International Day for Biological Diversity 2018
This year the 22nd of May will be a celebration of the progress made since the implementation of the Convention on Biological Diversity 25 years ago. The International day for Biological Diversity was designed to overlap with the UNs post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals and the date chose to commemorate the adoption of the Convention of…
Tourism creates 8% of global carbon emissions – can they be curbed?
The global carbon footprint of the travel and tourism industry has long been a concern, with aviation in particular being a major source of greenhouse gases, and the major component of the estimated carbon cost of tourism. But a new analysis published in Nature Climate Change says that the carbon footprint of the industry is…
Cutting plastic bottle use in adventure travel
Earth Day 2018 is on Sunday April 22, and the theme for this year is ending plastic pollution. One of the biggest sources of plastic waste from the general public is single-use plastic bottles, and tourists are a big source of this waste. Even those of us who rarely use disposable drinks bottles when at…
Earth Day 2018 – The campaign to eliminate plastic pollution
[Image credit: Pixabay – hhach] This blog post was written by our new Content Editor – Ellen Baker, ahead of Earth Day on Sunday 22nd April. This year the annual environmental issues awareness event ‘Earth day’ is focussing on the topic of plastic pollution; the problems generated by our high usage of single use plastics…
Chocolate SDGs unwrapped
“The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), otherwise known as the Global Goals, are a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure that all people enjoy peace and prosperity.”1 Should we prioritise chocolate in this universal call to action? Threats to the cocoa industry including low productivity, marketing challenges, pests and disease,…
Water, tourism and gender – how tourism can increase inequalities. From the work of Dr Stroma Cole
March 22 is World Water Day, designated to focus our attention on the importance of water. The theme for World Water Day 2018 is ‘Nature for Water’ – exploring nature-based solutions to the water challenges we face in the 21st century. But of course water is essential for life, and thus affects every aspect of…
Family-centric cinema: a Q&A on changing the conversation for women in agriculture
Women need first-hand information and knowledge about new agricultural technologies to have a say on how family farms are run, according to Dannie Romney, Global Director, Development, Communication and Extension, CABI. Dannie is currently Project Executive for the Africa Soil Health Consortium (ASHC) and Gender and the Legume Alliance (GALA) projects working jointly in Ghana. …
Irrigation facilities to enhance all year seed supply by farmers in central Uganda
Lack of access to quality seed, particularly of traditional crops that are not well integrated into the formal sector, remains a key challenge for increased productivity of these crops in African farming systems. CABI, working with national and regional partners, aims to strengthen seed systems in Africa through developing farmer seed enterprises and linkages to…
Stuffed and starved: is sufficiency the new efficiency?
Attending a recent Chatham House event, one statistic seemed to encapsulate the crisis of our current food system: 795 million eat too little while 2 billion eat too much. After the initial shock of hearing this, I couldn’t help but wonder; if there’s plenty of food to go around why are we simultaneously starving and…
Invasive species, climate change and tourism impacts the greatest threats to natural World Heritage
A new report from the IUCN looks at conservation prospects, threats, protection and management of natural World Heritage sites. The IUCN World Heritage Outlook 2 summarises the key trends in the state of conservation of natural World Heritage sites, the threats and pressures they are facing, and the effectiveness of their protection and management. The…