The richness and diversity of England's natural environment is under threat. Our population continues to grow. The impacts of changing climate exacerbate the problems. For too long the natural world has been treated as a luxury, a nice-to-have, optional extra. The vital public services that it provides for everyone in this country have been taken for granted. Not only does it give us the basic necessities of life - clean air, clean water and productive soils - but it provides the raw materials for sustainable energy production and construction. It is our natural health service, with the potential to make a major contribution to the health and wellbeing of the nation, free for everyone to use.

And our natural environment provides the foundations of our cultural identity, brings pleasure to millions and underpins our tourism and recreation industries. And as climate change begins to bite, it becomes even more important in its capacity to store carbon, soak up excess water and channel run-off naturally away from our towns and cities.

Natural England's State of the Natural Environment 2008 report, published today, shows that wildlife inside protected areas such as Sites of Special Scientific Interest is, for the time being, on sound footing. But outside nature's gated communities the diversity and local distinctiveness of our wildlife and landscapes is in long-term decline.

HARRIET HARMAN, who has been accused of contributing to family breakdown by DRAWING UP POLICIES THAT BENEFITED UNMARRIED COUPLES, claims in a new book that promoting marriage is not part of ministers' jobs, and they may as well just say they want everyone to be happy. She also says there is no ideal type of household in which to bring up children - despite research showing that having two parents is best - and that couples should not stay together if they feel their relationship has broken down.

The book, by Anastasia de Waal, claims Labour is trapping people in poverty by ignoring the effect of marriage on a household's wealth, in its attempt not to be judgmental about single-parent families. THE BOOK ALSO SAID LABOUR SHOULD STOP TREATING FATHERS LIKE "OPTIONAL EXTRAS". Its non-judgmental approach to families let fathers escape without facing up to their share of the responsibility, it said. Maria Miller, the shadow minister for families, said: "LABOUR SEEMS RELUCTANT TO HELP FAMILIES STAY TOGETHER: THE BENEFITS SYSTEM PROVIDES AN INCENTIVE FOR COUPLES TO LIVE APART."

MISS HARMAN, WHO IS ALSO LEADER OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS, was interviewed for Second Thoughts on the Family, which is published Monday by Civitas, the think-tank. The book, which paraphrases her interview at her request, states: "HARMAN BELIEVES HIGHER RATES OF SEPARATION ARE DOWN TO A POSITIVE: GREATER CHOICE.

Tensions over that clash of interests have intensified in recent months after the surprising news that, after three years of declines, deforestation of the Brazilian Amazon had accelerated in the last half of 2007. And this week, BRAZIL'S HIGH PROFILE ENVIRONMENT MINISTER, MARINA SILVA RESIGNED, saying that she didn't have sufficient political backing to protect the Amazon against POWERFUL BUSINESS INTERESTS AND THEIR SUPPORTERS IN THE GOVERNMENT.

It's not immediately clear how her departure - she will still push on environmental issues from her seat in Brazil's senate - will alter current policies, but environmentalists said they have lost their main champion in the government. Reacting to the report of accelerating rain forest loss, Brazil's environmental agency, known as Ibama, has launched a tough enforcement campaign against illegal deforestation known as "Operation Arc of Fire."

Since February, the federal police presence in this area and others where significant parcels of forest and farmland meet has grown noticeably. Millions of dollars of fines have been levied, deforestation suspects arrested, and tons of suspect-origin lumber impounded. Winning over the ranchers and farmers operating in or near the Amazon could be the key to sparing more actual rain forest - and reforesting some of what's been lost.

In one of his most out-spoken interventions in the climate change debate, he said a £15 billion annual programme was required to halt deforestation or the world would have to live with the dire consequences. "That is roughly just under one per cent of all the insurance premiums paid in the world in any one year. It is an insurance premium to ensure the world has some rainfall and reasonable weather patterns. It is a good deal."

"WE WILL END UP SEEING MORE DROUGHT AND STARVATION ON A GRAND SCALE. Weather patterns will become even more terrifying and there will be less and less rainfall," he said. "We are asking for something pretty dreadful unless we really understand the issues now and [the] urgency of them."

The Prince said the rainforests, which provide the "air conditioning system for the entire planet", releasing water vapour and absorbing carbon, were being lost to poor farmers desperate to make a living. He said that every year, 20 MILLION HECTARES OF FOREST - EQUIVALENT TO THE AREA OF ENGLAND, WALES AND SCOTLAND - WERE DESTROYED and called for a "gigantic partnership" of governments, businesses and consumers to slow it down. "What we have got to do is try to ensure that these forests are more valuable alive than dead."

Police have used tear gas and rubber bullets to try to stop gangs of armed youths from attacking foreigners and looting and burning their property. Five people were killed overnight in the area of Cleveland. Two of them were burned and the others beaten to death. More than 50 were taken to hospitals with gunshot and stab wounds. During the day, a church where about 1,000 Zimbabweans have been taking refuge was attacked.

Bishop Paul Veryn of the Central Methodist Church which was attacked told SABC radio: "We consider that the situation is getting so serious that the police can no longer control it." As night fell, immigrants were streaming into one police station near downtown Johannesburg carrying whatever belongings they could, reports Caroline Hawley.

Many now fear for their lives, she reports. One Zimbabwean woman told the BBC she would flee back home rather than risk losing her two children to the mobs.

THE UN HAS WARNED THAT THE HARVEST COULD FAIL THIS YEAR AND NEXT, making the country - currently a net rice exporter - a net importer of rice. It says that to prevent this, farmers in the worst affected areas must be given all the help they need. The cyclone devastated the fragile ecosystem in five coastal areas. The UN says that, in places, the damage caused by the huge wave that hit the Irrawaddy Delta two weeks ago was worse than that wreaked by the tsunami in 2004. Deforestation meant the wave swept further inland. Food stocks and rice seed were lost - livestock, tools and equipment, too.

Farming is the most important means of livelihood for more than 70% of Burma's population. Usually, farmers in the Irrawaddy Delta provide two-thirds of the country's rice harvest. THE HIGH COST OF IMPORTED FERTILISERS AND LOW CROP PRICES were already making life hard for them, even before the cyclone, and for many families life was already very harsh and insecure. Now it has just got much worse.

Diderik de Vleeschauwer from the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) says, "Time is running out. We are running against the clock. IF RICE SEEDS ARE NOT RECEIVED WITHIN THE NEXT 40 TO 50 DAYS, PLANTING WILL NOT HAPPEN IN TIME, AND PEOPLE WILL NOT BE ABLE TO HARVEST RICE BY THE END OF THIS YEAR."

"TOO OFTEN IN THE MIDDLE EAST, POLITICS HAS CONSISTED OF ONE LEADER IN POWER AND THE OPPOSITION IN JAIL," Bush said at the World Economic Forum on the Middle East. "The time has come for nations across the Middle East to abandon these practices, and treat their people with the dignity and respect they deserve." Bush's address to hundreds of global policymakers and business leaders gathered in this Red Sea beach town was his finishing touch on a five-day Mideast trip to Egypt, Israel and Saudi Arabia.

The speech, and Bush's second Mideast trip of the year, came eight months before the end of his presidency, his target date for reaching a sweeping peace agreement that would resolve generations-old grievances and create a Palestinian state. The president counseled Arab states to "MOVE PAST THEIR OLD RESENTMENTS AGAINST ISRAEL" AND "INVEST AGGRESSIVELY" IN THE PALESTINIAN PEOPLE, what he views as their role in the process. In contrast, many Arabs think Bush leans too far Israel's way in the long-running Mideast dispute, and that Washington doesn't push Israel hard enough to give way on issues that anger Palestinians and stymie a deal.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas told Bush directly about his concerns with the Knesset speech, "We said that it was disappointing, and a missed opportunity, because you (Bush) could have said that the Palestinian people should have their freedom and independence in order to achieve peace in the entire area," he said. Erekat said Bush responded in the private meeting by saying he was the first American president to endorse an independent Palestinian state and that he would spare no efforts to achieve the goal.

The new questionnaire, known as the Common Assessment Framework (CAF), is part of a £20million programme called Every Child Matters (ECM), ostensibly set up to ensure youngsters are safe and leading positive lives.

Professionals - such as police officers, teachers and doctors - and volunteers are now under orders to subject children to a questionnaire if they consider them "at risk": A DEFINITION SO BROAD THAT MANY DECENT PARENTS COULD FIND THEMSELVES LABELLED AS POTENTIAL ABUSERS. The questions don't need a parent's consent since any child over 12 is deemed responsible enough to grant permission for an interview. Any child not achieving the Government's five "outcomes" - being healthy, staying safe, enjoying life, "making a positive contribution", and achieving " economic well-being" - is now defined as having "additional needs".

The 46-page Government guide, Using The CAF In Practice, suggests "practitioners" ask questions such as: "Do you feel you are the right weight for your height?" One police officer, who attended a CAF course, told me that many of his colleagues are so reluctant to interview teenage criminals about their emotional needs, sex life and diets that they avoid calls involving them. "We're cops, not social workers," he said. "It's insane. JUST FILLING IN ONE OF THESE FORMS, WITH A FOUL-MOUTHED YOB WHO'S LAUGHING AT YOU, WILL TAKE HALF A SHIFT. MEANWHILE, THE PUBLIC IS UNPROTECTED."

In an effort to develop a more "common" approach, anyone from a sports coach to a playgroup worker is allowed to question a child, AS LONG AS THEY'VE BEEN ON A THREE-HOUR TRAINING COURSE. There is a risk that the interrogators could include people who may derive a perverse thrill from asking children personal questions about bathing, dressing and "changes to their body". ALLOWING SO MANY PEOPLE TO PROBE INTO CHILDREN'S PERSONAL LIVES IS ALSO A THREAT TO THIS COUNTRY'S LONG-TREASURED RIGHT TO PRIVACY.

Figures uncovered by the Telegraph show that almost 4,000 women have had at least four abortions. In a "grotesquely bleak" picture of British society, SCORES OF WOMEN HAVE HAD AT LEAST EIGHT TERMINATIONS. The figures emerged as the row over controversial changes to fertility law erupted into a bitter war of words, with a minister accusing "anti-abortion" MPs of trying to "hijack" legislation.

On the eve of a crucial Commons vote, Dawn Primarolo, the Public Health Minister, accused Tory backbenchers of an underhand attempt to remove the right to abortion by tabling amendments to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill. In an interview with the Telegraph, she also accused MPs who oppose the creation of hybrid embryos of putting forward "extreme and untrue arguments".

Nadine Dorries, the MP leading the campaign to reduce the abortion time limit from 24 to 20 weeks, hit back at the criticism, while revealing that she has received hate mail over her stance. Gordon Brown was forced to concede free votes on key aspects of the legislation after three Roman Catholic members of his cabinet made clear they would vote against the measures. A free vote will also be allowed on abortion amid unease about THE NUMBER OF LATE TERMINATIONS CARRIED OUT FOR "SOCIAL" REASONS. It emerged on Saturday that NHS DOCTORS WERE REFUSING TO CARRY OUT LATE PROCEDURES and that 75 per cent of the 7,000 terminations performed after 17 weeks of pregnancy each year were being carried out at private clinics and charities.

Despite a new President, VLADIMIR PUTIN REMAINS IN OVERALL CONTROL. No decision of any significance for the Russian people, or the rest of us, will be made in the foreseeable future without the say-so of Medvedev's unsmiling master.

Despite the fact that Putin's Russia is increasingly autocratic and irredeemably corrupt, the man himself - THEIR BORN-AGAIN TSAR - IS OVERWHELMINGLY REGARDED AS THE ANSWER TO THE NATION'S PRAYERS. Putin boasts that since he came into office investment in the Russian economy has increased sevenfold (reaching $82.3 billion in 2007) and that the country's GDP has risen by more than 70 per cent. It is almost solely down to Russia's vast reserves of oil and gas. Ex-President Putin is regarded as the answer to the nation's prayers. When Putin came to power, the world price of crude oil was $16 dollars a barrel; it has now soared to more than $120 dollars - and no one knows where or when this bonanza will end.

SO WHERE HAS ALL THE OIL WEALTH GONE? According to Transparency International - a global society which campaigns against corruption - Russia has become a world leader in the corruption stakes. Foreign analysts estimate that no less than $30 billion a year is spent to grease official palms to oil the wheels of trade and commerce. Almost every NATIONAL RADIO AND TELEVISION STATION IS NOW CONTROLLED DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY BY THE STATE, and the same applies to every newspaper of any influence. THE STRUCTURE OF THE STATE - the alliance between the Kremlin, the oligarchs, and the security services - IS AWESOMELY POWERFUL.

THE KREMLIN'S GROWING RAPPROCHEMENT WITH BEIJING (the adversaries of a generation ago are now not only major trading partners, but conduct joint military exercises) SHIFTS THE BALANCE OF POWER IN THE WORLD. And as life on earth becomes less and less secure, with evermore people competing for a dwindling supply of vital resources, RUSSIA, AS AN ENERGY GIANT, IS ONCE AGAIN A BIG PLAYER ON THE WORLD STAGE.

Chile's National Emergency Office, ONEMI, said heavy ash kept shooting from the volcano in southern Chile as it generated small tremors. On the ground, heavy flooding hit the area around Chaiten as falling ash swelled rivers, overflowing their banks."There's been additional volcanic activity that we're really worried about," regional governor Sergio Galilea told reporters.

The Chaiten volcano, 760 miles (1,220 km) south of the capital Santiago, started erupting on May 2 for the first time in thousands of years, spewing ash, gas and molten rock into the air. The government on Wednesday declared the town of Chaiten, only six miles (10 km) from the erupting volcano, off-limits for three months and reported that about 90 percent of the town had been flooded by the Blanco and Raya Rivers.

No deaths have resulted, but thousands of people have been evacuated within a 30-mile (48-km) radius, including the 4,500 residents of Chaiten. The column of ash above the volcano, kept aloft by the pressure of constant eruptions, rose as high as 20 miles (32 km) early in the eruption but has since fallen back to about 4.5 miles (7 km).

The move, WHICH WILL FLOOD THE MARKET WITH AN ESTIMATED 1.5 MILLION TONNES OF HIGH-GRADE AMERICAN RICE THAT IS SITTING IN JAPANESE SILOS, comes amid continuing rice export restrictions by some of the world's biggest suppliers and rioting in countries where the population cannot afford the price increases.

Senior government sources in Tokyo told The Times that Japan had received permission from Washington to begin exports from ITS GIANT, BUT LARGELY HIDDEN, MOUNTAIN OF UNWANTED AMERICAN RICE to countries that need it most. The exposure of the vast Japanese rice surplus has emerged as ONE OF THE CHIEF IMBALANCES OF WORLD RICE MARKETS AND AN EFFECT OF THE COMPLEX AND WASTEFUL LATTICE OF RULES, SUBSIDIES AND PACTS that have knocked global agriculture markets so badly out of kilter.

Rice experts say that the move could defuse temporarily one of the principal catalysts of the food-price crisis - the perception that the world is running out of rice - and the panic and hoarding that has accompanied it. With commodities traders sniffing that a US-Japan deal was imminent, rice FUTURES ENDED THE ASIAN TRADING WEEK IN A DRAMATIC NOSEDIVE AS THE PROSPECT OF A SUDDEN SUPPLY SURGE and bullish harvest forecasts routed speculative money from the market.

The collapse came as think-tanks and food experts called on Japan and the US to urgently unwind one of the biggest "invisible" distortions in global rice markets: a quirk of World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules that obliges Tokyo to buy rice it does not need and that eventually rots in storage. THE WTO RULE, ITS MANY CRITICS SAY, EFFECTIVELY TURNS MILLIONS OF TONNES OF HIGH-GRADE AMERICAN PRODUCE INTO FEED FOR JAPANESE HOGS AND CHICKENS.

Traders gave warning, however, that many of the factors that propelled rice prices to their recent highs remained in place. THE CYCLONE IN BURMA HAS EFFECTIVELY TURNED THAT COUNTRY FROM AN EXPORTER TO AN IMPORTER OF RICE, AND EXPORT RESTRICTIONS IN INDIA AND VIETNAM REMAIN IN PLACE.

IT WAS BUSH'S SECOND PERSONAL APPEAL THIS YEAR TO KING ABDULLAH, head of the monarchy that rules this desert kingdom that is a long time prime U.S. ally and home to the world's largest oil reserves. BUT SAUDI OFFICIALS STUCK TO THEIR POSITION THAT THEY WILL ONLY PUMP MORE OIL INTO THE SYSTEM WHEN ASKED TO BY BUYERS, something they say is not happening now, the president's national security adviser told reporters.

"Saudi Arabia does not have customers that are making requests for oil that they are not able to satisfy," Stephen Hadley said on a day when oil prices rose above $127 a barrel, a record high. "What the Saudis wanted to tell us was we're doing everything we can do ... to meet this problem, but it's a complicated problem."

The Saudi oil minister, Ali al-Naimi, announced that the kingdom decided on May 10 to raise production by 300,000 barrels at the request of customers, including the United States. He said that increase was sufficient. "SUPPLY AND DEMAND ARE IN BALANCE TODAY," he told a news conference.

President Bush has never been known for his eloquence, but his comment earlier this month that INDIA'S GROWING MIDDLE CLASS was demanding "BETTER NUTRITION AND BETTER FOOD, AND SO DEMAND IS HIGH, AND THAT CAUSES THE PRICE TO GO UP" was neither particularly mangled nor, at first flush, offensive. In the days since, though, India's most nationalistic politicians, newspapers and television pundits have expressed outrage, calling Bush's comment rude and insensitive because it suggests Indians are to blame for recent global food price increases and implies they should eat less. "U.S. EATS 5 TIMES MORE THAN INDIA PER CAPITA" blared a headline in the Times of India above a typical story outlining the massive disparities between the amount of grains, meat and vegetables the average American and average Indian consumes.

There's no doubt that China and India's growing middle classes are consuming more and different types of food. As people get richer they tend to eat more meat and dairy products, for instance, and that's exactly what's happening in China and India. That growing demand will naturally push up prices over the long term. But it's debatable whether the huge price run-ups in the past few months for staples such as rice and corn can be pinned on China and India alone.

Short-term factors - such as the huge BOOM IN BIOFUEL production and the skyrocketing COST OF FUEL that has pushed up FERTILIZER AND TRANSPORT PRICES - play a big part too. But to pretend that tens of millions of Chinese and Indians who are joining the middle class every year have no impact on demand for food is silly. Many Americans overeat, but a growing number of Indians do as well (even if the national calorie intake is still relatively small). That's a problem for both countries' general well-being and health, but it's not the main issue in rising food prices.

THE KEY IS NOT DEMAND, BUT SUPPLY. Agricultural production in places such as India has not kept up with the incredible social changes under way in the country's cities and towns. The green revolution of three decades ago helped keep the country from starvation, but since then PRODUCTIVITY GROWTH IN INDIAN AGRICULTURE HAS HARDLY MOVED.

Dan Toole, the South Asia regional director for the United Nations Children's Fund, said "WHAT'S NEEDED IS MASSIVE INVESTMENT IN FARMING, more assistance for the hundreds of millions of Indians who are malnourished, and for the government "to somehow get beyond the policy and into the implementation."

And if the commercials seem more pervasive than ever, that's because they are. DRUG MAKERS SPEND NEARLY $5 BILLION A YEAR TO MAKE SURE YOU'RE HEARING ABOUT THEIR PRODUCTS ? a sound investment considering that every $1,000 they spend translates to 24 new prescriptions, according to the House Commerce Committee. Drug ads are, not surprisingly, meant to sell products, not scare consumers off, SO THEY'RE NOTORIOUS FOR CAREENING QUICKLY THROUGH THE OBLIGATORY LIST OF THE MEDICATION'S RISKS.

The FDA states that DTC commercials must present a "fair balance" of the benefits and side effects of a drug, but it's obvious most don't. It's commonly understood by psychologists ? and ad makers ? that if a person is presented with a list of things, HE OR SHE IS MORE LIKELY TO REMEMBER ITEMS AT THE BEGINNING AND AT THE END OF THE LIST THAN ITEMS JUST PAST THE MIDDLE.

While drug makers abide by the law and present important side effect information, it's no surprise that they NEARLY ALL FOLLOW THE SAME FORMAT: putting benefit information in the first half of the commercial, side effect information just past the middle, then benefit information again at the end. THAT'S A FEATURE COMMON TO MOST DRUG ADS: THEY LEAVE YOU CONFUSED ABOUT THE INFORMATION.