Flooding often hits low-lying parts of Ethiopia between June and September, when heavy showers fall on dry regions.

"As the weather is too difficult for helicopters, we were unable to fly," local police commissioner Tsegay Muluneh told AFP news agency.

"We have dispatched more boats from the area and from the federal government with more personnel, medical teams, swimmers, divers and emergency food," he said.

Over the past two years flooding has afflicted several areas of eastern and southern Ethiopia, killing hundreds and displacing hundreds of thousands.

The flooding of the river and tributaries, which flow into Lake Turkana on Ethiopia's border with Kenya, also destroyed many homes and swept away hundreds of livestock.

Warnings

Weather forecasters say heavier than usual rains are expected in the coming weeks across much of Ethiopia.

Officials have issued a fresh warning for people living near the Awash River, which is some 300 km (190 miles) east of Addis Ababa, and which flooded earlier this month.

The authorities in Dire Dawa in the east have banned the rebuilding of settlements on the river banks and declared the areas a disaster zone.

There are 256 confirmed deaths from last week's flooding, but some 250 people are still missing and 10,000 were displaced.

The UN's World Food Programme is distributing relief supplies there. "The extensive flooding was a cruel blow for already vulnerable people, many of whom have now lost everything, including their families," WFP's acting country representative Ebenezer Ngowi said in a statement.

Critical zone sites include an extraordinary diversity of soils and ecosystems ranging from the tropics to the poles, from deserts to wetlands, and from rock-bound uplands to delta sediments.

"Because the critical zone includes air, water and soil and is the focal point of food production, it has a major effect on human life," Sparks said. "It is imperative that we better understand the interactions that occur there."

The report calls for an international Critical Zone Exploration Network, as well as a systematic approach across a broad array of sciences--including geology, soil science, biology, ecology, chemistry, geochemistry, geomorphology and hydrology--to study critical-zone processes.

"We need to understand how living organisms interact with the solid earth at the scale of a billionth-of-a-meter as well as the scale of landscapes, how these effects have changed over geologic time, and how they will change into the future as humans continue to drastically alter the earth's surface," said Sue Brantley, a Penn State University geoscientist who co-chaired the workshop.

Scientists need to determine "how the physical, chemical and biological components of Earth's weathering transforms mineral and organic matter, sculpts terrestrial landscapes, and controls the exchange of greenhouse gases and dust with the global atmosphere," said Enriqueta Barrera, program director in the National Science Foundation's Division of Earth Sciences, which funded the workshop that led to the report.

Scientists believe four key questions surround activity of the atmosphere, landforms, ecosystems and water.

+ What processes control fluxes of carbon, particulate and reactive gases in the atmosphere?

+ How do variations in, and changes to, chemical and physical weathering processes impact the critical zone?

+ How do weathering processes nourish ecosystems?

+ How do biogeochemical processes govern long-term sustainability of water and soil resources?

Funding for the critical zone workshop and associated activities was provided by grants from NSF's Division of Earth Sciences to the University of Delaware and Penn State, and by the NSF Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR) program in Delaware.

The ministry said another 415 people had been reported missing during the period.

Typhoons, eight of which have struck since May, were the main killer, accounting for 1,045 dead or missing, followed by floods and landslides with 758, the ministry said.

The previous highest death toll for the same period was 1,556 in 2003, the government said. Last year the death toll over that time was 1,328, with 1,376 lives lost during that particular period in 2000.

The data, which confirms a report on this year's death toll published by the nation's Red Cross Society last week, did not provide figures for years before 2000.

The data from the civil affairs ministry also did not take into account the lives lost from Typhoon Saomai, which struck on Thursday last week and killed at least 255 people, according to the latest official figures on Monday.

This would bring the official death toll to well over 1,900.

Government officials have said that this year's typhoon season started about a month earlier than usual, with the storms fiercer and more frequent than usual partly due to the impact of global warming.

"Against the backdrop of global warming, more and more strong and unusual climatic and atmospheric events are taking place," the head of the China Meteorological Administration, Qin Dahe, said recently.

"The strength of typhoons is increasing, the destructiveness of typhoons that have made landfall is greater."

It said the quake struck 188 km southwest of Ambon in Indonesia's Moluccas. The MGA official said the quake could be felt in Ambon.

There was no immediate tsunami warning posted on the Pacific
Tsunami Warning Center's Web site (www.prh.noaa.gov/ptwc)

Earthquakes occur frequently near Indonesia, which lies on a seismically active stretch of the Pacific basin known as the "Pacific Ring of Fire."

In May this year, a strong earthquake also hit the city of Yogyakarta in Java killing at least 5,000 and a tsunami after a quake on July 17 off the south coast of Java killed at least 600.

A 9.15 magnitude earthquake on December 26, 2004 in the sea off the Aceh province triggered a tsunami in the Indian Ocean that killed more than 220,000 people in the region.

There are more than a billion overweight people in the world and 800 million who are undernourished, he said at the Gold Coast convention centre near Brisbane. The world population is estimated at about 6.5 billion.

"Obesity is the norm globally and undernutrition, while still important in a few countries and in targeted populations in many others, is no longer the dominant disease."

The "burden of obesity", with its related illnesses, was also shifting from the rich to the poor, not only in urban but in rural areas around the world, he said.

China typified the changes, with a major shift in diet from cereals to animal products and vegetable oils accompanied by a decline in physical work, more motorised transport and more television viewing.

But all countries had failed to address the obesity "boom", the University of North Carolina professor said.

Food prices could be used to manipulate people's diets and tilt them towards healthier options, he suggested.

"For instance, if we charge money for every calorie of soft drink and fruit drink that was consumed, people would consume less of it.

"If we subsidise fruit and vegetable production, people would consume more of it and we would have a healthier diet."

University of Minnesota professor Benjamin Senauer used a comparative study of lifestyles in the United States and Japan to show how the costs of food and transport play a role in the problem.

Japan has one of the world's lowest rates of obesity and the US one of the highest.

"The average Japanese household spends almost a quarter of its income on food compared to under 14 percent in the US," Senauer said.

While a direct tax on food in the US to reduce obesity would not be politically acceptable, agricultural subsidies which resulted in cheap food could be reduced.

But other factors such as exercise also played an important role and again economic influences were involved, he said.

"Japanese cities are based on efficient public transport -- and walking. The average American commutes to work, drives to the supermarket and does as little walking as possible."

The average Japanese man walks four miles (6.4 kilometres) a day while almost a quarter of US adults may only walk between 1,000 and 3,000 steps a day, Senauer said.

While the relative cost of calories and fat had decreased over time, technology had eliminated much of the need for physical activity during work.

For most Americans, getting enough physical activity now required a conscious commitment to exercise and often cost money, such as the price of a round of golf or membership of a gym."

"Obesity and overweight bring with them significant risks of chronic disease and premature death and adjusting domestic policy to encourage a less sedentary lifestyle is literally a matter of life and death," he told the conference.

The bureau's monitoring station in Yichang City, Hubei Province, home to the Three Gorges Reservoir, the world's largest hydro-power project, said the local hydrological figure set a new low record.

River navigation authorities have reinforced patrols and assistance operations along the waterway, warnings vessels against running aground.

Flood control experts say that the river's flood season will end in a month. Despite the current drought, summer or even autumn flooding is still a possibility.

Weather forecasts offer little hope of rainfall in the next few days in the upper and middle reaches of the river, including Sichuan, Hubei provinces and Chongqing Municipality, where farming is suffering from the blistering drought.

Southwest China's Chongqing Municipality is suffering the worst drought of the past 50 years. Water supplies for nearly 7.5 million people have been threatened, local authorities said Monday.

To date, more than 19 million mu (1.3 million hectares) of cropland have been affected and more than 6.8 million head of livestock are facing temporary water shortages, according to a spokesman with the Chongqing Municipal Disaster Relief Office.

"Two thirds of the communities and townships in the municipality have reported water supply difficulties," he said.

The drought has caused direct economic losses of about 2.5 billion yuan (312.5 million U.S. dollars), including nearly 1.8 billion yuan (225 million U.S. dollars) in the agricultural sector, he said.

The drought struck Chongqing in early July, 10 to 15 days earlier than in past years. But in total the dry spell has lasted for more than 50 days in most areas in the municipality, and 70 days in some, the spokesman said.

Since July, there have been 13 to 24 high temperature days in most parts of Chongqing, with maximum temperatures of 38 to 40 degrees Celsius, he said.

Prolonged high temperatures and scarce rain have dried out two thirds of the rivers in the municipality, said a spokesman with Chongqing Waterway Bureau.

In neighboring Sichuan Province, the drought has made it difficult for more than 3 million people and 4 million livestock to access drinking water. Meanwhile, nearly 21 million mu (1.4 million hectares) of cropland have been affected, or 39 percent ofthe total in the drought-hit areas.

The drought has caused direct economic losses of more than 7 billion yuan (8.75 billion U.S, dollars), according to the provincial disaster relief office.

"Sichuan is suffering its worst drought since 1972," said ZhangShilin, director of the office responsible for artificially influencing weather.

In a bid to relieve the drought, Sichuan will trigger artificial rain in 12 cities, including the provincial capital of Chengdu, if weather conditions permit, Zhang said.

Local governments in the drought-affected areas have allocated funds to help residents tap ground water and improve water conservation facilities.

Government departments concerned have been asked to make daily reports on the drought situation.

A central Philippine island province declared a "state of calamity" following what authorities called the country's worst spill.

Faced with a potential "environmental catastrophe," the Philippine coast guard called for a national mobilization of resources to mitigate the impact of the large amount of leaking fuel, "which is now considered as the biggest major oil spill that has hit our country."

The Japanese tanker Bright Artemis spilled the oil following a collision Monday with the Amar, a smaller cargo ship, Mitsui O.S.K. Lines said in a statement. It said the accident took place when the tanker maneuvered near the Amar, which was in distress about 300 miles west of India's Nicobar islands.

The exact amount of the spill was not clear, the announcement said. The tanker was carrying about 77.6 million gallons, or 250,000 tons, of crude. It had left port in Oman bound for Japan.

There were no reports of injuries aboard the tanker, which had a Croatian captain and crew of 23, or the Amar, which was registered in Singapore.

Mitsui said the spill had been reported to Singaporean and Indian Coast Guard officials.

The largest oil spill involving a U.S. vessel occurred when the Exxon Valdez oil tanker emptied 11 million gallons of crude oil into Prince William Sound off the coast of Alaska in 1989, killing hundreds of thousands of birds and marine animals and soiling more than 1,200 miles of rocky beach.

The South Australian Research and Development Institute (SARDI) said Tuesday its search for "Australia's ugliest merino lambs" may hold the key to securing the nation's A$2.8 billion (US$2.1 billion) wool industry.

The institute said ugly lambs -- with uneven wool, strange fibres, clumps of wool that fall out, bare patches, no wool, or highly wrinkled skin -- are usually culled by farmers.

"Before sending them to the abattoir, we'd like farmers to talk to us first, because studying animals with extreme features offers one of the most efficient ways to find good genes that can impact on certain wool traits," said project leader Simon Bawden.

"It might seem a paradox that ugly wool may be good, but when looking through a genetic profile, the random genetic mistakes act like a flag, speeding up our search to finding genes critical to wool formation and synthesis," Bawden told reporters

The institute hopes to the DNA study will lead to improvements in Australia's merino wool, making it stretchier, less scratchy, shinier and easier to spin, and better able to compete against synthetic fibres.

So far only 10 ugly sheep have been found this lambing season, which stretches from April to September, when statistically there could be hundreds, said the institute.

Talk about diversity!

When the nonprofit organization Terralingua mapped the distribution of languages against a map of the world's biodiversity, it found that the places with the highest concentration of plants and animals, such as the Amazon Basin and the island of New Guinea, were also where people spoke the most languages.

As well as serving as indicators of biodiversity, languages also act as good signs of cultural diversity and a group's understanding of surrounding environments, because people store communal knowledge in their language.

"Wherever humans exist, they have established a strong relationship with the land, and with the biodiversity that exists there," said anthropologist and Terralingua President Luisa Maffi. "They have developed a deep knowledge of the plants and animals, the local ecology, as well as a knowledge about how to use and manage the resources to ensure continued sustenance of biodiversity."

Languages hold valuable knowledge about how to preserve biodiversity.

Native languages have many names for plants that describe how and where they grow, as well as their medicinal uses. But the meanings often do not survive translation from one language to another.

"If you've learned something about a plant from a speaker of an indigenous language, but you don't use the language, it's harder to pass on that knowledge," said linguist Pamela Munro of UCLA.

Destabilizing a forest

As one example, members of the Native American group called the Sekani practiced controlled burning of the forests of British Columbia to regenerate the forest and keep the understory clear for game animals. Their methods also kept the mountain pine beetle pest at bay.

A small pox epidemic decimated the indigenous people and the timber industry took over the management of the forests, putting a stop to the controlled burns.

Since the 1990's, without the regular burnings, the beetle's outbreak has destroyed more than 7 million acres of forest.

"The forests have been made unusable because the native populations have not been allowed to continue those practices," Maffi said. "Ultimately their communities will have to disperse, which will lead to a loss of cultural and linguistic diversity."

Ancient respect for fish

In Thailand, new protective measures are observing an age-old respect for one of the world's largest freshwater fish by following ancient fishing practices.

The Mekong giant catfish, called the "king of fish" in Cambodian, can grow to more than 10 feet in length and has a regal history.

Cave paintings in Thailand dating back 3,500 years illustrate the Mekong giant catfish's long-lived importance. Traditional fishermen in the northeast of Thailand have historically believed that they should not catch the fish. If they do, they hold a religious ceremony to ward off bad luck, burning an image of the fish.

This summer, in celebration of Thai King Bhumibol Adulyadej, fishermen in Thailand and Laos took an oath to abide by these ancestral fishing taboos to avoid fishing the critically endangered beast. The fish is also legally protected in Cambodia.

By following tradition, the fishermen may save the catfish from being the first extinct casualty in the Mekong River, a diverse habitat that is home to more than 1,200 species.

Saving the salmon

Similarly, in Washington State, time-honored lessons are being heard.

Generations of the Tulalip and Yakima tribes and other Native American groups have relied on Pacific salmon as a key resource; they also value the fish very highly and harvest with forethought.

"They treat salmon with respect so that the fish return every year," said ethnobiologist Eugene Hunn of the University of Washington.

The tribes hold annual salmon ceremonies to honor the fish. The first catch of the season is celebrated with singing, dancing, and the passing of salmon tales from generation to generation.

Yet commercial fishing has led to drastic reductions in salmon populations-some species face endangerment.

Since a 1974 decision upheld the Indian's rights to harvest fish, the tribes and the Washington Department of Fisheries have collaborated to maintain a healthy population of Pacific salmon that will return to spawn in the Columbia River and east of the Cascade Mountains.

"Salmon is sacred to them not just as a matter of maximizing profit," Hunn told LiveScience. "To preserve a resource for the people of your community for the future without end imposes a different attitude toward the fish. Now, these attitudes have become more widely recognized."