A lunar orbiter that Japan planned to launch this summer will probably be delayed because some of its parts have been recalled by their U.S. manufacturer, Japan's space agency said Wednesday.
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency said no new date has been set for the repeatedly postponed launch of the Lunar-A probe, but a Japanese media report said it would take place sometime next year.
An agency committee released a report saying it would be "difficult" for the probe to be launched as scheduled this summer from a space center in southern Japan because some of its thruster valves have been recalled for potential defects by their U.S. manufacturer, Moog.
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Hostile environment: The U.N. Environment Program conference adopted a resolution Wednesday tackling the ways environmental problems can trigger war, but activists accused the agency of dodging other important issues.
The three-day forum of environment ministers and officials from 150 countries also adopted a "Jeju initiative," named for the city hosting the conference, aimed at identifying the world's best water-conservation practices and endorsing them as examples for water-starved countries. The executive director of the U.N. environmental program called the initiative an "important paper" but conceded "we cannot simply have a smile on our face."
He said the U.N. program needs better funding, a complaint echoed by environmental groups in attendance. France has been pushing to make the U.N. program, which is voluntarily funded, a higher-tiered agency with mandatory funding and increased authority.
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A vanishing breed: Domestic breeds are disappearing at an alarming rate, the United Nations' agriculture agency said Wednesday at the start of a three-day meeting in Rome on animal genetic resources.
Of 6,300 breeds registered by the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, 1,350 are either extinct or threatened by extinction. A diverse gene pool is considered a crucial weapon in coping with drought, famine and epidemics.
Among threatened breeds are some kinds of cattle in Africa that are resistant to a kind of sleeping sickness, and a breed of sheep, Navajo churro, which are raised in the western United States, Hoffmann said.
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Dust in the wind: Dust and sand storms have plagued Northeast Asia for centuries but are getting worse in modern times, U.N. environmental officials said Wednesday.
Storms affect the region nearly five times as frequently as they did five decades ago, but strategies remain elusive, delegates from 158 countries were told on the final day of a U.N. Environment Program conference in South Korea.
Dust and sand storms originate in the dry regions of northern China and Mongolia and blow across the Korean Peninsula and Japan, causing respiratory ailments and disrupting transportation and industry.
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AP and Reuters contributed to this report.
