-The Hindu The United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20) is set to take place on June 20 at Rio de Janeiro, 20 years after the 1992 Earth Summit on Environment & Development. World leaders, experts, and U.N. agencies are expected to take stock and reaffirm global commitment to sustainable development. The summit is taking place against the backdrop of threats of catastrophic climate change, unprecedented environmental degradation and widespread market...

India's Genetically Modified (GM) crop growth story has been stalled with just four states allowing field trials. An eminent scientist has sought Prime Minister's intervention in this regard.  Field trials of newly developed GM crops are important for scientific analysis of the yield and its commercial release. Till 2010, research institutions were free to conduct field trials anywhere in the country. But in 2011, the environment ministry had imposed a condition...

The ASCI report says there is ample evidence of “market dominance” in specific media markets, but the government has ignored the report for three years. A ministry official tells PARANJOY GUHA THAKURTA that it is unlikely to be implemented. A report prepared by an independent institution recommending imposition of cross-media ownership restrictions recently entered the public domain nearly three years after it was submitted,  following a rebuke to the government by...

London, June 11: An investigation has exposed the organised criminals who secretly trade organs for British transplant patients for as little as £4,500 (Rs 3.85 lakh). The gangs, operating in eastern Europe and the Indian subcontinent, prey on the desperation of patients requiring organs and the poverty of donors who often earn less than £1,000 (Rs 85,754) from the exploitative deals. The so-called organ brokers have developed a network of corrupt officials...

There are major issues at stake in the Rio+20 Summit on Sustainable Development to be held on 20-22 June. Yet governments of developing countries have not given adequate importance to the run-up to the conference. As has happened in the climate change negotiations, the outcome draft now under negotiation shows a concerted move to rewrite the terms of global environmental governance. There is an attempt to push through the decidedly...