Volcanic Ash images

The outflow of volcanic ash has had a devastating effect on the local islanders, trying to sustain a normal life at the base of an erupting volcano.

An Icelandic farmer dressed in protection gear to try and ensure the safety of his livestock.

National Geographic photography team filming close-up shots of the volcano.

Taiwan Farmers Potty Train their Pigs to Reduce Pollution

Farmers in southern Taiwan have started to potty-train their pigs in response to a planned water pollution fee, breeders and officials said Monday.
To keep their livestock from defecating into nearby rivers, a growing number of farms have established special "toilets" smeared with faeces and urine to attract the pigs -- and farmers say the results have been very encouraging.

"The pig toilets on my farm help me collect about 95 percent of all pig waste, making cleaning much, much easier," Chang Chung-tou, a pig farmer in Yunlin county, told AFP.

The Environmental Protection Administration, which will introduce a new fee on water pollution in the middle of 2010, plans to encourage other pig breeders to begin potty training.

"Apart from Yunlin, we have launched trial pig toilets in Changhua county (in central Taiwan). We are evaluating the results," an official from the administration said.

Taiwan has a total of about six million pigs, most of them raised on farms in the centre and the south.

One in five complaints about water pollution received by the administration is about waste from livestock farms.

Finland leads UN food body helping farmers fight climate change

The programme will also for the first time "create a global database on current and projected greenhouse gas emissions in land and agriculture for the most important agricultural commodities, countries and regions."

The Food and Agriculture Organisation is to promote the potential for agriculture in the developing world to lower greenhouse gas emissions, the UN body said on Tuesday.

"Finland is the first country to contribute to a 60 million dollar FAO programme to support climate change mitigation in agriculture in developing countries," the Rome-based body said in a statement.

"The multi-donor programme aims to promote sustainable low-emission agriculture in developing countries over the coming five years, in partnership with countries and other relevant organisations," the FAO said.

Agriculture accounts for 14 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions and is in a position to make a significant contribution to reducing emissions, particularly in developing nations, the FAO said.

"Many suitable technologies and farming practices to sequester carbon in smallholder agriculture already exist," said FAO Assistant Director-General Alexander Mueller.

"These include practices used in conservation and organic agriculture, based on no/low tillage, utilising residues for composting or mulching, use of perennial crops to cover soil, re-seeding or improving grazing management on grasslands and agroforestry, which combines crops and trees."

The programme will also for the first time "create a global database on current and projected greenhouse gas emissions in land and agriculture for the most important agricultural commodities, countries and regions."

The FAO said last week that while farming could offer a cost-effective way of cutting greenhouse emissions, it had been "largely excluded" from the current UN climate summit in Copenhagen.

Brazilian Farmers cynically bulldoze UNESCO tribal reserve

A group of Brazilian ranchers is bulldozing a UNESCO reserve inhabited by an indigenous Indian tribe with no prior contact with the outside world, an native rights group said Monday.

Survival International said the UNESCO bioreserve in Paraguay's Chaco region is home to the only uncontacted indigenous tribe in South America outside of the Amazon -- the Ayoreo-Totobiegosode.

"The Totobiegosode's land is being destroyed as we speak," said Stephen Corry, director of Survival International.

"Given that their land falls within a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, we hope that UNESCO can play a part in stopping this destruction and pressing for the recognition of their land rights."

The group says a Paraguayan government representative and two relatives of the tribe attempted to enter the region, but were barred by employees of the ranchers' company, Yaguarete Pore S.A.

Survival International said the reserve was intended to protect both the Indian group but also species including the jaguar, "an irony given that a Spanish language translation of that word, yaguarete, is the name of the company bulldozing the reserve."

Satellite photos show that thousands of hectares of the reserve have been destroyed, even though the company has had its license to operate there withdrawn by the Paraguayan government, Survival International said.

UNESCO biospheres are designated under the United Nation's agency's "Man and Biosphere Program," and are intended to promote conservation and sustainable development.

There are over 500 designated sites in over 100 countries, according to UNESCO. The Chaco region in Paraguay was designated in 2005.

Botswana: In conflict with success of Elephants

The landlocked southern African country has more than 150,000 elephants, a conservation success story that means the animals increasingly come into conflict with the growing human population.

Tourists love to watch herds of elephants trekking across Botswana's famed Okavango Delta, but nearby farmers watch in dismay when the animals trample their crops, leaving them little to eat. Now those farmers have a new, safe weapon to keep elephants at bay: chilli peppers.

Planted around crops, infused into cloth, even made into chilli-dung bombs -- Botswana's farmers are trying myriad uses of tabasco peppers whose potent smell repels elephants from their fields.

Government-sponsored training on how to use the chillis to best effect wrapped up last week, and farmers say they're optimistic the peppers will cut down on their crop losses as they begin planting this month.

"We are hopeful that this time around we will have better harvest unless if a natural disaster strikes," said Kgagiso Moruti, a 44-year-old villager from Eretshe village in the Okavango district.

"The problem has been the elephants, but now that we have been trained on how to deal with them, we have no doubt that we will reap what we sowed."

The landlocked southern African country has more than 150,000 elephants, a conservation success story that means the animals increasingly come into conflict with the growing human population.

"We have trained villagers in all methods of using chilli peppers to ward off elephants, which have always been a headache to them, especially when it comes to damaging crops," Gaseitsiwe Masunga, chief wildlife biologist for northern Botswana, told AFP.

Masunga said the chillis are best planted around the perimeter of maize and sorghum crops, acting as a buffer. If elephants wander in, the smell of the chillis crushed under their feet will drive them away.

Chillis can also be mixed with oil and infused into mutton cloth, which is then hung on a fence along the boundary of the field.

More dramatically, the peppers can be ground, mixed with dung and molded into bricks that can then be ignited when dry. The smoke emitted from the smouldering dung blocks causes elephants to retreat.

"The interesting thing about this programme is that villagers will kill two birds with one stone, as the chilli pepper will also provide a source of income for the communities as after harvest some of it will be sold in both the local and international market," Masunga said.

Another farmer, 38-year-old Tapelo Tawana, said if the programme works, his family should have enough food as well as some disposable income from the chilli crop.

"We would use the much-needed cash for the upkeep of our families," he said.

Similar schemes have paid off in Namibia and Zambia, where small farmers face similar threats from marauding elephants, said Conservation International programme cordinator Anna Songhurst.

"It worked in these countries and there is no way it can fail in Botswana as long as villagers follow what they were taught," she said.