‘China growth model cannot be universal’

Wen Teijun, dean of Renim University in Beijing, has been documenting the world's agrarian history and turmoils. He initiated the New Rural …

Save the Nu/Salween river

China's plan to build a series of dams over southeast Asia's second largest river has evoked a strong response from environmental, human rights …

Debate renewed on blame for global warming

THE 1990-91 edition of World Resources, brought out by the Washington-based World Resources Institute (WRI), concluded developing countries as a …

China's reforms

Land use in China is in for irretrievable change. At the Third Plenum of the 16th Party Congress, held October 11-14, 2003, the world's biggest …

India's Chandrayaan programme is "ambitious"

A moon rush is hotting up, with India, China and Japan devising substantial space exploration programmes to compete with the big players -- the …

'Censuses mean little'

A POPULATION expert sharply critical of India's achievements in curbing population growth. A demographer with scant respect for the census. A …

'Ministries play the blame game'

Jagdish Bahadur, an expert on glaciers and former joint advisor, department of science and technology, and Syed Iqbal Hasnain, who heads the …

Fig leaf for the business world

That is what the Montreal Protocol, meant to do away with ozone depleting substances, has become. India's phase out programme under the protocol …

The precarious geopolitics of phosphorous

Both nitrogen and phosphorous are essential to life. Lynchpins both to global food production, circulating through synthesis or export and then …

Linkage between science and public policy has weakened

M S Swaminathan, popularly known as the father of India’s Green Revolution, has been associated with national agricultural research system (…

Cancun clinches deal—for polluters

Cancun has restored the sanctity of multilateral negotiations under the UN climate convention. People had lost faith in it by the end of the …

Treasure in troubled land

International aid has supported the economy of Afghanistan for 12 years. With aid flow gradually declining, the war-torn country will now have to …

Clash of the cyberworlds

In an increasingly digital world, the issue of Internet freedom and governance has become hugely contested. Censorship and denial of access occur …

Battle for the Internet

As the Internet becomes the public square and the marketplace of our world, it is increasingly becoming a contested terrain. Its potential for …

Long yarn

The cotton story is a tangled tale. In many parts of India, farmers are committing suicide. It's been a while Andhra Pradesh, Punjab and now …

Science under siege

Agricultural science has ossified in India. Despite a vast network of public research institutions and agriculture universities across the country,…

Time-out

The 17th Conference of Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change met in Durban in December 2011. Negotiations were heated and …

Sunshine sector loses sheen

About 40 kilometres from Delhi, in the bustling real estate market of Noida-Greater Noida, lies the biggest irony that the renewable energy …

Future compromised

The Earth Summit was a historical opportunity to set the world on the correct development trajectory. Negotiators from 191 countries came …

Desperate for gas

Gas is the cleanest of fossil fuels and also more efficient and cheaper to use. Yet, in India, there has been no policy focus on this fuel, …

Kudankulam meltdown

The spectre of Fukushima continues to haunt the world, forcing governments in most parts of the globe to rethink their plans to tap this …

Can China’s dynamic zero-COVID policy survive in the face of citizen protests, infectious variants?

China is recording more than 70,000 COVID-19 cases daily, a pandemic high for the country  

China's 'Silk Road urbanism' is changing cities from London to Kampala – can locals keep control?

China’s ambition to reshape the world economy has sparked massive infrastructure projects spanning all the way from Western Europe to East …

Why China’s shrinking population is a big deal — counting the social, economic and political costs of an aging, smaller society

By 2040, around a quarter of the Chinese population is predicted to be over the age of 65

NASA images show flood water spilling from Yangtze river dams

Water was seen moving through the gates of the Three Gorges Dam to the smaller Gezhouba Dam, around 26 kilometres southeast