Rabat (AFP) Feb 16, 2022 Morocco said Wednesday it will launch a nearly $1 billion aid programme to help its agriculture industry, which has been hit hard by a particularly acute drought in recent years. The emergency plan “aims to mitigate the effects of delay in rainfall, to alleviate the impact on agricultural activity and to provide assistance to the farmers and livestock breeders affected”, … Continue reading Morocco announces $1 billion drought relief plan

Sydney (AFP) Feb 16, 2022 Australia’s leading wine producer says sales to China have evaporated since Beijing imposed strict tariffs on Australian wine imports but buoyant demand elsewhere helped avert disaster. Treasury Wine Estates, the makers of Penfolds, on Tuesday posted a 7.5 percent year-on-year decline in net profit in the six months to December 31, citing China’s tariffs on Australian wine and the impact … Continue reading Australian wine giant shakes off China sales collapse

Vienna VA (SPX) Feb 11, 2022 Spire Global, Inc. (NYSE: SPIR), a leading global provider of space-based data, analytics, and space services, hasS announced that it has been awarded as part of Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) Delivery Order 4 of the contract issued by the National Oceanographic and Oceanic Administration (NOAA), for commercially available space-based radio occultation (RO) data for use in operathttp://dlvr.it/SK3dDg Continue reading Spire Global awarded NOAA contract to deliver satellite weather data

Paris (ESA) Feb 11, 2022 Hereford, which is the county seat of Deaf Smith County in Texas, is widely known for its agriculture industry. Known as the beef capital of the world owing to its large number of cattle fed, Hereford can be spotted in the centre-bottom of the image. The area is known for its semiarid climate, with heavy farming and ranching sustained by … Continue reading Earth from Space: Hereford, Texas

Kinshasa (AFP) Feb 15, 2022 Environmental group Greenpeace on Tuesday said the Democratic Republic of Congo has failed to respect a multi-million-dollar agreement signed with Britain last year to finance protecting its ecologically vital forests. The DRC and Britain approved funds worth $500 million as part of the Central African Forest Initiative (CAFI) two months ago in Glasgow, which hosted the COP26 climate changehttp://dlvr.it/SK3dDY Continue reading DR Congo flouting forest protection deal: Greenpeace

Singapore (SPX) Feb 15, 2022 Kacific Broadband Satellites and Farmer Charlie will bring affordable satellite-powered agricultural information and expertise to farmers in remote and isolated places across South East Asia and the Pacific. The companies have signed an MoU supporting sustainable development and agriculture in small holdings across the region. Kacific and Farmer Charlie will work together to deliver agricuhttp://dlvr.it/SK3dCB Continue reading Kacific and Farmer Charlie team up to boost agricultural output across Pacific

Raleigh NC (SPX) Feb 15, 2022 Researchers at North Carolina State University have developed an automated technique that uses satellite imagery to determine when swine waste lagoons were constructed, allowing researchers to determine the extent to which these facilities may have affected environmental quality. Swine waste lagoons are outdoor basins used to store liquid manure produced by swine farming operations.http://dlvr.it/SK3d7Q Continue reading Satellite imagery gives researchers timeline of when swine waste lagoons were built

Paris (AFP) Feb 14, 2022 The megadrought that has parched southwestern United States and parts of Mexico over the last two decades is the worst to hit the region in at least 1,200 years, researchers said Monday. Human-caused global heating accounts for more than 40 percent of the dry spell’s intensity, they reported in the journal Nature Climate Change. “The turn-of-the-21st-century drought would not be … Continue reading Climate-boosted drought in western US worst in 1,200 years

Tunis (AFP) Feb 14, 2022 Tunisia will return more than 280 containers of waste illegally imported from Italy in 2020, the north African country’s environment ministry said Monday. The containers were brought in by a Tunisian company that falsely claimed that the household waste – barred from import under Tunisia law – was in fact plastic scrap to be recycled. The importation had sparked widespread … Continue reading Tunisia to return illegally imported waste to Italy

Hong Kong (AFP) Feb 14, 2022 Hong Kong’s health facilities have been overloaded by an “onslaught” of Covid-19 infections, its leader said, even as authorities cling to a “zero-Covid” policy despite an unprecedented rise in cases fuelled by the Omicron variant. Authorities have adhered to mainland China’s policy of stamping out the smallest outbreak with mass quarantine, widespread tracking, and prolonged social distancihttp://dlvr.it/SJzbMC Continue reading Hong Kong leader says city ‘overwhelmed’ by Omicron wave