Climate campaigners have accused Scottish ministers of being “inept” and “short-termist” after they scrapped Scotland’s target to cut carbon emissions by 75% by 2030.

Màiri McAllan, the Scottish net zero secretary, confirmed her government had abandoned that target and would also drop legally binding annual targets on reducing carbon emissions, after damning criticism from a UK advisory committee.

In what opposition politicians labelled a “humiliating” climbdown, McAllan said Scotland would instead follow the lead of the UK and Welsh governments by adopting five-yearly “carbon budgets” aimed at meeting its zero emissions target date of 2045.

McAllan told MSPs this decision had been heavily influenced by the UK Climate Change Committee, which said last month the 2030 target was “no longer credible” because of inadequate action on home heating, transport, farming and nature restoration by Scottish ministers.

She said the 2030 target had always been stretching, and claimed the new approach was simply a pragmatic response, acknowledging the huge scale of the task that involved “minor legislative amendments”.

But Prof Piers Forster, the CCC’s interim chair, said scrapping the 2030 target was “deeply disappointing” as it undermined effective climate action. He urged McAllan to set out the new commitments as soon as possible.

“Interim targets and plans to deliver against them are what makes any net zero commitment credible,” he said. “They are essential for enabling a stable transition. Long-term planning is vital for businesses, citizens and future parliaments. Today that has been undermined.”

Friends of the Earth Scotland, previously a supporter of Scotland’s efforts to be a “world leader” on climate action, said this reversal was “the worst environmental decision in the history of the Scottish parliament”.

Imogen Dow, its head of campaigns, said: “Instead of using the past decade to deliver warm homes, reliable public transport and a fair transition away from fossil fuels, inept, short-termist politicians have kept millions of people trapped in the broken status quo that only benefits big polluters.”

Jamie Livingstone, the head of Oxfam Scotland, said the decision was a “reprehensible retreat caused by [the Scottish government’s] recklessly inadequate level of action to date. With scientists linking deadly heatwaves in west Africa to climate change and Dubai drowning in a deluge of rain, the urgency of climate action couldn’t be clearer.”

The rollback is doubly difficult for Scottish ministers because Nicola Sturgeon, the previous first minister, had made the climate crisis one of her government’s top priorities. She was the first UK leader to acknowledge the planet faced a climate emergency.

Sturgeon signed a power-sharing deal with the Scottish Green party in 2021 which prioritised climate action, and then posed with Greta Thunberg at the Cop26 climate summit in Glasgow later that year.

Graham Simpson, a Scottish Conservative MSP, said it was a surprise that Patrick Harvie and Lorna Slater, the Scottish Green co-leaders who signed that agreement, had not resigned their ministerial posts in embarrassment. Harvie said the Greens were still driving change.

The Scottish government now has to table urgent legislation to scrap Holyrood’s current climate act, which sets annual targets, and instead use carbon budgets. Those five-yearly budgets set a ceiling for how much CO₂ can be emitted in those time periods.

McAllan said the Scottish government would quadruple the number of electric vehicle chargers, “explore” a new integrated public transport ticket system, pilot emissions reduction schemes on livestock farms, consult on a new carbon tax for large rural estates, and use rates relief to subsidise green energy for businesses.

Livingstone said these “largely recycled measures represent baby steps forward rather than the giant leaps needed and are a thinly veiled distraction from ministers’ failure to deliver their existing climate commitments”.

After reviewing the results of thousands of tests on fruits and vegetables, Consumer Reports has found unhealthy levels of pesticides in about 20% of US produce.

This chart, in alphabetical order, shows the risk from pesticides in conventional and organic produce, as well as whether the fruits and vegetables are domestically grown or imported. Consumer Reports “recommends those rated as very low, low or moderate risk. When possible, replace a food rated high or very high with a lower-risk one, or choose organic. Keep in mind that the risk comes from repeated servings over time.”

Risks are calculated for the amount a 35-pound – or four-year-old-child – can safely consume each day.

Read more from this pesticide investigation:

• Can you wash pesticides off your food? A guide to eating fewer toxic chemicals

• Kale, watermelon and even some organic foods pose high pesticide risk, analysis finds

• Blueberries and bell peppers: six fruits and vegetables with the most pesticide risk

• What’s safe to eat? Here is the pesticide risk level for each fruit and vegetable

Fossil vertebrae unearthed in a mine in western India are the remains of one of the largest snakes that ever lived, a monster estimated at up to 15 metres in length – longer than a T rex.

Scientists have recovered 27 vertebrae from the snake, including a few still in the same position as they would have been when the reptile was alive. They said the snake, which they named Vasuki indicus, would have looked like a large python and would not have been venomous.

The lignite mine where the fossil was found is located in Panandhro, in the western state of Gujarat.

“Considering its large size, Vasuki was a slow-moving ambush predator that would subdue its prey through constriction like anacondas and pythons. This snake lived in a marshy swamp near the coast at a time when global temperatures were higher than today,” said Debajit Datta, a postdoctoral researcher in palaeontology at the Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee and the lead author of the study, published in the journal Scientific Reports on Thursday.

Because of the incomplete nature of the Vasuki remains, the researchers gave an estimated length range of 11-15 metres and 1 tonne in weight.

Vasuki, named after the snake king associated with the Hindu deity Shiva, rivals in size another huge prehistoric snake called Titanoboa, whose fossils were discovered in a coalmine in northern Colombia in 2009. Titanoboa, estimated at 13 metres long and more than 1 tonne, lived between 58m and 60m years ago. The largest living snake today is Asia’s reticulated python at 10 metres.

“The estimated body length of Vasuki is comparable to that of Titanoboa, although the vertebrae of Titanoboa are slightly larger than those of Vasuki. However, at this point, we cannot say if Vasuki was more massive or slender compared to Titanoboa,” said Sunil Bajpai, a palaeontologist, professor at Roorkee and the study’s co-author.

These huge snakes lived during the Cenozoic era, which began after the dinosaur age ended 66m years ago.

The biggest Vasuki vertebra was about 11cm (4in) wide. Vasuki appears to have had a broad, cylindrical body perhaps around 44cm wide. The skull was not found.

“Vasuki was a majestic animal,” Datta said. “It may well have been a gentle giant, resting its head on a high porch formed by coiling its massive body for most parts of the day or moving sluggishly through the swamp like an endless train.”

The researchers are unsure what prey Vasuki ate, but considering its size it could have included crocodilians. Other fossils found in the area included crocodilians and turtles, as well as fish and two primitive whales, Kutchicetus and Andrewsiphius.

Vasuki was a member of the madtsoiidae snake family that appeared roughly 90m years ago but went extinct about 12,000 years ago. These snakes spread from India through southern Eurasia and into north Africa after the Indian subcontinent collided with Eurasia about 50m years ago, Bajpai said.

This was a dominant snake family during the dinosaur age’s late stages and into the early Cenozoic before its diversity dropped, he added.

“Snakes are amazing creatures that often leave us stunned because of their size, agility and deadliness,” Datta said. “People are scared of them as some snakes are venomous and have a fatal bite. But snakes perhaps attack people out of fear rather than with an intent to attack. I believe snakes, like most animals, are peaceful creatures, and an important component of our ecosystem.”