23 February 2012 (AFP) – The collapse of the Mayan civilization was likely due to a relatively mild drought, much like the drier conditions expected in the coming years due to climate change, scientists said Thursday. Scholars have long believed that a major drought caused severe dry conditions that killed off the ancient culture known […]
In this world of 7 billion people, the global rural-urban balance of populations has tipped irreversibly in favour of cities. But what, exactly, is a “city” in 2011? Hania Zlotnik, the director of the Population Division of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs cautions against assuming too easy a definition because governments […]
December 5 (Catholic World News) – As the Durban Climate Change Conference reached its midway point, the president of the Church’s confederation of relief and development agencies compared current environmental policies to apartheid. Cardinal Óscar Rodríguez Maradiaga, president of Caritas Internationalis, said that “just as South Africa’s apartheid era policies sought divisions along race lines, […]
By David A Gabel, ENN20 October 20 Colombian government officials have reported that as many as 2,000 sharks have been killed in a single incident for their fins. The slaughter occurred in the Malpelo Wildlife Sanctuary, a remote 8,570 square kilometer area of the ocean off Colombia’s Pacific coast. The sharks were found at the […]
By Damian Carrington 30 August 2011 If, like me, you think urgent global action is needed to avert the worst impacts of global warming, then you will also agree that global opinion is crucial: political will is created directly out of public pressure. So a new global survey suggests the glass is two-thirds full. Sixty […]
By Sean Mattson10 June 2011 CERRO SAPO, Panama (Reuters) – The harlequin frog that hops and swims the rocky streams of a damp niche of Toad Mountain in eastern Panama’s dense tropical jungle has probably been on Earth for around 3 million years. Within a few more years, the black-spotted orange-and-white amphibian with dazzling green-tinged […]
By Dahr Jamil 02 Mar 2011 San Salvador – “We have a very clear position,” El Salvador’s Minister of Environment, Herman Chavez, told Al Jazeera at his office in San Salvador, the capital. “The President of El Salvador, last year on July 20th, in an extraordinary meeting of presidents that was convened here in San […]
By ELISABETH ROSENTHALMarch 9, 2011 TIMBÍO, Colombia — Like most of the small landowners in Colombia’s lush mountainous Cauca region, Luis Garzón, 80, and his family have thrived for decades by supplying shade-grown, rainforest-friendly Arabica coffee for top foreign brands like Nespresso and Green Mountain. A sign in the center of a nearby town proclaims, […]
Contact: Beth King, kingb@si.edu, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute 14 Feb 2011 Sleeping Beauty’s kingdom was overgrown by vines when she fell into a deep sleep. Researchers at the Smithsonian in Panama and the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee received more than a million dollars from the U.S. National Science Foundation to discover why real vines […]
By The Tico TimesMonday, January 10, 2011 Thugs on Saturday allegedly chased a biologist through a crowded market in the Pacific port of Puntarenas after he attempted to film shark fins drying at a makeshift dock. Investigating Costa Rica’s profitable shark-fin trade appears to be an increasingly dangerous undertaking. For the second time in less […]
