22-Jul-2018: Odisha police launches drive to bust pangolin smuggling racket
A special unit of the Odisha Police has launched a drive to bust an international syndicate that peddles "endangered" pangolin, one of the world's most illegally traded mammals.
Odisha Director General of Police (DGP) R P Sharma said that, a process has been initiated to crack the international pangolin smuggling racket, possibly with the help of the Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT). MLAT is an agreement between nations to exchange information or provide legal assistance for enforcing laws.
An organised international network smuggles pangolin for its scales. As the members of the network also operate from neighbouring countries such as Myanmar, an effort is being made to get hold of them by exploring the MLAT provisions. The matter is being forwarded to the Ministry of Home Affairs, which could then approach the Myanmar government for necessary assistance.
The move to bust the global racket has gained pace after six persons, who were involved in smuggling pangolin scales from Odisha, West Bengal and Mizoram to Myanmar and China, were arrested earlier this year. The key players in India have been arrested, while those operating from China and Myanmar are yet to be nabbed.
The STF is planning to approach the Interpol to bust the international network of pangolin smuggling, for which adequate preparations are being made at present. Stressing that pangolin poaching is rampant in districts like Kandhamal, Nayagarh, Ganjam, Kalahandi, Boudh and Rayagada, the "main consumer" of Pangolin scales happens to be China, where they have a huge demand for medicinal purposes. It seems that illegal pangolin trade has grown considerably in Odisha over the years. The animal scales are usually smuggled by road and trains to China via north-eastern states.
The Ganjam-Nayagarh-Kandhamal belt of Odisha has become a hub of illegal pangolin trade in the recent years. During monsoons, teams of smugglers from outside visit the area to procure scales of the animal.
3-May-2018: First organised census of Indus Dolphins begins in Punjab.
Punjab government and WWF-India together are conducting a first organised census of Indus Dolphins. Found only in India and Pakistan, the Indus Dolphins are confined to only 185 km stretch between Talwara and Harike Barrage in India's Beas river in Punjab.
Officials from the Department of Forests and Wildlife Preservation, Punjab and WWF-India are currently working in two teams and will estimate their population over the five-day exercise. It is the first organised census to establish their near accurate population as to plan their conservation accordingly.
Dolphins are a key indicator of a river health. The most flourishing population of the Indus dolphin, Platanista gangetica minor, is found across Pakistan where their numbers are estimated around 1,800 over a stretch of 1,500 km of the Indus river. In India, a tiny population survives in this small stretch of Beas river. Experts say they were also found in Sutlej decades back, however, river pollution is believed to be a major cause of their extinction from the habitat.
According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), construction of critical barrage is associated with the large-scale decline in the area of occupancy, "which have not ceased". IUCN suspects the population size of the Indus river dolphins has reduced by more than 50 per cent since 1944.
A blind species that communicates through echo like a Bat does, Indus dolphins are one of the seven freshwater dolphins found across the world.
30-Apr-2018: Australia pledges half a billion to restore great barrier reef
Australia pledged Aus. $500 million ($379 million) in new funding to restore and protect the great barrier reef on Sunday.
The World Heritage listed site, which attracts millions of tourists, is reeling from significant bouts of coral bleaching due to warming sea temperatures linked to climate change. It is also under threat from the coral eating crown of thorns starfish, which has proliferated due to pollution and agricultural runoff. The predator starfish feeds on corals by spreading its stomach over them and using digestive enzymes to liquefy tissue.
The reef is a critical national asset, contributing Aus$6.4 billion a year to the Australian economy. Canberra has previously committed more than Aus$2 billion to protect the site over the next decade, but has been criticized for backing a huge coal project by Indian mining giant Adani nearby.
With its heavy use of coalfired power and relatively small population, Australia is considered one of the world’s worst per capita greenhouse gas polluters. Canberra insists it is taking strong action to address the global threat of climate change, having set an ambitious target to reduce emissions by 26 to 28% from 2005 levels by 2030. Part of the money will be used to mitigate the impacts of climate change. Conservationists said while the funding was “an important step”, the biggest threat to the reef was global warming and not enough was being done to combat it by embracing clean energy.
22-Jan-2018: Predatory starfish devours the Great Barrier Reef
A multimillion-dollar campaign to stop the predatory crown-of-thorns starfish devouring the Great Barrier Reef was announced by the Australian government in a push to preserve the World Heritage-listed ecosystem.
The coral-eating starfish are naturally occurring but have proliferated due to pollution and agricultural run-off at the struggling reef.
Their impact has been profound—a major study of the 2,300-kilometre (1,400-mile) long reef's health in 2012 showed coral cover has halved over the past 27 years, with 42 percent of the damage attributed to the pest.
Aud$60 million (US$48 million) would go into the new drive, with just over half to be spent on incentives for farmers to prevent agricultural pollutants from running into the reef. Funds will also go towards increasing the number of patrol vessels and divers targeting the starfish.
The reef is also reeling from significant coral bleaching due to warming sea temperatures linked to climate change.
Canberra in 2015 narrowly avoided UNESCO putting the site on its endangered list, and has committed more than Aus$2.0 billion to preserve it over the next decade.
It has been criticized for backing a huge US$16 billion coal project by Indian mining giant Adani near the reef, which environmentalists warned would harm the natural wonder.