CLIMATE CHANGE: Fungi Offer Non-GM Way to Enhance Food Crops

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"> <br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiwH6zsCtETo5BADiUUxMXYGr0aHPHNRgbiYpJBQQBgHXB0HDUR7GtxIzr-hCDb64OQbaLDMIII1g9vRl-o6Uyee-uQzmFMouLsBA0tuSyheYqFwlklRQlVy8jtwN4_CVSwY877cS5TwI/s1600/201205151222210806.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiwH6zsCtETo5BADiUUxMXYGr0aHPHNRgbiYpJBQQBgHXB0HDUR7GtxIzr-hCDb64OQbaLDMIII1g9vRl-o6Uyee-uQzmFMouLsBA0tuSyheYqFwlklRQlVy8jtwN4_CVSwY877cS5TwI/s1600/201205151222210806.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-size: medium;"> <span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; font-size: 8pt;">Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/plantstoriesproject/6931910350/"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none;">Plant Stories Project</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div> <div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-size: medium;"> <span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; font-size: 8pt;">Race is on to find ways to be able to produce enough</span></div> </td></tr> </tbody></table> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">JOHANNESBURG</span></st1:city></st1:place><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"> (IRIN) - As temperatures soar and droughts increase in frequency, scientists around the world are working to create food crops tolerant of extreme temperatures - often an expensive and laborious process. But a cheaper and quicker alternative could be in sight, new research suggests. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Fungi and other microbes could enable food crops like maize, wheat and rice to grow in high temperatures and salty soils, and even withstand erratic rainfall, say microbiologists, who have begun to look at the relationship between plants and micro-organisms for clues to their mutual survival through thousands of years of climate change. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Making food crops tolerant to climatic stresses could be as simple as coating seeds with micro-organisms that can confer desired traits. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">A matter of urgency<o:p></o:p></span></b></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Helping food crops weather climate change is a matter of urgency, said experts from 15 research centres of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research’s (CGIAR) Research Programme on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security. The programme had been asked by the UN to summarize the effects of climate change on 22 of the most important agriculture crops, from staple cereals to potatoes, lentils and commercial fruit crops like bananas. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Time is of the essence, as droughts have already become more frequent and rainfall more erratic in various parts of the world. By 2050, climate change could cause irrigated wheat yields in developing countries to fall by 13 percent, says a CGIAR review by senior scientist Philip Thornton. Irrigated rice yield could fall by as much as 15 percent. In <st1:place w:st="on">Africa</st1:place>, many farmers of maize could lose 10 to 20 percent of their yields. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We have always thought that plants had learned to adapt to climatic stresses like high temperatures and drought, but now we find that microbiomes [communities of microbes] within plants have conferred traits on them to be able to withstand the stressSome temperature-tolerant new crops are already being grown in Asia, developed by subjecting grain plants to stresses such as drought conditions, then isolating genes from those that survive. But this kind of conventional breeding is long-drawn process, often taking 10 to 15 years to develop a successful crop variant. It is widely used because many Asian and African countries do not accept genetically modified (GM) products. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Micro-organisms could provide a faster option. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Microbiomes aid survival <o:p></o:p></span></b></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">"We have always thought that plants had learned to adapt to climatic stresses like high temperatures and drought, but now we find that microbiomes [communities of microbes] within plants have conferred traits on them to be able to withstand the stress," said Rusty Rodriguez, a microbiologist affiliated with the University of Washington, who recently established his own non-profit organization (Symbiogenics) to conduct more research into the plant-microbe symbiosis.  <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Human and plant life is intertwined with that of micro-organisms. A human body contains more bacteria than human cells; in several studies published this year, members of the Human Microbiome Project reported that microbes "contribute more genes responsible for human survival" than humans themselves. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The new plant studies show that microbiomes are similarly crucial in the plant world. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Scientific American reported in 2010 that Mary Lucero, a molecular biologist at the US Department of Agriculture, had found fungi could help plants capture more nitrogen from the atmosphere, reducing the need to apply chemical fertilizers. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">More recently, Rodriguez and his team have shown how a certain fungus, when introduced to the seeds of maize, wheat, tomatoes, watermelons and other plants, enabled those plants to withstand more than 50-degree Celsius temperatures. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">‘Results within a year’ <o:p></o:p></span></b></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Rodriguez says he took fungi from plants near the <st1:city w:st="on">hot springs</st1:city> in the <st1:country-region w:st="on">US</st1:country-region>’s <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Yellowstone</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">National Park</st1:placetype></st1:place>. The stress tolerance traits are only found in microbes found in those conditions; the same fungus isolated from a non-stressed condition do not have those traits. His teams have also undertaken missions to collect fungi from extreme conditions in the Antarctic, Mount Everest in the Himalayas and the <st1:placename w:st="on">Great Basin</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">Desert</st1:placetype> in the <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">US</st1:place></st1:country-region>. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Rodriguez said he and his team could likely find similar microbes in any part of the world - for instance, in the <st1:place w:st="on">Sahel</st1:place> - and conduct trials within the region to isolate the useful microbes. "We could have results within a year," he said. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He has already conducted trials in the <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">US</st1:place></st1:country-region> with maize and rice, and found that yields can grow up to 10 percent in the case of rice in cold temperatures, and up to 80 percent in the case of maize in high temperatures. The team is awaiting the results of a trial in which maize was grown during the worst drought to hit the <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">US</st1:place></st1:country-region> in decades. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He has also isolated a virus in the fungus that makes plants even more resilient to heat. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The plan is to keep the costs of providing the technology to farmers very low. "Corn in the <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">US</st1:place></st1:country-region> is sold in 42lbs [about 20 kg] bags. We want to keep the cost of coating the seeds with microbes to under US$20 [per bag]," said Rodriguez <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Another peer-reviewed study has shown that certain fungi can make rice plants more tolerant to drought, salt and even cold while reducing water consumption by 20 to 30 percent. Salt tolerance is a sought-after trait in regions affected by rising sea-levels and storm surges that cause saltwater intrusion, such as the rice-growing regions of <st1:country-region w:st="on">Bangladesh</st1:country-region> and <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Vietnam</st1:place></st1:country-region>.<o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Rodriguez said he and others are looking for opportunities and funding to conduct trials in <st1:place w:st="on">Africa</st1:place>, where this technology is desperately needed. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This point was also made by CGIAR’s <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Thornton</st1:place></st1:city> in his paper Recalibrating Food Production in the Developing World: Global Warming Will Change More Than Just the Climate, which explores the complexities of climate change’s impact on crops. Some crops might be able to withstand high temperature but could be sensitive to changes in rainfall. "Other crops can tolerate seasonal flooding but are susceptible to new or increased levels of pests and diseases brought on by high temperatures." <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">A variety of changes must take place, including changes to the mix of crops being grown, <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Thornton</st1:place></st1:city> said in an email to IRIN. Research can help by "showing farmers not only how to grow new crops but also how to utilize them in different ways (e.g., different ways of preparing and cooking cassava). The socio-cultural aspects may be difficult to deal with, but through a combination of market forces (changes in relative prices of staples) and time, diets may change slowly,” he said. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"><b>Circumventing controversy? </b><o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Meanwhile, other researchers are exploring the use of GM to increase crop resilience. But the safety of GM has been heatedly debated, with many activist groups, governments and regulatory bodies calling for products containing GM ingredients to carry special labels. <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The American Association for the Advancement of Science has recently come out against labelling requirements. “These efforts are not driven by evidence that GM foods are actually dangerous. Indeed, the science is quite clear: crop improvement by the modern molecular techniques of biotechnology is safe.” <o:p></o:p></span></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <br /></div> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The microbiome studies might offer a way to circumvent these controversies, offering faster and cheaper solutions without the patina of “mad science” often attributed to GM products. The journal New Scientist reported this year that, unlike genetic engineering, which takes years to induce plants to switch various metabolic pathways to become more drought-tolerant, fungi can activate "them all in one go." <o:p></o:p></span></div> </div>

CLIMATE CHANGE: Fungi Offer Non-GM Way to Enhance Food Crops

Photo:  Plant Stories Project Race is on to find ways to be able to produce enough JOHANNESBURG (IRIN) - As temperatures soar ...

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INDIA LIFTS TSUNAMI WARNING

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /> <div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">  </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">NEW DELHI (NNN-Xinhua) -- India has lifted tsunami warning for the first 8.6 magnitude earthquake which hit Indonesia 's northern Sumatra on Wednesday, but has extended that for the 8. 2 magnitude aftershock which hit Aceh one hour later, said local TV channel CNN-IBN.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The Indian government has meanwhile has asked all bodies responsible for disaster prevention and relief to be fully prepared.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The Indian Air Force has sent 80 National Disaster Response Force members and two tons of relief materials to Port Blair, the main port town of the Andaman islands and Nicobars Islands in the Bay of Bengal, where 3.9 meter high waves have been sighted by local fishermen.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Authorities have also orders ships to leave Port Blair, although officials asked local fishermen not to panic.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Strong tremors were felt across eastern coast of India after the Indonesian quake. Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Kochi and some other cities also reported mild tremors. -- NNN-XINHUA</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">  </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div></div>

INDIA LIFTS TSUNAMI WARNING

   NEW DELHI (NNN-Xinhua) -- India has lifted tsunami warning for the first 8.6 magnitude earthquake which hit Indonesia 's northern Su...

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CLIMATE CHANGE: Understanding Rio+20

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2EYORG64SLrmAP25r-1ikaJfc5sDl4JN6qtshC_9h8SvZVx7hjxbRFx9Bs3EhCHP3Bf7spf0ngwQ0B8VWOXLN_o-SmufCZs7NeodNC_kTUn6CbjZXsSxDpSYM_kNG2KvPFaelQDPb6mY/s1600/201108081026210918.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="288" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2EYORG64SLrmAP25r-1ikaJfc5sDl4JN6qtshC_9h8SvZVx7hjxbRFx9Bs3EhCHP3Bf7spf0ngwQ0B8VWOXLN_o-SmufCZs7NeodNC_kTUn6CbjZXsSxDpSYM_kNG2KvPFaelQDPb6mY/s400/201108081026210918.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Photo: <a href="http://www.irinnews.org/photo/"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none;">Jason Gutierrez/IRIN</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">We have to take action now to sustain life in the coming years<o:p></o:p></span></div></span></td></tr> </tbody></table><div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 18px;">JOHANNESBURG (IRIN) - A Nobel laureate, a Swedish environmentalist’s idea, the “doughnut” concept, Scandinavia’s sense of social capital, measuring the quality of life, and valuing the oceans are just some of the things trending in the run-up to the Rio+20 UN Conference on Sustainable Development due to be held on 20-22 June 2012.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Rio+20 will look at how economies have grown at the expense of natural resources and human capital since the last Earth Summit in Rio in 1992, when the concept of “sustainable development” gained currency. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">The idea of growth meeting “the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” has not gained much traction since the 1992 conference - largely because countries continued to equate development with economic growth, and sustainable development languished as a fringe environmental concern, says a UN-commissioned study.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Twenty years later, “sustainable development remains a generally agreed concept, rather than a day-to-day, on-the-ground, practical reality,” says a report by the UN High-level Panel on Global Sustainability.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Since 1992, alarm bells on several interconnected factors with a far-reaching impact on growth, resources and the quality of life - accelerated man-made climate change, population growth, increasing numbers of hungry people, rapidly depleting and more expensive fossil fuels, and a decline in food production - have been ringing louder. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">“Achieving sustainability requires us to transform the global economy. Tinkering on the margins will not do the job,” said the UN Panel’s report. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Optimists in the scientific and aid community hope Rio+20 will develop from an opportunity to reflect into a collective effort to plot the world’s future growth path. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">IRIN aims to make the conference more relevant and accessible by examining some of the ideas circulating ahead of it. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">1. Elinor Ostrom: Fast emerging as the moral and academic compass of the conference, Ostrom’s work, which won her the Nobel Prize for Economics in 2009, shows that growth combined with the sustainable use of natural resources is achievable. Ostrom looked at certain rural communities in Asia, Africa and Europe which have for centuries successfully managed in a sustainable way their common resources - grazing land, water and forests. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When the Scandinavian countries had to set targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, they did not consider the markets... but went ahead because they value the well-being of humans and environment...The communities developed while preventing problems such as overgrazing, misuse of forests or over-consumption of water. The fact that Ostrom took a multidisciplinary approach (rooted in economics, environment and social capital, successfully combining the three pillars of sustainable development), makes her the expert everyone wants to hear from. She was the chief scientific adviser to the recent Planet Under Pressure conference - an attempt by the scientific community to set the agenda for Rio+20. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">2. Planetary Boundaries and Future Earth: The concept of Planetary Boundaries proposed in 2009 by Johan Rockstrom of the Stockholm Resilience Centre and 28 scientists, posits that there are nine critical Earth-system processes and associated thresholds that we need to respect and keep within, in order to protect against the risk of irreversible or even catastrophic environmental change on a continental or global scale. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Doing so would create a safe operating space for humanity. According to the concept’s authors, three of the nine suggested thresholds have already been crossed (climate change, biodiversity and the nitrogen cycle). The threshold for the phosphorus cycle (linked, within the concept, to the nitrogen cycle) has also been crossed, according to a scientific paper in 2011.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">The status of the concept grew after being mentioned in the UN Panel report. The Boundaries concept has inspired the “nexus approach” between food, water and energy, which was also noted by the UN panel. “All three [food, water and energy] need to be fully integrated, not treated separately if we are to deal with the global food security crisis,” said the report. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Rockstrom, last week announced the launch in Rio of Future Earth, a 10-year collaborative initiative which will provide the knowledge to help societies meet their sustainable development goals. The International Council for Science, the Belmont Forum (a high-level group of donors who fund climate research), the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), the UN University, and the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) are all part of the initiative. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Tom Mitchell, head of climate change at the UK’s Overseas Development Institute (ODI), was a bit skeptical about how “10 years of science inquiry” would help. He said countries needed solutions now - embedded in governments and designed to cater for national requirements. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">3. The doughnut: In February 2012, Kate Raworth, a senior researcher with Oxfam, pointed out that human growth was glaringly absent from Rockstrom’s concept. She combined social boundaries (such as access to water, health services, food, jobs, energy and education for all) within the planetary boundaries - highlighting the need for an environmentally safe space which needed to be compatible with poverty eradication and rights for all. Between the planetary ceiling and the social foundation lay an area - shaped like a doughnut - which is a “safe and just space for humanity to thrive in”, her paper said.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Raworth said well-designed policies can promote both poverty eradication and environmental sustainability. She told IRIN the objective was to be able to take care of everyone’s minimum needs, while re-defining the meaning of prosperity, which is equated with material wealth and associated with over-consumption (e.g. food, vehicles).</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"><br /> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"> “Governments need to look beyond taking care of people’s material needs and focus on quality of life, qualities of social relationships.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"><br /> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“The concept of Planetary Boundaries is almost pure science,” noted Andrew Scott, researcher with ODI, while the “doughnut” concept was grounded in human reality and the need to agree on a minimum standard of living, whilst guarding against over-consumption.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"><br /> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">This calls for the need to review UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which were not very ambitious to begin with, he said. “Instead of calling for the eradication of poverty it [the MDGs] settled for the halving of poverty by 2015.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Felix Dodds, eminent author and head of the Stakeholder Forum for a Sustainable Future, also enthused about the “doughnut proposal” in the Planet Under Pressure conference, and suggested the world should strive to turn everyone into a member of the middle-class. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">4. Sustainable agriculture: After years of lobbying for an agriculture system which would respect the biosystem and at the same time increase the production of quality food to keep the numbers of malnourished down, scientists feel they are making headway. The proposed draft outcome document of the Rio+20 conference makes note of their concerns. But is that good enough - will that force a change and make sustainable agriculture a part of mainstream policy in countries? <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Kenyan scientist Judi Wakhungu, a member of the Commission on Sustainable Agriculture and Climate Change, says attitudes are changing on the ground: Sustainable agriculture is now being taught in universities in developing countries; donors particularly in Scandinavian countries are more willing to fund such initiatives tailored by developing country governments; and at government levels, sectors such as water, energy and agriculture have begun to talk to each other. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Christopher Barrett, who teaches economics and agriculture at Cornell University in the USA, said: “The central issue is high-level political commitment to enacting the necessary policies.” He said the “lofty rhetoric” of the L'Aquila G-8 summit, or earlier summits such as Gleneagles, have “not been matched by significant new investments or policy innovations by the world's major economies”. Progress towards sustainable agriculture was “incremental and dwarfed by the fiscal and employment challenges faced by the OECD [Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development] countries,” he added, and we should “not hold our breath for any great breakthrough” at Rio+20. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">5. Social capital versus market-based approaches: Academically, social capital is a concept which places value on social relations and the role of cooperation to get collective results. The concept is making waves among development experts and the scientific community in the Rio+20 context, particularly as it forces societies to reflect on their value systems. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">“It [social capital] is too technical a word,” says Oxfam’s Raworth, but essentially the concept is about valuing quality of life and interpersonal relations more than material wealth. Brazilian scientist Carlos Nobre, a member of the Commission on Sustainable Agriculture and Climate Change, explained: “It is a concept followed by Scandinavian countries - where human well-being is more important than the market value of a particular resource. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="text-align: center;"><br /> </div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFvjtPQZdNkowpb_Gestv39B_KW7-kEcFrfUxUA11I89iBVqP3jjgwJ1-9So-8VaKQj5kJsBzr6cNO25o_xE3DZZRUNxzozyyDUP8H-nJmxQE7CFROzAEN_a0lxCC7nMo7j7CaaqpqOi0/s1600/201112021203540454.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="241" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFvjtPQZdNkowpb_Gestv39B_KW7-kEcFrfUxUA11I89iBVqP3jjgwJ1-9So-8VaKQj5kJsBzr6cNO25o_xE3DZZRUNxzozyyDUP8H-nJmxQE7CFROzAEN_a0lxCC7nMo7j7CaaqpqOi0/s400/201112021203540454.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Photo: <a href="http://www.shaynerobinson.co.za/" target="_blank"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none;">Shayne Robinson/Greenpeace</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">Multilateral processes to make life on earth sustainable such as the<o:p></o:p></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">UN talks on climate change have been moving at a snail's pace<o:p></o:p></span></div><div><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;"><br /> </span></div></span></td></tr> </tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">"For instance when the Scandinavian countries had to set targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, they did not consider the markets and industries but went ahead because they value the well-being of humans and environment more than anything else.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">But the reality is that most countries value markets more than human and environmental well-being, say experts, so a value has to be attributed to a natural resources to make people take care of it. As UNEP head Achim Steiner says, “we have to place ecology in economics.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">“We need to create markets around natural resources such as provision of environmental services,” said ODI’s Mitchell. The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change did that with trees and carbon, but the process has not got very far. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Both Raworth and Nobre said that to achieve real change, attitudes to wealth needed to be changed, but this could only happen from the bottom up. "Market-based mechanisms to control and exploit the use of our natural resources should be seen as a means to get to a state of well-being and not as the goal," said Nobre. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Richard Norgaard, one of the founders of ecological economics, said at the Planet Under Pressure conference that instead of markets dictating and shaping our economies, “we need to ask what kind of economy we want to live in and then design incentives for the markets.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">6. Measuring wellness: Putting a value on the quantity of natural resources that had to be exploited to achieve certain outcomes could help in terms of sustainability, argued Pablo Muñoz, an economist working on the Inclusive Wealth Report (IWR) project, a joint initiative of UN Univeristy-International Human Dimensions Programme on Global Climate Change (IHDP) and UNEP, aiming to measure, among other forms of wealth, the Natural Capital of countries. The report will be released at Rio+20. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">"A country can exhaust all its natural resources while posting positive GDP [Gross Domestic Product] growth," said Muñoz. The world needs "an indicator that estimates the wealth of nations - natural, human and manufactured and ideally even the social and ecological constituents of human well-being," he added. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Some findings of the reports were released at the Planet Under Pressure conference. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Between 1990 and 2008, the wealth of Brazil and India in terms of per capita GDP rose 34 percent and 120 percent respectively. Natural capital, the sum of a country's assets, from forests to fossil fuels and minerals, declined by 46 percent in Brazil and 31percent in India, according the new indicator. Brazil's "Inclusive Wealth" rose by 3 percent and India's rose by 9 percent over that time. But do not expect countries to start using the new indicator any time soon. "It took years for countries to come round to using GDP - so it will be a few years yet," said Muñoz. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">7. Valuing the oceans: Attempts to put a value on the exploitation of natural resources are ongoing globally. A new book by the Stockholm Environment Institute calculates the impact of climate change on the economic value of the oceans. It says climate change (in the last 200 years the oceans have absorbed 25-30 percent of the global accumulated emissions of carbon dioxide) alone could reduce the economic value of the oceans by up to US$2 trillion a year by 2100.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div></div>

CLIMATE CHANGE: Understanding Rio+20

Photo:  Jason Gutierrez/IRIN We have to take action now to sustain life in the coming years JOHANNESBURG (IRIN) - A Nobel laureate, a ...

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A 5.2 Magnitude Earthquake Jolts Indian Capital and Neighboring States

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /> </span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzZbVyOBnPGYMh-yAoFYa8Fa8J9R2zT_oz1_k8E3aTPWbnT-rQ6hZr8Wd1EqstbEgw3EI6yjS7RDAHP74NjplsmzHiJ_qFc_IntOKp2TLUfSBLpOhYwJGvcAm3SWN92RMBivzri9pD7OU/s1600/407969791_144a58d359_z.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzZbVyOBnPGYMh-yAoFYa8Fa8J9R2zT_oz1_k8E3aTPWbnT-rQ6hZr8Wd1EqstbEgw3EI6yjS7RDAHP74NjplsmzHiJ_qFc_IntOKp2TLUfSBLpOhYwJGvcAm3SWN92RMBivzri9pD7OU/s400/407969791_144a58d359_z.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;">Photo:<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/araswami/407969791/"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;"> flickr.com/araswami</span></a></span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: left; text-indent: 36.0pt; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div></td></tr> </tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">NEW DELHI (NNN-Xinhua) -- An earthquake measuring 5.2 magnitude on the Richter scale jolted the Indian capital and its surrounding areas this afternoon, but no casualties have been reported. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">The epicenter of the quake, which was felt throughout the capital region and some northern Indian states, was near Bahadurgarh town at the Haryana-Delhi border region, just 35 km from New Delhi, said Indian Meteorological Department. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">A school boundary wall in the Mayna village of Rohtak district of Haryana collapsed during the 15-second tremor, according to Indo- Asian News Service. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">Residents and office staff were seen running out of houses during the quake. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">On Sept. 8, 2011, a quake measuring 4.2 magnitude shook the Indian capital at 11:28 p.m. with its epicenter located at Sonipat in Haryana state. -- NNN-XINHUA <o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

A 5.2 Magnitude Earthquake Jolts Indian Capital and Neighboring States

Photo: flickr.com/araswami NEW DELHI (NNN-Xinhua) -- An earthquake measuring 5.2 magnitude on the Richter scale jolted the Indian cap...

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Deadly Tornadoes Again Touch Down in US

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">Tornadoes spawned by powerful storms have raked several states across the United States, causing at least 27 deaths and widespread destruction.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">Officials said all the confirmed deaths Friday were in Indiana and were quoted as saying the town of Marysville was "completely gone" following the tornado outbreak. In the state's Henryville area, the severe weather caused extensive damage to a high school, but only minor injuries were reported.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">Media reports say there also was heavy damage near Louisville, Kentucky, where another tornado touched down on Friday evening. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">Tornadoes hit earlier in the day in the southern state of Alabama, sending some residents to hospitals. One of the twisters damaged the roof of a maximum-security prison. Authorities say despite significant damage to the roof and the prison fence, none of the more than 2,000 inmates escaped.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">A devastating tornado struck the Huntsville area nearly a year ago. Soon after Friday's twisters hit near the same place, resident Tara DuBose-Schmitt, a teacher and mother of two, said, "I'm rattled [worried]."<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">Twisters also were confirmed Friday in central Tennessee. Dozens of school systems sent children home early to avoid possible strong winds, heavy rain, and large-sized hail as well as tornadoes. Tornado warnings were issued for a number of counties across central and eastern Tennessee.  <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">The severe weather comes just two days after tornadoes cut a path of destruction through the central and southern parts of the U.S., killing 13 people.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">The powerful storm system tore through neighborhoods in the states of Illinois, Missouri, and Tennessee on Wednesday, and spawned tornadoes in Kansas and Kentucky. ---VOA News<o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

Deadly Tornadoes Again Touch Down in US

Tornadoes spawned by powerful storms have raked several states across the United States, causing at least 27 deaths and widespread destru...

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Analysis: Agriculture in a Changing Environment

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /> <div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><br /> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><span style="font-size: 11px;"><br /> </span></span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJjfOeS7hnwaT64vya_qayPrdOOrhzDdKj_Bevj0hCV4zXQw0c6NhyAwiMUNJ-D2bWfxzAp5VqcuxG0xy_MCRUj2YfXRfW5w9prdWp2dWNnIav7OT5D125U5nne42VrRBqJj8kkx5L1vw/s1600/201102140732020812.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJjfOeS7hnwaT64vya_qayPrdOOrhzDdKj_Bevj0hCV4zXQw0c6NhyAwiMUNJ-D2bWfxzAp5VqcuxG0xy_MCRUj2YfXRfW5w9prdWp2dWNnIav7OT5D125U5nne42VrRBqJj8kkx5L1vw/s1600/201102140732020812.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo: <a href="http://www.irinnews.org/photo.aspx"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none;">Jaspreet Kindra/IRIN</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Cows release huge amounts of warming methane every year<o:p></o:p></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-size: medium; text-align: left;"><br /> </div></td></tr> </tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">JOHANNESBURG, (IRIN) - Agriculture has been seen either as a cause or victim of global warming at the UN climate change talks over the past few years - something that has thwarted efforts to attract the investment it needs, say scientists. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Some at the talks see a more dominant role for agriculture - an emitter of major greenhouses gases such as nitrous oxide and methane - in reducing global warming. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change estimates agricultural emissions account for 13.5 percent of all man-made greenhouse gas emissions. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">At the same time, poor countries want more money and better technology to help farmers adapt to the impact of climate change such as frequent droughts, flooding and increased salinity. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“It is really a bad split for agriculture,” said John Beddington, the <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">UK</st1:place></st1:country-region>’s chief scientific adviser, and one of the authors of a paper calling for a more integrated approach, combining mitigation and adaptation efforts. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The paper, published in the current edition of Science with contributions from several scientists, calls for a better understanding of agricultural practices with the aim of delivering multiple benefits - reducing emissions, helping agriculture to adapt, and using limited resources (like water) efficiently. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">One model to emulate could be Denmark, where one of the world’s strictest agriculture control systems is in place - including, for example, the use of environmentally friendly practices such as substituting pig slurry (pig waste and water) for artificial fertilizers. The country has managed not only to reduce emissions from agriculture by 28 percent but also increase productivity. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This kind of win-win agriculture would attract more funding from a wider range of sources, said Beddington. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Know the difference<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Climate change’s impact is likely to be greatest in low and middle-income </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">tropical regions,</span></div><table align="right" border="1" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="MsoNormalTable" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: #eeeeee; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1pt; border-image: initial; border-left-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1pt; border-right-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1pt; border-top-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1pt; margin-bottom: 3.75pt; margin-left: 6pt; margin-right: 6pt; margin-top: -0.75pt; width: 200px;"><tbody> <tr> <td colspan="2" style="border: none; padding: 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt;"> <div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-element-anchor-horizontal: column; mso-element-anchor-vertical: paragraph; mso-element-frame-hspace: 8.25pt; mso-element-frame-vspace: 1.5pt; mso-element-left: right; mso-element-top: middle; mso-element-wrap: around; mso-element: frame; mso-height-rule: exactly; text-align: justify;"><b><span style="color: #006699; font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma;">Know the difference<o:p></o:p></span></b></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td style="border: none; padding: 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt;" valign="top"> <div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-element-anchor-horizontal: column; mso-element-anchor-vertical: paragraph; mso-element-frame-hspace: 8.25pt; mso-element-frame-vspace: 1.5pt; mso-element-left: right; mso-element-top: middle; mso-element-wrap: around; mso-element: frame; mso-height-rule: exactly; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><!--[if gte vml 1]><v:shapetype id="_x0000_t75" coordsize="21600,21600" o:spt="75" o:preferrelative="t" path="m@4@5l@4@11@9@11@9@5xe" filled="f" stroked="f"> <v:stroke joinstyle="miter"/> <v:formulas> <v:f eqn="if lineDrawn pixelLineWidth 0"/> <v:f eqn="sum @0 1 0"/> <v:f eqn="sum 0 0 @1"/> <v:f eqn="prod @2 1 2"/> <v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelWidth"/> <v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelHeight"/> <v:f eqn="sum @0 0 1"/> <v:f eqn="prod @6 1 2"/> <v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelWidth"/> <v:f eqn="sum @8 21600 0"/> <v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelHeight"/> <v:f eqn="sum @10 21600 0"/> </v:formulas> <v:path o:extrusionok="f" gradientshapeok="t" o:connecttype="rect"/> <o:lock v:ext="edit" aspectratio="t"/> </v:shapetype><v:shape id="_x0000_i1025" type="#_x0000_t75" alt="" style='width:9pt; height:7.5pt'> <v:imagedata src="file:///C:\Users\wisdom\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image001.gif" o:href="http://www.irinnews.org/images/design/sqr.gif"/> </v:shape><![endif]--><!--[if !vml]--><img align="absMiddle" height="10" src="file:///C:\Users\wisdom\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image001.gif" style="text-align: -webkit-center;" v:shapes="_x0000_i1025" width="12" /><!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td style="border: none; padding: 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt; width: 132.0pt;" width="176"> <div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-element-anchor-horizontal: column; mso-element-anchor-vertical: paragraph; mso-element-frame-hspace: 8.25pt; mso-element-frame-vspace: 1.5pt; mso-element-left: right; mso-element-top: middle; mso-element-wrap: around; mso-element: frame; mso-height-rule: exactly; text-align: justify;"><strong><span style="color: #006699; font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Adaptation</span></strong><span style="color: #006699; font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">: Adjustment in natural or human systems in response to actual or expected climatic stimuli or their effects, which moderates harm or exploits beneficial opportunities<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td style="border: none; padding: 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt;" valign="top"> <div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-element-anchor-horizontal: column; mso-element-anchor-vertical: paragraph; mso-element-frame-hspace: 8.25pt; mso-element-frame-vspace: 1.5pt; mso-element-left: right; mso-element-top: middle; mso-element-wrap: around; mso-element: frame; mso-height-rule: exactly; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"><!--[if gte vml 1]><v:shape id="_x0000_i1026" type="#_x0000_t75" alt="" style='width:9pt;height:7.5pt'> <v:imagedata src="file:///C:\Users\wisdom\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image001.gif" o:href="http://www.irinnews.org/images/design/sqr.gif"/> </v:shape><![endif]--><!--[if !vml]--><img align="absMiddle" height="10" src="file:///C:\Users\wisdom\AppData\Local\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image001.gif" v:shapes="_x0000_i1026" width="12" /><!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></div></td> <td style="border: none; padding: 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt; width: 132.0pt;" width="176"> <div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-element-anchor-horizontal: column; mso-element-anchor-vertical: paragraph; mso-element-frame-hspace: 8.25pt; mso-element-frame-vspace: 1.5pt; mso-element-left: right; mso-element-top: middle; mso-element-wrap: around; mso-element: frame; mso-height-rule: exactly; text-align: justify;"><strong><span style="color: #006699; font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Mitigation</span></strong><span style="color: #006699; font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">: A human intervention to reduce the sources or enhance the sinks of greenhouse gases<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td colspan="2" style="border: none; padding: 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt 3.75pt;"> <div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-element-anchor-horizontal: column; mso-element-anchor-vertical: paragraph; mso-element-frame-hspace: 8.25pt; mso-element-frame-vspace: 1.5pt; mso-element-left: right; mso-element-top: middle; mso-element-wrap: around; mso-element: frame; mso-height-rule: exactly; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #006699; font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma;">Source: IPCC<o:p></o:p></span></div></td> </tr> </tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"> where pressure will mount to produce more food because of population and income growth, says agricultural economist Christopher Barrett, who teaches at </span><st1:place style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';" w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Cornell</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">University</st1:placetype></st1:place><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">. The global focus, therefore, has to be on helping agriculture in those regions adapt, and not just produce more or reduce emissions. “And that agenda needs to encompass post-harvest storage, distribution and transformation.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Despite growing support for an integrated approach to agriculture encompassing adaptation and mitigation efforts, policy actions have been slow to materialize in most countries and at the UN climate change talks, the paper says. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">A first step, say the scientists, is to get commonly agreed definitions of concepts like “climate-smart agriculture” and “sustainable intensification”, which integrate the two approaches. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The authors of the paper include ecologist Bob Scholes of South Africa’s Council for Scientific and Industrial Research; Mohammad Asaduzzaman, research director of the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies; and Judi Wakhungu, executive director of the African Centre for Technology Studies in Kenya. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Climate-smart” <o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The “climate-smart” concept as developed by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) advocates practices which generate both adaptation and mitigation benefits such as the efficient use of organic fertilizers; the development of efficient seed systems which produce crops naturally resilient to climatic shifts; the harvesting of water for irrigation; the production of biogas from livestock manure; and greater reliance on forage from maize crops to feed animals. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Such initiatives would not only improve food production but also reduce harmful gas emissions, says FAO. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">About 70 percent of agriculture-related emissions are associated with the manufacture and use of nitrogen-based fertilizers -in large part through the emission of nitrous oxide - according to a 2011 review by the UK Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC). <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The livestock sector generates 65 percent of human-related nitrous oxide, which has 296 times the Global Warming Potential (GWP) of carbon dioxide. Most of this comes from manure. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Belching cows, goats and sheep emit 80 million tons of methane into the atmosphere every year. Though methane remains in the atmosphere for a short time (9-15 years), it has 23 times the GWP of carbon dioxide. Irrigated rice farming is another major source of methane emissions. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Soil carbon sequestration <o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But the “climate-smart” concept was given another interpretation at the <st1:city w:st="on">Durban</st1:city> climate change talks in December: The World Bank announced it had launched a “climate-smart agriculture” pilot project in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Kenya</st1:place></st1:country-region>. The project (which is still running) aims to get small farmers to adopt agricultural practices such as low-tillage, which trap carbon in the soil in such a way that it is not re-emitted into the atmosphere (soil carbon sequestration). The carbon is then sold as credits in carbon markets. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Think-tanks like the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), and scientists at BBSRC, point out that sustainable agriculture can increase the sequestration of carbon in the soil but it is difficult and costly to measure. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">IATP’s senior policy analyst, Steve Suppan, said the very high transaction costs of converting Kenyan farmers’ work into carbon credits would be better spent on more rapidly adapting <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Kenya</st1:place></st1:country-region>’s agriculture to climate change. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Because the project's transaction costs are nearly half of the project budget, the main project co-benefit is not for the farmers but for the carbon accounting methodology that the Bank wishes to sell globally.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Tosi Mpanu-Mpanu, <st1:place w:st="on">Africa</st1:place>’s chief negotiator at the climate talks, who had been lobbying for a stronger presence for agriculture in the adaptation track, said they wanted predictable funds for agriculture, and not from shaky carbon markets, which in this case - for credits based on soil carbon sequestration - did not exist. “Our farmers will also be told to grow certain crops which sequester more carbon rather than what the farmers need, compromising their security.” <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">NGOs like ActionAid warn of the possibility of “soil grabs” in developing countries by big business to offset their emissions. Mitigation cannot be the predominant objective of any project aimed at benefiting agriculture, said ActionAid’s Harjeet Singh. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Mitigation projects in agriculture need to begin in industrialized agriculture and land-clearing for agribusiness. The agro-ecological techniques of climate-smart agriculture should be deployed for adaptation, not in the service of carbon derivatives markets,” said Suppan. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Beddington said linking “climate smart agricultural practices” with carbon markets was “unfortunate”. The Science paper he co-authored calls for unpacking the term in such a way that addresses concerns that it might be giving more weight to agriculture’s role in reducing emissions, rather than focusing on improving production and ways to adapt. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Leslie Lipper, a senior environmental economist with FAO, said soil carbon sequestration is one example of an integrated approach but she was not against sourcing finance from carbon markets. “Identifying, crediting and financing mitigation co-benefits that can be generated from improving agricultural systems offers the potential to open a new and additional source of finance to help meet the investment gap” in agriculture. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Sustainable intensification” <o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">In agriculture, the term “sustainable intensification” as defined by FAO, refers to an increase in production either by using more inputs such as labour, land, time, fertilizer, feed or cash; or the maintenance of production at a certain level with the effective use of smaller amounts of fertilizer, or mixed cropping in smaller fields. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Sustainable intensification”, said Scholes, focused more on increasing production not by physical expansion but the efficient use of inputs. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change has called for views on agriculture within the climate change context to be submitted to its Subsidiary Body for Science and Technological Advice by 5 March 2012.<o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

Analysis: Agriculture in a Changing Environment

Photo:  Jaspreet Kindra/IRIN Cows release huge amounts of warming methane every year JOHANNESBURG, (IRIN) - Agriculture has been se...

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PHILIPPINES: Shelter Key Issue for Washi Survivors

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdC3hTj8wfprF9onoxMpZEMU0W5O86wLrBrOqvcZJqXrOxJPK1FTeBCLbUj0vRVgtLLl3zKJEZDVPC9Aboxbf0dkM1kJr6ms1RsGYpUHEdCx8kT0Od731hmfaSNzFwCPNDpVnc-XYr2Uw/s1600/201112221206520385.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdC3hTj8wfprF9onoxMpZEMU0W5O86wLrBrOqvcZJqXrOxJPK1FTeBCLbUj0vRVgtLLl3zKJEZDVPC9Aboxbf0dkM1kJr6ms1RsGYpUHEdCx8kT0Od731hmfaSNzFwCPNDpVnc-XYr2Uw/s1600/201112221206520385.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; font-size: xx-small;"><i>Photo: <a href="http://www.unicef.org/philippines/"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none;">Courtesy of UNICEF</span></a><o:p></o:p></i></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; font-size: xx-small;"><i>One month on, thousands of survivors are still in need</i></span></div></div></td></tr> </tbody></table><div style="text-align: justify;"></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-family: "\0027Trebuchet MS\0027";">MANILA<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>(IRIN) - One month after tropical storm Washi pummelled parts of the southern<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><st1:place u1:st="on"><st1:placetype u1:st="on">island<span class="apple-converted-space"></span></st1:placetype> </st1:place>of<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><st1:placename u1:st="on">Mindanao</st1:placename>, shelter remains the key challenge facing tens of thousands of survivors.</span></i></b><b><i><span style="background: white; font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"><o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div><br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">Tropical storm Washi hit two major cities, Cagayan de Oro and Iligan in northern <st1:place w:st="on">Mindanao</st1:place>, and 800 neighbouring villages on 16-18 December, triggering large-scale flooding and landslides that affected more than one million people. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">With more than 50,000 houses damaged or destroyed, some 26,000 survivors remain in 56 overcrowded evacuation centres, the country's National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC) reported on 17 January.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), another 200,000 are in makeshift shelters or staying with host families. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">"Our top priority at the moment is to ensure that shelter solutions are provided to all the displaced, including families from informal settlements and those living in areas deemed the danger zone," Jacqui Badcock, UN Humanitarian Coordinator for the <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Philippines</st1:place></st1:country-region>, told IRIN. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">In the aftermath of the storm, the government declared strips of land within 20m of the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Cagayan</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">River</st1:placetype></st1:place>, the country's longest, and its surrounding islets as "no-build zones". Many of the displaced lived in these areas. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">The government and aid groups are now working to identify available land that could be used as temporary relocation sites while permanent sites are being constructed. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">"We [the humanitarian community] are working closely with the government to ensure the relocations are voluntary, safe and dignified," Badcock added. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">Relocation is being done on a staggered basis. An initial 350 of the most vulnerable families, who were living along the riverbanks, have been moved to tents at a temporary relocation site in Cagayan de Oro. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">Permanent relocation sites for those who lost their homes and those who cannot return to their areas of origin (declared by the government as "no build" zones) are due to open in July 2012, according to OCHA; however, the exact number of people to be provided with shelter or shelter-repair assistance remains unconfirmed. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">Availability of land and property rights are an additional challenge, shelter experts say. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">"Although a few relocation sites have already been identified and are being prepared, acquiring land for temporary and permanent shelters is a huge challenge," Anna Pont, International Federation of the Red Cross (IFRC) shelter cluster coordinator in Mindanao, said. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">"The land secured should optimally be close to people's livelihoods or has to provide them with new livelihood opportunities," Pont said. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">Accessing remote areas <o:p></o:p></span></b><br /> <b><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><br /> </span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcyYfgzGCvsD5l5iCDO0cFHs1pmtU-bWzs1UkilOZRcAIGmjNvhplWZ-zSN9l3QipEnqogOVmWRNV7icEuHtzoRQp-2ML9Gjol-KZC8S3hT4C1UqGWuD1tYZZREJUJHUjjYTZrm4Et_hc/s1600/201201170908310920.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcyYfgzGCvsD5l5iCDO0cFHs1pmtU-bWzs1UkilOZRcAIGmjNvhplWZ-zSN9l3QipEnqogOVmWRNV7icEuHtzoRQp-2ML9Gjol-KZC8S3hT4C1UqGWuD1tYZZREJUJHUjjYTZrm4Et_hc/s1600/201201170908310920.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-size: medium; text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; font-size: 8pt;">Photo: <a href="http://ochaonline.un.org/PhilippinesCountryProfile/tabid/4261/Default.aspx" target="_blank"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none;">OCHA/The Philippines</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-size: medium; text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS'; font-size: 8pt;">Tents at a temporary shelter site in Cagayan de Oro<o:p></o:p></span></div></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-size: medium; text-align: justify;"><br class="Apple-interchange-newline" /></div></td></tr> </tbody></table><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">Meanwhile, local government and aid agencies are still struggling to reach those outside evacuation centres, particularly in remote and isolated areas.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">One month on, communities outside Iligan and in parts of the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) remain cut off and accessible only by air. Already affected by internal conflict, Washi has aggravated the vulnerability of these areas, aid workers confirm. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">"The urgent needs are food, clothing and shelter," Ben Aspera, head of the sub-office for the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Iligan, confirmed. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">Helicopters provided by the Philippine Army fly in supplies twice daily; however, their capacity is largely limited by both quantity and weight. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">"We are able to fly in food, clothing and sleeping supplies. We cannot bring in heavy shelter supplies at the moment," Aspera said. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">And while local and national authorities continue to work to clear roads to better access those affected, incessant rains are making that difficult. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">"We are continuously working on clearing the roads, but we are hampered by rains. We need to be careful because this area is prone to floods and landslides. Likewise, rains sometimes delay us from airlifting supplies," Benito Ramos, head of the NDRRMC, told IRIN. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">"Our immediate concern is to sustain these communities until they can be given permanent shelter," Ramos stressed. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">The government declared a state of national calamity in the most devastated areas on 20 December to hasten relief and rehabilitation efforts as well as facilitate international aid. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">On 22 December, the UN and humanitarian partners called for US$28.6 million to support the government. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">To date, $7.4 million (26 percent) has been provided for shelter, food, water, sanitation and hygiene and logistics. This includes a $3 million disbursement from the UN Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF).  <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">An estimated $9 million is needed for shelter requirements alone, of which $2.7 million or 30 percent has been funded.<o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

PHILIPPINES: Shelter Key Issue for Washi Survivors

Photo:  Courtesy of UNICEF One month on, thousands of survivors are still in need MANILA   (IRIN) - One month after tropical storm Washi ...

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At Least 25 Killed In Philippines Landslide

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /> <div style="border-bottom: double windowtext 2.25pt; border: none; mso-element: para-border-div; padding: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in;"> <div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><b><br /> </b></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><st1:city w:st="on"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="background: white;">MOSCOW</span></span></st1:city><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="background: white;"> (RIA Novosti) - At least 25 people have been killed and many others remain buried in rubble after a landslide in a mining area in the <st1:country-region w:st="on">Philippines</st1:country-region>’ southern <st1:place w:st="on">Mindanao</st1:place> region, regional media reported.<o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The landslide hit the gold-rich <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">village</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">Panganason</st1:placename></st1:place> in the early hours of Thursday, the Philippine Star said on its website, quoting a police official.<o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Rescuers have recovered 25 bodies from the rubble, with 15 people still missing, the official said.<o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Civil defense chief Benito Ramos was quoted by AFP as saying some 100 people remained unaccounted for. The figure is based on village officials’ accounts, he said.<o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Between 700 and 800 people are believed to reside in the stricken village.<o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Rescuers have hard time in reaching the area due to its unfriendly terrain, reports said.<o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; mso-border-bottom-alt: double windowtext 2.25pt; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 1.0pt 0in; padding: 0in; text-align: justify;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">The region where the disaster occurred saw devastating floods last month triggered by a tropical storm which killed more than 1,250 people.</span><o:p></o:p></span></span></div></div></div>

At Least 25 Killed In Philippines Landslide

MOSCOW (RIA Novosti) - At least 25 people have been killed and many others remain buried in rubble after a landslide in a mining area i...

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Powerful Earthquake Rocks Japan

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><br /> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjODdbNfXc8bRYILamxOMPqEwA9m1ffoCGQ2QQHeW2YDKW3yQ-nS_AGgP46WaYbT9OQYrKJKCdGQNMUnJf4_l5yIzlxMDqojvcPqnG-eKQKMvDKf4eHa_RdWXSaktOb-J-jZmv9-W1dYcg/s1600/usgs_japan_quake_01Jan12-resized.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjODdbNfXc8bRYILamxOMPqEwA9m1ffoCGQ2QQHeW2YDKW3yQ-nS_AGgP46WaYbT9OQYrKJKCdGQNMUnJf4_l5yIzlxMDqojvcPqnG-eKQKMvDKf4eHa_RdWXSaktOb-J-jZmv9-W1dYcg/s1600/usgs_japan_quake_01Jan12-resized.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 9px; line-height: 10px; text-align: right;"><span style="color: #999999; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><i><b>Photo: USGS</b></i></span></span> </td></tr> </tbody></table><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">Seismologists say a powerful earthquake measuring 7.0 rocked southern <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Japan</st1:country-region></st1:place> Sunday, but there were no reports of damage or casualties, and no tsunami warning was issued.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><br /> <br /> The U.S. Geological Survey put the epicenter of the quake in the Izu islands, 486 kilometers south of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Tokyo</st1:place></st1:city>.  The quake struck at a depth of 371 kilometers.<br /> <br /> <st1:country-region w:st="on">Japan</st1:country-region>'s Meteorological Agency said quake struck at 2:28 in the afternoon (0528 UTC) and caused buildings to sway in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Tokyo</st1:city></st1:place>.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><br /> <br /> <st1:place w:st="on">Northeastern Japan</st1:place> was devastated on March 11 by a massive earthquake and tsunami that left nearly 20,000 people dead or missing. ---VOA News<o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

Powerful Earthquake Rocks Japan

Photo: USGS Seismologists say a powerful earthquake measuring 7.0 rocked southern Japan Sunday, but there were no reports of damage o...

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India's Cyclone Death Toll Reaches 42

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><br /> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Indian authorities say the devastating cyclone that struck the country's southeastern coast Friday killed at least 42 people and damaged hundreds of homes.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Cyclone Thane lashed the coast between Cuddalore in Tamil Nadu state and the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">territory</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">Pondicherry</st1:placename></st1:place> with winds up to 135 kilometers per hour, before gradually weakening.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Officials say at least 26 of the deaths were in the Cuddalore district. They say most of the deaths were caused by wall collapses and electrocution.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Authorities said Saturday that engineers are working to restore telephone and power lines that were cut off in some regions during the cyclone.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Coastal villages were evacuated to shelters before Thane hit land. ---VOA News<o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

India's Cyclone Death Toll Reaches 42

Indian authorities say the devastating cyclone that struck the country's southeastern coast Friday killed at least 42 people and damag...

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India: Cyclone “Thane” Subsides After Killing 33 in Tamil Nadu State

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /> <div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';"><br /> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="background: white; font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">By P.Vijian </span><o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">CHENNAI, Tamil Nadu state, <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">India</st1:place></st1:country-region> (NNN-Bernama) -- Cyclone "Thane" eased off after storming across the southern state of Tamil Nadu, but the gushing storm killed 33 since Friday. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The ferocious gale moved across <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">India</st1:place></st1:country-region>'s southern states, threatening coastal hamlets, fishermen and keeping coast guards on high alert, but people escaped major calamity. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">"It has crossed Cuddalore and Puducherry. Gradually it will weaken and there is nothing alarming, but there will be a lot of rain in the next few days," Dr S.R Ramanan, director of the Area Cyclone Warning Centre at the Chennai Regional Meteorological Centre, told Bernama. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Local officials estimated nearly 5,000 fishermen's houses and fishing boats were wrecked by the cyclonic storm, which arrived with a wind speed of 140km per hour -- leaving many homeless just hours before the New Year celebration. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was a grim reminder of the devastating Indian Ocean Tsunami that killed nearly 8,000 people in Tamil Nadu on Dec 26, 2004. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However, Andhra Pradesh another southern state and home to a major fishing industry, escaped without much damage to the coastal communities. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa on Friday announced a RM85 million financial package to rehabilitate damaged infrastructure and houses in the eastern part of the state. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Though weather experts predict the year-end cyclone threat is over, people along shore-lines are yet to return to their homes and are still squatting in government relief camps. -- NNN-BERNAMA<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /> </div></div>

India: Cyclone “Thane” Subsides After Killing 33 in Tamil Nadu State

By P.Vijian CHENNAI, Tamil Nadu state, India (NNN-Bernama) -- Cyclone "Thane" eased off after storming across the southern sta...

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