Sustainable agriculture depends on biodiversity

Kevin Parris, OECD Agriculture Directorate*

Agri-food production relies on biodiversity. Yet farming can weaken it. Increasing food production will mean finding ways of expanding agriculture without upsetting our planet’s biological interdependence.

Ed note:An article that looks at the relationship between farming and biodiversity and establishes lines of exploration needed in order for farming to be sustainable. Kind of short and not too in-depth but a good outline for getting a handle on the relationships and ideas required for sustainability.

Corporate titans launch new climate change campaign

Tue Feb 20, 4:09 PM ET

NEW YORK (AFP) - Heavyweight companies including General Electric and Citigroup joined forces in a high-profile campaign against global warming, demanding that governments mandate caps on greenhouse gases.

The three-year-old Global Roundtable on Climate Change launched a new strategy backed by over 85 companies and groups including Air France, metals giant Alcoa, German pharmaceuticals maker Bayer and insurer Allianz.

Light at end of tunnel for British coal-mining industry
02-20-2007, 04h57
CWMGWRACH, Wales (AFP)

With lights twinkling brightly from their helmets, a group of miners emerge caked in dust from a deep coal-mine in the village of Cwmgwrach in south Wales.

The reopening of Cwmgwrach (pronounced Kumrak) marks a much-needed glimmer of hope for Britain's mining sector, which has been blighted by social and economic problems since the 1980s.

After 60 years of decline, the industry has been shaken up by technology which has slashed energy wasted in the coal-mining process -- while also cutting carbon dioxide emmissions.

Crop production worst in 20 years

Rice farmers are feeling the effects of the drought, with dire forecasts for summer crop production figures.

Rice farmers are feeling the effects of the drought, with dire forecasts for summer crop production figures.

The drought will slash Australia's summer crop production to its lowest level in more than 20 years.

Washington's $8 Billion Shadow

Mega-contractors such as Halliburton and Bechtel supply the government with brawn. But the biggest, most powerful of the "body shops"—SAIC, which employs 44,000 people and took in $8 billion last year—sells brainpower, including a lot of the "expertise" behind the Iraq war.

By Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele

ED NOTE: This is a very long and well researched article on SAIC, perhaps the largest of the "governmental" corporations of the new American outsourced government. Can we say Neo-Fascism? This is absolute must read material.

By MATTHEW L. WALD
Published: February 21, 2007
NYTimes

WASHINGTON, Feb. 20 — Within the next few years, power companies are planning to build about 150 coal plants to meet growing electricity demands. Despite expectations that global warming rules are coming, almost none of the plants will be built to capture the thousands of tons of carbon dioxide that burning coal spews into the atmosphere.

By STEPHEN LABATON
Published: February 21, 2007
NYTimes

WASHINGTON, Feb. 20 — A divided federal appeals court on Tuesday upheld a new law stripping federal judges of authority to review foreign prisoners’ challenges to their detention at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

The decision set the stage for a third trip to the Supreme Court for the detainees, who will once again ask the justices to consider a complex issue that tests the balance of power among the White House, Congress and the courts in the murky context of the fight against international terrorism.

Cooling the Planet

If we can’t adequately reduce or sequester carbon emissions, are more-radical alternatives like orbital mirrors a solution to climate change?

By Mark Williams

In the past two decades, various novel planet-cooling technologies have been proposed--improbable, monumental projects such as putting into orbit giant mirrors with thousand-kilometer diameters or clouds of trillions of wafer-thin, butterfly-light lenses.