In 2024, the Emergency Events Database (EM-DAT) recorded 393 natural hazard-related disasters. These events caused 16,753 fatalities and affected 167.2 million people. Economic losses totaled US$241.95 billion. The year 2024 was marked by extreme temperature events in Asia that caused thousands of deaths, severe droughts in Africa affecting over 25 …
Limited data exists on emissions from agriculture-driven deforestation, and available data are typically uncertain. In this paper, we provide comparable estimates of emissions from both all deforestation and agriculture-driven deforestation, with uncertainties for 91 countries across the tropics between 1990 and 2015. Uncertainties associated with input datasets (activity data and …
The world’s last great wildernesses are shrinking at an alarming rate. In the past two decades, 10% of the earth’s wilderness has been lost due to human pressure, a mapping study by the University of Queensland has found. Over the course of human history, there has been a major degradation …
Climates scope a detailed, country-by-country quantitative assessment of clean energy market conditions and opportunities in 71 nations in South America, Europe, Africa, the Mideast, and Asia. For the first time since Climate scope was launched fouryearsago the average country score fell year-on-year. The top 10 highest scoring nations this year …
Global warming is expected to intensify the Earth’s hydrological cycle and increase flood and drought risks. Changes over the 21st century under two warming scenarios in different percentiles of the probability distribution of streamflow, and particularly of high and low stream- flow extremes (95th and 5th percentiles), are analyzed using …
The researchers aimed to provide the first comprehensive estimates of the burden of group B Streptococcus (GBS), including invasive disease in pregnant and postpartum women, fetal infection/stillbirth, and infants. Intrapartum antibiotic prophylaxis is the current mainstay of prevention, reducing early-onset infant disease in high-income contexts. Maternal GBS vaccines are in …
The Index of Economic Freedom provides compelling evidence of the wide-ranging tangible benefits of living in freer societies. The Index analyzes economic policy developments in 186 countries. Countries are graded and ranked on 12 measures of economic freedom that evaluate the rule of law, government size, regulatory efficiency, and the …
The total number of persons that suffer from hunger in Latin America and the Caribbean has increased, reversing decades of progress, even as overweight and obesity emerged as a major problem in all countries in the region of the Americas, according to the Panorama of Food Security and Nutrition in …
Fight to protect natural resources has become too dangerous in the face of violence from state forces, private security groups and state-sponsored vigilantes, say groups from 29 countries across Africa, Latin America and Asia Land rights defenders from 29 countries have written to the UN asking it to act against …
Latin American cloud forests, energy-saving street lights in Rio de Janeiro and sustainable cattle ranching in the Amazon will get a boost from new financial instruments to channel capital for tackling climate change, their backers said. The Lab, a network of programmes that incubates sustainable finance mechanisms, expects to attract …
This global report maps 39 dimensions of country risk that are material to the private sector, using globally comparable datasets produced by international institutions. Indian pharma companies should adopt sustainable financing strategies to develop zero-wastewater facilities says the report. The Earth Security Report 2017 provides a roadmap for global business …
Coffee lovers may find it harder to get their favourite caffeine fix in a few years' time, as global warming could cut coffee growing areas in Latin America by as much as 88 percent by 2050, scientists said on Monday. Latin America is the world's largest coffee-producing region. Coffee growing …
A severe late spring storm in central Mexico in March 2016 that struck the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve was unique because it was accompanied by high-velocity winds that eliminated the normal thermal protection provided by the Oyamel fir forest. Temperatures throughout the forest merged with the colder open-area ambient temperatures. …
Incorporating climate risk management into infrastructure planning and design is critical to building societal resilience and protecting economic growth. As pressures grow to build new infrastructure to cope with growing populations and to support expanding economic agendas, it is critical to ensure that policy makers and development practitioners are aware …
Universal access to electricity is deemed critical for improving living standards and indispensable for eradicating poverty and achieving sustainable development. In 2003, the 'Luz para Todos' (LpT—Light for All) program was launched aiming to universalize access to electricity in Brazil. The program focused on rural and isolated areas, also targeting …
For the past few years, Piauí, Brazil, has focused on generating jobs and generating renewable energy hand in hand. Piaui is captivated by the win-win-win-win of wind and solar power projects. (There are four wins since, aside from jobs and energy, renewables cut air pollution and global warming emissions.) Setting …
Historical changes in soil carbon associated with land-use change (LUC) result mainly from the changes in the quantity of litter inputs to the soil and the turnover of carbon in soils. We use a factor separation technique to assess how the input-driven and turnover-driven controls, as well as their synergies, …
Climate change is ranked alongside the Islamic State as one of the world's two greatest threats with increasing numbers of people concerned about global warming, according to an international survey by a U.S. think tank. The Pew Research Center survey of nearly 42,000 people in 38 countries showed the percentage …
This study explores the potential links between specialization in cocoa exports and deforestation in developing nations through the lens of ecologically unequal exchange. Although chocolate production was once considered to have only minimal impacts on forests, recent reports suggest damaging trends due to increased demand and changing cultivation strategies. I …
The fall armyworm, Spodoptera frugiperda (J. E. Smith 1797) (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae), is the most important corn pest in South America. Larvae feed mostly on leaves, but also ears when population densities are high. This pest has been historically controlled with insecticide applications, but many cases of resistance have limited their …
The strong focus on species extinctions, a critical aspect of the contemporary pulse of biological extinction, leads to a common misimpression that Earth’s biota is not immediately threatened, just slowly entering an episode of major biodiversity loss. This view overlooks the current trends of population declines and extinctions. Using a …
