Africa

Peter Biar Ajak is an outspoken critic of South Sudan and has been detained there since July.

Nigeria and South Africa are through to the semi-finals of the Under 20 Africa Cup of Nations in Niger which means they qualify for this year's World Cup in Poland.

Nigeria has one of the lowest rates of female participation in parliament, according to the UN.

A female MP calls for checks on whether male MPs had undergone the procedure.

By Kunal Sen
HELSINKI, Finland, Feb 8 2019 (IPS)

Following on from Finn Tarp, my predecessor, is a daunting prospect, but I look forward to working with my colleagues at UNU-WIDER and with our many partners to build on the achievements of the past 10 years.

I was first acquainted with UNU-WIDER as a graduate student in the United States in the late 1980s. I came across several of the institutes publications which became classics in the field of development economics, including Hunger and Public Action by Jean Dreze and Amartya Sen, and Varieties of Stabilization Experience by Lance Taylor.

These publications had a profound impact on my own thinking, and since then many other UNU-WIDER publications have had similar transformative effects on successive generations of social scientists.

Kunal Sen

In a world where there are increasing asymmetries of knowledge creation and sharing between the Global North and South, UNU-WIDER is ideally placed to use the power of its global network to address the pressing questions in development.

The three interconnected transformations I am delighted to take the helm at UNU-WIDER, an institution which has been associated with some of the most advanced thinking in development economics.

UNU-WIDER has combined outstanding research with sustained policy engagement on some of the most pressing concerns affecting the living standards of the world’s poorest people.

WIDER impact
Over the past 33 years, and most recently under the leadership of my predecessor, Finn Tarp, in the last 10 years, UNU-WIDER has significantly advanced our understanding of the causes of poverty and inequality, climate change, the roots of gender inequality, and the challenges of structural transformation for low-income countries necessary to achieve the SDGs

In the new year, we launched our new work programme for 2019–23. This will be the most ambitious work programme that UNU-WIDER has undertaken so far. I believe the challenge of development is ultimately a question of transformation — how to bring about broad-based sustained improvement in multiple dimensions of wellbeing necessary to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

This involves transformation in three different dimensions: economies, polities, societies. The new work programme will address these dimensions of transformation, which will become the thematic foci of UNU-WIDER’s research in the coming years: Transforming Economies, Transforming States, and Transforming Societies.

Transforming Economies — the first thematic focus of UNU-WIDER’s new work programme — is at the core of any meaningful development strategy and set of policies.

Large-scale changes in the structure of economic activity and employment opportunities must take place if absolute poverty is to be reduced alongside addressing economic and social inequalities.

Economic transformation is also essential in delivering higher levels of income and increasing market activity. These are critically needed to improve the mobilization of domestic resources and establish an enlarged tax base that can finance the investments needed to achieve the SDGs.

But for meaningful economic transformation to take place, there needs to be a political transformation as well. This is why Transforming States will be the second thematic focus of UNU-WIDER’s work programme.

Capable and effective states are needed to work with the private sector to achieve higher rates of economic growth, but also to bring about a shift to more environmentally sustainable production.

At the same time, the state has a key role to play in providing necessary public goods and in shaping the transformation of societies in ways that yield greater empowerment — through proactive policies to help reduce marginalization of the poor and to achieve greater gender equality.

Accountable states that are responsive to the needs of their citizens are an essential factor in national development. The challenge is to build capable and legitimate states in difficult contexts, especially in fragile and conflict-affected environments.

The third thematic focus of the new work programme is Transforming Societies. Economic and political transformation needs to be accompanied by social transformation, such that every citizen can live in a socially inclusive and egalitarian society.

Increasing the capacities, resources, and confidence of individuals and their communities is a means to end poverty and to contain and reduce not only gender inequality, but other social inequalities as well.

This is now a pressing concern in many societies, especially when high inequality destabilizes political systems, increases state fragility, and hinders the transformation of economies.

The actions of both state and non-state actors (such as non-governmental organizations and community groups) matter in bringing about social transformation. The challenge for us is to understand the conditions under which such actions are possible, and when they can become transformative.

How will we get there?
These three themes are at the very centre of the UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Much of our work will include mobilizing policy research, evidence, and action around selected goals of the 2030 Agenda as well as responding to the Agenda’s ‘call for increased support for strengthening data collection and capacity-building in Member States’.

With the three transformations in mind we will start the work with launching six flagship projects in 2019 — on informality, women’s work, social mobility, building capable states, structural transformation, and extractives.

As always, we welcome the UNU-WIDER network to engage with us in thinking through and taking action for a more sustainable and equitable future for all. How can this be practically done?

Keep an eye on calls for papers and research proposals coming out throughout the year, apply for visiting scholaror PhD fellowhip in order to visit and work with us.

Right now we have an open call for papers for the next WIDER development conference, being held 11-13 September 2019 in Bangkok, in partnership with UNESCAP. The theme of the conference is Transforming Economies – for Better Jobs.

We welcome submissions of proposals from you and I hope to meet many of you in Bangkok — it is your active participation in UNU-WIDER’s development conferences that have made these events the successes that they are.

The views expressed in this piece are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Institute or the United Nations University, nor the programme/project donors.

The post Transforming Economies, States, & Societies – Building Evidence for Achieving SDGs appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Kunal Sen is Director, UN University, World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER)

The post Transforming Economies, States, & Societies – Building Evidence for Achieving SDGs appeared first on Inter Press Service.

From Left to Right: Ambassador Masahiko Kiya, the Ambassador for TICAD 7,MOFA Japan, Ambassador Soloman Maina, Kenya’s ambassador to Japan and Siddharth Chatterjee, United Nations Resident Coordinator to Kenya. Credit: Kenya Embassy 10 January 2019

By Siddharth Chatterjee
NAIROBI, Kenya, Feb 8 2019 (IPS)

1. Why Blue Economy in Africa? What potentials does Africa have?

The blue economy in Africa is neglected, ignored or underexploited, but it can offer a range of African solutions to African economic problems. More than one-quarter of Africa’s population lives within 100km of the coast and derive their livelihoods there. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), by 2020, the annual economic value of energy activities related to maritime affairs will reach EUR 2.5bn.1 Out of the 54 African countries, 34 are coastal countries and over 90% of African exports and imports are transported by sea. The territorial waters under African jurisdiction cover a surface area of 13 million km², with a continental shelf of some 6.5 million km² comprising exclusive economic zones (EEZ). The continent covers 17% of the world’s surface water resources. The strategic dimension of the blue economy is an indisputable reality for African countries. It is for this reason that it has been included in the African Union’s Agenda 2063 and that a practical handbook on the blue economy was prepared by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa in March 2016.

According to an FAO study, the total gross added value of the fisheries and aquaculture sector in Africa is estimated at USD 24bn, i.e. 1.6% of the GDP of all African countries.2 Still according to FAO, this sector employs some 12.3 million people, but is largely underexploited. There is a need to professionalize the aquaculture and fisheries sector.

By any standards, Africa is at least underusing, possibly even drastically wasting, its blue economy potential. This must be rectified. By some estimates, the African maritime industry is already worth USD 1 trillion annually. But, with the right economic policies implemented, it could triple in just two years.

2. Why is Japan needed? What advantage does Japan have to be a partner country?

Japan is essentially a Blue economy and a global economic giant. Africa can learn and benefit from Japan. Let me start by commending Japan for co-hosting the Blue Economy Conference with Kenya and Canada in Nairobi in 2018.

If the continent is to establish a viable blue economy, African countries must begin with focus on the current limited infrastructure and capacities to assure maritime security and coastal protection. The second imperative is to establish partnerships, including innovative financing models, preferably driven by the private sector.

Kenya co-hosted the Sustainable Blue Economy Conference (SBEC) between the 26th and 28th November 2018 with Canada and Japan.3 SBEC aimed to make progress towards safeguarding and developing the world’s water bodies and the ecosystems that live therein. The conference hosted over 17,000 participants from 184 countries and sought to exploit the potential of oceans, seas, rivers, lakes by leveraging on the latest scientific knowledge and innovation while ensuring the proper conservation of the aquatic resources for generations to come. During the conference, President of Kenya Mr. Uhuru Kenyatta made several pledges including enhancing security in the high seas, combating illegal fishing while supporting sustainable and responsible fishing of endangered species and key fish stocks, among other things.

Japan’s support to the Blue economy will ensure that the Blue/ocean economy, will be “a major contributor to continental transformation and growth” as envisaged in the Agenda 2063, Furthermore the sector will benefit from Japanese expertise in maritime security and safety. Japan has proven expertise and demonstrated real contributions in ensuring freedom and safety of navigation, as witnessed by Japanese contributions to improving navigation safety in the Straits of Malacca.

I actually see Kenya as a gateway to Africa. Kenya has the ports. It has the infrastructure. It is interconnected. It is a beacon of hope in a region of instability. In fact it represents everything that we want to see happen all across Africa. And therefore to me Kenya becomes even more crucial in becoming the convener and the facilitator of the entire Blue Economy dialogue.

We as the UN family stand ready to support Japan in advancing a sustainable Blue Economy in Kenya.

3. What opportunities does Japanese companies have? How should Japan be involved in developing Blue Economy?

There five areas where Japan’s ocean industry expertise could be shared to promote the blue economy in the Africa region.4

i. Most African states are looking seaward for alternative non-conventional renewable sources of energy. There’s interest in offshore solar power as having high potential as a major source of energy. Japan private sector can help here. Japan’s largest solar power plant, the Kyocera Corporation’s Kagoshima Nanatsujima Mega Solar Power Plant, is an offshore technology built on reclaimed land jutting the waters of Kagoshima Bay, generating 70 MW of energy in Kagoshima City. The project has an annual power generation capacity of 78,800MWh and is expected to supply clean electricity to approximately 22,000 average households.

ii. While there’s been no commercial developments to date there’s still international interest in deep-sea mining in the Indian Ocean. For polymetallic nodules, Japan is a pioneer investor in the Indian Ocean and the International Seabed Authority entered into contract with Japan after the Law of the Sea Convention came into effect. Japan can help with mining technology, processing technology and environmental impact assessment. There’s also growing interest in developments in relation to deep water gas hydrates energy reserves (reservoirs of gas trapped in ice crystals) where Japan is at the cutting edge. India and Japan last year carried out a joint survey for gas hydrates using a Japanese drilling ship in the Indian Ocean. Japan has set itself the target of bringing methane hydrates into the mainstream by the early 2020s. Prime Minister Modi has listed work on gas hydrates among the top 10 potential areas of research for India.

iii. R&D in marine biotechnology is emerging as a promising sector for growth and employment in the Indian Ocean. The Indian Ocean region is rich in marine biodiversity: we’re likely to see the realisation of marine biotechnology potential, including the culture of a range of marine organisms for biofuels, bioremediation and bioproducts.

iv. Aquaculture is a key driver of the Blue Economy in the Indian Ocean providing food, nutrition and employment opportunities to the people in the region. Since capture fisheries face the problem of overfishing in the region, the challenges of food security can be addressed through aquaculture production. Aquaculture has the potential to transform the global food system for the better. Japan has tremendous skills in this industry and can assist African states in developing aquaculture systems that expand the range of foods and the nutritional content of those foods, while ensuring that the industry is economically and environmentally sustainable.

v. Japan can strengthen the digital blue economy in the Indian Ocean: the undersea cables and the electronic services that they can enable, such as broadband and data exchange. Japan can contribute to the growing digital fabric connecting the Indian Ocean: it’s got some of world’s top vendors of submarine cable systems.

4. What do you expect for TICAD 7? Could you tell us on what you are working with Japanese government for the conference?

UNDP is the longest serving co-organizer of TICAD process with the Government of Japan. Co-organizing TICAD process provides Japan and UNDP with important strategic advantages, including: (1) facilitating global discourse on Africa’s development; (2) promoting innovative partnerships; (3) Enhancing integration of the UN Development System; and (4) Enhancing strategic partnerships with Japan in Africa as the key driver of the corporate strategic partnership with Japan.

In addition to the issues raised above, we expect TICAD 7 to promote Africa’s blue/ocean economy to enhance sustainable use of marine resources, developing port facilities and facilitating marine transport. Furthermore we expect the issue of Africa’s infrastructure and connectivity to be high on the TICAD 7 Agenda as this will unlock the construction and management of quality transport infrastructure, such as ports, maritime corridors, airports, railroads, bridges and trunk roads that are efficient in view of life-cycle cost, reliable, safe, resilient against natural disasters and environmentally friendly, to strengthen connectivity in Africa, utilizing state of the art infrastructure technology.

5. What challenges does Africa have to develop Blue Economy? What infrastructures/rules/policies are needed?

From concerns around environmental sustainability to the dangers of corruption and a dearth of actionable data, policymakers need vast resources to get to grips with large swathes of their own territory.

There are also challenges related to climate change, rising sea temperatures, ocean acidification and rising sea levels.

There are current conflicts driven by lack of demarcation of maritime and aquatic boundaries. This has been a constant source of tensions between neighbouring countries, not only threating any long-term investment considerations, but also leading to irresponsible use of resources.

The continent needs to fast-track resolution of disputes and strengthen their maritime and riparian cooperation mechanisms. This will provide grounds for working on interstate economies of scale and develop strategies for bridging technical and infrastructure gaps among States.

In line with SDG 14, development of this sector must also promote social inclusion while ensuring environmental sustainability. In this respect, the continent owes special consideration to people living along the shores of oceans, lakes and rivers, essentially youth and women. The question of how this new frontier can address poverty reduction and hunger when leaving no one behind must be a central consideration. We need to be able to govern resources effectively and be able to utilise them in a way that’s transparent and inclusive.

Equally daunting is required transboundary negotiation among at least 38 African countries, intensive planning, intersectoral planning, intragovernmental coordination, extensive training and complex multi-stakeholder engagement.

The African Union has launched its 2050 Integrated Maritime Strategy in a bid to provide a broad framework for the protection and sustainable exploitation of Africa’s marine resources. At its heart lies the creation of a Combined Exclusive Maritime Zone of Africa (CEMZA), a common maritime space intended to boost trade, protect the environment and fisheries, share information and boost border protection and defence activities.

1 See Energy Technology Perspectives 2012, Pathways to a Clean Energy System, available at https://www.iea.org/publications/freepublications/publication/ETP2012_free.pdf
2 See FAO, (2014). The Value of African Fisheries, available at http://www.fao.org/3/a-i3917e.pdf
3 Japan joined Canada and Kenya in co-hosting SBEC and provided KEN Sh300 million funding for the conference; https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2001300222/japan-offers-sh300-million-for-blue-economy-conference
4 See Anthony Bergin (2016). A vision in blue: Japan and the Indian Ocean, available at https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/25444-2/

The post Blue Economy: The New Frontier for Africa’s Growth & How Japan Can Help appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

An interview with Siddharth Chatterjee UN Resident Coordinator to Kenya by Nikkei Shimbun, Japan and reproduced by IPS.

The post Blue Economy: The New Frontier for Africa’s Growth & How Japan Can Help appeared first on Inter Press Service.

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Even with a metre of snow outside in Ottawa, Canada, a wide variety of imported apples and other fruits are available in Canadian food markets. Credit: Stephen Leahy/IPS

By Stephen Leahy
ONTARIO, Canada, Feb 8 2019 (IPS)

Canada introduced a new healthy eating food guide January 2019 and, for the first time, the meat, dairy and processed food and beverage industries were not involved. Based on the recommendations of health and nutrition experts, the guide places a new emphasis on eating plants, drinking water and cooking at home.

Health experts have long warned that Canadians don’t eat enough vegetables, fruits and whole grains.  The new guide wants to shift diets toward a high proportion of plant-based foods like legumes, beans, and tofu and less dairy, eggs, meat and fish. It also warns parents to limit children’s consumption of fruit juices and sugar-sweetened milk beverages.

“Healthy eating is an important part of maintaining a healthy lifestyle and helps prevent chronic diseases like type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and some cancers,” said Theresa Tam, Chief Public Health Officer of Canada, in a statement.

Canada’s new guide is amongst the best in the world says Wayne Roberts, an independent food policy analyst and writer. “It’s comparable to Brazil’s excellent guide with its emphasis on eating fresh, unprocessed food,” Roberts told IPS.

The guide goes beyond advising Canadians what foods to eat but how to eat by recommending cooking at home, eating meals together and avoiding fast food said Jennifer Reynolds of Food Secure Canada, an alliance of organisations and individuals working together to advance food security.

Canada’s new healthy eating food guide. Courtesy: Government of Canada

Canadians spent 19 billion dollars on fast food in 2017, an average of 2,200 dollars per year for a family of four.

Unicef ranked Canada 37th out of 41 rich countries when it comes to providing healthy food for kids. The long road to developing a new food guide represents a whole new direction for food in Canada, said Reynolds in an interview. Despite a powerful food industry lobby, new legislation is expected this year to limit marketing of unhealthy food and drinks to children. 

Not only is shifting to more plant-based diets good for both health and the planet, it is a golden opportunity to re-direct Canada’s export-focused, commodity agricultural system to sustainable agriculture and support rural economies while addressing food insecurity, Reynolds said.

Despite living in a wealthy country, more than one in 10 Canadians cannot afford or have access to sufficient nutritious food to maintain health researchers at the University of Toronto report.

They recommend a national food policy that brings all sectors of government together to address this long-standing issue. Such a policy is sorely needed to not only address hunger and under-nutrition but also the challenges of climate change and the decline in rural economies, said Reynolds.

A national food policy could also address the shocking amount of waste in Canada’s food system where nearly 60 percent of all food produced is wasted according to a new report The Avoidable Crisis of Food Waste.

This is the first such analysis of any countries’ food production system said Martin Gooch, CEO of  Value Chain Management International (VCMI), a company that helps industries’ lower costs and improve the efficiency of their supply chains.

“I was astonished by the amount of waste in this industry,” Gooch told IPS.

The research is a “world first” because it measures weight using “a standardised system across the whole food value chain,” and includes all food types from both land and water. It also includes primary data from across the supply chain and consulted more than 700 food industry experts.

The value of all food that is lost or wasted in Canada is a staggering 49 billion dollars, said Lori Nikkel of Second Harvest, an agency that collects surplus food and gives it away to those in need. The VCMI study found that a third of Canada’s wasted food could be “rescued” and sent to communities in need.

Waste happens at all stages of food production including produce left to rot in the fields due to labour shortages, low prices or cancelled orders. Another major issue is the food industry’s focus on producing huge volumes of food as cheaply as possible over quality said Gooch. When a company in the orchard industry switched its emphasis to quality, it resulted in reduced costs, doubled profits while total volume produced was the same or less.

The lion’s share of food waste is during food production and processing the study found. Only 14 percent of food waste is at the household level. Best-before dates are the other major cause of food waste by both consumers and retailers. Product dating practices have nothing to do with food safety. Companies can use any date they wish. There are no standards or regulations, nor were best-before dates found on most products just 10 years ago said Gooch.

Given Gooch’s knowledge of Canada’s food waste he was quite surprised to see the Food Sustainability Index rank Canada among the best in the world in preventing food waste with a score of 97.80 out of 100. “That’s incorrect, we found an astonishing amount of waste in Canada’s food system,” he said. 

The Index was drawn up by the Italian foundation Barilla Center for Food and Nutrition and the Intelligence Unit of the British magazine The Economist. The index ranked 67 countries based on three categories: food and water loss and waste, sustainable agriculture and nutritional challenges. Canada ranked third overall, much to the surprise of everyone interviewed for this article. 

When IPS questioned the Barilla Center about food waste it said Canada ranked poorly, in fact 65th out of 67 counties with 80 kilograms (kg) of food waste per capita per year based their estimates. However, since Canada has a wide range of policies to address food waste it received a far higher final ranking on the Index. 

However, the VCMI study found that Canada’s actual per capita food waste was closer to 1,000 kg per year, per person not the estimated 80 kg. 

The third place overall ranking the Index is a result of Canada having strong policies. “While Canada does not perform particularly well in most cases on outcome metrics, the country does have strong policies to make changes, especially when compared to the United States,” Valentina Gasbarri of the Barilla Center told IPS in an email.

“We are open to discussions around what improvements could be made [to the Index],” Gasbarri said. 

Perhaps the index was weighted too much towards policy and intentions mused Roberts. “It certainly does not represent on the ground reality in Canada.” 

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The post Canada Implements New Food Guidelines, But What About the Food Waste? appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Poultry production is giving hope for deported migrants who make up the Association of Active Women Working Together for a Better Future, in the village of Los Talpetates, Berlin municipality in the eastern Salvadoran department of Usulután. Credit: Edgardo Ayala/IPS

By Edgardo Ayala
Feb 8 2019 (IPS)

Salvadoran farmer Lorena Mejía opens an incubator and monitors the temperature of the eggs, which will soon provide her with more birds and eggs as the chickens hatch and grow up.

Mejía is one of the beneficiaries of a project that seeks to offer productive ventures to women who, like her, have been deported from Mexico or the United States while they were attempting to achieve “the American dream.”

“I left because I worked in a factory in San Salvador, but the money wasn’t enough,” the 43-year-old woman told IPS in the yard of her home in the village of Talpetate, Berlin municipality in the eastern Salvadoran department of Usulután."Rural women are the motors of the economy, and at FAO we support returnees through inclusive and equitable processes." – Emilia González

In 1998, after a dangerous journey of several weeks, Mejia managed to settle in Dallas, Texas in the U.S.

She worked there in cleaning services at a school and in a hotel, but she returned to her country in 2001, with many broken dreams.

“Now I’m focused, together with my colleagues, on making this project grow,” she said.

Mejía and other local women farmers founded the Association of Active Women Working Together for a Better Future in 2010, and came up with an initiative that would offer productive opportunities to other returning migrants.

Currently, some 40 women make up this organisation, 15 of whom are involved in poultry production, who have received technical support from the state-run National Centre for Agricultural and Forestry Technology (Centa), as well as from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) office in El Salvador.

The rest grow El Salvador staple crops: corn and beans.

In spite of the importance of the support from Centa and FAO for the women’s organisation, the Salvadoran State has not yet developed a strategy aimed at the economic reinsertion of returning migrants, and in particular women.

“Sometimes what you need is a little boost,” said Mejia.

In the small rural village of Talpetate, home to some 70 families, jobs are scarce and poverty is rampant.

According to official figures published in May 2018, 32.1 percent of rural Salvadoran households are below the poverty line, compared to 27.4 percent in the cities.

The project, which was launched in November 2018, provided each participating family with 25 hens to produce eggs.

Dennis Alejo, a Salvadoran deported while trying to cross into the United States, has found in tomato production the best way to make a living and generate a handful of jobs in his native Berlin, in the eastern Salvadoran department of Usulután. Credit: Edgardo Ayala/IPS

According to the participants, income from the sale of eggs is still modest. But in the future, when production has increased, they expect to earn about 200 dollars a month as a collective.

That money is reinvested in the small collective farm, in order to improve and increase production, with more incubators and infrastructure.

“Rural women are the motors of the economy, and at FAO we support returnees through inclusive and equitable processes,” Emilia González, the U.N. organisation’s assistant representative for programmes in El Salvador, told IPS.

An important component of the project is that it also supports food sustainability, because part of the egg and poultry production goes to household consumption.

“We saved the money we would use to buy a few pounds of chicken,” Marlene Mejía, 46, another of the beneficiaries, told IPS.

She also tried to reach the United States, in 2003, as an undocumented migrant. But she only managed to make it partly across Mexico, before she got stuck in a town whose name she never knew.

After several days of confinement with very little food in a house run by migrant traffickers, she decided to return to her country.

The migration of Salvadorans to the United States is a phenomenon that has marked this small Central American country of 7.3 million people.

It is estimated that at least 2.8 million Salvadorans live in the United States, part of an exodus that intensified in the 1980s, when El Salvador experienced a bloody civil war (1980-1992).

Three planes arrive weekly from the United States with deportees, as well as three buses from Mexico.

According to official statistics, more than 26,000 Salvadorans were deported in 2018, mainly from Mexico and the United States. A high figure, but 1.2 percent lower than the total for 2017, which was 26,837.

For the past four years, Marlene Mejía has also been making pupusas, the most popular dish in El Salvador: a corn tortilla filled with beans, cheese and pork rinds, among other ingredients.

“If you have a job here, why suffer over there?” she asked.

The Salvadoran government offers some support for the economic reinsertion of returnees, through the project called “El Salvador is your home”, launched in October 2017.

According to data from the Foreign Ministry, 147 people received seed money to start up a project for economic and psychosocial reintegration, while another pilot project for the productive insertion of Usulután is aimed at 208 people.

But these are derisory amounts in terms of the number of beneficiaries, given the magnitude of the deportations and the country’s economic problems, so that most returnees find no economic stability, and government assistance falls far short.

“Evidently it is insufficient; a bigger effort is needed to be able to offer options to people when they return to their hometowns,” Jaime Rivas, a migration researcher at Don Bosco University, told IPS.

Some returnees manage to set up ventures on their own, with little or no governmental or international support.

Dennis Alejo, 30, has tried to cross the U.S. border five times since 2010.

The last time, in 2015, he managed to reach the outskirts of San Antonio, Texas, but the group of migrants with whom he had been crossing the desert for seven days was intercepted by the “migra”, as migrants popularly call agents of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

But he managed to escape and hide in the bush.

“I spent the whole night hugging the scrub to hide from a helicopter with a searchlight, which was looking for me,” he told IPS.

Now, through his own efforts, and overcoming all sorts of obstacles, Alejo grows good quality tomatoes on a small plot of land he rents in Berlin, thanks to the 1,800 plants he planted three years ago.

He also employs a dozen young people as pickers, and feels he’s preventing youngsters from risking their lives crossing deserts to get to the United States.

“I don’t pay them much, just five dollars a day, but if I had more support, I could employ more people,” he said.

Because Alejo also faces the lack of financial support to set up an irrigation system to boost production.

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Owen Barder is Senior Fellow at the Center for Global Development (CGD), Vice President and Director of CGD, Europe

By Owen Barder
WASHINGTON DC, Feb 7 2019 (IPS)

It is time for an open, fair, merit-based process to appoint the next President of the World Bank. And I’ll explain below why I think the Europeans may, at last, break the cartel that has prevented this.

The “Gentleman’s Agreement”

Since the Second World War, Europe and the United States have operated the so-called “Gentleman’s Agreement”—that the Bank would be led by an American while the International Monetary Fund (IMF) would be led by a European.

This carve-up is an accident of history. British economist John Maynard Keynes had assumed that Harry Dexter White, a US Treasury Department official, would be appointed to run the IMF.

But partly because of suspicion that White was a communist—perhaps even a Soviet agent—the US Treasury Secretary decided to back Eugene Meyer as President of the World Bank instead.

The US Government didn’t think they could expect to nominate the head of both major financial institutions, and so a European has run the IMF ever since.

In the last two decades there have been empty promises in summit communiques to replace this cartel with a merit-based system for these appointments, but the World Bank has always gone to the American nominee, and the IMF to a European. And as my colleague Nancy Birdsall pointed out yesterday, the behind-closed-doors process means the World Bank post has always gone to a man.

The first time that the American candidate for President of the World Bank faced serious challenge was in 2012. There were three nominees—Jim Kim, José Antonio Ocampo, and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala—who were interviewed by the Executive Board, and the appointment went to a vote.

Though Okonjo-Iweala was clearly the better candidate, Kim was eventually selected. It was assumed he won European votes as payback to the United States for allowing Christine Lagarde to be appointed unopposed to the IMF. Okonjo-Iweala said at the time that, while she had not expected to win, the process “will never ever be the same again.”

Owen Barder

Now that President Trump has nominated David Malpass to succeed Kim, the time has come to find out if Okonjo-Iweala is correct. Will the other shareholders force a fair process based on merit?

If so, Malpass seems unlikely to emerge as the victor. If 2012 was the crack in the glass ceiling, will 2019 be the year that we punch through?

The election is by a simple majority of Board votes, and while the United States is the largest shareholder it has only 16 percent of the votes. The Europeans, between them, have about 30 percent.

So, the United States cannot veto the appointment of another candidate who has the backing of the other shareholders.

High stakes for all

The World Bank (and IMF) are of most importance to the countries which have least control over them. More than a quarter of 2017 commitments were in sub-Saharan Africa, which has less than six percent of votes.

European leaders should seriously take into account the views of the Bank’s main stakeholders when making their decision, not simply adjust their power-sharing agreement with the United States.

There is a lot at stake for all of us. We need an effective and legitimate World Bank to tackle global problems such as climate change, financial instability, and pandemic disease, as well as to share knowledge, ideas and capital to help countries to meet the global goals.

For as long as the US and Europeans conspire to shut out the rest of the world from the leadership of the World Bank, it is impossible for it to be really legitimate and effective.

Given the obvious reasons why it makes sense to have a properly merit-based process, why might the Europeans nonetheless continue with the anachronistic “Gentleman’s Agreement”?

Four possible reasons it may continue:

1. They want to retain the privilege of nominating the Managing Director of the IMF.
2. They are concerned that the US will cut contributions to the World Bank if the US nominee is snubbed.
3. They are concerned to maintain good diplomatic relationships with the US generally, and this seems like a relatively unimportant concession to make for that broader goal.
4. These decisions are made mainly by white men from Europe and America, whose instinct will be to maintain their privileged access to international appointments.

Reasons that may not hold water in 2019

For a start, most European countries accept the inevitability of merit-based appointments at the IMF. It would be a big gamble to back the US nominee at the World Bank in the hope that they might maintain their grip on the IMF one last time.

They are sceptical that a US President committed to putting “America First” will keep his end of that bargain. Malpass’s nomination might, at last, be what breaks European and US collusion. Nor is the prospect of reduced US financing of the World Bank a significant consideration.

The World Bank is depending on donor contributions less and less for its finances, and the UK is currently the largest contributor to IDA, so even if there were a sharp fall in US contributions—which would be a decision for Congress, not the White House—this would not make a very big difference to the overall finances of the Bank.

On the contrary, a change in the leadership arrangements might well open the way to much larger donations from emerging countries such as China and India, as well as other European donors, more than compensating from a reduction in US contributions.

With the decline in US funding of the World Bank, the threat of a cut of funding no longer needs to be taken as seriously as once it was. Would the Europeans be willing to risk this slight to the United States?

Many would: there is little political advantage at home from being seen to cozy up to the Trump administration. Most will reckon that the US is unlikely to pay an enormous amount of attention (after all, the present US administration doesn’t care much about the multilateral system).

For example, nobody batted an eyelid when the rest of the world rejected the US nomination of Ken Isaacs to lead the International Organisation of Migration, another post which had traditionally gone unopposed to the United States. The world community appears to be growing a spine.

The only remaining reason that this might not happen is the inertia of privilege. Decision-makers find it hard to imagine a world in which these choices are made by fair, open processes. But once we make the change, it will be hard to remember why it ever seemed so difficult.

What’s next?

The next step is for one or more of the influential shareholders—perhaps one of the larger European countries—to build support for a more open and contested process, rather than allow the US nominee to be nodded through.

For the UK, this is a teachable moment. All the rhetoric at the moment is that the UK’s development policy should do more to serve the UK “national interest” as well as reducing poverty and spreading prosperity.

Arguably, it is in the UK’s short-term national interest to shore up its alliance with the United States, because the UK needs them for security and economic reasons, perhaps more than ever as it leaves the EU.

But it is also in the UK’s long-term national interest to have an effective, rules-based, multilateral system with legitimate institutions. Reforming the governance of the World Bank, and having a President who commands global respect, will help the UK achieve long-term goals of shared, sustainable development.

From a development point of view, there is no doubt that the UK should back a better candidate than Malpass. From a short-term foreign policy point of view, the temptation might be to go along with Trump’s pick.

Penny Mordaunt, UK Governor of the World Bank, is going to have to choose a side: the UK’s long-term interest in development, global soft power and the multilateral system, or its short-term interest in its relationship with the United States.

Her choice will send a powerful signal about whether the UK remains seriously committed to international development, or if the country has subsumed all that beneath short-term foreign policy considerations.

Potential candidates

There is time to nominate an alternative to David Malpass. Excellent candidates might include Nancy Birdsall, José Antonio Ocampo (again), Suma Chakrabarti, Kristalina Georgieva, Sri Mulyani Indrawati, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala (again), Maria Ramos, Minouche Shafik, and Tidjane Thiam. Let the candidates—including David Malpass—make their case, and see if the world can coalesce around the best person. It is time to call time on the Gentleman’s Agreement.

The link to the original article:
https://www.cgdev.org/blog/time-gentlemen-please

The post Time, Gentlemen, Please—Next President of the World Bank appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Owen Barder is Senior Fellow at the Center for Global Development (CGD), Vice President and Director of CGD, Europe

The post Time, Gentlemen, Please—Next President of the World Bank appeared first on Inter Press Service.