Climate and Environment

The Chullpia community in Peru has developed floating solar panels to provide electricity for irrigation projects.
© UNDP Peru/Giulianna Camarena

After this year’s Climate Action Summit, what happens next?

12 October 2019
Global

People across the world need to embrace “fundamental change” in order to combat climate change and meet the target of restricting the increase in global temperatures to 1.5 degrees Celsius, Claudio Forner, from UN Climate Change in Bonn, told UN News in an interview that took place following the Climate Action Summit.

Plastic pollution is harmful to the Albatross bird. Many of them accidentally eat plastic and other marine debris floating in the ocean, mistaking it for food.
NOAA CREP

World Migratory Bird Day highlights deadly risks of plastic pollution

12 October 2019
Global

Saturday marks World Migratory Bird Day which, this year, is raising awareness about the serious threats that plastic pollution poses to bird life, with a call for urgent measures to end the problem. 

View of the mass destruction by Hurricane Dorian in Marsh Harbour, Abaco Island in the Bahamas. (11 September 2019)
UN Photo/Mark Garten

UN migration agency launches $10 million appeal to support hurricane recovery in The Bahamas

11 October 2019
Americas

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) has launched a $10 million appeal to assist The Bahamas as the country continues to recover from the devastation brought on by Hurricane Dorian just over a month ago.

A girl wearing her hijab in Iran (File).
UNICEF/Aslan Arfa

Friday’s Daily Brief: Day of the Girl Child, mayors lead on climate emergency, Turkey Syria offensive, new statelessness pledges, extremism in social media

11 October 2019
Global

Our top stories for Friday: Day of the Girl Child celebrated around the world; city mayors lead on climate fight; humanitarian alarm rising over Turkey’s Syria offensive; history’s made as countries step forward to tackle global statelessness; Burkina Faso violence forces 500,000 from their homes; 'white extremist’ use of social media in attacks must be curbed.

Lima, the capital of Peru, a South American megacity. (file)
World Bank/Franz Mahr

Climate emergency: City mayors are 'world's first responders', says UN chief

11 October 2019
Global

City bosses are “the world’s first responders to the climate emergency” UN chief António Guterres declared on Friday, at an international mayors’ summit in Copenhagen.

Floating city imagined by Oceanix
Screenshot from Oceanix

Monday’s Daily Brief: 'Waste to wealth' campaign, nuclear power and climate change, 'dangerous nationalism' a threat, Hammarskjöld latest

7 October 2019
Global

A recap of Monday’s stories:  New UN-Habitat campaign converts waste into wealth; refugee agency chief issues alert over  'dangerous nationalism',  UN warns against Syrian civilian displacement; Guterres renews call for full disclosure by States over 1961 Hammarskjöld plane crash; First-ever conference on nuclear power and climate change.

The Enrico Fermi nuclear generating Station near Monroe, Michigan, US.
NOAA/OAR/Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory

Ramp up nuclear power to beat climate change, says UN nuclear chief

7 October 2019
Global

Without significantly increasing the use of nuclear power worldwide, it will be difficult to achieve the goal of reducing harmful emissions and fighting climate change, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said on Monday.

Farmers in Fiji are expected to benefit from UN support to counter the effects of climate change. (file)
UNDP

UN commits to help Pacific island agriculture adapt and survive climate crisis

4 October 2019
Asia Pacific

The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) pledged on Friday to work hand in hand with the people of the Pacific to improve nutrition, and mitigate the worst effects of climate change, which pose an existential threat to many island nations across the region. 

UN Secretary-General António Guterres at the opening ceremony of the Climate Action Summit on 23 September 2019.
UN Photo/Cia Pak

Thursday's Daily Brief: UN chief remembers former Assembly President, Council on Africa's Great Lakes, FAO data shows stable food prices

3 October 2019
Global

A recap of Thursday's stories: Guterres addresses climate emergency in op-ed; UN envoy highlights 'golden opportunity' for Africa's Great Lakes region; FAO scales up banana crop protection against disease; Data shows September food prices held steady; Somalia Partnership Forum concludes.

 

Secretary-General António Guterres visits a school affected by Cyclone Idai in the Munhava neighborhood in Beira, Mozambique. (25 June 2019)
UN Photo/Eskinder Debebe

UN’s Guterres: Broad climate ‘movement’ has begun, but there’s a long way to go

3 October 2019
Global

When it comes to the climate emergency, “we have a long way to go. But the movement has begun,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres declared in a widely-distributed opinion piece on Thursday, reaffirming his concern over the threats posed by a warming world, unless more urgent action is taken.