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Exclusive: legal concerns over plan to roll over forestry agreements without reviews
Documents reveal government plans to extend RFAs without fresh environmental or scientific reviews
Federal and state ministers have discussed legal concerns that imminent extensions to logging agreements might be invalid as they are based on old scientific assessments.
Commonwealth and state concerns about the “legal and political risks” to the RFA extensions that are about to be agreed are highlighted in a collection of 10 documents – including briefing notes and “contentious issues briefs” – prepared for the New South Wales primary industries minister, Niall Blair, and the state’s lands and forestry minister, Paul Toole, and obtained by Guardian Australia.
Continue reading...Last male northern white rhino's death highlights 'huge extinction crisis'
The tragic death of Sudan the rhino should act as a warning of the need to act to prevent mass extinctions around the world, say conservationists
Conservationists have warned that the death of the last male northern white rhinoceros in Kenya is a sign that unsustainable human activity is driving a new era of mass extinctions around the globe.
Sudan, the “gentle giant” who lived in the Ol Pejeta conservancy in Kenya, was put down on Monday after the pain from a degenerative illness became too great.
Continue reading...UK will lead European exoplanet mission
Gove tells Tory MPs to 'keep eye on prize' in row over fishing waters
Environment secretary says UK control of fishing waters delayed, not abandoned, by Brexit deal
The environment secretary, Michael Gove, has issued a coded warning to rebellious Tories to keep their “eyes on the prize” as he said he understood the fishing industry’s grave disappointment at Theresa May’s agreement to keep EU fishing policies during the Brexit transition period.
Scottish Conservative MPs are due to meet the prime minister in Downing Street on Tuesday following an outcry from the industry over the deal struck with Brussels.
Continue reading...Sudan, the world's last male northern white rhino, dies – video report
The last male northern white rhino has died, leaving only two females to save the species from total extinction.
Sudan, the ‘gentle giant’ who lived on the Ol Pejeta conservancy in Kenya, was put down on Monday after the pain from a degenerative illness became too great. He is survived only by his daughter and granddaughter
Continue reading...Japanese basket pattern inspires new material
Meet the dogs being trained to sniff out looted ancient treasures
Last male northern white rhino dies in Kenya
Fishermen: tell us what you think of the recent Brexit concessions
If you work in the UK fishing industry we’d like to hear what you think about the latest changes to affect fisheries
After pledging to repatriate control of UK fisheries and set quotas as part of core Brexit strategy, the government appears to have backed down in face of EU opposition. Instant return of control after Britain leaves the EU no longer seems possible, with vessels from Europe allowed to have continued access during the transition period after 29 March 2019.
Labor vows to block 'largest removal of marine area from conservation, ever'
Opposition condemns Coalition plan to open more recreational and commercial fishing areas
Labor says it will move to disallow new marine park management plans proposed by the Turnbull government, branding the change the “largest removal of marine area from conservation, ever, from any government in the world”.
The new management plans were uploaded by officials on the federal register of legislation on Tuesday, cutting across a public announcement the Turnbull government had planned to make on Wednesday.
Continue reading...Children drawing more women in science
Shoestring expedition returns with wild photos of Sumatra
A shoestring expedition to one of the remotest places in Sumatra has returned with stunning photos of tigers, tapirs, clouded leopards among other rare species, large and small. Will they find orangutans next?
Last year a motley crew of conservationists, adventurers and locals trekked into one of the last unexplored regions of Sumatra. They did so with a mission: check camera traps and see what they could find. The team – organized by the small NGO, Habitat ID – came back with biological gold: photos of Sumatran tigers, Malayan tapirs, and sun bears. They also got the first record of the Sunda clouded leopard in the area and found a specimen of a little-known legless reptile called Wegner’s glass lizard. But most tantalizingly of all is what they didn’t find, but still suspect is there: a hidden population of orangutans that would belong to the newly described species, Tapanuli orangutan (Pongo tapanuliensis).
“The trek into the interior was fraught with hordes of leaches, wasps, cliffs, river-crossings, and trackless jungle, and it pushed everyone on the team to their limits,” Greg McCann, the head of Habitat ID and a team member, said, clearly relishing the adventure to an undisclosed area they call Hadabaun Hills.
Continue reading...Last male northern white rhino is put down
Hopes for species rest on IVF with two females after death of Sudan, the ‘gentle giant’
The last male northern white rhinoceros has died, leaving only two females with which conservationists hope to save the species from extinction.
Sudan, the “gentle giant” who lived in the Ol Pejeta conservancy in Kenya, was put down on Monday after the pain from a degenerative illness became too great. He is survived by his daughter and granddaughter.
Continue reading...Rhino dies: Sudan was the last male northern white
Antony Albanese on bushfire climate row
Survey reveals which Easter eggs use the most packaging
Plastic and cardboard packaging makes up more than a quarter of product weight in some of the UK’s best-selling chocolate eggs
Packaging alone accounts for up to a quarter, on average, of the total weight of the most popular Easter eggs on sale on the High Street, new research by a consumer group has revealed.
Fish and chips to curry: UK's favourite dishes at risk from climate change, research shows
Earth Hour campaign aims to raise awareness of the impact global warming could have on food supplies, from cod stocks to the rice and tomatoes used to make chicken tikka masala
Some of the UK’s best-loved dishes – including fish and chips and chicken tikka masala – could be under threat as a result of climate change, environmentalists warn in a new report on Tuesday.
Can climate litigation save the world?
Courts are a new front line of climate action with cases against governments and oil firms spiralling, and while victories have so far been rare the pressure for change is growing
Global moves to tackle climate change through lawsuits are poised to break new ground this week, as groups and individuals seek to hold governments and companies accountable for the damage they are causing.
Continue reading...Country diary: a landscape coming in from the cold
Claxton, Norfolk: A lone blackbird offers hope of spring in the snowstorm’s Arctic silence
Even now there are several roadside heaps of it where the snowdrifts had been so high that we were entirely cut off for three days. These vestiges hardly conjure the power of that extraordinary storm, but it has been fascinating to track the whole system as a single organism.
Continue reading...Marine heatwave set off 'carbon bomb' in world's largest seagrass meadow
22% of seagrass in Western Australia’s Shark Bay was lost after 2010-11 heatwave, causing release of up to 9m tonnes of carbon
A marine heatwave in Western Australia in 2010 set off a massive “carbon bomb”, damaging the world’s largest seagrass meadow, releasing millions of tonnes of carbon that had been collected for thousands of years below the surface.
Although Australia doesn’t currently count carbon released from damaged seagrass meadows in its official greenhouse gas emissions, if it did, the results mean those figures might need to be revised upwards by more than 20%.
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