"SOIL RESOURCES"

Noon briefing by Stephanie Tremblay, Associate Spokesperson for the Secretary-General.

Briefing by Stephane Dujarric, Spokesperson for the Secretary-General.

Briefing by Stephane Dujarric, Spokesperson for the Secretary-General.

A new report  presented by the former President of Mexico, Felipe Calderón, finds that governments and businesses can now improve economic growth and reduce their carbon emissions together. UNIFEED - UNTV

Economic growth in Sub-Saharan Africa continues to rise from 4.7 percent in 2013 to a forecasted 5.2 percent in 2014. This performance is boosted by rising investment in natural resources and infrastructure, and strong household spending, according to the World Bank’s new Africa’s Pulse, a twice-yearly analysis of the Africa’s economic prospects. WORLD BANK

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon met with former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, his newly appointed Special Envoy for Cities and Climate Change. The role of the Special Envoy will be to galvanize urban action to reduce greenhouse emissions ahead of the United Nations climate summit this coming September. UNTV

Europe's forest ministers and other high-level delegates from 40 countries gathered today in the Rovaniemi, Finland to discuss how forests can help European nations move further towards the goal of greening their economies. Juha Ojala, Director General at the Finnish Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, nominated Santa as the Ambassador for European Forests. FAO

A new FAO report says that the waste of a staggering 1.3 billion tonnes of food per year is not only causing major economic losses but also wreaking significant harm on the natural resources that humanity relies upon to feed itself. Each year, food that is produced but not eaten guzzles up a volume of water equivalent to the annual flow of Russia's Volga River and is responsible for adding 3.3 billion tonnes of greenhouse gases to the planet's atmosphere. FAO

The Special Representative of the Secretary-General for West Africa, Said Djinnit, briefed the Council on the latest report of the Secretary-General on the activities of the United Nations Office in the region (UNOWA). UNTV

Hundreds of thousands of people gathered at national celebrations yesterday (9 July) to mark South Sudan’s second Independence Day celebrations at a ceremony led by South Sudan’s first President Salva Kiir. UNMISS