Environment | WPN World People News

The nation’s largest and oldest civil rights organization, the NAACP, along with 17 of the nation’s leading public health and environmental organizations, defends the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) 2012 Mercury and Air Toxics Rule before a high federal appeals court. Earthjustice is representing the NAACP, the Sierra Club, Clean Air Council, and the Chesapeake Bay Foundation in the case.

Ulrike Rodust

U.S. national beekeeping organizations along with the National Honey Bee Advisory Board and the Pollinator Stewardship Council have filed an opening brief in an appeal challenging the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for its approval of the pesticide sulfoxaflor, shown to be “highly toxic” to honey bees, and other insect pollinators. Sulfoxaflor is the first of a newly assigned sub-class of pesticides in the “neonicotinoid” class of pesticides and is considered by the EPA to be “highly toxic.” Many scientists across the globe have linked this class of pesticides as a potential factor to widespread and massive bee colony losses. The case was filed as the beekeeping industry across the country struggles for survival and faces the costly effects of pesticides upon their businesses.

The World Wildlife Fund {WWF} is disappointed that the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCFPC) once again failed to take meaningful action against tuna overfishing and the overall excess of vessel capacity in the region, passing a watered down measure in effect only for 2014 and deferring action for future years.

Thirteen years ago, I first traveled with a scientific expedition team to Kiribati’s Phoenix Islands, an extremely remote and unexplored oceanic coral archipelago in the Central Pacific that was, until then, little known and poorly understood. Our mission was to explore the remote and pristine reef systems around the islands and to assess their unique biodiversity and conservation potential. It was a trip that changed my life.

An International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) expert team today completed a review of Japan's efforts to plan and implement the decommissioning of TEPCO's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station. The International Peer Review of Japan's Mid-and-Long-Term Roadmap towards the Decommissioning of TEPCO's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station Units 1-4 conducted its visit from 25 November to 4 December 2013.

Wilmar International, the world's largest palm oil trader announced a No Deforestation Policy in response to pressure from Greenpeace, NGOs and consumers around the world. The policy has the potential to be a landmark win for the world’s forests and the people that depend on them for their livelihoods.

Global environmental organisation WWF has applauded an initiative from more than a dozen countries to freeze subsidies that encourage overfishing, hoping it will spur action by other governments and help speed progress on the more than a decade of negotiations in the World Trade Organisation (WTO).