CleanBiz.Asia Staff

A good deal of secrecy is still prevalent in how natural resources are managed by countries in the Asia Pacific region, according to the Resource Governance Index released by the Revenue Watch Institute. The Index measures transparency and accountability in the oil, gas and mining industries in 58 countries worldwide, including 12 in Asia-Pacific where these industries play an important role. While none of the Apac dozen made it into the top “Satisfactory” segment, India, Timor-Leste and Indonesia made up the top three in the “Partial” segment. The Philippines and Mongolia were a little further back, but nonetheless showing progress toward a well-governed and accountable resource sector.

In the wake of last month’s Rana Plaza disaster some of the world's top clothing retailers – including PVH, Tchibo, H&M, Inditex (which owns the Zara chain), Marks & Spencer, Primark and Tesco – have signed up to a legally binding agreement to help finance fire safety and building improvements in the factories they use in Bangladesh. The official death toll from the collapse of the factory build now stands at 1,127, with 2,438 people injured – many seriously - and another 98 still listed as missing. This makes it the world's worst industrial accident since the Bhopal disaster in India in 1984.

According to reports emanating from Montreal, ahead of a three-day symposium on Aviation and Climate Change being held by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the civil aviation industry is edging toward embracing a mandatory scheme for offsetting its greenhouse gas emissions. ICAO, a United Nations body, has been tasked with developing a global plan to manage aviation emissions in time for its triennial assembly in September.

Burma's first solar power plant - a 210-MW project which its developer claims will be the world’s third largest – is to be built within the next 21-months to provide a much-needed boost to the country’s electricity generating capacity. The developer, Thailand’s Green Earth Power (GEP), has signed a memorandum of understanding with Myanmar's Ministry of Electric Power for what will be the country's first solar power plant, with a total project cost of USD275 million. GEP president and chairman Paul Bernard Yang said the company would sign the power purchase agreement (PPA) with the Ministry of Electric Power within the next 90 days.

Using disposable polystyrene tableware is now okay in China after the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) overturned a 14-year ban earlier this week, much to the dismay of environmentalists and community groups. The ban was imposed by the now defunct State Economic and Trade Commission in 1999 due to environmental damage from its production and use. The NDRC now says disposable polystyrene tableware not only conforms to national food wrapping standards, but also can be recycled to make construction materials, paints and stationery.

A majority of the world’s largest companies are either failing to report their greenhouse gas emissions or doing so incorrectly according to a new study from the Environmental Investment Organisation (EIO), a UK-based climate change and finance think tank. Looking at carbon emission reports covering 2011 – the most recent year where a full set of data is available – the EIO found that only 37 percent of the world’s largest 800 companies are reporting complete data and correctly adopting the basic principles of greenhouse gas emissions reporting. Just 21 percent had their data externally verified.

A new report by Australia’s Climate Commission says that China is one of the world’s bright spots in global action to curb the effects of climate change. Though China remains the world’s biggest greenhouse gas emitter, the report, The Critical Decade: global action building on climate change,  found that in 2012 China reduced the carbon intensity of its economy more than expected and almost halved the rate of growth for electricity demand.

Asia Pacific has surpassed the rest of the world in its consumption of materials and will continue to dominate world material flows, according to a new UN Environment Programme (UNEP) report released today. The region’s trade balance indicates that the current rate of exploitation of its resource base is no longer sufficient to support the region’s fast-growing economies and changing lifestyles. From 1970-2008, consumption of construction minerals increased 13.4 times, metal ores and industrial minerals consumption 8.6, fossil fuels 5.4, and biomass 2.7 times.

The massive hydroelectric dam building program in Southwest China may have a causal link to the magnitude-7 earthquake that rocked Lushan, in China’s Sichuan province on Saturday, killing 179 and leaving thousands injured and homeless. The April 20 earthquake occurred along the same Longmenshan Fault Belt as the magnitude-8 tremor that killed more than 80,000 people in Sichuan five years ago. According to Fan Xiao, a geologist and chief engineer of the Regional Geological Survey Team of the Sichuan Geology and Mineral Bureau, the latest quake is likely to have been part of a stress adjustment process, making the region more dangerous after the Wenchuan quake.