News stories by Stephanie Wildes, page 3

, Nov 20 (IPS) - Thousands of small farming families in Pará, in the Amazon jungle in northeast Brazil, have turned to the African oil palm as a new source of income, through contracts with biofuel companies. Strange bedfellows, which poses cultural and economic challenges.

MONTEVIDEO, Nov 06 (IPS) - The small South American country of Uruguay could become a major logistics hub in the Southern Cone due to the deepwater port that the government is planning to build in a tourist area on the Atlantic ocean.

BRASILIA, Aug 30 (IPS) - Today's new world of digital communications presents public media outlets with a complex challenge: to conquer loyal and active audiences, with programming that is beholden neither to governments, their main funders, nor to market imperatives.

NEW YORK, Aug 06 (IPS) - Ask a random New Yorker what their city is famous for and "composting" is about as likely to make the list as "cheap housing" and "warm winters". But if it is up to Mayor Michael Bloomberg, this will soon change.

LA PAZ, Jul 05 (IPS) - South American leaders demanded that the governments of France, Italy, Portugal and Spain provide explanations and public apologies to Bolivian President Evo Morales for refusing his presidential jet permission to fly through their airspace on his way home from Moscow.

ANTIGUA, Guatemala, Jun 05 (IPS) - The drug problem should be tackled not as a security issue but as a public health question, with policies for "prevention, treatment and rehabilitation," delegations from the 34 countries participating in the 43rd General Assembly of the Organisation of American States agreed.

GWANGJU, South Korea, May 21 (IPS) - As news of the death of former Argentine dictator Jorge Rafael Videla in a prison cell spread around the world, Julia Parodi, who was in this South Korean city to receive the Gwangju Prize for Human Rights on behalf of HIJOS, said he died in the right place.

JIQUILISCO, El Salvador, Apr 29 (IPS) - Community leaders in El Salvador are opposed to the government's plans to use U.S. aid funds to develop the country's Pacific coastline, on the grounds that it would threaten the environment in a vast area.

TARIJA, Bolivia, Dic 27 (IPS) - Due to the intense political polarisation in the Chaco region, home to Bolivia's oil and natural gas wealth, three indigenous lawmakers who entered the legislative assembly of the southern department of Tarija as representatives of their people have quickly come to wield decisive power.

MANILA, Dic 14 (IPS) - With newly re-elected President Barack Obama having chosen Southeast Asia as his first foreign destination, where he also attended the much-anticipated pan-Pacific East Asia Summit, the U.S. has underscored its commitment to its so-called strategic ‘pivot' to the Asia-Pacific region.