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Amazon deforestation gets the Panorama treatment

If you haven't had your fill of news from the Amazon lately (we've recently had live webcasts and slideshows from regions where fires have swept through), Monday's edition of Panorama is dedicated to the largest rainforest on Earth, and Greenpeace will featured.

Called Can Money Grow On Trees?, it will examine how the rising cost of food is threatening the Amazon as more forest is converted into farmland for cattle ranching - the current dry season provides an excellent opportunity for a bit of fire-based forest clearance. Also included will be the question of whether financial mechanisms (like our own proposal) can be brought in to make forests more valuable if they're left standing.

We haven't seen the final programme, but it's on BBC1 at 8.30pm, with a repeat on Friday 12 September at 12.45am. Of course, you can watch it at anytime on the wondrous iPlayer after transmission (although only if you're in the UK).

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Tesco spends £25 million to change a light bulb (amongst other things)

Something of a debate has developed on the venerable Today programme about light bulbs. It kicked off when Tesco boss Sir Terry Leahy appeared yesterday plugging a £25 million investment in a sustainable consumption institute. It's in collaboration with the University of Manchester which, according to Tesco's press release, will "explore vital areas of research such as how customers can be empowered and incentivised to buy green products and services, how business can adapt to meet customer needs and how we can train the next generation of environmental leaders and experts."

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Amazon soya campaign wins BBC food gong

Stop trashing the Amazon for fast food

I mentioned a few weeks ago that we had been nominated by the good listeners of BBC Radio 4's The Food Programme as part of their annual Food and Farming Awards for our Amazon soya campaign, of which the giant chickens running around McDonald's were a part. The judges agreed and at a swish awards dinner in Birmingham last Friday, we won the Derek Cooper Award for "a great model of how to research food issues across continents".

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Greenpeace nominated for BBC food award

Trashing the Amazon for fast food The global campaign to highlight how food companies were complicit in destroying the Amazon rainforest through their use of Amazon-grown soya made headlines around the world and clearly touched the hearts of Radio 4 listeners because we've been nominated for a gong in their Food and Farming Awards.

Most of the categories are turned over to shops and producers who go that extra mile in provide quality grub but we come under the Derek Cooper Special Award for, and I quote, "their work raising awareness of the ethical and environmental dimensions of food production, in particular their soya campaign". It was a public vote that got us into the nominations but it's the steely minds of the judging panel that will make the final decision, and with distinguished competition in the form of the Caroline Walker Trust and the Rt Hon Michael Meacher MP, it'll be tough. Tune in Sunday 26 November to see if we win.