FREDDY DIAS outlines the threats climate change poses to Goa, and stresses the need for immediate action to counter it

IN 1985 Former United Nations Secretary General Boutros Boutros Ghali famously said that

A new global free trade accord could help fight climate change by making clean-energy products more widely available, the World Trade Organization and United Nations Environment Program said on Friday.

Bucking conventional thinking about the climate hazards of shipping products by air, land and sea, the two agencies argued that a new Doha Round pact would do more good than harm.

A new scientific study has warned that if use of 'super greenhouse gases', known as hydrofluorocarbons or HFCs, is not controlled it could contribute to global warming. According sources here on Wednesday, these findings were made by an international team of researchers.

Hydrocarbon (HC) refrigerants are a "natural" cooler widely used in domestic and commercial refrigerators all over the world, except in the U.S. and Canada. HC refrigerants produce less greenhouse gasses than hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) technology, but they aren't approved for the U.S. market - yet.

Boosting investments in the conservation, rehabilitation and management of the earth's forests, peat lands, soils and other key ecosystems could deliver significant cuts in greenhouse gas emissions and avoid even more being released to the atmosphere, said a new report by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).