The actions we take now will determine whether the highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) H5N1 outbreak already affecting birds and mammals around the world takes hold in humans.
(AP Photo/Erin Hooley)
Our approach to combating pandemics must shift to one that prioritizes prevention of human infections with zoonotic viruses, rather than focusing on rapid response once human infection is widespread.
Smoke rises above a neighbourhood in the Sudanese city of Omdurman.
Shutterstock/Abd Almohimen Sayed
Frédéric Keck, Auteurs historiques The Conversation France
Italy has culled at least 40,000 animals in response to African swine fever, often in opposition to animal activists. The country could do well with exploring other solutions, starting with vaccines.
Fertilizer is a leading source of emissions of nitrous oxide, a planet-warming greenhouse gas.
pixdeluxe/E+ via Getty Images
The most comprehensive assessment yet of a powerful greenhouse gas shows which countries are driving the increase, and which ones are successfully cutting emissions.
A cauliflower crop bears the brunt of wet weather.
John Whitton
Severe weather and disease in Brazil’s main growing regions have led to a major global shortage. Australia does grow a lot of its own oranges, but still relies heavily on imported juice.
Harvesting avocados in Uruapan, in the Mexican state of Michoacan.
Ronaldo Schemidt/AFP via Getty Images
Avocados are marketed as a superfood, but growing them for an expanding world market has turned a rural Mexican state into an unsustainable monoculture.
We developed My Climate View to help Australian farmers and producers better understand the risks and opportunities they face over the next 50 years. Road-testing with farmers was vital.
Is the ban really a death knell for the Western Australian sheep industry, as is sometimes argued? Or just an inevitable step in a necessary transition?
Forest areas are in sharp decline in many parts of Ghana.
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Bree Hurst, Queensland University of Technology; Carol Richards, Queensland University of Technology; Hope Johnson, Queensland University of Technology, and Rudolf Messner, Queensland University of Technology
A Senate enquiry has found both suppliers and customers of our supermarkets are struggling. Regulators have to find a way to rebalance the market, which doesn’t make these groups bear the cost.
During the apartheid era, Transkei was one of several government-designated ‘homelands.’
Susan Winters Cook/ Getty Images
Klara Fischer, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
The South African government has failed to reverse the decline in smallholder farming that began during apartheid. A different approach is needed to support smallholder livelihoods.
A grower shows off his lush cassava garden.
Stephen Wooding
Cassava’s many assets would seem to make it the ideal crop, except for one drawback: It’s highly poisonous. Human ingenuity has made cassava edible for millennia.
Strong evidence suggests the risk associated with consuming milk contaminated with H5N1 influenza virus is minimal.
(AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
H5N1 influenza has been reported in dairy cows, and detected in milk. Here’s a look at what’s known about how pasteurization affects the virus and the safety of consuming H5N1-contaminated milk.
Managing Director, Triple Helix Consulting; Chief Executive Officer, Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research; Professorial Fellow, ANU Fenner School for the Environment and Society, Australian National University