A yearly review of countries' greenhouse gas emissions cut pledges under an extension to the global climate pact the Kyoto Protocol could be a way to raise climate ambitions, the European Union's lead climate negotiator said on Wednesday.

Negotiators from over 180 countries are meeting in Bonn, Germany, until Friday to work towards getting a new global climate pact signed by 2015 and to ensure ambitious emissions cuts are made after the Kyoto Protocol expires at the end of this year.

The Philippine fisheries chief on Sunday said he had ordered a study into a foreign species called the ‘knife fish’ that was posing a threat to the local fishing industry at the country’s largest lake.
The knife-shaped fish are reported to be multiplying in Laguna Lake where they are displacing the native species, said Asis Perez, head of the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources.
‘It is carnivorous. It will compete with our existing natural fish. We have yet to get a full appreciation of the damage caused by this fish,’ he told AFP.

The anti-dumping decision is among the biggest in U.S. history

The United States, on Thursday, announced the imposition of anti-dumping tariffs of more than 31 per cent on solar panels from China. The move by the Commerce Department is certain to infuriate Chinese officials already upset after recent bilateral frictions over China's human rights policies and its increasingly confrontational approach toward U.S. allies such as the Philippines and Japan.

The United States on Thursday announced the imposition of antidumping tariffs of more than 31 percent on solar panels from China.

The move by the Commerce Department is certain to infuriate Chinese officials already upset after recent bilateral frictions over China’s human rights policies and its increasingly confrontational approach toward American allies like the Philippines and Japan.

The antidumping decision is among the biggest in American history, covering one of the largest and fastest-growing categories of imports from China, the world’s largest exporter.

The World Bank is lending the Philippines $275 million to tackle huge volumes of untreated sewage that threaten to swallow the capital Manila, the lender said Wednesday.
The loan would be reinvested by a government bank into Manila Water Co. and Maynilad Water Services projects to boost the two utilities' household wastewater collection and treatment systems, the World Bank said.

The Asia-Pacific region may be home to some of the world’s fastest growing economies including China, Japan, India and Indonesia. But, last year at least, it also was the most vulnerable to natural disasters that hampered expansion and disrupted trade.

The United Nations Economic and Social Survey of the Asia Pacific, a report released Thursday, says Asia Pacific sustained damages and losses of $266.8 billion out of $366 billion globally in 2011 — the worst year in history for catastrophes.

In flood-hit fields in the Philippines, farmers are testing a hardy new variety of rice that can survive completely submerged for more than two weeks.

In Kenya's Kibera slum, poor urban families are turning around their diets and incomes just by learning to grow vegetables in sack gardens outside their doors. And in India, a push to help marginalised rural communities gain title to their land is leading to a significant drop in hunger.

‘Spread of the Bt gene could make brinjal a problematic weed'

An independent enquiry has revealed that the cultivation of genetically engineered (GE, also called genetically modified, or GM) Bt brinjal poses risks to the environment and possibly to human health. The occurrence of wild, weedy and also cultivated relatives presents a likelihood that the GE Bt gene will spread to these relatives but, so far, this has largely been overlooked in the risk assessments for GE Bt brinjal, it says.

The International Rice Research Institute recently said that the rice wasted in the Philippines ever year could feed several million people.
Citing a study done by Food and Agriculture Organisation, the IRRI in its publication ‘Rice Today’ said the Philippines, the world’s biggest rice importer for several years, wasted rice that is worth minimum $5,35,00 every day, or at least $223 million a year, enough to feed 4.3 million.
The study also said all the countries with rice as a staple wasted the cereal in huge amounts.