Africa

By Asif Zaman
DHAKA, Bangladesh, Jun 4 2020 (IPS)

Lockdowns have been the main measures to ‘flatten the curve’ of COVID-19 infections. But lockdowns typically incur huge economic costs, distributed unevenly in economies and societies. In fact, some governments acknowledged that they were choosing ‘life over economy’.

‘Life vs. Economy’: A false dichotomy
As lockdowns have been repeatedly extended arguing that economy can be revived but not the dead, it has become increasingly clear that ‘lives and livelihoods’ are intrinsically intertwined. The longer the lockdowns, higher is the risk of hunger and hence death.

Asif Zaman

Lockdowns can set back progress and people’s welfare irreversibly, especially for the vulnerable. Most ‘casual’ labourers, petty businesses and others in the ‘informal’ economy find it especially difficult to survive extended lockdowns.

With millions already jobless, the International Labour Organization (ILO) warns that nearly half of global workforce are at risk of losing livelihoods. The United Nations University-World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER) estimates that a 20% income or consumption contraction could increase poverty levels by 420–580 million. It is estimated that 9 out of every 10 students in the world have been disrupted.

Therefore, many countries, especially developing ones, are under increasing pressure to re-start their economies.

Re-starting the economy: ‘To be or not to be’
The countries that are easing lockdown restrictions are also seeing spikes in the COVID-19 infections. South Korea re-tightened lockdown restrictions after spike in cases. Iran reopened in April to save the economy, but within a month designated Tehran and eight provinces as “red zones”.

The World Health Organization (WHO) and reputed medical journal, The Lancet, warned against scaling back lockdown restrictions too quickly.

Countries now need to find an optimal manner of re-starting the economy. However, the timing and pace of relaxing restrictions will depend, among others, on what the countries have done during the lockdown period, e.g., increase supply of personal protective equipment (PPEs), intensive care beds (ICUs), creating mass awareness about precautionary measures, etc.

Countries also need to maintain law and order and a planned process of opening the economy is required. So, what should this planned process look like? What will the optimal approach be based on?

Here we suggest 3S – Smart, Science-based and Sectoral – solutions

Smart Solutions
Epidemiologists talk of “smart containment” that all can practise. By ‘smart’ we mean effective but cheap; innovative but easy-to-use solutions to minimize the risk of COVID-19 in the workplace. This requires cross-fertilization of ideas from different disciplines: public health experts, clinicians, industrial-organizational psychologists, economists, architects, and engineers. Lessons from the best practices of the globe need to be compiled, customized and tested.

One of the main reasons why countries such as Singapore, Hong Kong and Vietnam have coped better than others is that they learnt difficult lessons after the SARS epidemic of 2002-04. The same can be said about Ghana, Senegal and some other African countries which experienced the 2014 West Africa Ebola outbreak .

Good primary-health systems can devise and disseminate sensible adaptations as seen in Vietnam and the Indian state of Kerala. Rwanda and the Indian state of Karnataka installed foot-operated handwashing stations at busy places such as bus depots and railway stations. Such facilities should be installed in slums and work places. Local leaders must play an active role to spread health messages, regarding face-masks, and isolation of suspected.

Science Based Solutions
Science means data. Armed with data, governments can continuously refine their policies. Up to date data on both health and socio-economic outcomes will support evidence-based decision-making. However, low statistical capacity needs to be addressed urgently. The solutions for workplace safety must have solid scientific foundation – risk assessment of a workplace and strategies for mitigation must be scientific.

To limit the risk requires an epidemiological approach that focuses on the places and people most likely to spread the disease. Thus, greater focus has to be on high-risk urban slums, prisons and refugee camps where people live in congested quarters with limited facilities for good hygiene practices. For example, architects and urban planners are experimenting with innovative solutions in Dhaka.

Tracing, testing, isolating and treating have to be an integral part. But mass testing is expensive, and the Vietnam experience of targeted approach coupled with contact tracing and selective quarantine seems more suitable for poor countries.

Sectoral Solutions
Solutions for the Garments Industry, Banking Sector, Construction Sector, etc. need to be tailored based on sectoral and site-specific risk assessments. Then, customized protocols for the various sectors need to be developed so that these sectors can start operating by minimizing the risk of contagion.

For example, industrial engineers can redesign the workplace of RMG industries to ensure adequate physical distancing with little changes. The workers’ flow or movement needs to be properly designed and monitored. There should be protocols during entry to the factory and during their stay. Special equipment like automatic/foot operated hand washing stands or disinfection chambers using food grade disinfectants can to be installed at the gate of each floor.

The service sector requires customer/client flow solutions. These solutions ensure customer/client satisfaction and safety of both customer/client and service provider.

The construction industry requires site management protocols such as: site entry/egress procedures, limiting number of workers on site, maintaining worker hygiene, delineating risk zones, etc. The construction project schedule needs to be designed in a way so that workers can work in parallel avoiding high labour-intensive functions.

All sectors need to have customized protocols for COVID-19 cases: procedures for detecting symptoms, isolating infected staff and arranging hospitalization if needed. Psychological counselling is required to elevate worker morale.

Government stimulus packages can be tied to the compliance of the guidelines for workplace safety. Adoption of new risk minimizing technology can also be subsidized through the stimulus package. However, building awareness among entrepreneurs is also critical in successful implementation of such guidelines.

This is a mammoth task to prepare sector-wise customized protocols. These protocols have to be approved by appropriate regulatory bodies. Sectoral experts can play a key role in helping government develop these guidelines. Signs that the virus may be weakening also gives us hope.

Dr. Asif M. Zaman, Environmental Engineer, MD Esolve Intl Ltd. He also teaches at the North South University, Dhaka, Bangladesh (asif@esolveint.com)

The post Shedding Some Light at the End of the Covid-19 Tunnel: Plotting a Way Forward appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Credit: KMP

By Elena L. Pasquini
ROME, Jun 4 2020 (IPS)

Landless farmers who produce rice for the landlords of big “haciendas” can’t get more than a little pocket money from their harsh work—not enough to provide diverse and healthy food for their families. Seasonal workers on sugar-cane plantations know that they can count on only six months of earnings. When summer arrives, those whose irrigation facilities have been destroyed by typhoons, or those who never had any, struggle while waiting for the rain.

That was the snapshot of agriculture in the Philippines when the COVID-19 outbreak hit the country. And it still is. The colonial past shaped a farming sector dominated by large export-oriented monocrop plantations; large plots devoted to agribusinesses, industrial plants, or housing subdivisions; and, still, 7 out of 10 farmers with no land, regardless of decades of attempts to enforce land reform.

“The agriculture in the Philippines is not actually ready for any pandemic,” said Kathryn Manga, community development worker and project officer at Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas, KMP, the Peasant Movement of the Philippines, founded in 1985 and supported by the Agroecology Fund. It has more than two million members, representing landless peasants, farmworkers, peasant women, and young farmers.

“Even before COVID, the agriculture in the Philippines was not sufficient to support its people… There was already a crisis, with prices of commodities, even vegetables and rice, that have gone up,” she told Degrees of Latitude.

Farmers have never stopped advocating and putting their lives at risk for “genuine land reform” as a prerequisite for the development of an agricultural model able to ensure food security: “The monocrop practice has really destroyed the ecosystems, the natural resources of our country. We would want Filipino farmers to enjoy a system where they would be able to decide what type of crops to plant. Something they can think of eating with their family,” Manga said.

What farmers grow is now mostly intended for sale, and diversity of production is rare. Manga told the story of those who cultivate rice, one of the most important staple commodities of the country: “When they sell their palay – the palay is the rice – for a low price, they go home with the little money they get … After selling their palay to the landlord … they have to go [back] to the market to buy rice.” Nothing remains for self-consumption because all the rice goes to pay land rents or inputs needed for production.

Farmers in the lockdown

Credit: KMP

COVID-19 containment measures added “chaos” to an already fragile situation, according to Manga. The military and authorities controlled the movement of farmers, preventing them from tending farms and selling their produce. Volunteers who took part in relief operations to bring food to the most vulnerable were detained and charged with the accusation of violating the quarantine, six of them from KMP. However, small-scale agriculture is still proving its resilience in this emergency.

Lockdown “has really been very militaristic,” Manga said. “Check-points were placed in many different regions, [and] also in Metro Manila. … People were just told to stay at home. Without a job, they were not able to eat. For farmers it is very difficult … There’s really no work from home for them.”

Access to food has been an issue not only for rural poor but also for urban communities: “If the Philippines’ government will not really support agriculture, it will be difficult to have food security especially in urban areas, to access good and low-price vegetables in Metro Manila,” she said.

However, networks of farmers have been able to mobilize food even during the lockdown. From Bulacan—50 km north of Manila, where a past programme of KMP helped farmers to occupy unused land—come the vegetables that are feeding the most vulnerable in the city. “These are mostly for urban poor communities, for homeless people, for workers who are not able to go home to their provinces. It started with a Church organization that has a mobile kitchen and looked for a community of farmers who were producing vegetables.”

KNP, whose member organizations have been able to deliver ten thousand kilos of vegetables in the first month of operations, has also launched an online food shop whose profits support their relief activity.

Land, agroecology for resilience

Credit: KMP

At the root of insecurity, however, is a century-long agricultural system based on extensive farming. It has been designed based on the export of high-value commodities like sugar, pineapple, and banana, as well as on production of rice.

Government, according to farmers organizations, has failed to address the crucial question of land distribution and is not providing the support that farmers need for production, including self-production of seeds or irrigation. “There is no production support for the Filipino farmers. There’s an irrigation bill that was passed two years ago, but until now it has not been given a budget by the government,” Manga said.

Farmers plant on land they rent and what they get is barely enough to pay for it. “They do not have the certificate of ownership.” That’s the point, she stressed. “[If] most of their produce has to be as payment, they won’t have extra for their own [consumption].”

“If you have a small plot that you can till, if you can grow a garden with vegetables, it would be easy. Many people [now live on what they] call ‘survival crops,’ crops that they do not really plant regularly, but they find around—root crops or vegetables which grow wild”.

Ownership of land means farmers can choose what to grow for themselves and for their communities in a model of agriculture based on diversification and sustainability. The agroecological model “will bring healthy food to Philippinos and the farmers,” Manga said.

Filipino farmers have practised agroecology for a long time, but monocrop and GMOs planting, according to Manga, has led to a decreased biodiversity and increased dependency on external inputs, including chemicals. Farmers are now trying to replant local seed varieties and are looking for diversification in the farm: “Those who are practising diversified farming still have rice, [but also] vegetables, root crops, fruit trees, and medicinal plants … which is also food for them. They have some animals ….”, she said.

Access to the market remains a major bottleneck: “Many of our farmers still need to go through the middlemen who buy the products at the very low price and then they transport to the nearby markets, in Metro Manila or in the region,” Manga explained. Middlemen, for instance, can pay 16 pesos for squash that will be sold on the market for 50 to 60 pesos each. When KMP offered to buy some farmers’ produce at a higher price, they expressed great concern: “It will make the middlemen angry and many of them will not go back to us,” they said. KMP is trying to overcome the problem by working with local organizations instead of individual farmers.

However, in the long-term, food security is a matter of rights: “The State should recognize the right to food, the right to produce food, the right to till the land, and to have control of the land that farmers have been tilling for generations. Farmers have the right to choose their own production system,” Manga said.

This article was first published by Degrees of Latitude

The post The Struggle for Land and Food in the Locked-down Philippines appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By El Hassan bin Talal
GENEVA, Jun 4 2020 (IPS)

In these difficult times for the Palestinian people and for justice, the Government of Israel is proposing to add further to the turmoil by unilaterally absorbing large swathes of the Palestinian West Bank of the Jordan River. It might therefore be fitting to remind the world of the chronology of the events leading up to the creation of the State of Israel in May 1948.

HRH Prince El Hassan bin Talal

In 1947, the UN had passed Resolution 181, which clearly divided Palestine into two states, one Arab and one Israeli. Sadly, Israel—almost immediately after coming into being—adopted a policy of intimidation aimed at the civilian population of those areas allocated to Palestine, resulting in the Nakba, the catastrophe which led to the fleeing of the inhabitants of those areas to safe haven in neighbouring countries, and adding further to Palestinian diaspora.

As a consequence of the Israeli aggression, the Palestinian people asked Jordan to intervene to protect and ensure their territory. The Arab Legion, largely commanded by British officers, secured East Jerusalem and the West Bank from Israeli occupation. This led to the Rhodes General Armistice of April 1949.

Subsequently, at the Jericho meeting in 1950, Palestinian notables requested the “Constitutional Union” of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, the West Bank and the Old City of Jerusalem. The agreement was that this should prevail until such time as a Palestinian state could come to fruition, without prejudice to the inherent Palestinian right to Self-Determination.

It would be useful to recall that The Partition Plan Resolution of the General Assembly of 1947, upon which Israel relied for its declaration of statehood on the 14th of May 1948, was meaningless unless Israel accepted the UN Charter under which the territory and people of Palestine were already subject to the legal imprint of Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations, the Mandate for Palestine 1922, and the UN Charter of 1945.

The Charter expressly included “the principle of self-determination of peoples”. Israel’s attitude to the UN Charter is consistently selective, invoking what assists its case, and ignoring what destroys it.

In November 1947, my grandfather King Abdullah I wrote in an article in the American Magazine: “We Arabs ask no favours. We ask only that you know the full truth, not half of it. We ask only that when you judge the Palestine question, you put yourself in our place.”

The full article can be found on my late brother King Hussein’s website: http://www.kinghussein.gov.jo/kabd_eng.html.

These words were written on the eve of the 53rd anniversary of the 1967 war.

HRH Prince El Hassan bin Talal served as Crown Prince of Jordan from 1965-1999 alongside his brother, the late King Hussein of Jordan.

 

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By Cecilia Russell
MILAN, Italy, Jun 4 2020 (IPS)

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the inherent fragility of food systems, Marta Antonelli told an international video conference organised by the Barilla Center for Food Nutrition (BCFN).

However, she said, it also offered an opportunity to reset the way food is produced, distributed and consumed.

The pandemic disrupted the food system, triggering food insecurity and resulted in sharp increases in the cost of food – up to 10 per cent in sub-Saharan Africa. Jobs were lost, children who received one meal a day at school lost access to this source of nutrition, and the pandemic would see an increase in the number of people who go hungry.

Antonelli, who is BCFN’s head of research, said the pandemic had focused global attention on the importance of nutrition. With one in three adults in developed and developing countries overweight or obese with their share of non-communicable diseases, including cardiovascular diseases, cancers, diabetes created a community vulnerable to the disease.

Antonelli said the launch of BCFN’s 10-point strategy on Wednesday, June 3, 2020, aimed to create a global dialogue of scientists, businesses, NGOs, civil society about the organisation’s actionable strategy to enable eaters – people – to make healthy and sustainable choices easily.

The wide-ranging 10-point strategy includes creating international best practise for creating healthy food systems – while respecting food preferences and culture, cut down on food loss and waste on farms, kitchens and restaurants, involve business to focus on health and sustainability.

It also includes a call to incentivise technological and digital innovation in food and agricultural information, improving seed security and building and education to empower eaters to make sustainable and healthy food choices.

Speaker after speaker highlighted nutrition and food impact on the COVID-19 pandemic: from its genesis in bats to implications for those sickened by the virus.

“COVID-19 is providing unprecedented opportunities to create a resilient food system that is truly regenerative and restorative, healthier for people, and leaves no one behind. This is also essential to accelerate the transition towards the 2030 Agenda and the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, which are all directly or indirectly connected to food,” BCFN said in a statement.

Professor Riccardo Valentini of the University of Tuscia, RUDN University of Moscow said habitat destruction was crucial for understanding the genesis of the pandemic. COVID-19 was not China’s problem or the problem of any other one country. It needed to be addressed globally.

This reinforced the theme that there is only one health system: for humans, animals, plants and the environment.

At least two speakers addressed the issue of COVID-19 and nutrition – of food as medicine or how bad nutrition could jeopardise health.

Gabriele Riccardi, of the University of Naples Federico II, said middle- and high-income countries, with their mainly animal-based and refined carbohydrate diets, found it exposed people to the devastating effects the virus. COVID-19 adversely affected people with comorbidity associated with obesity like heart diseases.

It was significant Riccardi said, in the last ten years many countries, which had previously improved nutrition, had moved in the wrong direction. The consumption of fruit and vegetables declined, while the use of meat increased.

He called for a system which supported production that ensured availability and affordability of good nutritious food even in the most remote marketplaces.

Camillo Ricordi, from the University of Miami on the other hand, said early studies indicated that good nutrition, in particular, adequate consumption of vitamins D and C and Omega 3 enhanced the immune system and produced clear benefits in resistance to the disease and ability to decrease inflammation.

Barbara Buchner, of the Climate Policy Initiative said the pandemic was a wake-up call for all social and financial systems to be better prepared for a crisis. She said it was frightening that only 8 percent of public finance was currently channelled into sustainable land use and this was exaggerating the growing crisis of food security in many nations.

She said it was likely that $20 trillion would be spent in the next six to 18 months to stimulate economies as governments globally rollout plans and cash for economic stimulus and enhancing social safety nets.

“We have a window to rebuild our world for more inclusive, more resilient, more sustainable future,” Buchner said. It was essential financial solutions that can drive resources towards sustainable agriculture supply chain were found – for example, through public-private incubator initiatives such as the Global Innovation Lab for climate finance.

She concluded that global solidarity and leadership were critical for maximising the positive impact of the recovery on building a resilient food system that is healthy, healthier for the people, but also for the planet and that leaves no one behind.”

 

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Two Kenyans share their experiences during lockdown and changes they have had to adjust to.

Gen Khalifa Haftar's forces have been besieging the capital for more than a year.

Zekiya Louis (R) and Manuela Ramirez (L) handing out free water to protesters in Times Square, New York. Credit: James Reinl/IPS

By James Reinl
NEW YORK, Jun 4 2020 (IPS)

The United States has been a story of broken dreams and broken glass this past week.

Once again, an unarmed black man died at the hands of a white police officer, with George Floyd being pinned to the ground under a lawman’s knee in Minneapolis, Minnesota, as stunned passersby made cell-phone videos of the incident to post on social media.

Once again, local protests snowballed into nationwide rallies against police violence and racism that in some cases led to clashes, smashed windows, torched cars and looted stores — dashing hopes that America was making progress on race relations.

In New York City, Zekiya Louis, a 29-year-old beautician and entrepreneur, headed to Times Square to pass out free bottles of water at a Black Lives Matter protest aimed at prompting action from a Washington elite that has struggled with civil rights woes for decades.

“It’s becoming a problem now because nine out of ten times it’s black people who are the victims of police violence — and we’re tired of that,” Louis, who was born in the U.S. and has family in the Caribbean, told IPS. 

“I know that a lot of people are protesting and they’re angry and they’re breaking stuff. But you gotta understand we tried protesting peacefully, we tried holding hands and coming together, and what we got was more violence and tear gas.”

The U.S. has been convulsed by waves of protests and mayhem since Floyd, 46, died on May 25 in the state of Minnesota after police officer Derek Chauvin, 44, pinned his neck under a knee for nearly nine minutes while Floyd was handcuffed face down in the street.

In videos, Chauvin appeared unphased as Floyd repeatedly gasped and said he could not breath, while onlookers urged officers to release the detainee, who had been accused by a deli worker of buying cigarettes with a counterfeit $20 bill.

Chauvin and three other officers involved in Floyd’s arrest were sacked soon after videos of the incident became a viral sensation and the latest example of police violence against an unarmed black man to send shockwaves across the U.S.

Chauvin has since been charged with second-degree murder and the other three former  officers — Tou Thao, Thomas Lane and J. Alexander Kueng — face counts of aiding and abetting murder.

The Floyd saga follows the high-profile cases of police killing unarmed black men, including  Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, Eric Garner in New York, and others that also prompted waves of grief, demonstrations and soul-searching.

Within days, protests had spread from Minneapolis to dozens of cities across the U.S., including Los Angeles, Chicago, New York and Washington, some of which were accompanied with violence and looting. Police have made some 9,300 arrests. 

Protestors have been met with tear gas, flash grenades and, at times, excessive force by the authorities. Police have targeted journalists, including the arrest of CNN reporter Omar Jimenez as he was broadcasting live. Officers have also been injured.

President Donald Trump expressed his “sorrow” at the “horrible thing” that ended Floyd’s life, but also courted controversy by threatening to use soldiers and warning via Twitter that “when the looting starts, the shooting starts”.

On Monday, Trump made headlines again, threatening to deploy the military on U.S. soil and posing for cameras while holding a bible in front of a damaged church shortly after police had used tear gas to disperse peaceful protesters from the scene.

On Wednesday, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, urged U.S. politicians to “condemn racism unequivocally” and “truly tackle inequalities” in a society in which whites are richer and healthier than blacks.

“The voices calling for an end to the killings of unarmed African Americans need to be heard,” Bachelet said in a statement.

“The voices calling for an end to police violence need to be heard. And the voices calling for an end to the endemic and structural racism that blights U.S. society need to be heard.” 

While many protesters demanded accountability for the officers involved in Floyd’s death, they also raised broader concerns about heavy-handed policing, systemic inequality between black and white Americans and the painful legacy of slavery.

At a briefing with journalists, veteran rights campaigner Rev Al Sharpton said that the Floyd case must lead to new federal laws, the BBC reported.

“If we come out of all this and do not have federal legislation where we can protect citizens from local policing … then all of this is drama to no end. Drama in the street must be geared to fundamental legal change,” said Sharpton. 

Back in Times Square, Manuela Ramirez, a 23 year-old Colombian student and waitress, who lives in Brooklyn, New York, called for big changes to how police officers perceive the citizens they are paid to protect and serve.

“I believe that there’s a lot of good cops and there’s a lot of bad cops killing people — and that’s what we shine the light on,” Ramirez told IPS. 

“It’s that mentality of these people who are just going to do bad things to us, and nobody should think like that.”

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WHO delivered medical supplies to fight the COVID-19 pandemic in the Republic of Congo in April 2020. Credit: World Health Organization (WHO)

By Lawrence Surendra
BANGKOK, Thailand, Jun 4 2020 (IPS)

In the midst of the COVID 19 pandemic, the much-anticipated 73rd World Health Assembly (WHA) of the WHO concluded without any major controversies or disagreements.

The landmark WHA resolution to bring the world together to fight the COVID-19 pandemic, co-sponsored by more than 130 countries, and adopted by consensus, called for the intensification of efforts to control the pandemic, and for equitable access to and fair distribution of all essential health technologies and products to combat the virus.

Basically, a message that any vaccines produced should not be privatised by corporate capitalist greed.

Pandemics have been with us for a very long time. Medical science and public health focus on infectious diseases spanning the pre-antibiotic and post-antibiotic era, has tried to keep pace with the newer forms and zoonotic variations and shown us that reducing the emergence of a virus to a single source is futile.

The eminent flu epidemiologist, late Dr Louis Weinstein, commenting on the 1968 Hong Kong Flu epidemic that appeared simultaneously all over the world, observed that such epidemics do not spread from a single source. Humans have constantly battled with new infectious diseases.

Post COVID, anti-bacterial treatments for what are called ‘sick-car’ and ‘sick building’ syndromes are now flourishing. Though, however much we sanitise and keep our immediate environment clean, will that help in the fight against infections and infectious diseases?

Dr. Zinsser in , ‘Rats, Lice and History’, wrote in 1935, “ Infectious disease is one of the few genuine adventures left in the world … however secure and well-regulated civilized life may become, bacteria, protozoa, viruses, infected fleas, lice, ticks, mosquitoes and bedbugs will always lurk in the shadows ready to pounce when neglect, poverty, famine or war lets down the defences….

About the only genuine sporting proposition that remains unimpaired by the relentless domestication of a once free-living human species is the war against these ferocious little fellow creatures which lurk in the dark corners and stalk us in the bodies of rats, mice and all kinds of domestic animals; which fly and crawl with the insects and waylay us in our food and drink and even in our love”.

His work was considered a classic with the NYTimes calling it, “one of the wisest and wittiest books that have come off the presses”.

Looking for the source of the viruses is a distraction in understanding the causes. The destruction of our natural environment, clearly, has been the major cause for the pandemics that humanity has faced.

COVID 19 forcefully brought this truth home; while forcing a lock down on the activities of humans, it allowed the natural world to breathe again.

Rene Dubos, the pioneer of Ecological Medicine, who was awarded a Pulitzer in 1969 for his classic work, ‘So Human an Animal: How We Are Shaped by Surroundings and Events’, brought to us long back the connection between the state of our natural environment and our pathologies.

Writing in the Scientific American (1955) an article titled, “Second Thoughts on the Germ Theory’, he wrote, “During the first phase of the germ theory the property of virulence was regarded as lying within the microbes themselves. Now virulence is coming to be thought of as ecological. Whether man lives in equilibrium with microbes or becomes their victim depend upon the circumstances under which he encounters them”.

He was the one who coined the expression, “think globally, act locally” which nowadays is used like a fashion statement, without knowing the origins or the deep philosophical significance Rene Dubos attached to an expression that he first coined. The current COVID world has forcefully shown the importance of “thinking globally and acting locally”.

Where do we go from here in managing this global public health crisis and repairing the relationship of humans to the planet and its sentient beings? The question ‘What now?” is posed as a query for action, for a road map, in the way, the Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation Report ‘What Now: Another Development ‘
posed it in 1975.

Another Development: Approaches and Strategies was launched in 1976, as an independent contribution to the Seventh Special Session of the United Nations General Assembly on Development and International Cooperation. With a print run of 100,000 copies in six languages, the Report came to play a significant role in the development debate during the following years.

The ‘What Now Report’ was envisaged as a “tribute to the man, Dag Hammarskjöld, the UN Secretary-General 1953–1961 and one of the last century’s most remarkable international leaders, who more than any other, gave the United Nations the authority which the world (now) needs more than ever”.

The five principles of ‘Another Development’ in 1975 stated, “Need based – Development geared to meeting human needs, material and non-material; Endogenous – stemming from the heart of each society which defines in sovereignty its values and the vision of its future;

Self-reliant – implying that each society relies primarily on its own strength and resources in terms of its members’ energies and its natural and cultural environment;

Ecologically sound – utilising rationally the resources of the bio-sphere in full awareness of the potential of local ecosystems as well as the global and local outer limits imposed on present and future generations.

And based on Structural transformation – so as to realise the conditions required for self-management and participation in decision making by all those affected by it, from the rural or urban community to the world as a whole, without which the goals above could not be achieved.

These five principles are even more relevant today and could be the new Panchseel of a new commitment we should make for mutual co-existence between peoples and between humans and nature.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, delivering the prestigious Dag Hammarskjold Uppsala Lecture on Earth Day in 2018 and titled, ‘Twenty-first century challenges and the enduring wisdom of Dag Hammarskjöld’, stated that, “The problems of our time are global problems that can only be solved with global solutions”.

Pointing in his lecture that Hammarskjold, “was a man of culture”, Guterres said, “that allowed him to have a universal view, a universal perspective; to consider diversity as a richness; to be able to understand others; to promote tolerance; to promote dialogue and to find solutions for the most difficult and intricate diplomatic problems of his time”.

“This is what, indeed, is sometimes lacking today” and that, “the proof that this translated into a vision of the world that remains as accurate today as during his lifetime is very well captured” he said in what Hammarskjold had said then, ‘Our world of today [of course many decades ago] is more than ever before, one world. The weakness of one is the weakness of all, and the strength of one – not the military strength, but the real strength, the economic and social strength, the happiness of people – is the strength of all. Through various developments that are familiar to all, world solidarity has been forced upon us. This is no longer the choice of enlightened spirits, it’s something which those whose temperament leads them in the direction of isolationism have also to accept’.

Almost five decades later, organizations with the history, prestige and authority like the Dag Hammarskjold Foundation are uniquely placed to draw upon the wisdom of the past and cooperatively navigate Earth and humanity to a safe place.

Reviving the spirit of ‘What Now’ as the new Panchsheel that works beyond nation states and the strong men that lead these nations states lies the future.

The Foundation needs urgently to take initiatives, using the current crisis as an opportunity to create new global institutional platforms for solidarity based on the principle of ‘planetary citizens’ away from the hyper-nationalists of the present who in history, have “goose stepped” us into disasters.

New generations are looking for such answers. The world must move away from the strong-man politics of men who are also no ‘men of culture’.

Former US President Barack Obama in his Nelson Mandela speech in South Africa, commenting on strong man politics dominating the major large nations of the world, said, “Look around. Strongman politics are ascendant, suddenly, whereby elections and some pretence of democracy are maintained—the form of it—but those in power seek to undermine every institution or norm that gives democracy meaning”.

Fortunately, both in the Northern Hemisphere and the Southern hemisphere we now have women in power who are bringing a different quality to national and global leadership.

From Asia, and in small countries like South Korea articulate women of such clarity and depth of experience in international leadership, like Madam Kang, Kyung-wha Korea’s Foreign Minister, are leading with such finesse the Foreign Policy of a nation wedged between big powers. These resources of leadership need to be harnessed for the global good.

The theme for World Environment Day (Friday June 5), is ‘Time for Nature’. Humanity has ‘Time for Nature. Nation states and strong men who lead them have no time for nature which is why we are in the mess we are in and why we need ‘Another Development’ led by this new generation of women leaders currently managing national and global affairs with such wisdom.

The post Beyond the COVID-19 Pandemic: What Now? appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Lawrence Surendra is a Chemical Engineer and Environmental Economist and has been a Scholar-in Residence at the Dag Hammarskjold Foundation, Uppsala, Sweden

 
“Before there can be truth there must be a true man”-- Chuang-Tzu

The post Beyond the COVID-19 Pandemic: What Now? appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Vladimir Popov and Jomo Kwame Sundaram
BERLIN and KUALA LUMPUR, Jun 4 2020 (IPS)

The world economic contraction so far this year is largely due to measures, especially at the national or local level, to contain or prevent Covid-19 contagion, particularly those restricting business operations, thus reducing economic activity, output, incomes and spending.

Vladimir Popov

Lower business and worker incomes have reduced spending, for both consumption and investment, and thus overall or aggregate demand. While there has indeed been much novel ‘financial folly’ in the last decade, responsible for its dreary ‘recovery’, and financial circumstances will retard recovery, the cruel public health dilemma posed by the viral pandemic is surely its immediate cause.

To be sure, recent economic performance in much of the world had been quite lacklustre, with no strong recovery since the 2008-09 global financial crisis and Great Recession despite the unexpected impact of ‘unconventional monetary measures’, especially in the north Atlantic economies.

Recessions and recessions
The recessions have been quite uneven, due to different circumstances and responses. Various aspects may bear some resemblance to other supply-side recessions, e.g., those caused or worsened by post-war conversion of armaments industries, oil price shocks (e.g., in 1973, 1979, 2007) and ‘shock therapy’-induced ‘transformational recessions’ in ‘post-communist’ and other economies in the 1990s.

A general recession typically involves declines in many, if not most industries, sectors and regions. Such output contraction typically implies underutilized production capacities, raising unemployment unevenly during a general recession.

In contrast, a structural recession refers to falling output in one or a few related industries, sectors or regions, not sufficiently offset by other rises. However, not all supply side recessions necessarily involve structural transformation, especially if not deliberately induced by government.

Really different this time?
A structural transformation – with unviable activities declining as more ‘competitive’ alternatives grow – may not involve overall economic contraction if resource transfers – from declining activities to rising ones – are easy, rapid and low cost.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram

Such resource transfers typically require ‘repurposing’ labour as well as plant, equipment and other ‘fixed capital’ stock. Typically, unplanned structural transformations result in supply-side recessions as resources are withdrawn without being redeployed for alternative productive ends.

Some examples include post-war recessions when converting military industries to peacetime non-military purposes after wars end. After the Second World War, US output declined for three years, and was 13% lower in 1947 compared to 1944.

The 1990s’ recessions in many post-communist economies were similarly due to poor management of structural transformations with declining agriculture and manufacturing, often despite more resource extraction, with some contractions deeper than the 1930s’ Great Depression.

In market economies, such adjustments typically increase unemployment as industries become unprofitable – e.g., due to cost spikes – and lay off workers. Growing unemployment lowers wages, while the conventional wisdom claims that cheaper labour costs will induce new investments.

Market resolution of such unexpected, massive disruptions is likely to be poorly coordinated, slow and painful, with high unemployment for years. Alternatively, governments can guide, facilitate and accelerate desired changes with appropriate relief and industrial policy measures.

Keynes needed, but not sufficient
Slumps in travel, tourism, mass entertainment, public events, sit-down eateries, hotels, hospitality, catering, classrooms, personal services and other such activities have been due to physical distancing and other containment requirements.

Such collapses will not be overcome with support, relief and stimulus measures as most such activities cannot fully resume soon, even in the medium term. Expansionary Keynesian fiscal and monetary policies to address collapses in aggregate demand have limited relevance in addressing government-mandated restrictions intended to contain contagion.

Furthermore, as Nobel economics laureate Paul Romer and Alan Garber note, “loan guarantees and direct cash transfers will stave off bankruptcy and default on debt, but these measures cannot restore the output that is lost when social distancing keeps people from producing goods and services”.

Of course, relief measures for those losing incomes can help mitigate the effects of the adverse supply and demand shocks involved, but much depends not only on direct, but also indirect, second or even third order effects, partly reflected in Keynes’ ‘multiplier’ muted by other government measures.

A necessary precondition for the multiplier to accelerate broader economic recovery is the prior existence of underutilized productive capacities. Otherwise, increasing demand will simply raise prices when output and efficiency cannot be quickly increased profitably.

One size does not fit all
Newly restructured economies will inevitably emerge from the pandemic, but some will do better than others. There is and will be greater need and demand for new as well as modified goods and services such as medical supplies, health facilities, care services, distance learning and web entertainment.

Economies trying to adjust to the new post-contagion context should use industrial policy or selective investment and technology promotion to expedite restructuring by directing scare resources from unviable, declining, sunset industries to more feasible, emerging, sunrise activities.

Enabling, incentivizing or even requiring needed resource reallocations can help overcome supply bottlenecks. China and other East Asian countries have already had some early successes in thus addressing their Covid-19 downturns.

All workplaces adversely affected by precautionary requirements will need to be safely reconfigured or repurposed accordingly. Structural unemployment problems, due to skill shortages not coinciding with available labour skill supplies, can be better addressed by appropriate government-employer coordination to appropriately identify and meet skill requirements.

Government policies, e.g., using official incentives, can thus encourage or induce adoption of desirable new practices, such as ‘clean investments’ for ‘green’ restructuring, e.g., by using renewable energy and energy saving technologies. Without such inducements, stimuli and support for desirable new investments, desired structural shifts may be much more difficult, painful and costly.

Thus, the ongoing Covid-19 crisis should be seen as an opportunity to make much needed, if not long overdue investments in desirable sunrise industries, services and enterprises, including personnel retraining and capability enhancement as well as workplace repurposing.

Vladimir Popov is a Research Director in the Dialogue of Civilizations Research Institute in Berlin and author of How to Deal with a Coronavirus Economic Recession?

The post Covid-19 Recessions: This Time It’s Really Different appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Credit: URDEE IMAGE/ZUMA WIRE/ALAMY LIVE NEWS

By Antoinette Sayeh and Ralph Chami
Jun 4 2020 (IPS)

The COVID-19 pandemic is crippling the economies of rich and poor countries alike. Yet for many low-income and fragile states, the economic shock will be magnified by the loss of remittances—money sent home by migrant and guest workers employed in foreign countries.

Remittance flows into low-income and fragile states represent a lifeline that supports households as well as provides much-needed tax revenue. As of 2018, remittance flows to these countries reached $350 billion, surpassing foreign direct investment, portfolio investment, and foreign aid as the single most important source of income from abroad (see Chart 1). A drop in remittance flows is likely to heighten economic, fiscal, and social pressures on governments of these countries already struggling to cope even in normal times.

Remittances are private income transfers that are countercyclical—that is, they flow from migrants into their source country when that country is experiencing a macroeconomic shock. In this way, they insure families back home against income shocks, supporting and smoothing their consumption. Remittances also finance trade balances and are a source of tax revenue for governments in these countries that rely on value-added tax, trade, and sales taxes (Abdih and others 2012).

In this pandemic, the downside effect of remittances drying up calls for an all-hands-on-deck response—not just for the sake of the poor countries, but for the rich ones as well. First, the global community must recognize the benefit of keeping migrants where they are, in their host countries, as much as possible. Retaining migrants helps host countries sustain and restart core services in their economies and allows remittances to recipient countries to keep flowing, even if at a much-reduced level. Second, donor countries and international financial institutions must also step in to help migrant-source countries not only fight the pandemic but also cushion the shock of losing these private income flows, just when these low-income and fragile countries need them most.

Transmission of shocks

Remittances are income flows that sync the business cycle of many recipient countries with those of sending countries. During good times, this relationship is a win-win, furnishing much-needed labor to fuel the economies of host countries and providing much-needed income to families in the migrants’ home countries. However, this close business cycle linkage between host and recipient countries has a downside risk. Shocks to the economies of migrant-host countries—just the sorts of shocks being caused by the coronavirus pandemic—can be transmitted to those of the remittance-recipient countries. For example, for a recipient country that receives remittances representing at least 10 percent of its annual GDP, a 1 percent decrease in the host country’s output gap (the difference between actual and potential growth) will tend to decrease the recipient country’s output gap by almost 1 percent (Barajas and others 2012). Remittances represent much more than 10 percent of GDP for many countries, led by Tajikistan and Bermuda, at more than 30 percent (see Chart 2).

The pandemic will deliver a blow to remittance flows that may be even worse than during the financial crisis of 2008, and it will come just as poor countries are grappling with the impact of COVID-19 on their own economies. Migrant workers who lose their employment are likely to reduce remittances to their families back home. Recipient countries will lose an important source of income and tax revenue just when they need it most (Abdih and others 2012). In fact, according to the World Bank, remittance flows are expected to drop by about $100 billion in 2020, which represents roughly a 20 percent drop from their 2019 level (see Chart 3). Fiscal and trade balances would be affected, and countries’ ability to finance and service their debt would be reduced.

Banks in migrant-source countries rely on remittance inflows as a cheap source of deposit funding since these flows are altruistically motivated. Unfortunately, these banks are now likely to see their cost of operations increase, and their ability to extend credit—whether to the private sector or to finance government deficits—will be greatly reduced (Barajas and others 2018). Furthermore, the typically credit-constrained private sector—mostly comprising self-employed people and small and medium-sized enterprises—is likely to lose remittance funding, in addition to dealing with even tighter credit conditions from banks. All this will come on top of lower demand for their services and products as a result of the crisis.

That’s not all. A prolonged crisis could worsen pressure in labor markets of rich countries, and out-of-work migrants could lose their resident status in host countries and be forced to return home. For example, in Gulf states such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, which rely on migrant labor from the Middle East, North Africa, and Southeast Asia, the drop in the price of oil and economic activity could result in migrants (some of whom are already infected with the virus) returning home. They are likely to join the jobless in their home countries—in labor markets already brimming with unemployed youth—as well as put more pressure on already fragile public health systems. This could heighten social pressure in countries already ill prepared to deal with the pandemic and possibly also fuel spillovers beyond their borders. People escaping tough situations in their own countries are likely to seek other shores, but richer countries, also in the midst of fighting the virus, may have very little desire to allow migrants in—potentially leading to an even greater refugee crisis.

Global threat

Compared with previous economic crises, this pandemic poses an even greater threat to countries that rely heavily on remittance income. The global nature of this crisis means that not only will recipient countries see remittance flows dry up, they will simultaneously experience outflows of private capital, and maybe a reduction in aid from struggling donors. Typically, when private capital flees a country because of a macroeconomic shock, whether climate related or because of a deterioration in the country’s terms of trade, remittance flows come in to lessen the impact of capital flight. By contrast, in this current crisis, poor countries can expect to experience both phenomena—capital flight as well as a drop in remittance flows.

With global demand likely to suffer, it would be hard for remittance-recipient countries to export their way out of this crisis. Currency depreciation cannot be expected to spur demand for their exports or attract tourism since this shock is systemic (Barajas and others 2010). Currency weakness will likely worsen the economic situation for many of these low-income and fragile states whose debt is in foreign currency, further depressing local demand and resulting in greater shrinkage of local economies.

What can be done?

The crisis has the unique effect of tightening fiscal constraints in low-income migrant-source countries just when there’s much more for the public sector to do, both in terms of protecting the population from the pandemic and supporting local economies in weathering huge negative shocks. The loss of tax revenue resulting from the drop in remittance- supported consumption will only make things worse for governments already strapped for funds and severely strain their ability to engage in countercyclical fiscal measures. This creates tremendous urgency for the international community to help, even when rich countries are themselves facing huge fiscal burdens.

It is in the best interest of rich countries for migrants not to go home as well as to provide resources for poor countries to fight the pandemic. Infection rates are much higher in rich countries and are especially high among migrant workers owing to their dismal working and housing conditions. Migrants who go home are at risk of taking the virus with them. If this happens, poor countries will provide a rich incubator for the virus that will boomerang as refugees seek new shores. Then it will take decades—and many lives—for the world to be rid of this virus.

Three key actions need to be taken now.

First, host countries need to stabilize the employment opportunities of the migrant workers in their economies. Relief packages that target employment protection for citizens in rich countries can also help migrant workers remain employed. Recognizing the need to protect and stabilize the welfare of migrant workers, the prime minister of Singapore recently assured migrant workers in his country that “we will look after your health, your welfare, and your livelihood. We will work with your employers to make sure that you get paid and you can send money home . . . This is our duty and responsibility to you and your families.” Action by host countries can help keep the remittance lifeline alive, as well as reduce the likelihood of migrants returning home.

Extending protection to migrants will also help advanced economies get back to full production sooner. If host countries send migrants back, it will take even longer to restore production in rich countries to former levels. In countries such as the United States that depend on seasonal labor, keeping migrants within their borders and enhancing testing for infection will bring a double benefit—ensuring the supply of fresh agricultural products for the host country and preserving remittances for migrants’ home countries.

Second, countries receiving returning migrants will need help to contain, mitigate, and reduce the escalation of outbreaks. Donor countries must help with the cost of virus mitigation, in an effort to lessen the severity of the crisis in local economies and stave off potential spillovers.

Returning migrants are likely to place further stress on the health care systems of migrant-source countries, which are struggling to contain local infections and avoid a shutdown of the local economy. Authorities in these countries will need enhanced testing as much as possible in urban areas, as well as support in implementing quarantine measures for returning migrants who may be infected. If the return of migrants is handled in this manner, there could be longer-term benefits for their home countries as well. Migrants who expect to be permanently repatriated may bring their savings with them, and their work skills could bring development benefits to their home countries.

Third, given that poor countries’ governments have limited room for maneuver, these countries will need the assistance of international financial institutions and the donor community. International financial institutions need to shore up fiscal and balance of payments assistance to these countries. This should include ensuring that these countries’ most vulnerable people—those most reliant on remittance inflows for their consumption and well-being—are able to access social insurance programs. And, perhaps now more than ever, the global effort to meet Sustainable Development Goal 10, reducing the high cost of remittances to 3 percent, could take center stage.

This crisis makes it clear that as a global community we, rich and poor countries, are all in this together. We can either lift all boats or, together, face the consequences of rising social inequality.

The post Lifelines in Danger appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Antoinette Sayeh is deputy managing director of the IMF, and Ralph Chami is assistant director of the IMF’s Institute for Capacity Development.

The post Lifelines in Danger appeared first on Inter Press Service.

FGM was outlawed by Sudan's new Sovereign Council, who have been in power since August 2019.

Kenyan journalist Larry Madowo writes about the racism he has experienced in the US.

Brendan Esposito/AAP

By External Source
SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA, Jun 3 2020 (IPS)

I can’t breathe, please! Let me up, please! I can’t breathe! I can’t breathe!

These words are not the words of George Floyd or Eric Garner. They weren’t uttered on the streets of Minneapolis or New York. These are the final words of a 26-year-old Dunghutti man who died in a prison in south-eastern Sydney.

David Dungay Jr was killed when prison officers restrained him, including with handcuffs, and pushed him face down on his bed and on the floor. One officer pushed a knee into his back. All along, Dungay was screaming that he could not breathe and could be heard gasping for air.

Dungay’s death in custody occurred in Long Bay prison during the 2015 Christmas season. It happened a short drive from an elite university, next to affluent, waterside suburbs.

But his horrific death did little to pierce this white bubble of privilege. The media barely blinked. The politicians did not emerge from their holiday retreats. None of the officers involved were disciplined or called to account.

 

Australia’s glass house

It is comfortable for us in Australia to throw stones at racist police violence in the United States. It is comfortable because we do not see our own glass house.

This is evident in Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s comments to 2GB on Monday:

And so as upsetting and terrible is the murder that took place, and it is shocking … I just think to myself how wonderful a country is Australia.

It is “wonderful” because we do not see the horror inflicted by the criminal justice system on First Nations people.

It is “wonderful” because we do not ever call their deaths in custody “murder”, using instead the euphemisms of “accident” or “natural causes”.

It is “wonderful”, because we have so normalised the passing of First Nations people that we are never shocked when they are killed.

It is “wonderful”, because we have a vocabulary to defend police officers responsible for racist violence, including people doing an “extremely difficult job”.

The official response to the killing of Dungay has wide ripples in the white Australian community and the legal community. His family maintain that the killing of their son, brother and uncle, who was unarmed, was murder. No criminal charges have been brought and the coroner in November 2019 blamed Dungay’s pre-existing health conditions. His comments minimised the responsibility on the part of the officers:

it is most likely that the cause of David’s death was cardiac arrhythmia. It is noted that David had a number of comorbidities, both acute and chronic, which predisposed him to the risk of cardiac arrhythmia … However, the expert evidence also established that prone restraint, and any consequent hypoxia, was a contributing factor although it is not possible to quantify the extent or significance of its contribution.

 

First Nations people are the most incarcerated in the world

The deaths in custody of First Nations Australians are not hidden. As a nation, we are choosing not to look at them. In 1991, the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody documented 99 deaths in custody.

Since then, 432 Indigenous Australians have died in custody, according to Guardian Australia’s Deaths Inside project.

First Nations people are the most incarcerated in the world, surpassing the rates of African American people in the United States. In 2019, for every 100,000 First Nations adults, 2,481 are in prisons, compared with 164 non-Indigenous people.

Despite comprising 2% of the general adult population, First Nations Australians are 28% of the prison population. For First Nations women, the rate is 33% and they are 21 times more likely to be imprisoned than non-Indigenous women. This is a product of systemic racism that also contributes to disproportionate deaths in custody.

Yet the deaths are only the tip of the iceberg. Everyday occurrences of police brutality against First Nations people, frequently filmed and uploaded on social media platforms, have even less formal oversight. The casual complacency about the harm inflicted on First Nations people means we do not know the true extent of its occurrence.

On Tuesday, a NSW police officer was put on restricted duties after a video emerged on social media of him appearing to kick an Aboriginal teenager.

 

Protesting deaths in custody in our backyard

In the wake of Floyd’s death, Dungay’s nephew, Paul Silva pointed to the lack of response to First Nations deaths in Australia:

We don’t get the same big response in Australia as they do in the United States with the Black Lives Matter movement, but we have had many people, both First Nations and non-Indigenous people standing with us. We can build on that – we need many more to join us. We can take inspiration from the United States and get back out on the streets in our own backyard, where there is so much brutality against Black people too, that’s the only way to get justice.

While the spotlight has been shone on the protests in the United States, most Australians would be unaware that each year on the anniversary of Dungay’s killing, there has been a protest, mostly at Long Bay jail.

This week in cities around Australia, protests are planned in the name of First Nations people who have died in custody. The numbers of those who converge on the streets is a litmus test of national tolerance for racial violence against First Nations people in the criminal justice system.

 

Where does racial violence against First Nations people end?

Despite more than 500 First Nations deaths in custody since 1980, there has never been a successful homicide prosecution in the criminal courts. Indeed, only a handful have resulted in charges being laid in manslaughter or, less frequently, murder.

A police officer has been charged with murder following the shooting death of a 19-year-old Warlpiri man last year. The officer intends to plead not guilty.

The Victorian Coroner this April also referred the death of Yorta Yorta woman Tanya Day to prosecutors for further investigation.

Without accountability, justice will not flow for the families and the chain of racial violence will not be broken.

The danger of expressing outrage towards African American deaths in custody is that we deflect our own agency and responsibility. We legitimise the violence at our doorstep that is in our control.

It allows us to walk past racist police interventions on the false assumption that the problem is with the First Nations person rather than the police and Australian culture.

The only response to racism is resistance. This must take place not simply in passive solidarity with African Americans, but in our active support, protest and sacrifice for the lives of First Nations Australia.

 

Thalia Anthony, Professor of Law, University of Technology Sydney

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

The post ‘I Can’t Breathe!’ Australia Must Look in the Mirror to See our Own Deaths in Custody appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Commonwealth economic adviser, Tamara Mughogho
Jun 3 2020 (IPS-Partners)

Imagine a world without the internet and erase the last few decades of technological advancement. Then imagine how governments, schools and businesses would have dealt with the COVID-19 pandemic.

As the pandemic continues its relentless march around the globe, there have been debates about the effectiveness of response strategies such as social distancing and stay-at-home orders. Particularly, there is concern about the ability of countries with larger populations to enforce these measures.

There is no question that technology has played a major role in the world’s response to COVID-19. It has allowed children to continue their education, people to shop online and work from home and governments to continue to function. But are we maximising the full potential of technology to fight this global pandemic?

How technology can help

Innovation and best practices are emerging across the Commonwealth, with countries like Singapore, Kenya and the UK developing or using technology to continue economic activities or control the spread of the virus. For instance, mobile apps are used in Singapore to trace and track infected individuals and those with whom they have come into contact.

Mobile technologies are also used to determine if people are breaking lockdown regulations. Such innovations could provide avenues for countries struggling with containing the spread of COVID-19, particularly those with very large populations.

These strategies are especially useful for the Commonwealth, which includes some of the most highly and densely populated countries in the world, such as:

• India (1.3 billion people)
• Pakistan (220 million people)
• Nigeria (206 million people)
• Bangladesh (164 million people)

Some of these nations have faced major challenges in enforcing lockdown measures with strong opposition from parts of their populations. In some cases governments have resorted to using force, with deadly consequences.

On the other hand, there are countries with smaller populations, like New Zealand, effectively managing to control the spread of the outbreak. It is therefore worth examining the correlation between population size and the effectiveness of COVID-19 responses, and how technology can help.

Protecting trade

Another important consideration is how technology can protect business and trade. The World Trade Organization estimates that the pandemic will cause global trade to decline between 13 and 32 percent. This would amount to a trade slump surpassing those caused by the Global Financial Crisis and the 2003 SARS Pandemic.

A decline in global trade could have negative impacts on fiscal sustainability for already economically vulnerable countries, and leave small states, that are heavily reliant on trade, with decreased revenue. The COVID-19 pandemic has therefore necessitated a step-up in technology infrastructure to ensure the continued efficiency of financial transactions and to help countries keep trading.

It is clear that the world needs to act together to mitigate the economic fallout from the pandemic.

The post Blog: Making technology an effective weapon in the battle against COVID-19 appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

This blog is part of the seminar series on ‘The Economics of COVID-19’.

The post Blog: Making technology an effective weapon in the battle against COVID-19 appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Eunice G. Kamwendo is an Economist and Strategic Advisor with UNDP Africa in New York. Chaltu Daniel Kalbessa is a UNDP Fellow and Strategic Analyst with UNDP Africa in New York.

By Eunice G. Kamwendo and Chaltu Daniel Kalbessa
NEW YORK, Jun 3 2020 (IPS)

With very weak health systems and overall capacity constraints to effectively respond to the deadly coronavirus disease, Africa’s fate against the invisible enemy, was going to be nothing short of catastrophic according to early predictions. Although Africa is yet to reach its peak, many countries are not seeing the exponential growth in case numbers, or in mortality rates as seen in other regions of the world. So far, the continent has the lowest mortality rates with higher recovery rates globally.

Eunice G. Kamwendo. Credit: UNDP South Africa

The slower than normal onset gives reason for some cautious optimism for Africa to weather this storm. What is working in Africa’s favor? Three key factors in our view which provide important lessons for the future.

Africa’s aggressive response:

First, is the swift and what seemed like an aggressive response to the pandemic by Africa as a whole. The continent reacted aggressively and proactively to COVID-19 as a preventative measure. By April 5, many African countries had imposed either localized, partial or full lockdowns of their countries, economies, schools, borders and large gatherings in an effort to contain the disease. Many of these measures were implemented long before any significant number of cases were recorded on the continent.

For a region that had only 99 confirmed cases by March 20, the above measures seemed extreme. Looking back, this was a bold response and rightly so. Stopping and containing the virus was not only a first line of defense for most, it constituted the main strategy between life and death given already overwhelmed and incapacitated health systems that have long struggled with responding to non-emergency cases. Such wholesale lockdown measures were complemented by community responses which for the African context have long proven to be effective in responding to similar disease outbreaks. The aggressive measures might be paying off.

Favourable population structure:

Africa’s demographic structure might be one of its mitigating features against Covid-19. The continent remains the most youthful globally, with more than 60.0 per cent of its population below the age of 25 compared to around 42.0 per cent globally. This trend is in stark contrast to developed regions where the proportion of aging populations are higher. The Covid-19 battle may be half won therefore given the continent’s demographic structure.

Available evidence corroborates with high risk population groups above, with age accounting for more deaths, without discounting other factors. In China, Europe and America for example more than 80% of Covid-19 related deaths are among the 65 years and above age group. All countries that have had the highest record of deaths are amongst the top ten countries with the largest share towards aging populations globally. Europe, America, and China have aging populations of about 20%, 16% and 12% respectively compared to less than 5% in Africa.

Chaltu Daniel Kalbessa. Credit: Zenanile Dlamini / UNDP, New York

Similar trends are observed in Africa with age accounting for most deaths in the 55 years and above age bracket. Granted, a much lower threshold than in developed regions but this is against a backdrop of low life expectancy pegged at 61 years for Sub Saharan Africa. Interestingly, countries that have higher proportions of adults over 65 years in Africa such as Tunisia (8%), Morocco (7.1%); Algeria (6.2%), South Africa (6%) and Egypt (5%) – account for up to two thirds of all Covid related deaths. This is quite instructive.

Exposure to a wide range of treatment regiments:

The continent shoulders the highest disease burden, with HIV, malaria and diarrhea amongst its top five killers. There were 25.7 million people living with HIV/AIDS and a little over 90% of those affected on antiretroviral drugs in 2018. Malaria is widespread just like the use Bacillus Calmette–Guérin (BCG) vaccinations which are believed to offer broad protection against respiratory infections. What is less known however, is the interaction between the prevalence of other diseases on the continent, related treatments and SAR-Covid-2. The question remains, whether the combined treatments for all these diseases are contributing to the high recovery rates and relatively low Covid deaths in Africa.

In Senegal and Madagascar for example, COVID-19 patients on hydroxychloroquine and the herbal remedy Artemisia annua have been observed to recover faster from the disease with lower deaths. In both countries, even with rising cases, recovery rates from Covid19 are much higher – consistent with the observations in most malaria prone countries. Interestingly, malaria is not prevalent in Africa’s Covid-19 hotspots of South Africa and North Africa.

The fact that the World Health Organization (WHO) is conducting clinical trials on malaria drugs (chloroquine/hydroxychloroquine); HIV drugs (remdesivir, ritonavir/lopinavir and interferon-beta) is quite telling and holds a promise for the continent where the use of these drugs is already widespread. The jury is still out on this one.

A Reason for Hope:

The African story is yet to fully unfold. For now, caution needs to be applied even with the pressure to lift restrictions to avoid the socioeconomic fallout. How countries will emerge from this crisis will be important. Any missteps can easily tip the scales towards disaster if the theories above do not hold. Maintaining some of the measures that have proven effective, ramping up experimentation with existing and herbal remedies combined with an innovation drive will certainly help the African case. From Senegal’s affordable rapid testing kits and low-cost ventilator substitution; Ghana’s innovation pooling test, Ethiopia’s contactless soap dispensers, mobile tech solutions in Nigeria, Uganda and Rwanda as well as the repurposing of industries to respond to the pandemic is deeply encouraging. The odds may be against the continent, but there is reason for hope.

The post The Curious Case of Covid-19 in Africa appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Eunice G. Kamwendo is an Economist and Strategic Advisor with UNDP Africa in New York. Chaltu Daniel Kalbessa is a UNDP Fellow and Strategic Analyst with UNDP Africa in New York.

The post The Curious Case of Covid-19 in Africa appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Latoya Mwoombola is juggling two careers at the same time, that of a doctor and of a rapper.

A displaced Yemeni woman stands outside a makeshift shelter that she shares with her extended family. Courtesy: IOM/O. Headon

By Samira Sadeque
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 3 2020 (IPS)

World leaders gathered on Tuesday to pledge $1.35 billion in aid for Yemen, which currently undergoing what many is the world’s “worst humanitarian crisis”, with Saudi Arabia announcing a contribution of $500 million. 

At the ceremony, the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) Peter Maurer said that reducing aid to Yemen at this time would be “catastrophic.” 

Those present at the ceremony repeatedly called for humanitarian access to be made accessible, without conditions, in the war-ravaged, famine-struck country where an estimated two million children are suffering from acute malnutrition. 

The pledge, the first of its kind to be held virtually, was organised jointly by the government of Saudi Arabia and the United Nations. Representatives from 125 member states, among other NGOs and civil society members, participated. 

The event was co-hosted by Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud, Saudia Arabia’s foreign affairs minister, and Mark Lowcock, U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator.

Yemen has been embroiled in a five-year-long civil war, with Saudi-backed forces fighting the country’s Houthi rebels. 

On Tuesday, Secretary-General António Guterres warned about the crises being exacerbated by the current coronavirus pandemic. 

“The pandemic poses a terrifying threat to some of the most vulnerable people in the world, weakened by years of conflict, and with a health system that is already on the brink of collapse,” he said.    

“Public health measures are particularly challenging in a country where trust in the authorities is weak, and fifty percent of the population do not have access to clean water to wash their hands,” he added. 

He said in order for the current situation to be contained, it was the crucial that the war ended. This, Guterres said, would open up channels to respond to the country’s needs in the fields of health, humanitarian concerns and human development. 

He reiterated his calls for a global ceasefire, which he appealed for in March as countries around the world began their lockdowns to contain the spread of the coronavirus.     

His calls were further echoed by Maurer, president of the ICRC, who blasted the blocking of humanitarian aid to the Yemeni people. 

“People’s needs are enormous, yet neutral humanitarian work is routinely blocked or politicised by conditioning it to intractable political progress,” Maurer said. “Blackmailing people into misery is not an option.”  

He announced four call-to-action on behalf of ICRC:

• a political solution, as this is the only means for creating a “sustainable improvement” for the current situation;
• reminding all actors that they must comply by International Humanitarian Law’;
• allowing full humanitarian access; and
• urging donors to scale up their donations as the world plunges into an economic downturn. 

“Conditioning aid to political progress is taking the people of Yemen hostage,” he added. 

The United Kingdom, which pledged $197 million in aid for Yemen, also highlighted similar concerns. It demanded that all restrictions that currently stand as a barrier for Yemenis to receive aid should be “immediately and permanently removed.” 

Guterres welcomed the aid. “Today’s pledges will help our United Nations humanitarian agencies and their partners on the ground to continue providing a lifeline to millions of Yemenis.”

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By External Source
Jun 3 2020 (IPS)

My name is Emma, I’m 10 years old, and I live in Canada. I am sharing this video with you, today, because I learned at school that my future – the future of all children – will be determined by what we do together today.

The life we lead – from the foods we eat, the air we breathe, the water we drink and the climate that makes our planet a livable place – comes from nature. If we do not do our part to help it, everything we have in our lives will be lost.

We are at a point of “no return.”

World Environment Day is the most important day for environmental action. It has been celebrated every year on June 5th: working with governments, businesses, celebrities, and citizens to focus their efforts on a key environmental issue.

This year, the theme for the day is “Biodiversity.” It is the foundation that supports all life on land and below water. It affects every aspect of human health, providing clean air and water, nutritious foods, science and medicine, resistance to disease and helps with climate change. Changing, or removing, just one part of this delicately balanced system affects the entire life system – and the results are devastating.

According to IPBES, as many as one million species of living things are at risk of extinction. 75% of our land-based environments and two thirds of our marine environments have been changed by human actions. Urban areas have more than doubled since 1992. Plastic pollution has increased ten times since 1980, all long before I was born.

And now, COVID19 shows just how the destruction of biodiversity can harm the system that supports human life. The United Nations says that almost one billion cases of illness and millions of deaths happen every year from diseases caused by coronaviruses. About three quarters of all emerging infectious diseases in humans are passed on to people from animals. And what most people do not understand is that sustaining biodiversity on our planet protects us against pandemics.

IUCN has made it clear that governments have not done enough to stop the loss of biodiversity on our planet.
Much remains to be done.

Nature is sending us a message. So please listen for the sake of our future!

The post WORLD ENVIRONMENT DAY 2020 appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Momodou Lamin Sisay, 39, from The Gambia, was shot dead after a car chase in Georgia.

By Pragyan Deb, Davide Furceri, Jonathan D. Ostry and Nour Tawk
Jun 3 2020 (IPS)

Since the COVID-19 outbreak was first reported in Wuhan, China in late December 2019, the disease has spread to more than 200 countries and territories. In the absence of a vaccine or effective treatment, governments worldwide have responded by implementing unprecedented containment and mitigation measures—the Great Lockdown. This in turn has resulted in large short-term economic losses, and a decline in global economic activity not seen since the Great Depression. Did it work?

Our analysis, based on a global sample, suggests that containment measures, by reducing mobility, have been very effective in flattening the “pandemic curve.” For example, the stringent containment measures put in place in New Zealand—restrictions on gatherings and public events implemented when cases were in single digits, followed by school and workplace closings as well as stay-at-home orders just a few days later—are likely to have reduced the number of fatalities by over 90 percent relative to a baseline with no containment measures. In other words, the results suggest that, in a country like New Zealand, the number of confirmed COVID-19 deaths would have been at least ten times larger than in the absence of stringent containment measures.

Credit: International Monetary Fund

Early intervention and containment measured as the number of days it took a country to implement containment measures after a significant outbreak—public health response time in epidemiology lingo—played a significant role in flattening the curve. Countries such as Vietnam that were faster to put in place containment measures witnessed a reduction in the average number of infections and deaths of 95 and 98 percent respectively. This in turn has laid the foundation for growth in the medium term.

Credit: International Monetary Fund

The effect of containment measures also varied depending on variations in country and social characteristics. The impacts were stronger in countries where colder weather during the outbreak produced higher infection rates, and where the population was older and hence more vulnerable to infection. On the other hand, having a strong health system and lower population density enhanced the effectiveness of containment and mitigation strategies by making them easier to implement and enforce. How civil society responded to de jure restrictions mattered as well. Countries where lockdown measures resulted in less mobility, and therefore more social distancing, saw a greater reduction in the number of COVID-19 infections and deaths.

Credit: International Monetary Fund

Finally, we explored whether the effect of containment varies across types of measure. Many of these measures were introduced simultaneously as part of the country’s response to limit the spread of the virus, making it challenging to identify the most effective measure. Nevertheless, our results suggest that while all measures have contributed to significantly reduce the number of COVID-19 cases and deaths, stay-at-home orders appear to have been relatively more effective.

Our empirical estimates provide a reasonable assessment of the causal effect of containment policies on infections and deaths, giving us comfort that the Great Lockdown, despite its enormous short-term economic costs, has saved hundreds of thousands of lives. Ultimately, the course of the global health crisis and the fate of the global economy are inseparably intertwined—fighting the pandemic is a necessity for the economy to rebound.

Pragyan Deb is an Economist in the IMF’s Strategy, Policy and Review Department. Davide Furceri is a Deputy Division Chief in the IMF’s Research Department. Jonathan D. Ostry is Deputy Director of the IMF’s Asia and Pacific Department.

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