ENVIRONMENT: U.N. Minimising Tropical Deforestation – Report

Scientists at a world meeting on forests are reporting that tropical deforestation is much worse than the most recent surveys from the United Nations show.

SCIENCE: That Buffalo-Sized Rat Could Have Much to Say

What would you think of a rat that was as big as a buffalo? Even if that was eight million years ago?

SCIENCE: Climate Change Cutting Crops, Warn Researchers

World cereal stocks are plunging to their lowest levels in recent history and might not recover due to climate change, experts say.

TECHNOLOGY-AFRICA: Women Find Reason for Optimism in Internet Usage

Slowly, but effectively, the Internet is empowering women in Africa to follow events as they have never witnessed before. The latest case in point is the women in Somalia who have been following their country's peace talks in neighbouring Kenya via Internet usage.

COMMUNICATIONS-LATAM: Telecentres to Narrow Digital Divide

Several Latin American governments are setting up telecentres where people can surf the Internet, often free of charge, in an attempt to narrow the digital divide within their societies, which is perhaps larger than the gap that separates them from the industrialised world.

SCIENCE: Hubble Telescope’s Days May Be Numbered

The U.S. space agency's decision to begin shuttle flights again in 2004 is fuelling hope that the dwindling life of the Hubble Space Telescope might be extended.

TECHNOLOGY-AFRICA: Internet Creates a New Class of Users

Even critics of massive spending on computer and Internet technology in Africa, at what they fear is at the expense of poverty alleviation efforts, are conceding that so-called "New Media" are helping Africans economically.

VENEZUELA: Rain God Gets His Own Planet

A "mini-planet" far out in our solar system, discovered by astronomers at a Venezuelan observatory, will bear the name Huya (Juyá), the rain god of the Wayúu Indians who live on the arid Guajira Peninsula of northern Venezuela and Colombia.

SCIENCE: Trawlers ‘Bulldozing’ Sea Mountains, Say Researchers

Scientists are warning that the drop in coastal fish stocks worldwide has pushed fishing fleets into deeper waters in search of rich undersea hills called seamounts, where hundreds of new species have been discovered in recent years.

SCIENCE: Researchers Unite to Unearth Key to Food Security

Governments, the World Bank and NGOs such as Greenpeace and Oxfam have agreed to participate in a global review of the role of science and technology in farming, a project they say could reshape approaches to future food security issues.

HEALTH: Scientists Link GM Crop Weed Killer to Powerful Fungus

Scientists are expressing alarm after finding elevated amounts of potentially toxic fungal moulds in food crops sprayed with a common weed killer widely used with genetically engineered (GE) plants.

SCIENCE-MEXICO/U.S.: Potatoes Debut Blight-Fighting Gene

Potatoes armed with genes resistant to the crop's leading enemy, late blight, are undergoing trial by fire in Mexico by being exposed to the disease in open field tests. So far, the potatoes have been winning, though it is only a partial victory.

ENERGY-CUBA: Solar Panels to Light Up Remote Households

Around 500,000 people living in remote mountainous areas of Cuba will finally be able to pack away their oil lamps, listen to radio, and even watch TV, thanks to the growing use of renewable energy sources in this Caribbean island nation.

SCIENCE: Canada’s GM Crops Sprout Problems, Says U.K. MP

Former U.K. Environment Minister Michael Meacher toured Canadian farms recently to witness problems with genetically modified (GM) crops that might serve as cautionary tales for other countries.

CENTRAL AMERICA: A Setback for Food Research and Security

Food security for poor rural families, a top priority on the Central American development agenda, will be all the more difficult to achieve now that the regional network for research and distribution of improved varieties of maize, beans and potatoes has closed up shop.

DEVELOPMENT: Biotech Revolution Bypasses Poorer Nations, Warns U.N.

The biotechnology revolution - which has been characterised by modern-day advances in agriculture, medicine, industry and the environment - is bypassing most of the world's poorer nations, according to a new U.N. study released here.

SCIENCE-US: Bush Plan Seeks "Second Opinion" on Global Warming

The George W. Bush administration announced a new 10-year plan Thursday to study the "uncertainty" around global climate change - instead of taking action to fix it, scientists and environmentalists say.

SCIENCE-JAPAN: The Underwater Wonders Revealed by Kaiko

The Japanese research submarine known as the Kaiko is lost forever, but its legacy lives on. The amazing information it collected from the previously unexplored ocean depths spurred important research in medicine, geology, genetics, biology and even telecommunications.

ARGENTINA: Journey in Search of Dinosaurs

Any volunteer willing to put up 1,910 dollars and travel costs can be part of a palaeontology expedition in Argentina's Ischigualasto Park, a site that could hold the secret to the origins of dinosaurs and even of mammals.

TECHNOLOGY: Big Pharma Cracks Down on Cheap Internet Drugs

The huge U.S. pharmaceutical industry is trying to crush Canadian-based Internet companies that sell drugs at relatively low prices to U.S. customers, Canadian pharmacists say.

ENVIRONMENT-US: Groups Seek Halt to Bio-Pharming Field Trials

Even as the United States sues the European Union in the World Trade Organisation for shunning genetically engineered crops, the administration of Pres. George W. Bush has itself become the target of a lawsuit by groups seeking a ban on open field trials of plants designed to produce pharmaceutical drugs.