-Outlook Hyderabad: New approaches such as Public Private Partnerships(PPP) and community-based activities would go a long way in maintaining healthy ecosystems and improving livelihoods, a senior World Bank official said here today. Observing that there is not enough public money to invest in the biodiversity needs of the world, Rachel Kyte, World Bank Vice President for Sustainable Development, said new approaches are needed to finance nature conservation efforts. The World Bank has a...

-The Times of India India's two top metros, Mumbai and Delhi, still lack what it takes to be world class cities. In a United Nations report on world's cities, India's financial capital ranked 52 among 95 cities while the political capital came in 58th. The State of World's Cities report released by UN Habitat on Wednesday, ranked cities on five parameters of "prosperity". While Shanghai, Beijing and Bangkok were all ranked higher...

-The Hindu Ahmedabad: The Election Commission (EC) has directed the Gujarat government to set up a Media Certification and Monitoring Committee (MCMC) to check the menace of paid news during the build-up to December’s State Assembly election. The EC identified paid news masquerading as news as a major problem during elections. It has also issued guidelines to the MCMC to not only monitor all the political advertisements to be aired on television...

-Live Mint The OECD forum is discussing how to make the aspirations of the common man relevant to policymaking New Delhi: In the face of a deepening economic crisis and social resistance to austerity measures, world leaders are considering a collective experiment to include parameters such as well-being and happiness in national and international statistics. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) World Forum on Measuring Well-being for Development Policy Making being...

-The Telegraph Calcutta: Demand for commercial gas has risen sharply in Bengal, prompting suggestions that the subsidy cap on domestic cylinders has unmasked one of the worst-kept secrets in the country. The sudden spurt is being attributed to demand from commercial establishments and auto-rickshaws that were so far depending heavily on the subsidised cooking gas rampantly pilfered from the domestic segment. “We have been selling 6,000 (commercial) cylinders a day (to establishments) after...