News Southern Africa's booming industry in wood carvings may be coming at a high price: the destruction of the region's hardwood forests. Environmentalists say the largely unregulated activity has almost wiped out the African Blackwood in Malawi, a hardwood coveted by carvers for its colour and texture. Photos: ForestPress
By Tim Hirsch, Buenos Aires The US has been defending its decision not to take part in the Kyoto Protocol, just two months before the international agreement to cut greenhouse gases comes into force. Senior US negotiator Harlan Watson attacked the treaty as being politically motivated rather than based on science. Speaking to reporters at the UN climate change convention in Buenos Aires, he suggested European countries were in no position to lecture the Americans about cutting emissions.
News By Elizabeth Blunt (Buenos Aires) The US has told a UN conference on global warming that it has no intention of re-joining international efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions. The chief American negotiator at the conference in Argentina's capital Buenos Aires ruled out any move to sign up to the Kyoto Protocol for years. He told reporters that efforts to cut emissions were based on bad science.
News The world would require measures more far reaching than the Kyoto agreement to address climate change, federal Environment Minister Ian Campbell said today. Parties to the Kyoto agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are meeting in Buenos Aires for the last time before it comes into effect in 2005.
Poor countries should be given extra help to avoid the worsening effects of climate change, a UN conference on global warming has been told. Argentina's environment minister Ginés Gonzalez Garcia opened the conference in Buenos Aires by saying his country had already experienced major changes. High rainfall, violent storms and increased levels of disease were all blamed on climate change, he said. The meeting takes place a month after Russia ratified the Kyoto Protocol.
News Each holiday season, shoppers find themselves confronted with a difficult choice: celebrate with a real or plastic tree. What most people don't realize is that the best choice has always been the traditional and natural choice, a real Christmas tree. Real Christmas are a benefit to the environment from the time they are planted until after the holiday season when they can be recycled. While they're growing, real Christmas trees support life by absorbing carbon dioxide and other gases and emitting fresh oxygen. This helps prevent the earth-warming greenhouse effect.
News A Chinese coal production company said yesterday it will receive US$19 million under a purchase agreement it signed with the World Bank to cap greenhouse gas emissions. The company promised to reduce carbon dioxide-equivalent emissions by 4.5 million tons in two decades. According to the agreement signed on Wednesday, Jincheng Anthracite Coal Group Co Ltd will capture coal mine methane and use it for power generation at the Sihe mine in Jincheng City in north China's Shanxi Province.
News 300 people have died from landslides and floods, proof that the country is mismanaging its forestry policy Phillipines officials say the death toll from landslides and floods unleashed by a tropical storm in the Philippines has exceeded 300. Several villages have been engulfed by mudslides caused by heavy rain on the east coast of Luzon Island.
News Photo by University Of Warwick LONDON - A rose is a rose is a phone? British scientists seeking to protect the environment have designed a biodegradable mobile phone cover that breaks down in soil when discarded and sprouts a flower from a seed embedded inside the case.
News Montreal, December 1, 2004 – ForestLeadership is pleased to announce a new Awards Program to recognize individuals and organizations demonstrating exceptional leadership, communication and collaboration skills.
News The Global Forest and Paper Summit 2005, Vancouver, BC, Canada, June 1-3. is comprised of a series of events that will bring together senior executives from the world's leading forest and paper companies with internationally recognized thought leaders and government policy makers to discuss the key issues and challenges facing the sector globally over the next decade.
News BEIJING (AFP/ForestPress)— Global environmental group Greenpeace accused a Singapore-based multinational pulp and paper company of illegal logging and rampant forest destruction in southwestern China's Yunnan province. Asia Pulp and Paper Co. Ltd (APP) was flouting China's forestry law and was preparing to sow destruction to Yunnan forests by replacing natural growth with eucalyptus tree plantations, Greenpeace China said in a report.
FAO Forestry Paper 144 Sustainable management of tropical forests in Central Africa In search of excellence FAO Forestry Paper 143
News The sudden boost trillions of cicadas dying en masse give to North American forests is apparent from a new study published in Science magazine. The insects emerge from below ground and swarm over the landscape every 13 or 17 years to briefly sing and mate. Their decomposing carcasses will increase bacteria, fungi and nitrogen in forest soils, Louie Yang shows. This may explain why trees grow faster following cicada emergences, the University of California scientist says
News California Governor Arnold Schwarzeneggar has vetoed proposed state legislation giving preferential treatment to Californian companies using environmentally sustainable forestry practices California Governor Arnold Schwarzeneggar has vetoed proposed state legislation giving preferential treatment to Californian companies using environmentally sustainable forestry practices that would have discriminated against New Zealand timber imports.
Under the name of Hungarian Foresters’ Association a new organisation is taking wing to safeguard the interests of the branch. The staturory meeting is called for December 17th, 10. am, in Citizens’ House, at 6 Visi Imre street, district VIII, Budapest.
News BRASILIA - About half of Brazil's original Amazon rainforest has been occupied by man, deforested or used for industry like logging and its destruction is worse than government data shows, a leading environmental group said on Tuesday. The study using satellite photos shows that land occupation and deforestation covers some 47 percent of the world's largest jungle, an area bigger than the continental United States, the Brazilian non-government organization Imazon said.
