Researchers use supercomputer to predict potential breeding areas as food security fears grow
Scientists monitoring the movements of the worst locust outbreak in Kenya in 70 years are hopeful that a new tracking programme they will be able to prevent a second surge of the crop-ravaging insects.
The UN has described the locust outbreak in the Horn of Africa, and the widespread breeding of the insects in Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia that has followed, as “extremely alarming”.
Continue reading...Investigation traces meat sold to JBS and rival Marfrig to farm owned by man implicated in Mato Grosso killings
A new investigation has linked the world’s biggest meat company JBS, and its rival Marfrig, to a farm whose owner is implicated in one of the most brutal Amazonian massacres in recent memory.
The report by Repórter Brasil comes as JBS faces growing pressure over transparency failings in its Amazon cattle supply chain.
Continue reading...Naturalist says approval of high-speed rail project failed to take account of climate impact
A fresh legal challenge to HS2 has been launched by the naturalist and broadcaster Chris Packham, arguing that the UK government’s decision to approve the high-speed rail network failed to take account of its carbon emissions and climate impact.
Packham and the law firm Leigh Day said the Oakervee review, whose advice to proceed with HS2 in full was followed by Boris Johnson last month, was “compromised, incomplete and flawed”.
Continue reading...Dozen member states hope letter will focus minds before Glasgow UN talks this year
A dozen countries have called for an EU climate target for 2030 to be drawn up “as soon as possible”, if the bloc is to galvanise the rest of the world before vital UN talks in Glasgow later this year.
In a letter to the EU’s top official on climate action, Frans Timmermans, the dozen EU member states say “the EU can lead by example and contribute to creating the international momentum needed for all parties to scale up their ambition” by adopting a 2030 EU greenhouse gas emissions reduction target “as soon as possible and by June 2020 at the latest”.
Continue reading...UK on course to lose a quarter of its sandy coast because of human-driven erosion
Almost half of the world’s sandy beaches will have retreated significantly by the end of the century as a result of climate-driven coastal flooding and human interference, according to new research.
The sand erosion will endanger wildlife and could inflict a heavy toll on coastal settlements that will no longer have buffer zones to protect them from rising sea levels and storm surges. In addition, measures by governments to mitigate against the damage are predicted to become increasingly expensive and in some cases unsustainable.
Continue reading...Australia is heating more rapidly than the global average, with a rise of 4C expected by 2100, Bureau of Meteorology says
The summer just finished was Australia’s second-hottest on record, with the temperature 1.88C above average, the Bureau of Meteorology says.
The only hotter summer on record was the previous year, which was 2.14C above average. Temperatures this summer were above average across almost the entire country.
Continue reading...6 March 1920 The rough cocksfoot and spear grass along the lane ditches bent over as with a light fall of snow, while the horses shivered down their quarters
Surrey, March 4
Hoar frost fell heavily in the early morning – it came from the south in a mist that clouded the moon; the rough cocksfoot and spear grass along the lane ditches bent over as with a light fall of snow. Cattle turned on to the pasture land smelt the air and stopped to low; when, a little later, the horses were set, some to the harrow and some to the drill, they shivered down their quarters; the labourers at each turn of the field swung their arms and called cheerily. The sound carried a long way; it roused an old sheep-dog in his kennel, and presently the ducks called to each other while they waddled about the farmyard.
Related: Country diary: Hurt Wood, Surrey Hills
Continue reading...Sioned Jones convicted of stealing logs after 20 years of felling non-native trees in Cork
Sioned Jones used to adore the landscape and wildlife of her adopted home in Bantry, a bucolic region in west Cork on Ireland’s Atlantic coast. She planted vegetables and herbs, foraged for nuts and berries and observed birds, insects, frogs and lizards.
Then, on land above her house, the state-owned forestry company Coillte planted a forest of Sitka spruce, a non-native species that Jones considered a dark, dank threat to biodiversity.
Continue reading...German teenager spoke at an event at US rightwing conference CPAC
A young campaigner who has been hailed by climate sceptics as the right’s answer to Greta Thunberg has previously described a white nationalist who appeared to promote “white genocide” theories as one of her “inspirations”.
Naomi Seibt, a 19-year-old from Münster, Germany, who styles herself as a “climate realist”, has also had to deny she made remarks that could be seen as antisemitic following an attack on a synagogue last year.
Continue reading...Emmerson Mnangagwa makes passionate plea for support as he targets upper middle-income status by 2030
The president of Zimbabwe has appealed for help in pulling his debt-ridden country out of “financial isolation”.
Emmerson Mnangagwa made his passionate call for international funding after he failed to secure new loans from the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, African Development Bank and the Paris Club due to outstanding foreign debts of $8bn (£6.2bn).
Continue reading...Teams allowed to take beach route to get to Netherlands’ first F1 grand prix in 35 years
The return of Formula One to the Netherlands after 35 years has become mired in controversy after two racing teams got the green light to drive across a beach nature reserve to ensure their staff avoid traffic on the way to the circuit.
The teams of Red Bull Racing and AlphaTauri will be allowed to drive from their hotels along two miles of beach within the Noordvoort reserve, a popular resting spot for seals and breeding birds located between the Zandvoort racetrack and the North Sea.
Continue reading...South-west and north-west of England, Wales and Northern Ireland are likely to be worst hit
Heavy downpours are expected to cause more flooding to homes and businesses over the weekend, as the latest storm to hit the UK takes hold.
Yellow weather warnings are in place for Storm Jorge on Friday, with the south-west and north-west of England, Wales and Northern Ireland expected to experience the worst of the deluge.
Continue reading...Scheme provides clean water and helps foster trust between indigenous groups
Romelia Mendúa was handing out plantain drinks served in aluminium bowls. Guests were seated in a hammock and on the bare wooden floor. Beyond the window was the lush vegetation of Ecuador’s north-eastern Amazon.
Chocula, as the drink is called, is made by mashing plantains into water, and is a common refreshment in the Amazon. But the water in Mendúa’s chocula was no ordinary water. It came through a tap in her kitchen connected to two tanks outside collecting and filtering rainfall.
Continue reading...Coastline that has been up for Unesco listing has been in poor condition for years
Italian prosecutors have seized control of the famous Scala dei Turchi limestone coastline, one of the Mediterranean’s main tourist attractions, citing poor handling of the cliff’s preservation.
For years, the site of the Scala dei Turchi – meaning Turkish steps or stairs of the Turks – a candidate for Unesco heritage, has been in a state of degradation. It is subject to constant erosion and theft by visitors who detach pieces of marl, the white sedimentary rock that gives the steps their distinctive appearance.
Continue reading...Bank of England governor warns City about need for businesses to fully disclose climate impact
Businesses must improve how they disclose their impact on the environment or risk failing to meet climate targets, the Bank of England governor, Mark Carney, warned the City on Thursday.
Without disclosure rules that allow investors to compare how businesses are meeting the climate challenge, the world risks missing targets to be carbon neutral by 2050, Carney said.
Continue reading...Greta Thunberg-effect behind sales boom in books on everything from plastic waste to endangered wildlife
I’m reading one of a small forest’s-worth of beautiful new picture books about the environment with my eight-year-old twins. The Sea, by Miranda Krestovnikoff and Jill Calder, takes us into mangrove swamps and kelp forests and coral reefs. We learn about goblin sharks and vampire squids and a poisonous creature called a nudibranch. Then we reach the final chapter on ocean plastics. When we learn that by 2050 there could be more plastic in the ocean than fish, Esme bursts into inconsolable tears.
Continue reading...Pacific nation’s protected zone has led to commercial tuna fishing vessels leaving the country
Palau’s much-touted marine sanctuary has backfired, with the fishing ban leading to an increased consumption of the reef fish in the western Pacific country – such as grouper, snapper and parrotfish – that the marine sanctuary promised to protect.
Palau introduced a new 500,000 sq km (193,000 sq mile) marine sanctuary on 1 January to much fanfare.
Continue reading...Australia is heating faster than the global average, and extreme heat days are on the rise. Doctors say there’s clear evidence that it’s killing people prematurely
Continue reading...WorkSafe Tasmania last week issued a ban on the protesters over ‘unsafe behaviours’ and threatened fines of up to $500,000
Activists from the Bob Brown Foundation have been given the legal all-clear to protest in Tasmanian forests after a ban issued by the state’s workplace safety regulator was lifted.
WorkSafe Tasmania last week issued a ban on the protesters over “unsafe behaviours” and threatened fines of up to $500,000 if they didn’t comply.
Continue reading...World’s second biggest miner says it will reduce emissions by 15% by 2030, but ‘will not set targets for our customers’
Mining giant Rio Tinto says it wants its globe-spanning operations to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 and will spend US$1bn over the next five years to reduce its carbon footprint.
The second biggest miner in the world has also committed to reducing its emissions by 15% by 2030.
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