Tropical forests, vital allies in the fight against climate breakdown, are vanishing at an alarming rate. On Thursday, in a bid to help reverse this trend, Brazil launched a new initiative at a summit of world leaders in Belém, the gateway to the Amazon.

Opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan has fallen by 20 per cent compared to last year, continuing a dramatic decline since the introduction of a nationwide ban under the Taliban in 2022 – but synthetic drugs and shifting trafficking routes are posing new challenges.

ROME, November 5 (IPS) - Ehmudi Lebsir was 17 when he trudged more than 50 kilometres across the desert to stay alive. Half a century on, the Sahrawi refugee still has not gone home to what was then Spanish province of Western Sahara.

BANGKOK, November 5 (IPS) - The message is clear: today’s youth are not “wishy-washy.” They are not just the future—they are the present, full partners in shaping it, and “power-sharing” is the new mantra. The veterans of activism are being reminded not merely to listen but to hear and to leave their egos at the door.

SRINAGAR, India, November 5 (IPS) - The world is falling dangerously short of meeting the Paris Agreement goals, with global greenhouse gas emissions rising to record levels and current national pledges still far off the mark, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) said in its Emissions Gap Report 2025: Off Target.

DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania, November 5 (IPS) - At dawn in Manzese, a dusty township on the outskirts of Dar es Salaam, silence hangs where the sounds of commerce once roared. The township, usually crowded with street cooks, vegetable vendors, mechanics, and motorcycle taxis snaking through the morning rush, stood eerily empty. Shutters are pulled down, wooden stalls abandoned, and the air is heavy with the smell of burnt rubber. For five days, the township’s bustling economic life has been paralyzed—leaving residents unable to buy food or access basic services.

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia / ABUJA, Nigeria , November 5 (IPS) - Three decades after the first Climate COP, the multilateral climate process – which was intended to serve as an instrument of justice and a guardian of the planet’s atmosphere – has fallen far short of its goals.

VICTORIA, British Columbia, Canada, November 5 (IPS) - At COP15, the developing countries were calling for the temperature to not rise above 1.5 degrees and they ignored the Copenhagen Accord which agreed to 2.0 degrees

As the Second World Summit for Social Development continued in Doha on Wednesday, governments warned that global progress risks stalling unless social protection, equality and peace are prioritised – and backed with political and financial commitment.

Civil society networks and private sector leaders crossed paths in the buzzing corridors of the Qatar National Convention Centre, a reminder that social development is not just debated in meetings rooms – it touches jobs, families and futures.