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High-strength mycelium-based bricks for sustainable construction

More than 200 children have been killed and 1,100 injured in Lebanon in the past two months, UNICEF has said, due to Israel's war on the country

Israeli attacks have killed at least 17,400 children in Gaza. That is one child killed every 30 minutes.

Among the documented children killed, there are at least:

• 710 babies below the age of one
• 1,793 toddlers (1-3 years old)
• 1,205 preschoolers (4-5 years old)
• 4,205 primary school children (6-12 years old)
• 3,442 high school children (13-17 years old)

In July 2011, the anti-Muslim neo-Nazi killed eight with a car bomb in Oslo and then gunned down 69, most of them teenagers, at a Labour Party youth camp on Utoeya island.

The woman at the center of France's mass rape trial gave her final statement in court on November 19. Her ex-husband and dozens of other men are accused of raping her while she was drugged.

Development banks sent $2.3 billion to industrial animal agriculture in 2023.

Recent data analysis conducted by a human rights advocacy organization found that nearly a dozen international finance institutions directed over $3 billion to animal agriculture in 2023. The majority of those funds — upwards of $2.27 billion — came from development banks and went towards projects that support factory farming, a practice that contributes to greenhouse gas emissions as well as biodiversity loss.

The researchers behind the analysis are calling on the development banks — which include the International Finance Corporation, or IFC, part of the World Bank — to scrutinize the climate and environmental impacts of the projects they fund, especially in light of the World Bank’s climate pledges. (...)

• A 2020 government decree that transferred administrative control of nonprotected forests in Sri Lanka to local governments has been formally revoked by the country’s new government.

• The move follows its overturning by the country’s Supreme Court, where environmental activists argued it could allow the release of these forests for development projects without proper environmental assessments.

• Known as “other state forests” (OSFs) or “residual forests,” they harbor high levels of biodiversity and serve as crucial connectivity or buffer zones that help reduce human-wildlife conflict.

• They could also play a key role in the government’s commitment to the 30×30 initiative of protecting 30% of land and sea area by 2030.

Environmental advocates understand the announcement as a reversal, calling it “absolutely devastating.”

The Biden administration has backtracked from supporting a cap on plastic production as part of the United Nations’ global plastics treaty.

This represents a reversal of what the same groups were told at a similar briefing held in August, when Biden administration representatives raised hopes that the U.S. would join countries like Norway, Peru, and the United Kingdom in supporting limits on plastic production.

Nearly 70 countries, along with scientists and environmental groups, support the latter. They say it’s futile to mop up plastic litter while more and more of it keeps getting made.

Agriculture delegates use influence to “distract” policymakers from genuine solutions needed to transform food and farming, say campaigners.

Overall, 204 agriculture delegates have accessed the talks this year,

Food sector lobbyists remain highly influential, travelling to Baku as part of country delegations from Brazil, Russia and Australia, among others. This year, nearly 40 percent of delegates travelled to the summit with country badges – which lent them privileged access to diplomatic negotiations, up from 30 percent at COP28, and just five percent at COP27.

“To witness present at COP29 JBS lobbyists, the world’s largest meat producer and a major culprit in Amazon deforestation, should be of great concern to all.”

Nestlé – which accessed the talks through the delegation of Switzerland – has emissions three times larger than those of its country host. It is also a member of lobby groups that have pushed back against environmental action, such as the European Dairy Association (EDA), (...)

Explore the discovery of a massive coral in the Solomon Islands, visible from space and teeming with marine life

Seven French designers and artists have worked with a mycelium-based biomaterial called Reishi to create products including folding screens, desks and lighting fixtures.

Mohawk Council of Kahnawake Chief Jeremiah Johnson has some ideas about the science of using mushrooms and fungi to break down toxic fuel spills or leaks, and he thinks they are about ready to see the light of day.