As part of the Running Dry series, the Guardian looks at how drought and famine are forcing Guatemalan families to choose between starvation and migration
At sunrise, the misty fields around the village of Guior are already dotted with men, women and children sowing maize after an overnight rainstorm.
After several years of drought, the downpour brought some hope of relief to the subsistence farmers in this part of eastern Guatemala.
Continue reading...If there is a glimmer of light amid the darkness of recent reports from the Brazilian Amazon, where deforestation is accelerating along with threats to the indigenous people who live there, it could lie in the growing power of climate diplomacy, combined with increased understanding of the crucial role played by trees in our planet’s climate system. The deal agreed a month ago between the EU and the Mercosur bloc of Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay (Venezuela is suspended) enhances European leverage with its South American trading partners. Already, the prize of access to EU markets is credited with having convinced Brazil not to follow Donald Trump’s lead by withdrawing from the Paris climate deal. Now the EU must strengthen its environmental commitments, as a letter from 600 scientists demanded before the deal was agreed.
Brazil’s president, Jair Bolsonaro, made no secret of his plans to promote development, and drew powerful support from Brazil’s agribusiness and mining interests before last year’s election. He scorns conservation and indigenous rights, claiming recently that his foreign opponents want Amazon tribes to live “like cavemen”. Satellite data shows the message is getting through, with clearances up sharply and this month set to be the first in five years in which Brazil has lost an area of forest bigger than Greater London. Illegal gold mining too is spreading. Last week one of the leaders of the Waiãpi people, Emyra Waiãpi, was found stabbed to death on a remote reserve in the state of Amapá, after armed men raided his village.
Continue reading...CSIRO says dramatic climate events are compounding the effects of underlying global heating
Extreme climate events such as heatwaves, floods and drought damaged 45% of the marine ecosystems along Australia’s coast in a seven-year period, CSIRO research shows.
More than 8,000km of Australia’s coast was affected by extreme climate events from 2011 to 2017, and in some cases they caused irreversible changes to marine habitats.
Continue reading...James Marape says Australia, with New Zealand and PNG, has a moral obligation to listen to the voices of smaller island nations
Australia has a responsibility to protect the Pacific region from the impacts of climate change, PNG’s newly appointed prime minister has said.
James Marape told the Guardian Australia had “a moral responsibility … to the upkeep of the planet”, particularly given the extreme effect it was having on smaller Pacific nations.
Continue reading...The Arctic Circle is suffering from an unprecedented number of wildfires in the latest sign of a climate crisis. With some blazes the size of 100,000 football pitches, vast areas in Siberia, Alaska and Greenland are engulfed in flames. The World Meteorological Organisation has said these fires emitted as much carbon dioxide in a month as the whole of Sweden does in a year
Continue reading...The death of fair trade (Journal, 23 July) can partly be laid at the door of the EU. Its treatment of former colonies, restricting tariff-free trade to “primary produce” so that the profitable part of the businesses, manufacture, is protected, means that they may be independent in terms of politics, but are economically still the same colonies.
Take Ghana, which Samanth Subramanian mentions. Go and buy your bar of “Fairtrade” Divine chocolate. On the back it waxes lyrical about Kuapa Kokoo, the cocoa farmers’ organisation that tries to guarantee fair and stable prices for cocoa beans, with a bit extra for the social premium. Read to the end of the small print where it says: “Made in Germany”. Ghana has a perfectly good chocolate factory, at the port town of Tema, but workers only make chocolate for the local market, because that is all they are allowed to do. Ghana would be a lot richer if it could sell the manufactured product over here, but that would be in direct competition with the German manufacturer, which the EU is formed to protect. That is why I voted leave in the referendum – though I probably would not do so again, as Brexit is unlikely to improve the situation.
Tim Gossling
Cambridge
Mobile phone video of incident goes viral as one of nine people attacked dies of injuries
Indian police have arrested four people after a mob of villagers brutally beat to death a tiger that had attacked local people.
Mobile phone footage of the incident went viral on social media, and officials said one of nine people injured by the animal earlier had died in hospital.
Continue reading...An urban waterway is more than just a short cut through the city – it’s a testament to the power of nature over neglect
The roar of the road is receding with each step down and with it the light is changing; it is dancing, mirrored and then dappled in the ripples of the water. One layer down and the city has become an entirely different place.
I, like many, am using the canal as a quiet cut-through. It smells different down here; there’s the dankness of the water, for sure, but there’s a wealth of green filtering the fumes from above. And the soundscape changes – song birds, the curious grunt of a bank of geese eyeing me and the dog warily, the lap of the water’s edge and the groan of metal sidings that are there to repair the bridge.
Continue reading...Indigenous leaders who say Brazil’s new president is trying to force them from their lands are braced for a new era of ruin
As a blood-orange sunset drifted towards the forest canopy, Raimundo Kanamari sat on the riverbank and pondered the future of his tribe under Brazil’s far-right president.
Related: Video of uncontacted Amazon tribe highlights threat from illegal loggers
Continue reading...Highs in Germany, Netherlands and Belgium exceeded for second time in 24 hours
Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium have recorded all-time national temperature highs for the second day running and Paris has had its hottest day ever as the second dangerous heatwave of the summer sears western Europe.
The extreme temperatures follow a similar heatwave last month that made it the hottest June on record. Scientists say the climate crisis is making summer heatwaves five times more likely and significantly more intense.
Continue reading...Weather may spark storms, travel delays, and power cuts as temperatures head towards 39C
Britain could bake under record-breaking heat as temperatures could potentially climb to 39C on Thursday.
The scorching conditions may spark thunderstorms which could trigger travel delays, flash flooding, and power cuts.
Continue reading...Campaigners hail scheme to protect and restore forests around the world as ‘pivotal step’ towards ensuring goods remain untainted
The EU has taken a “pivotal step” towards addressing the deforestation caused by its consumption of soy, chocolate, meat and other products, environmental campaigners have said.
The EU said this week it had set out a new plan to protect and restore the world’s forests, which involves working with governments to promote better use of land and resources, managing supply chains, and carrying out research. A possible new regulation to “minimise the impact of EU consumption on deforestation and forest degradation” will also be assessed under the plan.
Continue reading...The remarkable transformation of canals is a global phenomenon and the ultimate symbol of how our cities have changed – for good and ill
Every second Monday of the month, a small group of volunteers meets in the training room of a Birmingham supermarket. They discuss what has long seemed to many of their friends a crazy and probably doomed idea: how to excavate a contaminated 40-year-old waste dump, create an urban marina, restore three miles of derelict canal and build several new bridges and locks.
Last month, however, the meeting of the 18-strong Lapal Canal Trust committee was joyous. After 20 years of trying to restore this short stretch of the 200-year-old Dudley No 2 canal, permission had finally been granted, they were told.
Continue reading...Scientist behind study urges platform to tweak algorithms to ‘prioritise factual information’
The majority of YouTube videos about the climate crisis oppose the scientific consensus and “hijack” technical terms to make them appear credible, a new study has found. Researchers have warned that users searching the video site to learn about climate science may be exposed to content that goes against mainstream scientific belief.
Dr Joachim Allgaier of RWTH Aachen University in Germany analysed 200 YouTube videos to see if they adhered to or challenged the scientific consensus. To do so, he chose 10 search terms:
Continue reading...All-time records in Germany and Luxembourg could also fall in continent-wide heatwave
The Netherlands and Belgium have recorded their highest ever temperatures as the second extreme heatwave in consecutive months to be linked by scientists to the climate emergency advances across the continent.
The Dutch meteorological service, KNMI, said the temperature reached 39.1C (102F) at Gilze-Rijen airbase near the southern city of Tilburg on Wednesday afternoon, exceeding the previous high of 38.6C set in August 1944.
Continue reading...Call for new Geneva convention to protect wildlife and nature reserves in conflict regions
International lawmakers should adopt a fifth Geneva convention that recognises damage to nature alongside other war crimes, according to an open letter by 24 prominent scientists.
The legal instrument should incorporate wildlife safeguards in conflict regions, including protections for nature reserves, controls on the spread of guns used for hunting and measures to hold military forces to account for damage to the environment, say the signatories to the letter, published in the journal Nature.
Continue reading...In a combative question time the energy minister suggests the Coalition has an ‘open mind’ on nuclear power
Angus Taylor has flagged the Morrison government has an “open mind” about pursuing nuclear power during a combative question time where the energy minister was pursued about rising emissions and his meetings with officials about the protection of grassland in the south-eastern highlands.
Taylor, who is the minister for energy and emissions reduction, was asked repeatedly by Labor on Tuesday whether emissions had risen in recent years, whether he supported calls by government backbenchers to establish a nuclear industry, and whether he had declared any relevant conflicts when meeting departmental officials.
Continue reading...As well as investing billions in reinforcing cities against climate disasters, we should support those feeling its impact right now
It was my birthday recently, and it was sad to “celebrate” with another climate disaster here in the Philippines.
Heavy flooding destroyed the work of farmers in Kapatagan Valley, the rice-growing area of Lanao del Norte province on the island of Mindanao. I know the area well – it is where I started my aid work in the early 1990s.
Continue reading...Informal settlements are expanding, with a new occupation attempt every 11 days, and the threat to the rainforest is severe
Antonio Pinto’s makeshift home on the outskirts of Manaus is an open-air shack, one of dozens of similar dwellings of timber and tarpaulin scattered around the hills.
Around them is the evidence of the use of flame and iron: the hills are scorched and brown, littered with fallen logs and toppled, twisted trees.
Continue reading...Clip shows a bare-chested man with a spear, who is believed to belong to the Awá people, the world’s most threatened tribe
Remarkable close-up footage that appears to show an uncontacted tribesman in the Amazon rainforest has been released by an indigenous media group that wants to raise awareness of the threat posed by illegal loggers, miners and drug traffickers.
Related: The Amazon tribe protecting the forest with bows, arrows, GPS and camera traps
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