ENVIRONMENT-INDIA: Law on Forest Rights Fails to Deliver
By Manipadma Jena
BHUBANESWAR, India - A four-year-old landmark law that was supposed to bring profound changes in the lives of India’s tribal and forest-dwelling peoples has failed to deliver on that promise.
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BIODIVERSITY: Lucrative Shark Trade Under Scrutiny
By Matthew Berger
WASHINGTON - As climate change transforms the acidity and oxygen levels of the world's waters with devastating effects for some marine species, others are facing an even more immediate threat from human consumption.
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INDONESIA: Waste Composting Project Blazes Cleaner Path
By Kanis Dursin
JAKARTA - Battling the pain from a boil on his left thigh, 45-year-old Inggit Tukino pulled his two-wheeled cart through the overcrowded alleys of a slum in Rawabebek, Penjaringan hamlet in here North Jakarta.
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EDUCATION-URUGUAY: Gardens of Knowledge
By Silvana Silveira
MONTEVIDEO - "Nature is wise, and if we take the time to observe it, we can learn so much" is the underlying philosophy of a number of innovative programmes being carried out in Uruguayan schools that are using gardens as a teaching resource, explained Edith Moraes, director of the national Primary Education Board.
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TANZANIA: Weather Changes Turn Farming into Gamble with Nature
By Denis Gathanju
DAR-ES-SALAAM - Changes in weather patterns have turned agriculture into a gamble with nature for Tanzanian farmers. Prolonged droughts and floods have made the lives of small-scale farmers, who don’t have access to irrigation, extremely difficult.
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FINANCE: Self-Policing of Extractive Industries a "Dismal" Failure
By Charles Fromm
WASHINGTON - An international initiative that seeks to reform how governments profit from their natural resources should not reduce its existing standards of membership solely because candidate countries have been reluctant or incapable of meeting them, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Tuesday.
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RIGHTS: "Famine Marriages" Just One Byproduct of Climate Change
By Thalif Deen*
UNITED NATIONS - The negative fallout from climate change is having a devastatingly lopsided impact on women compared to men, from higher death rates during natural disasters to heavier household and care burdens.
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ENVIRONMENT-UGANDA: Landslides - Experts Warn Worst is Yet to Come
By Joshua Kyalimpa
KAMPALA - Fourteen-year-old Isaac Wadyegere of Bundesi village in Bududa district woke up to a rainy and chilly Monday morning and went to school as usual. But Mar. 1 was not a usual day in eastern Uganda.
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ECUADOR: Avatar Downfall a Blow for Indigenous Communities
By Gonzalo Ortiz
QUITO - Science fiction blockbuster Avatar was the big loser in the Oscar awards ceremony - not only a blow for director James Cameron but also seen as a symbolic reverse in the struggle to recover Amazon rainforest areas in Ecuador from the effects of oil pollution.
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PERU: Suspension of Mining Operation Merely a Placebo
By Milagros Salazar
LIMA - Although the Peruvian government reported that it had suspended the exploration activities of the Afrodita mining company in the country's northern Amazon jungle region to avoid further protests by local indigenous people, officials took no actual steps to bring the firm's work to a halt.
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