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Sadio Mane completes a £35m move from Liverpool to Bayern Munich on a three-year contract.

Salmon fishing. Credit: iStock

By Marla R. Emery, Jean-Marc Fromentin and John Donaldson
BONN, Germany, Jun 22 2022 (IPS)

You probably use wild species far more often than you realise. For many people, especially in more developed economies, the use of wild species sounds like something quite removed from their everyday lives – something perhaps more relevant to other people, in other countries.

It is a fact, however, that the use of wild species is a vital part of almost every human community. If you eat fish, they are most likely wild species. When you take cough medication, it’s likely to be derived, in part, from wild plants. Your wooden furniture may once have been a wild tree. Even the joy and inspiration you get from nature, such wildlife watching, is another use of wild species.

The 2019 Global Assessment Report by IPBES (Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services) alerted the world that direct exploitation is one of the main reasons that 1 million species of plants and animals now face extinction – many within decades. This should have been a wake-up call. Our human behavior is harming wild species, some of which we have relied on for centuries to provide nutrition, clothing, shelter, and more.

In other words, we use wild species to meet a wide range of human needs. By damaging them, we are also harming ourselves – and the policies and decisions we make about the use of wild species have consequences for our health, food security, livelihoods and general wellbeing.

This doesn’t mean that we have to stop eating fish entirely, give up on cough medication or find other materials for our homes – but what is needed, urgently, is better information and knowledge together with stronger institutions to ensure that our use of wild species is sustainable.

For this reason, four years ago, nearly 140 Governments tasked 85 leading experts, from every region of the word, with preparing a landmark new IPBES assessment report on the sustainable use of wild species – to help inform decisions about nature by governments, businesses, civil society, indigenous peoples and local communities – in fact by everyone whose choices and actions impact nature.

In the first week of July, this report – drawing on more than 6,200 sources, will be considered by the member States of IPBES. Once accepted, it will become the go-to resource to inform policy options and actions to promote the more sustainable use of wild species from the global to the national and even the very local scale.

One of the things that sets this report apart is the extent to which it draws on the expertise and experiences not only of the natural and social sciences – but also of indigenous peoples and local communities. For many local communities, the use of wild species is inextricably entwined with their culture and identity – with customs and practices evolved over millennia to ensure sustainable use.

The report will also have very immediate real-world relevance. Having been specifically requested by, among others, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), it will directly inform the decisions of the 19th World Wildlife Conference in Panama in November 2022.

Additionally, it will be taken up by the Parties to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity in the negotiations later this year of the new global biodiversity framework for the next decade. The sustainable use of wild species is also closely related to our ability to meet the UN Sustainable Development Goals and to deal with other global challenges such as land use and climate change.

Among the most important aspects of this new IPBES report is just how vital the sustainable use of wild species is to everyone – everywhere, in the face of multiple global environmental crises. It will offer better information and options for solutions that work – for people and the rest of nature.

Dr. Marla R. Emery is a Scientific Advisor with the Norwegian Institute for Nature Research and retired Research Geographer with the US Department of Agriculture.

Dr. Jean-Marc Fromentin is a Researcher at the French Research Institute for the Exploitation of the Sea (IFREMER), Deputy Director of the MARBEC research Unit.

Prof. John Donaldson is an independent biodiversity consultant and previously Chief Director Biodiversity Research, Assessment and Monitoring at the South African National Biodiversity Institute.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Excerpt:

The authors are Co-Chairs of the IPBES Assessment of the Sustainable Use of Wild Species

A polio vaccinator administers the oral polio vaccine to a child in Pakistan. Credit: Ashfaq Yusufzai/IPS

By Ifeanyi Nsofor
ABUJA, Jun 22 2022 (IPS)

For forty days, Kunle Adeyanju – a Nigerian, Rotarian, polio eradication advocate and biker – rode for more than 12,500km from London to Lagos to raise funds for polio eradication.

Adeyanju documented his journey on Twitter, where his handle is appropriately named @lionheart1759. Indeed, it takes one with a lion’s heart to embark on such a bold adventure. People like philanthropist Bill Gates, who works on polio eradication, and the CEO of Twitter, Parag Agrawal, tweeted out their support and admiration.

Even in the face of dwindling resources and competing demands, the push for the total eradication of polio must continue because as long as even a few people have polio, it could spread widely again

I also followed Adeyanju’s journey on Twitter, and I applaud him too, including because I love to see individuals pursue their dreams, no matter how terrifying it seems. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Africa’s first female President and former President of Liberia, aptly captures this sentiment, “The size of your dreams must always exceed your current capacity to achieve them. If your dreams do not scare you, they are not big enough.”

I also support his cause. Polio is a serious infectious disease – it causes paralysis of muscles and also kills if the respiratory muscles are affected. In the past, polio victims who were unable to breathe on their own were placed in iron lung machines to enable them to breathe. Thanks to the efficacy of the polio vaccine, this is now history.

I am a proud alumnus of polio eradication. It was my first experience in global health. As a young monitoring, evaluation and surveillance officer at Nigeria’s National Programme on Immunization, I was involved in the global polio reaction initiative supporting advocacy, training of health workers and supervising routine and polio vaccinations across Nigeria.

We’ve seen in recent years how the global community has come a long way in almost making polio the second infectious disease (after smallpox) to be eradicated. Without a doubt, Rotary International has been a major partner and funder on this journey. I am part of the Rotary International family and was the president of the Rotaract Club at the Nnamdi Azikiwe University College of Medicine, Nnewi, southeast Nigeria. Rotary International launched a global polio vaccination campaign in 1985.

Three years later, the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) was established. At that time, polio paralysed more than 1000 children globally daily. Since then, more than 2.5 billion children have been immunized against polio. Consequently, global incidence of polio cases has decreased by 99%. Currently, wild poliovirus continues to circulate in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Nigeria interrupted polio transmission in 2019.

Even in the face of dwindling resources and competing demands, the push for the total eradication of polio must continue because as long as even a few people have polio, it could spread widely again. The final five-year push to eradicate polio would cost an estimated less than $1 billion per year.

Like Adeyanju, Gates, and others, I want to see polio completely eradicated. These are four areas where those $5 billion funds could make that possible.

First, polio vaccine is needed to vaccinate all eligible children. To be fully protected for life, children need four doses of polio vaccines. Polio vaccines come in two forms – oral and injectable. Based on UNICEF estimates, cost per fully vaccinated child is $0.42 for oral polio vaccine. In contrast, it is $2.78 for an injectable polio vaccine.

Second, polio surveillance is a continuous process necessary for prevention and detection of the virus. The polio virus is passed out in stool. That’s why polio transmission is faeco-oral.

This makes polio transmission common in communities with poor sanitation and widespread public stooling. Surveillance activities involve collecting and screening stools of children who have quick onset paralysis after episodes of fever. Further, environmental surveillance of polio involves collecting and testing sewage water for the polio virus.

Third, vaccine storage via modern cold chain equipment. Maintaining the right cold chain for vaccines requires constant electricity, which is lacking across communities in sub-Saharan Africa. For example, only 48% of sub-Saharan Africa has access to electricity, according to the World Bank.

Therefore, clean renewable energy such as solar is a sustainable way to provide the right cold chain for vaccines. Across African countries, some primary health centers already use solar freezers for vaccine storage. Solar freezers don’t come cheap. A Solar Direct Drive Freezer sold on the African Union’s “Africa Medical Supplies Platform” costs $5,797.56.

Lastly, public health education is imperative to achieve equity in complete polio eradication and to continue to see successful vaccination campaigns in countries without polio. Indeed, the University of Global Health Equity, Rwanda captures this succinctly, “to achieve equity in healthcare, depends on equity in health education”.

Polio education is delivered in communities using community health workers, community leaders and community based organisations. Other means include use of radio, TV, print media and electronic media. More polio education should be delivered via social media. Adeyanju has made polio topical among youths on social media by following his heart and pursuing his dream

Adeyanju’s bold ride from London to Lagos has put polio on the front burners of international discourse, especially in these times of covidization of everything.

Through his action, he has answered in the affirmative Rotary International’s four-way test of what people say, think or do:

Is it the truth? – Yes

Is it fair to all concerned? – Yes

Will it build good will and better friendships? – Yes

Will it be beneficial to all concerned? – Yes

Thank you, Kunle Adeyanju. Your boldness will save lives and stop children from being paralysed. You are a hero.

 

Dr. Ifeanyi McWilliams Nsofor is a graduate of the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine. He is a Senior New Voices Fellow at the Aspen Institute and a Senior Atlantic Fellow for Health Equity at George Washington University.

Students attending class at the Souza Gare school in the Littoral region, Cameroon. The school hosts displaced children who have fled the violence in the North-West and South-West regions. Photo credits: ECW/Daniel Beloumou

By Joyce Chimbi
Nairobi, Jun 22 2022 (IPS)

It is not enough that they were robbed of their childhoods and their shattered young lives defined by bombs, bloodshed and death. Now, crisis-impacted school-aged children are falling off the academic bridge that could lead them out of the carnage.

Not only has the number of crisis-impacted school-aged children requiring education support grown from an estimated 75 million in 2016 to 222 million today, but they are also furthest left behind proficiency standards, according to a new report by the UN global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises, Education Cannot Wait (ECW).

A young Palestinian refugee attends school in Lebanon.
Photo credits: ECW/ Fouad Choufany

“Around the world, 222 million children are having their education cruelly interrupted. Their dreams for the future are snatched away by conflicts, displacement and climate disasters, UN’s Secretary-General António Guterres.

The study paints an alarming picture of the academic life of crisis-impacted children inside makeshift refugee settlements, damaged classroom walls and communities torn apart by war and disaster.

Of the 222 million crisis-affected children and adolescents in need of urgent education support, “an estimated 78.8 million are out of school. Close to 120 million are in school but not achieving minimum proficiency in math or reading. One in ten crisis-impacted children attending primary or secondary education is achieving proficiency standards.

Further, 84 percent of out-of-school, crisis-affected children and adolescents live in protracted crises. Of these, about two-thirds are in ten countries, Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Mali, Nigeria, Pakistan, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan and Yemen. These countries are also specifically targeted through ECW’s ground-breaking multi-year investments.

Student attending class at a local school in Ungheni, Moldova. The school hosts Ukraine refugee children who attend class with Moldovan pupils.
Photo credits: ECW

The war in Ukraine is pushing even more children out of school, with recent estimates indicating the conflict has impacted 5.7 million school-aged children. Behind these numbers, millions of vulnerable girls and boys worldwide await a global collective action.

The ECW study shows the response to education in emergencies, and protracted crises remains chronically underfunded and that the funding gap appears to have worsened since the COVID-19 pandemic started.

In response to the urgent global education crisis, ECW and strategic partners launched the #222MillionDreams resource mobilization campaign in Geneva on July 21, 2022.

“This is a global call to action: we speak of the 222 million dreams representing each 222 million children and adolescents sustaining the extreme hardship of emergencies and protracted crises. Their dreams are profoundly driven by their experience of wars and forced displacement.

“This is our moment to empower them to turn their dreams into reality,” said Yasmine Sherif, Director, ECW.

“While the world struggles with the devastating impacts of armed conflicts, COVID-19 and climate change, 222 million children and adolescents live through these horrific experiences. They dream to become their full potential rather than a victim. Do not let them down. It is our duty to empower them through quality education and to help make their dreams come true.”

As such, the campaign calls on donors, the private sector, philanthropic foundations and high-net-worth individuals to urgently mobilize more resources to scale up ECW’s investments, which are already delivering quality education to over 5 million children across more than 40 crisis-affected countries.

“In the face of these crises, the UN’s fund for education in emergencies, ECW, is standing with children across 40 countries. We need governments, businesses, foundations and individuals to support the vital work of ECW,” says Guterres.

“We need their ideas and innovations as we look ahead to September’s Transforming Education Summit. Help us place education within reach of every child, everywhere. Help us keep 222 million dreams alive.”

Gordon Brown, UN Special Envoy for Global Education and Chair of the ECW High-Level Steering Group, says the financial resources to ensure every child and young person can receive a quality education is attainable.

“Now, we need to take responsible action for the 222 million children and youth in emergencies and protracted crises. Governments, the private sector, and foundations can and must unlock these resources. Only then can we empower them to reach their potentials and realize their dreams,” he said.

The campaign stresses that it will be too late for children waiting for wars or climate crises to end to have the opportunity to learn and thrive. Acting now empowers crisis-impacted children with the tools they need to become positive change-makers through safe, inclusive, quality education.

“In times of crisis, children experience uncertainty with regard to their future and are faced with a total disruption of their routines. Going to school provides children with protection, a sense of normalcy and hope and is a means to provide longer-term perspectives,” says Patricia Danzi, Director General of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.

“We know that after school disruption and closures, many children will not continue their education. Switzerland is committed to contribute to reducing the risk of lost generations through its support of education in emergencies. We are thus partnering with ECW.”

Global leaders have committed to “ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education and promoting lifelong learning opportunities for all” through the 2030 Agenda for SDG 4. The new estimates indicate that COVID-19 and other factors have derailed two decades of education gains.

According to the UN, basic school infrastructure is lacking in many Least Developed Countries. Only 54% of schools have access to safe drinking water, 33% have reliable electricity, and 40% have hand washing facilities.

Students attending class at a school near Mugina in Cibitoke Province, an area that has experienced a rise in landslides due to climate change in Burundi.
Photo credits: ECW/Amizero

In light of these needs, Guterres is convening the “Transforming Education Summit” in September 2022. The Summit seeks to “mobilize political ambition, action, solutions and solidarity to transform education: to take stock of efforts to recover pandemic-related learning losses; to reimagine education systems for the world of today and tomorrow, and to revitalize national and global efforts to achieve SDG4.”

With the urgent need to respond to the significant education needs of vulnerable boys and girls trapped in emergencies and protracted crises, the #222MillionDreams campaign encourages people everywhere to call on world leaders and world-leading businesses to act now.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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Excerpt:

“We speak of the 222 million dreams representing each 222 million children and adolescents sustaining the extreme hardship of emergencies and protracted crises. Their dreams are profoundly driven by their experience of wars and forced displacement. This is our moment to empower them to turn their dreams into reality.” Yasmine Sherif, Director, ECW

Secretary-General António Guterres talks to villagers in Llano Grande, Colombia, where he witnessed how the peace process was developing in Colombia. November 2021. Credit: UNMVC

By Oliver Dalichau
BOGOTA, Colombia, Jun 22 2022 (IPS)

On Sunday, 19 June 2022, the hopes of millions of Colombians working for a more democratic, safer, ecological, and socially just country came true.

Senator Gustavo Petro, in a duo with his Afro-Colombian vice-presidential candidate, environmental expert Francia Márquez, received approximately 50.44 per cent or 11,281,013 of the votes cast, and has been elected the 42nd President of Colombia.

Both his predecessor Iván Duque and his opponent Rodolfo Hernández publicly congratulated him on his election victory.

Some 22,445,873 people or 57.55 per cent exercised their right to vote in the run-off election on 19 June 2022, about 3.7 per cent more than in the first round three weeks ago. Only in 1998 was the turnout higher.

Getting people to the polls is not always easy in Colombia: Thousands of people in some parts of the country again had to travel for several hours, even days, to reach one of the polling stations. In some regions, heavy rain also prevented people from voting. In addition, threats, violence, and vote-buying continue to restrict voting, especially in remote rural areas.

Oliver Dalichau

For the first time in the country’s history, neither a conservative nor a member of the Liberal Party will lead the government of Latin America’s fifth largest economy.

With Gustavo Petro, the winning streak of leftist movements and parties in Latin America continues and provides further momentum for the upcoming elections in Brazil in October 2022.

Gustavo Petro’s opponents

In this historic situation for Colombia, what will matter is how the losers behave. On Sunday, Petro not only relegated his direct challenger, the anti-women and anti-migrant 77-year-old self-made millionaire and populist, Rodolfo Hernández, to second place, but with him also the country’s previous political elite.

With 47.31 per cent or 10,580,412 votes, Hernández received much less support than the polls had predicted.

However, significantly more people than in the last elections opted for neither candidate: 490,118 or 2.23 per cent gave a voto blanco.

This is a Colombian peculiarity that allows voters to express their disagreement with the candidates but, unlike abstention, allows them to exercise their democratic right.

Precisely because this triumph is so unique, President Petro should now reach out to his critics, remind the losers of their responsibility in state politics and call on the opposition to work constructively. At the moment, it is unclear whether the losers will be able to accept their new role.

The military, traditionally strong in Colombia, also remains a key player in this phase of the democratic transition. It is expected that the military leadership will soon send out signals that leave no doubt about Gustavo Petro’s election victory.

He will also be their commander-in-chief after his inauguration on 7 August. Should the recognition fail to materialise publicly, Petro’s presidency would be tainted from the outset and rumours of an imminent coup d’état would continue to do the rounds. Both Colombian NGOs and the international community should keep a close eye on this.

Six urgent challenges

In any case, the new president faces enormous challenges. It is already questionable whether Petro will find a majority in the Colombian parliament for a fundamental change of the unequal living conditions, the high unemployment, inflation rate, national debt, and the necessary socio-ecological transformation of the country.

Although quite a few deputies of his left-progressive alliance Pacto Histórico support Petro after the congressional elections in March, he lacks a legislative majority of his own.

Moreover, the newly elected representatives must first prove that they can stick together and also lead a government together, especially now that the ministers are to be appointed. Tensions are already pre-programmed in the colourful spectrum of the Pacto Histórico.

The government’s most urgent tasks include:

Reviving the peace process: In the last four years under Iván Duque’s ultra-right government, the peace process signed in 2016 with the former guerrilla group FARC was hardly implemented.

President Petro needs to relaunch it, push for its implementation, and ensure that social and local leaders are better protected from displacement, violence, and assassination. This year alone, more than 60 of these líderes sociales have been murdered.

After this process, a dialogue with the guerrilla organisation ELN would be necessary too. It is up to the new government to send out signals define conditions as to whether and how negotiations can take place.

A new economic policy: Petro takes over a country with the highest inflation rate of the last 21 years from his unpopular predecessor. With a current debt of around 63 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) and a budget deficit of over six per cent, the president-elect has announced that he will begin his term with a structural tax reform.

This envisages an increase in the tax burden for the richest 0.01 per cent of the population. This idea is vehemently opposed by the political right. During the election campaign, they left no stone unturned to discredit Petro, accusing him of preparing the country’s economic decline.

Commitment to women’s rights and greater equality: Petro proposes the creation of a Ministry of Equality led by Francia Márquez, which would be responsible for formulating all policies to empower women, people of all sexual orientations, the different generations, and ethnic and regional diversity in Colombia.

Under Petro, women in particular could expect to gain priority access to public higher education, credit, and the distribution and formalisation of land ownership.

Petro and Marquez are proposing an energy transition that will rule out new developments of future oil fields.

Land reform and protection of indigenous people, peasants, and Afro-Colombian women: The extremely unequal distribution of land is one of the structural causes of the armed conflict in Colombia. The internal displacement of recent decades has led to the expansion of arable land: the resulting tensions are at the root of conflicts between ethnic communities (indigenous and Afro-Colombian) and peasant women over access to this land.

All these groups have been and continue to be excluded from the development of the country. At the same time, they are among the most affected by the armed conflict’s violent dynamics.

Petro’s government will need to ensure a more equitable distribution that enables the integration of ethnic and farming communities into the production and development circuits.

Better education for more people: During the social protests last year (and already in 2019 and 2020), the demand for more public and quality education was one of the central messages of the mostly peacefully demonstrating Colombians.

Petro promises to provide them with a higher education system in which public universities and secondary schools in particular are properly funded.

More environmental protection: Under the Duque government, environmental and climate protection in Colombia was largely neglected, deforestation increased, and the first fracking pilot wells were approved. Petro and Marquez have announced fundamental change.

They are focusing on a more environmentally-friendly production and service model and are proposing an energy transition that will rule out new developments of future oil fields. This process is to be accompanied by a land reform on unproductive lands – mostly resulting from illegal forest clearance.

A Colombia of social justice

Beyond these urgent reform tasks, the president and his government will also have to find answers in other important areas, such as integrated security reform, a diversified new foreign policy, a different drug policy, and on the regulation of narcotics.

At the same time, they must not disregard the necessary coalition with civil society that ultimately lifted them into office.

Gustavo Petro and Francia Márquez achieved something historic on that memorable Sunday in June 2022. The expectations for both are huge, perhaps even unrealistic. On the one hand, the winning couple must stick together and remain capable of compromise.

At the same time, both have raised many hopes and are exemplary for the new Colombia: both want a more social, a more ecological, a more secure, and a more democratic republic.

President Petro will make mistakes and he will hardly be granted the usual 100 days grace period.

The fact that the ultra-conservative and liberal power elites were voted out of office by the majority of Colombians is a political turning point for the country. The losers will hardly accept the new opposition role constructively – and as an important element of a consolidated democracy.

It is more likely that they will torpedo the new government from day one and do everything they can to make it fail.

President Petro will make mistakes and he will hardly be granted the usual 100 days grace period – neither by his hopeful supporters from civil society, nor by the more than ten million people he has failed to convince of his programme and person.

He will have to govern openly, transparently, and with a certain flexibility to be able to react appropriately to national and international challenges. He will have to change his behaviour, which is often described as arrogant and self-centred.

And he should emphasise the social team spirit that was the basis for the victory of the Pacto Histórico. That is the only way he can succeed in breathing new life into the peace process and achieve the urgently needed reforms in economic and social policy for Colombia. And he will need many allies to succeed, both at home and abroad.

German and European politicians would be well advised to pledge their support to the new president and strengthen the peace process along the way. At the same time, this would contribute to the consolidation of democratic institutions after this historic change of government.

Both remain crucial for a sustainable, peaceful development of the country, and necessary for a Colombia of social justice.

Oliver Dalichau heads the office of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung in Colombia.

Source: International Politics and Society (IPS)-Journal published by the International Political Analysis Unit of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, Hiroshimastrasse 28, D-10785 Berlin

IPS UN Bureau

 

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It is the first royal visit to the country, which will host a summit of the 54 Commonwealth members.

President Jair Bolsonaro launched the sale of shares of Eletrobras, the largest company in the electricity sector in Brazil, which will be privatized through its capitalization. The State will remain as a minority partner, in a privatization process approved by Congress, conditional on the construction of gas thermoelectric power plants in the interior of the country, far from gas fields and pipelines. CREDIT: Alan Santos/PR-Public Photos

By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO, Jun 21 2022 (IPS)

Brazil has abundant low-cost energy, but by the time it reaches the consumer it is one of the most expensive in the world. This contradiction hinders the country’s human and economic development and the “solutions” found have actually aggravated the problem.

The rise of hydrocarbon prices on the international market, intensified by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, unleashed a battle by the government to curb energy prices, as the rising costs hurt the administration’s hopes for reelection in the October elections. Lower taxes were the chosen formula.

“It is positive, it mitigates the problem, but it does not improve energy efficiency,” said Paulo Pedrosa, president of the Association of Large Industrial Energy Consumers and Free Consumers (ABRACE), whose members are responsible for the consumption of 40 percent of the electricity and 42 percent of the natural gas used in Brazil.

Now that the debate on the subject has been sparked, the opportunity should be used to bring about structural changes, aimed at “removing from energy the costs of public policies, of many extra costs that should not be in the electricity bill,” he argued.

Energy is expensive in Brazil due to numerous subsidies, charges, taxes and various contributions that drive up prices, especially the cost of electricity. They account for half of the total cost paid by the consumer, according to ABRACE.

This is what puts the cost of energy in Brazil among the two or three most expensive in the world, along with Germany and Colombia, according to the International Energy Agency, even though the country is an oil exporter and 60 percent of its electricity comes from an abundant, cheap source: water.

The Itaipu binational hydroelectric power plant, shared with Paraguay, was the last large, low-cost plant to be located close to major consumer markets. Inaugurated in 1984 on the Paraná River, on the border with Paraguay and close to Argentina, its installed capacity is 14,000 megawatts. Brazil’s hydroelectric potential since then has been limited to rivers in the Amazon rainforest, with more expensive construction costs and the need for long transmission lines to large consumers. CREDIT: Itaipu Binacional

Industry suffers the consequences

This paradox reduces the competitiveness of the national economy, especially in energy-intensive industries, and hinders growth and human development, said Pedrosa.

As a result, the deindustrialization that Brazil has been suffering for at least three decades has accelerated.

The situation “has worsened in the last 10 years, when decision-making has been captured by particular interests in the industry’s chain, politicians and local economies,” he said in a telephone interview with IPS from Brasilia.

The Court of Accounts, responsible for public expenditure oversight, identified 16 types of subsidies included in the monthly bill that electricity distributors pass on to consumers.

All consumers are charged for the cost of fossil fuels to generate electricity in remote areas of the Amazon, for the losses suffered by distribution companies due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and even for subsidies to give polluting coal-fired power plants a longer lifespan, until 2040.

“Irrigated agriculture receives the subsidy, it does not pay for part of its consumption under the pretext of producing food. But what is the point of subsidizing the production of soy, most of which is destined for export?” asked Roberto Kishinami, head of energy questions at the non-governmental Climate and Society Institute.

Navy Admiral Bento Albuquerque was removed from his post as minister of mines and energy by President Jair Bolsonaro on May 11, 2022 for failing to impose fuel price containment on state-owned Petrobras. Bolsonaro is trying to prevent the oil hike from affecting his popularity and his slim chances of reelection in October. CREDIT: Marcelo Camargo/Agência Brasil

Social policy

Some subsidies could be justified because of their social purpose, but it shouldn’t be energy that should be taxed, but the national budget, he argued. “An income transfer program like the Bolsa Familia would be better,” he said.

Kishinami was referring to the program that since 2004 provides a subsidy of about 80 dollars a month to poor families, which was renamed Auxilio Brasil by the administration of far-right President Jair Bolsonaro.

“Lowering the price of energy is also a social policy,” said Pedrosa. “Brazil has a vocation to produce cheap and clean energy, something that the world values more and more every day, and wasting this advantage harms everyone, not only industry,” he argued.

On Jun. 14, ABRACE released a study on “The impacts of electricity and natural gas prices on growth and economic development”, commissioned from the economic consultancy Ex Ante.

If a “competitive price” for electricity were achieved, with a reduction of 23 to 34 percent for industries that vary in terms of energy consumption, Brazil could raise its annual economic growth from the expected 1.7 to 4.8 percent on average over the next 10 years, and generate 6.74 million additional jobs, according to the study.

The country could thus move up 10 positions in the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) Human Development Index ranking, from 84th place in 2019 to just under Mexico, which ranked 74th.

The study is aimed at broadening and guiding the energy debate, which is in the interest of the whole country, not just the industry and politicians, Pedrosa said.

In this South American country of 214 million people, energy represents 17.1 percent of the total cost of living for families, and an even higher proportion among the poor. This includes direct spending on electricity, gas and other fuel.

It also takes into account the cost of energy embedded in the goods and services consumed by the family, or indirect energy consumption. Bread, for example, contains 27.2 percent of energy in its final price, milk and meat 33.3 percent and school notebooks 35.9 percent.

In a family’s basic food basket, the study estimated the share of energy in the total cost at 23 percent.

In other words, rising energy prices cost everyone different amounts, depending on their consumption of goods and services. This is also the case for companies. The construction industry spends 14 times more on energy included in supplies and machinery than in the plant where it operates.

The timing is opportune for the debate on energy prices and their social and economic effects, because Brazil will elect its president, state governors and national and state legislators in October.

Another reason is that the rise in oil and gas prices provoked a strong reaction from the government and pro-government parliamentary leaders. Bolsonaro has tried to blame the state-owned Petrobras oil giant for increasing its prices according to international prices, a rule adopted by the company with the endorsement of the government, its majority partner, since 2017.

The Itá Hydroelectric Power Plant, on the Uruguay River in southern Brazil, is also one of the last low-cost plants due to its proximity to the consumer market. It is a concrete face rock-fill embankment dam, a low operational cost structure, with the reservoir at the top of the mountain, which was favored by the topography. CREDIT: Mario Osava/IPS

Legislators of chaos

On Jun. 15, Congress approved a law that caps the maximum merchandise circulation tax charged by state governments on fuel, energy, mass transit and telecommunications, considered essential services, at 17 percent.

This tax varied greatly among the 26 Brazilian states and the Federal District, from 25 to 34 percent, for example, on gasoline, and from 12 to 25 percent on diesel, the most important fuel for the transportation of cargo.

The same legislators who are now seeking to curb energy prices, with the risk of generating serious fiscal problems for the states, with ineffective measures, according to analysts, passed several laws in recent years that incorporate undue costs in energy.

The privatization of Eletrobrás, the largest company in the sector in Brazil, was approved conditional upon the construction of natural gas thermoelectric power plants that would produce a total of eight gigawatts of power. The costs will be high because areas were chosen far from the natural gas fields and without gas pipelines for the plants.

Pedrosa and Kishinami believe the measures were taken with the elections in mind and do not correct the tangle of errors and expenses accumulated in Brazil’s energy system. Both are betting on Bill 414, already approved in the Senate and pending in the Chamber of Deputies, which would reform the sector.

It will be the first step in separating infrastructure from electricity sales and establishing a system of competition, with the supply of different types of energy from a variety of sources, renewable or not, Kishinami told IPS in Rio de Janeiro.

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As cigarette smuggling in Southern Africa becomes big business, researchers have expressed concern that tobacco consumption is increasing in younger people and developing countries. Credit: Ignatius Banda/IPS

By Ignatius Banda
BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe , Jun 21 2022 (IPS)

Cigarette smuggling has emerged as one of the most lucrative enterprises between Zimbabwe and South Africa, with border authorities seizing contraband worth millions of dollars in recent years.

Last month, South African police confiscated cigarettes worth ZAR1,7 million (about USD105,000) from Zimbabwean smugglers who have taken advantage of porous border controls between the two southern African countries for years.

In November last year, another Zimbabwean was nabbed as he attempted to smuggle cigarettes worth ZAR30 million (about USD1,850,000) into South Africa, where there is a ready and expanding market for cigarettes.

The following month, another Zimbabwean was caught attempting to smuggle cigarettes worth ZAR2,6 million (USD160,300) into South Africa. The escalation of the movement of contraband highlights the complexity of not just border controls but how cigarettes and tobacco are proving to be the new gold for criminal syndicates.

As a global anti-tobacco lobby grows amid concerns of unabated tobacco-related deaths, researchers are training the spotlight on tobacco consumption and its toll on public health and national economies.

In a new report by the University of Chicago, researchers who have created a Tobacco Atlas after surveying 63 countries say global smokers now exceed 1.1 billion people.

While, according to researchers, global smoking prevalence is dropping, from 22.6 percent in 2007 to 19.6 in 2019, Africa and other developing parts of the world are recording an increase in tobacco consumption, the report says.

The findings will likely concern African governments where public health services are already struggling. The Tobacco Atlas researchers raise concerns about tobacco-related diseases and deaths in developing countries.

Tobacco-related diseases are expected to increase in future years in countries with low Human Development Index scores, the Tobacco Atlas researchers predict.

“Some African countries are seeing an increase in adult and youth smoking. What we’ve seen in Africa is the slowest decline in smoking prevalence of any region,” said Professor Jeffrey Dope, lead author of the Tobacco Atlas and a professor of public health at the University of Illinois.

“The tobacco industry is aware of this. They are working very hard to convince governments that tobacco is very important for the economy. Unfortunately, they’re having some success,” Dope said during a Zoom report launch early this month.

Further findings noted that more young girls than boys are taking a puff, with the ubiquity of social media “influencers” being a driver of the trend.

“Global progress is threatened by growing smoking rates among children aged 13 to 15 in many countries and by tobacco industry tactics such as targeting poor countries with weak regulatory environments,” the researchers said.

“We have countries where female teens smoke more than male teens and adult females, which is happening in different parts of the world,” said Violeta Vulovic, senior economist at the Institute for Health Research and Policy at the University of Chicago.

“The tobacco industry aggressively markets to children, especially through flavour products. And through social media, especially influencers, the industry clear understanding that the peer-to-peer effect is perhaps the most effective way to get kids to try smoking,” Vulovic said.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) says tobacco causes more than 8 million global deaths annually. More than “7 million of those deaths resulting from direct tobacco use, while around 1.2 million are the result of non-smokers being exposed to second-hand smoke.”

Covid-19 has only added to global health challenges that have pushed the tobacco agenda to the periphery, researchers say.

“In the wake of Covid-19, countries are prioritising public health and investing in strategies to support health and economic growth,” said Nandita Murukutla, one of the contributors to the Tobacco Atlas research.

“For countries that want to recover, tobacco control should be high on their agenda,” Murukutla said.

However, with African countries continuing to rely on tobacco for forex earnings, findings contained in the Tobacco Atlas are not likely to persuade governments to slow down the production of what across the continent has been called “green gold.”

One way to deal with the increase in smoking, the University of Chicago researchers say, is to “raise taxes on tobacco.”

“This is so that kids cannot afford to smoke. We know from decades of research that young people are extra sensitive to price,” Vulovic said.

The researchers say this has worked in other African countries to stem the illicit cigarette trade.

“Countries should look to Kenya as an example of a country that is keeping its tobacco taxes high and controlling its supply chain – little illicit trade – successfully,” Dope told IPS. “These modest investments in tax administration in Kenya have reaped huge rewards in terms of increased tax revenues, which they then reallocate to social programmes such as health and education, among others.”

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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By External Source
GENEVA, Jun 21 2022 (IPS-Partners)

The United Nations global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises, Education Cannot Wait (ECW), released a shocking new report today that indicates the number of crisis-impacted school-aged children requiring educational support has grown from an estimated 75 million in 2016 to 222 million today.

Of the 222 million crisis-affected children and adolescents in need of urgent education support, the study indicates that as many as 78.2 million are out of school, and close to 120 million are in school, but not achieving minimum proficiency in math or reading. In fact, just one in ten crisis-impacted children attending primary or secondary education are actually achieving these proficiency standards.

The analysis indicates that 84% of the out-of-school crisis-impacted children are living in areas with protracted crises. The vast majority of these are in countries specifically targeted through ECW’s ground-breaking multi-year investments, including Afghanistan, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Mali, Nigeria, Pakistan, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan and Yemen. The war in Ukraine is pushing even more children out of school, with recent estimates indicating the conflict has impacted 5.7 million school-aged children.

These alarming new figures are released against the backdrop of a recent ECW study showing that the response to education in emergencies and protracted crises remains chronically underfunded, and that the funding gap appears to have gotten even worse since the COVID-19 pandemic.

To respond to this pressing global education crisis, ECW and strategic partners launched the #222MillionDreams resource mobilization campaign in Geneva today. The campaign calls on donors, the private sector, philanthropic foundations and high-net-worth individuals to urgently mobilize more resources to scale up ECW’s investments, which are already delivering quality education to over 5 million children across more than 40 crisis-affected countries.

The campaign rallies together donors and other strategic partners in the lead up to the Education Cannot Wait High-Level Financing Conference ¬- co-hosted by ECW and Switzerland, and co-convened by Germany, Niger, Norway, and South Sudan – taking place 16-17 February 2023 in Geneva.

“The financial resources to ensure that every child and young person can receive a quality education exist in the world. Now, we need to take responsible action for the 222 million children and youth in emergencies and protracted crises. Governments, private sector and foundations can and must unlock these resources. Only then can we empower them to reach their potentials and realize their dreams,” said The Rt. Hon. Gordon Brown, UN Special Envoy for Global Education and Chair of the ECW High-Level Steering Group.

“This is a global call to action: we speak of the 222 million dreams representing each of the 222 million children and adolescents sustaining the extreme hardship of emergencies and protracted crises. Their dreams are profoundly driven by their experience of wars and forced displacement. This is our moment to empower them to turn their dreams into reality. While the world struggles with the devastating impacts of armed conflicts, COVID-19 and climate change, 222 million children and adolescents live through these horrific experiences. They dream to become their full potential rather than a victim. Do not let them down. It is our duty to empower them through quality education and to help make their dreams come true,” said Yasmine Sherif, Director of Education Cannot Wait.

“In times of crisis, children experience uncertainty with regard to their future and are faced with a total disruption of their routines. Going to school provides children with protection, a sense of normalcy and hope and is a means to provide longer-term perspectives. We know that after school disruption and closures, many children will not continue their education. Switzerland is committed to contribute to reducing the risk of lost generations through its support to education in emergencies. We are thus partnering with Education Cannot Wait and look forward to co-hosting the High-Level Financing Conference in Geneva,” said Patricia Danzi, Director General of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.

Global leaders have committed to “ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education and promoting lifelong learning opportunities for all” through the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (SDG4). The new estimates indicate that COVID-19 and other factors have derailed two decades of education gains. According to UN reports, basic school infrastructure is lacking in many Least Developed Countries. Only 54% of schools have access to safe drinking water, 33% have reliable electricity and 40% have handwashing facilities.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres is convening the “Transforming Education Summit” in September 2022. The Summit seeks to “mobilize political ambition, action, solutions and solidarity to transform education: to take stock of efforts to recover pandemic-related learning losses; to reimagine education systems for the world of today and tomorrow; and to revitalize national and global efforts to achieve SDG4.”

On the heels of the Summit, the Education Cannot Wait High-Level Financing Conference is the opportunity for leaders to turn commitments into action, by making substantive funding contributions to ECW that will help turn dreams into reality for the children left furthest behind in crises.

Read UN Secretary-General António Guterres Statement.

#222Million Dreams
The #222MillionDreams campaign encourages people everywhere to call on world leaders and world-leading businesses to address the concerning rise in the number of crisis-impacted children requiring educational support. Join the campaign by making a $222 individual donation to Education Cannot Wait, and by sharing your support on social media with videos, posts and calls to action to support #222MillionDreams.

Excerpt:

“Around the world, 222 million children are having their education cruelly interrupted. We need governments, businesses, foundations & individuals to support the vital work of Education Cannot Wait. Help us place education within reach of every child, everywhere. Help us keep 222 million dreams alive.” ~ UN Secretary-General António Guterres

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By Anis Chowdhury and Jomo Kwame Sundaram
SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, Jun 21 2022 (IPS)

After decades of rejecting international tax cooperation under multilateral auspices, rich countries have finally agreed. But, by insisting on their own terms, progressive corporate income tax remains distant.

Tax avoidance and evasion by transnational corporations (TNCs) are facilitated by ‘tax havens’ – jurisdictions with very low ‘effective’ taxation rates. Intense competition among developing countries to attract foreign direct investment (FDI) makes things worse.

Anis Chowdhury

Developing countries need tax revenue most, but they will lose more, as a share of GDP, than wealthy countries. But a global minimum corporate (income) tax rate (GMCTR) can become a “game changer” undermining tax havens.

Minimal minimum rate
TNCs exploit legal loopholes to avoid or minimize tax liabilities. Such practices are referred to as ‘base erosion and profit shifting’ (BEPS).

Tax havens collectively cost governments US$500–600bn yearly in lost revenue. Low-income countries (LICs) will lose some US$200bn, more than the foreign aid, of around US$150bn, they receive annually.

Corporate income tax represents 15% of total tax revenue in Africa and Latin America, compared to 9% in OECD countries. Developing countries’ greater reliance on this tax means they suffer disproportionately more from BEPS.

A GMCTR requires TNCs to pay tax on their worldwide income. This discourages hiding profits in tax havens. The Independent Commission for the Reform of International Corporate Taxation (ICRICT) recommended a 25% GMCTR.

This 25% rate was around the current GDP-weighted average statutory corporate tax rate for 180 countries. Slightly below the OECD countries’ average, it is much less than the developing countries’ average. So, a GMCTR below 25% implies major revenue losses for most developing countries.

To reverse President Trump’s 2017 tax cut, the Biden administration proposed, in April 2021, to tax foreign corporate income at 21%. In June, the G7 agreed to a 15% GMCTR, endorsed by G20 finance ministers in July. This poor G7 rate is now sold as a “ground-breaking” tax deal.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram

Unsurprisingly, the World Bank President also rejected 21% as too high. The Bank has long promoted ‘race-to-the-bottom’ host country tax competition. Embarrassingly, its Doing Business Report was ‘suspended’ indefinitely in 2021 after its politically motivated data manipulation was exposed.

The OECD also wants to distribute taxing rights and revenue by sales, and not where their goods and services are produced. Critics, including The Economist, have pointed out that large rich economies would gain most. Small and poor developing economies, particularly those hosting TNC production, will lose out.

The OECD proposals could reduce small developing economies’ (SDEs) tax bases by 3%, while four-fifths of the revenue would likely go to high income countries (HICs). Hence, developing countries prefer revenue distribution by contribution to production, e.g., employees, rather than sales.

Undemocratic inclusion
Developing countries have never had a meaningful say in international tax matters. G20 members should have asked multilateral organizations, such as the UN and the IMF, which the G7 dominated OECD has long blocked.

Instead, the G20 BEPS initiative asked the OECD to work out its rules. After decades of keeping developing countries out of tax governance, its compromise Inclusive Framework on BEPS (IF) promotes lop-sided international tax cooperation.

Developing countries were only involved “after the agenda had been set, the action points were agreed on, the content of the initiatives had been decided and the final reports were delivered”.

Developing countries have been allowed to engage with OECD and G20 members, supposedly “on an equal footing”, to develop some BEPS standards. To become an IF member, a country or jurisdiction must first commit to the BEPS outcome.

Thus, the non-OECD, non-G20 countries must enforce a policy framework they had little role in designing. Unsurprisingly, with little real choice or voice, the 15% GMCTR was agreed to, in October 2021, by 136 of the 141 IF members.

FDI vs taxes
The proposed OECD tax reforms are supposed to be implemented from 2023 or 2024. The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) Investment Division recognizes it will have major implications for international investment and investment policies affecting developing countries.

UNCTAD’s World Investment Report 2022, on International tax reforms and sustainable investment, offers guidance for developing country policymakers to navigate the complex new rules and to adjust their investment and fiscal strategies.

Committed to promoting investments in the real economy, especially by FDI, UNCTAD recognizes most developing countries lack the technical capacity to address the complex tax proposal. Implementing BEPS reports and related documents via legislation will be difficult, especially for LICs.

Existing investment treaty commitments also constrain fiscal policy reform. “The tax revenue implications for developing countries of constraints posed by international investment agreements (IIA) are a major cause for concern”, the Report notes.

Although tax regimes influence investment decisions, tax incentives are far from being the most important factor. Other factors – such as political stability, legal and regulatory environments, skills and infrastructure quality – are more significant.

Nonetheless, tax incentives have been important for FDI promotion. Such incentives inter alia include tax holidays, accelerated depreciation and ‘loss carry-forward’ provisions – reducing tax liability by allowing past losses to offset current profits.

With the GMCTR, many tax incentives will be less attractive to much FDI. Tax incentives will be affected to varying degrees, depending on their features. UNCTAD estimates productive cross-border investments could decline by 2%.

Hence, policymakers will need to review their incentives for both existing and new investors. The GMCTR may prevent developing countries from offering fiscal inducements to promote desired investments, including locational, sectoral, industry or even employment-creating incentives.

Investors rule
With generally lower rates, ‘top-up taxes’ could significantly augment SDEs’ revenue. Top-up taxes would apply to profits in any jurisdiction where the effective tax rate falls below the minimum 15% rate. This ensures large TNCs pay a minimum income tax in every jurisdiction where they operate.

However, host countries may be prevented by IIAs – especially Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) provisions – from imposing ‘top-up taxes’. If so, they will be imposed by TNCs’ mainly rich ‘home countries’.

Thus, FDI-hosting countries would lose tax revenue without benefiting by attracting more FDI. Existing IIAs – of the type found in most developing countries – are likely to be problematic.

Hence, the GMCTR’s implications are very important for FDI promotion policies. Reduced competition from low-tax locations could benefit developing economies, but other implications may be more relevant.

As FDI competition relies less on tax incentives, developing countries will need to focus on other determinants, such as supplies of skilled labour, reliable energy and good infrastructure. However, many cannot afford the significant upfront financial commitments required to do so.

Many important details of reforms required still need to be clarified. Thus, developing countries must strengthen their cooperation and technical capabilities to more effectively negotiate GMCTR reform details. This is crucial to ‘cut losses’, to minimize the regressive consequences of this supposedly progressive tax reform.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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