News stories by Fabíola Ortiz

Brazil spends some 10 billion dollars a year on health care for smokers — more than three times the tax revenue from the tobacco industry in this country, which is the world's top exporter and second producer of tobacco.

As Rio de Janeiro prepares to host the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, which will discuss the green economy, the Brazilian city has put an end to one of its worst environmental sins: the enormous Jardim Gramacho garbage dump on Guanabara Bay.

The Brazilian government of Dilma Rousseff is taking firm steps towards stronger relations with Africa, such as the creation of a special fund to finance development projects together with multilateral lenders like the World Bank.

In the green belt of market gardens that feeds the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro, women farmers are learning environmentally friendly techniques in response to extreme weather events and their effects on the land.

The 380 families living in Piquiá de Baixo, a small town in the northeastern Brazilian state of Maranhão, are fed up with having to endure high levels of pollution from nearby steelworks in their water, air and soil.

Social movements from several countries accused Brazil’s Vale, the world’s second largest mining company, of causing serious environmental and social damage, as well as the deaths of 15 workers in labour accidents between 2010 and 2012.

On her first visit to Brazil, the United Nations humanitarian affairs chief Valerie Amos stressed the need to take advantage of this country’s experience in disaster response and the fight against poverty.

Weather events such as extreme temperatures and drought caused global agricultural losses of 11.4 billion dollars in 2011, while 12 million hectares of farmland are lost to land degradation every year, and unsustainable agricultural practices contribute to the emission of greenhouse gases.

Community radio stations in Brazil are finding the internet and user-friendly information technologies to be valuable allies for their broadcasts, which focus on citizenship, social equity and human rights.

The fall in world tobacco consumption, especially in industrialised nations, is a sign of the urgent need for producer countries like Brazil, China, India and the United States to offer their farmers alternatives to growing tobacco.