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EU Environment Ministers Uphold GM Bans in Austria, Hungary
The notion that independent European nations can decide for themselves on whether to allow genetically modified (GM) crop cultivation in their countries was given a boost on 2 March, when EU Environment Ministers voted to uphold national bans in Austria and Hungary. This is the second time in as many months that national bans on GM…
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EU Slaps Duties on American Biodiesel
Looking to support their struggling biodiesel producers, European governments voted Tuesday to impose temporary anti-dumping and anti-subsidy tariffs on imports of US biodiesel. The vote follows repeated complaints from the European Biodiesel Board (EBB) over US subsidies for its domestic biodiesel producers, which the Board says unfairly undercut European competitors in their home market. Inside…
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India Moves to Protect Traditional Medicines
In an unorthodox move to protect citizens’ access to traditional medicines, the Indian government has effectively licensed 200,000 local treatments as ‘public property’, making the local remedies free for everyone to use, but not to be branded for sale. The initiative follows the disquieting discovery by scientists in Delhi of the extent of ‘bio-prospecting’ of natural…
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Canada Threatens WTO Suit as EU Edges toward Seal Ban
A committee of European lawmakers voted last week to ban all seal imports into the EU on the grounds that the hunt is inhumane, provoking a strong reaction from the Canadian government, which maintains that such a ban would cripple a key domestic industry. “We have told [the EU] repeatedly that we will exercise all our…
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South African Climate Summit Yields Pessimism on Copenhagen
South African officials meeting at a major summit on climate change in Johannesburg say that a reaching comprehensive climate change deal in Copenhagen is unlikely, citing the continued developed-developing country divide on the issue and diverging interests within the two groups. The conference, held from 3-6 March, was launched amid optimism with Minister of Environmental Affairs…
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Climate Change Triggers Surge in Brazilian GM Crop Testing
Brazilian scientists say 2009 will be big year for the expansion of genetically modified (GM) crops in the country as they search for ways to overcome the negative agricultural impacts related to climate change. As crops are increasingly pushed southward due to temperature increases and as the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts temperatures to…
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Events
Coming up in the next two weeks (6-20 March) 12-13 March, San José, Costa Rica. SIXTH MEETING OF THE LIAISON GROUP ON CAPACITY-BUILDING FOR BIOSAFETY. This meeting of the Convention on Biological Diversity’s Liaison Group on Capacity-building for Biosafety will provide advice to the Executive Secretary on a number of issues arising from previous decisions…
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Resources
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AND CHINA: RECOMMENDATIONS FOR THE FORESTRY, COTTON AND E-PRODUCTS SECTORS. 2009 By Jason Potts, and David Runnalls, International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD). This report, which summarises the results of the first phase of the Global Markets Project, provides an overview of the social and environmental impacts associated with the Chinese forestry, cotton…