21 - 27 October is International Lead Poisoning Prevention Week - a call to action for individuals, civil society organizations, industry and governments to work together to ban lead paint.

Lead poisoning is preventable. Yet lead exposure accounts for 540 000 deaths and 13.9 million years lost to disability and death due to long-term effects on health, with the highest burden on developing regions.

Australia becomes the latest country to join the movement to turn the tide on plastic, as Melissa Price, the country’s minister of the Environment, announces that the country is joining the Clean Seas campaign.

Could fungi help us deal with our plastic addiction? Scientists at London’s Kew Botanical Gardens think so. The first ever State of the World’s Fungi, produced by Kew Gardens and a team of around 100 scientists from 18 countries, reports that fungi successfully degrades polyurethane in a matter of weeks.

The hum of moving garbage trucks and the squawks of scavenging birds at a sprawling landfill on the outskirts of Durban, South Africa, may seem to some like an unlikely location for a massively successful renewable energy project.

The Copernicus Sentinel-5P satellite, operational since early 2018, is starting to return high resolution maps of air polluting gases that are invisible to the human eye. Amongst the first images released by mission scientists were plumes of nitrogen dioxide flowing from power plants as well as traffic-choked cities in Europe.

Pakistani customs officers trained by UN Environment are responsible for a massive seizure of R-22 (also known as HCFC-22) refrigerant, a powerful ozone-depleting substance and greenhouse gas.

A new report draws on the climate change mitigation experiences of a number of countries to highlight “win-win” options for Ethiopia and Kenya.

The Nordic countries – Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden – have valuable experience in developing solutions that can reduce global greenhouse gas emissions and save money in the longer term.

The city of Hangzhou in eastern China was once described by the Italian explorer Marco Polo as the, “finest and most splendid city in the world”. Today it is once again on the map thanks to a range of initiatives to cut air pollution and increase the livability of the city.

In the crowded classroom, a music class is underway. The sounds of flutes and shakers, gradually becoming more synchronized with practice, fill the air. Teachers at the front laugh in approval as children dance and stomp their feet with such energy that the school’s tin roof begins to rattle.

“I spent the first 10 years of my life travelling in dogsled, fishing for food,” says Sheila Watt-Cloutier, an Inuk from Kuujjuaq, Nunavik, in Northern Quebec, Canada.