South Africa’s acid mine drainage wastewater is ‘mineable’... According to Dr Anthony Turton, director of Touchstone Resources, consideration should be given to studying the economic feasibility of ‘mining’ South Africa’s problematic acid mine drainage (AMD) and wastewater (mentioned in the December 2010 Scan) for metals, minerals, salt and even hydrogen. Turton is a protagonist not only of ‘mining’ AMD, but also the water in sewage works and obtaining phosphate, which is crucial for food security, as a by product."

“During the recent uprising in Egypt, the city of Alexandria witnessed fierce violence including the burning down of the provincial government building and state security headquarters. However a rare point of agreement between anti-regime protestors and the government security apparatus was to protect the Bibliotheca Alexandrina (BA). The images of a human barricade shielding the BA during the protests highlight the importance of this institution.

“In recent years, Qanats, ancient hydraulic irrigation and potable water disbursement systems, are being revived to mitigate water shortages. Although Iraq has seen significant technological development in water treatment and disbursement, these projects are difficult to manage in remote or rural areas for various technical and energy related problems.

"Thailand’s Red Shirts offer an example of digital immigrants that parallels the rise of other political groups in the region. In July 2009, laborers, and motorcycle taxi drivers who had never previously use computers, subscribed to twitter in order to vote for Thaksin Shinawatra in the “Twitter Wall of Fame” competition."

"HealthNet Global (HNIG) is a private healthcare information technology solutions provider that is collaborating with a cell service provider Aircel to introduce an application into the market that will enable 3G medical consultations using smart phones."

Implications:

Sankara Nethralaya hospital, a not-for-profit ophthalmic hospital in Chennai, has "mobile van units that operate out of remote rural areas."

"Technicians offer basic eye-checks for the rural poor, and then the results are transmitted through a messaging service and very small aperture terminals (VSATs) to an eye specialist in Chennai. Roughly 60-120 patients are examined per day."

Implications:

The Sanjeevani project "combines the use of cell phones and computers to enable services such as Tele-consultations, Tele-education and Tele-diagnosis. Tele-consultations allow for patient histories to be placed online so they can be accessed by doctors in different parts of the country with ease. Tele-diagnosis allows specialist to consult with local physicians via video-chat and calls. This facility could prove to be particularly helpful to poorer sections of the society that live in rural areas, and have limited access to specialists."

Contrary to general understanding, new research suggests that middle class farmers who invest in newer farming technology are going to be more negatively effected by climate change than poorer subsistence farmers.

Bangladesh is developing the “Golden Rice,” or the world’s first ever vitamin-A rich rice. The rice will soon undergo greenhouse and field-testing before scientists move onto the production phase. If all goes well, Bangladesh will be able to combat vitamin A deficiency in expecting mothers and children within five years via the most-consumed food item in the country. Vitamin A deficiency is the cause of blindness and child mortality in severe cases.

Urea Deep Placement (UDP) technology used for rice production requires 40 – 50% less urea than other fertilizer methods through the use of urea briquettes that are placed in the soil, not on the surface, and release nitrogen slowly. The briquettes reduce the amount of fertilizer lost through runoff and release into the atmosphere.