Archive for May 10th, 2010

UN fears ‘irreversible’ damage to natural environment

Agence France-Presse: The UN warned on Monday that "massive" loss in life-sustaining natural environments was likely to deepen to the point of being irreversible after global targets to cut the decline by this year were missed. As a result of the degradation, the world is moving closer to several "tipping points" beyond which some ecosystems that play a part in natural processes such as climate or the food chain may be permanently damaged, a United Nations report said. The third "Global Biodiversity ...

Changing technologies to keep up with climate change

Reuters: Technological innovation is key to helping African farmers cope with the increasing challenges posed by climate change, say specialists. "Temperatures have increased and the danger is that agriculture is the backbone of [Africa's] economies," Lindiwe Majele Sibanda, chief executive officer of the South-African based Food, Agriculture and Natural Resources Policy Analysis Network (FANRPAN) [http://www.fanrpan.org/], told IRIN. "The increase in temperatures means we have less water in ...

Japan suggests a ‘Biodiversity Decade’

Mongabay: Japan, the host nation for the Nagoya Biodiversity Summit in October, has suggested adding a few more years to the UN's awareness-raising efforts on the biodiversity crisis. Instead of having the International Year of Biodiversity conclude after this December, Japan says it will propose making 2010-2019 the International Decade of Biodiversity. The announcement comes after a new UN report shows that biodiversity continues to decline worldwide threatening to 'tip' entire ecosystems ...

Madagascar: Frog rears young in dead leaves

BBC: A new species of frog has been discovered that lays its eggs and grows its tadpoles in dead leaves that litter the forest floor. The frog, found in the rainforest of Madagascar, is the first amphibian known to reproduce in this way. Other species reproduce in water that collects or pools within plants, but the new frog is the first discovered to rear its young in fallen leaves. Details are published in the journal Naturwissenschaften. Scientists have called the ...

No end in sight as huge U.S. oil spill veers west

Reuters: BP Plc said on Monday it will make another attempt at containing oil gushing deep in the Gulf of Mexico, this time with a much smaller funnel than it tried before, as a massive slick threatened Louisiana shores west of the Mississippi Delta. BP now aims to deploy a small "top hat" dome over the leak after its effort over the weekend to cover it with a huge metal box was stymied by a buildup of crystallized gas hydrates. Fears of a prolonged environmental and economic disaster ...

China spearheads biodiversity efforts: UNEP

Xinhua: The UN Environment Program (UNEP) has lauded efforts being spearheaded by China to stem a rapid decline in biodiversity that is now threatening extinction for almost half the world's coral reef species. UNEP spokesman Nick Nuttall said China is among the six countries in the world with the highest increase in land being converted or in the process of being converted to organic agriculture - up 300,000 hectares between 2007 and 2008. "However, there is a growing recognition in the ...

Helicopters to drop sandbags for oil protection

Associated Press: A sandbag airlift is under way in Louisiana. Blackhawk helicopters are picking up sandbags to fly them to be dropped on five points east of Port Fourchon. The project is aimed at protecting Lafourche Parish marshes from the massive oil slick. The spill began creeping farther west of the Mississippi River last week. Workers in a waterfront yard on Sunday packed sand into bags. About a dozen Louisiana National Guard soldiers put straps on one-ton sandbags to ready ...

Weather notes from both poles

Y! Green: Indicators continue to show disturbing trends and unexpected events, indicating that changes are taking place in the Earth's environment. The South Pole has had its warmest year ever (since record keeping began in the 1950s), and the North Pole experienced unexpected rain in late April. "My business is weird, wild and wacky weather, and this is up there among fish falling from the sky or Niagara Falls running dry," according to David Phillips, a senior climatologist with Environment ...

Oil spill solutions uncertain, slick spreads west

Reuters: The huge slick from the Gulf of Mexico oil spill threatened Louisiana shores west of the Mississippi Delta on Monday as BP Plc said it was trying multiple options to control the leak, without being sure that they would work. Fears mounted of a prolonged and growing environmental and economic disaster for the U.S. Gulf Coast after a weekend setback in an initial undersea move by the oil giant to contain the spill, which could become the worst in U.S. history. BP Chief Operating ...

World governments fail to halt biodiversity loss

Reuters: World governments have failed to meet a 2010 target to halt biodiversity loss and action must be taken to preserve the species and ecosystems upon which human life depends, a United Nations report said on Monday. In a move endorsed by the U.N. General Assembly, more than 190 countries committed in 2002 to achieve a significant reduction in the rate of biodiversity loss by 2010. But the report said: "The diversity of living things on the planet continues to be eroded as a result ...