is free of toxic chemical substances.