Feeds2Read: RSS FEED .: IPS Inter Press Service One Planet - 1.4 Million Species / Convention on Biological Diversity :. The Convention on Biological Diversity, signed by 150 governments at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, is the main instrument for protecting biodiversity and ensuring equitable and sustainable access to the benefits of the Earth's genetic riches and a healthy environment. But much has yet to be done just four years before the 2010 deadline agreed by the international community for achieving significant results in reducing biodiversity loss. Once again in Brazil, but this time in the southern city of Curitiba, the states party to the Convention are gathering in March to discuss these issues, as well as the Biosafety Protocol, including protecting biodiversity from the risks of biotechnology and preventing bioterrorism., RSS Feeds Aggregator and RSS Directory

The Convention on Biological Diversity, signed by 150 governments at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, is the main instrument for protecting biodiversity and ensuring equitable and sustainable access to the benefits of the Earth's genetic riches and a healthy environment. But much has yet to be done just four years before the 2010 deadline agreed by the international community for achieving significant results in reducing biodiversity loss. Once again in Brazil, but this time in the southern city of Curitiba, the states party to the Convention are gathering in March to discuss these issues, as well as the Biosafety Protocol, including protecting biodiversity from the risks of biotechnology and preventing bioterrorism.

.::BIODIVERSITY: Mammals Face Extinction Crisis::.

BARCELONA, Oct 7 (TerraViva/IPS) - One in four mammals on Earth is at risk of disappearing forever, according to the new "Red List of Threatened Species" released by the Geneva-based International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) on Monday.

.::ENVIRONMENT: Twisted As Unnaturally as the Banks::.

BARCELONA, Oct 6 (IPS/Terraviva) - The financial meltdown in most of the industrialised world presents an opportunity for a new economic model that would end short-sighted search for high returns, according to leading economists attending the IUCN World Conservation Congress here.

.::ARGENTINA: Guardians of the River ::.

PUERTO RECONQUISTA, Argentina, Oct 2 (IPS) - "There is no water…there are no fish," says Olga Ledesma, her skin weathered from 40 years of small-scale fishing, as the boat slowly winds its way along a branch of the Paraná river, South America’s second-longest river.

.::ENVIRONMENT-AUSTRALIA: Discoveries Highlight Danger to Reefs ::.

MELBOURNE, Oct 2 (IPS) - Efforts to create an inventory of life on Australia’s major coral reefs -- to be used as part of a baseline to determine the impacts of global warming and overfishing upon reefs -- have turned up hundreds of previously unknown and rare species.

.::ARGENTINA: Women Create Food and Jobs in Wetlands::.

SANTA FE, Argentina, Oct 1 (Tierramérica) - Wearing a cap and a white apron, Melina Lucero cuts the heads and tails off fish caught in the Paraná River, before skilfully filleting them. Her co-workers will process and package the fish to sell as traditional, small-scale fish preserves at food fairs along the banks of the river in Argentina.

.::Q&A: 'Oil Prices Have Revived Interest in Dams'::.

VIENTIANE , Sep 30 (IPS) - Concerns over the future of fisheries in the Mekong River floated to the surface at the first round of discussions held here late this month to shape a blueprint to build a series of mega dams across South-east Asia’s largest body of water.

.::VIETNAM: Heeding Climate Change Warnings::.

HANOI, Sep 29 (IPS) - With a predicted sea level rise of one metre by 2100, Vietnam may end up being one of the nations worst hit by climate change. Such a rise would affect five percent of the land area, 11 percent of the population and seven percent of the agriculture.

.::ASIA: Calamities, Climate Change - Reprieve for Mangroves ::.

BANGKOK, Sep 24 (IPS) - Lack of access to military-ruled Burma has not stopped a global environmental body from setting its sights on the country’s Irrawaddy Delta, which was devastated by a powerful cyclone in early May. Rehabilitating mangroves is the draw.

.::EUROPE: Transgenic Crops' Days May Be Numbered::.

LISBON, Sep 16 (IPS) - Pressure from the president of the European Commission has not succeeded in advancing the cause of transgenic crops. In spite of the power wielded by the executive organ of the European Union, the bloc’s member countries are gradually discontinuing the use of genetically modified seeds.

.::BRAZIL: Courts - the Battleground for Fight Against Paper Mills ::.

PORTO ALEGRE, Brazil, Sep 15 (Tierramérica) - The battle against the wood pulp ndustry has intensified in the Brazilian courts, especially in those states where eucalyptus plantations have expanded the most: Bahia and Espírito Santo in the east and Rio Grande do Sul in the south.

.::ENVIRONMENT-BRAZIL: Click Here to Plant a Tree::.

RIO DE JANEIRO, Sep 7 (Tierramérica) - It has become fashionable in Latin America to pursue initiatives towards "zero carbon", neutralising the climate-changing greenhouse gases produced by industry, commercial aviation and even the football World Cup -- and along with it, atoning for the environmental sins of polluters.

.::VIETNAM: Paying for Ecosystems::.

HANOI, Sep 4 (IPS) - Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES), an environmental scheme now being trialled in this South-east Asian country, may serve as a model for the region, if found successful.

.::ENVIRONMENT: Amazon Increasingly Oily::.

LIMA, Aug 28 (Tierramérica) - More than 180 oil and natural gas fields extend across the western Amazon, shared by five South American countries and threatening biodiversity and indigenous lands, warns a study by U.S.-based organisations.

.::ENVIRONMENT: Conservation as Artists' Muse::.

SAN DIEGO, California, Aug 25 (IPS) - Pulled-together socialites and not-so-sloppy artists recently gathered for an atypical art exhibition in San Diego that combines art with wilderness conservation, using contemporary art to investigate vanishing worlds and the people that inhabit them.

.::Q&A: "Amazonas State Is in the Environmental Vanguard"::.

MANAOS, Brazil, Aug 23 (Tierramérica) - The Brazilian state of Amazonas is "a quarry of ideas and creativity" and is in the vanguard for having preserved 98 percent of its native forests, paying for environmental services, and enacting the pioneering Climate Change Act, says Nadia D'Ávila Ferreira, the state's secretary for the environment and sustainable development.