The IMF’s April 2025 Regional Economic Outlook for Sub-Saharan Africa presents a clear warning: regional growth is slowing, debt pressures are mounting, and donor assistance is declining. Yet the report outlines critical opportunities particularly in domestic revenue mobilization, structural reform, and private sector activation that can shape a more resilient …
Pune, September 10 The latest to join the green brigade in the city, the jewellers may gift every customer, who purchase gold from them on Dassera (buying gold on Dassera is considered auspicious), a Shami tree sapling. The Department of Social Forestry has proposed to distribute about one lakh saplings …
Focus on empowerment: C. Ramasamy (second left), Vice-Chancellor of Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, releasing a souvenir in Coimbatore on Monday. Jayanthi Murali (right), Head of Division (Land Use), State Planning Commission, Chennai, receiving the first copy. Coimbatore: The Self-Help Groups (SHGs) generate positive impact on the rural economy through empowering …
The concept of ecosystem services has received significant attention since the appearance of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment(MA). Ecosystem services are the benefits people obtain from ecosystems. The MA has subdivided ecosystem services into four categories: provisioning such as the production of food and water; regulating, such as the control of …
Climate change is a serious environmental challenge that could undermine the drive for sustainable development. Since the industrial revolution, the mean surface temperature of earth has increased an average of 1degree celsius per century due to the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Furthermore, most of this change has …
GDP does not calculate the wealth of ecosystems and biodiversity Human well-being is completely dependent on the smooth flow of ecosystem services, such as food, fibres, clean water, healthy soil and carbon capture. They are public goods, but with no market and no prices, and hence are rarely detected by …
A report riles industrial farming nations and agribusiness The us, Canada and Australia have rejected an International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (iaastd), which believes there should be a shift in practising agriculture, to a
Mangroves are disappearing rapidly worldwide despite their well documented biodiversity and the ecosystem services they provide. Failure to link ecological processes and their societal benefits has favored highly destructive aquaculture and tourism developments that threaten mangroves and result in costly
The rapid increase in food prices in many countries has led to substantial media attention on agriculture. This publication does not attempt to cover everything there is to know about agricultural ecosystems. Rather, it tries to present well documented facts and figures to better understand the challenges facing the sustainable …
Biodiversity for food and agriculture includes the variability among living organisms contributing to food and agriculture, including also the forestry and fisheries sectors. This concept includes diversity within species, between species and of ecosystems. While biodiversity for food and agriculture will be significantly affected by climate change, it will also …
The coastal marine environment provides enormous value in fishery and other products and in ecosystem services including coastal protection, water purification, and appropriate locations for ports, harbors, urban centers, tourist destinations, and numerous recreational pursuits. Current management practices are ineffective and to continue them will endanger coastal economies and ecosystems …
The potential loss or large-scale degradation of the tropical rainforests has become one of the iconic images of the impacts of twenty-first century environmental change and may be one of our century's most profound legacies. In the Amazon region, the direct threat of deforestation and degradation is now strongly intertwined …
This publication highlights the importance of sustainable agriculture not only to preserve biodiversity, but also to ensure that will be able to feed the world, maintain agricultural livelihoods, and enhance human well being into the 21st century and beyond. At the same time, it seeks to highlight the importance of …
Payments for environmental services (PES) are an innovative approach to conservation that has been applied increasingly often in both developed and developing countries. To date, however, few efforts have been made to systematically compare PES experiences. Drawing on the wealth of case studies in this Special Issue, we synthesize the …
Marketing several environmental services from a single area can help access diverse sources of funding and make conservation a more competitive land use. In Bolivia's Los Negros valley (Department of Santa Cruz), bordering the Ambor
Payments for environmental services (PES) have attracted increasing interest as a mechanism to translate external, non-market values of the environment into real financial incentives for local actors to provide environmental services (ES).
The Environmentally Sensitive Areas (ESA) program, when launched in the United Kingdom (UK) in 1986, was the first agri-environmental program in the European Union (EU). This program grew to a total of 43 designated ESA schemes in the UK as a whole, 22 of which were in England. A variety …
