By Captain Paul Watson 16 April 2014 (Facebook) – Being a wildlife conservationist or an environmentalist is now considered one of the planet’s most dangerous occupations. We face very dangerous and powerful vested interests each day. They outnumber us and they are financially and politically connected. They are ruthless and they will deal harshly with […]
By DENIS D. GRAY14 April 2014 BANGKOK (AP) – As head of his village, Prajob Naowa-opas battled to save his community in central Thailand from the illegal dumping of toxic waste by filing petitions and leading villagers to block trucks carrying the stuff — until a gunman in broad daylight fired four shots into him. […]
3 April 2014 (FAO) – The FAO Food Price Index is a measure of the monthly change in international prices of a basket of food commodities. It consists of the average of five commodity group price indices, weighted with the average export shares of each of the groups for 2002-2004. » The FAO Food Price […]
Geneva, 24 March 2014 (WMO) – Temperatures in South America were dominated by hot conditions in most parts of the continent, except for some limited areas in southern Brazil and the north-central and western parts of South America, which had near to colder than average temperatures. A warm October–December period – including the hottest December […]
25 February 2014 (mongabay.com) – With more than 140 cities implementing water rationing, analysts warning of collapsing soy and coffee exports, and reservoirs and rivers running precipitously low, talk about the World Cup in some parts of Brazil has been sidelined by concerns about an epic drought affecting the country’s agricultural heartland. With its rise […]
1 February 2014 (World Bulletin) – Even by Brazilian standards – man, it’s hot. January was the hottest month on record in parts of Brazil including its biggest city, São Paulo. The heat, plus a severe drought, has kindled fears of water shortages, crop damage and higher electricity bills that could drag down the economy […]
By John Vidal18 December 2013 (theguardian.com) – 2013 was the seventh warmest year on record and saw one of the strongest cyclones, some of the longest heatwaves and the most topsy-turvy weather experienced in decades. Nowhere is thought to have witnessed faster change than Nikkaluokta, a small Lapland village above the Arctic circle in northern […]
By Brad Plumer14 November 2013 (Washington Post) – Want to know where we’re destroying the world’s forests? Here’s the very first high-resolution map showing the change in the world’s tree cover between 2000 and 2012. That comes from a new study published Thursday in the journal Science — the first effort to quantify in detail […]
29 October 2013 (mongabay.com) – Roads are rapidly expanding across the Brazilian Amazon opening up once remote rainforests to loggers, miners, ranchers, farmers, and land speculators, finds a new study published in the journal Regional Environmental Change. Researchers from Imperial College London and Brazil-based Imazon used maps of existing roads and satellite imagery to track […]
By Rhett A. Butler 23 October 2013 (mongabay.com) – Illegal logging remains pervasive in the Brazilian state of Pará, finds an assessment released Monday by Imazon. Analyzing satellite data and records from Pará’s environmental agency Sema, the Brazil-based NGO found that 78 percent of logging documented via satellite between August 2011 and July 2012 was […]