IN NEWS

India to Launch Forestry Satellite in 2013

New Delhi, Aug 9 – A satellite for monitoring the country’s forest cover will be launched in 2013, the Rajya Sabha was informed Monday.

‘A forestry satellite will be launched in 2013 so that we can monitor the forest cover of the country on day to day basis,’ Environment and Forests Minister Jairam Ramesh informed the Rajya Sabha.

‘A family of forestry satellites will be launched, it will make real time monitoring possible,’ he said.

Replying to supplementary questions, the minister informed the house that the country has gained over three million hectares of forest in the last 10 years.

‘India is one of the few countries where green cover is increasing. In Brazil, three million hectares of forest is cleared every year but in India we have gained three million hectares of forest in the last 10 years,’ Ramesh said.

http://www.vamban.com/news/india-to-launch-forestry-satellite-in-2013/

August 9, 2010

Gas Shortages In India Threaten Survival of the Forest

Many small towns in the country of India are accustomed to using natural gas in their daily cooking chores. But, because of the gas shortages happening all over the country, many villagers are being forced to find alternative means of cooking their foods. The main alternative fuel seems to be wood from the nearby forests.

No where is this more true than in the rural country of Himachal Pradesh. As more and more villagers make use of firewood from the forests, however, the deforestation is putting stress on the surrounding environment in ways that threaten the viability of the ecosphere…………..

For full report, right click on:

http://www.consumersreviewguide.com/2010/08/09/gas-shortages-in-india-threaten-survival-of-the-forest/

Students learn about biodiversity

KARTHIK MADHAVAN

Thirteen thousand is the number of butterfly species in India! Surprised? Read on. Our country has 350 varieties of mammals, 1,200 types of birds, 453 species of reptiles and 45,000 kinds of plants. All these make India a biodiversity-rich nation.

Not only that, 18 per cent of the plants in India are not found anywhere else. That is, these plants are endemic to our country.

There is more to our nation, as a group of students learnt at the two-day event the Institute of Forest Genetics and Tree Breeding, Coimbatore, conducted recently………………………

For full report, right click on:

http://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/kids/article560817.ece

Posco's India steel mill may be cleared after Aug 16

2010-08-09 09:54 (UTC)

By Krittivas Mukherjee

NEW DELHI, Aug 9 (Reuters) - South Korean POSCO's $12 billion steel mill project in India could be cleared soon after a panel investigating a breach of law in acquiring land for the plant submits its report on August 16, a top official said on Monday.

Optimism for the project, now delayed by over three years, has risen, given the fact that its progress is being monitored by the prime minister's office as a test case reflecting the country's investment climate………………………………..

For full report, right click on:

http://www.xe.com/news/2010/08/09/1323517.htm?utm_source=RSS&utm_medium=TL&utm_content=NOGEO&utm_campaign=News_RSS_Art3

Posco Says Indian Enviroment Ministry Asked Orissa to Stop Acquiring Land

By Sungwoo Park - Aug 9, 2010 5:33 PM GMT+0530

Posco, South Korea’s biggest steelmaker, said India’s environment ministry asked the state government of Orissa to halt land acquisitions from farmers occupying the site of the company’s proposed $12 billion plant.

The order followed a non-government organization’s claim more native residents are living in the forest land than the state reported, Choi Doo Jin, a spokesman for the Pohang-based mill, said today, without identifying the organization. The ministry plans to count for itself the number of households after the Orissa administration asserted its tally was correct, he said………………

For full report, right click on:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-08-09/posco-says-india-s-enviroment-ministry-ordered-orissa-to-stop-buying-land.html

Climate change: how to play our hand?

There have always been extremes of weather around the world but evidence suggests human influence is changing the odd

Peter Stott

guardian.co.uk, Monday 9 August 2010 16.20 BST

Over the past week or so, Pakistan has been devastated by its worst floods for generations and Moscow has suffered under a blanket of smogafter its hottest day in 130 years of records. What is causing these and other recent extreme weather events and are they linked to climate change?

Because of a rare meteorological pattern we can see a connection between extreme weather across Eurasia. Usually, the flow in the upper troposphere over northern India, the Himalayas and Pakistan is dominated by the monsoon anticyclone which pushes the sub-tropical jet to the north of the Tibetan Plateau. This prevents mid-latitude weather systems from penetrating very far south, unlike this year, when active weather systems have spread southwards into Pakistan. Here this has combined with the monsoon to produce record rainfall. The record-breaking high temperatures in Moscow, forest fires and damaged crops are another consequence, as was the excessive rain over China ……………………………………………….

For full report, right click on:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/aug/09/climate-change-flooding