As the number of droughts increases globally, scientists are working to develop predictions of how future parched conditions will affect plants, especially trees. New results published today in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution by 62 scientists, led by Henry Adams at Oklahoma State University…

Climate history locked in stalagmite evidence warns of 10,000 years of drought – 100 centuries – to come in the Middle East. LONDON, 11 July, 2017 – Here is the long-term weather forecast for the heart of the Middle East. There will be 10,000 years of drought before rainfall increases significantly…

Global mean sea level rise (GMSLR) stemming from the multiple effects of human-induced climate change has potentially dramatic effects for inland land use planning and habitability. Recent research suggests that GMSLR may endanger the low-elevation coastal zone sooner than expected, reshaping…

The Barilla Center for Food & Nutrition (BCFN) Foundation and The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) created The Food Sustainability Index (FSI), which ranks countries on food system sustainability based on three pillars: food loss and waste, sustainable agriculture, and nutritional challenges. The…

By saving, exchanging, and reusing seeds over thousands of years, farmers and gardeners carefully selected crops for various traits adapted to many growing conditions and climates, creating a rich genetic plant heritage that formed the base of the global food supply. Over the last century, however…

JRC has collected data on rainfall erosivity from 3,625 meteorological stations in 63 coun­tries to establish the first ever Global Rainfall Erosivity Database (GloREDa). Quantifying rainfall erosivity is challenging as it requires high temporal resolution(1-60 minutes) and high fidelity rainfall…

The JRC’s Soil Team is working on the first global assessment of the impacts on soil biodiversity of both anthropogenic and non-anthropogenic pressures. To reach this goal, JRC carries out a survey to incorporate expert judgements. The result of this survey will allow to rank the main pressures on…

The Sustainable Development Goals Report 2017 reviews progress made towards the 17 Goals in the second year of implementation of the 2030 Agenda, supported by multiple charts and infographics. This report follows the recently published report of the United Nations Secretary-General on "Progress…

The Sustainable Food Trust today publishes summary proceedings of an international conference which brought together leading experts to establish the true cost of American food. America was one of the first countries to intensify food production and as a result was also one of the first to suffer…

Increasing numbers of German farmers are relying on organic production, with 7.5 percent of all arable land now cultivated ecologically. The government has set its sights on an ambitious target of 20 percent.

In September 2015, the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda was adopted, and for the first time, migration was included in mainstream global development policy. With the objective of communicating how IOM identifies migration in the 2030 Agenda to stakeholders and the wider public, and to shed light…

The loss of productive land is often one of the key drivers of human mobility. Land degradation might lead to increases in migration because of the need to diversify incomes, but it can also cause reduced mobility by eroding the financial or physical assets and capital required to finance migration…

Topsoil is created by the physical and chemical weathering of rock into sand, silt and clay. It is estimated that this process builds topsoil at the rate of one inch every 500 years. Such a timescale effectively makes soil a non-renewable resource in our lifetime. Perhaps it was for this reason that…

Environmental protection and human food security co-exist in a critical balance, one that is often difficult to get right. The pressures of population rise, farming intensification, and loss of habitats and species mean that protections afforded under the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) are…

Researchers have examined environmental and economic impacts of supermarket food waste in a new study. Bread and meat products made the largest contribution to the environmental footprint of the supermarket assessed. Alternative waste strategies, such as using bread waste as animal feed, have the…

In 2011, the European Commission DG Joint Research Centre (JRC) set up the Sino-European panel on Land and Soil (SEPLS). The group’s tasks are to provide the Commission with advice and expertise on the current state of land and soil resources and potential environmental and socio-economic…

The challenge to develop trends in soil erosion changes can be responded developing modelling scenarios of the two most dynamic factors in soil erosion: rainfall erosivity and land cover change. The mean rainfall erosivity for the European Union and Switzerland is projected to be 857 MJ mm ha-1 h…

Droughts, climate change, land degradation, and desertification are closely interrelated. The World Bank group is working with countries around the world to help build resilience to the growing economic, environmental, and social challenges we face today, including drought and desertification

Since instability broke out in Tripoli, irregular migration from West Africa towards Europe has surged. Though precise figures are hardly available, migration flows from Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal and the Gambia have increased and these countries are the first areas of departure in West Africa…

The impacts of climate change on global temperatures profoundly affect people’s ability to sustain their livelihoods as well as their health; both of these dimensions in turn influence the migration of people. Indeed, increasing heat related to climate change is likely to result in more disruptive…

The International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) released a policy brief exploring how global standards and guidelines contribute to gender equality and women’s empowerment in agriculture. The brief, ‘How to Improve Gender Equality in Agriculture,’ explains how using voluntary…

UNECA launched a High Level Panel on Migration in Africa, to report to the AU Heads of State Summit in July 2018. The Initiative on Child Rights in the Global Compacts organized a Global Conference on Children on the Move, and is preparing a document to guide the inclusion of children's rights in…

BRICS countries commited to enhance cooperation on energy efficiency at the second meeting of the BRICS Working Group on Energy Saving and Improvement of Energy Efficiency, which was held in Beijing. The UNEP-DTU Partnership published reports identifying sectoral high impact opportunities for…

The abovementioned paper carefully avoided the word forest in its title; it challenged the various definitions of forest that may cause more confusion than necessary, and preferred the more objectively observable ‘tree cover’ term for discussing what types of changes are occurring in China and…

Green growth policies need to be founded on a good understanding of the determinants of green growth and need to be supported with appropriate indicators to monitor progress.