Category Archives: Agriculture

Rallies Across Africa Demand Global Action, Climate Justice Ahead of UN Summit

“The urgency of the climate crisis cannot be understated, particularly here in Africa, which is the region most vulnerable to climate impacts,” said one campaigner.

By Brett Wilkins Published 9-23-2022 by Common Dreams

Ugandan climate activists demonstrate in Kampala on September 23, 2022. (Photo: Hilda F. Nakabuye/Twitter)

Thousands of African activists and members of communities on the frontlines of the worsening climate emergency turned out Friday to call on world leaders—who will gather in Egypt in November for the United Nations Climate Summit—to urgently address a crisis that disproportionately impacts their lives.

Demonstrators took to the streets, public spaces, and even waterways in countries across a continent that’s responsible for just 4% of global greenhouse emissions to demand climate justice and an end to fossil fuel exploration and extraction ahead of the U.N.’s COP27 conference, scheduled to start November 6 in Sharm El-Sheikh. Continue reading →

Number of Ultrarich Hits All-Time High as Someone Dies From Hunger Every 4 Seconds

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“Those with the power and money to change this must come together to better respond to current crises and prevent and prepare for future ones,” a coalition of charities asserted.

By Brett Wilkins Published 9-20-2022 by Common Dreams

A Somali woman and her severely malnourished child wait for medical assistance from the African Union Mission in Somalia. Photo: UN

As a new analysis revealed that the global ranks of the superrich soared to a record number, a coalition of charity groups said Tuesday that hundreds of millions of people around the world are hungry—and that someone starves to death every four seconds.

At least 238 international and local charities from 75 countries signed an open letter noting that “a staggering 345 million people are now experiencing acute hunger, a number that has more than doubled since 2019.” Continue reading →

New Study Warns Swaths of Amazon Have Already Passed Key ‘Tipping Point’

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“The tipping point is not a future scenario but rather a stage already present in some areas of the region,” note researchers.

By Jessica Corbett Published 9-5-2022 by Common Dreams

Photo: Amazônia Real/flickr/CC

Indigenous leaders and scientists on Monday revealed research showing that the destruction of the Amazon rainforest is so advanced that some swaths may have hit a key tipping point and never recover.

While experts have long warned of human activity causing portions of the massive, biodiverse rainforest to shift to savannah, the new findings were unveiled on the Global Day of Action for the Amazon and the launch of the 5th Amazon Summit of Indigenous Peoples: Solutions for a Living Amazon in Lima, Peru. Continue reading →

If you thought this summer’s heat waves were bad, a new study has some disturbing news about dangerous heat in the future

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*Parts of China suffered through a monthslong heat wave in summer 2022.*
*China Photos/Getty Images*

David Battisti, University of Washington

As global temperatures rise, people in the tropics, including places like India and Africa’s Sahel region, will likely face dangerously hot conditions almost daily by the end of the century – even as the world reduces its greenhouse gas emissions, a new study shows.

The mid-latitudes, including the U.S., will also face increasing risks. There, the number of dangerously hot days, marked by temperatures and humidity high enough to cause heat exhaustion, is projected to double by the 2050s and continue to rise.

In the study, scientists looked at population growth, economic development patterns, energy choices and climate models to project how heat index levels – the combination of heat and humidity – will change over time. We asked University of Washington atmospheric scientist David Battisti, a co-author of the study, published Aug. 25, 2022, to explain the findings and what they mean for humans around the world. Continue reading →

Renewed Calls to Ban Glyphosate After Toxic Herbicide Found in 80% of US Urine Samples

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“This chemical should not be in our bodies,” asserted one green group in response to a new CDC study.

By Brett Wilkins Published 7-11-2022 by Common Dreams

Photo: Mike Mozart/flickr/CC

Environmental and public health advocates renewed calls to ban glyphosate after a recently published U.S. report revealed the cancer-linked herbicide—which is the active ingredient in Bayer’s popular Roundup weedkiller—was found in the urine of more than 80% of study participants.

Of the 2,310 urine samples taken from children and adults for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 1,885 contained detectable amounts of glyphosate. Continue reading →

Children ‘Dying Before Our Eyes’: Aid Workers Plea for Help as Famine Unfolds in Somalia

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“Already 1.5 million children below the age of five are malnourished,” said one United Nations official, “and we expect that 356,000 of these may not survive through the end of September.”

By Brett Wilkins Published -22-2022 by Common Dreams

Norwegian Refugee Council Secretary-General Jan Egeland listens to a woman speaking during a visit to drought-stricken Somalia on June 21, 2022. (Photo: Jan Egeland/Twitter)

International aid workers are issuing desperate pleas for help this week as severe climate-driven drought coupled with critically depleted global food supplies due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine are fueling a slide into “catastrophic famine” in Somalia that could claim the lives of hundreds of thousands of children by summer’s end.

“Already 1.5 million children below the age of five are malnourished, and we expect that 356,000 of these may not survive through the end of September this year,” Adam Abdelmoula, the United Nations’ humanitarian coordinator for Somalia—which has suffered an unprecedented four consecutive failed rainy seasons—said during a visit to Dolow in the south near the Ethiopian border. Continue reading →

‘Major Victory’: Court Orders EPA Review of Glyphosate’s Cancer and Endangered Species Risks

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“While it comes too late for many farmworkers and landscapers who suffer after glyphosate exposure, we are grateful for the court’s ruling,” said a representative for one plaintiff.

By Jessica Corbett Published 6-17-2022 by Common Dreams

Photo: Mike Mozart/flickr/CC

A federal appeals court on Friday issued a ruling on the weedkiller glyphosate that the coalition involved with the case called “a historic victory for farmworkers and the environment.”

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ordered the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to review its conclusions about the safety of glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, a popular herbicide created by Monsanto—which Bayer acquired in 2018. Continue reading →

Court Rules ‘Highly Imperiled’ Bumblebees Can Be First Insects Protected by California Law

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“With one out of every three bites of food we eat coming from a crop pollinated by bees, this court decision is critical to protecting our food supply,” said one advocate.

By Brett Wilkins Published 5-31-2022 by Common Dreams

A bumblebee in flight approaches a flower. (Photo: Andrés Morya/flickr/cc)

Wildlife defenders on Tuesday welcomed a California appeals court ruling affirming that a regulatory agency can classify four types of bumblebees as “fish” under the law in order to consider them for candidacy on the state’s endangered species list, a ruling that paves the way for the protection of other insects including the monarch butterfly.

“With one out of every three bites of food we eat coming from a crop pollinated by bees, this court decision is critical to protecting our food supply,” said Rebecca Spector, West Coast director at the advocacy group Center for Food Safety, a party to the case. Continue reading →

The Ukraine war has given NATO renewed credibility. That’s a problem

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On the biggest issues that will threaten people around the world in the coming years, NATO is well-night irrelevant

By Paul Rogers Published 5-21-2022 by openDemocracy

Image: Public domain

So far, the greatest of Vladimir Putin’s many failures in the Ukraine war is his aim of seriously weakening NATO.

Far from creating greater disunity between member states, Russia’s president has given NATO a new purpose, just as its role was starting to be questioned. Its unity has even been enhanced, and Sweden and Finland have now applied to join.

This may have drastic global consequences. Continue reading →

Green Groups Blame Bolsonaro Policies as Amazon Deforestation Sets New Monthly Record

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“The Bolsonaro administration is abetting deforestation and environmental crime,” said one campaigner, “and what we harvest are these terrible, scary, revolting numbers.”

By Brett Wilkins Published 5-6-2022 by Common Dreams

Photo: Amazon Watch/Twitter

Brazil’s space research agency revealed Friday that deforestation in the country’s Amazon rainforest last month shattered the previous record for April, a development one conservation campaigner called “very scary” and an indication of the criminal level of environmental destruction occurring under the administration of far-right President Jair Bolsonaro.

The National Institute for Space Research said nearly 400 square miles of the world’s largest rainforest was destroyed in Brazil last month, an area the size of 1,400 soccer fields and by far the biggest loss for April since record-keeping began in 2015, Agence France-Presse reports. Continue reading →

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Category Archives: Agriculture

If you thought this summer’s heat waves were bad, a new study has some disturbing news about dangerous heat in the future