ENVIRONMENT: Galapagos Islands in Search of Clean Energy

Ecuador has taken the first step towards ending the oil dependence of its Galápagos Islands, in the eastern Pacific Ocean, with the official opening of a 10.8 million dollar wind energy facility on the island of San Cristóbal.

CLIMATE CHANGE: Biofuels Worse Than Fossil Fuels, Studies Find

Biofuels are making climate change worse, not better, according to two new studies which found that total greenhouse gas emissions from biofuels are far higher than those from burning gasoline because biofuel production is pushing up food prices and resulting in deforestation and loss of grasslands.

ENVIRONMENT: Record Financing For Biofuels, Not Food

Biofuels have quickly turned from environmental saviour to just another mega-scale get-rich quick scheme. Countries and regions without their own oil reserves to tap now see their farms, peatlands and forests as potential "oil fields" - shallow but renewable lakes of green oil.

WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM: The Public Eye Is Watching

Civil society is in Davos, Switzerland once again to keep a watchful eye on events at the World Economic Forum (WEF). The social and environmental behaviour of 1,000 of the world’s most powerful companies will be scutinised at this annual meeting of business leaders, presidents and prime ministers, and free-market economics experts.

INDIA: &#39World&#39s Cheapest Car Environmentally Costly&#39

Nothing has generated as much hyperbole in the global automobile industry in recent years as the unveiling, last week, of an ultra-cheap bare-bones car made by the Tatas, India’s steel and engineering giant.

BRAZIL: Land Shortage Provokes Murders of Indigenous People

At least 76 indigenous people were murdered in Brazil in 2007, 58 percent more than in 2006. The killings increased the most in the west-central state of Mato Grosso do Sul, where the Guaraní people are confined to territories too small for them to maintain their traditional way of life.

ARGENTINA: Dairy Farmers Aggrieved, Despite High Prices

Dairy farmers in Argentina have led the latest in a long series of protests by agricultural associations, despite the record high prices for farm products.

CHALLENGES 2007-2008: Cuban Economy in Need of Nourishment

Increasing food production is the main challenge to be faced by the Cuban economy this year, to improve people’s quality of life. It was one of the recurrent themes raised at the popular debates convened on the government’s initiative in the second half of 2007.

ENERGY-SOUTH AFRICA: Food Security Hobbles Biofuel Strategy

Worried that it may be seen as insensitive to the food needs of Africa, the South African government, which is facing a general election in 2009, has chosen food security in framing a biofuel policy.

CLIMATE CHANGE: Forests Could Cool or Cook the Planet

A two-degree Celsius rise in global temperatures could flip the Amazon forest from being the Earth's vital air conditioner to a flamethrower that cooks the planet, warns a new report released at the climate talks in Bali, Indonesia Friday.

ENERGY: Nascent Biofuel Market Has Birth Defects

The development of an international market for crop-based fuels could reduce climate changing gas emissions and mitigate the inflationary impacts of the current euphoria surrounding this energy alternative, but it is a process that will take years.

DEVELOPMENT: Food Prices Climbing, With No End in Sight

Globalisation, climate change, and the mass production of biofuels are pushing up food prices worldwide, which could jeopardise the livelihoods of the world's poorest, according to a report released Tuesday by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).

Q&A: The Senselessness of Tax-Free Oil and Subsidised Ethanol

Protectionist measures for renewable fuels are unacceptable while trade in polluting and costly fossil fuels is completely free, says Marcos Sawaya Jank, president of an organisation representing the most competitive producers of sugar and ethanol in the world, in this interview with Mario Osava.

AGRICULTURE: Costly Prosperity

Many of the people who are now complaining that biofuels are driving up agricultural prices fought in the past against the "deterioration of the terms of exchange," or the devaluation of commodities with respect to manufactured goods, as a key factor in underdevelopment.

EUROPE: &#39Biofuels Can Hurt the Poor&#39

A body tasked with shaping European Union policy on biofuels is dominated by companies with a vested interest in promoting this source of energy, environmentalists have claimed.

DEVELOPMENT: Food to Biofuels a "Recipe for Disaster"

A long-held basic human right, the right to adequate food for the world's 854 million hungry people, is being threatened once again - this time by the conversion of wheat, sugar, palm oil and maize into agricultural fuel.

ENVIRONMENT: Biofuels – Great Green Hope or Swindle

A raft of new studies reveal European and American multibillion dollar support for biofuels is unsustainable, environmentally destructive and much more about subsidising agri-business corporations than combating global warming.

ENVIRONMENT-LATAM: Ethical Development to Cool Off the Planet

Brazilian Environment Minister Marina Silva suggested an ethically and politically sustainable development model at a conference in this southeastern Brazilian city that has brought together national and international authorities and experts, business leaders and researchers to discuss solutions to fight climate change in the region.

ENERGY-MALAYSIA: Subsidising Gas to Private Power – State Utility Pays

A staggering 27.6 billion ringgit (8.2 billion US dollars); that's the amount the Malaysian public has incurred through gas subsidies given out over the years to private power producers by national petroleum corporation Petronas.

ENERGY: Report Challenges EU Subsidies for Biofuels

The European Union's support for biofuels may not be the most cost-effective way for the 27-country bloc to tackle climate change, a new study has concluded.

ENERGY-SWEDEN: Wood Cellulose – Alternative to Brazilian Ethanol?

The world’s car makers are racing each other to produce powerful new models that run on ethanol-based fuels for the booming Swedish market.