News Focus

The Dominican Republic's organic and Fairtrade boom has helped banana growers but what about the slum-dwelling Haitian migrant workers? Tom Levitt reports on the plight of the forgotten people in the banana trade

Tom Levitt speaks to one of China's most respected investigative journalists Liu Jianqiang on the rise of environmental activism in China

Lord Smith, chairman of the Environment Agency, joins the calls for a gas 'fracking' boom, saying it would provide 'energy security'

Pastoralism is in crisis across Africa. But it could yet survive as the best available defence against climate change and famine. Tom Levitt reports from southern Ethiopia

MoD under fire after DECC report finds number of sites contaminated with radioactive waste is far higher than previously estimated

How a seemingly jovial naked bike ride protest can bring key environmental issues like oil and car dependency to new audiences

Row over ‘unethical’ London 2012 sponsorship continues as campaigners target BP, Rio Tinto and Dow Chemicals

Can national parks and marine protected areas safeguard endangered wildlife against the growing pressures of population growth and climate change?

Worried by an eco backlash, the bottled water industry is waging a PR battle to turn the public back onto plastic bottled water

Although currently out-of-favour with the UK government, eco-towns may still offer the best hope for creating sustainable communities

The first study conducted in a natural environment has shown that systemic pesticides damage bees' ability to navigate

Government orders to use dangerous organophosphate chemicals left hundreds of sheep farmers with debilitating ill health, Tom Levitt reports on the UK's forgotten pesticide tragedy

UK opposition to restricting the use of pesticides in the 1990s and 00s has at times even seen the intervention of former Prime Minister Gordon Brown to lobby the case for the farming industry

Consumers could unwittingly buy rings or other jewellery linked to serious human rights abuses after Kimberley Process fails to prevent the sale of diamonds from Robert Mugabe's Marange diamond fields

Following allegations of defying India's Biological Diversity Act (BDA), Monsanto faces a lawsuit from the Indian government, reports Rosie Spinks

In the midst of a dire need to feed millions of people facing hunger because of drought, Kenya's newly passed Biosafety Act allows for the importation of GM crops - but at what cost?

David Cameron's appointment of a 'shops tsar', the controversial Localism Bill, and increasing opposition to supermarkets and other chain stores could mark a turning point in the struggle to save Britain's high streets

A ten-year campaign opposing a Shell gas pipeline in a remote cornor of Ireland is documented in a major new film - The Pipe - and has become a focal point for a community's right to oppose corporations and central government

The Export Credit Guarantee Department is accused of underwriting unethical and carbon-intensive business deals in developing countries and operating with a lack of transparency - charges it denies.