Order of the National Green Tribunal in the matter of In Re: News Item titled "Are missing palm trees causing more lighting deaths in Bihar appearing in ‘The Times of India’ dated 29.05.2025". The original application was registered suo-motu based on the news item titled "Are missing palm trees causing …
A RECENTLY developed species of a native Australian tree -- the northern black wattle (Acacia auriculiformis) -- may save the precious tropical teak forests from being wiped out by offering high-quality furniture wood. Already well-established in China, India and south-east Asia, the black wattle is not a favourite for good-quality …
DEFORESTATION in the Brazilian Amazon since the 1970s is lower than estimated, but its effect on biological diversity is greater. Estimates of deforestation ranged as high as 50,000 square kilometres per year to 80,000 sq km in the late 1980s. But a NASA-University of New Hampshire study published in Science …
DESPITE being warned about the pitiable plight of the Uru Eu Wau Wau Indians in northwest Brazil, the World Bank (WB) did not stop to consider the effect on the tribals of a road construction project it was financing in the region. And now, unfortunately, the warnings are coming true. …
BOREAL forests -- consisting of mostly coniferous and some deciduous trees in the northern hemisphere -- are being destroyed faster than before and may be making the world a hotter place. Boreal forests comprise one-third of the world's forests and cover almost 8 per cent of the land surface. About …
DEVELOPING countries with vast forest reserves took a major step in coordinating a joint position on international cooperation in tropical forest management at the first ministerial conference of the forestry forum for developing countries (FFDC) in New Delhi in September. Indian environment minister Kamal Nath, who chaired the conference, told …
• Acknowledge that forests are an inalienable national resource and countries will choose uses of their forest resources according to national priorities and strategies; • assure access to technology through international cooperation to strengthen national capability; • increase financial assistance provided by developed countries and international organisations, including a restructured …
Tropical Forest Action Programme (TFAP) By far the biggest international body in tropical forest management, TFAP was formed on the 1983 decision of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation's committee on forest development in the tropics, consisting of about 50 Northern and Southern governments. FAO and some aid agencies expected …
SLASH-and-burn cultivation immediately conjures images of destruction. One imagines vast areas of smouldering forest land dotted with burnt out tree stumps. But this method of farming, also known as swidden cultivation, is actually a sustainable form of forest agriculture. The technique of slash-and-burn cultivation has been practised by generations of …
BORNEO'S dense, virgin rainforests are interspersed with large, naked patches where trees have been plucked out by loggers. Meandering rivers such as the Baram that run through the forests have turned red with silt washed down from the now-barren hillsides. The government and the timber companies, however, blame tribal shifting …
THE INTERNATIONAL Institute of Environment and Development (IIED) in London has been conducting research on environment- and development-related policy issues for the past 20 years. Policies for a Small Planet is its vision of "sustainable development" prepared for the 1992 Earth Summit and could well rate as one of its …
TROPICAL timber-producing countries insist temperate forests must be included in any accord reached to replace the International Tropical Timber Agreement (ITTA) when it expires next year. Their demand was made at a meeting of timber-producing and -consuming countries held in Geneva recently, even as Bruno Manser, a Swiss anthropologist, staged …
THE BRAZILIAN government swung into action recently to evict thousands of gold-panners from a 94,000- sq-kin Yanomami reserve near the Venezuelan border to save the 9,000 members of South America's largest Indian tribe from an outbreak of malaria. Thousands of panners who left the reserve to celebrate Carnival elsewhere are …
OVER THE years, the world at large has come to realise that the results of science must cease to remain the private property of a privileged few. This is all the more significant today, when the results of science have touched the very problem of existence. The need for public …
THE SPLENDOUS of a tropical rain forest invariably make a profound impression at first sight. "Here I first saw a tropical forest in its sublime grandeur- nothing but the reality can give any idea how wonderful magnificent the scene is..." exulted Charles Darwin, whose theory of evolution significantly shaped modern …
There has been a gradual decline in the natural vegetation around Madras. The reduction and fragmentation of the mainly tropical, dry, evergreen forest, also called scrub jungle, has led to the extinction of bird species, particularly those that are habitat-specific. Studies showed more migratory birds were found where new trees …
Malaysia is gaining support to fight industrialised countries who are pressing for a ban on logging in the tropical rainforests. Its partners in the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) have supported its stand and agreed to dissuade other countries from following Austria's lead and imposing mandatory labelling on tropical …
Information on the African rainforest elephant, whose survival is threatened, is trickling in now via satellite, thanks to a new technology. Wildlife biologists of the New York Zoological Society have put collars that emit ultra-high-frequency signals on a forest elephant in Korup National Park, Cameroon, and on a savannah elephant …
Japan, once described as an ecological outlaw in a civilised world, faced punishment in March 1991 for its role in endangering the hawksbill sea turtle. The US administration threatened to restrict import of all wildlife products from Japan, including pearl import worth US $53 million, unless the Japanese mended their …
Norway, Iceland and Japan have all faced pressures and threats of green embargoes over their demand for whaling quotas. These countries want the right to harvest whales "scientifically", particularly the minke whale, a smaller and supposedly not endangered mammal. In July 1990, the International Whaling Commission (IWC) met and, under …
Opposition to US beef imports began in Europe a few years after health conscious European consumers discovered US beef was hormone treated. When this issue was raised in GATT, the US argued there was little scientific evidence to show hormone-treated meat is harmful. But the EC, prompted by politics and …
