(main photo: In this file photo a farmer holds a handful of soil parched because of drought in Tunisia's east-central area of Kairouan, on 20 October, 2021. AFP Photo)

Human activities are damaging and degrading the lands of the Earth in an unsustainable fashion according to a new United Nations (UN) report.

Up to 40 percent of the global terrain has already been devalued, mainly through modern agriculture.

The governor of North Bank Region has reiterated that Climate Change is and continues to be a major economic, social & environmental problem and therefore called for aggressive and integrated approach in building local capacities on climate resilience in a bid to reduce the negative impact and phenomenon on the livelihood of the local population. 

Situated on the southern edge of the Sahara Desert, Koulikoro, Mali is on the frontlines of a slow-moving environmental and humanitarian crisis. Extreme temperatures, extended periods of drought, and desertification are making it increasingly more difficult for farmers like Sitan Camara to make a living on their land.

Severe weather, rain and flooding are at the forefront of the minds of many South Africans, especially those in KwaZulu-Natal. Early last week (11-12 April 2022), the province’s coast received heavy rain, with some areas recording over 300mm in 24 hours. This is about a third of the annual rainfall in KwaZulu-Natal.

• Critics of the Indonesian government’s plan to build a new capital city in the coal-mining heartland of East Kalimantan province have long warned about the abandoned mining pits dotting the landscape.
• The government has now acknowledged that these will be a problem: it says it has identified 2,415 of these pits at the site of the new city, covering a combined area of 29,000 hectares (71,700 acres).
• It also says it’s been working to rehabilitate these decommissioned mines since 2021 — a revelation that has raised concerns that the public is paying

• Critics of a government plantation scheme have slammed the program following revelations that only a fraction of forest reserves cleared for plantations over the past decade have actually been replanted.
• An investigation by environmental news site Macaranga found that only 5% of the 77,331 hectares (191,089 acres) of forest reserves cleared in Pahang state for plantations between 2012 and 2020 were replanted.
• A Pahang state opposition lawmaker has called the program a “cover-up” for a logging scheme, while an environmental activist has criticized

As KwaZulu-Natal continues to count the cost of the floods that have ravaged the province, poor residents who have lost their homes are in desperate need of humanitarian assistance, said the shack dwellers’ movement Abahlali baseMjondolo.

“The number of people who have lost their lives has yet to be confirmed, but our members witnessed people, including at least two babies, being taken by the water and many people are missing,” said the organisation, which is active in KwaZulu-Natal’s informal settlements.

• On March 27, Nepali authorities evicted about 100 members of the Indigenous Chepang community living in Chitwan National Park and set fire to their huts.
• They allege the community members are encroaching on national park land, famous for its rhinos and tigers, and building new settlements despite warnings and resettlement plans rolled out by the government.
• However, community members say that only providing shelter, and not land for subsistence farming and their traditional livelihoods, does not solve the community’s problems.
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Main photo: Workers walk to work at an export processing zone early in the morning after crossing the Mongla river in Mongla, Bangladesh, March 3, 2022. This Bangladeshi town stands alone to offer new life to thousands of climate migrants. (AP Photo/Mahmud Hossain Opu)

In Bangladesh, the south west seaport town of Mongla is home to thousands of refugees. They are not fleeing war or another conflict. They are refugees from climate change.