Climate-change summit a step further, but where to?
ROME—The United Nations Climate Change Summit in Bonn is a step further, most experts say. Fine, but toward what?
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ROME—The United Nations Climate Change Summit in Bonn is a step further, most experts say. Fine, but toward what?
By Paloma Duran | Inter Press Service
ROME—Pressures on global land resources are now greater than ever, as a rapidly increasing population, coupled with rising levels of consumption, is placing ever-larger demands on the world’s land-based natural capital, warns a new United Nations report.
ROME—As an unprecedented gesture, Pope Francis has donated €25,000 to the United Nations (UN) Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) efforts supporting people facing food insecurity and famine in East Africa.
UNITED NATIONS—In March 2015 at the Sendai World Conference for Disaster Risk Reduction, then-President of Kirbati, Anote Tong, made it very clear how vulnerable his country was to climate and disaster risk, when he informed the room (which was sadly less than half full) that his country had purchased land in Fiji.
VIENNA, Austria—It may be the 21st century but more than 3 billion people still use fire for cooking and heating. Of those, 1 billion people have no access to electricity despite a global effort launched at the 2011 Vienna Energy Forum to bring electricity to everyone on the planet.
ROME/GENEVA—Religious discrimination, fanaticism and xenophobia have worsened in several countries in Europe, Asia, Africa, the Middle East and North America, thus, there is a need for alternatives to identify a common strategy to address these challenges, a Geneva-based think tank promoting global dialogue said.
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia—The greatly excessive use of antibiotics in food production in recent decades has made many bacteria more resistant to antibiotics.
UXBRIDGE, Canada—The Carbon Law says human carbon-dioxide (CO2) emissions must be reduced by half each decade starting in 2020. By following this “law”, humanity can achieve net-zero CO2 emissions by midcentury to protect the global climate for current and future generations.
UNITED NATIONS—Religious advocacy groups have a long history of working with the United Nations, pushing back against progressive interpretations of the terms “family” and “marriage” as enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
UNITED NATIONS—Unhealthy environments—both inside and outside the home—cause the deaths of more than 1.7 million child under the age of 5 every year, according to two new reports released by the World Health Organization (WHO) on Monday.
ROME/GENEVA—The United Nations health organization has just published its first-ever list of antibiotic-resistant “priority pathogens”—a catalogue of 12 families of bacteria that pose the greatest threat to human health.
UNITED NATIONS—Kids growing up in the Seychelles think of the ocean as their backyard, says Ronald Jean Jumeau, the Seychelles ambassador to the UN.
UNITED NATIONS—A significant global demographic change having far-reaching consequences, yet receiving, scant attention is the rise of one-person households.
LITTLE ROCK, Arkansas—Earl Hatley, a descendant of the Cherokee/Delaware tribe, has witnessed the consequences of using hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” on his native land to produce shale gas.
CANCUN, Mexico—“We don’t have access to marine areas, because most are protected areas or are in private hands. We indigenous peoples have been losing access to our territories, as this decision became a privilege of the state,” complained Donald Rojas, a member of the Brunka indigenous community in Costa Rica.
DHAKA—Though highly hopeful about achieving the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) well ahead of the 2030 deadline, Bangladesh is upset over the procedures to access the Green Climate Fund (GCF), calling them “ridiculously complex” and warning that they may slow down its drive to achieve the SDGs.
CALI, Colombia—A global food watchdog works around the clock to preserve crop biodiversity, with a seed bank deep in the Colombian countryside holding the largest collection of beans and cassava in the world and storing crops that could avert devastating problems.
MARRAKECH, Morocco—With climate change posing growing threats to smallholder farmers, experts working around the issues of agriculture and food security say it is more critical than ever to implement locally appropriate solutions to help them adapt to changing rainfall patterns.
PENANG—New research is showing that air pollution is a powerful silent killer, causing 6.5 million worldwide deaths, as well as being the major cause of climate change.
NAIROBI, Kenya—Land degradation already affects millions of people, bringing biodiversity loss, reduced availability of clean water, food insecurity and greater vulnerability to the harsh impacts of climate change.
QUITO, Ecuador—“We, as mayors, have to govern midsize cities as if they were capital cities,” said Héctor Mantilla, city councilor of Floridablanca, the third-largest city in the northern Colombian department of Santander.
ROME—Almost inadvertently, humankind is getting closer every day to the point of no-return toward what could be called the “climate doomsday”.
By Dr. Shamshad Akhtar | Inter Press Service
UNITED NATIONS—The world will need to more than double its current infrastructure stock over the next 15 years—a massive undertaking that could either contribute to or combat catastrophic climate change—according to a new report.
SANTIAGO, Chile—Climate change is leading to major modifications in agricultural production in Latin America and the Caribbean, and if mitigation and adaptation measures of the productive system are not urgently adopted, threats to food security will be exacerbated.
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia—Given the enormity of the challenges confronting humanity, the world’s investment in science, technology and innovation is woefully inadequate.
UNITED NATIONS—The International Criminal Court (ICC) will pay more attention to crimes of environmental destruction and land-grabs, according to a new policy paper published by the court.
ROME—The warning is sharp, and the facts alarming: 92 percent of the world’s population live in places where levels exceed recommended limits. And 6.5 million people die annually from air pollution.
HONOLULU, Hawaii—The international conservation community has taken an important step toward saving African elephants from mass slaughter by voting at a major congress to call on all governments to ban their domestic trade in ivory.
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