South Korea will host a global conservation forum next month as part of its efforts to raise awareness on the importance of nature and promote sustainable development, officials said Thursday. The Environment Ministry said it will cohost the “World Leaders’ Conservation Forum 2015” in Jejudo Island on July 7-9. The forum is an upgraded event of the World Leaders Dialogues, which was first initiated at the World Conservation Congress 2012 in Jejudo. Under the theme of “Nature: A Path to Peace and

For the estimated over 2.5 billion people around the world who are connected to the Internet, it is impossible to imagine life without it. The Internet has rewoven the fabric of our daily lives ― how we communicate with each other, work and entertain ourselves ― and become a foundation of the global economy. Seemingly on a daily basis, new businesses that use the Internet as their foundation are disrupting and often replacing long-standing business models and industries. From music and video to

Korea’s major IT companies mostly do not use renewable energy despite increasing public calls for environment-friendly measures, a global civic group report showed Wednesday. According to Greenpeace Korea, the country’s seven major Internet firms were found to have used less than 1 percent renewable energy for running their data centers. Most are supplied by electricity from fossil fuels or nuclear power. IT corporate service provider SK C&C used only 1 percent solar power for their energy suppl

Lee Ye-do, a 46-year-old office worker in Daejeon, lost his wife earlier this month. She suffered from a mystery lung-related disease for more than a decade. “When the symptoms first showed years ago, doctors couldn’t figure out the cause. She received pneumonia treatment because the symptoms were similar. But her condition didn’t get better,” Lee recalled. It was around the time she gave birth to their second son in 2001, he told The Korea Herald.In 2011, the couple finally found out that she w

Han Eun-suk, a 53-year-old housewife in southern Seoul, is meticulous in selecting her cooking ingredients, especially water. She never drinks tap water, citing an unpleasant chemical smell and safety concerns. Worried about her family’s health, she has installed a water purifier at home instead. “There’s a weird smell in tap water. How can you trust tap water that comes through old underground pipes? It’s always better to be safer,” Han said. Han is part of the majority of Koreans who are reluc

South Korean men are more satisfied with their spouses than women are, the main reason being the wives shouldering more household chores than the husbands, a public survey showed Wednesday. According to a survey conducted by the Seoul Metropolitan Government last year, 73.2 percent of surveyed husbands in the capital responded that they are content with their spouses, with 40 percent being very satisfied. For wives, however, only 62.6 percent said they are satisfied with their husbands. Over 10