Global Dev

Articles

Lake Chad Drying Up

Six out of nine planetary systems key to the survival of the human species are under threat. Is Earth still a safe operating space for human beings? And, a mega-engineering project to save an endangered African lake — on the drawing board, and very worrisome.


Planetary Boundaries Breached

Six out of nine planetary systems key to the survival of the human species have been compromised, breaching the estimated boundaries of Earth system stability and resilience and pushing it “well outside of the safe operating space for humanity.” The GPM spoke with Katherine Richardson, lead author of “Earth beyond six of nine planetary boundaries.”



The First 9-11

A year after the US Supreme Court banished abortion rights, millions of American women and girls face dire health and emotional health threats. Twenty two years after the Twin Towers’ destruction, we recall the first 9-11 — back in 1973. And, Palestine Panopticon. Israel’s vast carceral system for subjugated Palestinians.


Bosses Old & New

In West Africa, French colonialism officially ended in the 1960s. Six decades later, neocolonialism lives on. These days, America is the world’s preeminent imperial power and NATO its most powerful tool. In Cambodia, French colonists are long gone. Military chiefs and their rich clients rule the roost, much to the detriment of biodiverse ecosystems.



Poisonous Legacies

Uranium mining in Niger: a filthy, toxic business. Fifty years after the end of America’s war on Vietnam, traces of US chemical weapons linger. And, the Anthropocene. A geologist talks about humanity’s transformation of Planet Earth.






Palestinian Journalists Under Fire

Basel Adra is a 27-year-old Palestinian journalist from the village of Mufagara, in the Masafer Yatta region of the southern Palestinian West Bank. Basel is an accredited journalist with the Israeli publication +972. On July 15, while covering a Jewish settler attack on his village, Basel was detained by Israeli military forces. After several hours of abuse — bound and blindfolded under a hot sun — Basel was released.


Green Planet Monitor Podcast

Artificial Intelligence: existential threat to humanity, or just to basic civil rights? Personal DNA testing – you never know what you’ll find. And, Forever Chemicals in the blood of pregnant mums and their babies.


Green Planet Monitor Podcast

Nothing woolly-headed or Utopian about it: A universal, guaranteed basic income. A hundred years later, memories of war that do not fade. And, one of humanity’s great revolutions – the 1950s Great Acceleration has transformed Earth’s surface completely, hurtling our planet into an uncertain future.



Green Planet Monitor Podcast

Humanity’s impact on Planet Earth has a name: the Anthropocene. The start of Earth’s human age can be pinpointed in ice and biological cores, and the bottom sediments of bays and lakes — including a small lake in southern Ontario. But human beings have no control. And now we stand at catastrophe’s door.


Green Planet Monitor Podcast

Powerful new antibiotics discovered using artificial intelligence. Sitting in a restaurant, staring at a piece of fish — Is it really that expensive kind? Pull out your DNA barcode reader, and find out! And, sex and the brain; women’s and men’s are wired differently; men’s brains are sexualized before they’re born.




Green Planet Monitor Podcast

A US Supreme Court ruling throws American wetlands under the bus. In the oven, wheat and corn flour turn into bread and tortillas; spread on farm fields, rock flour reacts with carbon dioxide, turning into carbonates that get stored – forever. And, sharp questions off his tongue and a smartphone in hand, a Canadian activist ambushes politicians.