The world is getting warmer and natural hazards are becoming more intense, likely bringing higher economic losses in the future. Today, four major weather perils result in expected economic losses of USD 200 billion annually. With more severe weather coming, economic losses are set to rise. The study analysis finds …
Per capita vegetable production in Asia and the Pacific has increased some 25 percent over the last decade. Yet, while Asian countries produce more than three-quarters of the worlds vegetables, they and other producers worldwide will need to dramatically increase their vegetable production by 47 percent to meet the nutritional …
Christian Aid publishes a report showing the devastating effects of climate change, with communities worldwide, particularly in worst hit poorer countries, being forced to change their way of life. While record-breaking floods in the UK received massive media coverage, along with broad acceptance that climate change was to blame, the …
Twenty-two people have been killed and nearly 200,000 others evacuated as floods and landslides hit a southern Philippine region still recovering from a deadly 2012 typhoon, the government said on Tuesday. Torrential rain struck the eastern section of Mindanao island at the weekend, unleashing a fresh round of misery for …
At least 13 people have been killed and tens of thousands forced from their homes by flooding and landslides caused by days of incessant rain in the southern Philippine island of Mindanao. Monday the weather bureau warned of more rain as a low-pressure area moves closer. The National Disaster Risk …
Natural disasters, led by Super Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines and flooding in Europe, cost a total of $125 billion (92bn euros) in 2013, German reinsurance giant Munich Re estimated on Tuesday. The figure was below the average over 10 years of $184bn, with insured losses of $31bn, down from …
The Asian Development Bank, the United Kingdom, and the Rockefeller Foundation are teaming up to help Asia’s fast growing secondary cities protect their urban poor from the ravages of climate change. The three partners have agreed to roll out an innovative programme to help 25 secondary cities in the region …
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged the international community today to ramp up aid for the Philippines' typhoon reconstruction, saying "we must not allow this to be another forgotten crisis." Ban met with key ambassadors stationed in Manila at the end of his three-day visit and urged donor countries to …
Twenty-seven bodies, all unidentified, were among the latest to be recovered under debris The death toll from Typhoon Haiyan that struck the central Philippines on Nov 8 has passed 6,000 with nearly 1,800 people missing, officials said today. Twenty-seven bodies, all unidentified, were among the latest to be recovered under …
IN AUGUST environmentalists in the Philippines vandalised a field of Golden Rice, an experimental grain whose genes had been modified to carry beta-carotene, a chemical precursor of vitamin A. Golden Rice is not produced by a corporate behemoth but by the public sector. Its seeds will be handed out free …
Scientists have discovered a wonder rice gene that could dramatically increase yields of one of the world’s most important food crops, the Philippines-based International Rice Research Institute (Irri) said yesterday. Preliminary tests show that yields of modern long-grain “indica” rice varieties, the world’s most widely-grown types of rice, can rise …
Cadres of Change: Transforming Biotech Farmers in China, India, and the Philippines is an empirical testimony to how biotech crops are changing the lives of small farmers, their families and that of their communities. It is also a serious look into how technology adoption in developing countries can address key …
Delegates from more than 190 nations at the annual U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) negotiation in Warsaw, Poland today reached agreement on a pathway to Paris in 2015, where they have committed to adopt a new, comprehensive, post-2020 agreement to address the climate crisis. Countries also agreed to …
The World Bank said it raised to almost $1 billion its financial aid package to support relief and reconstruction in typhoon-devastated areas in the central Philippines, as the toll of death and destruction kept rising more than two weeks after the storm. The World Bank said it offered $480 million …
The report warns of emerging epidemics in some countries A significant progress has been seen in a number of countries in Asia and the Pacific in reducing new HIV infections by over 50 per cent since 2001, but the impact appears to be slowing down with overall numbers across the …
The typhoon that hit the Philippines has caused crop losses worth $110 million and inflicted damage to the agriculture sector of more than twice that figure, preliminary estimates from the United Nation's food agency showed on Tuesday. Some 153,495 hectares (ha) of rice paddy, maize and other high value crops …
WARSAW: World may be looking at India for its response to what had happened recently in Odisha and Uttarakhand due to natural disasters which were results of climatic extremes, but there was not a word on these two unfortunate incidents from Indian side, comprising official negotiators, here at the UN …
The Global Climate Risk Index 2014 has ranked Pakistan among the three most affected countries worldwide for three consecutive years by climate-related catastrophes. The Germanwatch climate risk index shows that the most severe weather-related catastrophes occurred in Haiti, the Philippines and Pakistan. The ninth annual index was released at the …
China, the EU and environmentalists criticized Japan at U.N. climate talks on Friday for slashing its greenhouse gas emissions target after its nuclear power industry was shuttered by the Fukushima disaster. The Japanese government on Friday decided to target a 3.8 percent emissions cut by 2020 versus 2005 levels. That …
The Warsaw climate meet may have had a dramatic start with a Philippines envoy announcing a fast until a meaningful outcome to negotiations, but there’s no sign of progress towards any agreement with some industrialised countries even backing out of their earlier commitments. The Philippines climate change commissioner Yeb Sano’s …
Haiti, the Philippines and Pakistan were hardest hit by weather disasters in 2012, a report issued at U.N. climate talks on Tuesday showed, as the death toll mounted from the latest typhoon to devastate the Philippines. Germanwatch, a think-tank partly funded by the German government, said poor nations had suffered …
