Drought and disease hit Peru

You may remember a report earlier this year on a drought in Mexico and how it was affecting both country and city-dwellers.

Farther south, inhabitants of the Andean mountains of Peru are also being hurt. Al Jazeera reports on how rising temperatures caused by climate change mean that diseases originally only seen in tropical areas are spreading to the mountains.

Watch the video, from Al Jazeera, for more.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Mexico: heavy rains can't beat the drought

Although Mexico is in the grip of the worst drought it has suffered since World War II, houses flooded and streets turned into lakes this week when torrential rainfall lashed Mexico City and the neighboring state of Mexico.

Speaking to El Universal, Ramón Aguirre, director of Mexico City's water system, said the heavy rains wouldn't be enough to replenish reserves, and that ongoing water rationing would continue.

See the video for more.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Video: Mexico: heavy rains can’t beat the drought. Credit: Deborah Bonello

Hurricane Jimena in photos

These photos were sent to us by Tracy Ehrenberg and Glenn Ehrenberg, who live on the southern tip of Baja California in Cabo San Lucas. They photographed Hurricane Jimena unfolding yesterday.

 

Photos from top: The surf at Cabo Falso late afternoon Tuesday as Hurricane Jimena passes; 50 mph winds and stronger gusts whip the Pacific side Cabo San Lucas. Credit: Tracy and Glenn Ehrenberg

Plastic bags outlawed in Mexico City

In the latest effort to improve Mexico City's environment, it became illegal last week for supermarkets and other businesses to hand out nonbiodegradable plastic bags to customers.

CNN reports that "amended ordinances on solid waste now outlaw businesses from giving out thin plastic bags that are not biodegradable."

Sure enough, on my weekly trip to the Soriana supermarket in my neighborhood, I had my groceries packed into plastic bags emblazoned with a logo promising they were biodegradable.

All stores, production facilities and service providers within Mexico City, also called the Federal District, will be affected by the new law, which makes Mexico City the second big city in the Western Hemisphere to enact such a ban, along with San Francisco.

The move by the Mexico City government follows a number of other recent environmentally friendly initiatives, including the introduction along some routes of new buses that emit less pollution, and a planned bike-lending scheme expected to launch in December.

Officials hope to increase bicycle use, but riding on the streets of the city right now is a health risk due to a lack of bicycle lanes and reckless drivers.

-- Deborah Bonello, in Mexico City

Hairless dogs in competition; meet Mexico's Xoloitzcuintles

Spend any time on the streets of Mexico, and you will eventually see them. Mexico's hairless brown or red-skinned dogs -- the Xoloitzcuintle (pronounced sholo-squint-lay).

Love them or hate them, they've played a long-term part in Mexico's history, according to Gabriel Mestre, who is a small-scale Xoloitzcuintle breeder and author of a number of books on the subject. He says this breed of dog can be traced back at least 2,800 years in Mexico, and that some Mexicans believed that the animals had curative powers.

Not all Xoloitzcuintle dogs are bald, and litters yield hairy and hairless pups. But it's the hairless dogs that tend to attract more attention, Mestre says.

He sells most of his dogs and puppies to other breeders in Europe, and says the reactions he gets when he takes his dogs out onto the streets here in Mexico City are mixed. Some people compliment him, others shy away. Mestre's client base does suggest that the unusual looking animals are an acquired taste and are more popular with foreign than domestic breeders.

But that doesn't stop him from showing them off, and he's a regular at national and international dog shows around the world. We went along with him and one of his dogs, 8-month-old Aztlan, to a recent show here in Mexico City.

Watch the video for more.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Video: Mexico’s hairless Xoloitzcuintle in competition. Credit: Deborah Bonello

9 of the world's 10 happiest nations are in Latin America

Residents of Latin American and Caribbean nations constitute some of the happiest on the planet, according to a recent study.

A British research group, the New Economics Foundation, found that Costa Rica in Central America is the "happiest and greenest" in the world.

The group's Happy Planet Index, which is based on data from 143 countries around the world, reports that:

"Costa Ricans report the highest life satisfaction in the world, have the second-highest average life expectancy of the New World (second only to Canada) and have an ecological footprint that means that the country only narrowly fails to achieve the goal of 'one-planet living': consuming its fair share of the Earth's natural resources."

The report from the organization says that Costa Rica has taken steps to reduce its environmental impact.

"Unique in the world for having combined its ministries of energy and the environment back in the 1970s, a staggering 99 per cent of its energy comes from renewable sources."

The only country outside Latin America and the Caribbean to make the list of 10 happiest nations is Vietnam.

Download the report here

Baby sea turtles set free in Mexico

Lindsay Barnett writes on L.A. Unleashed, the Los Angeles Times' all-things-animal blog:

It's World Turtle Day, and we can't think of a better way of celebrating our shell-wearing friends than by watching a troupe of the little guys released on a beach in Puerto Escondido, Mexico.

Click here for the full blog post, which details how you can help turtles and tortoises.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Where did the Mexican earthquake catch you?

Mexico City and Puebla were given a shaking this afternoon by a brief but strong earthquake, sending many people (including us here in The Times' Mexico City Bureau) running into the streets. 

Details on the consequences of the quake are still emerging. Meanwhile, a Mexican friend sent me the following link to a song by the legendary Chico Che called "Where Did the Earthquake Grab You?"

Here in a city that in the last few months has been plagued by a deadly flu outbreak, recession and an equally strong earthquake just three weeks ago, maybe there's nothing left to do but dance.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Brazil's Lula takes center stage in Latin America

Chris Kraul and Patrick J. Mcdonnell report from São Paulo on the growing popularity of Brazil's President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

"Buoyed by a robust economy and his ability to work with leaders across the ideological spectrum, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has emerged as the chief power broker and mediator in South America.

"Lula's rise has paralleled the decline of U.S. influence in its 'backyard,' analysts say, a result in part of Washington's plummeting global prestige and the Bush administration's unremitting focus on the Middle East.

"A moderate with an unassailable leftist background, Lula has become the point man for healing regional crises such as the current turmoil in Bolivia and the recent escalation of tensions among Colombia, Venezuela and Ecuador."

Click here for more about Brazil.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Photo: Brazil's Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, second from the right, with Venezuela's Hugo Chávez, Bolivia's Evo Morales and Ecuador's Rafael Correa at the meeting in which they talked about regional integration in Manaus, Brazil. Credit: Antonio Lacerda / European Pressphoto Agency

Seafood trade in Gulf of Mexico swamped by Ike and Gustav

The Associated Press surveys the damage done by this year's Hurricane Ike and Hurricane Gustav, which is being felt among gulf seafood harvesters, distributors and restaurants:

On the eve of October's peak seafood harvesting season, migrant fishermen are sweeping debris from gutted bay-side homes instead of scooping shrimp and oysters from the Gulf of Mexico's lucrative floor. The $100-million fishing industry in Galveston Bay is nearly paralyzed.

Hurricane Ike's effect is being felt among gulf seafood harvesters, distributors and restaurants. Government and industry officials fear it will take as long as two years for the processing plants, boats and docks along the bay to recover and rebuild.

"It's like a bomb went off," said Lisa Halili, owner of Prestige Oysters Inc., which is among the largest seafood harvesters in Texas and Louisiana.

Read the full dispatch on the damage left by Hurricanes Ike and Gustav here.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City