Leading scientists on Thursday called on the upcoming Rio Summit to grapple with environmental ills that they said pointed to “a humanitarian emergency on a global scale.”
In a “State of the Planet” declaration issued after a four-day conference, the scientists said Earth was now facing unprecedented challenges, from water stress, pollution and species loss to spiralling demands for food.
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Climate change is amplifying risks from drought, floods, storms and rising seas, threatening all countries but small island states, poor nations and arid regions in particular, UN experts warned on Tuesday.
In its first-ever report on the question, the Nobel-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said man-made global-warming gases are already affecting some types of extreme weather.
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Lloyd’s of London insurance market on Wednesday posted its second-largest annual loss owing to record claims for catastrophes including Japan’s earthquake disaster and floods in Thailand.
The company suffered a pre-tax loss of £516 million ($822 million, 615 million euros) in 2011 on soaring claims, Lloyd’s said in a results statement. That compared with a profit before tax of £2.195 billion in 2010.
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The Japanese government’s worst-case scenario at the height of the nuclear crisis last year warned that tens of millions of people, including Tokyo residents, might need to leave their homes, according to a report obtained by The Associated Press. But fearing widespread panic, officials kept the report secret.
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Mexican President Felipe Calderon on Tuesday announced a 2.6-billion-dollar program to help victims of a record drought, including food and water handouts, as rural victims protested in the capital.
The “unprecedented sum would attend to a catastrophic situation in Mexico,” Calderon said during a public act. The aim “is that no family is without water or food due to this drought.”
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Petrol is already beyond the price range of many Africans while surging population levels should force governments in Asia to limit car use, political and business leaders said Wednesday.
While economic gloom in the eurozone is the most immediate concern of delegates gathered here for the annual Davos forum, the challenge of feeding and powering an ever expanding planet is the main long-term headache.
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..Rising oil prices and chilly economic times are prompting increasing numbers of Greeks to chop down trees for winter warmth, a group of forest engineers warned Tuesday.
Nikos Bokaris, a spokesman for the Panhellenic Union of Forest Engineers, said the debt-wracked nation’s forest ecosystems were not yet under threat, but urged the government to act quickly to prevent broader damage.
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The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Thursday it had suspended food distribution to 1.1 million people in central and southern Somalia after Al Shabaab militants blocked deliveries in parts of the famine-hit country.
The independent humanitarian agency, one of few providing aid supplies there despite huge logistical and security constraints, said local authorities had blocked deliveries since mid-December in the Middle Shabelle and Galgadud regions.
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Wind turbine giant Vestas said Thursday it would slash 2,335 jobs, leaving Denmark’s government red-faced after it made “green technologies” a top priority of its just-launched EU presidency.
Beyond those redundancies, another 1,600 people in the United States may be fired if a tax credit was not extended, the group warned.
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The United Nations is calling for about $28 million in funding to help those affected by last weekend’s devastating tropical storm in the southern Philippines.
The UN has likened the scene in the region after tropical storm Washi to the impact of an inland tsunami.
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The disasters that plagued the globe this year will send 2011 into the record books as the most costly year for catastrophes on record.
Japan’s powerful tsunami, earthquakes in New Zealand, floods in Thailand and a series of severe tornadoes in the U.S. all contributed to $350 billion in disaster losses, according to a new estimate from reinsurance company Swiss Re AG.
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Canada became the first country to formally withdraw from the Kyoto Protocol, saying the pact on cutting carbon emissions was preventing the world from effectively tackling climate change.
“We are invoking Canada’s legal right to formally withdraw from Kyoto,” Environment Minister Peter Kent said following a marathon UN climate conference in South Africa, at which nations agreed to a new roadmap for worldwide action.
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European ministers say they have made a significant step in securing a deal to draw up a new international climate treaty, but campaigners warned it would not be enough to tackle global warming.
The deal, which was finally agreed as UN climate talks in Durban, South Africa, overran by almost 36 hours, commits all countries – including major polluters the US and China – to negotiate a legally enforceable treaty on cutting emissions by 2015.
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DURBAN, South Africa (Reuters) – The United States denied on Thursday it was trying to delay a new global climate deal until 2020, saying it supported an EU proposal that aims to chart a path to a more ambitious pact to fight climate change.
Delegates from almost 200 countries have until Friday to decide whether to commit to signing up to an internationally binding climate deal by 2015 at the latest.
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The Rio+20 summit next year should focus on reshaping the world economy to better “manage the planet,” the UN’s top environment official told AFP at climate talks in Durban.
“Rio will help the world look at climate change in the broader context of the changes we need to bring about in our global economy,” United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Executive Director Achim Steiner told AFP on the sidelines of the 12-day negotiations, which end Friday.
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The world is getting hotter, with 2011 one of the warmest years on record, and increasing temperatures are expected to amplify floods, droughts and other extreme weather patterns around the planet, said a U.N. report released on Tuesday.
The World Meteorological Organisation, part of the United Nations, said the warmest 13 years of average global temperatures have all occurred in the 15 years since 1997.
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Video Report: Dozens of shattered communities in Japan are facing the difficult decision on whether to rebuild or relocate one [...]
Video Report: Flood levels around the New South Wales city of Wagga Wagga have begun falling, but residents have been [...]
Video Report:Thousands of residents remain isolated by floodwaters along the New South Wales north coast as the threat moves inland.About [...]
Video Report:Aerial views show the destruction left behind by typhoon Washi after it lashed the southern Philippines, killing over 250 [...]
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