Good nutrition is the nexus point where food security, public health and environmental protection meet.  As world leaders in Copenhagen struggle for an ambitious deal, let us not forget that it is the future of our children that is at stake. Hurricanes, floods, heat-waves and droughts wreak havoc when they strike, but in the desolation they leave behind it’s relatively easy to reconstruct a road or a house. A human...

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...

Even as attention is focused on the upcoming talks at Copenhagen, the Campaign for Survival and Dignity (CSD) notes a “dangerous side of negotiation” that has been taking place along the main talks. These negotiations have concerned a scheme called ‘REDD,’ which could result in a massive land grab across India’s forest and Adivasi belts, one that would make the current conflicts over land acquisition look minor, a CSD statement...

James Hansen, world’s leading climate change expert, says summit talks are so flawed that a deal would be a disaster.  The scientist who convinced the world to take notice of the looming danger of global warming says it would be better for the planet and for future generations if next week’s Copenhagen climate change summit ended in collapse. In an interview with the Guardian, James Hansen, the world’s pre-eminent climate...

Was Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh right when, holding the toxic waste at the Union Carbide/Dow Chemicals’ factory in Bhopal, he made light of the problem, saying: “I held the toxic waste in my hand… I’m still alive and am not coughing?” Is the state government in Bhopal right when it cites a series of reports, including one from the Defence Research and Development Establishment (DRDE) in Gwalior, to say that...