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WTO Urged Not to Treat Water Like Widgets
Posted by Inter Press Service: Carey L. Biron on December 4th, 2013
Inter Press Service: As government representatives gather Tuesday in Indonesia for what could be final negotiations towards a global trade agreement under the World Trade Organisation (WTO), environmentalists and social justice campaigners are urging them to specify that water resources cannot be treated as commodities.
Critics of the privatisation and "financialisation" of natural resources are pointing to mounting interest by multinational investors in viewing common water resources as tradable, a change that development...
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South of the Border, Mining Is King
Posted by Inter Press Service: Carey L. Biron on November 1st, 2013
Inter Press Service: Civil society groups from throughout Latin America are urging "home countries" to take greater responsibility for the actions of their companies abroad, particularly those in the extractives industry.
"We would like to be able to influence policies that are being developed around the supply of minerals for various purposes - a lot of these policies are being framed as having to do with national defence, so there's practically a guarantee that these reserves must continue to be supplied," Pedro...
U.S. Regulator Lodges “Environmental Objections” to Keystone Plan
Posted by Inter Press Service: Carey L. Biron on April 23rd, 2013
Inter Press Service: Advocacy groups here are applauding the publication of new government concerns, formally expressed Monday by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), over a recent assessment of the environmental impact of a major oil pipeline that would run between Canada and the U.S. Gulf Coast.
Because the EPA will eventually have to sign off on any decision to approve the pipeline proposal, made by a Canadian company called TransCanada, this indication of the agency's strong reservations over the government's...
Keystone Opponents Deepen Criticism of Proposed Pipeline
Posted by Inter Press Service: Carey L. Biron on April 16th, 2013
Inter Press Service: Two new reports, put out by a cross-section of U.S. environmental and public interest groups, are attacking central rationales for the construction of a major new Canada-U.S. oil pipeline proposal, which has emerged as an emblematic cause for green groups who have angrily denounced a U.S. government approvals process.
A new study released Tuesday by eight of the country's most established environmental advocacy groups suggests that U.S. regulators have massively underestimated the proposal's environmental...
Concerns Mount as U.S. Plans Major Natural Gas Exports
Posted by Inter Press Service: Carey L. Biron on March 26th, 2013
Inter Press Service: Environmentalists and others here are reacting with concern to a surprise announcement on Monday of a major deal that would see U.S. natural gas exported to the United Kingdom, marking the first time that such sales have been permitted.
The agreement, between the UK energy company Centrica and the U.S.-based Cheniere Energy Partners, would see more than 1.7 million metric tonnes of liquefied natural gas (LNG) per year shipped to the United Kingdom, starting in 2018. The U.K.'s gas supply has been...
U.S. Environment Agency Releases First Climate Adaptation Plan
Posted by Inter Press Service: Carey L. Biron on February 12th, 2013
Inter Press Service: For the first time, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has publicly released a draft plan on how the department's programmes will adapt to global warming, in a move that could lay additional groundwork for important new emissions rulemaking the agency may announce in coming months.
Obama is being urged to set new carbon standards on U.S. power plants, cutting their greenhouse gas emissions by at least a quarter by 2020. Credit: public domain
The EPA is tasked with oversight of the...
Major Extractives Firms No Longer Ignoring Community Consent
Posted by Inter Press Service: Carey L. Biron on September 27th, 2012
Inter Press Service: New research from Oxfam, an international aid agency, finds that some of the largest multinational oil and mining companies are increasingly incorporating principles of community consent into their day-to-day operations.
Oxfam's researchers looked at 28 of the world's largest extractives companies and combed through their publicly available commitments to addressing the issue of community rights. They used the information to come up with a ranking - the Community Consent Index - that, coupled...
Calls for an African Green Revolution, Only Smarter
Posted by Inter Press Service: Carey L. Biron on June 7th, 2012
Inter Press Service: To deal with looming food crises in the coming decades, Africa needs a Green Revolution on par with what took place in Asia during the 1960s and 1970s, according to experts in Washington.
But such a revolution would need to ensure that the mistakes made in Asia are not repeated in Africa, warned Shenggen Fan, director general of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) here, while unveiling a new policy brief released here on Thursday.
As world leaders prepare to gather in Rio...