CITIES MAKE one simple promise to newcomers: Sacrifice yourself to me and your children shall prosper. This promise drew Ahmed Raza, a small-time wrestler from an Uttar Pradesh village and millions like him to the capital of newly-independent India. Raza kept his part of the bargain, yet half a century later, his daughter was pushed out of the city her father helped build, the only home she has known. “I...

Rich and poor countries have to give ground to get a deal in Copenhagen; then they must focus on setting a carbon price AT A time when they are not short of pressing problems to deal with, the presence of 100-odd world leaders at the two-week meeting that starts in Copenhagen on December 7th to renew the Kyoto protocol on climate change might seem a little self-indulgent. There will be oceans...

The President of International Fund for Agricultural Development stresses that access to funds for developing countries will help them make ethical decisions in the quest for food security. Just days before the UN Climate Change summit at Copenhagen, Kanayo Nwanze, President of IFAD (International Fund for Agricultural Development), stresses that access to funds for developing countries will help them make ethical decisions in the quest for food security. Nwanze was...

Without crop varieties adapting to extremes of weather, feeding world population will be difficult Shortage of water resources will be one of the greatest problems NEW DELHI: “The threat of climate change and its impact on agriculture is real. We have evidence that by 2025 in some parts of the world including India, parts of Asia and parts of Africa, crop yields will drop from anything between 20 and 40 per cent...

A simple and strictly local power generation system has proved that rural Indian communities are willing and able to pay for reliable electricity.  Some seven years ago, two young men, chums from their days at boarding school, chatted over the Internet about what they might do for villages in their home state of Bihar. The company they went on to create has begun establishing small power plants driven by gases...