boats on Seine River
Land Use/Forests

Paris Olympic Torch Brightens UNESCO World Heritage Sites

PARIS, France, June 18, 2024 (ENS) – France is hosting the Summer Olympic Games for the first time in 100 years, and this year the Paris 2024 Olympic Torch Relay illuminates the wonders of Europe’s finest environments as it visits 30 protected UNESCO World Heritage natural and cultural sites. […]

sharks, sunset, Maldives
Latest News

EU Hosts Global Ocean Meetings, Sets Goals, Raises Billions

BARCELONA, Spain, May 5, 2024 (ENS) – The 2024 Ocean Decade Conference, held in Barcelona from April 10 to 12, attracted over 1,500 participants from 124 countries and thousands of online viewers. Under the theme “The Science We Need for the Ocean We Want,” this conference emerged as one of the largest-ever gatherings of the global oceanic community. […]

Rogun Dam construction
Latest News

River Protectors Warn Banks as to Central Asia’s Biggest Dam

OAKLAND, California, March 15, 2024 (ENS) – Monday was the 27th International Day of Action for Rivers, a day when all across the world rivers were cleaned, dams were protested, webinars and classes were taught, adventures were had, and ecosystems were protected by people across six continents with at least one thing in common – a shared love for the world’s rivers. […]

Black Sea grain ship inspectors
Food

Hungry Millions Held Hostage, Black Sea Grain Deal Collapses

ISTANBUL, Turkiye, July 23, 2023 (ENS) – Intensifying the food insecurity across much of Africa, the Russian government is weaponizing food in its war on Ukraine. Moscow pulled out of the Black Sea Grain deal last week and is now warning that any ships traveling to Ukraine’s Black Sea ports will be seen as potentially carrying military cargoes. […]

sunrise Uruguay
Latest News

Earth Commission: ‘Sick’ Planet Needs Safe and Just Treatment

STOCKHOLM, Sweden, May 31, 2023 (ENS) – Humans are taking “colossal risks with the future of civilization and everything that lives on Earth,” a new Earth Commission study published today in the journal “Nature” concludes. Forty researchers from across the globe delivered the first quantification of “safe and just Earth system boundaries” on both global and local levels… […]

Ijen geopark Indonesia
Land Use/Forests

UNESCO Designates 18 New Gorgeous Global Geoparks

PARIS, France, May 24, 2023 (ENS) – The United Nations is adding 18 new sites to its network of outstanding Geoparks, showcasing some of the most marvelous sites of natural beauty on the planet. The UNESCO Global Geopark designation was created in 2015 to recognize “geological heritage of international significance.” […]

Jabiru stork
At Risk

UN Petitioned to Save Pantanal Wetland Wildlife From Fires

PARIS, France, August 21, 2022 (ENS) – As this year’s fire season intensifies, wildfires in Brazil are jeopardizing the world’s largest tropical wetland, the Pantanal, and its rare and imperiled wildlife. Inhabited by 3,500 species of plants, 600 bird species, 150 mammals, 175 reptiles, 40 amphibians and 300 freshwater fish… […]

reef sharks
Latest News

State of the Oceans Alarms World Leaders

LISBON, Portugal, July 1, 2022 (ENS) – Heads of state, world leaders, and government officials wrapping up their week-long meeting in Lisbon at the UN Ocean Conference admitted to being “deeply alarmed by the global emergency facing the ocean.” Across the planet, coastal erosion, rising sea levels, warmer and more acidic waters, marine pollution, overexploitation of fish populations and a steep decline in marine biodiversity are getting worse… […]

RSS

Answering the Imperiled Ocean’s Silent Cries for Help

BREST, France, February 25, 2022 (ENS) – “Immense, restless and wild,” the ocean is beset by dangers, but solutions do exist and Europe is ready to lead the way to healthier seas, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told attendees at the high-level segment of the One Ocean Summit in Brest on February 11. […]

Latest News

Artificial Intelligence Ethics Approved by 193 Countries

PARIS, France, December 1, 2021 (ENS) – The first global agreement on the ethics of artificial intelligence, AI, was adopted Thursday by 193 countries. All the member states of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, UNESCO, adopted the historic agreement that defines the common values and principles needed to ensure the healthy development of AI. […]

RSS

Rare, Exceptional Places Chosen for World Heritage Status

PARIS, France, August 3, 2021 (ENS) – Sheltering endangered animals, birds and butterflies, giant trees, pristine waters – five natural sites are so precious to the world that they deserve the protection of World Heritage status, the UNESCO World Heritage Committee has decided. The five are now on the list, bringing the number of World Heritage natural sites to 218. […]

At Risk

Climate Puts Great Barrier Reef World Heritage ‘In Danger’

GLAND, Switzerland, June 24, 2021 (ENS) – The International Union for the Conservation of Nature, IUCN, the official advisor on nature to UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee, has recommended that the world’s largest reef, Australia’s Great Barrier Reef be placed on the List of World Heritage in Danger. […]

Air/Climate

Changing Climate Top Threat to Natural World Heritage

GLAND, Switzerland, February 17, 2021 (ENS) – Climate change is now the biggest threat to natural World Heritage sites with their incomparable landscapes, rare ecological processes, critical habitat and exceptional biodiversity, finds a new assessment by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, IUCN. […]

leopard
Land Use/Forests

Paradise Closing: Oil Drilling Begins in Okavango Delta

WINDHOEK, Namibia, February 1, 2021 (ENS) – The fate of one of Africa’s most valuable ecosystems will depend on results from wells being drilled deep into the bedrock beneath the Kalahari Desert of northern Namibia and Botswana in the hunt for a petroleum reservoir. If the search by Canadian oil and gas company ReconAfrica is successful, the region could be irrevocably transmogrified… […]