Carbon credits are emerging as a new market for developing Asian nations, reports Umesh Pandey in Singapore

As Asia starts to witness a rise in carbon trade, many markets are looking to start trading Certified Emission Reduction (CER) credits and Thailand is not being left behind.

Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, India, China (both in Shanghai and Beijing) are all reported considering opening exchanges for trading carbon credits.

Mumbai, July 20 MoU signed between Maharashtra Jeevan Pradhikaran and Singapore agency for water management

Water woes are likely to end at Ambernath as the Maharashtra Jeevan Pradhikaran (MJP), which supplies water to the town, is likely to start 24-hour water supply.

This comes into effect after the MJP signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Public Utility Board (PUB), the national water agency of Singapore, for urban water management.

The metro rail dream was revived once again for Ahmedabad on Wednesday, when a high-level delegation, led by Singapore minister of state for foreign affairs Balaji Sadasivan, told top Gujarat officials that it was interested in investing in the project in a big way. A senior state official, who participated in the meeting, told TOI: "The metro rapid transport system (MRTS) in Singapore is perhaps the best in the world. There is a need to clinch the opportunity.'

Singapore: Once there was a dirty bit of sea next to the world's busiest port here. Today it is an island where birds nest and people play, though the entire island is made of rubbish. You wouldn't know unless you were told. There's no sight or smell at Semakau landfill to indicate it is the last depository of Singapore's garbage. The corals and all the animals of the beach have been fooled too

In the global rush for resources, a tiny pink crustacean living in the seas around Antarctica is testing man's ability to manage one of the world's last great fisheries without damaging the environment. Krill, which grow to about 6 cm (2 inches), occur in vast schools and is the major source of food for whales, seals, penguins and sea birds. Without it, scientists say, the ecosystem in and around Antarctica could collapse.

Creeping out of their condo after dark carrying illicit bags of garbage was not part of the life Sarah Moser and her husband envisioned for themselves before moving to tropical Singapore. But with recycling in its infancy on the island, such nocturnal escapades have become normal for the two academics. Each week they dodge watchful security guards, barking dogs and suspicious neighbours to carry rubbish they cannot recycle at home to recycling bins far down the road.

It will be more greenery for Lalbagh Botanical Gardens as the horticulture department has embarked upon a special tree exchange programme, to add to the parks existing diversity on the lines of animal exchange plans undertaken by zoos of the country. Though the City's lung space is shrinking, the silver lining is that under this programme, the park will get over 3,000 trees from every nook and corner of the world. "We already have about 7,500 trees of 1,854 species. Now another 850 species will arrive,' Dr M Jagadish, Deputy Director, Lalbagh Botanical Gardens told Deccan Herald.

A Singapore-based company made a presentation on a 43-km elevated road around the city at Writers' Buildings on Tuesday. The proposed ring road will start and end on Strand Road. Transport minister Subhas Chakraborty, finance minister Asim Dasgupta and senior officials watched the presentation. "The company gave us a clear idea about its plans,' said Chakraborty. The Singapore firm and five other companies are conducting a feasibility study of the proposed road.

A new generation of drugs made from nature, from antibiotics to treatments for cancer, may be lost unless the world acts to stop biodiversity loss, according to a new book. These developments could come from chemicals made by frogs, bears and pine trees, but the authors of "Sustaining Life" warned that species loss from climate change and pollution would hit the future of medicine and the pharmaceutical industry.