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What were the defining issues of this year in development? Land grabs dominated headlines as investors bought up swaths of Africa, Britain controversially decided to stop sending aid to India and the Rio+20 conference on sustainability caused widespread frustration. Click on the pictures to explore the issues and revisit this year's major topics

The clock is ticking. Every second, it seems, someone in the world takes on more debt. The idea of a debt clock for an individual nation is familiar to anyone who has been to Times Square in New York, where the American public shortfall is revealed. Our clock (updated September 2012) shows the global figure for almost all government debts in dollar terms.

useful for first question on h/w 3

"In June 2012, "Welcome to the Anthropocene"-a film about the state of the planet-opened the UN's Rio+20 summit on sustainable development. The summit was the largest UN meeting to date. 3mins 38 worth watching A 3-minute journey through the last 250 years of our history, from the start of the Industrial Revolution to the Rio+20 Summit. The film charts the growth of humanity into a global force on an equivalent scale to major geological processes. "

"0.85 - the amount in degrees Celsius that the world's land and oceans warmed between 1880 and 2012. 3.7 - the amount in Celsius of extra global surface warming we will likely get between 2081 and 2100 if greenhouse gas emissions stay roughly on their current path. 14 - the number of chapters in the full Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis report. Australian scientists feature as authors in 11. 19 - the amount in centimetres the world's oceans have risen between 1901 and 2010. 36 - the number of pages in the summary document. 39 - the number of countries represented in the list of authors and review editors for the full report. 40 - the percentage rise in the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere between the years 1750 and 2011. 55 - the number of countries represented in the list of expert reviewers. 63 - the amount in centimetres of extra sea level rise we will likely get between 2081 and 2100 if greenhouse gas emissions stay roughly on their current path. 90 - the percentage of the extra energy in the climate system between 1971 and 2010 that has been taken up by warming oceans. 209 - the number of lead authors who worked on the full report. 600+ - the number of contributing authors to the full report. 1089 - the number of self-appointed expert reviewers of the full report. 1250 - the number of figures (that's charts, graphs and other eye candy) contained in the full report. 2000+ - the number of pages in the full draft of Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis. 9,200 - the number of scientific publications cited in the full report. 54,677 - the number of comments made on the full report by the group of self-appointed expert reviewers. 1,400,000 - the number of words in the full report. 2,000,000+ - the amount in gigabytes of numerical data gathered from computers running models of the world's climate systems. 30,000,000,000 - the tonnes of ice that "likely" melted from the Antarctic Ice Sheet on average each ye

"Indonesia lost 840,000 hectares of forest in 2012 compared to 460,000 hectares in Brazil, despite its forest being a quarter the size of the Amazon rainforest"

China: snapshot of a decade As the country prepares for its 10-year power handover, we look at how it has changed. Also, we debate what should be the main priority for new leader Xi Jinping. Share your suggestions

The banana War is over

China's economy will be biggest in world by end of 2016, says leading international thinktank

"Africa is getting too hot for its cocoa crop. The west has to take some responsibility both for the demand and for climate change"

No !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Mobile phone services are improving agricultural yield and profits by providing farmers advice on crops, weather and market prices