Deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest rose to the worst level of deforestation since 2008, heaping further pressure on the environmental policy of President Jair Bolsonaro who favors developing the Amazon region economically.

According to a recent Swiss National Bank’s assessment, the threat posed by climate change to Switzerland’s economic and financial stability appears to be moderate at present. These risks and the assessment of associated exposure could change, however.

There is a booming sector selling solar water heaters and panels imported from India and China in Yemen. Many areas need pumps to bring drinking and irrigation water to the surface and fuel shortages have also made water hard to come by.

Chronic smokers who switched from tobacco cigarettes to e-cigarette vapes in a large randomised control trial saw a significant improvement in markers of heart health after just a month, a study at Britain’s Dundee University states.

Zimbabwe’s industries are beginning to turn to solar panels and battery storage systems to keep business humming during lengthy power cuts. But the switch has faced a range of obstacles, from the still substantial price tag to theft of the batteries.

Highly toxic chemicals, posing dire risks to human health, have been found in dangerous concentrations in free-range chicken eggs in Indonesian communities where plastic waste accumulates. Plastic scrap is entering Indonesia through recycling imports, primarily from Australia, Canada, Ireland, Italy, New Zealand, UK, and the US.

Medicins Sans Frontiers is using GIS mapping technology and a mobile phone app as key tools to combat the virus and plan their work. The technology allows health workers to identify dengue hotspots and direct prevention and awareness-raising campaigns to the most-affected areas.

The EIB, the biggest multilateral lender in the world, will stop funding fossil fuel projects at the end of 2021. The policy raises new risks for the gas industry, aiming to provide a cleaner alternative to coal and oil.

IBM said on Thursday it will launch a new weather forecasting system which will be able to predict conditions up to 12 hours in advance and cover parts of the world which have not had access to such detailed data.

China’s emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide from its energy sector are expected to increase this year and next, driven by rising oil and gas consumption instead of by coal, a team of industry experts warned.