Posts tagged with 'forests'
In the Seychelles archipelago in East Africa, flooding and erosion caused by rising sea levels pose an imminent threat to the country’s many low-lying islands. At the same time its mangrove forests, which serve as a vital buffer against these ...
Residents of Jakarta, Indonesia woke up on August 31, 2023, to a thick blanket of haze and news that their city was again ranked the most polluted in the world — one of many times during the last several months when air quality became ...
Today’s climate change headlines often seem at odds with each other. One day, it’s catastrophic wildfires wreaking havoc around the world; the next, it’s an optimistic piece on the rapid scale-up of solar and wind power. Taken together, such stories ...
This year is a critical moment for climate action. The mounting impacts of climate change, from floods and droughts to hurricanes and heat waves, are taking a major toll on human lives and economies globally — particularly in vulnerable developing nations ...
Climate change is already having a significant impact on Africa’s ecosystems, economy and society. This year alone, 1.8 million Africans were displaced during a prolonged drought, the Democratic Republic of Congo experienced catastrophic flooding, and Cyclone Freddy left a trail of destruction in Malawi and Mozambique. ...
New data from WRI’s Aqueduct Water Risk Atlas show that 25 countries — housing one-quarter of the global population — face extremely high water stress each year, regularly using up almost their entire available water supply. And at least 50% of the ...
Thousands of people in Quebec, Canada evacuated their homes this month due to raging wildfires. More than 400 miles away, New York City experienced its worst air quality in history, and briefly had the worst air quality of any city in the ...
Over the past two decades, Rwanda – the land of a thousand hills – has made remarkable strides: poverty has significantly declined and quality of life has improved. The service, industrial and agricultural sectors have flourished. Even in the aftermath ...
Whether one seeks an escape from Delhi’s scorching summer heat or a winter afternoon basking in the sun, Sanjay Van National Park, one of the city’s few surviving urban forests, comes to mind. Mangalavanam in Kochi or Shalimar Bagh in ...
Many people point to forest restoration as a way to curb climate change, where replanted forests sequester carbon in trees and soils. But emerging evidence shows that restoration can provide non-carbon climate benefits, too — in particular, reducing heat and regulating rainfall. Here’s what ...
What will 2023 hold for the environment and development? The end of 2022 certainly left us in an interesting — and concerning — place. The world’s three-year-old pandemic proved it was far from over, sickening millions and affecting economies. Global ...
A New Yorker may not think about the forested Catskills Mountain Range upstate as she pours a glass of water. Londoners probably don’t consider the Amazon rainforest as they watch the rain falling on city parks. And folks in Addis ...
Global forest loss remains high. In 2021, the tropics lost 11.1 million hectares of tree cover, according to WRI’s latest analysis. This annual figure included 3.75 million hectares of loss within tropical primary rainforests, resulting in 2.5 gigatons of CO2 ...
The new Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report highlights the enormous potential of nature to reduce the risks of climate change and build resilience. Political momentum is building for this approach. For example, 137 countries committed in 2021 to collectively end forest loss and land ...
The world’s forests face a dire threat. Each year, 6 to 9 million hectares (15 to 22 million acres, an area roughly the size of Denmark) of forests are permanently cleared and many millions more are degraded. But many decisions affecting forests ...
