Large-scale crop plantations are expanding at a rapid pace across southeast Asia, with multinational firms often benefiting the most at the expense of local communities and the environment, two U.N. rights experts warned on Wednesday.

Demand for agrofuels, such as those derived from sugar cane and palm oil, has boomed thanks in part to the United States, Europe and other rich economies seeking alternative ways to fuel their cars and homes in order to reduce their carbon emissions.

The World Health Organization is expected to declare polio a global emergency after outbreaks in countries previously free of the disease.

The WHO wants to boost programmes in Nigeria, Pakistan and Afghanistan, the only countries where the disease is still endemic.

It says tackling polio is "at a tipping point between success and failure".

India, once regarded as one of the most challenging countries, was declared free of the disease in February.

A third of malaria drugs used around the world to stem the spread of the disease are counterfeit, data suggests.

Researchers who looked at 1,500 samples of seven malaria drugs from seven countries in South East Asia say poor-quality and fake tablets are causing drug resistance and treatment failure.

Data from 21 countries in sub-Saharan Africa including over 2,500 drug samples showed similar results.

Experts say The Lancet Infectious Diseases research is a "wake-up call".

Australia's Bureau of Meteorology said the climate models it monitors indicate a possible return of the El Nino weather pattern, often linked to heavy rainfall and droughts, in the second half of 2012.

The last severe El Nino in 1998 killed more than 2,000 people and caused billions of dollars in damage to crops, infrastructure and mines in Australia and other parts of Asia.

Fake and substandard malaria drugs are a growing threat to efforts to beat back the disease, a new study sponsored by the federal government has concluded.

Scientists from the National Institutes of Health analyzed 27 sets of tests of antimalaria drugs purchased in Southeast Asia and Africa between 1999 and 2010. The researchers published the results on Monday in The Lancet Infectious Diseases.

With a reputation for consistently delivering innovative and creative ideas that work, BBDO Lanka, a part of BBDO Worldwide, presented an idea that has the potential to revolutionize the scope of environmental conservation. The launch of Asia’s first mechanical air cleaning hoarding – a hoarding that actually filters certain harmful content from the surrounding air, purifies it and releases the purified air back to the environment.

Tobacco use is one of the leading preventable causes of death. The global tobacco epidemic kills nearly 6 million people each year. More than 600,000 people are exposed to passive smoking. Unless the countries take action promptly to arrest tobacco use, the death rate will rise to eight million people by 2030. Of them more than 80 per cent live in low and middle-income countries," Professor Carlo Fonseka told The Island.

Better care has cut the number of women dying in pregnancy and childbirth by nearly half in the past two decades, but there is still a death every two minutes, according to UN figures released yesterday.

India and Nigeria between them accounted for one third of the 287,000 deaths of pregnant women in 2010 and Africa accounts for 36 of the 40 countries with the highest maternal deaths.

But health experts hailed the 47% fall in fatalities from 543,000 in 1990, and said the strategy for saving more lives was clear.