Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said on Sunday he would seek to convince world leaders gathering in Rome this week that ethanol is not to blame for global food inflation threatening millions with hunger. Brazil is the world's largest ethanol exporter and a pioneer in sugar-cane based biofuels, making it a target of critics who say ethanol is behind increases in world commodity prices.

- A bill going to the US Senate next week seeking deep cuts in US greenhouse gases by 2050 is a "first step" but not enough to avert damaging climate change, the head of the UN Climate Panel said on Friday. Rajendra Pachauri also said that even tougher plans by some other developed nations to rein in emissions were insufficient to head off some projected impacts of global warming, ranging from more heatwaves and droughts to rising seas.

Myanmar must stop forcing cyclone survivors to return to their shattered homes where they face more misery or even death, rights groups said on Saturday, as a US official accused the junta of being "deaf and dumb" to foreign aid pleas. The former Burma's junta started evicting destitute families from government-run cyclone relief centres on Friday, apparently fearing the 'tented villages' might become permanent. "It's unconscionable for Burma's generals to force cyclone victims back to their devastated homes," Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.

UN-led climate talks kick off on Monday in Germany with experts trying to forge a global warming pact facing a new challenge from critics who say climate change measures are partly to blame for higher food and energy prices. The meeting is the second of eight which aim to secure a global climate deal by the end of next year, to come into force after the first round of the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012. The Bonn talks focus on the "toolkit" of steps which can curb rising emissions of greenhouse gas such as carbon dioxide, which scientists say risk catastrophic climate change.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said on Sunday he would seek to convince world leaders gathering in Rome this week that ethanol is not to blame for global food inflation threatening millions with hunger. Brazil is the world's largest ethanol exporter and a pioneer in sugar-cane based biofuels, making it a target of critics who say ethanol is behind increases in world commodity prices.

A bill going to the US Senate next week seeking deep cuts in US greenhouse gases by 2050 is a "first step" but not enough to avert damaging climate change, the head of the UN Climate Panel said on Friday. Rajendra Pachauri also said that even tougher plans by some other developed nations to rein in emissions were insufficient to head off some projected impacts of global warming, ranging from more heatwaves and droughts to rising seas.

Investing in agriculture in Africa to solve food shortages is more important than just reacting to the continent's present food crisis, according to the leader of a U.N. food aid organization. "The real underlying problem is a long-term one; productivity growth in agriculture is going down," International Fund for Agricultural Development President Lennart Bage said in a Thursday interview with The Japan Times.

Myanmar's military government appeared Friday to be reasserting its authority over cyclone relief operations as aid officials said it was forcing survivors out of refugee camps and hindering the access it had promised foreign aid workers. A U.N. official said the junta was making cyclone survivors leave government refugee camps and "dumping' them near their devastated villages with virtually no aid supplies.

In anticipation of a global summit on the food crisis, the United Nations called on world leaders on Wednesday to agree to urgent measures to ease demand for grains and alleviate high food prices.

Mankind is causing 50 billion euros ($78 billion) of damage to the planet's land areas every year, making it imperative governments act to save plants and animals, a Deutsche Bank official told a UN conference. A study, presented to delegates from 191 countries in the UN's Convention on Biological Diversity on Thursday, said recent pressure on commodity and food prices highlighted the effects of the loss of biodiversity to society.