EU/ERBD News
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Arctic sea ice melted to a record-low extent -- or will come a close second -- Reuters reported two prominent research institutes as saying. The findings confirm a trend that could yield an ice-free Arctic summer within a decade. In a 32-year satellite record, the five biggest melts have all been in the past five years -- likely a result of both man-made...
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Honey containing trace amounts of pollen from genetically modified corn must be labelled as GM produce and undergo full EU safety authorisation before it can be sold as food, the European Court of Justice ruled. The court found in favour of Bavarian beekeepers who said their honey had been “contaminated” by pollen from authorised Monsanto GM...
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Underscoring international oil companies’ determination to explore and develop the Russian Arctic, the US oil giant ExxonMobil has formed an exploration partnership with Rosneft, the Russian state oil company, The Financial Times reported. The Russian Arctic is one of the few places in the world with large untapped oil and gas reserves.
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A scheduled two-week protest against the proposed construction of a 2,575-kilometre-long oil pipeline from Canada’s tar sands to US refineries on the Gulf of Mexico is under way in Washington. Among the more than 160 people arrested outside the White House so far, in what The Guardian said may be the largest green civil-disobedience campaign...
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The food and humanitarian crisis in the Horn of Africa is man-made -- the result of artificially high food prices and civil conflict in southern Somalia, the World Bank’s lead economist for Kenya told Reuters. While droughts have often occurred in the region, Wolfgang Fengler said, “you need bad policymaking for that to lead to a famine”....
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Devastating oil spills in Nigeria’s Niger delta over the past five decades will cost US$1 billion to rectify and take as much as 30 years to clean up, The Guardian cited a UN Environment Programme report as saying. In the first large-scale scientific study of land and water pollution in the oil-rich delta, the UN said Shell and other companies ...
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Three Himalayan glaciers have been shrinking over the last 40 years because of climate change and two of them, in humid regions and on lower altitudes in central and eastern Nepal, may eventually disappear, Reuters reported Japanese researchers as saying. Their findings were published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Data from a US satellite...
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Amid the worst drought in the Horn of Africa in more than 50 years, the World Food Programme planned to airlift food. But such efforts, according to a commentary in The Atlantic, are unlikely to address the economic and climatological forces underlying the disaster. In addition to conflict and drought, Somalia’s problems include regional deforestation...
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More than 1,000 beef cattle that ate feed contaminated with radioactive cesium have been shipped all over Japan from Fukushima and other prefectures, Reuters quoted the Kyodo news agency as saying. Japanese consumers have become increasingly worried about food safety following cases of tainted vegetables, seafood and other products due to radiation...
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A new Greenpeace investigation raises questions about the responsibility of Nike, Adidas, Puma and other leading fashion brands for the firms they do business with in China, The Guardian reported. In its report “Dirty Laundry”, Greenpeace said a Chinese conglomerate supplying the brands has discharged hormone-disrupting chemicals and other toxins...
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