Good Food is First Food. It is not junk food. It is the food that connects nature and nutrition with livelihoods. This food is good for our health; it comes from the rich biodiversity of our regions; it provides employment to people. Most importantly, cooking and eating give us pleasure. …
to stop the illegal trade of animals from the Amazon, Brazil has launched a training course for police officers to detect forged export permits. Every year, about 12 million animals, worth us $1.5 billion in the international market, are smuggled out of Brazil, says Denner Giovanini, head of the National …
the Akali Dal-Bharatiya Janata Party ( bjp) coalition government in Punjab has decided to do away with a number of populist measures, including free water and power provided to farmers. Gifting money to girls belonging to a scheduled caste and or the Christian community at the time of their marriage …
Though the Himachal Pradesh government is willing to sacrifice the interests of villages in the Great Himalayan National Park (GHNP) for the cause of conservation of biodiversity, these concerns seem to take a backseat when other interests are involved. It has denotified 90 sq km of the park area for …
smog sends 53,000 people to the hospital each summer and triggers more than six million asthma attacks in the eastern United States, according to estimates released by clean air activists. Smog created in the summer is called ground-level ozone, the main culprit in what environmentalists believe is a public health …
National Report on the Implementation of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification in those Countries Experiencing Serious Drought and/or Desertification, Particularly in Africa (CCD)
The World Conservation Union (iucn) has warned that some of the most ancient trees on Earth face extinction. In a report titled Action Plan for Conifers, IUCN says a quarter of the world's conifer species are threated. Among these conifers, many are survivors from the dinosaur age. Only three specimens …
in an ambitious revival of exploration of Mars, two us spacecraft have approached the planet. One spacecraft has studied the atmosphere, prospects of water and observed weather through the seasons of a full Martian year (687 days). The second craft is on course for a landing on December 3 at …
Keeping ones mouth shut? Even the sharks know this, if we are to believe David Sims of the University of Aberdeen in the uk . According to Sims, basking sharks know when to keep their mouth shut, while they cruise the coast. He has also calculated that sharks need to …
as a twelve-year-old, Gurdev Singh Hira, now a senior soil physicist at the Punjab Agricultural University ( pau ) in Ludhiana, saw the water in his well rise so fast that he could touch it with his hands. But as he grew up the water level went down to such …
saudi arabia has banned the import of beef from South Africa because of concerns over "mad cow' disease, despite assurances from South Africa that its beef is safe, reported the daily Asharq al-Awsat . The South African government says the country has never been affected by the disease, which came …
eco-friendly truck: J Sainsbury Plc of the uk has developed the world's first solar photovoltaic-cooled food distribution truckthat aims at increasing the commercial use of the eco-friendly solar energy and reducing operating costs. Ample power for the refrigeration unit is generated by solar panels mounted on the trailer's roof. This …
Water lilies or nymphea can restore the purity of polluted rivers and other water sources. They can treat wastewater of residential as well as industrial areas, said scientists working at Hebrew University in Israel. According to the scientists, the plant is capable of absorbing huge quantities of heavy and poisonous …
the Turkish government has placed the town of Golcuk in quarantine to guard against the spread of diseases following the devastating earthquake in the second week of August. The naval base in the town was also sealed. Only those with special passes were allowed to travel in or out of …
new biofertiliser: Hyderabad-based Pratistha Industries Limited has come up with an indigenous technology to produce biofertiliser and protein-rich animal feed from maize waste. This technology has already been marketed by a Secunderabad-based entrepreneur, said K V S S Sriram, managing director of the company. The Thapar Corporate Research and Development …
Only 2.5 per cent of all the world's water is fresh, that is, fit for human consumption, agriculture and industry. However, in several parts of the world, water is being used at a much faster rate than can be replenished by rainfall. The United Nations warns that the shortage of …
There are numerous ways to get to the lake colony. But there is no way to avoid getting the weeds entangled with the oars. The weeds are something the people have learnt to live with, and have also found a couple of uses for them, such as fertilisers. They complain …
australia said it was seeking an injunction to halt "experimental' fishing by Japan for southern bluefin tuna. Australia has accused Japan of using science to disguise commercial fishing and is seeking a declaration from the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea that the experimental fishing programme is illegal. …
The country's forest cover has shrunk by a third in the last 15 years due to illegal logging, slash-and-burn farming methods and felling of trees to make way for plantation crops, according to forest officials. A study by Vietnam Forestry Scientific Institute (vfsi) reveals that natural forest now covers 28 …
