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BY MONICA DOBIE
BACTERIA in the digestive tracts of cows and other herbivores, that help break down the tough fibre in their diets, could be used as the base for a biological wood glue. Scientists from the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) in the United States have discovered that the microbes secrete a sticky outer coating that allows them to cling to a surface, similar to how cavity-causing bacteria adhere to teeth.…

BY MONICA DOBIE
MOVE over Harry Potter trading cards. Make way for deformed child victim of polio and newborn afflicted with tetanus trading cards. Yes folks, disease cards complete with gory, graphic pictures and interesting facts on the back are making the rounds in school playgrounds across the United States.…

Keith Nuthall
AS the European Union (EU) prepares to abolish its remaining restrictive import quotas for textile and clothing products, the latest European Commission statistics confirm that China is best placed to exploit this liberalisation. For 2003, China exported more textile products to the expanded EU, with 10.7% of imports.…

BY MARK ROWE
GIVEN the level of public concern over genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in what we drink and eat, most companies have chosen to tread warily around the issue and sought not to draw attention to it. In the Swedish town of Ystad, however, a small family brewery has adopted the opposite approach.…

Keith Nuthall
THE UNITED States has formally requested that a World Trade Organisation (WTO) disputes panel censure a 20 per cent tax imposed by Mexico on beverages and syrups that use sweeteners other than cane sugar, (and associated bookkeeping and reporting restrictions).…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THERE may be lies, damned lies and statistics, but no spin can conceal that a large proportion of international shipping and ports will not have complied with the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) security code by July 1, its implementation deadline.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) Council of Ministers has formally rejected an EU-US open skies deal that would deny European airlines the right of cabotage in the United States air travel market. Washington is currently refusing to offer this concession, valuable given the size of the US.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE NUMBER of people worldwide at risk from devastating floods will double from one billion today to two billion by 2050 without greater efforts to prevention and predict such disasters, United Nations University (UNU) specialists have claimed. In a first detailed policy statement from a new UNU environment and human security institute in Bonn, Germany, they point out floods currently annually inflict “up to 25,000 annual deaths, extensive homelessness, disaster-induced disease, crop and livestock damage and other serious harm” on over 520 million people.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
AN INTERNATIONAL meeting on ridding the world of PCBs has been staged in Geneva, Switzerland, linking aid donor governments with commercial firms with clean-up expertise and technologies. Coordinated by the United Nations Environment Programme, the meeting aimed to help fulfil the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants, which targets PCBs for elimination.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
LAWYERS acting for Saddam Hussein have failed to persuade the European Court of Human Rights to prevent the British government helping to hand him to the new Iraqi government, because it may decide to execute him. Despite the fact Mr Hussein’s regime oversaw many judicial executions, his legal team on Britain’s signing the European Convention on Human Rights – is committed to preserving “the right to life”.…