6 February 2017 (Mongabay) – Most of the attention around palm oil production has focused on where the crop has the largest footprint: Southeast Asia. Yet oil palm plantations are rapidly mushrooming throughout the tropics, from the species’ ancestral home in West and Central Africa to Pacific islands to Latin America. A new film, Appetite […]
By Brian Kahn 2 February 2017 (Climate Central) – The Environmental Protection Agency’s website has begun to transform under the Trump administration. A group of researchers have found what are likely the first steps in a major overhaul of a site that’s been closely watched since President Trump’s inauguration on Jan. 20. Federal climate plans […]
By Sandra Cuffe1 February 2017 (Mongabay) – Global Witness, a London-based NGO, published a report yesterday examining the involvement of government officials and foreign aid in violent conflicts over mining, hydroelectric, tourism, and palm oil projects in Honduras. The result of a two-year investigation, the report includes several case studies and a series of recommendations […]
By Tom Batchelor 30 January 2017 (The Independent) – A former climate change adviser to Donald Trump has said the US President will pull America out of the landmark Paris agreement and an executive order on the issue could come within “days”. Myron Ebell, who took charge of Mr Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) transition […]
28 January 2017 (United Nations) – The United Nations agencies dealing with global refugee and migration issues today expressed the hope that the United States will continue its strong leadership role and long tradition of protecting those who are fleeing conflict and persecution. “The needs of refugees and migrants worldwide have never been greater, and […]
By Sharon Lerner26 January 2017 (The Intercept) – While Donald Trump was reviving both the Dakota Access and Keystone XL pipelines, muzzling federal employees, freezing EPA contracts, and first telling the EPA to remove mentions of climate change from its website — and then reversing course — many of the scientists who work on climate […]
27 January 2017 (Climate Nexus) – In various interviews on Thursday, former U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) transition chief Myron Ebell confirmed the Trump team would probably seek significant cuts to the agency’s workforce and budget, but would not provide details of specific policy recommendations he made to the president. Ebell, who told the AP […]
By Niv Sultan 24 January 2017 (Center or Responsive Politics) – Scott Pruitt’s confirmation hearing last week involved some pointed visual props. Making the case that Pruitt, the Oklahoma attorney general who is President Trump’s nominee to head the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), is cozy with the energy sector, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) held up […]
By Joel Achenbach 26 January 2017 (The Washington Post) – Leaders of several of the nation’s top science organizations say they’ve been shunned by the Trump administration and are alarmed by signs that the administration will muzzle government researchers and reject the scientific evidence that informs such critical issues as vaccine safety and climate change. […]
By Lauren Leatherby27 January 2017 New York (Financial Times) – […] Mr Trump cited terrorism risks as his reason for limiting the number of refugees the US takes. However, since the US refugee programme began in 1975, more than 3.2m refugees have entered the United States and only three have carried out a deadly terrorist […]
