The report presents a mixed picture. Over the past 25 years, there have been notable improvements in child well-being in the group of countries examined in this report: steady decline in child mortality, overall reduction in adolescent suicide and increase in school completion rates. But the last five years have …
"In India, use of bicycle is still not encouraged much. However, in countries like Denmark and Netherland, bicycles are extensively used and are even considered a convenient means of transportation," said a New Delhi-based expert on transport, Anvita Arora. She was addressing a seminar jointly organized by Indore-based NGO Rupankan …
The Netherlands government has provided US$ 3 million (Tk 23 crore) to the UN World Food Programme (WFP) to help people living in disaster-prone districts of southwest Bangladesh get better prepared to face disasters in the future, reports UNB. The contribution will enable the government and WFP to support 7,000 …
Offshore wind farms to produce power for Kerala. A few years from now, wind farms located at sea could be churning out clean energy to feed the starved power grid in Kerala. The Agency for Non-conventional Energy and Rural Technology (ANERT) is preparing to take up a wind monitoring study …
Experts say the membership will help India procure more fuel and nuclear components Indian nuclear experts have told Business Standard that it is an opportune time for the country to gain membership of the Nuclear Suppliers’ Group (NSG), despite reservations expressed by China and some smaller European states such as …
Pit latrines are one of the most common human excreta disposal systems in low-income countries, and their use is on the rise as countries aim to meet the sanitation-related target of the Millennium Development Goals. There is concern, however, that pit latrine discharges of chemical and microbial contaminants to groundwater …
The felling of natural forest for palm oil plantations has enraged campaigners looking to protect orangutans An all-party scrutiny committee agreed new payments for renewable energy - including palm oil. This commodity is blamed for creating more greenhouse gases than it saves, and for destroying the rainforest habitat of orangutans. …
Expert warns that people should not be seduced by disaster insurance, saying it is not a panacea for weather-related shocks In most developing countries, farmers risk losing their crops and livestock to droughts or floods, and the recent intensity of these climatic shocks has been record-setting. As the losses from …
With a long-term vision of 100 years, the government is formulating a holistic and cross-sector plan on how to manage natural resources and reduce negative impacts of natural disasters for ensuring sustainable socio-economic development of the country. The Netherlands government is providing technical and financial support to Bangladesh to formulate …
About 40 to 54 per cent of the daily consumed foods including fish, milk and baby foods are found adulterated and poisonous and the adulteration is increasing for the last couple of years. This was disclosed in a report prepared by the National Food Safety Laboratory (NFSL) under the Institute …
Germany and six other EU nations hold the key to the decision on a rescue plan for the world's biggest carbon market after prices slumped due to record oversupply, three EU officials with knowledge of the matter said. The EU proposal to help emission prices rebound from all- time lows …
A Dutch court ruled on Wednesday that Royal Dutch Shell can be held partially responsible for pollution in the Niger Delta in southern Nigeria, saying the company should have prevented sabotage at one of its facilities. The district court in The Hague ordered Shell to pay unspecified damages to one …
The European Commission is considering law to ban pesticides linked to the decline of bees, a spokesman said on Friday. A report from the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) earlier this month said three widely-used pesticides made by Switzerland's Syngenta and Germany's Bayer posed an acute risk to honeybees. "We …
Scientists Lift Moratorium A Year After Tests Were Suspended Over Terror Fears Experiments with a deadly flu virus, suspended last year after a fierce global debate over safety, will start up again in some laboratories, probably within the next few weeks, scientists say. The research touched off a firestorm in …
Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission (BERC) has initiated a move to prepare a 'Feed-in-Tariff' (FIT) structure for renewable energy to promote its use in the country. FIT is a policy mechanism which is aimed at accelerating investment in renewable energy technologies. According to BERC officials, the regulatory body has successfully pursued …
Market leaders, Dutch follows tringent quality control The potato has a 12,000-year-old history but an even brighter future as a crop that is set to replace rice as a staple in the Asian rice-consuming countries. It requires less amount of water compared to other basic food products, without compromising the …
Exploring adaptation pathways into an uncertain future can support decisionmaking in achieving sustainable water management in a changing environment. Our objective is to develop and test a method to identify such pathways by including dynamics from natural variability and the interaction between the water system and society. Present planning studies …
With a strong tradition of recycling and incinerating, it now has too many waste-to-energy incinerators and not enough rubbish to meet demand. It has become Europe's biggest importer of trash from other countries, currently mainly from Norway. But as the European Union seeks to reduce the dumping of 150 million …
Consolidated net sales were Rs 33,867.32 cr for the given quarter as against Rs 32,507.45 cr last year Due to lower steel prices and higher raw material costs, coupled with the poor performance of its Europe division, Tata Steel reported a consolidated (including Tata Steel Europe Ltd, formerly Corus) net …
For policy making and spatial planning, information is needed about the impacts of climate change on natural ecosystems. To provide this information, commonly hydrological and ecological models are used. We give arguments for our assessment that modelling only is insufficient for determining the impacts of climate changes on natural ecosystems …
The EU plant health regime is no longer fit for purpose in preventing fatal plant diseases, says the Forestry Commission The UK's forests are under "unprecedented threat" from foreign pests and diseases, according to the government department responsible for the protection of forests and woodlands. The ash dieback fungus found …
