Africa - INTER PRESS SERVICE

Aquaponics, an innovative practice in the fisheries and aquaculture sectors, is revolutionising the way of conceiving food supply in many MENA countries. This dated picture shows fish pools in Palestine. Credit: Eva Bartlett/IPS.

By Maged Srour
ROME, Dec 7 2018 (IPS)

The Blue Economy is becoming an ‘El Dorado’, a new frontier for traditionally arid and water-stressed nations in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), according to Christian Averous, Vice President of Plan Bleu, one of the Regional Activity Centres of the Mediterranean Action Plan developed under the United Environment Regional Seas Programme.

But against the backdrop of the enormous potential represented by the Blue Economy, there are numerous challenges and critical issues that the region faces. Overfishing, water scarcity, highly salty waters, climate change, high evaporation rates, the oil industry and pollution are just some of things that place at risk the development and conservation of marine and aquatic resources in the MENA region.

In addition, rapid population growth throughout the region complicates things. According to the U.S.-based Population Reference Bureau, “MENA experienced the highest rate of population growth of any region in the world over the past century” and is growing at a current rate of 2 percent per year. It’s the second-highest growth rate in the world after sub-Saharan Africa, the organisation says.

Population growth leads to an increased demand for fish as a food source and this, combined with poor regulations and rapacious fishing practices, ultimately leads to an overall decline in marine populations. Eventually it compromises the survival status of the Red Sea coral reef, which is already highly threatened by pollution, unsustainable tourism and climate change, (even though corals in this region proved to be resistant to global warming).

The MENA region has also had to cope with poor management of water resources, with agriculture using 85 percent of freshwater. Available freshwater in the region is mainly underground and its non-renewable stocks are being depleted, warns the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). Over the last four decades, the availability of freshwater in the MENA region has decreased by 40 percent and will probably decrease by 50 percent by 2050. The consequences could be disastrous in terms of food security, rural livelihoods and economies.

The Blue Economy: a way to overcome challenges and boost development?

“It is very important to promote an ocean-based economy in today’s world, as governments struggle for economic growth, [particularly] in the MENA region as well as in the whole Mediterranean region and in the Gulf countries,” Averous tells IPS. 

This means that countries in the region should not only seek to preserve aquatic and marine resources, but should also invest in these same resources to foster a process of economic development and growth through them.

Farmed Tilapia on sale in a Cairo supermarket. Local farmers from Egypt, Algeria and Oman participated in farmer-to-farmer study tours, visited 15 integrated agri-aquaculture farms, and learnt new skills and techniques from each other. Credit: Cam McGrath/IPS.

Fisheries and Aquaculture

But best practices across the region are demonstrating just how much these countries believe in the enormous potential of the Blue Economy. One example is aquaponics, an innovative practice in the fisheries and aquaculture sectors that is revolutionising the food supply in many MENA countries. Aquaponics is the combination of aquaculture — the practice of fish farming and hydroponics (the cultivation of plants in water without soil).

“While hydroponics still uses some chemical fertilisers to grow plants, with aquaponics, the fish themselves, through their excrements, fertilise the water allowing plants to grow,” Valerio Crespi, Aquaculture Officer in FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture Department in Rome, tells IPS.

Egypt, Algeria and Oman recently embarked on a cooperation project promoted by FAO, where local farmers participated in farmer-to-farmer study tours where they visited 15 integrated agri-aquaculture farms and learnt new skills and techniques from each other.

“It was a good experience,” says Basem Hashim, an Egyptian farmer and consultant for the General Authority of Fish Resources Development, a movement which tries to shape new ideas and actions for agriculture and food in Egypt.

Basem took part in the study tours organised by FAO and thanks to that experience was able to outline and understand the most pressing challenges for the farming communities in the region.

“We know the importance of using water properly and of improving production [not only in terms of quantity, but] also in terms of quality,” he tells IPS. “At the same time, I think there is still not enough awareness in Egypt in terms of water scarcity, pollution and waste, even though the government is working with associations to raise awareness and transfer experiences.”

“The study tours were a clear example of successful South-South Cooperation,” says Crespi. “The ultimate goal, which is what we are working on right now, is to draft a road map to outline the best practices to best use water in these areas where water is scarce. In the three countries we have created national teams that have produced three technical reports that will be the basis of the road map.”

Aquaponics is an incredible innovation also because it allows these communities to have, thanks to the fish that are raised in those structures, a source of protein that would otherwise be poorly available if not nonexistent in some of these countries.

“In addition, with the same use of resources,” says Basem, “we also have fruits and vegetables. This is what the future looks like.”

Tere are other countries in the region are known for their best practices in the Blue Economy, particularly in the aquaculture sector:

• Iran has long-standing experience with rice-fish farming, which is currently estimated by experts to be practiced in 10 percent of all rice fields in the country, on a total area of between 50,000 to 72,000 hectares.
• Lebanon has been practicing aquaculture for many decades and in 2017 total fishery production from marine capture fisheries and aquaculture were 3,608 and 1,225 tonnes, respectively.
• Fish farmers in Israel are developing innovative technologies and breeding methods which are revolutionising their industry. The excellence of Israeli technology is not used alone in breeding in the country but is also appreciated and exported all over the world.

Coastal and marine tourism

According to Plan Bleu, in the past 20 years the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) contribution of the tourism sector has increased by 60 percent in Mediterranean countries. The Mediterranean region is the world’s leading tourism destination. International tourist arrivals have grown from 58 million in 1970 to nearly 324 million in 2015. It is also among the most frequented areas by cruise ships in the world, with some 27 million passengers visiting the area by 2013. Therefore tourism has been a positive economic asset for the region. 

But as surprising as it may be, it is not so much industrial pollution that represents the greatest damage to the marine environment, but tourism that has a huge negative impact on the region.

Tourism is in fact one of the main threats to ecosystems in the area. Indeed, locals confirm that industries and cruises operating, for example, in the Red Sea are subject to harsh regulations but the main threat to the environment is posed by waste disposal, especially of plastic, and by the enormous water footprint that each tourist leaves behind.

Perspectives about the future

The Middle East certainly has many challenges to face in terms of scarcity of natural resources and food security. For this reason the economy based on maritime sectors in the Mediterranean and in the Middle East represents a crucial potential for the economic development.

“We do not have any ‘miraculous’ innovation. We simply have some technologies that, if associated to traditional methods, can stimulate a process of sustainable development, which is a key factor for those countries struggling for finding enough natural resources,” says Crespi.

“Moreover,” he adds, “promoting a policy of implementation of Blue Economy, could reduce the rural exodus of these populations from the countryside to the cities, or even the exodus across the Mediterranean to get to Europe, risking their lives often for not finding the much desired job and economic prosperity.”

• The first global Sustainable Blue Economy Conference took place in Nairobi, Kenya from Nov. 26 to 28 and was co-hosted with Canada and Japan. Participants from 150 countries around the world gathered to learn how to build a blue economy.

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The post Middle Eastern Countries Can Overcome Pressing Challenges By Developing a Blue Economy appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Current & expected electricity generation of African countries.

By Laura Gil
VIENNA, Dec 7 2018 (IPS)

Years back, nuclear energy was a fancy option limited to the industrialized world. In due course, nuclear could be an energy source for much of Africa, where only South Africa currently has a nuclear power plant.

Governments across the continent are devising development policies to become middle-income countries in the medium term. Socioeconomic growth comes with a rise in energy demand—and a need for a reliable and sustainable energy supply.

For industrializing countries in need of a clean, reliable and cost-effective source of energy, nuclear is an attractive option.

“Africa is hungry for energy, and nuclear power could be part of the answer for an increasing number of countries,” says Mikhail Chudakov, deputy director general and head of the Department of Nuclear Energy at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), an international organisation that promotes the peaceful use of nuclear technology.

A third of the almost 30 countries currently considering nuclear power are in Africa.

Egypt, Ghana, Kenya, Morocco, Niger, Nigeria and Sudan have already engaged with the IAEA to assess their readiness to embark on a nuclear programme. Algeria, Tunisia, Uganda and Zambia are also mulling the possibility of nuclear power.

“Energy is the backbone of any strong development,” says Nii Allotey, director of the Nuclear Power Institute at the Ghana Atomic Energy Commission. “And where do we get energy from? We have hydro, thermal, fossil fuels, and we have local gas—but these are dwindling. They are limited; fossil fuels could run out by 2030. And, the prices are volatile.”

For Ghana, cost-effective, reliable electricity is the entry point to higher-value-added manufacturing and export-led growth. For example, the country’s reserves of bauxite—the ore used to produce aluminium—are an important source of income, but for now it is exported raw.

“We have a smelter, but it’s not operating at full capacity because electricity is too expensive,” Allotey says. “If we had cost-effective electricity, we would not be exporting raw bauxite, but exporting smelted bauxite at a much higher price. This would be a big move for Ghana.”

Power to the people
African governments are working to make electricity more widely accessible. Roughly 57% of the population of sub-Saharan Africa does not have access to electricity.

For many, the electricity supply is characterised by frequent power outages, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA), an organisation of 30 mostly industrialised countries that have met a set of energy security criteria.

Kenya is considering nuclear to meet the demand generated by hooking up households nationwide, which is expected to contribute significantly to the 30% increase in electricity demand predicted for the country by 2030.

A successful nuclear power programme requires broad political and popular support and a national commitment of at least 100 years.

“For a long time in our country electrification levels were low, but the government has put in a lot of efforts towards electrifying the entire country,” says Winfred Ndubai, acting director of the Kenya Nuclear Electricity Board’s Technical Department. “Even those areas that were considered to be remote are now vibrant. Within a period of about 10 years we have moved from [a] 12% electrification rate to 60%.”

Kenya depends mostly on non-fossil fuel for energy; about 60% of installed capacity is from hydropower and geothermal power.

Is Africa ready for nuclear?
“Going nuclear is not something that happens from one day to the next. From the moment a country initiates a nuclear power programme until the first unit becomes operative, years could pass,” says Milko Kovachev, head of the IAEA’s Nuclear Infrastructure Development Section, which works with countries new to nuclear power.

“Creating the necessary nuclear infrastructure and building the first nuclear power plant will take at least 10 to 15 years.”

A successful nuclear power programme requires broad political and popular support and a national commitment of at least 100 years, Kovachev added. This includes committing to the entire life cycle of a power plant, from construction through electricity generation and, finally, decommissioning.

In addition to time, there is the issue of costs. Governments and private operators need to make a considerable investment that includes projected waste management and decommissioning costs.

Kovachev points out that “the government’s investment to develop the necessary infrastructure is modest relative to the cost of the first nuclear power plant. But [it] is still in the order of hundreds of millions of dollars.”

Financing nuclear energy
Without proper financing, nuclear is not an option. “Most countries in Africa will find it difficult to invest this amount of money in a nuclear power project,” Kovachev stresses.

“But there are financing mechanisms like, for instance, from export agencies of vendor countries. Tapping into a reliable, carbon-free supply of energy when vendors are offering to fund it can make sense for several countries in Africa.”

Another aspect to consider is the burden on the electrical grid system of the country. Nuclear power plants are connected to a grid through which they deliver electricity. For a country to safely introduce nuclear energy, the IAEA recommends that its grid capacity be around ten times the capacity of its planned nuclear power plant.

For example, a country should have a capacity of 10,000 megawatts already in place to generate 1,000 megawatts from nuclear power.

Few countries in Africa currently have a grid of this capacity. “In Kenya, our installed capacity is 2,400 megawatts—too small for conventional, large nuclear power plants,” Ndubai says. “The grid would need to increase to accommodate a large unit, or, alternatively, other, smaller nuclear power plant options would need to be explored.”

One option is to invest in small modular reactors (SMRs), which are among the most promising emerging technologies in nuclear power. SMRs produce electric power up to 300 megawatts per unit, or around half of a traditional reactor and their major components can be manufactured in a factory setting and transported to sites for ease of construction.

While SMRs are expected to begin commercial operation in Argentina, China and Russia between 2018 and 2020, African countries are still wary of such a project.

“One of the things we are very clear about in terms of introducing nuclear power is that we do not want to invest in a first-of-a-kind technology,” Ndubai says. “As much as SMRs represent an opportunity for us, we would want them to be built and tested elsewhere before introducing them in our country.”

Joining a regional grid is another option. “Historically, it has been possible to share a common grid between countries,” Kovachev explains. “But, of course, this requires regional dialogue.” One example of such a scheme is the West African Power Pool, created to integrate national power systems in the Economic Community of West African States into a unified regional electricity market.

Another factor militating against a headlong rush into nuclear power is popular rejection of projects that are costly and hard to finance.

Also, countries are wary that in the event of a nuclear power plant accident, released radioactive materials will harm the environment and lives. Although no fatalities were recorded in the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan in March 2011 following the Tōhoku earthquake, the release of radioactive materials forced the evacuation of tens of thousands of residents.

IAEA assistance
While the IAEA does not influence a country’s decision about whether to add nuclear power to its energy mix, the organisation provides technical expertise and other pertinent information about safe, secure and sustainable use to countries that opt for nuclear energy.

Safety and security are key considerations in the IAEA Milestones Approach, a phased method created to assist countries that are assessing their readiness to embark on a nuclear power programme. The approach helps them consider aspects such as the legal framework, nuclear safety, security, radiation protection, environmental protection and radioactive waste management.

“Many, many people ask the question: Why nuclear?” Allotey says. “To me, it’s not about nuclear being an option. It is about energy being an option. Do you, as a country, need energy? And the simple answer is yes. So if you need energy, you need to find cost-effective electricity that is clean and reliable.”

“With a rapidly expanding population and plans to grow our economies, we need to work within these constraints,” he adds. “We are a continent that is in dire need of energy.”

The post Is Africa Ready for Nuclear Energy? appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Laura Gil, Africa Renewal

The post Is Africa Ready for Nuclear Energy? appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Credit: Raising Voices

By Comfort Mussa
YAOUNDÉ, Dec 6 2018 (IPS)

Ten years ago when I set out on a career in media, my dream was to work for a TV station. The first prospective employer I came across invited me to an interview in his hotel room.

As badly as I wanted the position, I had to give it up since it required a hotel room interview. Stories about employers demanding sexual favors for job opportunities were and are still very common in Cameroun.

Even before I had my foot in the door of my career, I was welcomed to a work landscape where sexual harassment at work was widespread. I went into this career “combat ready” having heard too many stories about what is expected from or done to women in the sector. Unfortunately, many women continue to go to work each day ready to fight off harassers. This constant battle is exhausting.

As widespread as sexual harassment is in corporate Cameroon, denouncing it is a herculean task for many women who are faced with the options of either enduring the harassment and keeping their jobs, or speaking out and going hungry

I settled for a radio job, gotten by merit. One afternoon as I was entering the studio, my colleague on the shift before mine was leaving. When I entered the studio, he closed the door and insisted on kissing me. I resisted and pushed him away. Other colleagues (males) in the technician’s booth watched it happen and laughed throughout. I was angry, disgusted and helpless. Colleagues laughed it off as a joke. The station at the time had no policy or provisions on how to handle cases of sexual harassment. Reporting sexual harassment in an organization with no internal tools or processes to deal with it, amounts to little or no action at all.

Many organizations do not have gender policies. In a recent report about sexual harassment at the African Union, interviewees said “…reporting incidents of sexual harassment was often counterproductive as there was no process internally to do so because the AUC does not have a sexual harassment policy”.

It isn’t just the lack of good corporate policies; it is the presence of patriarchal work culture and exploitation that makes it conducive for harassment to thrive. I remember, a colleague from another media house who was often assigned to go interview a particular business man in town or source for adverts from his company because she had broad hips and the business man had a known weakness for women built like that. Each time she was tasked with such assignments, she was told to “use her assets to secure funds for the organization”. She quit the job.

Forms of harassment at work are varied and include displaying inappropriate sexual images or posters in the workplace, telling lewd jokes, making inappropriate sexual gestures, staring in a sexually suggestive or offensive manner, making sexual comments about appearance, clothing, or body parts, inappropriate touching, including pinching, patting, rubbing, or purposefully brushing up against another person, making offensive comments about someone’s sexual orientation or gender identity.

This year I and other women journalists in Cameroon launched a campaign dubbed #StopSexualHarassment237 to address the recurrent stories of sexual harassment in work places. Many #MeToo stories came out of this campaign. A few media bosses reached out to ask what they could do to make their organizations safer. Others trivialized the issue and blamed frequent harassment on how women colleagues dressed. Other bosses, queried their staff for even taking part in such a campaign in the first place – a big indicator of how toxic some work spaces are and the hindrances to breaking the silence on the subject.

As widespread as sexual harassment is in corporate Cameroon, denouncing it is a herculean task for many women who are faced with the options of either enduring the harassment and keeping their jobs, or speaking out and going hungry. Denouncing could lead to one losing her job, as perpetrators are often people in positions of power. This situation can be easily solved if we had more women in management positions. Unfortunately, top leadership in corporate Cameroon is still a men’s club.

Over the years I have learnt that ensuring my safety at work starts right from recruitment. One question I ask every prospective employer or company I have worked with is “Does this company have a gender policy?” I set that agenda for what I expect from the company. I advise other women to do the same. One’s salary is not the only thing to crosscheck on a work contract. Our safety and sanity are important too.

In the past few months of our #StopSexualHarassment237 and #MeToo campaign, we have found strength in our collective resolve. Our campaign does not only engage professionals but also students in university and professional schools where unfortunately stories of sexual harassment have been normalised. So normal, that instead of fighting to stop sexual harassment society finds ways to justify and live with it. This “normal” was learnt. It is our duty to teach ourselves a new normal and stop sexual harassment at work and in our communities.

 

 

This article is published as part of an online campaign by the Gender Based Violence Prevention Network, coordinated by the Uganda-based organisation Raising Voices, to prevent violence against women. Use the hashtag #16daysofactivism to join the conversation, or check out @GBVNet via Twitter or visit the GBV Facebook page

 

The post Ending Sexual Harassment in the Work Place appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Polish Mothers in Krakow. Polish artist Cecilya Malik began a campaign against the removal of the obligation for private landowners to apply for permission to cut down trees. Credit: Tomasz Wiech

By Daan Bauwens
GHENT, Belguim, Dec 6 2018 (IPS)

Unjustified extra charges on drinking water, exploitation of labourers in the countryside and uncontrolled property speculation. In Europe’s periphery, citizens’ initiatives show how all too prevalent modern-day ailments can be tackled successfully. More often than not with the help of artists.

Spring 2014.

Pressured by the European Union, the International Monetary Fund and the European Central Bank, the government of an Ireland suffering from imposed austerity measures decides to introduce an additional levy on drinking water. Spontaneous protest ensue. A single woman, waking up in the middle of the night when workers are installing a water meter outside her house, comes out and blocks their way whilst still her night gown. She manages to get them to leave without finishing the job.

The meter fairy

Thousands follow her example in the following weeks. Some are arrested and convicted. In the southern coastal town of Cobh, citizens set up guard posts on bridges and boats to inform other citizens when the water company is arriving and where exactly it’s heading. Soon the protest receives the support of the trade unions and political parties, leading up to a demonstration march of 120,000 people in October of the same year. Mass demonstrations are subsequently held all through the country, often ending in concerts by popular Irish artists.

The largest protest campaign the country had ever seen forced the government to reduce the proposed water tax by 75 percent. The water tax is currently still on the table, but the Irish now have got the “meter fairy”. Residents of a house where a new water meter has just been installed can text their address to a certain number. The same night craftsmen will come over and remove the meter.

Property speculation

“Let me conclude with a warning,” says Brendan Ogle, one of the leading activists in the protests, “while we are progressing in some ways, we are at the same time slipping back to the darkest of ages.” Ogle refers to the housing emergency in his hometown Dublin, where rents have risen so sharply that this year the city has become most expensive place to live in the Eurozone, leaping ahead of both Paris and London.

“We squatted in an empty building and started a community centre for homeless people where they could stay and sleep,” says Ogle. “The court finally ordered we leave building, stating that while the homeless emergency is important, it is not more important than the right to property. Last Thursday, the 24th person that we housed in the building died on the streets. This in only 16 months.”

It seems to be a trend in cities all over Europe: a housing market under pressure causes speculation, leading to growing numbers of homeless people. The state doesn’t act and the law is not on the side of those who want to solve the problem.

Summit for activists

The same happened to Maria Sanchez of Cerro Liberdad, an citizen’s initiative which occupied an empty Andalusian farm owned by a bank. Sanchez put local labourers to work in decent conditions in a region that suffers from poverty and exploitation, and in March of this year she was arrested. All traces that her movement had left in the farm were erased.

“I did what the government fails to do,” she says, “I told that to the judge. This was not a crime.”

Ogle and Sanchez were just two of the 90 activists from all over Europe present at the summit “The Art of Organising Hope” that was held in early November in the Belgian town of Ghent. At the summit they showed each other how exactly they realised their plans to fight injustice, with the emphasis on the practical side of things.

The summit was the culmination of a research all across Europe that a fellowship of volunteers, journalists, artists and activists undertook in 2016 and 2017. Thoroughly documenting 60 grassroots and civil society organisations, they looked for hopeful discourses, methods and practices to counter the present-day upsurge of Euroscepticism and indifference.

Radical imagination

In the final selection of activists to be present at the summit, the majority turned out to be from Europe’s periphery with an especially large representation from the Balkans. That was no coincidence according to initiator and organiser Dominique Willaert, artistic leader of the Ghent-based social-artistic movement Victoria Deluxe.

“Activism and imagination at Europe’s external borders is much more radical than in Western Europe,” he says, “we brought them here especially to fertilise us with their imagination. During our trips around Europe we noticed that people in the periphery don’t feel as though they belong to Europe. That is most noticeable in countries that have fallen victim to European austerity measures.”

“The difference between them and us is striking,” he continues, “in Western Europe we strive for consensus and negotiation with the government, many organisations depend on the government for funding, so they become policy implementers. The activism and imagination of the external borders is much more radical.”

According to Willaert, it is exactly that imagination and radicalism that Western Europe needs. “We must give citizens the feeling that they have power and can create movements that bring change. Powerlessness can mean the end of Europe.”

Polish mothers on tree stumps

In the citizen’s projects at the summit it was moreover apparent that a large number was led by artists. “In order to develop deep democracy, new methods and symbols are needed,” Dominique Willaert explains his team’s choice, “we must go beyond the idea of parliaments and elected representatives. There is a need for new stories and images that can fertilise communities and mobilise people. That requires the help of artists.”

And social media seem to be quite an effective to tool in bringing that about, it seems. At the main stage, Polish Anna Alboth and Belgian Leen Van Waes told the story of how their Facebook solidarity campaign for for Syrian civilians led to a march that mobilised more than 4000 participants from 62 countries. The Civil March For Aleppo lasted eight and a half months, passing through Europe on foot from Berlin to Syria, an action that got the organising team nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

The most mobilising image came from the Polish artist Cecilya Malik. In the beginning of January a controversial new law removed the obligation for private landowners to apply for permission to cut down trees, pay compensation or plant new trees, or even inform the authorities of the plans to cut down trees. Up until now, more than one million trees have been reported cut down with newly cleared spaces in cities, towns and countryside as a consequence.

“I knew I had to do something,” Malik says, “but I had a six-month-old baby. So I came up with the plan to sit on one of the stumps every day, let someone take a picture of me while I was breastfeeding and share that image on social media.” The Polish government did not reverse the law despite the hundreds of mothers following Malik’s example. But the media attention on breastfeeding mothers on tree stumps did lead to a surge in environmental consciousness with the general public. This way, a new draft law excluding the vast majority of NGOs from the consultation process on environmental projects, was shelved for the time being.

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*Interview with Rachel Kyte, Chief Executive Officer of Sustainable Energy for All, and Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Sustainable Energy for All. She was also the World Bank Group Vice President and Special Envoy for Climate Change, leading the Bank Group’s efforts to campaign for the Paris Agreement.

By Rachel Kyte
UNITED NATIONS, Dec 6 2018 (IPS)

The cost of renewable energy is low, and at times, less than fossil fuels. What are the barriers to switching to renewables?

Where current energy systems exist, they will need to be upgraded to be able to draw power from modern renewables and to exploit storage solutions that they require.

Rachel Kyte

The institutions and mindsets of current systems are still comfortable with the systems of the past, those that prioritized fossil fuels in centralized grid systems.

The revolution of renewable energy is not just that it’s clean, but that it can be delivered both through the grid as well as decentralized solutions, allowing it to reach those who have never enjoyed access to reliable and affordable energy before.

Yet this change requires political leadership and policy certainty for the levels of investment needed, and we need that renewable investment now.

Q: The recent Cooling for All report highlighted an issue many people didn’t speak of until recently. How does it relate to climate?

A: As the world warms and populations rapidly grow, particularly in the cities of the developing world, we risk creating ‘heat islands’ that could substantially increase energy demands as people seek cooling access for their own health and safety, as well as the safety of medical supplies, fresh food and safe work environments.

At the same time, if we rely on today’s cooling technologies that use high hydroflourocarbons (HFCs) in air conditioning, we will exasperate climate impacts from a growing use of short-lived climate pollutants.

In policy terms, providing everyone with access to the sustainable cooling they need, is the opportunity at the intersections of the Sustainable Development Goals, Paris Agreement and the Kigali Amendment.

In human terms, finding a way to provide hyper efficient pollutant free cooling for people, their vaccines and food is about making sure we leave no one behind. While the Paris Agreement reached almost universal ratification in record time, we now need member states to move with the same swiftness and determination to ratify the Montreal Protocol’s Kigali Amendment.

Q: Can governments, businesses and communities that embrace clean energy solutions survive economically, and where do you see the greatest impact of green energy solutions?

A: The scientific evidence presented in the IPCC report means that all governments, through meeting their fundamental responsibilities in providing a duty of care to their citizens, need to ensure that aggressive and comprehensive policies are in place to speed energy transitions towards clean, affordable and reliable energy for all.

For business, being able to be on the leading edge of this transition means being positioned for profitability, success in attracting and retaining talent, and ensuring that inevitable regulation – and in some cases litigation – is a risk that is understood and well managed.

All businesses must regard carbon as a toxin which needs to be avoided, mitigated and managed to not only support climate action, but help ensure their business is resilient to the ever-growing impacts of climate change.

Q: Can we realistically meet the needs of the just under 1 billion people who don’t have regular access to electricity through renewable energy?

A: Yes. As an immediate step, we all have to be much more efficient in our use of energy. We can provide for many more needs with much less energy through technological innovation and business models. Renewable energy gives us a cost-effective way to meet the needs of those who have never had energy before to help them become economically productive.

By putting the needs of the last mile first, we can build decentralized, digitalized and decarbonized energy systems that meet everyone’s needs. This is not beyond human ingenuity – the cost is estimated at just over US$50 billion a year.

Yet it requires political will and determination. When we consider that US$50 billion leaves the African continent through illegal financial flows, money laundering and tax evasion each year, we must work harder to ensure that the energy needs of these vulnerable populations – women, children, remote rural populations – can be met.

Q: How can we support low-income countries when it comes to innovation and strengthening infrastructure that allow for modern technology approaches?

A: First, we need to support countries put in place robust policy frameworks and investment climates that will spur both domestic investment as well as attract international investment. Secondly, development finance, in partnership with these countries, has to be directed to meet the needs of the most vulnerable.

Our recent Energizing Finance report clearly shows that finance is still not reaching the top 20 countries with the largest electricity and clean cooking access gaps – dramatically slowing down progress to meet global energy goals and our promise to these populations.

Thirdly, we need specific initiatives that provide energy to the growing number of displaced people around the world.

Finally, the 3 billion that don’t have access to clean cooking deserve an urgent response from the international community at scale that connects industries around different fuel sources with new financial innovation that means the billions of women living on low incomes have a range of clean fuel choices, as opposed to the dangerous choice to cook a family meal while putting their health and the health of their children at risk.

*The interview is part of an editorial package from the SDG Media Compact and released by the UN’s Department of Public Information.

The post The Revolution of Renewable Energy Needs Political Leadership appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

*Interview with Rachel Kyte, Chief Executive Officer of Sustainable Energy for All, and Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Sustainable Energy for All. She was also the World Bank Group Vice President and Special Envoy for Climate Change, leading the Bank Group’s efforts to campaign for the Paris Agreement.

The post The Revolution of Renewable Energy Needs Political Leadership appeared first on Inter Press Service.

In 2017 Sri Lanka was hit by the worst drought in 40 years. It forced thousands in Sri Lankans to abandon their livelihoods and seek work in cities. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

By Tharanga Yakupitiyage
UNITED NATIONS, Dec 6 2018 (IPS)

In midst of the 24th United Nations climate change conference (COP24), many are trying to double down in the search for practical, actionable solutions to the climate crisis: land itself.

Ahead of the ongoing COP24, the U.N. Environmental Programme (UNEP) launched a report warning that the international community’s pledges under the Paris agreement, known as nationally determined contributions (NDCs) are insufficient to keep warming below 2 degrees Celsius.

The greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and, thus, ambition gap has already lead to the current impacts of climate change that can be seen around the world and will continue to see for decades to come, World Resources Institute’s (WRI) global climate senior associate and one of the lead authors of UNEP’s report Kelly Levin told IPS.

“The ambition of current country commitments is not in line with the spirit of the Paris Agreement. If we continue to do what we are doing right now, we are going to see over 3 degrees Celsius warming,” she said.

“The urgency and need to act has has never been higher,” Levin added.

Environmental Defense Fund’s (EDF) Chief Natural Resource Economist and one of the report’s contributing authors Ruben Lubowski echoed similar sentiments to IPS, stating: “We are nowhere near where we need to be, and we need to do better both in terms of getting the NDCs on track and then ratcheting them up over time to go beyond that.”

UNEP’s annual ‘Emissions Gap Report’ found that governments must triple their efforts as emissions must be reduced by a quarter by 2030 to keep warming no more than 2 degrees Celsius and would have to be halved to read the 1.5 degree Celsius target.

Not only is there a gap, but the report also found that there was a rise in emissions in 2017 unlike recent years.

While much of the attention remains on the need to reduce fossil fuel use, land restoration and reforestation are often neglected as solutions to the crisis.

“I think that there is an underrecognition of how important the land sector in particular is right now…it is one of the most immediately available opportunities and relatively least cost,” Lubowski said.

According to the U.N. Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), the land-use sector represents between 25 to 30 percent of total global emissions.

Tropical deforestation alone accounts for 8 percent of the world’s annual carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. If it were a country, it would be the world’s third-biggest emitter.

Though land-use change emissions have remained relatively flat, action targeting the sector is “low-hanging fruit” that can close the emissions gap by up to 30 percent, Lubowski noted.

“Reducing deforestation has already proven to be the most viable large-scale solution. What’s needed I think is to go beyond these just sticks and try to introduce some carrots in terms of some positive incentives…And we haven’t even come close to exhausting that opportunity,” he added.

Moving Around The Money

Fiscal policy reform is among the most effective tools to create incentives for low-carbon investments and reduce GHG emissions.

“Both the traditional fiscal policies as well as creating these carbon markets and emissions trading programs have really a big part to play in land-use, particularly tropical deforestation,” Lubowski told IPS.

He pointed to ecological fiscal transfer as one such policy as it allows local governments to receive tax revenue and resources based on their performance on conservation.

The inclusion of conservation indices as part of decisions around fiscal allocation provides incentives for local municipalities to protect land and forests as well as resources to expand such protections.

Without resources, local governments may be forced to allocate land to agriculture, industry, and construction in order to generate revenue.

Only a few countries have implemented the policy with Brazil being the first to take advantage of the opportunity with its ICMS-E programme.

This has lead to a 165 percent increase in the extent of conservation area between 1992 and 2000—equivalent to an increase of more than one million hectares of protected areas.

For instance, Parana, a southern Brazilian state, devoted five percent of the municipal tax share towards the protection of biodiversity conservation areas and watershed areas and has since expanded its protected areas.

Brazil’s efforts in curbing deforestation as a whole led to the decrease of almost 30 percent of GHG emissions.

However, there are now concerns that the newly elected Jair Bolsonaro will reverse the country’s trends after advocating for the reduction in conservation areas, increase in mining in the Amazon, and even the abolishment of the Ministry of Environment.

Neighbouring Colombia has taken a slightly different approach to that of Brazil by implementing a tax for every ton of CO2 a company is responsible for emitting.

Revenue from the tax are allocated towards land preservation and sustainable development in rural communities.

The fiscal policy also provides an incentive for companies as they can be exempt from paying a carbon tax if they become carbon-neutral or engage in offsetting activities such as environmental projects.

A similar carbon offsetting and reduction approach is also being designed by the aviation industry which is could be responsible for approximately five percent of global GHG emissions by 2050.

The Future is Trees

Since the land sector make up approximately 20-25 percent of NDCs, it is increasingly important to implement policies towards restoration and conservation, Lubowski noted.
However, both Levin and Lubowski noted that this will not be enough to reduce the emissions gap and reverse trends.

“We need action in every sector. We need to step away from fossil fuel energy sources and move towards clean energy sources, we need to stop deforestation and restore our lands, we need to curb emissions from agriculture, we need to address transportation and have zero energy cities,” Levin told IPS.

According to the UNEP report, if all fossil fuel subsidies alone were phased out, it would lead to a 10 percent reduction of emissions by 2030.

“We know what the ingredients are for success, we know how to do this. It’s not going to cost a lot and it will actually bring significant [benefits]… it’s just a question of getting down to it,” Levin added.

“I am definitely worried about where we are, especially if we are thinking about 1.5, the land sector becomes even more important in terms of not only reducing emissions which is essential but also going negative,” Lubowski said.

He urged for more international cooperation in reducing emissions and greater focus on forestry as a way to ramp up ambition in a cost-effective way.

Levin highlighted the need for countries to scale up their commitments by 2020 and COP to step up.

“[COP] will be a really important moment to reaffirm the process for countries…it’s the first test of the spirit of the Paris Agreement and it needs to send a really clear message of enhancing ambition,” she said.

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Credit: Caroline Trutmann / UNDP

By Richard Barathe
PANAMA CITY, Panama, Dec 6 2018 (IPS)

María is a 35-year old Salvadoran woman with three young children. Growing up, María knew her mother but never met her father. When María was six, she started working at the Central Market of San Salvador and at the age of 12 she was raped and became pregnant for the first time.

Later, María was expelled from her home once her mother got married for a second time, “My stepfather did not want to take care of me, even less with a son”, she told the researcher for “Resilient Youth, The Opportunity for Central America”, a study developed by the Regional Project Infosegura, a UN Development Programme-USAID joint initiative.

María lived in many different places until she met the father of her second daughter- who was killed years later. After his passing, María had a third child with a third partner whom she soon separated from, due to domestic violence. Currently, María’s teenage son lives with her father, uncle, and grandmother since she simply could not take care of him while also working full time.

Richard Barathe

Women all across El Salvador, women just like María have a life expectancy of around 75 years. It is safe to say that about half of María’s life has been deeply marked by the violence that women experience in Northern Countries of Central America, a region that for the past two decades has seen chronic violence despite Central America not having a regional war in decades.

When speaking of violence in the Northern Countries of Central America, it is assumed to be a problem concerning young men, since “only” 11 percent of the victims of violent deaths are women. However, the story of María is more common than is realized.

María is just another example of how women of this region live surrounded by a violence that affects them differently and specifically just because they are women.

This violence is not necessarily lethal, and victims often survive, but these women continue to be subjected to the same cycle of violence throughout their whole lives, impacting families and communities through generations, affecting their economy and sustainability, and distorting their capacities for development.

Data shows that in María’s home country, 93 percent of the victims of sexual crimes are women. Over two in every five the victims are under the age of 18. We also know that domestic violence is present throughout the adulthood of a woman and that a woman between 12 and 50 years old is at high risk of “disappearing”.

Over 3,500 women have been killed between the years 2010-2017, while nearly 2,700 were reported as Enforced Disappearances around the same period (201-2016) with 43 percent of them being minors.

We know this because the Salvadoran State has made progress in the management of information on citizen security with a focus on gender and has oriented public policies to guarantee evidence-based analysis.

Migration is a phenomenon that also characterizes this region, and data indicates that violence against women is an important factor to be considered. Our initiative also analyzed returnees data: migrants detained in transit who were sent back to their place of origin.

We know that 26 percent of these ‘returnees’ are women and 30 percent of all women say they have migrated due to violence, compared to only 18 percent of men who say violence is the main reason for leaving their country.

Every November, national, regional, and global actors campaign to eradicate violence against women. It is crucial to recognize violence against women as an essential element of citizen security: tackling it is a key step to build more cohesive and peaceful societies.

Addressing general societal violence with a special focus on violence against women must be at the foundation of comprehensive public policies on citizen security, that aim to eradicate all types of violence. Understanding everyday violence that women experience in their homes and streets is a security problem for communities and nations.

No nation will be safe unless women can live safely and develop their full potentials.

In this spirit, the 2030 Agenda and the 17 Sustainable Development Goals provide a holistic model for a comprehensive approach to ensure that women have a life free from all types of violence. All of society thrives with firm steps towards development when no one is left behind.

At UNDP, we are systematizing good practices and success stories of the work in Central America within the framework of the UNDP-USAID Infosegura Regional Project, which is dedicated to the development of capacities for the formulation of public policies based on evidence and with a gender approach. We are, thus, establishing standards, methodologies and scalable processes.

An essential part of the process has been to build trust and coordinate our work with national institutions producing and analyzing data, leveraging new technologies, national experts and innovation.

This coordination has resulted in regional accomplishments in information management with a gender focus, such as specialized surveys and standardized reports on acts of violence against women.

In El Salvador, Guatemala or Honduras, understanding the context of María’s story as accurately as possible will allow us to efficiently eradicate violence against women as well as all other types of violence. If countries are to achieve the 2030 Agenda, boosting gains in the economic, social and environmental realms, this can only be done if we ensure that no “Marías” are left behind.

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Excerpt:

Richard Barathe is Director, UNDP Regional Center for Latin America and the Caribbean

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By Porimol Palma
Dec 5 2018 (The Daily Star, Bangladesh)

The November 15 attempt to repatriate Rohingyas to Myanmar has failed. And that was destined too, despite wholehearted efforts from Bangladesh. Although Myanmar officials were quick to blame their Bangladesh counterparts for the “failure”, the ground reality provided a different picture.

Not a single Rohingya, listed in the first batch of 2,251 verified refugees supposed to return to their country on November 15, volunteered to go home. On the contrary, many of them staged demonstrations against the move while some tried to flee the refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar.

The fear of brutality they were subjected to by the Myanmar military when they were displaced from their homes in the Rakhine state understandably gripped them. Interviewed, they asked some burning questions, “Why should we return? Do you want us to return to a death camp? Do you want us to commit suicide? Can you guarantee that we would survive once we return?”

The Rohingyas also demand that for a voluntary return, the Myanmar government should reinstate them in their original homes, guarantee citizenship, safety and basic rights, including health, education and freedom of movement.

Until now, Myanmar has done little to fulfil those demands or made a sincere effort to remove the fears through a reconciliation campaign between people of different faiths. Therefore, the tactic of blaming Bangladesh now is as baseless as it was when the repatriation did not start on January 23 under a bilateral agreement, when there was no arrangement for determining the voluntariness.

This time the UN Refugee Agency, through individual interviews, concluded that the refugees are not volunteering to return. It is an essential procedure for refugee repatriation. The agency, which is also assessing the situation in Rakhine state, said the conditions there were not conducive for the return of the refugees.

Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali, after a meeting with foreign diplomats in Dhaka on November 15, confirmed that Bangladesh in no way wants forced repatriation. Japan, meanwhile, proposed that a group of Rohingya be allowed to visit the arrangements in Rakhine—a proposal that goes in line with that of UNHCR—to see for themselves the conditions there and decide if they would return. Bangladesh is likely to take up the issue with Myanmar soon.

But how fruitful that attempt from Bangladesh—sincere in all its efforts for voluntary, sustainable and dignified Rohingya repatriation—would be with a country in complete denial is a big question.

The world has lauded Bangladesh’s efforts in accommodating over a million Rohingya refugees. Bangladesh is also braving immense socio-economic, environmental and diplomatic challenges because of a problem created by Myanmar since 1982 when it curtailed citizenship of the Rohingya and many basic rights though they have been living there for generations.

Myanmar argues that the Rohingya militant attack triggered the military campaign in August last year, but its argument is weak as there is a greater question why Myanmar’s military junta curtailed Rohingya citizenship in 1982. That’s the root of all the subsequent problems—communal tension between the Buddhists and Muslims in Rakhine and low level of development works in Rakhine state. It left the population there in sheer poverty. If militancy grows out of that deprivation, it is the Myanmar government that has to take the responsibility for that.

UN investigators and other independent researchers have concluded that citizenship, basic rights, including education, health and movement of freedom, recognising the Muslims there as Rohingya, repatriating them in their original places of homes and returning their properties are the fundamentals for a sustainable repatriation.

Myanmar, however, is only assuring them of providing national verification cards (NVC), which it says, is a pathway to citizenship. It says the refugees would be sheltered in transit camps and eventually taken to their original homes. Rohingyas, however, disbelieve the proposition.

They say accepting NVCs means they are migrants from Bangladesh. Rohingyas also argue that the 124,000 Rohingyas displaced in a communal violence in 2012 are still living in the camps. They too would be put in similar camps if they return to Rakhine under present conditions.

The Rohingya crisis has become a major global issue, which prompted big powers including the US, EU, and Australia, to impose sanctions against several high-ranking army officials. They are also weighing trade sanctions. The International Criminal Court has issued ruling that it can prosecute Myanmar for its “genocidal intent”.

These actions mean Myanmar is being isolated in the global arena. Also, the Association of South East Asian Nations, which maintains the principle of non-interference in domestic affairs, is speaking louder against Myanmar now.

Myanmar now has only one option—accept the demands of the Rohingyas and take them back to their homes where they can live a life without any discrimination.

The ball is now in Myanmar’s court.

Porimol Palma is senior reporter, The Daily Star.

This story was originally published by The Daily Star, Bangladesh

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Seamounts are filled with a diversity of ocean life including anemones, feather stars, octopuses, lobsters and rockfishes. Credit: Ocean Exploration Trust, Northeast Pacific Seamount Expedition Partners

By Stephen Leahy
UXBRIDGE, Canada, Dec 5 2018 (IPS)

Despite the deep, cold waters, newly discovered undersea mountains off Canada’s west coast are home to a rich diversity of life.

“When we reached a seamount (undersea mountain), it was often like we were entering a forest, only of red tree corals and vase-shaped glass sponges,” said Robert Rangeley, Science Director, Oceana Canada.  “These areas were filled with a diversity of other animals including anemones, feather stars, octopuses, lobsters and rockfishes,” said Rangely who led the expedition in July.

Oceana, a marine conservation organisation, along with the Haida Nation, an indigenous people, the Federal government department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada, and Ocean Networks Canada were partners in the first in-depth investigation of the recently designated Offshore Pacific Area of Interest. This is a 140,000 square kilometre region 100 to 200 kilometres west of Vancouver Island in the province of British Columbia.

This waters in this region are also home to the vast majority of Canada’s known hydrothermal vents, deep-sea hot springs at the bottom of the sea floor.  As seawater meets the Earth’s molten magma it gets superheated and rises up through holes or vents in the sea floor carrying with it minerals leached from the crustal rock below forming bizarre chimney-like structures. These vents are home to strange forms of life that thrive in a toxic chemical soup where temperatures can reach 350 degrees C.

The expedition spent 16 days on the water and discovered six new seamounts with ancient and fragile coral forests and potentially new species. Even scientists who have visited seamounts on other parts of the world were blown away by the abundance and diversity of life found Rangely told IPS.

The expedition team also found lost fishing gear on some of the seamounts. This gear entangles marine life and destroys fragile and slow growing corals and sponges. Seamounts are often targeted by fishing vessels because they attract an abundance of fish. The damage wasn’t from bottom-trawling vessels that scrape along the seafloor but from long-line fishing. The Cobb seamount just outside of Canada’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) has been destroyed by fishing he said.

Canada is working to create a new marine protected area (MPA) for most of the 140,000 sq km Offshore Pacific Area of Interest. Credit: Ocean Exploration Trust, Northeast Pacific Seamount Expedition Partners

Seamounts need protection to provide refuge for marine life and Oceana wants to see all of Canada’s seamounts closed to bottom contact fishing Rangely said. Fishing can still continue away from seamounts, and will benefit from the closures. When seamounts are protected from fishing or resource extraction, it increases the quantities of fish outside the area in what’s known as a ‘spillover effect’.

Canada is working to create a new marine protected area (MPA) for most of the 140,000 sq km Offshore Pacific Area of Interest. Half the region would be closed to fishing to protect seamounts and hydrothermal vents. The new MPA may be officially in place in 2020 to help Canada get close to its United Nations Convention of Biodiversity commitment of protecting 10 percent of its marine and coastal areas by 2020. Canada had protected less than one percent by 2017. However, the current government is rapidly ramping up the number of protected areas but conservationists say these protections are too weak and allow fishing or resource extraction.

For example a near 50,000 square kilometre marine refuge east of Newfoundland on Canada’s Atlantic coast is off limits to fishing was just opened to allow drilling for oil and gas.

Canada is also scrambling to manage its fish stocks that have seen years of steady decline. Just a third of the nearly 200 stocks are considered healthy, according to a 2018 audit report by Oceana. Canada is a major fish and seafood exporter, with exports reaching C$6.9 billion in 2017.

After a decade of deep cutbacks by a previous government, Canada’s fisheries department under the Trudeau government is struggling to catch up. Most of the 26 critically endangered stocks do not have rebuilding plans in place the Oceana report found.

Last week the Canadian government announced $107.4 million over five years for rebuilding and assessments of fish stocks across Canada.

In a statement Oceana Canada’s Executive Director, Josh Laughren called this a critical investment addressing the urgent challenge of rebuilding depleted fisheries and rebuilding abundance.

• The first global Sustainable Blue Economy Conference took place in Nairobi, Kenya from Nov. 26 to 28 and was co-hosted with Canada and Japan. Participants from 150 countries around the world gathered to learn how to build a blue economy.

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On the doorstep of finalizing the roadmap to implementing the Paris Agreement, the water community is coming together to leverage opportunities and awareness about water’s role in tackling climate change.

By Maggie White
STOCKHOLM, Dec 5 2018 (IPS)

Most people will experience climate change in the form of water – higher frequency and intensity of floods and droughts, an increase in waterborne diseases, and overloaded sewage systems that are unable to cope with new demands.

At the same time, water offers some of the best solutions for reducing our climate impact and tackling effects of climate change. Yet, the role of water is poorly understood and often forgotten in the international climate debate.

Maggie White

The Conference of the Parties (COP) 24 is taking place in Katowice in Poland 2-14 December and there is a lot at stake. The UNFCCC’s 2015 Paris Agreement set goals for reducing carbon emissions and assisting countries in adapting to the adverse effects of global climate change.

At the meeting in Poland, the parties need to agree on the “rulebook” for the agreement, i.e. how it should be implemented. But water is largely absent from the agreement. However, many of the parties who ratified the Paris Agreement made water a central component of their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs).

At the doorstep of finalizing the road map for implementing the Paris Agreement, the water community fears a missed opportunity to leverage water’s full potential to mitigate the negative impacts of climate change. With recent estimates saying that emissions must come down dramatically in the next few years, this is a risk the world cannot afford.

Similarly, the most powerful manifestations of climate change are water-related and if that is not acknowledged, it will be difficult for countries to respond adequately. Climate change will also exacerbate water quality and variability, through changed precipitation patterns and changes to evapotranspiration and ultimately the water balance.

Trees, landscapes and agriculture are, for example, key for reducing emissions and mitigating climate change. Forests and wetlands act as sinks and reservoirs of greenhouse gases and play a central role in the hydrologic cycle, filtering, storing and regulating surface and groundwater flows.

Forest and wetlands can also act as buffers and provide nature-based solutions to many infrastructure problems that increasingly need to be addressed by decision-makers, not least to make human settlements more resilient to floods and droughts.

To ensure sustainable development, food security and economic stability in face of climate change, it is essential that water is acknowledged and integrated into efforts to mitigate climate change and adapt to its adverse effects.

To take action is also a question of climate justice; the people most affected by effects of climate change are seldom themselves causing major emissions. Yet, at the same time they can be strong agents of change. Inclusion of marginalized groups and stakeholders is consequently key in resilient decision and policy making.

The Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI) and AGWA, a network hosted and co-chaired by SIWI, are honoured to be official co-coordinators of the MPGCA (Marrakech Partnership for Global Climate Agenda) at COP24.

Along with other partners, we have organised several climate resilient water related events. See our activities on our SIWI at COP webpage, and follow our activities on social media using #SIWIatCOP.

Learn more about AGWA here.

View the UNFCCC’s MPGCA webpage.

Visit the COP24 event page.

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Excerpt:

Maggie White is Senior Manager - International. Policies, Swedish Water House

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Hans Friederich at a Chinese bamboo plantation. Photo Courtesy of INBAR

By Jamila Akweley Okertchiri
ACCRA, Dec 5 2018 (IPS)

The bamboo industry in China currently comprises up to 10 million people who make a living out of production of the grass. But while the Asian nation has significant resources of bamboo — three million hectares of plantation and three million hectares of natural forests — the continent of Africa is recorded to have an estimated three and a half million hectares of plantations, excluding conservation areas.

This means that there is a possibility of creating a similar size industry in Africa, according to International Network for Bamboo and Rattan (INBAR) director general Dr. Hans Friederich.

“In China, where the industry is developed, we have eight to 10 million people who make a living out of bamboo. They grow bamboo, manufacture things out of bamboo and sell bamboo poles. That has given them a livelihood and a way to build a local economy to create a future for themselves and their children,” he tells IPS.

INBAR is the only international organisation championing the development of environmentally sustainable bamboo and rattan. It has 44 member states — 43 of which are in the global south — with the secretariat headquarters based in China, and with regional offices in India, Ghana, Ethiopia, and Ecuador. Over the years, the multilateral development organisation has trained up to 25,000 people across the value chain – from farmers and foresters to entrepreneurs and policymakers.

Excerpts of the interview follow:

Africa is estimated to have three and a half million hectares of bamboo. While China has about six million hectares of natural forests, almost double the size of Africa’s, experts say there is potential for developing the industry on the continent. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

Inter Press Service (IPS): What has been INBAR’s Role in the South-South Cooperation agenda?

Dr. Hans Friederich (DHF): In fact, a lot of our work over the last 21 years is to link our headquarters in China with our regional offices and our members around the world to help develop policies, put in place appropriate legislation and regulations to build capacity, train local people, provide information, and carry out real field research to test new approaches to manage resources in the most efficient way.

I think we [have been] able to help our members more effectively and do more in the way of training and capacity building. I also hope we can develop bamboo and rattan as vehicles for sustainable development with our member countries around the world, especially in the Global South.

IPS: What are the prospects for Africa’s bamboo and rattan industry?

DHF: The recorded statistics say that Africa has about three and half million hectares of bamboo, which excludes conservation [areas].

So, if I were to make a guess, Africa has as much bamboo as China [excluding China’s natural forests] and that means theoretically, we should have the possibility of creating an industry as large as China’s in Africa. That means an industry of 30 billion dollars per a year employing 10 million people.

IPS: How is INBAR helping to develop such a huge potential in Africa?

DHF: The returns we are seeing in China may not happen overnight in Africa, China has had 30 to 40 years to develop this industry.

But what we are doing is working with our members in Africa to kick off the bamboo value chain to start businesses and help members make the most out of these plants.

IPS: Working with countries from the global south means replication of best practices and knowledge sharing among member states. Are there any good examples worth mentioning?

DHF: China is the world’s leading country when it comes to the production and management of bamboo so we have a lot to learn from China. Fortunately China has the financial resources that makes it easy to share that information and knowledge with our members …Looking at land management activities in Ghana, as an example, I think bamboo can really help in restoring lands that have been damaged through illegal mining activities.

Maybe that is actually where we can learn from other African countries because we are already looking at how bamboo can help with the restoration of degraded lands in Ethiopia.

Also, when we had a training workshop in Cameroon last year and we looked at architecture, we brought an architect from Peru who shared his experience of working with bamboo in Latin America, which was quite applicable to Cameroon. So we are using experience from different parts of the world to help others develop what they think is important.

IPS: What is the most important thing in the development of the bamboo and rattan value chain for an African country like Ghana?

DHF: There are a number of things that we can do. One area that Ghana is already working on with regards to bamboo and rattan, is furniture production. I know that there is fantastic work being done with skills development.

The value chain of furniture production is an area where Ghana already has a lot to offer. But if we can improve quality, if we can make the furniture more interesting for consumers, through skills training [of artisans], then that is an area where we can really help.

IPS: Which other opportunity can Ghana look at exploring in the area of Bamboo and Rattan value chain?

DHF: Another area of opportunity is to use bamboo as a source of charcoal for household energy. People depend on charcoal, especially in rural areas in Ghana, but most of the charcoal comes from often illegally-cut trees.

Instead of cutting trees we can simply harvest bamboo and make charcoal from this, which is a legally produced source.

The great thing about Bamboo is that it re-grows the following growing season after harvesting, so it is a very sustainable source of charcoal production.

IPS: What does the future look like for INBAR?

DHF: Two months ago Beijing hosted the China Africa Forum and we were very, very pleased to have read that the draft programme of work actually includes the development of Africa’s bamboo industry. There is a paragraph that says China and Africa will work together to establish an African training centre.

We understand this will most likely be in Ethiopia and it will happen hopefully in the coming years.

Another thing is that China and Africa will work closely together to develop the bamboo and rattan industry. They will also develop specific activities on how to use bamboo for land restoration and climate change mitigation and to see how bamboo can help with livelihood development in Africa in partnership with China.

This is a very exciting development, a new window of opportunity has opened for us to work together to develop bamboo and rattan in Africa.

 

Related Articles

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• When a Grass Towers over the Trees

The post Q&A: Creating an African Bamboo Industry as Large as China’s appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

IPS correspondent Jamila Akweley Okertchiri interviews DR. HANS FRIEDERICH, Director General of the International Network for Bamboo and Rattan (INBAR)

The post Q&A: Creating an African Bamboo Industry as Large as China’s appeared first on Inter Press Service.

The UN General Assembly will decide on any proposed cuts on US assessed contributions to the UN. Credit: UN Photo/Cia Pak

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Dec 5 2018 (IPS)

The speculation that the Trump administration plans to reduce its mandatory assessed financial contributions to the UN’s regular budget was implicitly confirmed when the US president told delegates last September that Washington “is working to shift more of our funding, from assessed contributions to voluntary contributions, so that we can target American resources to the programs with the best record of success.”

Any such reduction in the scale of assessment – which is based on each country’s “capacity to pay” — will not only undergo a long-drawn-out negotiating process but will also have a significant impact on the day-to-day operations of the world body.

But that resolution may be adopted by the 193-member General Assembly if the US resorts to strong-arm tactics — as US Ambassador Nikki Haley once threatened to “take down names” and cut American aid to countries that voted for a resolution condemning US recognition of Jerusalem as the new Israeli capital.

At a press conference announcing her decision to step down as US ambassador to the UN, Haley told reporters last October that that during her two year tenure “we cut $1.3 billion in the UN’s budget. We’ve made it stronger. We’ve made it more efficient.”

At the same time, the US has slashed its contribution to the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) , from $69 million in 2016 to zero in 2017, and cut $300 million in funds to the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), aiding Palestinian refugees.

The US, which pulled out of the Human Rights Council last June, has also threatened to “defund” the Geneva-based Council.

Scott Paul, Oxfam America’s Humanitarian Policy Lead, told IPS the Trump administration’s recent threats to cut funding for and cooperation with the UN undercut the world’s most important mechanism for reducing the risk of conflict, addressing acute humanitarian needs and building a better, safer world.

“Cutting US contributions not only undermines the effort to prevent conflict and end poverty; it limits the ability of the US to make it better and revitalize it to meet today’s challenges,” he pointed out.

Paul said responses to forgotten crises like the Central African Republic (CAR) and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are both less than 50% funded, “and we will likely see major humanitarian crises even less funded than they are right now”.

“With less reliable funding, when new crises emerge in the future, there will less capacity to respond to help the world’s most vulnerable people survive and live with dignity”.

“We hope other countries will step up to save lives in humanitarian crises, but the US is leaving a big gap to fill, and families caught in crisis will pay the price,” declared Paul.

However, the proposed reduction in assessed contributions by the US has to be approved by the UN’s Administrative and Budgetary Committee (the Fifth Committee), the Committee on Contributions and finally endorsed by the General Assembly.

Currently, the US makes the largest single contribution, paying 22 percent of the UN’s regular budget, which also give the US plenty of financial clout not only to demand some of the highest ranking jobs in the world body but also dominate discussions on the biennial budget, which is estimated at $5.4 billion for 2018-2019.

Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury, a former UN Under-Secretary-General and one-time President of the Security Council, told IPS that to have an agreement on reducing the scale approved by the General Assembly is a very complex and complicated process.

The proposal to reduce the scale by a country, particularly with a sizeable contribution, like the US, would mean increase in the contribution of other countries as the scale for all countries together adds up to 100 percentile points.

“It is a zero-sum situation,” he added.

According to this formula, besides the 22% contribution by the US, the percentage for the other major contributors include: Japan 9.7 %, China 7.9%, Germany 6.4%, France 4.9 %, UK 4.5%, Italy 3.7% and Russia 3.1%.
The poorest countries of the world pay 0.001% of the UN budget, whereas the Least Developed Countries (LDCs), described as the poorest of the poor, have a cap of 0.01% each.

Ambassador Chowdhury pointed out that a Member State proposing reduction needs to go through a painstaking and arduous process of bargain-laden negotiating process. It needs consistency, expertise and collegiality in going through the process till its objective of reduction in the scale is achieved.

Very importantly, he noted, the Permanent Representative of that Member State needs to be personally involved and lead the process throughout.

“The whole scenario for this unfolds as a Fifth Committee exercise at the UN – but also at the bilateral/regional levels for influencing that exercise. This is a tall order.”

The last time such an exercise was undertaken for the reduction of the US scale, from 25 percent to 22.5 percent, Ambassador Chowdhury was very closely following that process, as US Ambassador Richard Holbrooke was leading that effort on behalf of his country “in a masterful way using all kinds of avenues and leverages available to him.”

“That kind of tenacity, perseverance, skillful diplomatic maneuvers and personal relationship built with many of his counterparts from other nations at UN during his tenure is a rare combination.”

“As I was chairing the Fifth Committee in 1997-98 during the 52nd UN General Assembly session– and the scale of assessment and the biennium budget were both on the agenda– Richard kept in regular touch and sought clarification from me on many related issues.”

“That gave me an insight into the way his patient step-by-step strategy was bringing him close to his objective and finally, it was achieved without much acrimony and hard feeling,” Ambassador Chowdhury added.

At a press conference last October, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres– in response to a question on proposed US funding cuts– told reporters: “Until now, the United States has not put into question the assessed contributions to the United Nations”.

He said there have been decisions to withdraw support from different agencies whose work is not agreed by the United States, but there has not been a disruption of the funding from the assessed contributions, both for the normal function of the Secretariat and of peacekeeping.

“And, of course, we are doing everything we can in order to make sure that we can overcome the difficulties that have happened in relations to agencies like UNRWA [UN Relief and Works Agency] or UNFPA [UN Population Fund] that we consider to have a very important function that needs to be maintained,” he added.

Meanwhile, US National Security Adviser John Bolton rejected the argument that Washington will not be able to cut funding to the Human Rights Council because the Council’s operating expenses are funded through assessed contributions.

In an interview with Associated Press (AP), Bolton was quoted as saying: “We’ll calculate 22 percent of the Human Rights Council and the High Commissioner’s budget, and our remittances to the UN for this budget year will be less 22 percent of those costs — and we’ll say specifically that’s what we’re doing.”

Ambassador Chowdhury told IPS that another important element in his scale-reduction strategy by Holbrooke was a carrot –- namely paying up of all US arrears to UN amounting to $300 million plus, blocked by US Senator Jesse Helms as Chairman of Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

“That was also a considerable inducement.”

“In this context, I would say that it is nothing new for the UN to suffer due to US actions for not paying the assessed annual contribution on time, withholding part of the contribution on some excuse, proposing the reduction of the scale (in fact. since UN founding, US scale has come down from 30 percent to current 22 percent) etc.”

“I believe it would be smart on the part of the general UN membership and UN’s Senior Management leadership not to succumb to such eventualities as the US decides to lessen its multilateral engagements.”

“Yes, I agree that on time, in full and without condition payment of assessed contribution is a Charter obligation. But UN has not done anything to enforce this obligation.”

He said “contribution or absence of it” by the largest payer and the host country of UN should not have a negative impact on the policy direction and activities of the world body.

The UN needs to internalize the culture of doing more with less – motivation and inspiration to be of service to humanity should not be dependent on availability of “funds” only, he declared.

The writer can be contacted at thalifdeen@ips.org

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By Jan Lundius
Stockholm/Rome, Dec 5 2018 (IPS)

Why do we still need to be concerned about a war that ended a hundred years ago? Sure, it caused the death of at least 37 million people, but why bother about that now? Anyhow France´s president Emmanuel Macron believed it was worthwhile to commemorate the end of World War I and seventy world leaders were invited to attend the centennial ceremony by Paris´s Arc de Triomphe.

In pouring rain Macron delivered a speech in which he reminded the gathered leaders that “old demons” were once again emerging all over the world, threatening peace and global co-operation. A common theme for these forces is Nationalism. We all know what that is all about – an intense form of loyalty to one’s country, or to what is often labelled as “our people”, exaggerating the value and importance of our own nation, placing its interests above those of other countries.

In his speech Macron declared that: “Patriotism is the exact opposite of nationalism, which in fact is a betrayal of patriotism. By saying ´our interests first; who cares about the others?´, we erase what a nation holds dearest, what gives it life, what makes it great, and what makes it essential — its moral values.” Upholding moral values requires listening to others, efforts to co-operate and understand one another. We have to accept that the fate of all humans is intertwined and “giving into the fascination for withdrawal, isolationism, violence and domination would be a grave error” for which future generations will hold us all accountable.

Listening to this speech was the US President Donald Trump, a leader who once tweeted about Kim Jong Un: “Will someone from his depleted and food starved regime please inform him that I too have a Nuclear Button, but it is a much bigger & more powerful one than his, and my Button works!” and who is supporting Saudi Arabia´s devastating war in Yemen. Present was also Russia´s president, Vladimir Putin, whose regime supports a long-winding war in the Ukrainian Donetsk Oblast and bombed civilian targets in Syria. Trump, who like Putin proudly has ¬declared himself a nationalist, sat stony-faced during Macron´s speech, but smiled broadly as he exchanged a handshake with Putin, who flashed him a thumbs-up sign.

Like any other statesman Trump also gives speeches, maybe not as eloquent as Macrons´, but nevertheless quite forceful:

      You know what a globalist is, right? You know what a globalist is? A globalist is a person that wants the globe to do well, frankly, not caring about our country so much. And you know what? We can’t have that.

Why bother about all this? What is the use of remembering World War I? The reasons to this overwhelming affliction were manifold; political, territorial and economic. However, the main cause of the disaster was the growth of nationalism and imperialism, fuelled by a breakdown of the European power balance. The crumbling of the Austro-Hungary and Ottoman Empires. The unification of Italy and Germany, combined with a grave intoxication of nationalism, which appeared to have poisoned every European nation.

A case in point was England, with an anthem that declared Rule, Brittania, Britons never, never will be slaves and where the press constantly warned about German, Russian or French aggression, as well as the Yellow Peril and the danger of losing admirable hereditary genetic characteristics due to the influx of and mixing with “inferior races”. Such “invasion literature” depicted the Germans as cold, cruel and calculating. Russians were described as uncultured barbarians. The French were above all leisure-seeking nonentities, while the Chinese were murderous, opium-smoking savages and Africans childish and underdeveloped.

Germans sang Deutschland, Deutschland über alles. Über alles in der Welt, Germany, Germany above all. Above all in the world and celebrated German culture as humanity´s most perfect creation, protected and backed up by a splendid Prussian war machine. In Russia, more than 80 ethnic groups were forced to speak Russian, worship the tsar and practice the Russian Orthodox religion. Africa, the Middle East and Asia were being “carved up” and economically exploited by European powers, while people of almost every ethnic European group were convinced that they, their nation, or the one they aspired to create, occupied or would be destined to obtain a position of cultural, economic and military supremacy. With provocative remarks and high-flown rhetoric, politicians, diplomats, authors and journalists contributed to this divisive and eventually destructive mind set.

The result? Millions of dead, wounded, bereaved, bewildered and starving people all over the world. Did humanity learn anything? Twenty years after the armistice a great part of the world was plunged into the abyss of another devastating war, even worse than the first one. And now? Have we learned anything? What are we doing now? We are once again listening to the siren song of nationalists. Please – let us take warning from what has happened before and pay attention to other tunes:

Where have all the soldiers gone, long time passing?
Gone to graveyards, everyone.
Oh, when will they ever learn?
                                     (Pete Seeger & Joe Hickerson)

Jan Lundius holds a PhD. on History of Religion from Lund University and has served as a development expert, researcher and advisor at SIDA, UNESCO, FAO and other international organisations.

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Developing countries, especially those from Africa, want the elements of the Paris rulebook to be as unambiguous as possible to avoid past deliberate oversights that have rendered impotent previous pacts aimed at addressing climate change. Anne Holmes/ GraziaNeri - Italy/IPS

By Mithika Mwenda
NAIROBI, Dec 5 2018 (IPS)

An African delegation is in the Polish city of Katowice to join 30,000 delegates and thousands others from almost 200 countries attending the 4th edition of what has come to be known as annual climate change negotiation conferences organised under the auspices of the United Nations.

This year’s conference comes 24 years after the establishment of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, and it is the fourth since countries inked a deal in 2015 in France where after years of disagreements, adopted the Paris Agreement on climate change.

The two-week conference takes place at the backdrop of the alarm sounded by scientists working under the auspices of U.N.-mandated Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), whose special report released in October warned of dire consequences if the global community fails to put in place drastic measures to arrest the accumulation of climate-polluting emissions which cause global warming.

In its “state of the climate” report released few days ago, the World Metrological Organisation (WMO) indicates that the 20 warmest years on record have been in the past 22 years the global average temperature, and if the trend continues, the temperatures may rise by 3 to 5 degrees Celsius by 2100.

This spells doom for communities at the frontline of climate change impacts, but which may not be aware that the shifting seasons which are making it impossible for them to plant crops as they used to, the erratic rainfall which appears late and ends even before they plant, and are characterised by floods that wreck havoc in villages and cities, recurrent droughts which wipes their livestock and crops, are all manifestation of the changing climate which they should learn to live with in the foreseeable future.

Mithika Mwenda is the Executive Director for the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA).

The negotiations taking place in Katowice are aimed at discussing the best way possible to defeat challenges posed by climate change. Over years, discussions have centred on the efforts to reduce the green house gases believed to accelerate global warming, and how to live with the damage already caused while helping those who are unable to absorb the shocks emanating from climate change impacts.

At stake is the so-called “Paris Rulebook”, a framework of the Paris Agreement implementation which has already resulted into fissures between delegations from developed countries and poor countries. Developing countries, especially those from Africa, want the elements of the Paris rulebook to be as unambiguous as possible to avoid past deliberate oversights that have rendered impotent previous Pacts aimed at addressing climate change. On their part, industrialised countries are fighting to ensure the framework helps them escape their historical responsibility, which they successfully achieved under the Paris Agreement that seemingly has watered down the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities.

Whether Katowice will deliver a balanced rulebook or an eschewed framework favouring the powerful countries due to their manipulative, intimidating and/or carrot-dangling strategies will be judged in the two weeks. Throughout 2018, the Fiji Presidency has facilitated over a series of trust-building conversations meant to agree on contentious issues, including emission reduction levels by countries, support for poor countries and sources of money for such efforts.

The Fiji-facilitated interactions, known as Talanoa Dialogue, have been characterised by mistrust and normal rituals witnessed in all negotiations, and sceptics see no credible success in breaking the persistent North-South divide. Though Fiji has tried its level best to apply the spirit of “Talanoa”, which means, trust-building, the good intentions of the Pacific Island State have not helped to move the process forward.

Indeed, the president will be handing over the baton to his Polish counterpart with his only achievement being process-based “ where are we…where do we want to…how do we want to go there” ritual, which avoided to tackle the hard questions threatening to endanger the gains so far made in international climate governance system.

For African countries, any framework for the implementation of Paris Agreement that does not define the source of money and technology is hopelessly barren. Rich countries have turned the negotiations into market places to expand markets for their goods and services. In their effort to turn climate change into business opportunities, the industrialised countries and those in transition such as China, India and Brazil have encouraged their major transnational corporations to train their eyes on the emerging opportunities in the “climate sector”, where sectors such as “climate-smart agriculture”, “forest as Carbon sinks, “clean coal”, “climate finance, “low-carbon”, “climate resilient growth”, are gradually overtaking normal development discourse.

There is nothing wrong in turning the challenge of climate change into opportunities as the industrialised countries have vouched in the ensuing transformation where even international development assistance is conditioned. What is curious though is the fact that these conditionalities may disadvantage people already suffering the impacts of climate change. In addition, many donors are only interested in projects that are mitigation in nature, such as energy and major infrastructure projects which assure them on bigger profit margins. Adaptation, which does not have return for investment, is not attractive to many donor partners nor private sector investors.

A win-win framework in Katowice which considers the interest of industrialised countries and their businesses, as well as developing countries and their vulnerable communities to enable them transition to low-carbon, climate-resilient development trajectories without jeopardising the livelihoods of the present and future generations is thus the most suitable outcome.

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The post Call for a Win-Win Framework at COP24 appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Mithika Mwenda is the Executive Director for the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA).

The post Call for a Win-Win Framework at COP24 appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Yen Makabenta
Dec 4 2018 (Manila Times)

The climate change debate has become more complicated as the United Nations continues to double down on its forecast of climate catastrophe in response to near-global rejection of its warning.

The situation will intensify this December as nearly 200 countries meet for COP 24 in Katowice, Poland (the curious acronym stands for Conference of the Parties) to discuss a global plan of action against climate change.

Yen Makabenta

To defend against widespread skepticism and criticism of the UN climate agenda, climate alarmists are turning to former UK prime minister Margaret Thatcher for much-needed intellectual support in selling their program to scare humanity about climate catastrophe. She is a formidable figure to lean on (she was a major world leader during her time; and she got her training partly as a scientist).

In particular, they are quoting Thatcher’s words in a 1989 speech at the United Nations, wherein she sounded a call about the danger of global warming. The lady said then: “The danger of global warming is as yet unseen but real enough for us to make changes and sacrifices so we may not live at the expense of future generations… No generation has a freehold on this Earth; all we have is a life tenancy with a full repairing lease.”

Hot air and global warming
But there is a problem here. Thatcher, in fact, became a skeptic on global warming and climate change, and became even more so about the apocalyptic warnings that it engendered.

She devotes a chapter in her book Statecraft (HarperCollins, New York, 2002) to the subject. And she titled it “Hot Air and Global Warming.” She called Al Gore “ridiculous” for his “apocalyptic hyperbole” about the climate.

What a pity she is no longer around to brand the current surreal stewards of the United Nations!

Questions of a climate skeptic
Mrs. Thatcher left behind a lucid and knowledgeable exposition on global warming and the harebrained solutions that can help non-experts like yours truly in understanding the intricacies and implications of climate change.

She shows that skepticism is the sensible attitude to adopt towards the fevered claims and warnings of the UN and climate alarmists. It is a must once one is confronted with the grandiose claim that global warming is settled science.

Thatcher breaks everything down point by point.

The lady raises five key questions about global warming:

1. Is the climate actually warming?
This may seem obvious because of the media hype and climate politics. But the facts are in doubt. There seems to be a long-term trend of warming but, according to some experts, it is such a long-term trend that it is not relevant to current concerns.

A warming trend began about 300 years ago during what is called the Little Ice Age, and this has continued. It is recent developments which are more disputable.

Ground-based temperature stations indicate that the planet has warmed by somewhere between 0.3 and 0.6 degrees Celsius since about 1850, with about half of this warming occurring since World War 2. But against this, the temperature taken from weather balloons and satellites over the past 20 years actually show a cooling trend. The indirect evidence from rainfall, glaciers, sea levels and weather variability, often adduced to prove global warming, is similarly ambiguous.

2. Is carbon dioxide responsible for whatever global warming has occurred?
Here too the uncertainties are formidable. CO2 is not the only greenhouse gas. Methane, nitrous oxide, aerosols and water vapor — the most abundant greenhouse gas — make major contributions. So, exclusive concentration on CO2 either in analysis or in policy prescription is bound to mislead.

Still more important is the role of solar activity. Studies have suggested that increased solar output may have been responsible for half of the increase in temperature from 1900 to 1970 and a third of the warming since 1970.

Whatever we manage to do about CO2 and other greenhouse gases, we are not likely to be able to do much about the sun itself.

Human-induced global warming
3. Is human activity, especially human economic activity, responsible for the production of carbon dioxide which has contributed to any global warming?

The facts are unclear. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded in 1955 that “the balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate…However our ability to quantify the human influence on global climate is currently limited.”

Actually, not all scientists agree with the IPCC’s view. It is a great deal more tentative than some alarmist assertions.

In any one year, most CO2 production is not related to human beings. In fact, less than 5 percent of the carbon moving through the atmosphere stems directly from human sources.

4. Is global warming quite the menace suggested?
To doubt this is of course rank heresy, but one should at least start out with an open mind. In an ideal world, we would want a stable climate.

It is necessary to keep a sense of proportion. The world climate is always changing and man and nature are always, by one means or another, finding the means to adapt to it.

Earth temperatures today are probably at about their three-thousand-year average. And we have known periods of warming before. The Dark Ages and the Early Medieval period — about 850 to about 1350 — for example saw a sharp increase in temperature of 2.5 C.

There is only one thing worse than getting hotter — and that is getting colder. In the 1970s, after two decades of unusually cold weather, there was a minor scare about global cooling. Some of the same people now worrying about global warming offered broadly the same program of international controls to deal with the problem.

5. Can global warming be stopped or checked at an acceptable price?
At Kyoto, the United States answered “No,” at least to the proposals on offer. Perhaps the answer will always be “no.”

It will be necessary to resolve many remaining uncertainties before risking action that makes the world poorer than it would otherwise be by restraining economic growth.

If there were clear evidence that the world is facing climate catastrophe, that would be different, but such evidence does not so far exist.

What is far more apparent is that the usual suspects on the left have been exaggerating dangers and simplifying solutions in order to press their agenda of anti-capitalism.

Worries about climate should take their place among other worries — about human health, animal health, modified foods and so on. All require first-rate research, mature evaluation and then the appropriate response.

But no more than these does climate change mean the end of the world; and it must not mean either the end of free-enterprise capitalism

Lessons from predictions of global disaster
Thatcher ends her discussion of global warming with what she calls “the lessons from past predictions of global disaster.” They must be learned in considering the issue of climate change.

These lessons are:
1. We should be suspicious of plans for global regulation that all too clearly fit in with preconceived agendas.

2. We should demand of politicians that they apply the same criteria of common sense and a sense of proportion to their pronouncements on the environment as to anything else.

3. We must never forget that although prosperity brings problems it also permits solutions — and less prosperity means fewer solutions.

4. All decisions must be made on the basis of the best science whose conclusions have been properly evaluated.

Many new articles and commentaries on the UN climate agenda have jibed with Mrs. Thatcher’s critique of global warming. When taken together, these have combined to shape my skeptical view of global warming and the UN doomsday forecast.

I shall discuss in detail these articles and commentaries in my next column.

If the world is going to fade away in my lifetime, I figure that it is important to know what is happening than to just act surprised.

yenmakabenta@yahoo.com

This story was originally published by The Manila Times, Philippines

The post Why skepticism is the best attitude to take on UN climate catastrophism appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Arifa Noor
Dec 4 2018 (Dawn, Pakistan)

With the opening of the Kartarpur corridor, Prime Minister Imran Khan has been handed a diplomatic victory in his first 100 days, which beats his domestic score card hollow. But there are few who are willing to see this as a game changer in the stalemate that has been India-Pakistan relations in recent years.

Arifa Noor

The prime minister, of course, put a more optimistic spin on it. In his speech at the ceremony held on this side of the border, he brought up the old rivalry between Germany and France to illustrate that hope springs eternal.

In this, he is not alone. The European Union is an example used by many an optimist to suggest that a rosy future awaits Pakistan and India. But can the subcontinent follow the European example? The EU was not simply the result of a devastating war having inflicted such a heavy toll on two powers that overnight they opted for love and cooperation. Instead, the European Community as we see it was a long time coming, and continues to remain a work in progress.

It is important to recall how it began.

The first effort after the Second World War came in the shape of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) in 1951 and included six countries including France and Germany. And while it did expand trade between the member countries, it is not seen as a complete success. Its greatest achievement is seen as laying the foundation for greater cooperation and the Treaty of Rome, which established the common market for the member states.

The France-Germany example should not be seen to imply that the subcontinent can tread the same path.

Still, even the ECSC cannot be seen in isolation. It went hand in hand with Nato and the Marshall Plan which also encouraged European cooperation. But more than that, perhaps the world wars — and the lessons learnt from them — were the biggest motivating factor behind the ECSC.

Washington made it clear at the end of the Second World War that its aim was an independent Germany (after the disaster that was the Treaty of Versailles). For France, this meant that it had to rethink its past policies of invading German territory to ensure French security as had been done after the First World War. It now needed a new strategy — the alternative was the ECSC to ensure Germany could not use its steel and coal to build another ‘war machine’. In fact, after the end of the Second World War, the coal-dominated German region had been placed under an international body established by the allied powers, which was later replaced by the ECSC.

In other words, the idealistic idea of a united Europe was born of the necessities of realpolitik. There was some domestic opposition — Charles de Gaulle was an opponent of the ECSC. In Germany, political parties which aimed at a united Germany were against the community as they felt it pushed West Germany towards Europe.

And let’s not forget the biggest realpolitik reason of all — the threat from the Soviet Union, which is also seen to have provided an impetus to bringing the European countries together (as well as the rationale for Nato and the Marshall Plan).

In the subcontinent, at present, there are few parallels to draw — no outside external threat; no superpower assistance for larger cooperation; and, especially, no debilitating war which could have put paid to aggressive ambitions against one another’s enemies.

Here perhaps we have a slower process at work — an increasing realisation (especially on the part of Pakistan) of the need for peace for economic growth. Perhaps the harsh battle the country has fought internally has refocused some of its priorities — though this cannot at any scale compare to the devastation of the world wars.

In other words, there is no harm in using the France-Germany example to argue that long-standing enemies can move on to better relations and cooperation. But this should not be seen to imply that the subcontinent can tread the same path. Ours will be rather different — if and when it happens. Slow steps to improve the atmospherics (such as the Kartarpur corridor) and trade, rather than grand treaties providing large cooperative frameworks.

And this hopefully will slowly create a constituency for peace and an environment in which we can consider resolving the more contentious issues. A dispute such as Kashmir may have to become irrelevant before it can be resolved. This is to say that perhaps we shouldn’t look for a repeat of the Musharraf approach — to address Kashmir first.

As for the baby steps that can be taken, the film and cinema industry is a case in point. The cinema theatre industry in Pakistan would not have revived had the exhibition of Indian films not been allowed. Once the Indian films were exhibited, investors found it profitable to establish cinema theatres. The availability of cinema theatres in turn allowed local film-makers to make films, confident that they could be exhibited and a profit made (provided the movie was worth watching). And this led to the rebirth of the Pakistani film industry. And despite all this, the same industry (or parts of it) continues to also push for special favours for the local films vis-à-vis the Indian ones. But without the Indian films, would we even have Pakistani ones being made?

In fact, when Indian films were banned from cinema theatres towards the end of 2016 due to Pakistan-India tensions, it didn’t last long. The losses the cinema theatre owners faced necessitated a change within months.

This is one example of a peace constituency on our side of the border.

Is it wrong to assume that there can be more such examples of cooperation and trade? Small and unnoticed ones that quietly build up constituencies of peace? (Ideally, even Kartarpur should have been a quiet step so that it didn’t turn into a point-scoring exercise between the two rivals.) The power of quiet should never be underestimated.

The writer is a journalist.

This story was originally published by Dawn, Pakistan

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Community health worker Urmila Kasdekar performs a health check on a new born baby in Berdaball village of western India. In India, for example, where it is thought that as many as 120,000 babies alone die every year from sepsis caused by antimicrobial-resistant infections, doctors say two of the key factors behind rising AMR are pharmacies selling antibiotics without a prescription and poor infection control in overcrowded healthcare facilities. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS

By Ed Holt
BRUSSELS, Dec 4 2018 (IPS)

European Union officials and global health bodies have called for help for poorer countries as growing resistance to antibiotics threatens to become a ‘global health tragedy’ and jeopardises Sustainable Development Goals in some parts of the world.

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) has risen by as much as two thirds in the last two decades, according to some studies, and is now responsible for an estimated 700,000 deaths annually worldwide.

But this is projected to rise to 10 million per year by 2050 and cost up to 100 trillion dollars unless governments ramp up efforts to tackle it.

The growing problem with AMR has been put down largely to inappropriate use of antibiotics for both humans and animals.

As antibiotics have been used more widely and more frequently in both humans and animals, bacteria have built up resistance to them, rendering them effectively useless in some cases. Doctors say this would make routine operations more dangerous and certain medical treatments, such as for some cancers, would disappear completely.

When antibiotic resistance emerges in one place it also quickly spreads to other locations, meaning it must be tackled on a global scale.

While all World Health Organization (WHO) member states signed up to a multi-sectoral Global Action Plan on AMR in 2015, progress on its implementation has been mixed.

Some countries, notably in Europe, have made good progress, in other parts of the world things have moved much more slowly, if at all, raising fears that in poorer countries the problem is worsening and SDGs may not be reached.

EU Commissioner for Health and Food Safety, Dr Vytenis Andriukalitis, told IPS: “We need a global framework for tackling AMR in all regions, not just Europe. It needs to be dealt with because otherwise some countries won’t be reaching the SDGs.”

The size of the challenge presented by AMR in developing countries has been underlined in a slew of data and studies released during the World Antibiotic Awareness week last month (November).

An Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) study showed that while AMR rates averaged 17 percent in OECD countries in 2015, rates in India, China and Russia averaged 42 percent and were as high as 90 percent for some antibiotic-bacteria combinations.

Meanwhile, it said, AMR is forecast to grow up to four to seven time faster in some low and middle-income countries than in OECD states and in countries where healthcare systems are financially constrained, AMR is likely to cause ‘an enormous’ death toll, mainly among new-borns, infants and the elderly.

Another study earlier this year by researchers at ETH Zurich, the University of Antwerp and Princeton University showed that while global use of antibiotics in humans was estimated to have risen 65 percent between 2000 – 2015, use in low- and middle-income countries increased 114 percent.

Developing new antibiotics is complex – it has been decades since new classes of antibiotics were invented – and much of the focus in fighting AMR is being put on prevention.

The Global Action Plan is based on a multi-sectoral approach to AMR and charges governments with adopting national action plans involving improved awareness, understanding, surveillance, stewardship and prevention and control measures.

But in many developing countries, lack of funds in both healthcare and animal industries as well as weak legislation and enforcement are major barriers to those measures being effectively implemented.

In India, for example, where it is thought that as many as 120,000 babies alone die every year from sepsis caused by antimicrobial-resistant infections, doctors say two of the key factors behind rising AMR are pharmacies selling antibiotics without a prescription and poor infection control in overcrowded healthcare facilities.

Supporters of over the counter antibiotic sales in India argue that it is vital that antibiotics are available without prescription as there is a severe shortage of qualified doctors in many areas.

The government has tried to limit the sale of at least so-called ‘last resort’ antibiotics which are used when all others fail. However, the measure – putting a red line on boxes of the medicines in pharmacies to alert people – has been largely ineffective.

There are also concerns over the use of antibiotics in livestock.

According to the European Commission, in Europe, 70 percent of antimicrobials are consumed in food-producing animals. The figure is similar in the U.S. and is over 50 percent in China.

But monitoring antibiotic use in the animal industry in poorer countries is often more difficult.

“[Use of antibiotics in animal farming] is extremely difficult to enforce unless you have very good legislation and a system for monitoring,” Dr Nedret Emiroglu, Director Programme Manager, WHO Europe, told IPS.

While legislation on animal antibiotic use exists and is closely checked in developed states, particularly in the EU, in poorer countries it is sometimes absent or adherence is impossible to monitor effectively because of a lack of resources.

Despite the Indian government’s approval of a national action plan on AMR a year a half ago, critics point out that legislation and networks to control use of antibiotics for animal growth and tracking the sale and use of antibiotics in food production are, in reality, non-existent or ineffective.

The WHO has said that many middle- and low-income countries may need long-term development assistance to implement their AMR plans effectively and sustainably.

“We need financial support for low and middle-income countries,” Emiroglu told IPS.

She added this was crucial to ensure progress in one region of the world was not undermined by a lack of progress elsewhere.

“AMR knows no boundaries. What happens in one part of the world affects people in another,” she told IPS.

But many experts on healthcare in developing countries say a one-size fits all approach for all developing states will not work.

“Measures need to be different for different countries, especially when we are talking about poorer states. You cannot compare somewhere like India and Liberia,” Andriukalitis told IPS.

“In some countries they have problems with access to simple antibiotics, but in others there are problems because people are self-treating with no proper controls. In some places there is a lack of any basic understanding of hygiene and sanitation. We need long-term local strategies for [different] countries,” he added.

Meanwhile, AMR is putting SDGs in jeopardy in some places. Although AMR alone is unlikely to stop an SDG being achieved, left unchecked it could contribute to health, poverty and sustainable economic growth SDG targets being missed.

Longer hospital stays because of slower patient recovery and greater risk of treatment complications would put a massive extra strain on already struggling healthcare systems and worsen mortality rates and quality of life. Economies would be hit hard with the cost of not dealing with AMR forecast to cause a drop of as much as 3.8 percent in global GDP by 2050.

Meanwhile, AMR makes illnesses more expensive to treat and, as universal health coverage is limited in many poor countries and people have to pay out of their own pockets for treatment, these increased costs – as well as potential loss of income from morbidity and mortality – could drive individuals and families with limited resources into even greater poverty.

Dr Andrea Ammon, Director of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) which has been involved in monitoring AMR in Europe, told IPS: “​To achieve SDG3 [on health], AMR is not the only issue that needs to be addressed, but it is a crucial component.

“A high rate of AMR indicates that various elements in a health system may not be working satisfactorily because of a mix of factors. The factors causing high AMR rates could be cultural values, behaviour of healthcare providers and patients, regulatory issues such as OTC availability, or infection control. These factors may also prevent other targets included within SDG3 being achieved.”

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Credit: Benny Jackson on Unsplash

By Robert Muthami
NAIROBI, Kenya, Dec 4 2018 (IPS)

African countries have been at the climate-change negotiating table for more than 20 years. The continent faces some of the most severe impacts of climate change, but questions remain over its adaptive capacity despite this engagement.

African civil society organizations, trade unions and governments have advocated for three main means of implementation: climate finance for adaptation and mitigation; technology transfer; and capacity building.

The latter is aimed at facilitating and enhancing the ability of individuals, organizations and institutions in African countries to identify, plan and implement ways to adapt and mitigate to climate change. African countries are participating in the 24th Conference of the Parties (COP24) to the United Nations Framework Convention Climate Change (UNFCCC) currently taking place in Katowice, Poland from 2 to 14 December.

Through the Paris Work Programme (PAWP) expected to be adopted in Poland, African countries expect that COP 24 will deliver on the continent’s expectations with regards to facilitating climate resilience.

Climate finance for adaptation and mitigation
Climate change is impacting all economies in Africa, a continent highly dependent on agriculture. The impact is increasing the already high inequality, as resources meant for investment in social amenities are being channelled into climate-change adaptation.

In this case, due to climate change related disasters like droughts and flooding, there is an adverse impact on agricultural production—namely food insecurity. Therefore, resources meant to provide other services like universal and affordable health care, expansion of infrastructure and other social services for the poor are channelled to climate change response initiatives.

Panel Discussion for Kenyan Delegation Reflecting on the Progress of Agenda Items after UNFCCC-SB48. Credit: FES Kenya

During the COP 16, the world’s developed countries agreed to mobilize 100 billion US dollars per year by the year 2020 for adaptation and mitigation in developing countries. This is still a pipe dream as only 10 billion US dollars have been mobilized so far since the establishment of the Green Climate Fund (GCF) in 2006 to date.

Additionally, African countries continue to face difficulties in accessing the funds as they are on a perpetual treadmill of paperwork to even qualify to receive any of the funds earmarked for them. Is imperative of global social justice that this funding be fast-tracked.

As countries head to Poland, African nations approach the negotiations with the hope that issues dealing with transparency and accountability on climate financing will be made clearer and smoother.

Otherwise, African countries will be obliged to divert more domestic resources to meeting their commitments under their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC), which could affect other development priorities.

If promised international funding is not forthcoming and the shortfall needs to be made up from scarce domestic resources, this can mean these resources are no longer available at national level for example for social protection measures or food security. The decision in Poland should therefore be clear on provision, transparency and accountability of climate financing.

Technology transfer and capacity building
Many adaptation and mitigation solutions will require technology as well as financing, for the purposes of innovation and upscaling across various sectors. Technology transfer, therefore, is critical for African countries.

One of the concerns for African countries is the sheer lack of capacity to implement new technologies for climate-change responses. But Africa has the potential to also transfer technology to the north if the existing low carbon technologies that incorporate the already existing indigenous knowledge of African countries are expanded.

Therefore, a provision for reverse transfer from South to North with regard to technology should also be provided. At the moment the discussion is being handled as North–South transfer only.

Robert Muthami engaging Kenyan Participants during the Post UNFCCC-SB48 Reflection Workshop. Credit: FES Kenya

Africa is also cautious of becoming a testing ground for new technologies. Therefore, technologies from the north should be tried and tested before being transferred to Africa—for example short-lived solar panel technologies that end up being very expensive in the long run—a key issue that needs to be part of the discussions at COP 24.

Finally, the means of implementation, especially climate finance and capacity building on uptake and implementation, are critical for technology transfer to work in Africa.

Climate change needs to be tackled on a global level and in a just manner
The climate-change crisis is now being felt in developed countries. As Europe and America battle wildfires amid massive heat waves over the past year, the impact in Africa is felt even stronger.

The increasing frequency of droughts and flooding, and consequently increased risk of violent conflict in already volatile regions, present a major threat to livelihoods on the African continent. Looking ahead to Poland, it is the hope of African countries that these impacts will be reflected in the outcome document.

Lastly, as parties move towards operationalization of the Paris Agreement, it is important to ensure that the commitments towards promoting decent work and a just transition are properly articulated in the Paris Work Programme.

This is key because climate change is already having significant impacts on the world of work in Africa. Over 60 per cent of Africa’s economically active population works in and lives off the agricultural sector, which is adversely affected by climate change.

The transition to low-carbon economies offers great potential for green jobs creation, in areas such as the renewable-energy sector. This transition process however means that current existing jobs that do not offer sustainable production methods will be at a risk. It is important to ensure that this transition happens in a socially just and inclusive manner.

Therefore, a socially and ecologically just outcome from COP 24 must take into consideration the African demands on the means of implementation (climate finance, technology transfer and capacity building) for adaptation and mitigation as well as the necessity of a just transition.

This outcome should also facilitate the realization of the targets of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), especially goals 8, 10 and 13, which focus on promoting decent work, addressing inequality and climate action.

*For more information on the work by FES in Kenya visit the country office website and follow the official Facebook fan page.

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Excerpt:

Robert Muthami is a Programme Coordinator at the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, Kenya Office. He coordinates work around socio-ecological transformation

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By Jomo Kwame Sundaram and Anis Chowdhury
KUALA LUMPUR & SYDNEY, Dec 4 2018 (IPS)

In criticizing the ‘free trade delusion’, UNCTAD’s 2018 Trade and Development Report proposes an alternative to both reactionary nationalism, recently revived by President Trump, and the corporate cosmopolitanism of neoliberal multilateral discourse in recent decades by revisiting the Havana Charter on its 70th anniversary.

From ITO to WTO
Instead, it urges reconsideration of lessons from the struggle from 1947 for the Havana Charter. Although often depicted as the forerunner of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), the Charter was far more ambitious.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram

Initially agreed to 70 years ago by over 50 countries — mainly from Latin America, as much of the rest of the developing world remained under European colonial rule — it was rejected by the US Congress, with GATT emerging as a poor compromise.

As envisaged at Bretton Woods in 1944, over 50 countries began to create the International Trade Organization (ITO) from 1945 to 1947. In 1947, 56 countries started negotiating the ITO charter in Havana following the 1947 United Nations Conference on Trade and Employment in Havana, eventually signed in 1948.

The idea of a multilateral trade organization to regulate trade — covering areas such as tariff reduction, business cartels, commodity agreements, economic development and foreign direct investment — was first mooted in the US Congress in 1916 by Representative Cordell Hull, later Roosevelt’s first Secretary of State in 1933.

However, the US Congress eventually rejected the Havana Charter, including establishment of the ITO, in 1948 following pressure from corporate lobbies unhappy about concessions to ‘underdeveloped’ countries. Thus, the Bretton Woods’ and Havana Charter’s promise of full employment and domestic industrialization in the post-war international trade order was aborted.

In their place, from 1948 to 1994, the GATT, a provisional compromise, became the main multilateral framework governing international trade, especially in manufactures, the basis for trade rules and regulations for most of the second half of the 20th century.

The Uruguay Round from 1986 to 1994, begun at Punta del Este, was the last round of multilateral trade negotiations under GATT. It ended the postwar trading order governed by GATT, replacing it with the new World Trade Organization (WTO) from 1995.

Developmental fair trade?
The UNCTAD report urges revisiting the Havana Charter in light of new challenges in recent decades such as the digital economy, environmental stress and financial vulnerabilities. So, what lessons can we draw from the Havana Charter in trying to reform the multilateral trading order?

Anis Chowdhury

In light of economic transformations over the last seven decades, it is crucial to consider how the Havana Charter tried to create a more developmental and equitable trading system, in contrast with actual changes in the world economy since.

After all, the Charter recognized that a healthy trading system must be based on economies seeking to ensure full employment while distributional issues have to be addressed at both national and international levels.

Profitable, but damaging business practices — by large international, multinational or transnational firms, abusing the international trading system — also need to be addressed.

The Charter recognized the crucial need for industrialization in developing countries as an essential part of a healthy trading system and multilateral world order, and sought to ensure that international trade rules would enable industrial policy.

The GATT compromise exceptionally allowed some such features in post-war trade rules, but even these were largely eliminated by the neoliberal Uruguay Round, as concerns about unemployment, decent work and deindustrialization were ignored.

Paths not taken
The evolution of the international trading system has been largely forgotten. Recent and current tensions in global trade are largely seen as threatening to the post-Second World War (WW2) international economic order first negotiated in the late 1940s and revised ever since.

But the international order of the post-WW2 period ended in the 1970s, as policymakers in the major developed economies embraced the counter-revolutionary neoliberal reforms of Thatcherism and Reaganism against Keynesian and development economics after Nixon unilaterally destroyed the Bretton Woods monetary arrangements.

Besides international trade liberalization as an end in itself, financial liberalization and globalization were facilitated as financial markets were deregulated, not only within national economies, but also across international borders.

Industrial policy, public enterprise and mixed economies were purged by the new neoliberal fundamentalists as the very idea of public intervention for healthy, equitable and balanced development was discredited by the counter-revolution against economic progress for all.

With multilateralism and the Doha Development Round under assault, retrieving relevant lessons from the Havana Charter after seven decades can be crucial in steering the world between the devil of reactionary nationalist ‘sovereigntism’ and the deep blue sea of neoliberal corporate cosmopolitanism or ‘globalism’.

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