Can’t send lions to gun country: IUCN norms

AHMEDABAD: If guidelines of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) are anything to go by, Gir's lions can't be translocated to the Kuno-Palpur forest in Madhya Pradesh. One of the world's oldest, largest and respected global environmental networks says before translocation of any wildlife species, the natural habitat and range has to be considered. The guidelines also state the site should have a natural corridor between the original site and the new site.

Most importantly, however, the guidelines say that a thorough assessment of attitudes of local people to the proposed project is necessary to ensure long-term protection of the re-introduced population. This is especially true if the cause of the species' decline was due to human factors, include over-hunting or loss or alteration of habitat.

TOI had in its news report 'Life for Cheetah, death for lion', published on April 20 highlighted that Kuno-Palpur sanctuary is in Sheopur district, a region infamous for the gun cult. Licensed firearms alone are estimated to be 4,800 in a population of six lakh. There was no way of counting the number of illegal firearms, which could well be even higher given that this is the tip of Chambal valley, a favourite hideout of dacoits even today.

In stark contrast, Junagadh district which is home to Gir sanctuary has a population of 27 lakh with just 2,600 licensed firearms. Even the Union ministry of forests and environment had taken note of the gun cult in Sheopur when it was considering reintroducing cheetahs from Africa here.

"The state government should submit the IUCN guidelines in court along with the review petition against the translocation oder," says environmentalist Bharat Jethwa. "You can raise a number of issues against translocation with the help of these guidelines." Forest officials in Gujarat also say that Kuno-Palpur can't be considered a natural habit for the lions as there has been no sighting of lions outside Gir since the late 1880s.

The guidelines further state, "The site should be within the historic range of the species." Officials said that IUCN also states that reintroduction should be undertaken only as a last resort when no opportunities for re-introduction into the original site or range.

Besides, the Supreme Court verdict on translocation states, "Re-introduction of Asiatic lion, needless to say, should be in accordance with the guidelines issued by IUCN and with the active participation of experts in the field of re-introduction of endangered species."

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Plants moderate climate warming: Study

LONDON: As temperatures warm, plants release gases that help form clouds and cool the atmosphere, according to a new study.

Researchers from International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) and the University of Helsinki, Finland identified a negative feedback loop in which higher temperatures lead to an increase in concentrations of natural aerosols that have a cooling effect on the atmosphere.

"Plants, by reacting to changes in temperature, also moderate these changes," said IIASA and University of Helsinki researcher Pauli Paasonen, who led the study.

Scientists had known that some aerosols - particles that float in the atmosphere - cool the climate as they reflect sunlight and form cloud droplets, which reflect sunlight efficiently.

Aerosol particles come from many sources, including human emissions. But the effect of so-called biogenic aerosol - particulate matter that originates from plants - had been less well understood.

Plants release gases that, after atmospheric oxidation, tend to stick to aerosol particles, growing them into the larger-sized particles that reflect sunlight and also serve as the basis for cloud droplets.

The new study showed that as temperatures warm and plants consequently release more of these gases, the concentrations of particles active in cloud formation increase.

While previous research had predicted the feedback effect, until now its existence has not been proved except for case studies limited to single sites and short time periods.

The new study showed that the effect occurs over the long-term in continental size scales.

The effect of enhanced plant gas emissions on climate is small on a global scale - only countering approximately 1 per cent of climate warming, the study suggested.

"This does not save us from climate warming. Aerosol effects on climate are one of the main uncertainties in climate models. Understanding this mechanism could help us reduce those uncertainties and make the models better," said Paasonen.

The study also showed that the effect was much larger on a regional scale, counteracting possibly up to 30 per cent of warming in more rural, forested areas where anthropogenic emissions of aerosols were much lower in comparison to the natural aerosols.

That means that especially in places like Finland, Siberia, and Canada this feedback loop may reduce warming substantially.

The researchers collected data at 11 different sites around the world, measuring the concentrations of aerosol particles in the atmosphere, along with the concentrations of plant gases, the temperature, and re-analysis estimates for the height of the boundary layer, which turned out to be a key variable.

The new study was published in journal Nature Geoscience.

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Odisha to formulate a new policy to avoid elephant deaths

PTI Apr 26, 2013, 08.56PM IST

BHUBANESWAR: With elephant deaths taking place at regular intervals, the Odisha government has decided to formulate new policy in order to protect jumbos from electrocution and other accidents, official sources said.

The government has estimated Rs 21 crore to be spent for the new plan.

The decision in this regard was taken during review of elephant and tiger management policy by chief minister Naveen Patnaik.

As a number of elephants die due to electrocution and train mishaps, the government has decided to spend money on repair of sagging live electric wire in elephant passage areas, said chief conservator of forest (wildlife) JD Sharma.

Both forest department and energy departments have been asked to identify places where electric wires sagging have occurred in elephant corridors. The officials were asked to tighten electric wire and put additional poles, they said adding that Keonjhar, Dhenkanal and Bhanjagar have been identified as the places where maximum elephant electrocution cases are reported.

"We will take up electric wire repair work at certain places on priority basis," said a senior official of energy department.

This apart, Sharma said the state government's request the railway ministry on speed restriction in elephant passage route may yield result soon. Elephants have died in train mishaps at Huma in Ganjam district.

The state government's proposal before Centre for constituting Special Tiger Protection Force in Satkosia sanctuary was also discussed in the meeting. Issues relating to proper rehabilitation for the people residing in the core areas of Similipal and Satkosia sanctuaries were also discussed, a senior official said.

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Lion safari project caught in Centre-UP govt logjam

LUCKNOW: The ambitious lion safari project of UP government appears to be the latest casualty of strained relations between the state and the Centre, with the latter delaying green signal to it. To end the logjam, chief minister Akhliesh Yadav has written to the Union minister of environment and forest Jayanthi Natarajan seeking her intervention for the ministry's consent to the project.

In a letter dated April 3, CM has sought a clarification if establishing the lion safari in Etawah needs clearance under the Forest Conservation Act (FCA), 1980. The project was cleared by the Central Zoo Authority (CZA) in February this year. Its management and the master plan, too, have been approved. But at present the project is stalled, awaiting clearance under FCA from the Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF).

Since safari is an "extended zoo", permission from CZA has been secured and is sufficient, said sources in the forest department. Approval under FCA is not needed to set up zoos in the country. But, the regional office of MoEF has raised objections to the project citing reasons that it's a non-forestry activity and to pursue any such activity on forest land, clearance under FCA is required.

The chief minister has sought clarification on the point from the Union minister so that the project gets expedited. The minister is yet to respond to him. The project has been held up for two months since CZA gave its nod in February. All activity has been stopped by the state forest department at the project site after the regional office of MoEF objected to felling of 'babool' trees in the area and sought explanation from the department.

When contacted, chief wildlife warden and PCCF (wildlife) Rupak De said, "We have all necessary clearances and we already have clarification on FCA."

A lion safari and a breeding centre would be set up on 150.83 hectare of fisher forest area in Etawah, which is a reserve forest area. The project mooted by Mulayam government in 2005 was actively pursued by the state till 2007 when Mayawati came to power and shelved it. In March 2012, after SP government came to power, it revived the project. But, presently its fate hangs in balance as MoEF nod is awaited.

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Whales display human-like ability to learn from each other

LONDON: Humpback whales are able to pass on hunting techniques to each other, just as humans do, new research has found.

A team of researchers, led by the University of St Andrews discovered that a new feeding technique has spread to 40 per cent of a humpback whale population.

The community of humpback whales off New England, US, was forced to find new prey after herring stocks - their preferred food - crashed in the early 1980s.

The solution the whales devised - hitting the water with their tails while hunting a different prey - has now spread through the population by cultural transmission. By 2007, nearly 40 per cent of the population had been seen doing it.

"Our study really shows how vital cultural transmission is in humpback populations - not only do they learn their famous songs from each other, they also learn feeding techniques that allow them to buffer the effects of changing ecology," Dr Luke Rendell, lecturer in the School of Biology at the University of St Andrews, said.

The team used a new technique called network-based diffusion analysis to demonstrate that the pattern of spread followed the network of social relationships within the population, showing that the new behaviour had spread through cultural transmission, the same process that underlies the diversity of human culture.

The data were collected by naturalist observers aboard the many whale-watching vessels that patrol the waters of the Gulf of Maine each summer.

"We can learn more about the forces that drive the evolution of culture by looking outside our own ancestral lineage and studying the occurrence of similar attributes in groups that have evolved in a radically different environment to ours, like the cetaceans," researcher Will Hoppitt from Anglia Ruskin University said.

Humpbacks around the world herd shoals of prey by blowing bubbles underwater to produce 'bubble nets'.

The feeding innovation, called 'lobtail feeding', involves hitting the water with the tail before diving to produce the bubble nets.

Lobtail feeding was first observed in 1980, after the stocks of herring, previously the main food for the whales, became depleted.

At the same time sand lance stocks soared, and it would seem the innovation is specific to that particular prey, because its use is concentrated around the Stellwagen Bank, spawning grounds where the sand lance can reach high abundance.

Using a unique database spanning thirty years of observations gathered by Dr Weinrich, the researchers were able track the spread of the behaviour through the whales' social network.

The study was published in the journal Science.

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Modi orders strong review petition to keep lions in Gujarat

AHMEDABAD: Stung by criticism and protests within Gujarat over losing the lion transfer case against Madhya Pradesh in the Supreme Court, chief minister Narendra Modi took control over the matter at a meeting of the State Board for Wildlife, which he chaired on Thursday. He called for a strong review petition to be filed before the apex court to prevent the transfer of the first lot of lions from Gir to Palpur Kuno sanctuary in Madhya Pradesh.

Many of the members also spoke about the gun cult which exists in this part of MP - an issue raised by TOI after the judgment - and insisted that this point be strongly put forth in the petition. They felt that NGOs should also intervene in the SC and support Gujarat's case.

The meeting saw an agitated Modi snapping at senior forest officials for messing up the case. He glared at one member who quoted the TOI report, which stated that the best lawyers were not hired for the job. He ordered that all other matters on the agenda be dropped and only the lion issue be discussed.

Though he said he did not want the lion issue to be seen as a Gujarat versus MP case, Modi appeared clearly upset over the neighbouring state's chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan celebrating the victory in two quick tweets on April 8 - the day of the judgment.

Modi raised objection to the fact that the order had ignored the views of the board. Also, he found the idea of Gujarat sending lions regularly to MP objectionable.

Eminent environmentalist Lavkumar Khachar said the poaching problem in MP should be raised strongly. "The people of MP are expert poachers. The presence of large number of guns is a worrying factor. Also, one can kill lions by just spraying insecticides on the kill," he said.

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Greenpeace launches Arctic 'whistleblower' site for oil workers

Reuters Apr 24, 2013, 06.06PM IST

(Greenpeace wants governments…)

OSLO: Environmental group Greenpeace launched a website on Wednesday seeking to attract whistleblowers from within oil companies to reveal risks with drilling for oil and gas in the Arctic.

Greenpeace wants governments to ban oil and gas firms from the fragile Arctic environment.

It urged employees of oil firms and sub-contractors to submit information to the new website (www.arctictruth.org) if they knew about serious safety issues or risks that were in the public interest.

Greenpeace said that posters advertising the new website would be on show near the London offices of Royal Dutch Shell plc.

Shell, which says it puts safety first, said in February that it would not drill in Alaska's Arctic waters this year after a 2012 season that culminated in the grounding of its drillship in a storm.

Earlier this month, in another setback for Arctic drilling, ConocoPhillips shelved plans to drill exploration wells in the Chukchi Sea off Alaska next year due to regulatory uncertainties in the United States.

A retreat of Arctic ice, blamed by the UN panel of climate scientists on climate change, is making the region more accessible to oil and gas exploration.

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Gujarat will have to keep sending its lions to Madhya Pradesh

AHMEDABAD: The State Board of Wildlife is meeting on Thursday to prepare a strong review petition to be filed in the Supreme Court shortly to oppose the decision earlier this month to shift some Gir lions to Palpur Kuno sanctuary in Madhya Pradesh.

Studying the decision carefully, the authorities here have realized that this is not a one-time transfer of lions. The SC decision states that the gene pool in MP would be kept healthy by sending fresh male lions from Gujarat every three to five years. The wildlife board and the forest department feel that sending males from Gir to Kuno will disturb the social fabric of the prides.

Their main argument, according to top forest officials, will be that the gene pool of Gir lions has improved and not deteriorated as suggested in the project report for translocation. Gujarat forest officials will quote a study — 'Genetic variation in Asiatic lions and Indian tigers' — jointly conducted by the Center for Cellular and Molecular Biology, Hyderabad; Zoological Survey of India, Kolkata; and Center for DNA Fingerprinting and Diagnostics, Hyderabad.

Quoting the study, Gujarat will try to establish before SC that the lions are healthy and have no genetic disorder at present and are not likely to suffer any kind of such disorder in the next several years to come. Forest officials said that they have several scientific evidences to drive home the fact that the health of the lions is steadily improving. Earlier, the litter size was just one or at the most two, it is now normal to see a litter of two or three or even four cubs.

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‘Take your ads off trees or face legal action’

NEW DELHI: Using a tree as a free display board can have you prosecuted now. Taking note of a Times of India article titled "Ads nail city's greens" that was published on April 22, a five-member bench headed by NGT chairperson Swatanter Kumar has asked all civic and land owning agencies to immediately remove all boards, advertisements, signages and nails from trees in their respective areas. Anyone whose board is found nailed to a tree is to be prosecuted by the relevant authority.

The bench observed that based on facts presented before it on Tuesday, "it is clear that all the public authorities have failed to discharge their duties and statutory obligations. They have not only violated of various special statutes but also infringed their legal obligation arising out of the Environment Protection Act 1986. It is the obligation of the state to provide a healthy environment to the citizens and redress injuries to trees".

Based on the pictures carried in ToI report showing a DTC timetable hammered into a tree, the transport corporation has also been made party to the case as the 13th resopndent.

The court was hearing a case filed by Aditya Prasad against Union of India regarding de-concretization of trees and allied matters. It has directed all government authorities, specifically the three municipal corporations, Delhi Development Authority, DTC, Delhi Metro, National Highway Authority of India, director general of Central Public Works Department and chief engineer of the Delhi PWD to remove forthwith all boards, nails, advertisements and signs from trees in their respective areas and prosecute any person or agency whose board is found tacked to a tree.

The officials have also been asked to ensure that a space of 1m or as much is necessary is left around trees while tiling or concretizing. The bench said all such trees which are currently concretized should be freed up and no further tiling around trees should be permitted. It has made the vice-chairperson, commissioners, chief engineers, director generals and all senior-most officers of the respective organizations personally responsible for carrying out these orders.

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Greenpeace launches Arctic 'whistleblower' site for oil workers

OSLO: Environmental group Greenpeace launched a website on Wednesday seeking to attract whistleblowers from within oil companies to reveal risks with drilling for oil and gas in the Arctic.

Greenpeace wants governments to ban oil and gas firms from the fragile Arctic environment.

It urged employees of oil firms and sub-contractors to submit information to the new website (www.arctictruth.org) if they knew about serious safety issues or risks that were in the public interest.

Greenpeace said that posters advertising the new website would be on show near the London offices of Royal Dutch Shell plc.

Shell, which says it puts safety first, said in February that it would not drill in Alaska's Arctic waters this year after a 2012 season that culminated in the grounding of its drillship in a storm.

Earlier this month, in another setback for Arctic drilling, ConocoPhillips shelved plans to drill exploration wells in the Chukchi Sea off Alaska next year due to regulatory uncertainties in the United States.

A retreat of Arctic ice, blamed by the UN panel of climate scientists on climate change, is making the region more accessible to oil and gas exploration.

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3,000-year-old skeletons found in Indonesian cave

MELBOURNE: Archaeologists have discovered remains of 66 humans dating back to 3000 years in a cave in Sumatra island of Indonesia.

The team which excavated the Harimau or Tiger Cave also found the first example of rock art in Sumatra besides the discovery of 66 human burials.

"Sixty-six is very strange," said Truman Simanjuntak from Jakarta-based National Research and Development Center for Archaeology, adding that he and his colleagues have never found such a big quantity of burials.

"It means that this cave was occupied intensely by humans and they continued to occupy it for a very, very long time," he said.

The findings shed new light on the complex cultural behaviour of Indonesia's first farming communities, who lived in the limestone caves of Harimau and used them as a burial place and a 'workshop' for tool-making activities.

With much of the cave still to be excavated, researchers are excited about the secrets they might hold.

"There are still occupation traces deeper and deeper in the cave, where we have not excavated yet. So it means the cave is very promising," Simanjuntak said.

Simanjuntak visited University of Wollongong, Australia earlier this month to address researchers at the Centre for Archaeological Science (CAS).

CAS researchers will likely date the findings from the cave.

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CM Vijay Bahuguna opposes Centre's decision on eco-sensitive zone near Bhagirathi river

DEHRADUN: Uttarakhand Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna today strongly opposed the Centre's recent notification declaring a vast stretch of land from Gaumukh to Uttarkashi on either side of the Bhagirathi river as an eco-sensitive zone, saying it would adversely affect the infrastructure development projects in the area.

Bahuguna said several infrastructure development projects are in the pipeline in the region and the Centre's move will tantamount to stalling nearly all of them including construction of bridges, Border Roads Organisation's realignment work and flood control measures.

"The state cabinet will soon meet to discuss the negative fallouts of the decision and I will take up the issue with the Centre asking it to reconsider the move and thrash out a middle-of-the-road solution," Bahuguna said.

"Roads and bridges are to be built in the region which bore the brunt of natural calamities last year. With a notification like this we will not be able to take up those projects," he said.

However, the chief minister assured that the state government will discuss the matter with the Centre and leave no stone unturned to ensure that the notification does not affect development work in the region.

The Ministry of Environment and Forests issued a notification recently declaring 41 km area on either side of the Bhagirathi as eco-sensitive zone.

This will impose restrictions on quarrying, commissioning hydro power projects on Bhagirathi and construction of roads in the prohibited area which includes villages prone to natural calamities like cloudbursts and flash floods.

It will also impose a blanket ban on felling of trees and setting up of factories in the area.

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Nine districts in Arunachal Pradesh identified for rubber cultivation

ITANAGAR: The Rubber Board of India has identified nine districts in Arunachal Pradesh for rubber cultivation.

Rubber Board chairman Sheela Thomas said that the nine districts of East and West Siang, Papum Pare, East Kameng, Lohit, Lower Dibang Valley, Changlang, Tirap and Longding have a potential for cultivation of rubber in 25,000 hectare as per initial survey.

Official sources quoting chief minister Nabam Tuki who met Thomas yesterday said that rubber cultivation would meet 25 per cent of the state government's five-year job generation target of one lakh.

Describing rubber as a most viable and profitable crop which could yield Rs 2.7 lakh per hectare, Tuki called for taking up double cropping.

While making suggestions to identify more viable areas, he said that the beneficiaries would be selected in a transparent manner by deputy commissioners.

Stating that the Union trade and commerce ministry's support would be sought, Tuki insisted on high quality saplings and expert guidance.

Thomas who led a six-member team to the state on Saturday, said the North East would get the Board's priority attention and a demonstration firm could be set up in the state.

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20th century warmest in 1400 years: Study

MELBOURNE: Global warming over the 20th century has produced the hottest global average temperatures in 1400 years, a major scientific study has found.

Scientists have found that the period between 1971-2000 was warmer than any other time in nearly 1400 years.

The first continental-scale reconstruction of temperatures over the past 2000 years by an international team of scientists has highlighted the unusual nature of the 20th century warming.

Recent warming reversed the long-term cooling, during the period 1971?2000, when the average temperature was higher than any other time in nearly 1,400 years, according to the study published in Nature Geoscience.

Researchers, combining Northern and Southern Hemisphere temperature reconstructions, found that the 20th Century warming is a global event that has produced the hottest global average temperature in 1400 years.

This is in stark contrast to the Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age, which the study revealed did not occur simultaneously across the globe.

"The striking feature about the sudden rise in 20th Century global average temperature is that it comes after an overall cooling trend that lasted more than a millennium," said Dr Steven Phipps, author of the paper from the University of New South Wales' ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science.

"This research shows that in just a century the Earth has reversed 1400 years of cooling," Phipps said.

The researchers used data from 511 individual proxy records. The majority of these records came from tree ring measurements but also included coral reefs, cave formations, ice cores, lake sediments and some historical documents.

The 2000-year temperature snapshot revealed by the researchers shows a long-term cooling trend before human influences began to become significant.

This trend was primarily driven by natural cycles in the Earth's orbit. At the same time there were also natural fluctuations caused by volcanic eruptions and variations in solar activity.

It is these natural variations, and in particular the changes in the Earth's orbital cycle, that explain why some of the average global temperatures prior to AD 600 were as warm as today.

However, none of these natural influences account for the dramatic global temperature rises of the 20th century, researchers said.

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'Human assisted dispersal' of lions a good move: Bombay Natural Hisotry Society

MUMBAI: The Supreme Court of India's recent judgment permitting translocation of some of the endangered Asiatic lions from Gujarat's Gir National Park to Kuno Palpur Wildlife Sanctuary in Madhya Pradesh is considered to be a good and essential step for the long-term survival of the species.

The Bombay Natural Hisotry Society(BNHS) India, terms this type of re-introduction as 'human assisted dispersal', which means re-introduction of a species to some part of its former range through human intervention. BNHS is of the opinion that many other threatened species can be conserved using this approach wherever it is necessary and appropriate to do so.

BNHS observes that whenever natural dispersal of wild species is not possible any longer due to lack of habitat corridors because of human activities and settlements, it is essential to have 'human assisted dispersal'. Dr Rahmani elaborates on the point saying that although there has been good growth in the numbers of Asiatic lions in Gujarat following conservation measures, there are no forest corridors available at present for the animals to disperse to other areas of their former range in other states. In such cases 'human assisted d'ispersal is required. The same can be used for other threatened species on case to case basis.

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Being vegetarian is the only way to save the planet: Maneka Gandhi

Barkha Mathur, TNN Apr 20, 2013, 05.20PM IST

("There is an urgent need…)

Holding responsible the many fallacies that are associated with a vegetarian diet for the rise in the number of meat eaters, Maneka Gandhi, the founder of People for Animals, said that even medical practitioners were not aware of how well a vegetarian diet can work for physical well being. "They believe in the dictum 'garbage in garbage out.' They don't believe in the adage 'prevention is better than cure' and so preventive methods preached by naturopathy or ayurveda have been termed as alternative medicine." Diet and nutrition forms a very minuscule part of medical curriculum, she feels. "Even athletes turn vegetarians some five to six days before a tournament as it is known to make them feel more healthy and agile."

Dismissing all arguments against vegetarianism as puerile, Gandhi says, "Just see how well the Jains and the Marwaris do in life. It cannot be a co-incidence that they are so well educated and affluent. It is because of their way of life which involves least harm to a living being."

"There is an urgent need to instil these values in young children and for this we need to catch the adults who have an influence on them. It can be parents as well as teachers," she feels.

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Unruly nilgais on dangerous bull run

NEW DELHI: Gujarat is still smarting over the loss of some of its Gir lions to Madhya Pradesh. But many states would gladly give away an animal whose burgeoning population is causing havoc in farms, airforce stations and on national highways — the blue bull or nilgai. So fraught has this man-animal face-off become that Bihar issued an order on February 19 for culling these animals in a restricted way.

For Rahul Gupta (name changed), a nilgai will always evoke trepidation. Recently, as he was driving down a national highway at 9 pm, a blue apparition suddenly jumped in front of his luxurious car. It was a nilgai -- big, agile and just as bewildered as Gupta. The car crashed, the bonnet crumpled. Fortunately, the airbags saved him. "But it will cost me Rs 22 lakh to repair the car," says Gupta. He was lucky. Last April, a toddler and his father were killed when their Santro turned turtle on ramming into a nilgai in Gurgaon.

Nilgais also raid farms and damage crops. "Poor farmers existing on subsistence agriculture can ill-afford this and are increasingly hostile to them," says Dr N P S Chauhan, head of population management, Wildlife Institute of India, Dehradun. "After introduction of the Wildlife Protection Act (1972), many wildlife species, including nilgais, have increased considerably outside protected areas," says Chauhan in a research paper. This leaves crops as the only food available to them, says Bittu Sahgal, editor, Sanctuary Asia. Also, the decrease in predators -- wolves and jackals -- has further increased their numbers.

Nilgais, incidentally, come under Schedule III of the Wildlife Act. "Basically, this means that if a state government, under political pressure, wants to issue permissions to shoot nilgais, they can," says Sahgal. Constant skirmishes led the chief wildlife warden in Bihar to constitute a committee to issue licenses to kill them in a restricted way. The February 19 order states that the license to use stipulated firearms for culling will be valid for four weeks, that Rs 500 will be paid for each killing and Rs 1,000 for disposal of the body. Culling has also taken place in other states such as HP, MP and Gujarat.

Air force stations, too, are frequented by nilgai herds and use choppers to scare them away. Former group captain Pankaj Chopra says, "When I was the chief commanding officer of a forward station, I saw a nilgai and a MiG colliding on the runway. The plane turned turtle. We had a tough time extricating the pilot. The plane was written off." In 2008, an AI flight hit a nilgai at Chakeri airport in Kanpur. All escaped unhurt.

So what's the solution? "One should restore ecosystems so that the predator-prey ratio gets balanced," says Sahgal. "In the US where virtually every predator has been shot, humans have taken on this role and are turning the guns on animals." How about fencing highways or relocating them like the Gir lions, asks Gupta.

Easier said than done.

(Inputs from Madan Kumar in Patna)

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Being vegetarian is the only way to save the planet: Maneka Gandhi

Holding responsible the many fallacies that are associated with a vegetarian diet for the rise in the number of meat eaters, Maneka Gandhi, the founder of People for Animals, said that even medical practitioners were not aware of how well a vegetarian diet can work for physical well being. "They believe in the dictum 'garbage in garbage out.' They don't believe in the adage 'prevention is better than cure' and so preventive methods preached by naturopathy or ayurveda have been termed as alternative medicine." Diet and nutrition forms a very minuscule part of medical curriculum, she feels. "Even athletes turn vegetarians some five to six days before a tournament as it is known to make them feel more healthy and agile."

Dismissing all arguments against vegetarianism as puerile, Gandhi says, "Just see how well the Jains and the Marwaris do in life. It cannot be a co-incidence that they are so well educated and affluent. It is because of their way of life which involves least harm to a living being."

"There is an urgent need to instil these values in young children and for this we need to catch the adults who have an influence on them. It can be parents as well as teachers," she feels.

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Ban on night stay at Bhitarkanika National Park removed

KENDRAPARA, Odisha: The ban on night stay of tourists at the Bhitarkanika National Park in Odisha, which led to a decline in footfall of Indian and foreign visitors, has been withdrawn.

The fall in number of visitors to the internationally acclaimed wetland in Kendrapara district also adversely affected the economy of villages on its fringes as residents found few employment opportunities to make a living.

"We have lifted the night stay ban on tourists. The restriction had to be imposed following attack by hooligans on forest staff in January," Divisional forest officer, Rajnagar Mangrove Forest, Manoj Kumar Mahapatra, said.

The national park would remain open till May 15 and thereafter close till July 1 because of the nesting season of estuarine crocodiles.

It has now been made mandatory for visitors and tourists to carry proof of identity and it was necessary for securing an entry permit, forest officials said.

The forest department has also sought closure and relocation of IMFL shops at Gupti and Dangmal at the entry points to the national park, but the district administration was yet to respond, they added.

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Fishes found dead in historic temple pond

HAJO: Twenty-seven more fishes were found floating today in the Vishnupushkar Sarobar pond in the historic Hayagriva Madhab temple here in Assam's Kamrup (rural) district taking the number of dead fish recovered from the pond to 85 since yesterday.

The recovery also led to large scale protests in the area with people calling for swift action to save the aquatic life at the historic spot. Local residents found the fishes floating yesterday in the pond, which is home to about 1,200 fishes and 500 tortoises.
Teams from the Assam pollution control board and the forensic laboratory visited the place and collected samples of the water and bodies of fishes for testing, official sources said. While the exact cause was yet to be ascertained, sources in fisheries department said the aquatic creatures died due to lack of oxygen as the water in the pond had become stagnant due to lack of rainfall over the last few months.

Meanwhile, local residents and members of the All Assam Students' Union held a protest outside the circle office in Hojai today. They handed over a memorandum to chief minister Tarun Gogoi via the local officials, demanding action for the conservation of the water body and aquatic life.

The district administration has installed four pumps in the vicinity of the pond to flush out the stagnant water and pump in fresh water. Hajo, about 24 kilometres from Guwahati, is famed for Hindu, Islamic and Buddhist shrines with the historic Hayagriva Madhava Mandir.

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Saving Arunachal Pradesh's hornbills shortlisted for Green Oscars

LONDON: A project to save the hornbills of Arunachal Pradesh has been short-listed for the Green Oscars.

London based Whitley fund for nature on Thursday announced the shortlist of seven finalists for the Whitley awards, a prestigious annual international prize that honours exceptional individuals working in grassroots nature conservation, in what are often conflict-torn and under-resourced developing countries.

Aparajita Datta's project, "threatened hornbills as icons for the conservation of the Himalayan forests of Arunachal Pradesh, India" is among the seven finalists for the Rs 2 crore (£245,000) prize.

The state is home to five species of hornbills including the globally endangered rufous-necked hornbill and the brown hornbill.

The state is home to 26 different tribes and most of them attribute differential values to different hornbill body parts including the beak, meat, feathers (mostly tail and on occasions primary feathers of the wing) and fat.

The charity's patron 'the princess royal' will announce the final results at a special evening ceremony on May 2 at the Royal Geographical Society, London.

The princess royal will also present an additional prize, the Whitley gold award worth £50,000, to Ca?an ?ekercio?lu of Turkey, a past award winner who has used his grant money to particularly outstanding effect in supporting Turkey's first ever wildlife corridor.

Other finalists include Zahirul Islam for community based sea turtle conservation in Bangladesh, Ekwoge Enang Abwe for protection of the endangered great apes of Ebo Forest, Cameroon, Daniel Lejaroi Letoiye for restoring grasslands for the coexistence of Grevy's Zebra and free-ranging livestock, Kenya.

It has also short-listed John Kahekwa Munihuzi for saving Congo's last eastern lowland gorillas and Eugene Simonov for the protection of the Amur River basin and wetlands in China, Russia and Mongolia.

This year, which marks the 20th anniversary of the Whitley awards, saw a surge in applicants, with the highest number of entries yet to the scheme.

Rohit Naniwadekar from Ruffor foundation says Arunachal Pradesh is home to five species of hornbills. With more than 80% of its geographic area under forest cover, the state is most important for hornbill conservation in India. The species face significant levels of threats from hunting and habitat degradation/loss.

In various sites, excessive hunting has resulted in local extinction of species like the great hornbill which is the most preferred by many tribes for its beak, tail feathers and fat.

First awarded in 1994, the Whitley awards are presented annually to outstanding grassroots leaders in nature conservation across the developing world. Over the past two decades, the Whitley fund for nature has given almost £10 million to conservation and recognised 160 conservation leaders in more than 70 countries.

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Environmentalists protest shark fishing in Nicaragua

MANAGUA: An environmental group is calling for a greater government presence in Nicaragua's Caribbean waters following the discovery of a boat with dozens of dead sharks aboard in Little Corn Island.

Complaints have been filed with the Environment and Natural Resources Ministry, or Marena, and the Nicaraguan Aquaculture and Fishing Institute about the shark slaughter, the Nicaraguan Foundation for Sustainable Development, or Fundenic-SOS, said.

"We need a greater presence of the authorities in the area because this is what we managed to find. We do not know what is happening in the rest of the Caribbean," Fundenic-SOS biologist Fabio Buitrago told EFE.

"Up to now, we have only gotten a response from the Marena, which asked us to provide information about the boat and its captain," Buitrago said.

Shark fishing is not illegal in Nicaragua, but fishermen violate the law when they practice non-selective fishing by cutting the fins off sharks and tossing them back into the water alive.

"Shark finning", the controversial practice of slicing off a hooked shark's fins and then dumping the dead or injured animal into the water to save space, is banned in many countries.

The illegal trade in shark fins, which are considered a delicacy in Asia, is threatening some species with extinction.

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Ecology and evolution are intertwined, say researchers

LONDON: Overturning the common assumption that evolution occurs gradually over hundreds or thousands of years, researchers have found significant genetically-transmitted changes in laboratory populations of soil mites in just 15 generations, leading to a doubling of the age at which the mites reached adulthood and large changes in population size.

The researchers at the University of Leeds worked with soil mites that were collected from the wild and then raised in 18 glass tubes. Forty per cent of adult mites were removed every week from six of the glass tubes.

Lead author Dr Tom Cameron said "We saw significant evolutionary changes relatively quickly. The age of maturity of the mites in the tubes doubled over about 15 generations, because they were competing in a different way than they would in the wild. Removing the adults caused them to remain as juveniles even longer because the genetics were responding to the high chance that they were going to die as soon as they matured. When they did eventually mature, they were so enormous they could lay all of their eggs very quickly."

The initial change in the mites' environment—from the wild into the laboratory—had a disastrous effect on the population, putting the mites on an extinction trajectory.

Dr Cameron said: "The genetic evolution that resulted in an investment in egg production at the expense of individual growth rates led to population growth, rescuing the populations from extinction. This is evolutionary rescue in action and suggests that rapid evolution can help populations respond to rapid environmental change." The study has been published in the journal Ecology Letters.

Professor Tim Benton, of the University of Leeds' Faculty of Biological Sciences, said: "This demonstrates that short-term ecological change and evolution are completely intertwined and cannot reasonably be considered separate. We found that populations evolve rapidly in response to environmental change and population management. This can have major consequences such as reducing harvesting yields or saving a population heading for extinction."

Short-term ecological responses to the environment—for instance, a reduction in the size of adults because of lack of food—and hard-wired evolutionary changes were separated by placing mites from different treatments into a similar environment for several generations and seeing whether differences persisted.

Professor Benton said: "The traditional idea would be that if you put animals in a new environment they stay basically the same but the way they grow changes because of variables like the amount of food. However, our study proves that the evolutionary effect—the change in the underlying biology in response to the environment—can happen at the same time as the ecological response. Ecology and evolution are intertwined."

The size at which cod in the North Sea mature is about half that of 50 years ago and this change has been linked to a collapse in the cod population because adult fish today are less fertile than their ancestors.

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Climate talks slow, individual nations must take action: PM

NEW DELHI: Voicing concern over "painfully slow" progress in climate talks, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Tuesday said the goal of stabilizing global temperatures was "nowhere in sight" and pitched for individual countries to take action to increase energy efficiency.

Singh, inaugurating the Fourth Clean Energy Ministerial, also made it clear that rich nations, who were responsible for a bulk of greenhouse gas emissions, were best placed to provide workable solutions to mitigate climate change.

They (industrialized nations) also have high per capita incomes which gives them the highest capacity to bear the burden. They are technically most advanced, and to that extent best placed to provide workable solutions not only for themselves but for the whole world," he said.

At the same time, Singh said issues of financing mitigation actions to tackle climate change have been a focus of intense discussion in negotiations under the auspices of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

"Unfortunately, progress in these negotiations is painfully slow. The goal of stabilizing global temperatures at acceptable levels is nowhere in sight," he told Energy Ministers of 20 leading economies gathered here to discuss speedy transition to a global clean energy economy.

Singh said while it must be ensured that the UNFCCC process reaches some acceptable outcome, individual countries have to take action to increase energy efficiency and also to promote clean energy.

The Prime Minister said India was taking steps to exploit non-conventional clean energy sources like solar and wind power and has proposed to double renewable energy capacity in the country from 25,000 MW in 2012 to 55,000 MW by 2017.

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Dry weather affects rubber plants in northeast India

AGARTALA: Immature rubber plants of two-four years are drying up in India's northeastern region owing to prolonged dry weather, leaving the growers worried about their produce, an official said here on Tuesday.

The symptoms begin with yellowing of leaves and eventually branches of the rubber trees becoming partially or completely dry.

"Contemplating this as disease, the anxious growers have been using chemicals on their rubber plants under the influence of a section of unscrupulous traders," a Rubber Board official said.

The Kerala-based Rubber Research Institute of India (RRII) under the Rubber Board has advised the growers that the symptoms are not of any disease and that there is no need to spray any kind of chemical.

"Experts have investigated the problem and the growers have been advised that the prevailing hot and dry conditions are causing the drying of plants. There is no need to use fungicide or any other chemical as it is not a disease," RRII Deputy Director SS Dey said.

"As an immediate measure, growers are advised to provide shade to young rubber plants until the rains arrive. The main trunk of the plant can be whitewashed with clay to protect it from direct sun. Mulching can also be provided at the base of the plants," he said.

The official said the symptoms will persist until it rains, but the measures would prevent the plants from drying out completely.

According to the Rubber Board official, over 40 percent of the 12,000 hectares of new rubber gardens have been affected in Tripura alone.

Weather department officials said the prevailing dry weather in the pre-monsoon period (March-May) is not a normal phenomenon. In most parts of the northeastern region, except Arunachal Pradesh, there has been a huge deficit in rainfall so far.

"Some rains are likely to occur in the next couple of days," an official said.

After Kerala, Tripura has the second largest area under rubber plant cultivation in the country with 60,000 hectare in the state producing about 26,000 tonne of natural rubber in 2010-11.

In India's northeast, especially Tripura, rubber cultivation is yielding a better life for poor tribals, who were practicing 'jhum' or the slash-and-burn method of cultivation, and dramatically altering the economy of the region.

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Endangered Sumatran elephant born in captivity

CISARUA, Indonesia: A baby Sumatran elephant peeps out timidly from between the legs of its mother at an Indonesian zoo, where its birth has given a boost to the critically endangered animal.

Kartini, named after the country's most celebrated feminist, Raden Ajeng Kartini, was born on Friday under a captive breeding programme and is in good health.

"Her birth is the result of conservation efforts at the zoo, and we're all happy to welcome her," Taman Safari zoo spokesman Yulius Suprihardo told AFP.

The zoo said that she seemed happy, and was feeding from her mother every 30 minutes.

The 105 kilogram (231 pound) elephant was born just south of the capital Jakarta, but the animal is native to Sumatra island, where its population has halved in one generation, according to environmental group WWF.

There are fewer than 3,000 Sumatran elephants remaining in the wild, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

Rampant expansion of palm oil, paper plantations, and mines, has destroyed nearly 70 percent of the Sumatran elephant's forest habitat over 25 years, the WWF says, and the animals remain a target of poaching.

Three of the elephants were found dead in Riau province in November last year, with officials saying they were probably poisoned in a revenge attack by palm oil plantation workers who suspected the animals had destroyed their huts.

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Govt to soon fix green norms for SEZs, realty sector, roads

NEW DELHI: The environment ministry is likely to decide on a second set of key changes in green norms meant for SEZs, roads and the real estate sector, especially multi-storey buildings, next week. The committee it had formed on easing green regulations for clearances impacting these specific industries and sectors has submitted its report and the ministry is likely to take a view on it in the coming days.

The coming week is also likely to see some key green issues afflicting the mining industry being resolved - one way or the other - with the Supreme Court expected to decide the fate of Vedanta's bauxite mining in Odisha and the Karnataka iron ore mining case. The ministry is also expected to tackle the Goa iron ore mining cases.

The environment ministry had set up a committee on easing of norms for the real estate sector, roads and SEZs after strong pressure from industry lobbies as well as pressure from within the government to have a more "industry-friendly" green regime.

The committee had been asked to review the requirement of environmental clearance for highway expansion projects up to the right of way of 60 meters and length of 200 km and the need for linking width of roads and distance from fire stations with the height of multi-storey buildings. The panel was also tasked with assessing if these projects required a clearance from the central government at all or if they could take a nod from state authorities.

Changes in the norms for multi-storey buildings and the Goa mining cases are seen as important for those holding stakes in Maharashtra while the Karnataka mining case is bound to impact political as well as financial health of mining barons in the state which is slated for assembly elections in May.

The Vedanta case is keenly watched too with the UPA government at first coming down hard on the mining giant in Odisha for violating tribal rights under its flagship Forest Rights Act and other green laws but making a partial turnaround in the case before the Supreme Court. In a flip-flop, the government had recently cited religious reasons rather than specific clauses of the Forest Rights Act while defending its decision to block Vedanta's mining in Odisha.

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Antarctic summer ice melting 10 times faster: Study

SYDNEY:Summer ice in the Antarctic is melting 10 times quicker than it was 600 years ago, with the most rapid melt occurring in the last 50 years, a joint Australian-British study showed Monday.

A research team from the Australian National University and the British Antarctic Survey drilled a 364-metre (1,194 feet) long ice core from James Ross Island in the continent's north to measure past temperatures in the area.

Visible layers in the ice core indicated periods when summer snow on the ice cap thawed and then refroze.

By measuring the thickness of these melt layers, the scientists were able to examine how the history of melting compared with changes in temperature at the ice core site over the last 1,000 years.

"We found that the coolest conditions on the Antarctic peninsula and the lowest amount of summer melt occurred around 600 years ago," said lead author Nerilie Abram of the ANU Research School of Earth Sciences.

"At that time, temperatures were around 1.6 Celsius lower than those recorded in the late 20th century and the amount of annual snowfall that melted and refroze was about 0.5 percent.

"Today, we see almost 10 times as much of the annual snowfall melting each year.

"Whilst temperatures at this site increased gradually in phases over many hundreds of years, most of the intensification of melting has happened since the mid-20th century," she added.

The research, published in the journal Nature Geoscience, is only the second reconstruction of past ice melt on the Antarctic continent.

Abram said it helped scientists gain more accurate projections about the direct and indirect contribution of Antarctica's ice shelves and glaciers to global sea level rise.

"What it means is that the Antarctic peninsula has warmed to a level where even small increases in temperature can now lead to a big increase in summer ice melt," she said.

"This has important implications for ice instability and sea level rise in a warming climate."

Robert Mulvaney, from the British Antarctic Survey, led the ice core drilling expedition and co-authored the paper.

"Having a record of previous melt intensity for the peninsula is particularly important because of the glacier retreat and ice shelf loss we are now seeing in the area," he said.

"Summer ice melt is a key process that is thought to have weakened ice shelves along the Antarctic peninsula leading to a succession of dramatic collapses, as well as speeding up glacier ice loss across the region over the last 50 years."

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Feathered friends of India now homeward bound

SHIMLA: They still take the traditional Silk Route. Only, unlike ancient traders and travellers, they take wings.

The feathered guests that descend on various waterbodies across India with the onset of winter, after crossing national and international boundaries to avoid the extreme chill of their native habitats in Tibet, Central Asia, Russia and Siberia, are now set to make their annual return journey.

A migratory bird in the Kangra Valley's Pong wetlands in Himachal Pradesh, which was tagged with a global positioning system (GPS) transmitter last winter, has returned to its native China. A few other bird species are currently in lakes in Pakistan and Kyrgyzstan, after their winter sojourn in Pong's man-made wetlands, in the Himalayan foothills, about 250 km from state capital Shimla.

A few "holidaying" birds remain, though, in Pong.

"A pintail that was tagged with a satellite transmitter in Pong was recorded last week in China. Another bird of the same species has reached Kyrgyzstan," chief wildlife Warden AK Gulati told IANS.

He said the migratory routes of the birds stretched from India to China, with brief stopovers at key wetlands in the Himalayas and the trans-Himalayas.

The state wildlife department, in association with the Mumbai-based Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS), under a central government-aided project to track their migratory routes through satellite, tagged 14 migratory birds of different species for the third consecutive year in Pong.

BNHS assistant director S Balachandran, who installed the GPS chips on the birds and monitored their movements, said a common teal, tagged in Pong, was recently recorded in Pakistan.

Two birds - a greylag goose and a shoveller - were recorded in Srinagar and Harike in Punjab, respectively, this month.

"They might be on their return journey from Pong to their native habitats," he said.

Balachandran said a tagged common teal and a shoveller are still roosting in Pong.

"Some common teals and shovellers are still in Pong. They could start their return journey to their native habitats anytime now," he said.

Crossing national and international boundaries, millions of migratory birds of several species descend on various water bodies and wetlands in the region. They start returning by the end of February or the beginning of March.

In the last two years, the BNHS also installed metal bands and red and white neck collars with a serial number, place and date on more than 350 migratory birds in Pong.

The prominent species were the bar-headed geese, pintails, common teals, coots, cormorants, European lapwing, shovellers and wigeons.

Wildlife officials said a common teal that was ringed in Pong last year was shot dead in northeast Russia this year.

Around 123,000 waterfowl of 113 species were recorded in a census conducted by the wildlife wing in the first week of February at Pong Dam wildlife sanctuary spread over 307 sq km.

The largest influx was of the bar-headed goose, a regular visitor from Central Asia, including Tibet and Ladakh. Their number was around 34,000, wildlife officials said.

The other main species found were northern pintail (21,000), common pochard (12,000) and little cormorant (7,700), besides common coot, red-crested pochard, great cormorant, pintail duck, river tern and great-crested grebe.

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Secret population of rare orangutans discovered

NEW YORK: Researchers have discovered a population of 200 of the world's rarest orangutans hiding in the forests of Indonesia.

The previously unknown population was spotted by conservationists near the 140 square kilometres Batang park in the island of Borneo, according to the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS).

The International Union for Conservation of Nature has enlisted all the subspecies of Bornean orangutans as endangered, 'LiveScience' reported.

However, scientists have estimated that just 3,000 to 4,500 individuals are left in the subspecies known as Pongo pygmaeus pygmaeus, making them the most severely threatened.

Two-thousand of those live in the Malaysian state of Sarawak in Batang Ai National Park and Lanjak-Entimau Wildlife Sanctuary, researchers say.

As conservations with WCS and other groups surveyed the region in February this year, they found a total of 995 orangutan nests, including fresh nests that indicated the rare population was recently using the area, the report said.

Researchers studying fresh nests left by wild orangutans in Indonesia have, previously, found they are incredibly complex.

They have found that orangutans bend and interweave living branches about 3 centimetres wide to form the nest.

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Rhino killed in Kaziranga, horn chopped off

JORHAT: Kaziranga National Park lost another rhino to poachers on Friday. Poachers killed the rhino and chopped off its horn in the Agoratoli forest range of the park. Forest staff found the carcass at a place between Pahumari and Rongamotia anti-poaching camp in Agoratoli forest range.

Park officials said the rhino was killed by poachers a few days back. "We heard gunshots from the Pahumari anti-poaching camp area on Tuesday night. On hearing the sounds, a group of forest guards launched an operation, but the poachers managed to flee towards the hills of Karbi Anglong. No one has been arrested in the operation. Our staff also launched a search operation in the said areas, but no carcass was found on that night,'' said divisional forest officer (Kaziranga) Shil Sharma.

"We believe the rhino was killed on that night and poachers cut off its horn. But our staff failed to locate the animal on that night due to the darkness," he added. The incident occurred a few hours after the first test flight of the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) for better surveillance began in the park.

The state forest department had urged the Centre to provide an unmanned aircraft in Kaziranga National Park for better surveillance in the forest to check rhino poaching and accordingly, the first test flight for the unmanned aircraft was conducted in the park on Monday. The state government is now awaiting the Union defence ministry nod to use the facility. It will make Kaziranga the first national park in the country with an UAV system.

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Even animals indulge in self-medication

WASHINGTON: Animal pharmacists! The practice of self-medication in animal is lot more widespread than previously thought, according to new research.

Animals use medications to treat various ailments through both learned and innate behaviours, researchers said.

The fact that moths, ants and fruit flies are now known to self-medicate has profound implications for the ecology and evolution of animal hosts and their parasites, according to ecologist Mark Hunter from the University of Michigan.

Because plants remain the most promising source of future pharmaceuticals, studies of animal medication may lead the way in discovering new drugs to relieve human suffering, Hunter and two colleagues wrote in a review article to be published in the journal Science.

"When we watch animals foraging for food in nature, we now have to ask, are they visiting the grocery store or are they visiting the pharmacy?" Hunter, a professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and at the School of Natural Resources and Environment, said.

"We can learn a lot about how to treat parasites and disease by watching other animals," he said.

Much of the work in this field has focused on cases in which animals, such as baboons and woolly bear caterpillars, medicate themselves.

Hunter and his colleagues suggested that researchers in the field should "de-emphasise the 'self' in self-medication" and base their studies on a more inclusive framework.

"Perhaps the biggest surprise for us was that animals like fruit flies and butterflies can choose food for their offspring that minimizes the impacts of disease in the next generation.

"There are strong parallels with the emerging field of epigenetics in humans, where we now understand that dietary choices made by parents influence the long-term health of their children," Hunter said.

Researchers argued that animal medication has several major consequences on the ecology and evolution of host-parasite interactions. For one, when animal medication reduces the health of parasites, there should be observable effects on parasite transmission or virulence.

In addition, animal medication should affect the evolution of animal immune systems, according to Hunter and his colleagues. Honeybees are known to incorporate antimicrobial resins into their nests.

Analysis of the honeybee genome suggests that they lack many of the immune-system genes of other insects, raising the possibility that honeybees' use of medicine has been partly responsible - or has compensated - for a loss of other immune mechanisms.

Researchers also note that the study of animal medication will have direct relevance for human food production.

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Shanghai seizes 6,000 tonnes of foreign waste

SHANGHAI: A staggering 6,000 tonnes of waste tailings have been seized in China's Shanghai city during a crackdown on illegally imported garbage last month, officials said.

Officials have detected excessive amounts of arsenic and cadmium from the tailings, which could have caused contamination if processed by small refineries in China, Xinhua quoted Hu Licong, a customs official, as saying here Thursday.

The tailings, or the residue were imported mainly from countries in western Asia and eastern Europe.

Eight people have been detained for allegedly attempting to smuggle the tailings under fake documents that labelled them as metal ores, an official said.

Shanghai's customs also revealed to have intercepted 115 tonnes of waste tires, which China has banned from import over pollution concerns.

Chinese law on the control of solid waste bans imports that can not be used as raw materials or be recycled by harmless means.

High profits, however, have fuelled smuggling, which is often conducted by conspiring with overseas organizations.

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Oxford Book Store to promote rhino conservation

NEW DELHI: To spread awareness about the conservation of one-horned rhinos and its habitat in Assam, Oxford Book Store has tied up with the World Wide Fund for Nature ( WWF).

They will enroll customers of the bookstore and Cha Bar in the cause of conservation by contributing a small fraction of their purchase to fund the One-Horned Rhino Conservation Project.

"We will reach out to individuals of the younger generation through books and programmes to make for a better natural environment," said Ravi Singh, secretary general, WWF-India.

The partnership was announced at an event held in the capital late Thursday.

Sixteen rhinos have been killed by poachers this year. The Assam government has ordered a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the killings.

"The newest outlet of Oxford Bookstore in Connaught Place has stocked wildlife and environment conservation books and a green corner dedicated to WWF-India merchandise," Singh said.

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Pollution levels dipped since mining closure in Goa: Data

PANAJI: Pollution levels in the iron ore belts of Goa dropped considerably after mining activity was banned in September last, bringing them within the permissible limits, according to the data placed before the Legislative Assembly.

Citing the data measured till February, Environment Minister Alina Saldanha told the House yesterday that the pollution levels showed a downward trend.

The Supreme Court had imposed an interim ban on mining activity in Goa in September last on a petition filed by a local NGO pointing out illegal mining.

The Goa State Pollution Control Board (GSPCB) has been measuring the pollution levels in the mining belt at nine locations -- Curchorem, Honda, Codli, Assanora, Bicholim, Amona, Usgao, Sangume and Tilamol.

"Air is monitored through the presence of particulate matter of 10 microns diameter (PM10) and PM2.5," she said.

These particles are harmful as they can cause lung-related diseases.

The data tabled on the floor of the House reveals that the PM10 where in range of 77-80 micrograms per cubic metre, while the permissible limit is 100 micrograms per cubic metre.

The concentration of PM 2.5 in air stands between 15-40 micrograms per cubic metre, well within the permissible limit is 60 micrograms per cubic metre, Saldanha said.

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Industrial waste polluting Sundarbans ecosystem: Report

KOLKATA: Industries located along the Gangetic delta in Haldia, Kolkata and its outskirts are polluting the fragile ecosystem of Sundarbans, home to 40 lakh people and the Royal Bengal Tiger, a latest study says.

The research, conducted by a group of scientists from Calcutta University and Techno India University, says there has been a steady increase in the percentage of toxic heavy metals leading to the gradual deterioration of water there.

The scientists studied presence of zinc, copper and lead in the body of a shellfish species, commonly known as the Indian white shrimp, to assess the damage being done to the aqua-system.

Found abundantly in the water of Sundarbans, which has the largest mangrove forest in the world, Indian white shrimp is commercially important too.

"The low salinity and intense industrialisation in the Hooghly estuarine stretch is responsible for the high concentration of heavy metals in the shrimp muscle sampled from stations in and around the western side of Sundarbans," lead researcher and marine scientist, Dr Abhijit Mitra said.

In the study, heavy metals in the white shrimp's muscle exhibit a more or less similar order as that in water.

Interlinked by a complex network of tidal waterways and dotted with small islands of salt-tolerant mangrove forests, this biodiversity-rich world heritage site is famous as the last surviving coastal habitat of the Royal Bengal Tiger.

Though heavy metals such as copper, zinc and lead are normal constituents of marine and estuarine environments, additional quantities when introduced through industrial wastes or sewage enter the biogeochemical cycle and pose negative impact on the biotic community.

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More pollution means more air turbulence: Study

LONDON - Buckle up.

Researchers say that more pollution is likely to mean bumpier flights for trans-Atlantic travelers, explaining that models show increased turbulence over the north Atlantic as carbon dioxide levels rise.

University of East Anglia climate expert Manoj Joshi says that scientists have long studied the impact of the carbon-heavy aviation industry on climate change. Unusually, he said, "we looked at the effect of climate change on aviation."

In a paper published on Monday in Nature Climate Change Joshi and his University of Reading colleague Paul Williams ran a climate simulation which cranked up the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to twice its pre-industrial level.

What they found was a 10 to 40 percent increase in the median strength of turbulence over the North Atlantic in winter months.

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Germany to give India euro 1 bn loan for green energy development

BERLIN: Germany will provide India a soft loan of euro 1 billion (Rs 71 billion) for strengthening the transmission system of renewable energy in several states, a top official said on Wednesday.

The loan will be used for developing a " renewable energy corridor", the official added.

"We are hopeful of signing the agreement tomorrow (Thursday)," said Renewable Energy Minister Farooq Abdullah.

Abdullah, who is part of a delegation led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that arrrived here Wednesday on a three-day visit, said the deal would be signed after the second round of inter-governmental consultations between the two countries here Thursday.

Officials said cooperation in green energy would be one of the focus areas of discussion when the prime minister meets German Chancellor Angela Markel Thursday.

The two countries are also likely sign a joint declaration of intent for cooperation in green energy.

According to new and renewable energy secretary Ratan P. Watal, an investment of around Rs.40,000 crore ($7.5 billion) is required for strengthening the transmission system of green energy in India over the next four years.

"We aim to create 30,000 MW of additional capacity in renewable energy sector during the 12th Plan period (2012-17)," Watal, who is also part of the high-level delegation, told IANS.

This will require an investment of over Rs.200,000 crore (around $37 billion).

Watal said the states that will benefit from the German financial assistance include Gujarat, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh.

The money will be used largely by Power Grid Corporation for creating new transmission system and strengthening the existing one.

"The loan will be guaranteed by the government and it will have low interest rate of 2-3 percent," Watal said.

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India use drones to protect rhinos from poachers

GUWAHATI: Wildlife authorities are using aerial drones to oversee a sprawling natural game park in Assam to protect the one-horned rhinoceros from armed poachers.

Security officers conducted flights of the unmanned aircraft over the Kaziranga National Park on Monday and will fly drones at regular intervals to prevent rampant poaching in the park in the remote area of Assam.

The drones are equipped with cameras and will be monitored by security guards, who find it difficult to guard the whole 480-square kilometer reserve.

"Regular operations of the unmanned aerial vehicles will begin once we get the nod of the Indian defense ministry," said Rokybul Hussain, the state's forest and environment minister.

The drones will also be useful during the annual monsoon season when large areas in the Kaziranga reserve are flooded by the mighty Brahmaputra River and three other rivers that flow through the game park, park officials said.

Hussain said the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) will soon begin investigations into the steep rise in rhino poaching this year.

Poachers armed with automatic rifles killed 22 rhinos last year, but have killed 16 rhinos already this year.

Rhino horn is in great demand in China and Southeast Asia where it is believed to have medicinal properties.

A rhino census conducted in Kaziranga reserve two weeks ago put their number at 2,329, up from 2,290 in 2012.

In recent weeks, wildlife authorities in Assam have deployed 300 armed guards to protect the rhinos in Kaziranga but they have been no match for organized gangs of poachers who have been managing to strike at the rhinos with increasing regularity.

"What worries us is the use of automatic weapons like Kalashnikovs by the poachers," said Assam police chief Jayanta Narayan Choudhury.

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Pakistan to be hardest hit by climate change: Dawn

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan will be amongst the countries hardest hit by climate change, said a leading daily, warning that a disaster of enormous proportions is silently evolving in the mountains up north.

An editorial in the Dawn on Tuesday said that away from the din of politics and the immediacy of militant strife, a disaster of enormous proportions is silently evolving in the Hindu Kush-Himalayan mountains up north, one that could in time impact the length and breadth of Pakistan.

"The peaks are home to some 15,000 glaciers which, as a result of rising temperatures, are retreating at an alarming rate of almost 40 to 60 metres a decade, leaving behind glacial lakes in their wake," it said.

The daily warned that 52 such lakes, an inherently unstable phenomenon that can trigger devastating flash floods, have been classified as dangerous to human settlements.

Parts of Gilgit-Baltistan and Chitral have already suffered floods on this count in 2010.

"The melting of the glaciers will also ultimately lead to a rise in sea levels, threatening coastal areas and cities such as Karachi," it said, while referring to a meeting to review the progress of a four-year project between the government and international organisations to deal with the fallout of climate change in Pakistan.

It stressed that by most estimates, "Pakistan will be one of the countries hardest hit by climate change".

"It is therefore encouraging that the government is taking steps such as setting up meteorological observatories at sites vulnerable to glacial lake outburst floods and the planned establishment of automated weather stations in the area which should lead to improved data collection, an essential requirement for a well-calibrated response."

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Lucknow zoo gets a pair of Asiatic lions from Rajkot zoo

LUCKNOW: Hir and Kuber joined the extended family of Lucknow Zoo on Sunday. The Asiatic lions were brought from Rajkot zoo via road in exchange of 40 animals from Lucknow Zoo. The two have been kept in the lion house at zoo. A team of Lucknow Zoo officers and staff had left for Rajkot on April 2. The lions reached Lucknow on Sunday. The two were brought on a truck.

The duo besides being young, are also genetically superior, as they are of pure bloodline. At present, Lucknow Zoo has two lions. The male lion Prince is almost 18-year-old and has lived its prime. Lioness Shubhangi is equally old. The two were brought to city from Chandigarh zoo in April 2003. They are hybrid lions - a cross between the Asiatic and African lions.

Given the law, which does not allow propagation of hybrids, zoo authorities never paired the male and the females. As a result, no cubs were born in the zoo and the number of lions remained stagnant. Hir and Kuber bring hope that population of Asiatic lions in zoo might increase. The two will not be crossed. However, in future, Lucknow zoo can cross them with lions at Kanpur zoo, which were brought from Hyderabad on Saturday.

Hir was born to Viral and Masti, a pair of Asiatic lions at Rajkot zoo in February 2008. It is five-year-old. Cub Kuber was born to Moj and Arjun, another pair of Asiatic lions at Rajkot zoo in October 2011. It is more than one-year-old. Hir is a fertile female and she has given birth to three cubs during her stay at Rajkot zoo.

In exchange, Rajkot zoo will be getting ghariyals, hyenas, palm civet cats, pelicans and several types of pheasants. "These animals will be sent to Rajkot," said zoo director Renu Singh. The minister of state for zoological gardens SP Yadav was also present on the occasion.

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Japan's Tepco may run out of space for radioactive water

TOKYO: Japan's Tokyo Electric Power Co said on Monday it does not have enough tank space should it need to move contaminated water from storage pits that started leaking over the weekend at its wrecked Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

Two years after the worst nuclear disaster in a quarter of a century, Tepco is struggling with breakdowns and glitches in its jerry-rigged cooling system to keep reactors and spent fuel pools in a safe state known as cold shutdown.

About 120,000 litres (32,000 gallons) of water contaminated with radiation leaked from two giant pits over the weekend. The cooling system has broken down twice over the past three weeks.

The utility does not have enough sturdy, above-ground tanks it is building to take the water from the pits, a Tepco general manager, Masayuki Ono, said at a news conference at the company's headquarters.

Tepco engineers have not decided whether to transfer the water to above-ground tanks, Ono said. The plant's seven storage pits are lined with water-proof sheets meant to keep the contaminated water from leaking into the soil.

An earthquake triggered tsunami waves that crashed into the power plant north of Tokyo on March 11, 2001, setting off a chain of events that caused three reactors to melt down and forcing 160,000 people to flee from their homes.

In the immediate aftermath of explosions at the plant, Tepco released some radioactive water into the sea nearby, prompting protests from neighbouring countries. Many nations put restrictions on imports of Japanese food after the disaster.

It was the worst nuclear accident since the Chernobyl disaster in 1986.

"It is extremely regrettable that incidents keep occurring at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant," chief cabinet secretary Yoshihide Suga told reporters. "The government has instructed Tepco to carry out a fundamental review of how it's dealing with the problems."

Tepco's president, Naomi Hirose, was summoned to the industry ministry to explain the leaks in the temporary storage pits and got a public dressing down from the minister, Toshimitsu Motegi.

Tepco said on Friday it lost the ability to cool radioactive fuel rods in one of the plant's reactors for about three hours, the second cooling system failure at the plant in three weeks.

Last month, a senior Tepco executive told Reuters in an interview that the company was struggling to stop groundwater flooding into the damaged reactor buildings and may take as long as four years to fix the problem.

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CBI takes up probe into rhino killings in Assam

GUWAHATI: The CBI has taken up investigation into the killings of rhinos in Assam, state Environment and Forest Minister Rockybul Hussain said on Sunday.

Union Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions has sent a communication in this regard to the state government yesterday, Hussain told media.

However, details of the number of cases taken up by the CBI and the time-frame for the investigation was yet to be known.

"We are awaiting further details. But we welcome the Centre's initiative," Hussain said.

"We had suggested that the CBI take up all cases up to three to five years old. However, as per their (CBI) proforma they take up investigation based on cases and FIRs filed," he said.

The minister said he had written to Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi on September 27, 2012, for a CBI inquiry into the killings of rhinos and it was forwarded to the chief secretary the same day. The state home department had then contacted the union government in this regard.

The state government had in recent months come under intense criticism from Opposition parties and civil society over spurt in incidences of poaching of rhinos in Kaziranga National Park and other wildlife sanctuaries.

In January, the CID has taken over the investigation of seven cases related to poaching of rhinos.

Kaziranga National Park has witnessed incidences of poaching since last year. Last year 25 rhinos were killed in KNP, while this year since January 20 have been poached.

In Manas, two rhinos were poached this year and one was killed last year at Orang.

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Tulips in full bloom, over 45,000 tourists visit garden

SRINAGAR: More than 45,000 tourists have visited the Asia's largest Tulip Garden here since it was thrown open to public 10 days ago.

"The response so far has been very good as over 45,000 tourists have visited the garden since it was opened on March 27," Javaid Ahmad Shah, the official looking after the garden, told PTI.

As tulips are expected to remain in full bloom till the third week of April, at least 50,000 more tourists are likely to visit the garden, he said.

School holidays are beginning soon across the country and there is an expectation of heavy influx of tourists in the coming days, an official of the tourism department said.

He said Tulip Garden has become a star attraction for tourists visiting Kashmir at this time of the year.

"The garden has helped in not only advancing the tourism season in the Valley but has also become an added attraction for them to stay longer," the official said.

This year the Floriculture department has outsourced the entry ticketing to the garden.

"A private company bagged the contract by quoting the highest price of Rs 52 lakh," an official of the department said.

Formerly known as Siraj Bagh, the Indira Gandhi Memorial Tulip Garden was opened in 2008 by the then chief minister Ghulam Nabi Azad who was the brain behind the garden.

Tulips of all types and colours embellish the 15-hectare garden in the foothills of Zabarwan range, the opening of which has preponed the tourist season in the Valley as people from across the globe flock to Kashmir to see the garden.

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Hand-reared rhino has a baby, a first for India

Forest officials in India have notched up a proud first. Nine years after she was rescued from the swirling flood waters of the Brahmaputra in Kaziranga national park, Ganga has become the first hand-reared one-horned rhino in the country to give birth to a calf.

The delivery took place in the wild in Manas national park. Bhaskar Choudhury, regional head, northeast India, IFAW-WTI (International Fund for Animal Welfare-Wildlife Trust of India), is feeling as proud as a new parent. "This is the most significant news for rhinos and their rehabilitation. The success of a rehab programme depends on the species producing their offspring. We are very happy," he says. IFAW-WTI runs a programme with the Assam forest department to bring rhinos back to Manas, which lost all its rhinos to poaching in 2000.

In July 2004, a badly injured Ganga, then four months old, was rescued from Kaziranga and brought to WTI's rehab centre. The calf was in shock after being separated from its mother. "The basic challenge was to make it survive after the mother could not be found," says Choudhury. Ganga was then gently hand-reared, bottle-fed and weaned for three years, before being gradually acclimatised to the wild in Manas -- her interaction with humans almost ceased, except for periodic medical assessments.

All those efforts have now borne fruition. On Friday, Ganga's three-day-old female calf was first sighted by wildlife experts around noon. "We have been observing them for the past few hours and the calf is suckling every few minutes. Ganga too has adopted the calf. These are good signs, as the chances of rejection by hand-reared rhino mothers are more, than by those in the wild," says Choudhury.

WTI started the rhino re-introduction programme in Manas in 2006. Overall, five hand-reared and radio-collared rhinos have been introduced in Manas so far. The calf's birth is a significant development for the country, which has only 2500 one-horned rhinos now. Manas has 23, and the rest are in Kaziranga. Last year, 20 rhinos were killed by poachers in Kaziranga and this year, 13 have been killed in the first three months alone. "Our biggest worry for the calf is that it will be orphaned if its mother is targeted by poachers," adds Chowdhury. He is hopeful that the two other hand-reared female rhinos in Manas would take cue from Ganga and add to the rhino numbers soon.

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Hand-reared rhino has a baby, a first for India

Forest officials in India have notched up a proud first. Nine years after she was rescued from the swirling flood waters of the Brahmaputra in Kaziranga national park, Ganga has become the first hand-reared one-horned rhino in the country to give birth to a calf.

The delivery took place in the wild in Manas national park. Bhaskar Choudhury, regional head, northeast India, IFAW-WTI (International Fund for Animal Welfare-Wildlife Trust of India), is feeling as proud as a new parent. "This is the most significant news for rhinos and their rehabilitation. The success of a rehab programme depends on the species producing their offspring. We are very happy," he says. IFAW-WTI runs a programme with the Assam forest department to bring rhinos back to Manas, which lost all its rhinos to poaching in 2000.

In July 2004, a badly injured Ganga, then four months old, was rescued from Kaziranga and brought to WTI's rehab centre. The calf was in shock after being separated from its mother. "The basic challenge was to make it survive after the mother could not be found," says Choudhury. Ganga was then gently hand-reared, bottle-fed and weaned for three years, before being gradually acclimatised to the wild in Manas -- her interaction with humans almost ceased, except for periodic medical assessments.

All those efforts have now borne fruition. On Friday, Ganga's three-day-old female calf was first sighted by wildlife experts around noon. "We have been observing them for the past few hours and the calf is suckling every few minutes. Ganga too has adopted the calf. These are good signs, as the chances of rejection by hand-reared rhino mothers are more, than by those in the wild," says Choudhury.

WTI started the rhino re-introduction programme in Manas in 2006. Overall, five hand-reared and radio-collared rhinos have been introduced in Manas so far. The calf's birth is a significant development for the country, which has only 2500 one-horned rhinos now. Manas has 23, and the rest are in Kaziranga. Last year, 20 rhinos were killed by poachers in Kaziranga and this year, 13 have been killed in the first three months alone. "Our biggest worry for the calf is that it will be orphaned if its mother is targeted by poachers," adds Chowdhury. He is hopeful that the two other hand-reared female rhinos in Manas would take cue from Ganga and add to the rhino numbers soon.

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​9 chinkaras beaten to death near Barmer

JAISALMER: In a bizarre incident near Barmer, as many as nine chinkaras were literally beaten to death by poachers who left their bodies stuffed in gunny bags and fled. The chinkara or the Indian gazelle is the state animal of Rajasthan and is an endangered species.

Barmer district forest officer S R Yadav said the incident took place at the Baytu Pokaran mega highway, 45km from Baytu. Villagers from Samau Padamsingh village informed officials about bodies of chinkaras lying in nine gunny bags. When Yadav examined the bodies of the chinkaras he found injury marks on their heads.

Yadav said that prima facie it appears that on Tuesday night a group of chinkaras were passing from the area when poachers blinded them with bright light and they froze in their spots. The poachers then surrounded the frightened deer and rained blows on them with sticks and batons. Yadav said there were no bullet marks on the bodies of the chinkaras, only signs of physical injury on their heads.

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'Organic farming to usher in green revolution'

AMRITSAR: Laying stress on educating farmers to make right use of fertilizers and chemicals, Rajya Sabha MP and an acclaimed scientist, Professor MS Swaminathan said the wave of 'organic farming' will usher in the 'ever-green revolution' in country.

He said environmental issues confronting agriculture were serious but adopting the organic and controlled-fertilizers-use would end the woes. Professor Swaminathan was in the holy city on Thursday.

Talking to TOI the former head of National Commission on Farmers and Indian Council of Agriculture Research (ICAR), Professor Swamnathan also appealed to the younger generation to adopt agriculture as a vocation. "The country needs young farmers, men and women both. They are more ready to adopt new technology and modern methods of farming", he said. "There are environmental and marketing issues confronting Punjab's agriculture today. There are issues of farmers' debts and need for diversification and crop rotation", he said adding that more and more farmers must adopt organic farming and the government must help the farming community to get rid of the challenges of marketing.

He however, said Punjab had been and would always be the leader in grain production and the hard working farmers from here will continue feeding the country. The head of Punjab Farmers Commission Dr GS Kalkat who was accompanying Swaminathan cited cultural and behavioural patterns confronting farmers. He said the focus had always been on Agriculture but the time had come when emphasis should be laid on economic prosperity of farmers also.

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Shellfish species disappears near Japan's crippled n-plant

IANS Apr 2, 2013, 12.29PM IST

(File photo of the unit 1 reactor…)

TOKYO: A species of shellfish "Thais clavigera" has disappeared in a 30-km coastal area near Japan's crippled Fukushima nuclear plant, Japanese experts said.

Researchers from Japan's National Institute for Environmental Studies and National Institute of Radiological Sciences conducted the study in April 2012 on the shellfish's living status in 43 places from Japan's Chiba to Iwate prefectures for four months, Xinhua reported.

The team found that the Thais clavigera was extinct in eight of 10 places within the 20-km-radius alert zone of the nuclear plant.

The plant was damaged by a tsunami in March 2011 and triggered the world's worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in 1986.

Other shellfish species such as Cellana grata were found in the alert zone but the amount of them declined. A high dose of radioactive materials were found inside their bodies, the researchers said.

Thais clavigera, a kind of shellfish that widely lives across Japan, was found in most places that had been surveyed, including 25 of 33 places outside the alert zone, they said.

Toshihiro Horiguchi, the head of the team, said it was a rare occurrence that Thais clavigera entirely disappeared from a 30-km long area, adding that the extinction was probably caused by the nuclear crisis.

The link between the disappearance and the catastrophic tsunami was excluded as the shell was also found in other areas that affected by the disaster, the team said.

The report was announced in an annual meeting of the Japanese Society of Fisheries Science.

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Shellfish species disappears near Japan's crippled n-plant

TOKYO: A species of shellfish "Thais clavigera" has disappeared in a 30-km coastal area near Japan's crippled Fukushima nuclear plant, Japanese experts said.

Researchers from Japan's National Institute for Environmental Studies and National Institute of Radiological Sciences conducted the study in April 2012 on the shellfish's living status in 43 places from Japan's Chiba to Iwate prefectures for four months, Xinhua reported.

The team found that the Thais clavigera was extinct in eight of 10 places within the 20-km-radius alert zone of the nuclear plant.

The plant was damaged by a tsunami in March 2011 and triggered the world's worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in 1986.

Other shellfish species such as Cellana grata were found in the alert zone but the amount of them declined. A high dose of radioactive materials were found inside their bodies, the researchers said.

Thais clavigera, a kind of shellfish that widely lives across Japan, was found in most places that had been surveyed, including 25 of 33 places outside the alert zone, they said.

Toshihiro Horiguchi, the head of the team, said it was a rare occurrence that Thais clavigera entirely disappeared from a 30-km long area, adding that the extinction was probably caused by the nuclear crisis.

The link between the disappearance and the catastrophic tsunami was excluded as the shell was also found in other areas that affected by the disaster, the team said.

The report was announced in an annual meeting of the Japanese Society of Fisheries Science.

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Air pollution linked to 1.2 million premature deaths in China

BEIJING: Outdoor air pollution contributed to 1.2 million premature deaths in China in 2010, nearly 40 per cent of the global total, according to a new summary of data from a scientific study on leading causes of death worldwide.

Figured another way, the researchers said, China's toll from pollution was the loss of 25 million healthy years of life from the population.

The data on which the analysis is based was first presented in the ambitious 2010 Global Burden of Disease Study, which was published in December in The Lancet, a British medical journal. The authors decided to break out numbers for specific countries and present the findings at international conferences. The China statistics were offered at a forum in Beijing on Sunday.

"We have been rolling out the India- and China-specific numbers, as they speak more directly to national leaders than regional numbers," said Robert O'Keefe, the vice president of the Health Effects Institute, a research organization that is helping to present the study. The organization is partly financed by the United States Environmental Protection Agency and the global motor vehicle industry.

What the researchers called "ambient particulate matter pollution" was the fourth-leading risk factor for deaths in China in 2010, behind dietary risks, high blood pressure and smoking. Air pollution ranked seventh on the worldwide list of risk factors, contributing to 3.2 million deaths in 2010.

By comparison with China, India, which also has densely populated cities grappling with similar levels of pollution, had 620,000 premature deaths in 2010 because of outdoor air pollution, the study found. That was deemed to be the sixth most common killer in South Asia.

The study was led by an institute at the University of Washington and several partner universities and institutions, including the World Health Organization.

Calculations of premature deaths because of outdoor air pollution are politically threatening in the eyes of some Chinese officials. According to news reports, Chinese officials cut out sections of a 2007 report called "Cost of Pollution in China" that discussed premature deaths. The report's authors had concluded that 350,000 to 400,000 people die prematurely in China each year because of outdoor air pollution. The study was done by the World Bank in cooperation with the Chinese State Environmental Protection Administration, the precursor to the Ministry of Environmental Protection.

There have been other estimates of premature deaths because of air pollution. In 2011, the World Health Organization estimated that there were 1.3 million premature deaths in cities worldwide because of outdoor air pollution.

Last month, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, based in Paris, warned that "urban air pollution is set to become the top environmental cause of mortality worldwide by 2050, ahead of dirty water and lack of sanitation." It estimated that up to 3.6 million people could end up dying prematurely from air pollution each year, mostly in China and India.

There has been growing outrage in Chinese cities over what many say are untenable levels of air pollution. Cities across the north hit record levels in January, and official Chinese newspapers ran front-page articles on the surge — what some foreigners call the "airpocalypse" — despite earlier limits on such discussion by propaganda officials.

In February, the State Council, China's cabinet, announced a timeline for introducing new fuel standards, but state-owned oil and power companies are known to block or ignore environmental policies to save on costs.

A study released on Thursday said the growth rate of disclosure of pollution information in 113 Chinese cities had slowed. The groups doing the study, the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs, based in Beijing, and the Natural Resources Defense Council, based in Washington, said that "faced with the current situation of severe air, water and soil pollution, we must make changes to pollution source information disclosure so that information is no longer patchy, out of date and difficult to obtain."

Chinese officials have made some progress in disclosing crucial air pollution statistics. Official news reports have said 74 cities are now required to release data on levels of particulate matter 2.5 micrometers in diameter or smaller, which penetrate the body's tissues most deeply. For years, Chinese officials had been collecting the data but refusing to release it, until they came under pressure from Chinese who saw that the United States Embassy in Beijing was measuring the levels hourly and posting the data in a Twitter feed, @BeijingAir.

Last week, an official Chinese news report said the cost of environmental degradation in China was about $230 billion in 2010, or 3.5 per cent of the gross domestic product. The estimate, said to be partial, came from a research institute under the Ministry of Environmental Protection, and was three times the amount in 2004, in local currency terms. It was unclear to what extent those numbers took into account the costs of health care and premature deaths because of pollution.

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Deserted elephant calves being sent to Jaldapara

JHARGRAM: Two elephant calves who were deserted by their herd near here two months ago were on their way on Sunday to Jaldapara Wildlife Sanctuary in north Bengal for being trained.

Range officer, Jhargram range, Parthasarathy Tripathi said the two elephants, christened 'Raja' and 'Rani' by forest workers and lodged in the mini-zoo here after they were deserted by their herd, were being sent to the sanctuary in Jalpaiguri district.

"Veterinary doctors have examined both of them, who are two year olds. Their health parameters are normal," he said.

A mahout and forest workers had arrived from Jaldapara to escort the elephants in lorries, he said.

While 'Raja' was spotted by villagers at Fatikchua area under Kalaikunda forest range in Midnapore West district in January, 'Rani' was rescued by forest workers from Keshorrekhar area near Noygram in February, he said.

They were left behind by a herd of about 100 elephants who frequented the area from Dalma range in neighbouring Jharkhand.

They were kept in the Jhargram mini-zoo as it serves as a rescue centre, he said.

DFO Ashok Pratap Singh said the elephants were being sent to Jaldapara as Jhargram did not have the infrastructure for grooming pachyderms as 'kunki', specially trained to catch wild elephants.

The infrastructure was available only in Jaldapara and Gorumara National Park in West Bengal, he said.

After training, these two elephants would be used for forest patrolling and conducting elephant rides for tourists, he said.

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