Waitrose working to encourage sustainable food production
Scientists have taken a step forward in their efforts to tackle serious crop pests by reducing the sensitivity of biopesticides to sunlight Insect pests consume around a third of all the crops we grow, sometimes threatening food security. The main way of controlling these pests is by spraying chemical pesticides but these can be damaging […]
A passion for sustainable supply chains and the desire to do something useful, brought Becky Swinn to Lancaster University. Now her research project comparing the carbon footprint of British, Dutch and Kenyan cut flowers has won the prize for the Best Collaborative Project at the Lancaster Environment Centre. But, like many others, she wasn’t sure […]
Lancaster University is to strengthen its international links with strategic partners in Argentina through a new fellowship programme The university is to receive support through the new UUKi Rutherford Fund Strategic Partner Grant scheme, which is funded by the UK Department for Business Energy and international Strategy through the £118 million Rutherford Fund, which aims to attract global talent […]
Lightning may strike less often in future across the globe as the planet warms, a scientific study suggests. The research forecasts a 15% drop in the average number of lightning flashes worldwide by the turn of this century, if global temperatures are in the top range of forecasts.
A series of workshops is bringing together African researchers, businesses and policy makers to explore how knowledge exchange could help provide safe, sustainable water. Lancaster University staff delivered the first of five week-long Knowledge Exchange workshops, to initiate the start of the £7M RECIRCULATE project, supported by the UK Government’s Global Challenges Research Fund. RECIRCULATE aims to […]
Large-scale commercial trade of wild orchids is a pressing, but little-recognised conservation problem, according to researchers. Orchids are one of the largest families of flower plants in the world, and – on paper – they are among the most well protected. From edible orchid cake in Tanzania and ornamental orchids in Thailand and Brazil, to […]
Residents and workers in a major Pakistan city are exposed to harmful levels of pesticides, new research reveals. Scientists from Pakistan’s F Quaid-i-Azam University and Lancaster University have evaluated the organophosphate pesticide concentration in dust from farms and also from pesticide manufacturing plants in the megacity of Lahore.
The highest daily rainfall in 50 years didn’t stop members of the Lancaster Environment Centre’s new Sustainability Group putting their principles into practice The launch of the Group, which aims to support staff and students at the Lancaster Environment Centre to put sustainability into action, started indoors with presentations about the environmental and social impact […]
Researchers have quantified for the first time the long term threat to global drinking water posed by agricultural pollution trapped in the rocks beneath our feet. In a paper published in Nature Communications, researchers from the British Geological Survey (BGS) and Lancaster University show that vast quantities of nitrate are stored in the rocky layer between our soils and […]
Abandoned sugarcane plantations across the tropics could offer us a realistic, sustainable alternative to fossil fuels. Ethanol produced from sugarcane has been one of the most successful short-term strategies to date in decarbonising energy supply, particularly in Brazil where the sugarcane ethanol system results in just 14% of the CO2 emissions of petroleum. In 2012 Brazil […]
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