The World Meteorological Organization’s State of the Climate in Asia 2024 report warns that the region is warming nearly twice as fast as the global average, driving more extreme weather and posing serious threats to lives, ecosystems, and economies. In 2024, Asia experienced its warmest or second warmest year on …
Global warming intensifying natural disasters in Bangladesh Storms batter Bangladesh every year. Cyclone Sidr killed more than 4,000 people in November, 2007, causing a loss of over us $900 million. It triggered 5-metre high waves that devastated coastal areas, displacing over 2 million people The worst cyclone was in 1970 …
cyclone Sidr hit Bangladesh on the night of November 15, killing thousands of people and severely damaging paddy crops just before harvest, and the Sundarbans. Though the official death toll till November 20 was about 4,000, unofficial estimates say the figure could cross 10,000. The worst cyclone in terms of …
Ata-Ul-Haq is CEO of Green Technology Environmental Corporation, which set up Pakistan's first mega composting plant in Lahore in 2006. He tells Arnab Pratim Dutta that the model adopted for the plant can be replicated across South Asia Why a composting plant for Lahore? Getting this plant up and running …
No littering in bhutan: Bhutan has passed a law to prevent littering and pollution in the kingdom's capital Thimphu. The Thimphu Municipal Solid Waste Management Rules and Regulations 2007 will come into force from December 1, laying down stiff penalties for littering and illegal dumping of waste in and around …
despite the two recent floods which forced farmers to plant seedlings late, Bangladesh has achieved season's target of cultivation of paddy on 5.3 million hectares, say officials. In August and September, the country faced two massive floods which affected two-thirds of its land, especially in the central districts around greater …
cleaning Colombo: The Supreme Court of Sri Lanka in the second week of October has directed the attorney general to prepare a new action plan within a month to reduce air pollution caused by vehicles in the capital city of Colombo. Acting on a petition filed by the Environmental Foundation …
DAM IT: On August 30, 2007, the Pakistan government announced the expansion of the Tarbela dam, built on the Indus river. A consortium, Tarbela Hydro Limited and Associates, comprising the India-based Kohinoor Group and the UAE-based Al-Nahyan Group, was to undertake the US $500 million Tarbela dam expansion project to …
pakistan's plan of a 25-km elevated expressway in Karachi, linking the city's airport and two ports, has triggered protests in the country. Opponents of the us $350 million project point at financial unviability and a skewed environment impact assessment (eia) report. But the City District Government Karachi (cdgk), the project …
The floods in South Asia, which was one of the worst in recent times, have claimed hundreds of lives. By the second week of August, the floods had affected more than 20 million people and claimed around 2,000 lives across India, Nepal and Bangladesh, notes a un report issued on …
A review of the implementation of the Asian Development Banks (adbs) water policy and water supply and sanitation (wss) projects in India has exposed its failings. In 2005, adb funded WaterAid, international ngo, to conduct an independent review of its own water policy implementation in South AsiaIndia, Bangladesh and Nepal. …
there have been umpteen theories on why South Asians are more at risk of developing vascular diseases. Now a team of Indian, Canadian, Scottish and Iranian researchers have come up with a new theory based on the pattern of fat distribution in the bodies of South Asians to explain why …
power failure: Bangladesh's shrimp industry in the south of the country is facing severe power shortages. Work in 39 shrimp processing factories in Bagerhat, Khulna and Satkhira districts has been hampered and they have incurred losses amounting to Rs 2 crore per day. Factory owners complained that their factories had …
The Kathmandu reaches of the Bagmati River are widely characterised as severely degraded. This article explores the rhetorical life and death of the concept of a 'Bagmati civilisation': a particular configuration of history, cultural identity and river ecology espoused by a prominent Nepali river restorationist. Following the 2001 imposition of …
Dhole (Cuon alpinus), a pack-hunting canid, is a coursing predator of the Asian jungles. It preys on wild ungulates such as Sambar and Wild Pig and also on livestock when available. The propensity of Dholes to attack livestock, however, had resulted in the people of Bhutan nearly eradicating Dholes in …
The relationship between climate change and cities is complex. City-based activities contribute significant amounts of greenhouse gases and, simultaneously, are often more vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. Dhaka is now the world's eighth largest city and a significant proportion of Bangladesh's greenhouse gases are generated there although, relative …
India leads the world with largest number of diabetic subjects earning the dubious distinction of being termed the “diabetes capital of the world”. According to the Diabetes Atlas 2006 published by the International Diabetes Federation, the number of people with diabetes in India currently around 40.9 million is expected to …
Previous studies have found that atmospheric brown clouds partially offset the warming effects of greenhouse gases. This finding suggests a tradeoff between the impacts of reducing emissions of aerosols and greenhouse gases. Results from a statistical model of historical rice harvests in India, coupled with regional climate scenarios from a …
In the early 1980s, K. C. Saha from the School of Tropical Medicine in Kolkata attributed skin lesions in West Bengal, India, to exposure to arsenic in groundwater pumped from shallow tube wells. Despite these findings, millions of tube wells have been installed across the Bengal Basin, the geological formation …
• Annual rice production falls short of demand by 50 million tonnes. Annual growth in rice yield declined from 2.5 per cent during the green revolution (1960-70) to 1.1 per cent since 1980s, while global population grew by 1.4 per cent • 90 per cent of rice is cultivated in …
This study aims to provide a clearer picture of gender roles, issues and concerns in the artisanal and small mines1 (ASM) sector in India. Women constitute a large segment of workers in the informal2 mines all over the world. In India, however, the patriarchal social structure tends to obscure the …
