MEXICO CITY - The fine sands of northern Mexico's Samalayuca Desert could disappear due to extraction for commercial uses, warns the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

The ecosystem of the Samalayuca dunes is in danger, as is the entire Chihuahua desert, which covers 650,000 square km over seven states in northern Mexico and the southern United States, WWF researcher Azucena Garza told Tierramérica.

The Samalayuca Desert's 63,400 hectares are home to numerous species of plants and animals. The desert loses thousands of tonnes of sand each year to supply the needs of mining and construction.

According to WWF, which for the last two years has been providing support for various conservation projects in the Chihuahua desert, there are some areas of the Samalayuca where so much sand has been hauled away that the gravel underlayer is now exposed. The dunes are not infinite, said Garza; it is possible that this desert’s resources will be exhausted.

LIMA - Protection of Peru's extensive Amazon jungles will have the technological backing of the Global Positioning System (GPS), a satellite-based geographical monitoring method.

The purpose is to prevent international logging corporations, whose activity is supported by the new Forestry Act passed in July, from engaging in over-exploitation of the resource, explained Josefina Takahashi, head of the National Institute of Natural Resources.

Takahashi announced that the Forestry Act would include a clause that obligates logging companies to install GPS equipment in their heavy machinery.

GPS allows the tracking of any ship, object or person, with a margin of error of less than 10 metres. Installed on the machinery and equipment used in wood extraction, the system will serve to prevent logging activity in unauthorised areas, Takahashi said.

SANTIAGO - The Coalition for the Conservation of the Coastal Mountains, made up of 10 environmental and indigenous organisations, has called on the Chilean government to halt construction of a road because it is a threat to the area's biodiversity.

The road in question would connect the Pelada mountain range with Cudico, on the coast of the Lakes Region, or Region 10, some 900 km south of Santiago.

Cudico has been categorised as an area of great potential for biodiversity conservation as a temperate climate rainforest.

The coalition stresses that the region through which the road would be built is scarcely populated and that investments in road construction should be made elsewhere, targeting places with clear potential for tourism development, not this ecosystem considered unique in the world.

The group also emphasised that the Chilean government must comply with international biodiversity defence treaties and promote effective community participation at the moment of deciding on public projects.

RIO DE JANEIRO - Sufficient knowledge already exists to promote sustainable development and to serve the environmental market, but to do so in Latin America would require the investment of 200 billion dollars, according to the organisers of an international exposition of environmental technology.

The available solutions have scarcely been implemented and environmental leaders must update the information they have on technologies for their area, said Nelson Nefussi, co-ordinator of a seminar running parallel with the expo, to be held Aug 29 to Aug 31 in Sao Paulo.

According to the Inter-American Association of Sanitation and Environmental Engineering, 300 million Latin Americans are polluting the rivers with untreated waste and 130 million do not have access to clean water.

An international meeting of environmental and sanitation business leaders and an exposition of solid waste treatment technologies will, along with the Environmental Technology Fair, round out a broad forum for environmental debates in Sao Paulo this month.

SAN JOSE - Some 50 forestry experts from Central America agreed in Costa Rica to step up efforts to consolidate policies for the sustainable management of the region's forests.

Invited by the Central American Forestry Programme, the region's forestry officials and forest management specialists met the second week in August at the Tropical Agronomy Centre for Research and Education here.

The central issue of the conference was to define and implement criteria and indicators in sustainable management. It is a necessary step towards obtaining forestry certification, a kind of ''green'' stamp of approval that guarantees the origin of forest products. Certification would facilitate entry of these Central American products into the United States and European markets.