Category Archives: Environment

Revealed: UK supermarket and fast food chicken linked to deforestation in Brazil

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Tesco, Lidl, Asda, McDonald’s and Nando’s all source chicken fed on soya from Cerrado tropical biome region

Supermarkets and fast food outlets are selling chicken fed on imported soya linked to thousands of forest fires and at least 300 sq miles (800 sq km) of tree clearance in the Brazilian Cerrado, a joint cross-border investigation has revealed.

Tesco, Lidl, Asda, McDonald’s, Nando’s and other high street retailers all source chicken fed on soya supplied by trading behemoth Cargill, the US’s second largest private company. The combination of minimal protection for the Cerrado – a globally important carbon sink and wildlife habitat – with an opaque supply chain and confusing labelling systems, means that shoppers may be inadvertently contributing to its destruction.

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Report clears WWF of complicity in violent abuses by conservation rangers

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But independent review criticises wildlife fund’s inconsistent approach to human rights

A long-awaited report into allegations that conservation rangers supported by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) committed violent abuses in several countries, including murder, has cleared the organisation’s staff of complicity but criticised it for serious shortcomings in oversight.

But even as the report was released, campaigners for tribal rights – including Survival International, which has long been a critic of WWF – suggested the report had failed to investigate some of the most serious issues and that it had been released two days before the US Thanksgiving holiday in an attempt to bury the news.

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Mathias Cormann continues to talk up ‘green recovery’ in ‘vision statement’ for top OECD job

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Exclusive: Former finance minister’s pitch pushes ‘zero net emissions as soon as possible’, which contradicts record while in Australian government

Australia’s former finance minister Mathias Cormann is continuing to talk up the importance of a “collective green recovery” on the campaign trail to be the next secretary general of the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

In a “vision statement” for the position obtained by Guardian Australia, Cormann says undertaking “effective global action on climate change is a must and we must get to zero net emissions as soon as possible”.

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The Indian school where students pay for lessons with plastic waste

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Villagers once burned the toxic waste as fuel, but a pioneering couple’s radical education model uses it much more creatively

Every morning, students in Assam’s Pamohi village go to school clutching a bag of plastic waste, in exchange for which they will get their day’s lessons.

Akshar School, founded by Mazin Mukhtar, 32, and his wife Parmita Sarma, 30, has turned its pupils into ecowarriors by waiving school fees and helping to stop local people burning used plastic.

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New Zealand couple shuns developers to give 900 hectares of land to nation

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Dick and Jillian Jardine said it was ‘the right thing’ to hand beautiful plot in Remarkables to national trust for conservation

A New Zealand farming family has gifted 900 hectares of pristine land by the edge of Lake Wakatipu to the crown, saying it is “the right thing to do”.

The stretch of land at the foot of the Remarkables range will become open to everyone in 2022, after being handed over to the Queen Elizabeth II National Trust for “the benefit and enjoyment of all New Zealanders”.

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Joe Biden announces John Kerry as pick to be first ever US climate envoy – video

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President-elect Joe Biden seeks to blunt criticism from leftwingers as he formally introduces his first round of cabinet nominations, by emphasising the fight against the climate crisis.

Biden says that in John Kerry, a former secretary of state and presidential nominee, America will have a full-time climate leader for the first time, someone with 'a seat at every table around the world'

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Police investigate I’m a Celebrity over fears non-native bugs may be escaping

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Rogue creatures from bushtucker trials including ‘ultimate survivor’ cockroaches could threaten Welsh countryside

Police are investigating I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here! over concerns non-native wildlife could have escaped into the Welsh countryside during bushtucker trials, the Guardian can reveal.

Rural crime officers from north Wales police are looking into complaints that non-native creatures such as cockroaches, maggots, spiders and worms could threaten wildlife in the 100-hectare (250-acre) estate surrounding Gwrych Castle in north Wales, where the show is being held this year.

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John Kerry named as Joe Biden’s special climate envoy

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  • Activists welcome appointment of heavyweight figure
  • Kerry to treat climate crisis as ‘urgent national security issue’
  • US politics – live coverage

John Kerry, the former US secretary of state and Democratic presidential nominee, has been named as a special envoy on the climate crisis under Joe Biden’s incoming administration.

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Why is Joe Biden considering this man to help fight the climate crisis?

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The Biden transition team is facing pressure not to hire people with fossil fuel ties, like Obama’s energy secretary Ernest Moniz

It was a deceptively low-key occasion on Capitol Hill: an older man in a dark suit, talking into a TV camera about an energy report.

According to his firm’s 362-page analysis, the fastest path to California’s climate goals included continuing to rely on fossil fuels. The analysis was funded by gas companies and groups related to them, but he wasn’t a lobbyist or industry consultant. Quite the opposite, he was the Obama administration’s well-respected energy secretary, Ernest Moniz.

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G20 leaders pledge to distribute Covid vaccines fairly around world

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Virtual summit an awkward swan song for Trump who skipped some sessions to play golf

G20 leaders meeting remotely pledged on Sunday to “spare no effort” to ensure the fair distribution of coronavirus vaccines worldwide, but offered no specific new funding to meet that goal.

The virtual summit hosted by Saudi Arabia was an awkward swan song for Donald Trump, who skipped some sessions on Saturday to play golf, paid little attention to other leaders’ speeches and claimed the Paris climate agreement was designed not to save the planet but to the kill the US economy.

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One little straggler: the swallow that didn’t fly south for the winter

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As our climate changes, unseasonal sightings of migrant birds are on the rise, including one spotted this month

At first, I assumed it was a starling. But as the bird rose into the cloudy November sky, I realised it was actually a juvenile swallow, fully two months after I would expect to see one here in Somerset.

Swallows are the classic spring and summer visitor to our shores; the proverbial sign that winter is over and spring has finally arrived. Having returned here from their homes in Africa in late March or early April, they settle down to raise two or sometimes three broods of young before heading back south in early October.

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Brazil accused of holding up UN biodiversity talks

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Objection to virtual meetings threatens next year’s conference in China, say environmental campaigners

Brazil has been accused of obstructing global efforts to protect nature following a row over the use of virtual meeting technology to overcome Covid-19 restrictions.

The dispute threatens a key United Nations conference in Kunming, China, next year, which aims to set new targets to protect the Earth’s natural life support systems.

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Half of child psychiatrists surveyed say patients have environment anxiety

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Research finds young people in England feel growing distress about the future of the planet

More than half of child and adolescent psychiatrists in England are seeing patients distressed about the state of the environment, a survey has revealed.

The findings showed that the climate crisis is taking a toll on the mental health of young people. The levels of eco-anxiety observed were notably higher among the young than the general population, according to the Royal College of Psychiatrists, which has just launched its first resources to help children and their parents cope with fears about environmental breakdown.

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Blue whale sightings off South Georgia raise hopes of recovery

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After single sighting in 20 years of surveys, new expedition and analysis bring 58

When the Antarctic blue whale – the largest and loudest animal on the planet – was all but wiped out by whaling 50 years ago, the waters around South Georgia fell silent.

Twenty years of dedicated whale surveys from ships off the sub-Antarctic island between 1998 and 2018 resulted in only a single blue whale sighting. But a whale expedition this year and analysis by an international research team resulted in 58 blue whale sightings and numerous acoustic detections, raising hopes that the critically endangered mammal is finally recovering five decades after whaling was banned.

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UK to support plans for new global treaty to ‘turn tide’ on plastic pollution

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Lord Goldsmith says Britain, the second biggest per capita producer of plastic waste, could play leading role in tackling crisis

Britain has thrown its weight behind a new global agreement to tackle the plastic pollution crisis, which Lord Goldsmith said would go “far beyond” existing international agreements.

This week, the Guardian revealed there is growing support for such a treaty internationally, but that neither the UK nor the US, the world’s biggest per capita producers of plastic waste, had yet pledged their support.

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Senior Biden adviser set for key role has ties to oil and gas, climate activists warn

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Climate advocates urge Louisiana congressman Cedric Richmond to leverage his new position to help bring attention to their plight

As Louisiana congressman Cedric Richmond takes a senior role in the incoming Biden administration, climate advocates and leaders in the fight against toxic air pollution in his district have warned of his history of poor engagement with vulnerable communities and his ties to the oil and gas industry.

But they also have urged him to leverage his new position to help direct attention to their plight.

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Covid-19 mink variants discovered in humans in seven countries

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Denmark has already launched a nationwide cull of its farmed mink herd after concerns for vaccine efficacy

Seven countries are now reporting mink-related Sars-CoV-2 mutations in humans, according to new scientific analysis.

The mutations are identified as Covid-19 mink variants as they have repeatedly been found in mink and now in humans as well.

Uncertainty around the implications of the discovery of a Covid-19 mink variant in humans led Denmark, the world’s largest mink fur producer, to launch a nationwide cull earlier this month.

The cull was sparked by research from Denmark’s public health body, the Statens Serum Institut (SSI), which showed that a mink variant called C5 was harder for antibodies to neutralise and posed a potential threat to vaccine efficacy.

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Unilever sets target of €1bn in annual sales of plant-based foods

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Multinational plans to cash in on consumer trend towards reducing meat and dairy intake

Unilever is setting a target of €1bn (£900m) in annual sales of its plant-based foods through some of its best-known brands, as it seeks to cash in on the growing number of consumers reducing their meat and dairy intake.

The estimated five-fold sales growth over the next five to seven years will be driven by new products from The Vegetarian Butcher meat-free label, and bolstered by expansion of dairy-free ice cream and mayonnaise ranges from Ben & Jerry’s, Hellmann’s, Magnum and Wall’s.

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New Zealand marine heatwave looms following warmest winter on record

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Temperatures nearly two degrees above average have been recorded, months before the hottest part of the season

Climate scientists are warning New Zealand is on the brink of a marine heatwave after recording temperatures nearly two degrees above average in coastal waters off the North Island.

Forecasters at the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) said a marine heatwave is building, with above-average temperatures reported throughout October, following a record warm winter.

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What could a good green recovery plan actually look like?

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What do governments across the world need to do to shift economies away from fossil fuels?

What does a green recovery look like? That is the question governments around the world are considering as they decide how to align their $12tn worth of economic rescue packages for dealing with the coronavirus pandemic with their obligations under the Paris climate accord.

The UK is expected to announce a 10-point recovery plan this week, and observers have warned that if it lacks ambition, it could undermine the world’s goals of limiting catastrophic climate breakdown.

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