La veille

Humankind is revealed as simultaneously insignificant and utterly dominant in the grand scheme of life on Earth by a groundbreaking new assessment of all life on the planet. The world’s 7.6 billion people represent just 0.01% of all living things, according to the study. Yet since the dawn of civilisation, humanity has caused the loss of 83% of all wild mammals and half of plants, while livestock kept by humans abounds.

Proposals for coordinated climate action at the global level all too easily run into free-rider and fairness problems, leaving many of the most popular policy proposals dead on arrival. But a simple framework that gives all countries similar incentives would overcome these problems.

Major airlines have claimed in recent years that they can offset emissions by supporting forest conservation projects, yet a new investigation reveals that the systems used are deeply flawed. One of the main offset accreditors, Verra, whose ‘avoided’ deforestation scheme is criticised in the investigation for lacking credibility