The World Meteorological Organization’s State of the Climate in Asia 2024 report warns that the region is warming nearly twice as fast as the global average, driving more extreme weather and posing serious threats to lives, ecosystems, and economies. In 2024, Asia experienced its warmest or second warmest year on …
The appreciation for natural resources as a driver of economic development has undergone a dramatic change in the past decades. Although an abundance of resources was generally perceived as advantageous until the 1980s, an influential literature emerged in the 1990s that reached seemingly opposite conclusions. The phrase "natural resource curse" …
Cities worldwide are promoting environmentally "green' roofs to mitigate several urban problems. Ground cover, shrubs and other flora planted across a building's roof can reduce storm water runoff, easing the burden on local sewers and water treatment systems. And the vegetation can keep the roof cooler in summer, lowering interior …
Over the past decade, thousands of families in Rajasthan's remote villages have installed solar lighting systems at their homes, which harness solar energy to generate electricity. It is a simple device but it has shrunk the nights in Rajasthan's countryside. Over the past decade, thousands of families in the state's …
Water supply through gravity flow mechanism to rural homes, especially in tribal areas, can be regarded as a key component of rural development. A simple and sustainable concept, it has successfully provided a continuous water supply to rural villages. In gravity flow, water is harnessed by estimating the flow of …
What lessons for policy makers at national and international level can be drawn from the growing experiences of reconciling development and climate change? The key to achieving this is to approach the problem from the development perspective, since that is where in most countries the priority lies. Current knowledge on …
It's not often that a remote village finds a mention in government tourism brochures. Khonoma in Nagaland does. The village is not exactly an archetypal exotic destination. You have to withstand a two-hour, bone-rattling bus trip from Kohima to get there. But it's a trip worth taking if you are …
Centre for Environment Concerns (CEC), Hyderabad, in association with over two hundred activists and select voluntary organizations is assisting officials in select districts in implementing the NREGA in Andhra Pradesh. This is based on a memorandum of understanding between CEC and the Department of Rural Development and agreed upon as …
"Why do those people need toilets? They are dirty by birth and can never have clean habits" remarked Ghanasyam Malik of Banjor village in Ganjam district of Orissa. This is an often-repeated question faced by Gram Vikas's community organizer in villages where the MANTRA (Movement and Action Network for Transformation …
A global conference on small-scale fisheries that will highlight responsible fisheries and social development will be held 13-17 October 2008 in Bangkok, Thailand. The 4SSF Conference will have a broad scope allowing for the discussion of a wide range of issues including, inter alia, wider social and economic development and …
A recent Seafood Summit in Barcelona discussed the challenges and responses from West Africa to the issue of traceability of fish. Decreasing resources and swelling populations, as a result of internal migration generated by desertification, political unrest, etc., mean that if coastal communities are to continue making a living from …
The tribal women in the sleepy village of Donga-nala in Korba district run a unit for making medicines from herbs, thus converting traditional medicinal knowledge into fortunes. Tribal women beat the poverty trap with fortunes from traditional medicines Converting traditional medicinal knowledge into fortunes
Joint Forest Management (JFM) is an organic process targeting the regeneration of degraded forests by involving the local community and operates on the interaction between the Forest Department and the local community. Successful formation and functioning of Village Forest Councils (VFCs) is the key factor that decides the success of …
Three rooms of London's Lisson Gallery are currently home to 21 blocks of recycled human waste. I walk in between them, passing my fingers over the surface of one, round the corner of another. They don't smell, crumble or smudge.They are not distasteful to the eyes. They are large as …
In New Zealand, where I live, and in Australia, the pro- us media is today loaded with anti-Chinese propaganda. Only one metropolitan daily newspaper in New Zealand is not controlled by pro- us interests. It regularly exposes us propaganda. For example, it found that claims of formaldehyde contamination in Chinese-made …
Agricultural expansion, opening of new roads and migration of people to unexploited areas are all major causes of Amazon deforestation; thus many sectors share the responsibility for reversing it.
This publication details the successful story of participatory conservation of Whale Shark (Rhincodon typus) in Gujarat lead by WTI. The whale shark campaign is one of the stellar conservation stories that have come out of India in the past few years. To take a fish that was hunted and traded …
This report highlights the importance of strengthening institutions for environment management in sustaining and accelerating India's strong growth performance. Specifically, it analyzes and identifies opportunities in institutional development and capacity building measures to strengthen monitoring and enforcement of environmental compliance and enhances environmental performance in the three major sectors
This report addresses the interrelated challenges of development and environmental sustainability. It assesses progress and priorities in the agenda to achieve the MDGs. It assesses the challenge of environmental sustainability and its implications for developing countries, and monitors progress at national and global levels to address the challenge. Based on …
