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 …
With Vietnam slowly opening up to Western scientists in the last decade, numerous organisations have been vying with each other to study the country's flora and fauna. After Ho Chi Minh ousted the French in 1954, Vietnam's leaders closed the country and its forests were effectively locked to outsiders. Even …
Ornamental fish breeding has expanded recently in Hanoi because of rising incomes. Increased incomes and a liberalised foreign trade is also taking a heavy toll of orchids and rhododendrons. Ethnic minorities collect rhododendron plants in large quantities in the high mountains and bring them regularly for sale in the cities, …
The 72 million litres of herbicides sprayed by US forces in Vietnam during the war will continue to plague several generations of post-war populations with a high rate of reproductive abnormalities. Some 40 million litres of Agent Orange were sprayed; the herbicide contained 170 kg of dioxin, which is the …
The threat to deforestation comes from several basic reasons: the nature of the country's economy; its high population growth rate; firewood demand; shifting cultivation and fire damage; economic liberalisation; and, the pressure on the country to earn foreign exchange through biomass exports like wood and rice. The per capita income …
Afforestation : In 1993, a 10-year programme was initiated to regreen the barren lands of Vietnam. But as one diplomat in Hanoi pointed out, the government went about the task of greening the land "in a militaristic manner', and planted eucalyptus and other exotic species over large stretches of the …
what makes Vietnam particularly worthy from a biodiversity point of view is also its very rich base of traditional medicine. This means Vietnam has the potential to make a worthwhile contribution to the global food and health sectors. Says Nguyen Duc Tao of the Vietnam Pharmaceutical Corporation, which is trying …
About 89 per cent of the Vietnamese population consists of lowland Kinhs and the Muong people, who occupy the two agricultural deltas of the Red River and the Mekong river, besides the narrow coastal strip. The remaining 11 per cent consists of ethnic minorities, most of whom live in the …
Vietnam has an Association of Herbal Traditional Doctors with a nationwide membership of about 20,000, which is recognised by the government. But the association is starved of funds. These traditional doctors often offer their services free and are usually very poor. Berit Richter, a Danish activist working in Hanoi, is …
Sun-kissed sands and fisherfolk cracking coconuts at the edge of palm-fringed villages - this could very well be another day in Paradise! But the truth is that Madagascar's ecology is just living on the edge. The world's fourth largest island today has as much as 90 per cent of its …
Droughts in west Africa over the past 20 years may have been caused by the destruction of rainforests in countries such as Nigeria, Ghana and Cote d'Ivoire, and further deforestation in the region "could cause complete collapse of the west African monsoon', says Xinyu Zheng of the Centre for Global …
the hilly regions of the central Himalaya are facing problems in the storage of sufficient water, especially during summers, for drinking and irrigation purposes. The eight hill districts of Uttar Pradesh (up), spread over 51,000 sq km, have a population of approximately five million, for whom the water resources have …
DEFORESTATION in Pakistan has increased manifold in recent years. Over-grazing, taking over of forest land for cultivation and the increased demand for timber, have led to an increase in logging operations, which has resulted in the forest cover decreasing from 14 per cent to 5.2 per cent of the total …
IN SPITE of stringent laws and regulations, illegal timber trade is flourishing in South American Countries. Investigations carried out by the Amsterdam-based Friends of the Earth International (FOEI) in Brazil, Cameroon and Paraguay have revealed that rampant illegal logging not only continues to threaten sustainable forest management, but also creates …
IN 1996, Kerala, considered a seismically safe zone, witnessed a tremor of magnitude 2.8 (on the Richter scale). This is not 4D isolated case, for the state has lately been seeing an increase in the frequency of tremors in its central and southern parts. Studies by C P Rajendran and …
THE largescale destruction of west Africa's tropical forests by farmers has been projected as a well-known environmental scandal. But recently, two British scientists have turned the controversy on its head by suggesting that almost half of the tropical forests that are said to have been destroyed by logging and farming …
a recent report of the us state department has turned a blind eye to the illegal timber trade across the border of Thailand and Cambodia. In order to preserve its cordial relations with Thailand, the department has notified the us Congress that Thailand has effectively sealed its border with Cambodia …
According to an early February report, the highly ambitious Mahakali project implemented by the Nepalese government requires much more organised effort to control flooding, river shifting and leakages of irrigation canals. This assessment is based on past experiences of the Sarada barrage of the project
the world's only known natural habitat of the rare Kitti's hog-nosed bat (Craseonycteris thonglongyai) could be threatened by Thailand's bid to bring natural gas from offshore fields in Myanmar. The size of a bumble bee and weighing only two grams when fully grown, the bat is considered to be the …
On not being assigned any environmental cases, although he is known for being interested in environmental affairs: I have been deliberately kept away from anything to do with the environment as far as assignments are concerned. The reason for not assigning any such case to me can only be answered …
The Centre will transfer more authority to the West Bengal pollution board, announced the governor on January 24. The state government also plans to prepare an environmental status report and implement risk management plans for the Asansol Durgapur and Haldia industrial areas. The ministry of environment and forests has demanded …
