SCIENCE: Experts Discount Generic Fix For Global Warming

The failure or success of the embattled Kyoto Protocol on reducing greenhouse gas emissions should not sway countries in the South from developing their own, more appropriate agreements, according to a new report.

POLITICS: Observers Expect U.N. Cloning Controversy to Resurface

One of the most controversial items on this year's U.N. General Assembly agenda, human cloning, could be brought back to life next week after an earlier vote to delay the debate until 2005 passed narrowly, 80-79.

DEVELOPMENT: ‘Debt for Science’, Urges Brazil

A portion of developing countries' foreign debt payments should be channelled towards investments in their own national education, science and technology programmes, says Brazilian minister Roberto Amaral.

AGRICULTURE: Small Farmers Lead Way in Preserving Soil

Scientists and development experts are starting to recognise that traditional farming practices play a major role in preserving tropical soils - the world's richest - which in turn enhances food security.

SCIENCE-BRAZIL: Cow Clones ‘a la Natural’

Many people are disappointed when they meet Vitoria and Lenda, the first cows cloned in Latin America. "They're just like any others," tends to be the reaction when one first sees the two at the experimental farm of Sucupira, 30 km from Brasilia.

SCIENCE-ARGENTINA: ‘Pathetic Salaries’ Drive Researchers Abroad

Angeles Zorreguieta, 42, PhD in chemistry, is a full-time researcher and university professor, and the assistant director of an institute that trains future scientists. In the United States she would earn at least 40,000 dollars a year. But in Argentina she earns just one-seventh of that amount.

U.S.: Questions of Food Safety Dog Cloned Beef

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) faces increasing criticism for announcing that cloned animals are probably safe to eat, a claim that many scientists and consumer groups say is premature and scientifically unsupported.

DEVELOPMENT-AFRICA: Scientists Called to Look Beyond the Lab

A panel of prominent women scientists has argued that African researchers need to get out of their laboratories and enter the world of policy-making if they want to be of real benefit to their fellow Africans. The women say that researchers must also learn to market their ideas.

DEVELOPMENT-AFRICA: Making Every Drop Count

The prospect of a future plagued by water shortages in Sub-Saharan Africa is coming under the spotlight this week, in Nairobi.

SCIENCE: Oceans Still a Deep Mystery

Fish stocks cannot be managed properly because little is known about the ecology of the world's oceans, scientists from the Census of Marine Life project reported Thursday.

ENVIRONMENT-ARGENTINA: Saving Patagonia’s Wild Cattle

The wild cattle of the glaciers of southern Patagonia may be saved from oblivion by two Argentine scientists who, for the past 15 years, have been studying these abandoned animals in a bid to decipher what could be crucial genetic information.

DEVELOPMENT: GM Crops Suffer Another Blow

Genetically modified crops have proved a danger to wildlife in two out of three major experiments carried out in Britain.

TECHNOLOGY-AFRICA: Access to Computers Remain a Distant Dream for Women

At 50, Nyende Namisi, a peasant farmer in rural western Kenya, has never seen a computer before.

DEVELOPMENT: Can Technology Solve Hunger?

On the eve of World Food Day, the development community is divided over the best course of action to fight malnutrition and hunger, the leading causes of death and sickness worldwide.

SCIENCE: By Launching ‘Taikonaut’, China Lays Claim on Space

China laid its claim to being a growing technology giant by launching its first man in space Wednesday, breaking over 40 years of galactic domination by the United States and Russia.

GM FOODS: Mexican Maize Meets Banned Variety

Contamination of Mexico's maize by genetically modified (GM) varieties, including the banned StarLink, is much more widespread than previously reported, according to a new study sponsored by a coalition of indigenous and farmer groups.

SCIENCE: India Ignores Protests over Risky Nuclear Technology

Stiff protests from local residents in southern Tamil Nadu state have not deterred India's secretive nuclear establishment from pursuing fast-breeder reactor (FBR) technology, which is being phased out around the world because it is highly risky.

U.S.: Bush Nominates Conservative for UNESCO Post

On the eve of Hurricane Isabel in mid-September, President George W. Bush quietly nominated as ambassador to the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) Louise V. Oliver, a right-wing political activist and former president of a controversial political action committee, GOPAC, founded by former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich.

DEVELOPMENT: Britain Set To Seal Future of GM in Europe

The future of GM crops in Europe has been in the balance for some time, but that balance is now tilted more in favour of the anti-GM lobby following the results of a government-sponsored consultation process last week.

COMMUNICATIONS: Science Has the Word in WSIS Run-Up

Representatives from the international scientific community finally were able to convince the United Nations to take their contributions into account in the preparatory process for the World Summit on the Information Society, to be held here in December.

BRAZIL: Evidence of Pre-Columbian Civilisation Found in Amazon

Relatively large pre-Columbian societies dramatically modified one of the least-known areas of the Amazon Basin, the Upper Xingú River, along the Brazilian Amazon's southeast edge, says a study published last week by Science magazine.