Americans protest President Trump's withdrawal from the Paris Agreement on Climate Change outside the White House in June 2017. PHOTO: ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS/AFP
By Saleemul Huq
Jun 6 2018 (The Daily Star, Bangladesh)
A year has passed since President Trump announced that the United States would formally withdraw from the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. What has happened since has been a mixture of good and bad—but on the whole, more good than bad.
The obvious bad news was that the biggest and richest country was reneging on a commitment made by its president in Paris. This had several consequences, including the halting of the US pledge to provide funding for the Green Climate Fund (GCF) as part of the commitment of developed countries to provide USD 100 billion each year from 2020 onwards.
It also meant that the US federal government would not try to fulfil the commitments that it had made under President Obama to reduce its emissions of greenhouse gases.
However, the worst news is by far for the citizens of the US rather than for the rest of the world. This is the denial of the science and reality of human induced climate change by Trump and the head of the Environment Protection Agency (EPA). This has already had the effect of depriving US citizens of the protection from its own federal government to adapt to the adverse impacts of climate change. The more than 4,000 deaths of US citizens in Puerto Rico attributable to Hurricane Maria are just one example.
In contrast, the good news is that many people in the US are not following or even supporting their president. There is a growing movement of Americans who say they are still in the Paris Agreement and will do their best to fulfil the US commitments made under President Obama.
For example, around 20 governors of states, led by Governor Jerry Brown of California, have declared their intentions to fulfil their obligations under the Paris Agreement. In fact, California (which by itself is the 7th largest economy in the world) will be hosting a global summit on climate change in September this year.
At the same time, Mayor De Blasio of New York is leading many dozens of mayors of cities who are committed to fulfilling their obligations as well. In fact, he has re-constituted President Obama’s Climate Change Experts Advisory Committee which Trump had dismissed as soon as he moved
into the White House. This committee is now based at Columbia University in New York and is being funded by both the city of New York and the Governor of the State of New York.
Another even more important change for the better is the market driven shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy across the US even in states under Republican governors. This, despite efforts by Trump to subsidise the coal industry. No one wants to invest in coal any more.
At the international level the major reaction to the US withdrawal from the Paris Agreement was to rally everyone else to redouble their commitment. Thus, for example, President Macron of France offered to make up the financial contribution of the US in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) while other developed countries have promised to make up the US deficit of USD 100 billion per year from 2020 onwards.
Another important indicator of US’ isolation on this issue is the fact that not a single country joined the US in withdrawing from the Paris Agreement (unlike when they withdrew from the Kyoto Protocol with Australia by their side).
Perhaps the biggest shift that has taken place, which is not necessarily directly attributable to Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, is the inexorable global shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy driven by a combination of technological advances in wind and solar energy efficiency, along with improved electricity storage capacity (which allows the intermittency problem to be solved).
Countries like China and India are in the forefront of this revolution in energy systems and are likely to be the winners in the 21st-century race to a post-fossil fuel world leaving the US behind and 20th-century technologies.
Finally, while it is important to acknowledge that the decision of Trump to officially withdraw from the Paris Agreement is not a good development for the world, nevertheless, the fact that the rest of the world, and indeed even the people in the US, don’t agree with him is the ultimate good news.
One of the most important, but under-appreciated elements of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change is that while it required the leaders of all countries to come to an agreement first, the implementation of the agreement does not necessarily need those leaders anymore. Anyone and everyone can do his or her own part to implement the agreement without permission from political leaders.
In less than a year of President Trump’s withdrawal, this fact has become abundantly clear.
Saleemul Huq is Director, International Centre for Climate Change and Development at the Independent University, Bangladesh.
Email: Saleem.icccad@iub.edu.bd
This story was originally published by The Daily Star, Bangladesh
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A Nepali family. Credit: Mallika Aryal/IPS
By Sabin Shrestha
KATHMANDU, Nepal, Jun 6 2018 (IPS)
Less than thirty years ago the likelihood of a mother dying due to pregnancy or childbirth in Nepal was one of the highest in the world. In 1990 UNICEF estimated that the rate was 901 women or girls out of 100,000 – significantly higher than any of its neighbours.
Since then the country has been somewhat of a global success story in maternal health. By 2015 the rate had been reduced to 215 and it is hoped that it has fallen even further in the last three years.
In the 1990s over half of maternal mortality instances were due to unsafe abortions. Still illegal in most circumstances women often sought backstreet options carried out by untrained personnel. Abortion laws were strictly enforced to the point that pregnant women sometimes feared they would be charged with homicide – even if they miscarried.
I grew up in Kathmandu and have worked on this issue for more than 15 years. I’ve seen how the lives and well-being of Nepalese women and girls were being put at serious risk during a time when they needed support. Thankfully, others were in agreement.
Responding to months of lobbying and coalition-building Nepal’s Parliament passed a bill in 2002 which legalised abortion without exception for 12 weeks. Services to enable women to access reproductive health care were also scaled up in quite a short time frame. Nepal had achieved a minor miracle.
Although a conservative country in many ways the transition was relatively smooth.
But making sustained progress in this landlocked and developing nation, where most people live in a remote or rural area, was not easy. In the past legal abortions were difficult for most women to access and the financial cost in a public hospital was often more than a month’s salary, meaning that some women were either forced to continue with an unintended pregnancy – or avail of an unsafe abortion carried out by somebody without proper medical training.
In the mid 2000s an estimated 4,000 Nepalese women were still dying each year as they were being forced to undergo unsafe abortions.
Coming from a poor household in Western Nepal a young woman called Lakshmi had little hope of being able to pay for an abortion after becoming pregnant. Like many other women her realistic choice was to either get an unsafe abortion or to continue her pregnancy.
She chose the latter, but in 2007, along with our partner the Center for Reproductive Rights and my organisation the Forum for Women, Law and Development (FWLD), she brought forward what would turn out to be a landmark case.
Lakshmi maintained that Nepal’s government had failed to enforce its own law on reproductive rights and that safe and legal abortion was extremely difficult to access for most Nepalese women and girls – including herself. She argued that it was not sufficient that abortion was technically legal, but that reproductive health care was a basic constitutional right, which should be affordable and easily accessible.
In May 2009 the Supreme Court of Nepal agreed with her and called on the government to promote the availability of safe and legal abortion in Nepal, to enact a new separate act addressing the issues of women’s reproductive health rights, to ensure personal information of women who get abortions remains confidential and to inform, educate and increase awareness among the general public.
This was a major step forward, but it has only partially come to pass. Abortion services are currently available in 75 district hospitals and also in a limited number of primary health check locations. Since 2016 the Nepalese government has also provided free abortion services through Government Health institutions.
However, only 41% of women of reproductive age know that abortion is legal, it is still seen as a social taboo – and even when they do avail of it it is still treated as homicide in some cases. I know of at least 13 women who are serving prison sentences, including Meera, a young woman from Biratnagar, who is currently serving a seven year sentence for infanticide after she had a miscarriage in 2015.
The government has failed to make it possible for women to be able to afford to pay for abortions, a significant number still do not know that abortion is legal, information on contraception is still not properly communicated, and midwives and other medical personnel have yet to be properly trained on reproductive health and rights.
Out of the 323,100 abortions which took place in Nepal in 2014 only 137,000 were safe and legal. Untrained health workers are still carrying out the majority of abortions here.
Following the devastating 2015 earthquake in Nepal that killed over 9,000 people up to 90% of birthing centers in the 14 most affected districts were either seriously damaged or destroyed. During this time abortion was next to impossible to access. Three years on not all have been re-built, meaning that the challenges already faced by pregnant women have been exacerbated.
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However, things may finally be about to change for the better. A new bill on reproductive rights has been recently approved in principle by the Office of Prime Minister and Ministers Council, which will respond to the concerns highlighted by our Supreme Court nine years ago and will separate reproductive rights as a distinct legal issue. It will ensure that women have much better access to information on their rights and that a fund is set up for women who cannot access free abortions, carried out by only qualified health personnel.
We are hopeful that the government will formally enact this into law in the coming months, which will also finally make it impossible to convict a woman of homicide if she has an abortion or suffers a miscarriage. This would provide a context for securing the release of those who are still in prison for very unfair reasons and transform the futures of millions of Nepalese women and girls.
The post Nepal: Where Abortion is Treated as Homicide appeared first on Inter Press Service.
Excerpt:
Sabin Shrestha is Executive Director of the Forum for Women, Law and Development (FWLD), the Kathmandu-based partner of international women's group Donor Direct Action.
The post Nepal: Where Abortion is Treated as Homicide appeared first on Inter Press Service.
Juhern Kim, acting representative of the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) in Colombia, gives a presentation on the intergovernmental organisation’s strategies. Credit: GGGI Colombia
By Constanza Vieira
BOGOTA, Jun 6 2018 (IPS)
Colombia is a global power in biodiversity and water resources, but at the same time it depends on exports of fossil fuels, coal and oil, to the world. But don’t panic: in the green economy there are also incomes and jobs – says a world expert on the subject, Juhern Kim.
“If Colombia makes intelligent use of its abundant natural resources, its natural capital, it can create new business opportunities linked to bio-economics, sustainable agriculture and forestry, which have the potential to generate income and create green jobs,” Kim, an environmental economist and ecosystem management specialist, told IPS in an interview.
Kim is acting representative in Colombia of the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), an intergovernmental organisation created in 2012, which promotes sustainable development that is both economically viable and socially inclusive. It works directly in 26 countries, including Colombia.
In June last year, Colombia ratified the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, by which it pledged to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent by 2030, to help fight global warming.
Among other issues, Kim analysed in his interview with IPS how this South American country is moving towards climate change mitigation and adaptation and a low-carbon economy, as committed to in the climate agreement signed in December 2015 in the French capital, at the 21st Session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 21) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.
The expert, who previously represented the GGGI in Vietnam and worked on issues related to the green economy at the UN Environment, also analysed how Colombia can make its energy mix and its economy greener in general.
IPS: Colombia is the world’s fifth largest producer of coal. How does the GGGI suggest bringing about an end to mining, an activity that runs counter to the climate accords?
JUHERN KIM: Coal production plays an important role in the Colombian economy: it contributes around 1.5 percent of GDP and 18 percent of total exports. Since about 95 percent of the coal produced in Colombia is exported, national coal production is affected by international market trends.
The recent volatile price fluctuation for commodities, and the associated impact on the Colombian economy, clearly shows that the country’s economy needs to be diversified in order to grow more and better.
Furthermore, future global demand for coal will tend to fall, although it will happen progressively and not for all types of coal.
Many countries have started to shut down their coal plants, and have been working on reducing the consumption of other fossil fuels, reinforced by international commitments such as the Paris Agreement, where Colombia made its own commitment as well.
GGGI promotes a sustainable and inclusive economic growth path, which implies the reduction of coal and other fossil fuel use, due to the negative environmental impacts.
That’s why GGGI has been supporting the government of Colombia for the last year and a half through the National Planning Department (DNP) to formulate a long-term green growth policy, that proposes actions related to the economic activity of coal in three ways:
1. Incorporation of renewable energy in the energy mix. GGGI advocates for countries to achieve energy transitions towards cleaner technologies. In Colombia, the production of electricity from coal amounts to 8 percent of the total.
2. Exploring new economic growth drivers to diversify the economy currently depending on the mining-energy sector (oil and coal exports). For instance, Colombia has abundant resources associated with natural capital, such as biodiversity – if Colombia utilizes these resources wisely, they can create new business opportunities related to bio-economy, sustainable agriculture, forest economy, which have the potential to generate income and create jobs (green jobs).
3. Curbing the environmental impacts of coal mining, especially by informal miners. Coal mining has informality rates close to 40 percent, while many productive units do not have an environmental license and have exploitation techniques that are harmful to the environment. It is intended to strengthen the mining formalization and provide technical assistance to reduce pollution.
IPS: How can the coastal population be protected from the intensification of tropical storms and the advance of coastal erosion?
JK: Colombia is being highly threatened by tropical storms and coastal erosion in two coastal areas that represent nearly 1,700 km in the Caribbean and 1,300 km in the Pacific.
Colombia has coasts on two oceans, and the frequency and intensity of such extreme events has been increasing, which, added to the deficient planning of urban development, increases the vulnerability and risk of people, infrastructure, and ecosystems.
The National Adaptation Plan recognises the country’s vulnerability to this type of events.
The country is now moving in the right direction led by the Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development (MADS) by including climate change variables within the planning and zoning of the territories, which will be articulated with adequate financing and technology transfer to implement mitigation measures for this type of risks.
Of particular importance is the ecosystems-based adaptation measure.
In this case, protecting and increasing the mangroves on the coastal lines will reduce coastal erosion, and at the same time allow the sustainable use of this type of ecosystem for the benefit of local people’s livelihood.
In other cases, it will be necessary to implement traditional infrastructure measures that avoid short-term calamities. Increasing local capacities, public awareness, adequate planning and the implementation of risk mitigation measures are key to achieving this objective.
IPS: A key question is the energy transition. How can clean energy be promoted in Colombia? Is community self-management better, or are large regional concessions, criticised as monopolies, preferable?
JK: Colombia has a high proportion of clean energy from hydroelectric generation (70 percent). However, this energy depends on the hydrological cycle which makes it vulnerable to the effects of climate change.
In that sense, it will be beneficial for Colombia to diversify its energy mix with other sources of clean energy, with some policy changes and regulations in the wholesale energy market.
Colombia currently lags behind in terms of the production of non-conventional renewable energy resources, compared to neighboring Latin American countries like Chile. However, Colombia has a strong potential for generation of solar, wind and biomass energy, and those can also serve as alternative off-grid solutions.
We believe that renewable energy projects should be carried out by entities that have the right technical and financial strengths required to develop, operate and maintain this type of projects.
IPS: What does the GGGI think of fracking?
JK: Fracking, like any other exploitation technique, has associated risks in its implementation and management, as it is known for generating many environmental impacts, such as potential contamination of ground and surface aquifers, methane emissions, air pollution, etc. In addition, it also has a potential for increasing oil spills, which can harm soil and surrounding vegetation.
In general, as an institute dedicated to green growth, we promote the development of alternative renewable energy sources to reduce dependence on fossil fuels. As mentioned above, it would be expected that the government make some efforts to diversify their economy to generate new sources of economic development while taking care of the environment and social impact.
IPS: According to environmental analysts, when the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) withdrew from the territories it controlled, it became evident that the guerrillas had played a role as forest rangers in those areas, because thousands of hectares have been razed since then. What is your take on the situation and what do you think can be done?
JK: Although the presence of guerrillas in many forested zones of the country prevented the entry of agricultural expansion and exploration for natural resources in some sense, it is probably not that simple to say that they played a role as forest rangers, because they also supported the production of illicit crops that generated deforestation.
In brief, understanding the reasons for the increase in deforestation in the country is not simple math at all. And finding solutions is not simple as well.
It seems that the post-conflict process has been generating a change in the territorial dynamics, in some cases through an absence of control arguably provided by guerrillas in the past, in other cases through a high-level of speculation associated with unproductive land use, with false hope embedded for some people wanting to be awarded land titles if they put any type of activities in the land, and sell their land at a better price in the future.
The playing field must be levelled. The abovementioned situation prevents rural producers and entrepreneurs from accessing land with adequate support for productive activities and conservation incentives, such as credits (i.e. financial instruments), access to markets, financial incentives for conservation (e.g. payment for ecosystem services), and so on.
In fact, the whole landscape should be properly planned in an integrated way – i.e. sustainable landscapes approach, which promotes economic gains but minimising environmental impact and increasing social returns.
For instance, productive zones for local economic development should be set up, but it is not wise to set them in the biological corridor. Also, financial instruments designed to promote sustainable agriculture methods, such as agroforesty, can be a driver for making a sustainable transition.
Also, Colombia has defined an Integrated Strategy for the Control of Deforestation and Forest Management, which sets clear guidelines on how to address this issue. However, having this strategy is not enough if there is no tight alliance among Colombian society as a whole.
In addition, the public authorities have an important role to play to implement the vision for conservation of forests (i.e. command and control) – e.g. functions of the prosecutor offices, judges and many other actors, committed to reduce illegality.
The post Q&A: Greening Colombia’s Energy Mix appeared first on Inter Press Service.
Excerpt:
Constanza Vieira interviews JUHERN KIM, GGGI acting representative in Colombia
The post Q&A: Greening Colombia’s Energy Mix appeared first on Inter Press Service.
Michael Clemens is Co-Director of Migration, Displacement, and Humanitarian Policy & Senior Fellow, Center for Global Development
By Michael Clemens
WASHINGTON DC, Jun 5 2018 (IPS)
The US is going to use aid to shape migration. That’s at least how the president’s remarks seem to have laid it out on Wednesday, when he announced his White House is “working on a plan to deduct a lot of aid” from countries whose nationals arrive at the US border. “[W]e may not just give them aid at all.”
Michael Clemens
The target of these proposed cuts is clear. He was speaking at an event about gangs originating in El Salvador. The president’s words follow a recent series of remarks focused on the gang’s convicted and alleged crimes here in the US, purportedly the result of criminal entities sending members across the border as and among unaccompanied child migrants.But slashing assistance would miss an opportunity to effectively and cost effectively shape migration through aid. Cooperation in Central America has the potential not only to meet this administration’s goal of reducing illegal migration, but simultaneously to extend more security and opportunity to children in the communities that child migrants are leaving.
To achieve this, the administration’s strategy to shape migration through aid needs to done right.
If evidence isn’t behind the president’s efforts, this policy will at best do nothing to deter illegal migration from El Salvador, and at worst will encourage it.
If what the United States wants to do is prevent irregular child migration in a way that works and is cost effective, it should not do what it has traditionally done—spend ten times as much on border enforcement trying to keep child migrants out as it spends on security assistance to the region.
In fact, smartly packaged security assistance is the only things that have been shown to reduce violence effectively and cost effectively.
This is based on the initial evidence we have: that well-considered expansion of security assistance may reduce child migration. There is a lot of evidence we don’t have—namely, zero evidence that slashing aid will reduce migration.
Let’s take stock of what we do know:
First, cutting aid to the Salvadoran government will not make it stop promoting illegal migration by gang members, because the Salvadoran government is not doing that. Emigration from El Salvador is a choice made by individuals, not a policy of the government.
And the Salvadoran government, like every other government, is barred under international law from restricting emigration of its nationals.
Second, enhanced US assistance can meet the goal of reducing illegal migration, including by Salvadoran youths. This is because projects financed by US aid have been shown to reduce violence in the region, and that violence is a major driver of illegal migration.
We know this from independent and scientifically sound evaluations of such projects. The best example comes from a rigorous multi-year evaluation of USAID-funded crime prevention programming, under USAID’s Central America Regional Security Initiative (CARSI), including in El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala.
CARSI deployed a package of community-based programs aimed at violence prevention, also encompassing tools such as vocational skills building, engagement of at-risk youth, efforts to boost employment, and community-based policing.
The evaluation is reliable and transparent because it was carefully designed to compare randomly-chosen “treatment” and “control” communities, like a pharmaceutical trial. The package was shown to reduce reports of homicide and extortion by half.
Third, reduced violence acts directly to suppress illegal migration by youths. My research showed this through an unprecedented statistical analysis. I analyzed confidential government data on all 179,000 Unaccompanied Alien Children from El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala apprehended by US Customs and Border Protection over a six-year period, linking this to detailed data on violence in their communities of origin.
I find that a decline of ten homicides in an average municipality of this region caused six fewer children from there to be apprehended at the US border. I don’t just mean that less violence was associated with less child migration.
I find that declines in violence caused less child migration, regardless of those Central American municipalities’ geographic location, size, urbanization, ethnic composition, or extent of prior migration.
Putting this together implies that cutting off US assistance to Central American governments in their fight the gangs and cartels could drive more youths to the desperate choice of emigration. That would miss a big opportunity to help those kids find the safety they deserve.
But it will also miss an opportunity to act in the direct national interest of the United States. Assistance that reduces the number of people moving in desperation takes revenue away from the transnational criminal networks that prey on those people.
Beyond this, unaccompanied child migration from Central America is a major burden on every taxpayer in the United States. Hannah Postel and I estimate that each apprehension of a child migrant at the US border costs taxpayers at least $50,000.
Averting just one homicide per year in the region between 2011 and 2016 would have prevented about four child migrant apprehensions—a savings to US taxpayers of $200,000. So if a violence prevention program can stop just one homicide per year, and that program costs less than $200,000 (which is quite likely), that would mean a savings to US taxpayers.
Strategically designing foreign aid programs to effectively reduce violence, building programs on the evidence we have and piloting other ideas of what might work, can help shape the migration flows—including deterring UACs from leaving home. Greater cooperation with Northern Triangle partners can advance the US national interest. Leaving Central America to its fate will do the opposite.
The post US Administration Wants to Control Immigration by Slashing Aid: Here’s What They Need to Know appeared first on Inter Press Service.
Excerpt:
Michael Clemens is Co-Director of Migration, Displacement, and Humanitarian Policy & Senior Fellow, Center for Global Development
The post US Administration Wants to Control Immigration by Slashing Aid: Here’s What They Need to Know appeared first on Inter Press Service.
A group of demonstrators protest in the Argentine city of Rosario against the wave of lay-offs of public employees since President Mauricio Macri took office. Credit: Courtesy of Indymedia.org
By Yilmaz Akyüz
GENEVA, Jun 5 2018 (IPS)
It is now more than a decade and a half since the last severe currency crisis in a major emerging economy ‒ that was in Argentina in 2001-2002 following a series of crises in Russia, Turkey and Brazil. It is now common knowledge that such crises generally occur when countries fail to manage surges in capital inflows so as to prevent build-up of fragility including currency appreciations, large and persistent current account deficits, increased leverage and currency and maturity mismatches in balance sheets.
The absence of a major crisis in the Global South since the early years of the new millennium owes not so much to judicious management of the surge in capital inflows that had begun in the early 2000s and continued with full force after the global financial crisis, as to persistently benign global financial conditions resulting from exceptional monetary policies in the US, Europe and elsewhere in advanced economies and favourable global risk appetite.
Even though there has been no fundamental reversal of these policies, the arrival of Minsky moment appears to be imminent with markets, in expectations of normalization of monetary policy in the US, getting nervous about the risks they have taken by investing heavily in emerging economies with poor economic fundamentals in search for yield in conditions of low global interest rates and ample supply of liquidity.
Yilmaz Akyüz, chief economist of the South Centre, Geneva.
The first serious signs have appeared in Argentina with the recently elected government of Macri knocking on the doors of the IMF. But Argentina is perhaps only the tip of an iceberg. Several other emerging economies are equally and even more susceptible to sudden stops and reversals of capital flows and currency and balance of payments crises.
In typical IMF interventions in previous crises, liquidity support was provided mainly to keep debtor countries current on their payments to international creditors and to maintain the capital account open. As a result, obligations to private creditors were translated into debt to the IMF. Simultaneously, austerity was imposed on debtors by means of hikes in domestic interest rates, fiscal retrenchment, cuts in employment, wages and pensions in order to achieve a sharp turnaround in the current account, primarily through import compression, and to restore confidence among international creditors and investors.
This approach to crisis management was widely criticised on several grounds. A strong case was made that the combination of debtor austerity and creditor bailout would lead to inequality between debtors and creditors in the incidence of the burden of the crisis, create moral hazard by allowing creditors to avoid the full consequences of the risks they have taken and are paid for, and endanger the financial integrity of the Fund.
Inequalities could also be created among creditors; in the event of a default and restructuring, those who exit first could escape without haircut, leaving the others to take the full brunt of debt write-offs. Profit opportunities are also created for vulture funds, at the expense of genuine creditors as well as the debtor, as seen in the case of Argentina.
Considerable scepticism was also expressed within the Fund about the wisdom of using public money to bail out private creditors and investors. During the earlier episodes of crises, the IMF Board recognized the need for involving the private sector in forestalling and resolving financial crises, but insisted on voluntary mechanisms, notably collective action clauses (CACs) and automatic rollover clauses in debt contracts and informal negotiations between debtors and creditors.
However, as these proved ineffective and some advanced economies started to oppose bailouts, the IMF Board agreed that in extreme circumstances, if it is not possible to reach agreement on a voluntary standstill, members may find it necessary, as a last resort, to impose one unilaterally, and that since there could be a risk that this action would trigger capital outflows, a member would need to consider whether it might be necessary to resort to the introduction of more comprehensive exchange or capital controls.
No protection against litigation was offered, but it was suggested that the Fund could signal its acceptance of a standstill imposed by a member by lending into arrears to private creditors. The Fund staff went further and proposed a formal Sovereign Debt Restructuring Mechanism (SDRM) to facilitate sovereign bond workouts. However, this did not elicit adequate support and had to be abandoned. The issue was soon forgotten with a rapid recovery of capital inflows to emerging economies and bounce back of economic activity in crisis-hit countries.
However, private sector involvement in crisis resolution was back on the agenda again with the onset of the Eurozone crisis. The Fund turned its attention to sovereign debt restructuring after misjudging the sustainability of the Greek debt, very much in the same way as it had done with Argentina about a decade earlier, pouring in money to bail out private creditors.
It restarted searching ways and means for involving the private sector in crisis resolution so as to “limit the risk that Fund resources will simply be used to bail out private creditors” and to ensure that private creditors made some concessions and took some losses on their holdings as a condition for Fund lending.
Subsequently it was suggested that the sovereign approaching the Fund for assistance were to be asked to find ways of rolling over all bonds and commercial loans falling due within the life of the Fund programme. This would be necessary whether external payments difficulties are perceived to be as one of liquidity or solvency which is often difficult to identify with a reasonable degree of precision ex ante.
This so-called “reprofiling” was again to be market-based and voluntary. However, no statutory mechanism was proposed for bailing in the private creditors in the event of failure of a voluntary agreement. In such an event, as long as the IMF stood firm in refusing lending without private sector involvement, the debtor would have had no option but to impose unilateral standstills on its obligations to private creditors, but without any statutory protection against litigation. Although various proposals were made outside the Fund to address the holdout problem and protect debtors against litigation, the matter was once again put aside without being resolved.
The stakes are now getting higher because of massive amounts of external liabilities that emerging economies built up in the past ten years. These are not only in debt contracted in reserve currencies, notably by private corporations, but also unprecedented amounts of foreign holdings in local deposit, bond and equity markets.
Furthermore, most emerging economies have eliminated or significantly reduced restrictions over capital outflows by residents. Consequently, exit of nonresidents from local markets and capital flights by residents now constitute bigger sources of potential drain on reserves of emerging economies than external debt contracted in reserve currencies.
Emerging economies are widely commended for large amounts of international reserves they have accumulated in the new millennium. However, in the large majority of cases these came from capital inflows rather than current account surpluses. Cumulatively, all G20 emerging economies except China and Russia have registered current account deficits since the beginning of the millennium, at a total amount of some $2 trillion while their external labilities have increased by over $4 trillion.
Reserves accumulated is less than a quarter of the increase in total liabilities while the rest of capital inflows (new liabilities) has been used for financing current account deficits or private acquisition of assets abroad – assets that would not necessarily return at times of interruption and reversal of non-resident capital inflows.
As of end 2016, on average, the reserves of deficit G20 emerging economies were less than one-third of their total non-FDI external liabilities including debt issued internationally and non-resident holdings in local deposits, bonds and equities. In many cases these holdings plus short-term forex debt reach or exceed international reserves. In most cases reserves would be totally inadequate to provide a reliable buffer against a generalized exit of non-residents and a widespread capital flight by residents.
Given the dismal record of the IMF in crisis intervention and management, many emerging economies are loath to go back to the IMF in the event of a severe currency and liquidity crisis, except those such as Argentina whose neo-liberal policies are strongly supported by the IMF. In any case at some $800 billion, the lending capacity of the IMF would be too small to take on the task. The level of liquidity that may be needed by many emerging economies in the event of capital reversals exceed by a large margin what the IMF could provide under exceptional financing.
Most emerging economies would also be highly reluctant to resort to unilateral debt standstills and exchange controls in view of their exposure to creditor litigation and chronic dependence on international lenders and investors. On the other hand, not much relief could be expected from South–South multilateral arrangements for liquidity provision, notably the Chiang-Mai Initiative Multilateralization (CMIM) of East Asian countries and the Contingent Reserve Arrangement (CRA) of BRICS.
These are not only small in size but also have design problems. The CMIM has never been called upon, even during the global crisis. It does not include a common fund but a series of promises to provide liquidity, with each country reserving the right not to contribute to the specific request by a member. Its size is $240 billion and access beyond 30 per cent of quotas is tied to an IMF program.
The CRA is also designed to complement rather than substitute the existing IMF facilities. Its size is even smaller, $100 billion, and access beyond 30 per cent is also tied to the conclusion of an IMF programme. Thus, these regional arrangements do not provide escape from IMF conditionality and surveillance.
That leaves bilateral swaps among central banks and bilateral lending by governments of reserve-currency countries, notably the US, and surplus emerging economies with ample international reserves such as China. A very large part of bilateral swaps established by the US Federal Reserve is with other advanced economies.
Those with emerging economies (Brazil and Mexico) are too small to provide much relief. In the words of the former chair of the US Federal Reserve, Janet Yellen, expanding the swap lines to serve as a safety net for countries encountering balance of payments pressures is not within the Fed’s mandate and therefore is a complete non-starter. China has swaps with over 30 countries. But these are mostly with advanced economies and designed to support trade and investment and to promote the international use of renminbi rather than boost reserves.
To sum, as recognised by the IMF, the global financial safety net including international reserves, Fund resources, bilateral swap arrangements, regional financing arrangements is “fragmented with uneven coverage” and “too costly, unreliable and conducive to moral hazard”.
Given the aversion of emerging economies to the IMF and unilateral debt standstills and exchange controls, the next crisis is likely to be even messier than the previous ones. Some countries may seek and succeed in getting bilateral support from China or some reserve-currency countries according to their political stance and affiliation.
For instance, one of the most vulnerable emerging economies, Turkey, is likely to approach China, Russia or some Gulf states with strong reserve positions rather than the IMF if its currency goes into a free fall. In such cases, crisis intervention would become even more politicised than in the past and a lot less reliant on multilateral arrangements.
By failing to establish an orderly and equitable system of crisis resolution, the IMF may very well find its role significantly diminished in the management of the next bout of crises in emerging economies. In other words, multilateralism, however imperfect, could face another blow in the sphere of finance after trade.
The post Renewed Crises in Emerging Economies and the IMF ‒ Muddling Through Again? appeared first on Inter Press Service.
Excerpt:
Yilmaz Akyüz is chief economist, South Centre, Geneva and former Director of the Division on Globalization and Development Strategies, UNCTAD, Geneva
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Residents of the Eastern Cape's Amadiba coastal area gather in September 2015. Many fear mining would threaten their way of life by destroying grazing land and creating rifts in the community. Courtesy: Nonhle Mbuthuma
By Mark Olalde
PRETORIA, Jun 5 2018 (IPS)
South Africans await judgement to be handed down in a court case that could set a sweeping precedent by empowering communities on communal land with the right to reject new mining projects.
Calling the case a referendum on “the right to say no,” residents of several rural villages along the country’s eastern coast are asking the court to reinterpret current minerals extraction legislation to compel mining companies to gain explicit community consent prior to breaking ground on new operations.
The court case, for which arguments were heard in late April in Pretoria, stems from a dispute over a proposed titanium mine that has raged for more than a decade in the country’s rural Eastern Cape province in an area known as the “Wild Coast.” The project has pitted Australian mining company Mineral Commodities Ltd against a group of five local villages, collectively known as Amadiba. Locals consistently turned back the company’s attempts to mine, but bouts of violence have left several people dead.
“Their way of life is intrinsically linked to the land. Customary communities tend to suffer disproportionately from the impacts of mining,” the plaintiffs argued in their submission to the court, noting environmental degradation, displacement and loss of agricultural land. “Without free, prior and informed consent, they are at real risk of losing not only rights in their land, but their very way of being.”
Nonhle Mbuthuma is the secretary and acting leader of the Amadiba Crisis Committee, which represents many residents of the villages. She took over the group’s mantle of leadership when the committee’s chairperson, Sikhosiphi ‘Bazooka’ Radebe, was gunned down in front of his home in March 2016. Radebe was widely thought to have been murdered for his activism against the mine, and Mbuthuma’s name is believed to be written on a hit list alongside his.
“The land is our identity. When we lose that land, we lose who we are. And when you lose who you are, that’s no different than just someone killing you,” Mbuthuma said.
Nonhle Mbuthuma of the Amadiba Crisis Committee is believed to be on a hit list due to her opposition to a proposed titanium mining project on South Africa’s east coast. Credit: Mark Olalde/IPS
The communities and civil society organizations that have joined the plaintiffs asked that if the court does not side with their argument for consent, that it at least grants them the ability to negotiate terms such as royalties prior to mining. If the court declines that too, then the plaintiffs asked that the current legislation be found unconstitutional.
In the court filings, a subsidiary of Mineral Commodities argued that the plaintiffs misinterpreted the law well beyond its intended purpose in an effort to halt the mine, which already earned permits. The company noted that “if granted, [the plaintiffs’ application] will affect land and mining rights all over the country.”
“We hope that if the judge rules in favor of us, it will help all African communities, not only Xolobeni, because the problem of mining pushing people off their land is all over Africa,” Mbuthuma said, referencing one of the five villages in Amadiba that has become synonymous with the conflict.
Formerly under the control of the oppressive apartheid system, South Africa democratically elected a new government in 1994, which worked to return the country’s mineral wealth to its citizens while also fitting into international, capitalist markets. Under current legislation, mineral rights were claimed for the state in an attempt to foster economic development.
However, as the government handed out mining licenses, conflicts arose between mining companies and rural communities living on communal land. About 13 percent of the country’s land area remains held communally in the vestiges of apartheid-era “homelands” that were created as sham independent states to remove black South Africans from urban areas. An estimated 18 million South Africans live on these lands.
Traditional leaders such as chiefs, kings and queens and councils preside over communal land, but their mandate comes from the people, according to customary law. In this set of laws, these leaders cannot make decisions for their communities without the consent of the people.
In many cases, though, traditional leaders strike deals with mining companies that open up communal land to mining, often without community-level consent. This happened in Amadiba, where one chief supported the proposed mine and was made a director of a company linked to the project. In return, the chief said in a signed statement provided to the South African Police Service, he was promised that challenges to his chieftaincy would disappear and that he would earn profits from the mine.
Through a company spokesperson, Mineral Commodities CEO Mark Caruso declined to comment for this story.
Johan Lorenzen is an associate at Richard Spoor Inc. Attorneys, which is part of the community’s legal team. He said that such conflicts are common in rural areas that are struggling to realize the full benefits of a democratic South Africa.
“The majority of rural South Africans live on communal land such as the Amadiba community. Particularly as the world’s largest platinum producer, South Africa has seen a wave of mining right applications over customary land, and, without clarity over this question of whether there’s the right to say no, it has had sweeping effects on tens-of-thousands of people in rural South Africa,” Lorenzen said. He estimates a judgement will be delivered in several months.
The minister of the Department of Mineral Resources announced an 18-month moratorium that temporarily halted both the project as well as any new permit applications for the area. That is set to expire later this year, and it remains unclear what will happen when it does.
As part of the moratorium, the department committed to commission “independent social specialist/s to…investigate the deeply rooted cause of the problems and document the causes and possible solutions” of conflict surrounding the mine.
In a statement to IPS, the department admitted to eschewing that obligation. “There was no independent investigation conducted, due to the well-publicised challenges between the parties in the area,” the statement said, also noting that the department was yet to decide whether to renew the moratorium.
As an alternative way of elevating these residents’ voices, British photographer Thom Pierce recently shot a series of portraits of Xolobeni residents and made the frames into postcards that he plans to mail to the minister of the Department of Mineral Resources. On the postcards, community members described the importance of holding the final say over their own land.
Themba Yalo invoked the memory of the Pondoland Revolt, a 1960s uprising where residents of Amadiba and surrounding communities took up arms against the apartheid government and its supporters. “My grandparents fought for this land, for me to live freely. I will never agree to a mine coming here and destroying the land and the graves of my family,” he wrote.
Others, including Mamthithala Yalo, argued for agriculture instead of mining: “I have pigs, cows and goats that I farm on this land. I also grow all of the food that I need. I will never allow the mining to come and change the way I live. This land is not for sale.”
Related ArticlesThe post South African Lawsuit Could Bring Sweeping Changes to Land and Mining Rights appeared first on Inter Press Service.
By WAM
DUBAI, Jun 5 2018 (WAM)
Marking World Environment Day, DP World’s Jebel Ali Free Zone, Jafza, has launched the UAE’s first green storage and warehouse facilities in Dubai, helping business to reduce their carbon footprint.
The global trade enabler’s sustainable, long term growth is aligned with the United Nation’s ninth Sustainable Development Goal, SDG, to build resilient infrastructure, promote sustainable industrialisation and foster innovation.
While some cool storage facilities are now running entirely on solar energy, an increasing number of other Jafza warehouses will become more energy efficient as DP World’s Solar Programme is rolled out over the coming years.
The project supports the UAE Vision 2021 for a sustainable environment and includes construction of the largest distributed solar rooftop project in the Middle East, with the installation of 88,000 rooftop solar panels on DP World’s Dubai facilities. It is estimated that the panels will produce enough clean power for 3,000 homes a year.
Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem, DP World Group Chairman and CEO, said, “Corporate citizenship is part of the fabric of society today and it will play a major part in our future. Building green infrastructure allows us to reduce carbon footprint in our facilities. By investing in these projects, we also encourage the development of new skills, driving economic growth and job creation.
“Our experience and studies have shown that a mindset to conserve and the development of sustainable business practices enables efficient operation. This streamlines effort and saves resources, which enhances employee productivity and reduces cost. It a win-win for all.”
DP World’s Solar Programme also contributes to energy diversification in the region as part of Dubai’s Integrated Energy Strategy 2030, which seeks to reduce energy demand by 30% by 2030.
In 2010, the company was the first international trade enabler to join the Carbon Disclosure Project, CDP, which runs the global system that enables companies, cities, nations and regions to measure and manage their environmental impact.
DP World has been reporting results across its portfolio in 40 countries, monitoring energy use, making terminal operations more efficient, embracing renewable energy projects and investing in low-carbon technologies.
For the third consecutive year in 2017, DP World’s CDP report received the ‘leadership’ score of A-, highlighting the company’s role in implementing best practice in greenhouse gas emissions and improving environmental performance within its industry.
WAM/Elsadig Idriss/Hassan Bashir
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Entire neighbourhoods in Raqqa are damaged beyond repair. Credit: Amnesty International
By Donatella Rovera and Benjamin Walsby
RAQQA, Syria, Jun 5 2018 (IPS)
Driving around in Raqqa, it was easy to believe what a senior US military official said – that more artillery shells were launched into the Syrian city than anywhere else since the Viet Nam war.
There was destruction to be seen on virtually every street, in the heaps of rubble, bombed-out buildings and twisted metal carcasses of cars. There were also constant reminders of devastated civilian lives, in the broken possessions, scraps of clothing and grubby children’s toys scattered amongst the ruins.
Between 6 June and 17 October 2017, the US-led Coalition mounted an operation to “liberate” Raqqa from the armed group calling itself the Islamic State (IS). The Coalition claimed its precision air campaign allowed it to oust IS from Raqqa while causing very few civilian casualties, but our investigations have exposed gaping holes in this narrative.
Our new report, ‘War of annihilation’: Devastating Toll on Civilians, Raqqa – Syria, presents the evidence we collected over several weeks in Raqqa, investigating cases of civilians who paid the brutal price for what US Defence Secretary James Mattis promised to be a “war of annihilation” against IS.
Residents were trapped as fighting raged in Raqqa’s streets between IS militants and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighters, supported by the Coalition’s air and artillery strikes. IS mined escape routes and shot at civilians trying to flee.
Hundreds of civilians were killed: some in their homes; some in the very places where they had sought refuge; and others as they tried to flee.
We investigated the cases of four Syrian families, who between them lost 90 relatives and neighbours almost all of them killed by Coalition air strikes.
Destruction in Raqqa’s city centre. Credit: Amnesty International
In the case of the Badran family, 39 family members were killed in four separate Coalition air strikes as they ran from place to place inside the city, desperately seeking a way of avoiding rapidly shifting frontlines and coalition air bombardments over the course of several weeks.
“We thought the forces who came to evict Daesh [IS] would know their business and would target Daesh and leave the civilians alone. We were naïve. By the time we had realised how dangerous it had become everywhere, it was too late; we were trapped,” Rasha Badran told us.
“I don’t understand why they bombed us…Didn’t the surveillance planes see that we were civilian families?”
After several attempts to flee, Rasha and her husband finally managed to escape, having lost their entire family, including their only child, a one-year-old girl named Tulip, whose tiny body they buried near a tree.
The Aswads were a family of traders who had toiled hard all their lives to build a home in Raqqa. Some of them stayed behind to defend their home from being looted, sheltering in the basement. But, on 28 June, a Coalition air strike destroyed the building, killing eight civilians, most of them children.
Another family member was killed when he stepped on an IS mine after returning to the city to try to recover the bodies days later.
During the four-month offensive, US, British and French Coalition forces carried out tens of thousands of air strikes. US forces, which boasted about firing 30,000 artillery rounds during the campaign, were also responsible for more than 90% of the air strikes.
The Coalition repeatedly used explosive weapons with wide-area effects in populated areas where they knew civilians were trapped. There is strong prima facie evidence that Coalition air and artillery strikes killed and injured thousands of civilians, including in disproportionate or indiscriminate attacks that violated international humanitarian law and are potential war crimes.
Precision air strikes are only as precise as the information about the targets. In addition, when bombs big enough to flatten whole buildings are being used, as well as artillery with wide-area effects, any claims about minimizing civilian casualties ring hollow.
Amnesty International is urging Coalition members to investigate impartially and thoroughly allegations of violations and civilian casualties, and to acknowledge publicly the scale and gravity of the loss of civilian lives and destruction of civilian property in Raqqa.
The USA, UK and France must disclose their findings. They must be transparent in disclosing their tactics, specific means and methods of attack, choice of targets, and precautions taken in planning and execution of attacks.
They must also review the procedures by which they decide the credibility of civilian casualty allegations and they must ensure justice and reparation for victims of violations.
The victims, including tiny one-year-old Tulip, deserve justice. Coalition members must not risk repeating the same mistakes elsewhere.
The post Civilians Paid a Very High Price for Raqqa’s Devastating “Liberation” by US-led Forces appeared first on Inter Press Service.
Excerpt:
Donatella Rovera is a Senior Crisis Response Adviser and Benjamin Walsby is a Middle East Researcher at Amnesty International
The post Civilians Paid a Very High Price for Raqqa’s Devastating “Liberation” by US-led Forces appeared first on Inter Press Service.
MECLEP Project studied how migration, displacement, and planned relocation can improve adaptation to environmental and climate change. Photo: IOM
By International Organization for Migration
Jun 4 2018 (IOM)
In late March 2017, the IOM published the final report for a project on Migration, Environment, and Climate Change: Evidence for Policy (MECLEP), which concluded that in many cases migration contributes to adaptation to environmental and climate change, as it allows affected families to diversify their income, improve their employment, health, and education opportunities, and prepare them to better face future dangers caused by natural factors.
The study also showed how the displacement of persons due to natural dangers poses more challenges to adaptation, since it often increases the vulnerability of those displaced. The survey conducted by the MECLEP Project in Haiti confirms the results of previous studies (Gütermann and Schneider, 2011; Courbage, et al., 2013; Sherwood, et al., 2014): the vulnerability of the persons displaced by the 2010 earthquake increased after the earthquake. Many of these people ended up living for several years without basic services such as potable water, food, restrooms, sanitation, and adequate protection. On the other hand, however, seasonal migration (temporary migration without a permanent change of residence) turned out to be a positive adaptation strategy in Haiti.
Consequently, one policy-related recommendation that came out of the study points out the importance of doing everything possible to avoid the displacement of persons, while facilitating other forms of mobility such as seasonal migration, thus strengthening the resilience of famililes in the face of natural dangers and reducing the risk of disasters.
The study calls for preventing the displacement of persons, while facilitating other forms of mobility such as seasonal migration. Photo: IOM
Another important point highlighted by the MECLEP research refers to planned relocation, which can be a successful adaptation strategy while also exposing the population to new vulnerabilities. For example, field research conducted in the Dominican Republic (focused primarily on relocation of the population of Boca de Cachón, Jimaní, affected by the rising waters of Lake Enriquillo), shows that the relocation was positive in that it provided access to housing for the community, but the scarcity of water in the new lands ruled out farming, thus causing a great loss of the population’s ties to the land. In this sense, the study’s multiple recommendations for policy makers included the need to formulate politics and design relocation programmes with a socio-territorial focus and an emphasis on social participation when putting adaptation measures into practice.
Other important policy-related recommendations point out the need to integrate migration into urban planning efforts in order to reduce challenges for both the migrants and the destination communities, as well as the need to give special consideration to gender-related issues and the needs of the most vulnerable groups.
Generally speaking, the MECLEP Project stressed the importance, for countries affected by climate change, of gathering data and carrying out research on the connection between migration and climate change, in order to formulate proper policy responses. Workshops based on the first training manual focusing on the theme of migration, the environment, and climate change helped to develop tools for integrating human mobility into climate change adaptation plans and incuding environmental aspects in Haiti’s draft migratory policy.
The MECLEP Project, financed by the European Union and executed by the IOM with a consortium of six universities, concluded in late March 2017 after three years of implementation (January 2014 — March 2017). The objective of the Project was to study how migration, displacement, and planned relocation can improve adaptation to environmental and climate change, by comparing data gathered in six countries (the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Kenya, the Republic of Mauritius, Papua New Guinea, and Vietnam), as part of the IOM’s broader efforts in the area of migration, the environment, and climate change.
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Further Information
• Diagnosis of Information for Public Policies: Migration, Environment, and Climate Change in the Dominican Republic (text in Spanish)
• Challenges, Proposals, and Policies: Migration, Environment, and Climate Change in Haiti (text in French)
• Glossary on Migration, the Environment, and Climate Change (text in Spanish)
About the Authors:
Irene Leonardelli worked as a Research Assistant at the IOM’s Global Migration Data Analysis Centre in Berlin. Between October 2015 and March 2017, she collaborated with the MECLEP Project (Migration, Environment and Climate Change: Evidence for Policy). Leonardelli holds a Master’s Degree in International Migration and Social Cohesion from the University of Amsterdam, as well as a Licentiate Degree in Cultural Anthropology from the University of Bologne.
Guillermo Lathrop is a staff member at the Latin American School of Social Sciences (FLACSO), where he has worked on issues related to local economic development. Lathrop collaborated with the MECLEP Project in 2015 and 2016. In addition, he served as a conference speaker on regional development at the Institute of Social Studies in The Hague, Holland. He holds a graduate degree in Urban and Regional Planning from the Catholic University of Chile.
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