Africa

By Nora McKeon
ROME, Oct 19 2021 (IPS)

‘COVID 19 has multiplied hunger and malnutrition challenges. We need transformative action!’ The first speaker at the UN Committee on World Food Security’s (CFS) 49th Plenary Session, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, turned the spotlight on the disastrous impacts of the pandemic that have afflicted communities around the world for close to two years.

Nora McKeon

He was echoed by the presenter of the 2021 edition of the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World for whom ‘COVID is only the tip of the iceberg’, while keynote speaker, Jeffry Sachs, emphasized the multifaceted nature of the crisis, with chronic poverty and conflict at the center.

Delegation after delegation took the virtual floor to share their concerns: Kenya speaking for the Africa Group, Colombia, Cuba, Costa Rica, Norway, Morocco, Peru, Spain, Indonesia, Mexico, Malaysia, Mali, Cape Verde, South Africa, Uganda, Saint Lucia and more. The impacts of Covid 19 on food security and nutrition are heavy and lasting. The vulnerable are the most effected, within and between countries. Covid has deepened and exacerbated existing structural fragilities and injustices in our food systems. Its causes are multisectoral and cannot be treated in a siloed way.

‘Multilateralism, solidarity and cooperation are key to the way forward’, the President of ECOSOC added, and ‘the CFS is a unique multilateral forum because it brings all the actors together in the name of the right to food’. The text adopted at the end of Day 1 summarized all of these contributions, and deepened concern by drawing attention to the possibility of recurrent pandemics.

With this kind of an opening one could have expected a standing ovation when it was proposed, the following day, that the CFS put together a globally coordinated policy response to the impacts of COVID 19 on food security and nutrition and a proposed precautionary approach towards possible future shocks of this kind.

This proposal was a long time in the building. For a year and a half the CFS’s Civil Society and Indigenous Peoples’ Mechanism (CSM) had been documenting the experience and proposals of its constituencies and communities and bringing this evidence from the ground into the global debate. Earlier this year an informal ‘Group of Committed’ governments and other CFS participants had come together to push for the CFS to take determined action. How could it fail to live up to its mandate in the face of the most serious threat to global food security the world has faced since the 2007-2008 food crisis?

Just a week before CFS49 the Group of Committed had held a seminar where evidence and proposals for global policy action were presented by national governments, regional and local authorities, small-scale food producers, the urban food insecure, along with UN agencies, the Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, and the CFS’s own High-Level Panel of Experts.

The seminar demonstrated that action is being taken by different actors and authorities at local, national and regional levels, while UN agencies have developed and adopted relevant policy instruments and programmes in their respective sectors. What has been missing thus far is a way of putting the different perspectives and initiatives together into a multisectoral, multilaterally coordinated approach. Filling this gap was the proposal that was put on the table in CFS49.

‘We need a globally coherent and coordinated response to support governments’ efforts and the CFS is the appropriate place for this to happen,’ the Ambassador of Mali had exhorted in his opening address.

So what about the standing ovation? The proposal was supported by countries from the Global South led by African countries, the most affected by injustice in access to vaccines, dependency on food imports, and indebtedness, but including also Mexico, Peru, Morocco, the CSM and the Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food. ‘This is the place to deal with COVID!’ he said. ‘It is the priority food issue today. It wasn’t addressed by the UN Food Systems Summit. The CFS has the mandate and the tools, and the other UN agencies are highly committed to cooperate.’

But, incredibly and unacceptably, the proposal did not pass. It was blocked on specious, procedural grounds by a steamroller coalition of big commodity exporters who push back on any possible limitation that might be placed on global trade in the name of human rights, equity, environmental concerns: the US, Canada, Argentina, Brazil, Russia. The EU, shamefully, was silent.

The implications for inclusive multilateralism, democracy, the needed radical transformation of our food systems are severe. ‘A key barrier to transformation is interference from corporations,’ stated the delegate of Mexico. ‘Governments need to assume their role as agents of change, regulators of food systems, and protectors of the planet, but we can’t do it alone. Global attention is needed and the CFS is the right place for it.’

But The CFS is being held hostage. The arrogance with which a few are ignoring reality, evidence and urgency is leading to an unacceptable increase in the violation of the human rights of the many. Patience is wearing thin. ‘If I’m in this room it’s to honor the concerns of those most affected in my region,’ a member of the Group of Committed asserted in the aftermath of the session.

And the people of her region, along with others from around the world, are raising their voices ever more loudly, as in the counter mobilization to transform corporate food systems organized last July in parallel to the Pre-Summit of the UNFSS [hyperlink]. Radical food system transformation is being built from the ground up and the CFS, however handicapped, is the most resounding global echo chamber for people’s claims.

 

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The IMF and G20 concluded their Annual Meetings without real solutions to debt crises, fiscal austerity and financing shortfalls across the Global South. Credit: hrw.org

By Bhumika Muchhala
NEW YORK, Oct 19 2021 (IPS)

Last week’s annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank and G20 finance ministers illustrated that despite a historic debt crisis sweeping across developing countries and their urgent need for external financing for health and economic recovery, global economic institutions governed by rich countries do not possess the political will to deliver meaningful solutions. The inadequacy of the G20’s debt relief framework, which has failed to restructure sovereign debt since its inception, stands without change or any fresh effort to mobilize private sector participation in debt relief.

Despite the broad call to recycle SDRs from rich to poor countries, the few countries that made commitments to do so are employing a conditional loan mechanism which will further drive fiscal consolidation measures in low-income countries.

Deprived of the policy independence and vaccines that allow advanced economies to enact massive fiscal stimulus programs and open their economies, many developing countries are facing a cycle of deflation and despair.

The IMF’s flagship World Economic Outlook (WEO) confirms the entrenchment of global divergence between North and South by reporting that developed countries will return to pre-crisis growth projections in 2022 while developing countries’ recovery will stretch to 2024, in a journey marked by “permanent economic scarring and revenue losses” for the South.

The WEO concludes that unemployment is a major driver of this gap and unemployment rates would be persistently higher if trouble with vaccinations leads to COVID-19 becoming ‘endemic.’

A brand new (and conditional) loan to recycle SDRs?

In the months preceding the largest ever allocation of $650 billion SDRs was issued by the IMF on August 23, a momentum to recycle SDRs from rich to poor countries was generated by a broad range of actors, including the UN, governments and civil society.

A milestone was achieved when G7 leaders committed to voluntarily channel $100 billion of their unused SDRs. Despite this amount falling short of the IMF’s own conservative estimate of the $200 billion financing shortfall in low-income countries between 2021 and 2025, the move was welcomed in light of the unequal distribution of SDRs based on IMF members’ quotas, where over 60% (or $400 billion) of the SDRs go to developed countries.

After France announced it will channel 20% of its SDR allocation to African countries, with a focus on vaccine donations, all eyes were on the Annual Meetings for announcements by other rich countries.

In a virtual panel last week, IMF Managing Director Kristina Georgieva said that the “100 billion number is very achievable,” alluding to several countries who had stated, but not yet committed exact amounts, their intentions to channel SDRs. Given the urgency of fiscal space and external financing across developing countries, more details were expected.

The Fund was tasked by the G20, G7 and IMF membership to design a mechanism to recycle the funds. In response, the IMF proposed two key pathways, that of scaling up the long-standing Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (PRGT) concessional loan facility for low-income countries and establishing a new Resilience and Sustainability Trust (RST) that would be accessible to middle-income countries.

While both proposals were accepted by the G20 and the G24 group of developing countries in the IMF, years of critique looms over the PRGT for its fiscal consolidation conditions, including by the Fund itself. Empirical research has long illustrated how the PRGT shrinks public expenditure for indispensable social services and employees in health and education and promote regressive taxation measures that disproportionately hurt women and low-income communities.

Meanwhile, the RST, which is still being formulated and will be presented for approval to the Fund’s Board in 2022, is the first loan facility to address balance of payment risks stemming from climate change and pandemics, featuring conditionality related to climate or pandemic preparedness designed and monitored in coordination with the World Bank.

There are three key concerns that already emerge in the little that is currently published or known of the Fund’s design of the RST. First, access to the RST will be contingent on having a conditional IMF loan program already in place. According to one of the only published sources on the RST, it would likely ‘top up’ a regular IMF loan program.

Second, while many in the international community have asked the IMF to support countries with climate transition risks, including financing for a just transition, the RST should not be counted as climate finance. The latter is direct budget support for climate mitigation and adaptation, while the RST addresses budget distortions that may arise from climate change.

Third, it remains to be seen whether the RST’s stated objective of catalyzing private and other multilateral financing will involve creating an enabling environment for the vested interests of private finance in creating investible climate-oriented schemes that yield more for profit than for people.

In a letter to G20 finance officials and the IMF, over 280 civil society organizations and networks, including researchers and academics, called for a set of principles to govern the fair channeling of SDRs to developing countries.

These principles include, for example, attachment of policy conditionality, accrual of more debt, avoiding the double-counting of SDRs as aid, and ensuring access for middle-income countries that are often excluded from multilateral schemes.

The letter stresses the importance of recycling SDRs through grant funding that facilitates budget support for public services and a fair recovery that supports climate justice, and tackles economic and gender inequality, including the unpaid care burden that women bear, and the pandemic exacerbated.

A critical opportunity to progressively alter the basic tenets of development financing in the current global financial architecture has been missed by the Fund and its rich country members.

G20 fails to address record high debt distress

As the G20’s wholly inadequate debt moratorium concludes at the end of 2021, the World Bank reports that the debt burden of low-income countries rose to a record $860 billion and half of the world’s poorest countries are in external debt distress as a result of the pandemic. And yet, the G20’s finance ministers again fail to advance real debt solutions such as debt relief, debt cancellation and fair restructuring mechanisms for countries requesting debt reduction.

Indeed, no new relief scheme or possibility of a debt standstill was announced by the G20 finance minister’s communiqué, even with the imminent closure of its Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI).

Meanwhile, the G20 proved once again their lack of power to increase private sector creditor participation in debt reduction initiatives beyond mere reaffirmations. At the Spring Meetings in April 2021, Mohamed El-Erian, President of Queens’ College, Cambridge and Chief Economic Advisor at Allianz, said at a webinar that the Paris Club process of case-by-case debt treatments is “not enough to overcome coordination problems in the private sector; the Paris Club needs to impose more of a stick for the private sector.”

The inability to regulate the private sector into debt relief participation alludes to how the ‘chutzpah‘ of bondholders is a direct outcome of the way G20 leaders and their central banks have nurtured private finance to become so powerful that they now find themselves unable to curtail its might.

The Jubilee Debt Coalition stated in their press release that the G20 are asleep at the wheel as the debt crisis intensifies in low-income countries, pointing out that the DSSI has suspended less than a quarter of debt payments, while the G20’s Common Framework for Debt Treatments (CF) has restructured no debt.

In particular, private creditors received the largest amount of debt payments, $14.9 billion, and suspended just 0.2% of debt payments. In early 2021, Chad, Ethiopia and Zambia applied to the CF for debt restructuring. So far, none have been successful, in large part due to private lenders refusal to take part in debt reductions.

Meanwhile, the current rise in global interest rates will increase the cost of debt servicing, worsening debt crises and preventing indebted countries from both economic and health recovery.

In response to the wave of debt distress sweeping across the South, the UN Conference on Trade and Development has called for substantive debt relief and outright cancellation. The counterfactual, they state, is another lost decade for development marked by developing countries using their vital public finances for debt payments rather than investing in pandemic and economic recovery.

Even the Fund’s Fiscal Monitor report highlights limitations of the international debt architecture to support orderly restructurings as a core risk for global pandemic recovery.

In stark contrast to the G20, several developing countries at the 76th UN General Assembly in September called for debt cancellation, comprehensive debt restructuring and debt relief linked to middle-income countries or to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Small island and developing states called for debt relief in the context of a new vulnerability index for the provision of multilateral support. Against these segmented scales of political and economic power, a democratization of decision-making in the global debt architecture is increasingly urgent.

As long as the multilateral response to the debt crisis generated by the economic fallout of the pandemic is governed by creditor countries, the decades old imperative to establish a debt workout mechanism capable of carrying out timely and fair restructuring, including debt cancellation, will remain elusive.

Fiscal austerity continues to exacerbate global inequalities

In Georgieva’s policy agenda last week, she underscored that health spending is a priority and that where fiscal space is limited, “lifelines should be increasingly targeted toward the most vulnerable groups.” However, in her institution’s Fiscal Monitor, an explicit priority is placed on reducing deficit and debt levels, “undertaking structural fiscal reforms (such as pension or subsidies reform) … and committing to fiscal rules that lead to deficit reduction in the future.”

The IMF’s historical preoccupation with fiscal consolidation is a reflection of capital market and investor reasoning, in which the only path to securing access to low-cost borrowing for most developing countries is “strengthening the credibility of their fiscal policy.”

Embedded within a financial architecture shaped by a short-term and speculative logic, and pro-austerity bias, the South’s public budgets are subject to private interests that are in diametric opposition to equitable and rights-based development.

Consequently, the priority of securing the confidence of creditors is illustrated by Oxfam’s finding that out of 107 IMF loans, 90 require fiscal consolidation measures across 73 countries. Instead of facilitating public investment in health, education and social protection systems, medium-term policy advice in the loans cut and freeze public wage bills, through which public employees are financed, and increase or expand value-added and general sales taxes.

As UNCTAD puts it, unless the autonomy and impunity enjoyed by global finance is seriously regulated, the potential of fiscal policy to play a structural role in sustained decent work creation and pursuing the right to equitable development is rendered defunct.

Deepening inequality and poverty across the South is a direct result of the failure of effective multilateralism. Between 65 and 75 million people have been thrown into poverty, the gap between the top 10% and bottom 80% mushrooms, and achieving the SDGs by 2030 is rendered close to fantasy in many developing countries.

Women have been dealt the most unequal hand, experiencing at least $800 billion in lost income globally in 2020 while low-wage informal work and unpaid care work has increased beyond measure.

Ultimately, the principles of historical responsibility, distributive justice and interdependency of recovery must guide the centers of financial and economic clout to support rather than hinder health and economic recovery for the most vulnerable regions of the South.

Tinkering on the technocratic smokescreens of power and resource asymmetries created by centuries of colonial history, and more recently by four decades of neoliberalism that has institutionalized a pathologically unequal financialized world economy, will no longer suffice. Structural change is indispensable, precisely because the counterfactual may well be a lost decade for the vast majority of the human race.

Bhumika Muchhala is Senior Researcher and Policy Advocate on Global Economic Governance at the Third World Network.

 

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By Anis Chowdhury and Jomo Kwame Sundaram
SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 19 2021 (IPS)

The bogey of inflation has been revived. Dubious pre-pandemic economic progress, fiscal constraints and vaccine apartheid were bad enough. Now, ostensibly anti-inflationary measures also threaten recovery and sustainable development.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has revised downwards its latest global growth forecast. Its latest World Economic Outlook (WEO) warns of a “dangerous divergence” between richer and poorer countries. This has been exacerbated by, but has also worsened national fiscal disparities and the ‘great vaccine divide’.

Anis Chowdhury

Inflation bogey revived
Meanwhile, there is growing talk of ‘stagflation’ – of rising inflation with slow growth and high unemployment, as in the 1970s. Meanwhile, The Economist warns of harmful “wage-price spirals” aggravating vicious circles of rising inflation and wage demands.

But over 70%, or 152 of 209 economists polled believe rising inflation worldwide is due to temporary supply chain disruptions. Heads of major central banks – such as the US Federal Reserve, Bank of England and European Central Bank – concur.

Although the IMF agrees, it also urges policymakers to “be on the lookout and be prepared to act, especially if…prolonged supply disruptions, rising commodity and housing prices, permanent and unfunded fiscal commitments, a de-anchoring of expectations, combined with mismeasurement of output gaps [materialise]”.

The IMF’s October 2021 Fiscal Monitor urges governments to take all steps necessary to regain capital markets’ and lenders’ confidence, including by reducing budget deficits. But it also warns against ‘self-defeating’, premature phasing-out of needed recovery measures. Thus, the ‘two-handed’ IMF economists offer contradictory policy guidance.

Wrong diagnosis
But inflation is unlikely to persist. First, labour market deregulation since the 1980s has long eroded workers’ bargaining power. Hence, workers are now more worried about job security, badly eroded in recent decades.

Second, ‘decent’ job creation remains weak in most rich countries after decades of ‘off-shoring’ and labour-saving innovation. Unsurprisingly then, labour shares of national income have been falling since the mid-1970s.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram

While jobs typically trail recovery, the current lag is “more severe” than before, notes the IMF. Across the world, labour force participation and employment remain well below pre-pandemic levels, particularly for youth.

The WEO notes private investment fell in 2021’s second quarter, with several new uncertainties responsible. Slower investment and growth also mean less tax revenue and higher debt-GDP ratios. Cutting spending will only make things worse.

Correct diagnosis should be the basis for choice of medication. Contrary to monetarist faith, inflation is not only due to excess money supply. But if supplies are blocked – e.g., due to disasters, conflicts, curfews or transport restrictions – demand easily becomes ‘excessive’.

Inflation is often also due to big suppliers abusing their market power, with powerful firms raising prices with higher ‘mark-ups’. Privatization and deregulation over the last four decades have strengthened these monopolies or oligopolies.

Blunt instrument
The WEO seems more concerned with inflation than employment as financial markets demand monetary tightening, interest rate hikes and fiscal austerity. Bloomberg has urged emerging economies to “brace for rate hikes”, with Mexico, Brazil, Peru, Russia and others obliging, as The Economist anticipated.

The interest rate is a blunt tool. Inflation is reduced by raising interest rates, cutting growth and increasing unemployment – “tough medicine” indeed. Hawks emphasize how inflation erodes the poor’s purchasing power, but deny their prescriptions do worse.

One must also wonder how interest rate hikes are supposed to address actual problems. For example, in September 2021, global food prices shot up nearly 33% year-on-year, due to extreme weather and pandemic restrictions. Higher rates also certainly could not help when a severe drought hit hydroelectric power generation in Brazil.

Higher interest rates squeeze both private and government spending. Thus, rate hikes will likely trigger a vicious circle of further rate increases and general austerity, slowing recovery and raising debt-GDP ratios.

Raising interest rates in rich countries will also see more capital flight from developing countries and exchange rate depreciations. Already handicapped by vaccine inequity and constrained fiscal space, worsened by modest debt relief and pandemic support from rich countries, raising interest rates will set them further back.

Debt misconstrued
Rising debt levels have understandably been an on-going concern. In 2019, the World Bank warned that post-2008 global financial crisis (GFC) indebtedness was dangerous, noting all previous debt waves had ended in crises.

With the pandemic, fears have been “looming” again of “catastrophic” debt crises in developing countries. As if governments had much choice, the Wall Street Journal warned, “Governments world-wide gorge on record debt, testing new limits”.

The IMF’s October Fiscal Monitor acknowledges, “there is no magic number for the debt target. Macroeconomic theory does not prescribe a specific debt target; nor is there a clear threshold above which debt might become particularly harmful to economic growth”. This confirms earlier IMF and World Bank findings suggesting exaggeration of debt constraints.

Rather, the focus should be on “the likely growth effects of the level, composition and efficiency of public spending and taxation”. Instead of fixating on overall debt levels, its composition – domestic vs external, public vs publicly guaranteed – deserves more attention.

In fact, debt-financed infrastructure, education, skill development and retraining programmes all enhance growth. IMF research found such infrastructure investment had large growth effects without even raising the debt-GDP ratio.

Deep-seated challenges
The predictable recommendation is ‘belt-tightening’ – via ‘austerity’ and ‘higher interest rates’ – bringing even more economic contraction. Typical structural reform prescriptions – e.g., more labour market liberalization, deregulation, privatization and tax cuts – only make things worse, while regressive tax cuts rarely generate promised growth.

Financialization in recent decades has encouraged more speculation, share buybacks, real property, mergers and acquisitions. Consequently, the real economy has suffered, with inflation rising as productivity growth falters.

But inflation was kept in check by cheap imports and cheaper labour, even as profit margins and executive salaries rose. But neoliberals have not hesitated to claim credit for taming inflation during the Great Moderation via fiscal austerity, debt ceilings and inflation targeting.

Despite fiscal austerity, debt has risen, especially since the GFC. Slower growth has also meant less revenue, further reducing fiscal space. Public investment cuts – particularly for services, infrastructure, research and development – have also hurt productivity growth.

Build forward, not backwards
Every economic crisis is different in its own way. The COVID-19 recession involves both supply and demand shocks. Output has fallen due to lockdowns and value chain disruptions. Demand has also declined with lower incomes, less spending, more jobs lost and greater uncertainty.

When provided, relief measures have sustained some demand. Pandemic restrictions have accelerated digitalization, but other changes are also needed. Reforms must build on COVID-19 transformations for a better future , e.g., by promoting job-intensive green investments, worker reskilling and retraining.

The COVID recession thus offers an unexpected opportunity to ‘build forward better’ to address deep-seated problems to build a better world. This must necessarily involve shedding biased and dysfunctional arrangements, managing markets, guiding private investments, workforce retraining and investing in education, health and social protection.

 

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Coldstream Guardsman Matthew Talbot tried to escape up a tree while on an anti-poaching patrol.

Officials had earlier denied the government was behind allegedly deadly attacks in the region.

By Khondaker Golam Moazzem and Abdullah Fahad
Oct 18 2021 (IPS-Partners)

The Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) is following the developments of the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference, also known as COP26. Being one of the major climate-vulnerable countries, Bangladesh is a major party to this international conference. The CPD Power and Energy Study will publish a series of articles on key climate change-related issues highlighting the contexts, main debates and their impact and implications for Bangladesh. Articles will be published in The Daily Star every week till the middle of December 2021.

The 26th UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26) is just 15 days away. The COP26 secretariat, the UK and Italian government and governments of the participating countries are finalising their last days of preparation before meeting in Glasgow, UK from October 31 to November 12.

The major point of discussion now is: Will countries reach an agreement on three key issues? (a) phasing out of coal, (b) scaling up nationally determined contributions (NDCs); and (c) raising financing for adaptation.

Different parties and bodies related to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and, more specifically with the COP26, such as supreme bodies, subsidiary bodies, constituted bodies, funds and financial entities, ad-hoc working groups and non-party stakeholders, are now busy with dealing with issues.

Different party groups are taking preparation for the COP26, including developing country parties, the African Group, the Arab States, the Environmental Integrity Group, the European Union, the Least Developed Countries, the Small Island Developing States, the Umbrella Group, the OPEC countries, the CACAM, the Cartagena Dialogue, and the BASIC Group, which includes India and China. These groups have diverse offensive and defensive interests which need to be lessened to reach a consensus during the conference.

Global climate debates around COP26

Reaching consensus in the three key debating issues is the most difficult and complex process. First, countries need to agree to phase out coal by 2030 (developed countries) and 2040 (developing countries), abandoning fossil-fueled internal combustion engines.

There is a global call for saying no to any new coal-fired power plants and to join “Powering Past Coal Alliance”. The global coal-based power generation was 2,044,831 MW in 2019, of which 405,205 MW (19.8 per cent) is generated in developed countries and 80.2 per cent in developing countries. Currently, many coal power plants are under construction, which adds up to a capacity of 184,503 MW.

China, one of the biggest global investors of coal power plants, has recently announced that it would no longer invest in new coal power plants abroad. Such an announcement is highly appreciated. However, reaching the target of no-coal in developing countries by 2040, China needs a more aggressive commitment to its domestic use of coal.

Similar commitment will be required from India, with 228,964 MW of coal-based power generation capacity in 2019, for domestic and foreign-based power plants. Developed countries such as the US (246,187 MW), the EU and Japan and developing countries such as Korea, Indonesia, Taiwan, the Philippines, Malaysia, and Vietnam need to commit to reducing coal-fired power plants.

Second, an ambitious target setting is necessary with a view to keeping 1.5°C within reach by 2050. As of July 30, 2021, 113 out of 191 parties submitted updated NDCs.

Based on the update, emissions are likely to decrease by 12 per cent by 2030, but the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recently identified that we need about a 45 per cent net anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions reduction from 2010 level by 2030 to keep 1.5°C within our reach.

The current level of emissions will lead to an overall increase in the temperature of the planet by 2.7°C by the end of this century, which would be catastrophic. Will the heads of state of major developed and developing countries come forward with an ambitious commitment of targets for the reduction of carbon emission during the COP26?

Third, in the “Copenhagen Accord” adopted at the COP15 in 2009, developed countries promised jointly to mobilise $100 billion to address the needs of the developing countries by 2020. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the mobilised amount was $79.6bn in 2019.

The richest countries are behind in their commitment that needs to be met before the COP26 takes place. The UK has doubled international climate finance commitments, and this kind of initiative may help reach the target of $100bn on climate finance. The commitment made by the private sector on adaptation is highly discouraging, according to the UN Secretary-General – only 0.1 per cent of the total funding for adaptation.

While the Paris Agreement promised poorer countries technical and financial assistance in loss and damage, putting it in practice yet to be decided. The Santiago Network for Loss and Damage was established as part of the Warsaw International Mechanism in 2019. This COP can be the one where we operationalise the Santiago Network for Loss and Damage.

Article 6 of the Paris Agreement provides a foundation for an international carbon market that presents the possibility of trading emission reductions between countries. The challenge is that it may offer a loophole for not investing in emission reduction strategies while meeting the country’s target.

The Paris Rulebook implementation guideline for the Paris Agreement, which was adopted during the COP24 in 2018, with few unresolved issues, need to be finalised and agreed upon by parties. The COP26 is expected to finalise the Paris Rulebook.

Bangladesh in COP26

Bangladesh has a strong interest in the upcoming climate conference.

First, climate vulnerable countries like Bangladesh are already in climate emergency, characterised by more frequent and severe heat waves, heavy rainfall, and droughts.

As the current Climate Vulnerable Forum (CVF) presidency, Bangladesh released Climate Vulnerable Manifesto on September 7 following the CVF high-level exchange on the COP26. The manifesto calls for a “Climate Emergency Pact” in rebuilding the confidence in international climate cooperation.

This pact asks every country to enhance its effort on emission reduction to keep 1.5°C goal alive and 50 per cent of the $100bn climate finance to go to adaptation actions in the most vulnerable developing countries.

It is about time the global community acknowledges this by adopting a “Climate Emergency Pact”. Although there was supposed to be a 50:50 balance between climate change mitigation and adaptation actions, only $20.1bn went to climate change adaptation actions from $79.6bn in 2019.

Bangladesh has asked to include a delivery plan for a 50:50 balance between mitigation and adaptation in the pact. In the pre-COP closing plenary statement, Bangladesh emphasised the importance of the “Climate Emergency Pact” and is also looking for a much stronger role for loss and damages at Glasgow.

Second, it is expected that Bangladesh would make a forward-looking commitment to its nationally determined contributions. The Prime Minister of Bangladesh, who is going to head the delegate in the COP26, would consider delivering Bangladesh’s energy transition plan, particularly in case of phasing out of remaining coal-based power plants – those which are in operation, under construction and under planning. In this connection, Bangladesh may seek financial and technical support for the early retirement of coal-based power plants through the energy transition council.

The authors are respectively the research director and a senior research associate of the Centre for Policy Dialogue.

This story was originally published by The Daily Star, Bangladesh

Ras Bongo Wisely Tafari (far right) holds on to the CARICOM’s symbol of the reparatory justice movement, the reparations baton, in Castries, Saint Lucia. Credit: Alison Kentish/IPS

By Alison Kentish
DOMINICA, Oct 18 2021 (IPS)

The Rastafarian organizations in the Caribbean are determined that the issue of slavery reparations will emerge from the eclipse of COVID-19.

As the world deals with the impacts of efforts to contain the virus’ spread and regional governments tackle vaccine hesitancy and a wave of misinformation, issues not directly related to COVID-19 have had to be temporarily shelved.

However, members of the Caribbean Rastafari Organization are determined to keep the movement for slavery reparations in the minds of citizens and on the agenda of policymakers.

“From the time of emancipation in 1834, our ancestors have been clamoring for reparations. Some leaders have taken heed to the calling, some have ignored it, but the Rastafari nation from its inception has been appealing for reparations, and up to today, we are on that platform,” chairperson of the Caribbean Rastafari Organization, Burnet Sealy told IPS.

Sealy is known as Ras Bongo Wisely Tafari – part of a move by members of the Rastafarian faith to change the colonial names given at birth and advance the internal healing aspect of the reparations process.

He is a member of the Reparations Committee of Saint Lucia, one of 15 national reparations organizations in the member states of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) bloc.

In 2013, the group of nations established the CARICOM Reparations Commission (CRC), a body charged with making the ‘moral, ethical and legal’ argument for reparatory justice for organizations of the Caribbean Community.

The CRC is headed by Sir Hilary Beckles, Vice-Chancellor of the University of the West Indies.

“It is the greatest crime ever committed against humanity – a crime whose harm and suffering continue to haunt humanity in this 21st century. A crime that has anchored the 21st century within a legacy of untold human suffering, and there is no carpet in the world that is big enough to brush this under,” Sir Hilary told a Slave Trade Remembrance Day online discussion earlier this year.

The movement for reparations in the Caribbean has risen and waned in the last decade. Changes in administration on some islands, with ensuing shifts in policy directions and budgetary priorities, meant that funding for national committees has also been wavered.

The COVID-19 pandemic and its consequent limitations on movement and in-person gatherings have added another obstacle to the movement.

However, Ras Bongo Wisely Tafari says that despite the challenges, the Rastafarian movement remains committed to healing from the effects of slavery.

“Reparations Cannot Die,” he told IPS.

“We have been educating the masses on what reparations are all about. People think that reparation is just about money, but we are letting them know that this is not true. Reparations really mean repairing the damage that was done as a result of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade and Slavery, continuing to colonial rule. The damage was done mentally, physically, spiritually, financially, culturally.”

CARICOM, which is home to about 16 million people, has its reparations battle fought as part of a 10-Point Plan. Signed in 2013, the plan calls for:

• A full, formal apology for slavery by the governments of Europe;
• A repatriation program to resettle descendants of the over 10 million Africans who were forcefully transported to the Caribbean;
• An Indigenous Peoples Development Program to begin healing for genocide on the native Caribbean populations;
• The establishment of cultural institutions like museums and research centers;
• A program to remedy the public health crisis includes the African descended population in the Caribbean, which has the highest incidence of hypertension and type 2 diabetes globally. Regional health experts and historians say this is directly related to the ‘nutritional experience, physical and emotional brutality and overall stress profiles associated with slavery, genocide, and apartheid;
• Programs to eradicate the high levels of illiteracy that stem from slavery;
• The establishment of an African Knowledge Program;
• Psychological rehabilitation programs;
• Technology transfer;
• Debt cancellation.

“The argument has been won that reparatory justice is inevitable. The issue is how best to achieve it. Who should have the authority to conceptualize and structure it and how to ensure that while it has a reparatory function, it is also at the same time creating a greater sense of justice and humanity in the world,” says Beckles.

The road to reparatory justice has been tough to conceptualize in the Caribbean, and in the face of issues like climate change, biodiversity loss, and a global pandemic, slavery reparations often plummet on the list of priorities for governments.

For champions of the cause, however, the commitment is unwavering.

“It is our responsibility to maintain that focus of our ancestors and see to it that we have reparations,” Ras Bongo Wisely Tafari told IPS.

“This is not a quick fix. It is a long journey, but we refuse to give up. We will never give up the fight. Reparations are a must.”

 

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Women produce between 60 and 80 per cent of food in developing countries but own only 2 per cent of land worldwide. Credit: Kristin Palitza/IPS

By Baher Kamal
MADRID, Oct 18 2021 (IPS)

While more than a third of all purchased food is wasted in rich, mostly Western States, and a similar percentage is lost in poor countries due to the lack of appropriate harvesting, storage and transportation facilities, over three billion people –or some 40 percent of world population– cannot afford a healthy diet.
Add to these figures –which were released by UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) on 16 October this year, marking the World Food Day— another dramatic fact.

According to the World Bank, between 88 and 115 million people are being pushed into poverty as a result of the COVID 19 crisis, with the majority of the new extreme poor being found in South Asian and Sub-Saharan countries where poverty rates are already high.

This number adds to the more than 850 million people sinking already into hunger and extreme poverty, following United Nations estimates.

 

One billion food producers; one billion poor and hungry

These figures all combined raise the number of hungry and poor ​and extremely poor ​people worldwide to over one billion, that’s one in seven persons living on Planet Earth. That’s the same number of people –1 billion– that agri-food systems employ worldwide, more than any other economic sector.

Moreover, the way food is being produced, consumed and wasted exacts a heavy toll on our planet, putting unnecessary pressure on natural resources, the environment and climate, according to FAO.

“Food production too often degrades or destroys natural habitats and contributes to species extinction. Such inefficiency is costing us trillions of dollars, but, most importantly, today’s agri-food systems are exposing profound inequalities and injustices in our global society. Three billion people cannot afford healthy diets, while overweight and obesity continue to increase worldwide,” warns this world body.

 

They produce more, but eat less

Should all this not be enough, another aspect of overwhelming inequalities dominating current time, please also know that rural women make up to 40 percent of all food producers, according to the UN.

Nevertheless, rural women eat less, prioritise available food to their families, let alone bearing with the heavy burden of carrying water, cooking, washing, cleaning, selling food in local markets and streets, among other daily tasks, all of this without having in most cases in poor countries the rights to land property, among others.

Just an example: there are many millions of women who produce between 60 and 80 per cent of food in developing countries but own only 2 per cent of land worldwide, says in this regards the UN Environment Programme.

Furthermore: the UN Women, which devotes its work to promoting gender equalities, estimates that in 2020, some 2.37 billion people did not have access to adequate food.

“This is an increase of almost 20 per cent in just one year, where those most affected were again rural women and girls.”

On this, the entity on 15 October this year, on the occasion of the International Day of Rural Women, reported that across the world, food systems depend on the daily work of rural women.

“They play a variety of essential roles, from raising crops and processing their harvest, to preparing food and distributing their products, ensuring that both their families and communities are nourished.”

“Yet paradoxically those same women often have less access to food and a higher risk of hunger, malnutrition, undernutrition and food insecurity than their male counterparts.”

 

Eating last… and least

One of the causes is armed conflict. On this, Oxfam International reports that overall, 155 million people around the world are living in crisis levels of food insecurity or worse – that is 20 million more than last year. “Around two out of every three of these people are going hungry primarily because their country is in war and conflict.”

Women and girls are disproportionately affected. They face extraordinary dangers to secure food, and yet, too often eating last and eating least. Conflict and displacement have also forced women to abandon their jobs or miss planting seasons, adds this coalition of independent Non-Governmental Organisations, devoted to fighting inequalities.

 

More climate crisis; less humanitarian aid

Last but not least, such harsh inequalities are growing rapidly due to fast developing climate emergency, the drastic cuts in rich countries humanitarian assistance, the predominance of industrial food systems, intensive cultivation and harvesting, etcetera.

What fate for all these billions of hungry and extremely poor people in a world that produces enough to feed all of them?

Will the United States and the other major meat consuming countries choose to significantly reduce their beef consumption and move to plant-based diets as part of measures to address climate change, environmental degradation and biodiversity loss? Credit: Bigstock

By Joseph Chamie
PORTLAND, USA, Oct 18 2021 (IPS)

Probably no country is more closely associated with the hamburger than the United States. It’s fair to say that the hamburger is the country’s culinary icon. It’s the most popular fast food consumed and readily available from coast to coast.

Although some historical accounts chronicle the hamburger being prepared in Wisconsin in 1885, America’s hamburger affair reportedly began in 1904 when the hamburger made its official visible debut at the St. Louis Louisiana Purchase Exposition. Since then, the hamburger has become America’s most ubiquitous, dominant, and favorite food.

The United States consumes an estimated 50 billion hamburgers annually. That consumption amounts to about 150 hamburgers for each person per year or 3 hamburgers per person each week of the year

Given its popularity, pervasiveness and impact across the country, it’s worthwhile considering the total number of hamburgers the United States with its population of 333 million consumes annually. Is the total number of hamburgers consumed by the United States annually 1 billion, 5 billion, 25 billion or 50 billion?

The answer to that question is not 1 billion hamburgers. It’s also not 5 billion, nor even 25 billion.

The correct answer is the United States consumes an estimated 50 billion hamburgers annually.

That consumption amounts to about 150 hamburgers for each person per year or 3 hamburgers per person each week of the year. Among U.S. states, hamburger consumption is highest in Oklahoma and Nevada with 267 hamburgers consumed per person annually and lowest is in West Virginia with 171 hamburgers per person each year.

The hamburger has recently emerged as a controversial issue in U.S. politics. Some right-wing groups, politicians and others have warned voters that the Biden administration is “coming for your hamburgers”, cutting 90 percent of red meat from the U.S. diet and limiting each person to one hamburger per month.

The White House dismissed the false claims, saying they were just made up stories with a losing argument. The USDA also called the claims made by Republicans that Biden is trying to limit red meat consumption a fabrication and is not part of the administration’s climate plan nor greenhouse gas emission targets.

However, many in the country, including philanthropists, dietitians, scientists and others concerned about climate change, environmental degradation and biodiversity loss, have called for reducing meat consumption and moving toward a more plant-based diet.

Besides contributing to improvements in human health, reducing the consumption of animal products, especially beef, and eating mostly plant-based foods can significantly lower greenhouse gas emissions and reduce animal waste.

Such a change in the diet of the U.S. population of 333 million people, or 4 percent of the world’s population, would make available croplands for human plant food instead of feed for the country’s 94 million cattle, 77 million hogs and pigs, and 518 million chickens, as well as additional land for increased biodiversity.

 

 

It is estimated that it takes 1,800 gallons (6,814 liters) of water to produce one pound (0.45 kilogram) of grain-fed beef in the U.S. Also, it is estimated that 6.5 pounds (3 kilos) of greenhouse gases are released to produce the beef for just one-quarter pound (113 grams) hamburger.

One alternative to the beef hamburger is the veggie burger, which has long existed in many Eurasian diets. The veggie burger has become a growing U.S. fare for many, especially for younger eaters and those with health concerns who are choosing to avoid or reduce their red meat consumption.

Instead of meat, the patty in the veggie hamburger is made from vegetables, legumes, grains, seeds, and other plant-based ingredients. While available in most supermarkets, many have turned to popular recipes to prepare veggie burgers at home.

Several years ago fast food hamburger chains in cooperation with food companies began offering plant-based hamburgers with the taste of meat. Instead of using ground beef, the meatless hamburger is based on processed plant-based foods that are specially designed to resemble the taste of beef. In addition, sales of plant-based meat in supermarkets are increasing rapidly across the country.

The plant-based processed hamburgers contribute less greenhouse gas emissions, use less water and land than the traditional hamburger based on beef. However, those burgers can be high in saturated fats and sodium, both of which are linked to obesity, heart disease and high blood pressure.

Some U.S. elected officials do not believe that plant-based meat is an answer to climate change and moving towards green energy. Also businesses in many U.S. states object to reductions in meat consumption as it would decimate those working in the beef industry and have collateral economic damage.

Despite the U.S. government’s avoidance of the issue of meat consumption, concerns about climate change, environment degradation and biodiversity loss are challenging the country’s relationship with the hamburger.

Climate scientists have advised U.S. officials that the raising of cattle is unsustainable and generates high levels of greenhouse gases. In addition, producing beef involves the destruction of forests and other habitats to make way for pasture and for growing fodder to be feed for cattle.

The United States accounts for the largest amount of beef consumed annually by a single country. Of the world’s 59 billion kilos (130 billion pounds) of beef produced in 2020, the United States led with 21 percent, followed by China at 16 percent, the European Union at 13 percent and Brazil nearly at 13 percent. Together the top ten countries consumed about 83 percent of the total beef produced in 2020.

 

Source: Beef 2 Live (USDA).

 

Beef consumption per capita, however, varies among those top ten countries. For 2020 Argentina took the top position among those countries with 54 kilos of beef per person, followed by the United States and Brazil at 38 and 36 kilos per person, respectively. The lowest levels of beef consumption in 2020 among the ten countries were China and India at 7 and 2 kilos per person, respectively.

 

Source: Beef 2 Live (USDA).

 

Will the United States and the other major meat consuming countries choose to significantly reduce their beef consumption and move to plant-based diets as part of measures to address climate change, environmental degradation and biodiversity loss?

Politics, business interests, dietary preferences and cultural habits together strongly point to a likely answer to that question. In brief, beef consumption can be expected to continue in the United States as well as in other top major beef consuming countries well into the future.

Perhaps the United States, and maybe even other countries, will end the affair with the automobile, which has resulted in 290 million cars on U.S. roads?

Perhaps the United States, and other countries, will shift to renewables and eliminate fossil fuels, which account for about 60 percent of the electricity generation in the U.S.?

Perhaps the United States, and other countries, will decide to move toward population stabilization, instead of the currently projected U.S. population of 400 million by around midcentury?

Or perhaps more likely, the United States and other countries will simply continue with business as usual with, of course, a large order of fries alongside that hamburger to go with the disastrous consequences of climate change, environmental degradation and biodiversity loss.

Joseph Chamie is a consulting demographer, a former director of the United Nations Population Division and author of numerous publications on population issues, including his recent book, “Births, Deaths, Migrations and Other Important Population Matters.”

 

The construction of the Tat Sat Community Academy (TaSCA) in Kasasa, Uganda. While the project seeks to improve the livelihoods of all community members, there is a particular emphasis on uplifting women and girls. This is of greater importance now, with the COVID-19 pandemic having an outsized effect on women and girls across the world. Credit: Sylvester Mwanja, TaSCA Project Manager

By Ronald Kibirige and Scott Frank
TRONDHEIM, Norway / DENVER, USA , Oct 18 2021 (IPS)

As we honored women and girls last week, on the annual International Day of Rural Women on October 15, we want to highlight how a community is coming together to change the lives and livelihoods of rural women and girls in Uganda.

While the Tat Sat Community Academy Project (TaSCA) in Kasasa, Uganda, seeks to improve the livelihoods of all community members, there is a particular emphasis on uplifting women and girls. This is of greater importance now, with the COVID-19 pandemic having an outsized effect on women and girls across the world.

According to The World Economic Forum’s 2021 Global Gender Gap Report, school closures globally saw 1.54 billion children staying home, including 743 million girls. This shift has created barriers for access to health services, nutrition, and economic opportunities.

TaSCA board member Namayega Agnes says that in her rural community of Kasasa, women and children have not been given an equal chance for financial progress, development and contribution to the wellbeing of the community.

She also says challenges are more severe for girls, who face constant pressure to drop out of school to marry or pursue other perceived pathways to stability.

The TaSCA project, she believes, creates a gender balance – a shift in the current perceptions about the women and the girls in the community to be equally productive members of the community.

TaSCA is a community-led project being implemented by the TaSCA Kasasa Community Board (TKCB) in partnership with the Peace Africa Children’s Ensemble, a local nonprofit chosen by the community to help develop the project.

The effort is being supported by The InteRoots Initiative, a nonprofit organization which we co-founded a few years ago after previously collaborating together. Through an innovative model we call roots-up philanthropy, InteRoots is working to support the community members of Kasasa who are building TaSCA, which will include a school, savings and credit co-op, and cultural institution.

We hope TaSCA will provide equity in education, access to financing and financial support networks, and preservation of cultural practices. Additionally, community members also receive support with access to microlending through the Savings and Credit Cooperative Organization (SACCO), which will provide community financing, student/family financial support and economic education.

The community has said that it is imperative that along with access to microlending, students learn how to handle finances so that they can be equipped in the future for other opportunities.

Of immediate interest to the community is using the SACCO to invest in a mill, which will be used by the farmers in the community to produce locally instead of outsourcing at a high cost. The locally sourced food will also be available to the school’s students and staff members.

The Graduate Enterprise Fund, meanwhile, will allow students, upon graduation, to submit a plan for set-aside funds for purposes that will further goals. This may include continuing their education or starting a business.

The community board must approve the plan, and graduates will receive financial support for around one to two years, providing economic stability beyond graduation.

As stated above, now is the time for such initiatives. Because of the pandemic and its effects, it is estimated that an estimated 96 million people will be pushed into extreme poverty, of whom 47 million are women, according to UN Women.

We cannot stand idly by as we watch our fellow citizens of the world face such challenges and obstacles. We are excited by the potential TaSCA can have and are eagerly awaiting its opening in 2022.

Now more than ever, communities must come together to transform and uplift women and girls, especially in rural areas that may face greater barriers to access to health care, technology and education.

We hope Kasasa will be a model for others and we are heartened by the support the community has received so far. For updates on TaSCA and InteRoots’ work, please visit InteRoots.org.

Ronald Kibirige is co-founder and board chair of The InteRoots Initiative. Scott Frank is co-founder and executive director of the organization.

 

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