Focussing on agriculture and agro-commodities Muhammad Zamir Since my stint as Permanent Representative to FAO, while being Ambassador to Italy, I have been involved in keeping track of the steady evolution that has been taking place in agricultural practices not only in Bangladesh in particular but also within the developing world in general.

Everyone seemed to have a Mark Tully story to share at the launch of Foreign Correspondent: Fifty Years of Reporting South Asia at The Ambassador Hotel on Tuesday evening. Foreign correspondents and local journalists came together to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Foreign Correspondents' Club. Initially known as the Foreign Correspondents Association, the FCC was founded in 1958, and has counted many eminent journalists and photographers such as David Orr, Mark Tully and Pablo Bartholomew among its members.

Farewell. T V Venkitachalam's leave-taking from National Herald as its editor-in-chief was such a scene that only a dying newspaper could offer. Behind the door with a faded bronze nameplate that announced his designation, Venkitachalam sat in his chamber with volumes of Encyclopedia Britannica, a huge portrait of a brooding Pandit Nehru, a telephone that occasionally rings, and an old typewriter going off colour.

After earning an Oscar and Nobel Prize, Al Gore knows that when he speaks, people listen. Now his voice is even louder. The Gore-led Alliance for Climate Protection, an all-out marketing blitz, launched on Monday with plans to "ignite' Americans into taking action on global climate change. "When people unite and call for action, change is inevitable,'

China's growing influence in Africa is inimical to democracy in the region, according to Reporters Without Borders. The Paris-based media watchdog's annual report notes that China must take part of

Polaroid, the company behind the instant camera, is to stop making the film used in its iconic technology. The firm will close its factories in Massachusetts in the us, Mexico and the Netherlands.

The Russian Federation is now a "superpower' of spam email. According to the multinational computer security firm Sophos, Russia is the second-most-prolific country after the us in producing junk

>> Arab countries have agreed to allow punishment of satellite channels deemed to have offended Arab leaders or national or religious symbols. At a meeting in Cairo called by Egypt and Saudi

The government of South Australia is planning to ban junk food advertising in children's viewing times. The province's Health Minister John Hill says the government will implement a voluntary ban