News headlines in December 2010, page 2

  1. BRAZIL: Climate Change Means New Crop Health Concerns

    - Inter Press Service

    A story from Inter Press Service, an international news agency

    Farming around the globe, already reeling from drought, heat waves and major storms, will have to prepare for the new challenges that global warming will bring, especially in the form of pests and disease.

  2. BRAZIL: Oil Palm Plantations Expand on Degraded Land in Amazon

    - Inter Press Service

    A story from Inter Press Service, an international news agency

    Brazil hopes to eventually become a major producer of palm oil, thanks to the expansion of this new exotic monoculture crop in the eastern Amazon jungle, where eucalyptus plantations are also mushrooming on broad swaths of already deforested land.

  3. AGRICULTURE - SOUTH AFRICA: Small Scale Farmers Face Uphill Battle

    - Inter Press Service

    A story from Inter Press Service, an international news agency

    Just before sunrise 39-year -old Alan Simons, an emerging small-scale farmer, gets ready for his usual nine-hour day of harvesting, packing and deliveries. In his black Nissan van he drives ten kilometres to the seaside town of Strand outside of Cape Town to pick up his six workers, all of who are women.

  4. Assumptions on Overfishing Challenged

    - Inter Press Service

    A story from Inter Press Service, an international news agency

    For decades, fisheries around the world have relied on practices that take for granted certain assumptions about the industry, such as protecting younger fish while exploiting older fish and using trophic levels to monitor the health of fisheries. Recently, however, some scientists have begun to question these unanimously accepted practices. Experts are beginning to think that the science behind the global fishing industry may be completely wrong.

  5. CHINA: Scientists Push Desalination Meet Water Shortages

    - Inter Press Service

    A story from Inter Press Service, an international news agency

    While China faces grave water shortages, researchers at institutions across the country are working on new water- saving and desalination technologies that they hope can alleviate the crisis in the crucial years to come.

  6. BIODIVERSITY: A Year for Limited Optimism

    - Inter Press Service

    A story from Inter Press Service, an international news agency

    Nearly 12 months ago, when the U.N. heralded 2010 as the ‘International Year of Biodiversity’, unrealistic goals seemed to indicate failure for the ambitious initiative. But now that the year is drawing to a close, some experts also see the year’s progress as encouraging, and a reason for optimism.

  7. EASTERN EUROPE: Playing Dice With Migrants

    - Inter Press Service

    A story from Inter Press Service, an international news agency

    Over the past years, acceptance rates for asylum-seekers in Central and Eastern Europe have been decreasing slowly but steadily. Even for those who do receive protected status, life is a gamble.

  8. PAKISTAN: When Men Fear Telling Their Wives About HIV

    - Inter Press Service

    A story from Inter Press Service, an international news agency

    As a peer educator at a local HIV/AIDS organisation, Ahmad (not his real name) has taken care to teach his own wife anything and everything he knows about the disease.

  9. HEALTH-INDIA: Vitamin A Doses Keep Child Malnutrition Away

    - Inter Press Service

    A story from Inter Press Service, an international news agency

    With three small children to raise in a dirt-poor village in eastern India’s Bihar state, farm labourer Renu Devi is an unsung rural supermom who shuttles between home and field every day.

  10. MEDIA-HONDURAS: Ten Murders and No Justice

    - Inter Press Service

    A story from Inter Press Service, an international news agency

    The murder of Henry Suazo, a correspondent for a radio station based in the capital, brought this year's death toll for reporters in Honduras to 10, and made this Central American nation the second most dangerous country for journalists in Latin America, after Mexico.

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