Climate Food and Agriculture

Not in a While, Crocodile

Enviros say more than 10,000 endangered crocodiles in Paraguay are dying because a major river that irrigated their swamplands is now being diverted to provide water for agriculture in Argentina. The crocodiles, known as Yacares, are starving to death or being encased in mud as the swamps dry up. Their numbers had been climbing before […]

A review Fast Food Nation

Given my distaste for fast food and the general knowledge of its detrimental effect on the American diet, I didn't expect to find any revelations in Fast Food Nation. But journalist Eric Schlosser's thoroughly researched and well-written probe into the industry that has transformed American roadsides, eating patterns, and agriculture was actually an eye-opener.

The World's Shortest Forest

An excerpt from Blue Frontier

Predictable but unreported impacts from this spring's flooding on the Mississippi River will be an expanded dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico, more southern beach closures, and more dying coral in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary.

Pavement is replacing the world's croplands

As the new century begins, the competition between cars and crops for cropland is intensifying. Until now, the paving over of cropland has occurred largely in industrial countries, home to four-fifths of the world’s 520 million automobiles. But now, more and more farmland is being sacrificed in developing countries with hungry populations, calling into question […]

A review of Water: The Fate of Our Most Precious Resource

The underlying premise is simple: without water we die. As a Turkish businessman quoted in Marq de Villiers' impressive book, Water: The Fate of Our Most Precious Resource, says, "Millions have lived without love. No one has lived without water."

No-Thanks Giving

The world is running low on H2O

Droughts in the United States, Ethiopia, and Afghanistan have been big news this year — and even more serious water shortages are emerging as the demand for water in many areas of the world simply outruns the supply. Water tables are now falling on every continent. Literally scores of countries are facing water shortages. All […]

The Gambler

“If I gamble, I usually gamble at high-stakes, high-payoff games.” That’s a boast not from James Bond, but from a chemist speaking to the prestigious journal Science (the July 14 issue, from which all quotes but the last one in this column are taken). His name is Peter Schultz. He works at Scripps Research Institute […]

Farmers are reaping rewards from wind energy

Farmers and ranchers in the United States are discovering that they own not only land, but also the wind rights that accompany it. A farmer in Iowa who leases a quarter acre of cropland to the local utility as a site for a wind turbine can typically earn $2,000 a year in royalties from the […]