"Agriculture can do more than just focus on production," says Bob Watson, director of the International Assessment of Agricultural Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD), the project that he hopes will change agriculture forever when the final draft of its report is published on 15 April. "Farming can help supply clean water, it can help to protect biodiversity, and it should be managed in a way that manages our soils sustainably," says Watson, who used to be head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Most protected areas in the world are inhabited by people. Mexico is at the forefront of countries where local communities have direct ownership rights of their forests, with an estimated 56-80% of national forests directly owned by communities, within which extraction activities are regulated by Mexican environmental law.

Various schedules of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972 (henceforth WPA), dictate the level of legal protection given to species of Indian animals.

In impoverished Yunnan Province in southwestern China, a confrontation is brewing between economic growth and habitat preservation-and authorities are sending mixed signals about their intentions.

The Tibet

An innovative attempt to create a standard for certifying forestbased medicinal and aromatic plants (MAPs) by adapting global norms for national-level implementation.

The Apatani tribe lives in the Apatani valley in the lower Subansiri District of Arunachal Pradesh. The Apatanis are well known for their traditional rice and fish cultivation, their rich agro-biodiversity and the associated traditional knowledge that supports this agro-ecosystem.