The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) says that degradation of about two billion of hectares of arable land is due to population pressures in 64 of 105 countries. The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) says 11 states in Northern Nigeria (Adamawa, Bauchi, Borno, Gombe and Yobe states in the northeast Nigeria and Jigawa, Kano, Katsina, Kebbi, ...

Executive Director of the Green Climate Fund (GCF), Héla Cheikhrouhou, has announced that she will step down in September 2016, at the end of her current term as head of the Fund. Ms. Cheikhrouhou, who made the disclosure on Friday, was appointed by GCF’s Board in June 2013 to serve as the Fund’s first Executive Director and to establish the ...

To ensure sustainability and supply security, an International Energy Agency (IEA) report prescribes a new balance between regulation and competitive markets Electricity markets are undergoing massive transformation, as the push for low-carbon power generation shifts the industry towards high investment in renewables and other new technologies even as demand stagnates or declines in many countries. Just in time, the IEA ...

Christiana Figueres speaks at TED2016 – Dream, February 15-19, 2016, Vancouver Convention Centre, Vancouver, Canada In 2009, six months after a spectacularly failed climate change summit in Copenhagen, Costa Rican diplomat Christiana Figueres was appointed executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. Her job: Leading the next round of international climate change negotiations. At that time, no one believed that we could ...

Seventeen US governors have agreed to jointly pursue clean energy goals, including better energy efficiency and higher rates of renewable energy, modernising the electricity grid and promoting electric and alternatively fueled vehicles. The governors’ Accord for a New Energy Future makes an economic case for expanding cooperation between states on renewable energy by supporting the growth of innovative US companies. The document ...

The Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited (SPDC) said at the weekend that it has intensified recovery of oil from the February 14, 2016 spill at the Forcados Terminal export pipeline. The oil bigwig disclosed in a statement on Saturday that, supported by industry group Clean Nigeria Associates (CNA) and other oil companies, it has deployed specialised equipment to ...

For three days from Monday, February 15 to Wednesday, 17 February 2016 in Mexico City, over 65 women and men working on issues related to gender and biodiversity in Mexico came together to share experiences and provide input into the development of a gender-responsive National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan (NBSAP). Mexico is said to be the first pilot country ...

Condoms have been the most effective way to prevent sexual transmission of HIV. For discordant couples who want children, this can be a challenge. This report shows how a new drug on trial can give these couples hope.