Blogging the End of the World™
By Staff WritersNiamey (AFP) March 22, 2010 West African farmers appealed Monday for help as drought and famine menaced people and livestock, with malnutrition already affecting nearly a third of the population. “Communities of farmers and pastoralists are already severely affected … with the acute malnutrition rate estimated at 29.9 percent, which is double the […]
By NICK O’MALLEY INVESTIGATIONSMarch 19, 2010 THE massive expansion of the mining industry in the Upper Hunter Valley is making people sick, say concerned residents who have campaigned for a decade for the government to establish independent air-quality monitoring and to conduct a proper health study. One resident, Di Gee, from Jerrys Plains, worries that […]
“The stream was 50 meters from our house and chemicals were dumped into it. Oh, it stank! The water ran like a natural stream, but it was warm toxic waste water. We had headaches, dizziness, stomachaches…. Our children loved to fish and swim in the river. They came home covered in crude. We fried the […]
HONG KONGMon Mar 22, 2010 10:38am EDT (Reuters) – Hong Kong’s harbor was cloaked in thick smog on Monday as air pollution soared to record levels ahead of the Hong Kong Sevens rugby tournament this weekend, the city’s premier sporting event. Taiwan, too, was hit by what are being called the worst sandstorms in 25 […]
Reporting by Elias Biryabarema; Editing by Kevin Liffey KAMPALA (Reuters) – Pollution in parts of Lake Victoria is worsening so fast that soon it may be impossible to treat its waters enough to provide drinking water for the Ugandan capital, a senior official said Monday. The lake, east Africa’s largest by area, also supplies water […]
Reporting by Tim Cocks; editing by Ralph Boulton ABIDJAN (Reuters) – Human beings are flushing millions of tonnes of solid waste into rivers and oceans every day, poisoning marine life and spreading diseases that kill millions of children annually, the U.N. said on Monday. “The sheer scale of dirty water means more people now die […]
By Alister Doyle in Oslo (Reuters) – A U.N. conference rejected on Sunday trade restrictions on red and pink corals used in jewelry in what environmentalists called a new setback for endangered marine species. Delegates at the 175-nation meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) in Doha failed to back a […]
By Doug ChadwickPhotograph by Joel Sartore …Lakes, swamps, and rivers make up less than 0.3 percent of fresh water and less than .01 percent of all the water on Earth. Yet these waters are home to as many as 126,000 of the world’s animal species, including snails, mussels, crocodiles, turtles, amphibians, and fish. Almost half […]
Contact: Joe Caspermeyer, joseph.caspermeyer@asu.edu, 480-727-0369Arizona State University Plastics surround us. A vital manufacturing ingredient for nearly every existing industry, these materials appear in a high percentage of the products we use every day. Although modern life would be hard to imagine without this versatile chemistry, products composed of plastics also have a dark side, due […]
By Navin Singh KhadkaEnvironment reporter, BBC News An invasive plant is emerging as a major problem in a Nepalese national park renowned for protecting endangered wildlife species, say scientists. The Chitwan National Park is listed as a Unesco world heritage site and is a major tourist attraction. It has been a huge conservation success story, […]
