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Moushumi Akter at work inside Fakir Fashion Ltd., Bangladesh. Credit: WaterAid/Fabeha Monir

By Ruth Loftus and Michael Alexander
LONDON / EDINBURG, Sep 23 2022 (IPS)

As the devastating images of flooding in Pakistan went round the world and the country declared a state of emergency, some 4,000 miles away in Stockholm, delegates had just arrived for World Water Week – an annual focal point for global water issues.

For lots of the international attendees, many of whom were from the corporate world, the headlines were a deadly reminder not only of the power and value of water, but also of the failings of the global system to manage it properly.

There can be no debate that Pakistan’s latest flooding catastrophe has been exacerbated by the climate crisis. With COP27 on the horizon in November, and the UN Water Conference taking place in March next year, business leaders, governments, and key stakeholders must propel water issues to the top of the agenda and address them beyond the boardroom and throughout supply chains.

It’s fair to say that the important role businesses have to play in securing sustainable access to water has often been overlooked. Having a safe, reliable, and resilient water supply is essential for most production processes and the health and wellbeing of employees – plus, it also makes sound financial sense.

At World Water Week, WaterAid launched its latest research ’Boosting Business: why investing in water, sanitation and hygiene pays off’ to demonstrate to companies the business benefits and potential financial returns of investing in these facilities.

This pioneering, first-of-its-kind research was funded by Diageo, Gap Inc., HSBC, Twinings and ekaterra (previously part of Unilever). Research took place over four years, in four different countries, across four different sectors – including tea production, the clothing and leather industry and smallholder farming.

The WaterAid perspective:

The quantitative aspect of our pilot is vital as it’s all about how and why investing in taps, toilets and hygiene behaviour change is good for business. We were able to not only carry out thought-provoking project work with tangible benefits for the workforce and wider communities, but we were also able to quantify how that then impacted upon productivity; how many jeans were sewn together, how much tea was picked, how much absenteeism fell, how much the companies paid on medical bills decreased and so on. We then extrapolated this data into standout figures – the return on investment (ROI).

In a nutshell installing clean water and decent sanitation facilities helps employees stay healthy. This means less absenteeism, lower medical costs, improved morale, and productivity. For every $1 invested in clean water, our research showed the apparel and leather sectors combined gained a $1.32 return on investment and the tea sector projects a $2.05 return.

To highlight the stand-out examples – one of the ready-made garment (RMG) factories in Bangladesh showed a ROI of $9 on every $1 invested in WASH, whilst in one of the Twinings’ tea estate plantations in India, there was a $5 to $1 ROI during the pilot programme.

With continued investment over a ten-year period, the returns are even greater – indeed one of the RMG factories is projected to have $30 to $1 ROI – and if companies support their employees’ communities as well, significantly more people will benefit.

It’s important to also consider that some businesses will be put off by the initial capital expenditure, and the fact that the returns are not always immediate. However, low-cost solutions can often provide big results in the long-term.

Integrated within this is hygiene, which became a topic for board-level consideration during the pandemic and the sudden attention the world gave to enhanced handwashing has provided lasting impact as the first and most cost-effective defence against infection.

The key now is to think about how to maintain that beneficial shift in behaviour. Each workplace is different, but it’s time for companies to put the wellbeing of their workforce at the heart of their business strategies and make water, sanitation and hygiene a priority.

The business perspective:

At Diageo, we strongly believe that, as access to clean water and sanitation are fundamental human rights, all efforts should be made to achieve this global goal. Access to water is central to gaining an education, sustaining health and increasing employability, and it addresses gender inequalities in communities, since women carry most of the burden of water collection.

We fully appreciate the enormous positive impact of investment in WASH and chose to be a key business partner in this ground-breaking study so we could finally prove the case for investment through solid research and data, and share the message with other businesses.

We will take the findings and incorporate them across our business strategies. The strong, quantitative evidence is what we need to support the investment in WASH facilities which play a key part of our Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) action plan: Spirit of Progress 2030, and we now have the data and evidence to accelerate this work even further.

Future-proofing supply chains

Investing in water and sanitation facilities must be considered a core business priority and part of a water stewardship strategy, rather than an act of philanthropy or corporate social responsibility. No longer to be seen as a charity gesture, or a way of green-washing the business, but as a wise and smart way to future-proof: for communities and for businesses to thrive.

Businesses must now think beyond the immediate factory fence and look to their supply chains and to their employees’ welfare within.

As more extreme weather events happen globally, and ever-growing populations mean increasing demand for water, more companies need to follow suit and have a greater presence on the global stage to address the crisis. Businesses have a vested interest in securing sustainable access to water, and now, a clear financial incentive to ensure lasting change.

If businesses, governments, and civil society rally together, important ESG criteria can be addressed, and sustainable development goals (SDGs) to achieve 100% access to safe and sustainable water, toilets and hygiene facilities by 2030, can be fulfilled.

*Ruth Loftus is Senior Private Sector Advisor at WaterAid and Michael Alexander is Global Head of Water, Environment and Agriculture Sustainability at Diageo.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Rodrigo Reyes, 18, was forced to drop out of school in 2020, because his family could not afford to pay for the internet or electronic devices that would allow him to attend class online, just when he was about to finish high school and was thinking of studying mechanics, his dream. Since then he has been working as a vendor at his mother's stall in a market on the outskirts of the Peruvian capital. CREDIT: Mariela Jara/IPS

By Mariela Jara
LIMA, Sep 22 2022 (IPS)

“When the pandemic hit, I stopped studying, just when it was my last year of school…My parents couldn’t afford to pay for internet at home,” said Rodrigo Reyes, 18, one of the nearly 250,000 children who dropped out of school in 2020.

This figure includes primary and secondary school students who had enrolled for the school year but did not complete it."I have always believed that study is what pulls people out of ignorance, what sets us free, and that is what we wanted for our children when we came to Lima with my husband. That is why it hurts me very much that we have not been able to afford to support Rodrigo’s plans."-- Elsa García

In March 2020, as a preventive measure against the spread of COVID-19, remote education was adopted in the country, which meant that access to the internet and electronic devices was essential. Online classes continued until 2022, when students returned to the classroom.

But during this period, inequalities in access to and quality of education have deepened, affecting students who live in poverty or who form part of rural and indigenous populations.

Peru is a multicultural and multiethnic country with just over 33 million inhabitants, where in 2021 poverty affected 25.9 percent of the population, 4.2 percentage points less than in 2020, but still 5.7 points above 2019, the year before the outbreak of the pandemic. Monetary poverty officially affected 39.7 percent of the rural population and 22 percent of the urban population, reflecting a huge social gap.

“We are talking about the primary and secondary students who are always the ones who do not manage to thrive in their learning, those who, quote unquote, fail the Student Census Evaluation tests, who live in provinces that occupy the last places in the rankings at the national level,” said Rossana Mendoza, a university professor of Intercultural Bilingual Education.

“They are the same young people who face a number of deficiencies and services, they are indigenous people speaking a language other than Spanish for whom the Aprendo en Casa (learning at home) program launched by the government was not an adequate response,” she added in an interview with IPS at her home in the Lima district of Jesús María.

But students in poor suburbs were also affected. Mendoza said they had to alternate their school work with helping their parents by working to support the family, thus spending very little time on their studies.

Rossana Mendoza, a university professor in the Intercultural Bilingual Education program, says at her home in Lima that “the priority is to recover this population excluded from the education system,” referring to children and adolescents who are marginalized from the classroom, a proportion that has grown since the start of the COVID pandemic. CREDIT: Mariela Jara/IPS

This was the case for Reyes, who had no choice but to drop out of school and put aside his dream of becoming a heavy machinery technician.

“I was going to finish school at 16, I was going to graduate with my friends and then I planned to prepare myself to apply to the institute and become a mechanic… but it didn’t happen,” he told IPS at his mother’s stand where they sell food and other products at the Santa Marta market in his neighborhood, where he has been working full-time since the pandemic began.

Reyes lives in the outlying area of the district of Ate, one of the 43 that make up Lima, located on the east side of the capital. Like a large part of the population of the district of almost 600,000 inhabitants, his family came from the interior of the country in search of better opportunities.

“I have always believed that study is what pulls people out of ignorance, what sets us free, and that is what we wanted for our children when we came to Lima with my husband. That is why it hurts me very much that we have not been able to afford to support Rodrigo’s plans,” the young man’s mother, Elsa García, told IPS sadly.

The pandemic dealt a major blow to the family’s precarious budget, and Rodrigo and his two younger siblings dropped out of school in 2020. The following year, only the younger siblings were able to return to their studies.

“With my help at the shop we managed to save some money and my dad was able to buy a cell phone for my siblings to use and now they share internet. I have to continue supporting them so that they can finish school and become professionals, maybe later I can do it too,” Rodrigo said.

Barriers to education existed before the pandemic in this South American country. This is well known to Delia Paredes, who left school before completing her primary education because she became pregnant. Today she is 17 years old and has not been able to resume her studies.

She lives with her parents and younger sisters in the rural area outside of the town of Neshulla, which has a population of 7,500 and is located in the central-eastern part of Ucayali, a department in Peru’s Amazon jungle region. Her father, Úber Paredes, is a farmer with no land of his own and works as a laborer on neighboring farms, earning a monthly income of less than 100 dollars.

“I haven’t been able to afford to buy my daughter the shoes and clothes and school supplies she needed to continue studying, and after having her baby she became a homemaker helping my wife… I have no money, there is a lot of poverty around here,” he told IPS by telephone from Neshulla.

His younger daughters Alexandra and Deliz are in school and returned to the classroom this year. Alexandra feels sorry for her older sister. “She always repeats that she wanted to be a nurse. I have told her that when I become a teacher and am working, I will help her,” she said.

Early pregnancy, such as Delia’s, considered forced by rights organizations because it is usually the result of rape, reached 2.9 percent among girls and adolescents between 12 and 17 years of age in 2021. Like poverty, it is concentrated in rural areas, where it stood at 4.8 percent, compared to 2.3 percent in urban areas.

Sitting in front of their home in Neshulla, in the Peruvian Amazon region of Ucayali, are farmer Úber Paredes and two of his daughters. Delia, on the right, was forced to drop out of school after she became pregnant and her father could not afford to buy her supplies. Now 17, she has not forgotten her desire to become a nurse. Her sister Alexandra, on the left, has promised to support her in the future. CREDIT: Gladys Galarreta/ IPS

Widening gaps

In 2020, 8.2 million children and adolescents were enrolled in school nationwide, prior to the declaration of the pandemic. The total number of children and adolescents enrolled in May 2022 was close to 6.8 million. Educational authorities expected the gap to narrow over the next few months, but have not reported information on this.

In 2020 almost a quarter of a million schoolchildren were forced to drop out of school at the national level, and in 2021 the number was almost 125,000. However, by 2022, the gap has widened, with nearly 670,000 not enrolled in the current school year, which began in March.

This gap has emerged despite the fact that the Ministry of Education launched a National Emergency Plan for the Peruvian Educational System from the second half of 2021 to the first half of 2022, aimed at creating the conditions needed to bring back children who dropped out of school.

Professor Mendoza said the priority is to bring back to school the segment of the population excluded from the right to education. “A strategy is needed that provides support not only in terms of studying, but with regard to the difficulties dropped-out students face in surviving with their families who due to the pandemic have lost their mother, father or grandparents,” she said.

“You have to see them in that context and not just because they are underachieving in learning. To see that they have a life with terrible disadvantages to get ahead and that they are being excluded from the education system,” she said.

She added that it is necessary to clearly identify the target population. “The Peruvian school management system, which is quite developed, should allow us to know who these children and adolescents are, what their names are, where they live, what has happened to their families and how the school system can provide them with opportunities within their current living conditions.”

Mendoza explained that not only are they outside the system, but their living conditions have changed and they cannot be expected to return to the school system as if nothing had happened after they fell into even deeper poverty or were orphaned.

A community health volunteer informs community members about various methods of family planning. Photo Credit: UNFPA Kenya

By Stephanie Musho and Ritah Anindo Obonyo
NAIROBI, Sep 22 2022 (IPS)

Fatuma is a 24 year old girl from Korogocho, an informal settlement in Nairobi. She died in December 2021, from complications arising from an unsafe abortion. Her friend and a few of her neighbors found her bleeding profusely and unable to move. They rushed her to the hospital. Unfortunately, she died before she could see the doctor.

Unfortunately, Fatuma’s story is common for girls and women in Kenya. In fact, at least 7 of them die every day from complications arising from unsafe abortion. Worse still, is that with current trends – where 700 girls between the ages of 10 and 19 are getting pregnant daily; the harrowing statistics on abortions are likely to be worse. If Fatuma knew where she could access safe abortion services, she would not have died.

The Constitution operates a robust Bill of Rights that are legally binding - and not mere suggestions. In addition to expanding the right to safe abortion in Article 26(4), it explicitly provides for the right to the highest attainable standard of reproductive health in Article 43

Despite the Constitution of Kenya providing for three instances where safe abortion is permitted, the right to choose if and when to become pregnant as well as terminate pregnancies continues to be one of the most contested debates across the world. In Kenya, there has been considerable progress in promoting reproductive justice with the judicial arm of the government advancing the law. An example is the Malindi case (Petition E009 of 2020) that re-affirmed that abortion is a fundamental right as provided for in the Constitution.

Additionally, the court outlawed arbitrary arrests of trained healthcare providers and people seeking safe abortion within Constitutional limits. Nonetheless, these gains are under attack in what Kenyans are calling the new cold war. That is, the fight between pro-gender and reproductive justice proponents, against anti-choice subscribers.

In the past few years, there have been a series of events affecting both the social, political and legal environment for access to life-saving safe abortion services. Firstly, was the arbitrary withdrawal of the National Standards and Guidelines for Reducing Maternal Mortality and Morbidity in 2013. A year after they were reinstated by the High Court, the Ministry of Health suspended all training of medical abortion providers.

In July this year, the Ministry of Health launched the National Reproductive Health Policy(2022-2032), an unjust policy that did not follow due process in its enactment including the need for representative public participation as provided by Article 118 of the Constitution. The policy also leaves out a section of the population in access to reproductive health as it enforces parental consent and does not consider deaths and complications from unsafe abortion as a public health issue despite the statistics.

Additionally, consider the sustained attack on women’s health rights by opposition groups led by far-right extremist organization CitizenGO. They work to negate human rights under the guise of Christianity. They pay hungry and unsuspecting Kenyan youth to trend hashtags that intentionally amplify lies and half-truths about sexual and reproductive health and rights issues, especially abortion, LGBTI+ rights and sexuality education.

They continue to influence public opinion; and regressive laws and policies the world over, including in Kenya. Ironically, the organization which is headquartered in Madrid, is heavily funded by institutions in and individuals from the global north, yet maintain that sexual and reproductive health and rights is a foreign agenda to Africa – and must be rejected.

CitizenGO has in the past run smear campaigns against reproductive justice. These have included Hon. Susan Kihika (former Senator – and now Governor of Nakuru County) for sponsoring the Reproductive Health Bill 2019 in the Senate. This Bill would have provided a much needed legal framework on a wide range of reproductive issues such as assisted reproduction – which continue to operate in a vacuum.

Further, they have bullied Hon. Esther Passaris on social media for hosting a Christmas party for sex workers. Recently, they trolled Hon. Mukulia the sponsor of the East East Africa Community Sexual Reproductive Health Bill and called for his dismissal from the East Africa Legislative Assembly.

Critics could advance religious arguments to counter safe abortion and the rights of gender minorities. However, it is worth noting that these beliefs are subjective. Moreover, Kenya is a secular state that operates the doctrine of church-state separation. This principle creates distance between the two; recognizing that morality and religion are subjective.

Besides, the Constitution operates a robust Bill of Rights that are legally binding – and not mere suggestions. In addition to expanding the right to safe abortion in Article 26(4), it explicitly provides for the right to the highest attainable standard of reproductive health in Article 43. Additionally, it protects the right to privacy and human dignity. CitizenGO and such like organizations must therefore operate within the ambit of the laws of the Republic.

While the outcomes of these fights are denial of information and services for marginalized groups; this fight is not just about access to services and information. It is about unequal power relations. There are people who are giving big monies towards initiatives that work to curtail human rights and freedoms; permeating government, media and other key sectors against progress.

It is therefore dire that as supporters of sexual and reproductive health and rights, we invest time and resources studying the ever-changing strategies and tactics opponents use to undermine these rights and re-strategize for the war at hand. We must prioritize movement building and reproductive rights resilience. Until then, girls and women in Kenya – and beyond, will continue to die preventable deaths.

 

Stepanie is a human rights lawyer and a Senior Fellow at the Aspen Institute. Ritah is the Youth Project Coordinator at Reproductive Health Network, Kenya.

XR Red Rebels at a climate protest in Rome. Credit: Paul Virgo/IPS.

By Paul Virgo
ROME, Sep 22 2022 (IPS)

Blocking metros and highways in rush-hour traffic to stop commuters getting to work. Vandalizing petrol pumps to put them out of use.
Halting sporting events such as the French Open and the British Grand Prix. Disrupting bemused art lovers by gluing oneself to priceless masterpieces.

The methods used by the radical climate groups that have sprouted up in many countries in recent years, such as Extinction Rebellion, Just Stop Oil (JSO) and Insulate Britain, seem better suited to alienating people than bringing them on board efforts to stop the looming environmental catastrophe. And alienate people they have.

We don't want to make people feel guilty for driving a car or not doing much to have a lighter carbon footprint. But we do want them to remember that they're citizens and members of a community

So they have rights, as we live in a democracy, but they also have duties

The reaction to a series of road-block protests in Rome in June by Italy’s Ultima Generazione (UG – Last Generation) group is a good example. Videos released by the group have you on the edge of your seat in fear for the protestors. In one, a car drives so close to a young woman sitting in the road that she appears to go under the vehicle.

In another, motorists violently drag protestors from the highway, with a young male protestor getting pulled away by his pony tail.
The online abuse is high voltage too, with group members getting called everything, from spoilt brats to terrorists.

Many commentators cannot understand why the protests hit ordinary people going about the business, rather than the rich and powerful. Other actions, such protestors gluing themselves to Sandro Botticelli’s Primavera at the Uffizi’s gallery or throwing paint over the Ecological Transition Ministry, have generated bafflement too.

The actions have not just come under fire from people unaware of the scale of the environmental crisis.

Even Adrian Ramsay, the co-leader of the Green Party in England and Wales, told The i newspaper that “we don’t always agree with their tactics” when asked about Insulate Britain blocking motorways.

But, with the effects of the climate emergency increasingly manifest, these groups are not worried about being unpopular, as long as their message is heard.

“The main aim of our protests is to break the wall of indifference and polarize people,” Beatrice Costantino, a qualified vet who quit her career to dedicate herself full-time to fighting the climate emergency with UG, told IPS.

“We cannot have a constant, deep discussion on climate and ecological emergency without touching people’s emotions. We don’t want to make people feel guilty for driving a car or not doing much to have a lighter carbon footprint. “But we do want them to remember that they’re citizens and members of a community.

“So they have rights, as we live in a democracy, but they also have duties. We cannot offload our social responsibilities anymore and we must accept that our inaction is the biggest part of the problem. We cannot ask the government to change if we don’t put enough pressure on it and we are not willing to lose our privileges, our goods and our liberty for the (common) good and the truth”.

The group that led that way in adopting non-violent civil disobedience to demand climate action was Extinction Rebellion in the UK in 2018. UG and JSO are among several younger, even more radical groups that are part of the international A22 network.
Stop Old Growth in Canada, Derniere Renovation in France and Declare Emergency in the United States are other members.

They are inspired by examples of the successful use of civil resistance in the past, such as with the Suffragettes and the civil rights movement in the United States.

They believe that small groups of determined people can garner the active support of a relatively small proportion of the population, perhaps as low as 1% or 2%, to reach a sort of social tipping point that generates rapid change.

“We’re confident that this is the number of people that we really need for a non-violent revolution, as it has happened like this most of the time in the past,” Costantino said.

“When people are constantly bombed by news about climate crisis and people struggling against it, they start looking for more information, discussing it with friends and family, reflecting within themselves”.

She says the actions of the A22 network have produced results already.

“In Canada in 2021 more than 1,000 people protested against the destruction of virgin forests, going into the forests, blocking trucks, climbing up trees and tying themselves to them.

“But they received little media attention and lots of Canadians were not aware of the problem or didn’t care. “Now the Save Old Growth campaign is disrupting the public with fewer than 70 people. “They have been on the national news, they have been taken to prison and they have shocked the nation. “According to polls, now more than 80% of Canadians are worried about the problem and want the government to stop the destruction of their forests”.

Another characteristic of these protestors is their fearlessness when it comes to putting their safety and freedom on the line.
Indeed, many have faced prison for the cause, including 51 JSO supporters jailed on September 15 after taking action at the Kingsbury Oil Terminal in Britain.

Whether the majority like these tactics or not, with more protests planned in the coming weeks and months, we are certain to hear more about these groups. “What’s the price of inaction?” said Costantino.

“If we don’t cut emissions immediately, more than three billion people will be forced to leave their homes by 2070. “We must open our eyes and understand that our parents, our children, our loved ones are going to die in huge numbers if we don’t act now”.

Excerpt:

Radical climate groups undeterred by risks and unpopularity as long as message gets across

The 27th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, to be held in Egypt from 6 to 18 November 2022, seeks renewed solidarity between countries to deliver on the landmark Paris Agreement, for people and the plan. Credit: United Nations

By Sohanur Rahman
DHAKA, Bangladesh, Sep 22 2022 (IPS)

Each year, low-emitting countries like Bangladesh are the greatest sufferers and, paradoxically, pay the biggest price in losses and damages resulting from climate change.

The most vulnerable communities are the ones who are facing the reality which the COP27 climate summit in Sharm-El-Shaikh is attempting to avert. According to the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD), Bangladesh is anticipated to experience an average loss worth US$2.2 bn per year, which is comparable to 1.5 per cent of its GDP, owing to floods.

While the Centre for Environmental and Geographic Information Services (CEGIS) estimates that in the last 40 years alone, climate change has cost Bangladesh US$12 bn. This is triggering a 0.5 per cent to 1 per cent annual decline in GDP, which is predicted to reach 2 per cent by 2050.

From melting glaciers to a ‘monster’ monsoon, record-breaking floods have left a third of Pakistan currently under water and the climate catastrophe is altering the monsoon pattern in South Asia, increasing the likelihood of fatal deluges.

The entire region accounts for just a minuscule quantity of carbon emissions, with Pakistan and Bangladesh generating less than 1 per cent, but it is a ‘climate crisis hotspot,’ as recently noted by UN Secretary-General António Guterres as well as in the in Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report.

Therefore, it only seems fair, that the rich polluting nations should pay climate reparations to vulnerable countries for their historical injustices.

Last year, I spent two weeks in Glasgow for the COP26, hoping to bring positive news to the most affected communities. But sadly, it was a disappointment for all marginalised individuals as their voices were ignored during the summit. Although, at least, the youth were recognised for the first time at the COP.

And yet, we young people were left feeling helpless and betrayed after COP26. The empty pledges, known as the Glasgow Climate Pact, will not protect our people from the global climate crisis.

However, prioritising adaptation, COP26 established a comprehensive two-year Glasgow–Sharm el-Sheikh work programme on the global goal of adaptation. It contains an unprecedented ambition for developed countries to increase adaptation support to underdeveloped countries by 2025.

Lack of accessibility and accountability

The adaptation community contributed significantly, but primarily online and outside the negotiation rooms. The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbates the inaccessibility of climate discussions for individuals in the Global South along with systemic barriers. The disadvantaged and most affected must be allowed to participate in the COP process.

Especially because solutions will not come just from the conference rooms packed with experts, large businesses, and government leaders, but they must also come from the ground.

The world’s poorest have the most resilience and indigenous knowledge for dealing with crises. It is a way of learning by doing. We don’t know what will function, but we must try to adapt. Only those from vulnerable communities can teach the rest of the world about climate resilience.

This worldwide catastrophe is the outcome of a faulty economic paradigm fuelled by capitalism, European colonialism, and the increasing domination of powerful men. Despite recognising the harmful consequences and viable remedies, the global community is not acting quickly enough to address the climate crisis.

We are experiencing the same global catastrophe, but we aren’t in the same boat. It’s like we’re on the Titanic and the Global North is on lifeboats. Millions of people are drowning in the freezing water because the wealthy refuse to share, even though they are fully aware of the consequence. They can’t keep doing business as usual while greenwashing with empty climate summits.

An untapped resource: the youth

The unprecedented mobilisation like the global climate strike of young people around the world demonstrates the massive power they have to hold the world’s climate decision-makers accountable.

Youth groups have previously shown that they are capable of acting and promoting climatic issues from frontlines to headlines. As youth representatives from Bangladesh, we spoke on stage during the COP26 to emphasise the need to make the COP accessible for young people and the need for transformative actions for a resilient future.

The engagement of children and youth in climate actions is quite restricted in our nation. Young people on the front lines of disaster response and adaptation provide humanitarian assistance and lead adaptation initiatives as first responders. Bangladesh just finished its second term as president of the Climate Vulnerable Forum (CVF).

While Ghana designated a youth ambassador before taking over the presidency, Bangladesh missed the opportunity to involve young people in the CVF. Still, at least it has committed to guaranteeing youth participation at the COP25 by signing the Children and Youth Declaration on Climate Action.

Bangladesh has already labelled the long-term Delta Plan (BDP 2100) – a holistic plan to integrate the activities of delta-related sectors across the country – a gift and safeguard for future generations. But regrettably, it is ignoring the youth in the implementation process.

Bangladesh has emphasised young people’s participation in the National Youth Policy and the National Adaptation Plan. However, successful measures to involve children and youth from the local, national, and global levels have yet to be witnessed. The government has not allowed young people to participate in the country’s delegation and negotiation processes.

Youth participation in climate action is an undeniable element of inclusiveness. The young people must be included in the decision-making processes and even execution of climate policies, plans and projects partnering with young people at all levels.

The youth is already doing its part, by convening frequent discussions and lobbying, closely working with key ministries and parliamentary platforms like Climate Parliament Bangladesh to engage young people in the driving seats on climate action. The government and other development partners must reciprocate.

The need for more inclusion

The upcoming COP27 must be more inclusive. A good start is the annual pre-COP which will include a Youth COP as well as an ‘#AccountabilityCOP’. But in the run-up to the conference, there must be more young people represented in national delegations and in meaningful engagement in sub-national, national, and regional talks.

It must expand access to badges and financing for youth, particularly those from the Global South, and allow observers to actively engage in negotiating sessions.

At the moment, we are worried that COP27 will be worse than COP26. There have already been requests that the venue is moved from Egypt due to concerns about human rights violations as a consequence of the country’s restriction on civic space and the lack of rights to free expression, association, and peaceful assembly, as well as the persecution of the gender diverse groups.

Human Rights Watch already labelled Egypt’s presidency of the COP27 a ‘glaringly poor choice.’

On the road to COP27, we young people will present our agenda and continue to advocate for effective outcomes. If global leaders play less on hypocrisy and invest more, COP27 can be a breakthrough in climate justice for vulnerable peoples. In addressing this catastrophe, we advocate for climate justice for all people everywhere which is a new frontier of human rights.

Sohanur Rahman is the Executive Coordinator of YouthNet for Climate Justice.

Source: International Politics and Society is published by the Global and European Policy Unit of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, Hiroshimastrasse 28, D-10785 Berlin.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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By Jan Lundius
STOCKHOLM, Sep 22 2022 (IPS)

After general elections on the 12th September, Sweden is on the threshold of a new era. The Sweden Democrats (SD) won almost 21 percent of the votes and thus became the largest in a bloc of right-wing parties that now have a collective majority in the parliament. A nation that for a long time prided itself of being a beacon of tolerance and openness will now experience a historical transformation. The Sweden Democrats was once founded by Nazi sympathisers and for decades shunned by mainstream politicians. However, SD has now tipped the political scale in a country previously known for its stable and predictable politics, and some of the party’s former foes are now willing to co-rule with them.

SD thrives on fears of organized crime, narrow-mindedly associated with migrant environment. The party has benefited from many Swedes’ worries about immigration and a failed integration policy, which has secluded immigrants, often concentrating them to sparsely populated areas, or desolate suburbs, leaving many of them jobless and aid dependent. Most immigrants have not been obliged to learn Swedish and adapt themselves to Swedish society. SD is pointing out that Sweden’s foreign-born population has doubled in twenty years and has now reached twenty percent.

Recent high-profile cases of shootings and explosions in public places are connected with showdowns between criminal gangs fighting for a drug and weapons market often controlled by ethnic clans. A development feared by many Swedes and on social networks SD has resolutely inflated such fears. The party’s winning strategy has been its intention to introduce “strict law and order”, combining it with a ban on the entry of new asylum seekers, tougher criminal penalties, mandatory deportation of migrant criminals, penalise begging, and increase police presence in disadvantaged suburbs. Absent from these policies is an intensified effort to reach out to, integrate and educate immigrants, while assisting them in entering the labour market.

Leading SD for 17 years, Jimmy Åkesson is a vociferous demagogue, not afraid of using generalisations and cliches to engage a sympathetic public. He has been extremely active campaigning, travelling around the cities of the country. In his speeches, Åkesson has a knack for painting a grim picture of a country ravaged by crime, presenting his party as the only means to “make Sweden great again.”

Åkesson’s political foes and opponents eventually felt forced to climb up on his bandwagon of fear mongering, becoming engulfed by issues connected with law enforcement, while other important themes like rising energy prices, Sweden’s upcoming membership in NATO, disappointing results of educational reforms, long waiting times for adequate health care – all this was drowned out by a relentless focus on immigration and crime.

It seems like Swedish political parties have been blinded by their efforts to cling to power and influence, forgetting ideologies and their traditional agendas, becoming infected by the worryingly short-sighted ideology of an extremist party, which wants to return to a fictitious utopia consisting of a bygone ideal state of time-honoured norms and values. During debates preceding the elections almost nothing was said about a future threatened by climate change, a disappearing biodiversity, insufficiently controlled nuclear power, the automation of working life, growing mental maladies, and a vast array of other social problems.

Founded in 1988, SD struggled to win enough votes to elect any MPs at all. However, ever since entering the Parliament in 2010, the party has increased its share of successive elections. It’s growth has been staggering – in the 2006 election SD received three percent of the votes, in 2010 – 5,7 percent, in 2014 – 13 percent, in 2018 – 17.5 percent, and finally in 2022 – 21 percent.

SD’s success story has caused a fierce debate over how much the party has changed ideologically, while transforming itself from a political pariah to an influential power-broker. Jimmie Åkesson, who took over the leadership of SD in 2005, did ten years ago unveil a “zero-tolerance policy against racism and extremism”, excluding his party’s worst extremists. In 2015, he even suspended the party’s entire youth wing over its links to the far-right.

Why did SD exclude these “fanatics”, at the same time as it replaced its burning flame logo with a more innocent-looking flower and got rid of its slogan Keep Sweden Swedish? A viable explanation is that SD wanted to go “mainstream” by cleaning up a conspicuous past originating in the almost universally scorned White Power Movement with roots securely fastened down deep in the fertile ground of musty Nazism.

If SD members are reminded about this awkward truth, they might say that their party now is far from being Nazi-affected, as stated by a member of SD’s reformed youth moment:

All that was before I was born. People accuse us of bad stuff, but I don’t think the fact that there were shady people in the party 30 years ago has affected the appreciation of voters attracted by our current politics.

Probably not, even if SD’s legal spokesperson still seems to cling to the old slogan of Keep Sweden Swedish. He recently tweeted a picture of a Stockholm underground train branded with the party’s colours and stating “Welcome to the repatriation express. Here’s a one-way ticket. Next Stop Kabul.”

However, some people are well aware of the fact that when SD was established in the town of Malmö, one of its founding members was an old Nazi who once had volunteered in the Waffen-SS while another was “the last Swede who dared to show himself in a Nazi uniform.” Up until 1995, SD’s vice chairman was a lady who summarized the Party’s policy as

We can with a good conscience continue the fight against the poison of humanity: Marxists, Liberals and above all the Sionist occupying power. As the vermin they actually are, they will all be crushed like lice

It was this shady party that attracted four students in the university town of Lund. Jimmie Åkesson eventually became the leader of SD, while two members of the group now serve as Party Secretary and International Secretary, respectively. The fourth member, the only one who obtained a degree, is currently member of the Regional Board of Skåne, Sweden’s wealthiest region, after serving as Party Secretary and Vice Speaker of the Swedish Parliament.

As students these men enjoyed being “politically incorrect” and founded a group they called The National Democratic Students’ Union. They eventually joined the SD, stating they intended to “take over” this minuscule extremist party. They are now asserting they didn’t support SD’s extreme ideology. Nevertheless, why did they then chose to “take over” a Nazi party?

In his bland and impersonal political autobiography, Satis Polito, Latin for Sufficiently Polished, Jimmie Åkesson poses as heir to the “old” Social Democratic idea of a just and secure People’s Home. The cover is as falsely arranged folksy as the rest of SD’s messages. Vintage Social Democratic election posters and the cat are photo-shopped. The title of the book indicates SD’s intention of becoming housebroken by washing away its Nazi past. Or as an Italian newspaper expressed it: “Modern Fascism does not stomp around in leather boots, until it dares to show its true face it paws around in felt slippers.”

SD fits fairly well into a standard description of populist parties currently haunting the entire world:

• Exalting “common people”, depicted as a homogenous group opposed to a multifaceted society. A view connected with xenophobia and mistrust of “power elites”.
• Scepticism towards representative democracy. Right-wing populists are happy to participate in elections. If they win, they tend to change the rules of the game to benefit themselves. Like Hungary’s Victor Orbán who stated “we only have to win once.” If they lose, populists often question the election results, suggesting that elections were rigged, like Donald Trump.
• An aggressive political style is expressed through a vulgar use of language, sharp condemnations and ridicule of opponents, while depicting themselves as victims of a biased media and the “establishment”.
• A frequent use of poorly substantiated claims and/or conspiracy theories aiming at undermining stories promoted by “established media” and members of the “elite”.
• Instead of open racism and xenophobia populist parties claim to adhere to and support a “national culture”. Whatever that might be? Jimmie Åkesson wrote in his book that he wants a speedy dismantling of the multicultural policy, in the cultural area, as well as other areas of society /…/ A strengthening of the cultural heritage and a restoration of the common national identity. We simply do not want the divided, segregated – soulless – society that the social-liberal establishment has created for us. We fight it. That’s why they hate us. That’s why they fight us. As a Sweden Democrat, I believe that something cannot be considered part of Swedish culture if it lacks a deep anchorage among current or previous generations of Swedes, or if it is something that is unique to Sweden, or a part of Sweden.

Such sentimental and basically incomprehensible gibberish makes many worried what will happen now when SD is going to be part of the Swedish Government. To what purpose? SD believes neither in climate change, nor in the equal value of human beings. What kind of future are they and their fellow parties around the world intending to create?

The final words of Satis Polito fail to mollify any worries. Jimmie Åkesson claims that the Social-Liberal Establishment so far has thwarted SD, but

Just let them be.
It is only natural that a falling autumn leaf is startled by an increasing wind.

I wonder from what direction this gathering storm is coming. Probably, from the dark world once created by Nazis and Fascists.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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The Pacific Community’s Centre for Pacific Crops and Trees gene bank conserves more than 2,000 varieties of trees and crops in the Pacific Islands. Credit: Pacific Community

By Catherine Wilson
SYDNEY, Sep 22 2022 (IPS)

Safeguarding plentiful, nutritious supplies of food for the present generation of Pacific Islanders and those who come in the future is a frontline goal in the wake of the pandemic and the continual threat of climate extremes to island farming. But the region, where 50 to 70 percent of people depend on agriculture and fisheries for sustenance and income, is now one step ahead in that objective. The region’s agricultural gene bank, established by the development organisation, Pacific Community (SPC), is now acclaimed as world-class and a leader in building future food supplies.

The Pacific Community’s Centre for Pacific Crops and Trees manages the major research centre for plant genetic biodiversity and repository of seeds, tissue culture, and DNA. The gene bank, which currently conserves more than 2,000 varieties of trees and crops in the Pacific Islands, was the winner of the Innovative Island Research Award at this year’s global Island Innovation Awards in April. The new award program was launched last year by former President Bill Clinton and is supported by his New York-based Clinton Global Initiative.

“We won the award because of our strong research programs and our use of tissue culture to conserve plant genetic material. Through research, we are developing tissue culture as a means to sustainably conserve genetic material in the long term. Through tissue culture, we can also improve mass propagation and multiply genetic resources to meet a high level of demand. Tissue culture is also better for the safe distribution and exchange of plant materials across national borders,” Logotonu Waqainabele, Program Leader for the Pacific Community’s Genetic Resources in Fiji, told IPS.

The awards aim to reward and raise the profile of individuals and organisations who are leading positive change in people’s lives in island nations and communities around the world. They are also part of the Clinton Foundation’s mission to mobilise innovative and effective solutions to some of the most urgent challenges facing the world. This year, the twenty judges included Anote Tong, former President of the Republic of Kiribati, and James Michel, former President of the Republic of the Seychelles, along with Peter Thompson, the United Nations Secretary General’s Special Envoy for the Ocean, and Maria Concepcion, Program Manager for Oxfam America.

Pacific Community’s Centre for Pacific Crops and Trees gene bank won the Innovative Island Research Award at this year’s global Island Innovation Awards in April. The award program was launched last year by former President Bill Clinton and is supported by his New York-based Clinton Global Initiative. Credit: Pacific Community

Karen Mapusua, Director of the Pacific Community’s Land Resources Division in Fiji, believes the accolade will also bring greater certainty to the future of its work. “I think one of the important benefits will be funding and the sustainability of operations for the gene bank. To move to an increasingly sustainable funding model, we need more investment. And increased awareness of what we can provide, so that people know what we hold in the Pacific, the material, and its availability, for the world to see as well,” she told IPS.

“The broadening of our partnership base and attracting of other partners who are willing to support our programs, research and distribution will help us to achieve full food security, added Waqainebele.

The gene bank’s services are global: it supplies tissue culture, seeds, and planting materials to countries in all regions. These include all 22 Pacific Island states, but also African nations, including Ghana, Nigeria and Burkina Faso, the Caribbean and, in the Asian region, the Philippines, India and Indonesia, among others.

This year, the Pacific Community opened two new facilities to support its international distribution. A molecular laboratory, which provides pathogen testing of genetic material to international standards, and a quarantine greenhouse, which will be a reception centre for new plant imports.

Pacific Community’s Centre for Pacific Crops and Trees gene bank supplies tissue culture, seeds, and planting materials to countries in all regions, including 22 Pacific Island states, several African nations, the Caribbean, and, in the Asian region, the Philippines, India, and Indonesia, among others. Credit: Pacific Community

“A key role of the gene bank is to provide material that is safe and clean. Our molecular laboratory screens gene material, so that it is safe to send to other countries without diseases,” Mapusua explained.

The importance of SPC’s work in genetic resources cannot be overestimated. There is no food without seeds. And, looking to the future, ‘crop improvement and the delivery of high-quality seeds and planting materials of selected varieties to growers is necessary for ensuring improved crop production and meeting growing environmental challenges,’ reports the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

The Cook Islands is one of the gene bank’s beneficiaries. It’s vital to the “long-term conservation of important genetic resources of the Cook Islands. There are more than 50 clones of taro, bananas or plantain and sweet potatoes from the Cook Islands at the Centre for Pacific Crops and Trees for long-term conservation and future breeding work to improve crop genetic resources in the Pacific and other parts of the world,” William Wigmore, Director of Crops Research at the Cook Islands’ Ministry of Agriculture, told IPS.

“We also receive [from the gene bank] new varieties with higher yielding potential and better adaptability, pest, and climate tolerance. These are important food crops for food security,” he added.

Technicians at the Pacific Community’s Centre for Pacific Crops and Trees gene bank bag and test samples. The centre is gaining world recognition for food innovation. Credit: Pacific Community

Now, as the Pacific Islands strive to overcome the economic and social impacts of the pandemic, the reliable provision of seeds for food growing is even more critical. Unemployment and inflation have risen, incomes plummeted, and food supply networks widely disrupted. A World Bank survey in Papua New Guinea in 2020 found that about 25 percent of people who were employed before the onset of the virus had lost their jobs, and 28 percent of households had reduced their food consumption. In the Solomon Islands, the survey revealed that 60 percent of households with children under 5 years had cut back on their intake of essential foods.

In response, many Pacific Island governments have placed a high priority on encouraging the growing of food staples by families. For instance, in Tuvalu, workshops were organised by the government to train youths in agriculture, such as taro planting, and Fiji’s Ministry of Agriculture launched a program to provide seedlings direct to households.

“It is critical to provide the planting materials for recovery. It’s very important for maintaining food security in the region,” Mapusua told IPS. “It was very difficult during the pandemic as we had to fly these planting materials to different countries, but we were still able to sustain the collection and deliver these materials to countries.”

But, even before COVID-19 emerged, island nations were confronting numerous threats to agricultural productivity, such as high exposure to extreme climate, natural disasters, pests and diseases and a trend toward greater consumption of imported processed foods. According to the latest findings of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Pacific Island nations are among the ‘most vulnerable and exposed to climate change impacts,’ which include more frequent and extreme tropical cyclones, heatwaves and droughts, increasing water and food insecurity and the loss of marine and terrestrial biodiversity.

To address all these challenges, the Pacific Community has a long-term vision and action plan which starts with investing in plant research and crop development for the century ahead. “Our role is conservation for the future, but also the development of new varieties. For the future, climate change, food security and nutrition are the biggest issues. So, we have a big focus on conserving our plant diversity to help us develop new varieties which have a high climate resilience,” Waqainabele emphasised.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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We are failing to take antimicrobial resistance seriously, perhaps because it is not glamorous and relatable. Credit: Bigstock.

By External Source
Sep 21 2022 (IPS)

Staphylococcus aureus is the source of a skin infection that can turn deadly if drug resistant. Estimates regarding the most common resistant variation, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), exceed 100,000 deaths globally in 2019.

But up until recently, we did not have a solid grasp on how much of a problem MRSA—or any other antimicrobial resistant pathogen—was in Africa. It turns out, after testing 187,000 samples from 14 countries for antibiotic resistance, our colleagues found that 40% of all Staph infections were MRSA.

Africa, like every other continent, has an AMR problem. But Africa stands out because we have not invested in the capacity and resources needed to determine the scope of the problem, or how to fix it. Take MRSA. We still don’t know what’s causing the bacteria to become resistant, nor do we know the full extent of the problem.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has repeatedly stated that AMR is a global health priority—and is in fact one of the leading public health threats of the 21st century. A recent study estimated that in 2019, nearly 1.3 million people died because of antimicrobial resistant bacterial infections, with Africa bearing the greatest burden of deaths

We are failing to take AMR seriously, perhaps because it is not glamorous and relatable. The technology that we currently use to identify resistant pathogens is not fancy or futuristic looking. Combatting AMR does not involve miracle drugs, expensive treatments, or fancy diagnostic tests. Instead, we have bacteria and other pathogens that are commonplace and have learned how to shrug off the good old medicines that used to work.

The global health and pharmaceutical industries do not seem to consider solving this problem to be very profitable. Compare that to the urgency of solving COVID-19, which has been embraced—and interventions such as diagnostics subsidized—by governments eager to end the pandemic. The COVID-19 response has been characterized by innovations popping up literally every other week.

Why can’t we mobilize resources and passion for AMR? Are resistant pathogens too boring? Is it too difficult to solve through innovations? Does this make prospects for quick wins and fast return on investment too elusive for AMR, especially when compared to COVID-19 or other infectious disease outbreaks?

The World Health Organization (WHO) has repeatedly stated that AMR is a global health priority—and is in fact one of the leading public health threats of the 21st century. A recent study estimated that in 2019, nearly 1.3 million people died because of antimicrobial resistant bacterial infections, with Africa bearing the greatest burden of deaths. A high prevalence of AMR has also been identified in foodborne pathogens isolated from animals and animal products in Africa.

Collectively, these numbers suggest that the burden of AMR might be on the level of—or greater than—that of HIV/AIDS or COVID-19. The growing threat of AMR is likely to take a heavy toll on Africa’s health systems and poses a major threat to progress made in attaining public health goals set by individual nations, the African Union and the United Nations. And the paucity of accurate AMR information limits our ability to understand how well commonly used antimicrobials actually work. This also means we cannot determine the drivers of AMR infections and design effective interventions in response.

We have just wrapped up a project that gathered data on many of the scariest pathogens in 14 countries, revealing stark insights on the under-detected and under-reported depth of the AMR crisis across Africa. Less than two percent of the medical laboratories in the 14 countries examined can conduct bacteriology testing, even with conventional methods that were developed more than 30 years ago.

While providing national stakeholders with critical information to advance their policies on AMR, we have also trained and provided basic electronic tools to more than 300 health professionals to continue this important surveillance. While a strengthened workforce is critical, many health facilities on the continent are coping with interrupted access to electricity, poor connectivity, and serious, ongoing workforce shortages.

Our work has painted the dire reality of the AMR surveillance situation, informing concrete recommendations for improvement that align with the new continental public health ambition of the African Union and Africa Center for Disease Control (CDC). The challenge is to find the funding to expand this initiative to cover the entire African continent.

AMR containment requires a long-term focus—especially in Africa, where health systems are chronically underfunded, while also being disproportionately challenged by infectious threats. More funding needs to be dedicated to the problem and this cannot only come from international aid.

We urge African governments to honour past commitments and allocate more domestic funding to their health systems in general, and to solving the crisis of AMR in particular. We also call upon bilateral funders and global stakeholders to focus their priorities on improving the health of African peoples. This might require more attention to locally relevant evidence to inform investments and less attention to profit-driven market interventions, as well as prioritizing the scale-up of technologies and strategies proven to work, whether or not they are innovations.

Containing AMR means we have to fix African health systems. The work starts now.

The authors of this opinion piece are Dr Pascale Ondoa and Dr Yewande Alimi – Dr Pascale Ondoa is the director of science and new initiatives of the African Society for Laboratory Medicine (ASLM) and Dr Yewande Alimi is the Africa Center for Disease Control (CDC) antimicrobial resistance programme coordinator.

Two refugees identified as Muhindo and his wife Harriet are among the new waves of people leaving the Democratic Republic of Congo following inter-communal clashes in South-West DRC. UN agencies have called for substantive action on refugees, especially regarding food security. Credit: UNHCR

By Juliet Morrison
UNITED NATIONS, Sep 21 2022 (IPS)

Representatives from UN agencies and several countries called for more substantive action to support refugees and internally displaced people amid the ongoing global food crisis.

Co-hosted by the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), the World Food Programme (WFP), and the Permanent Mission of Switzerland to the United Nations, a panel discussion held on September 14, 2022, also explored innovative solutions to combat the food shortage and increase the capacity of refugees. It came ahead of a UN Security Council meeting on the global food crisis and protection.

Food insecurity has become an enormous problem. In 2019, WFP estimated that 145 million people were facing acute food insecurity. Now the organization predicates 345 million people are facing insecurity. The combination of climate change shocks, COVID-19, and conflict has pushed several countries, such as Somalia, Afghanistan, Ethiopia, South Sudan, and Yemen, to a very real risk of famine.

Yoseph Kassaye, Deputy Permanent Representative of Ethiopia, and Raouf Mazou, UNHCR’s Assistant High Commissioner for Operations at the UN Headquarters in New York City. Credit: Juliet Morrison/IPS

Action on food insecurity today is “more important than ever”, Valerie Guarnieri, WFP Assistant Executive Director, said during the panel section.

Among those particularly vulnerable to the negative impacts of food insecurity are refugees and internally displaced people.

Raouf Mazou, UNHCR’s Assistant High Commissioner for Operations and moderator of the event, explained that the increased vulnerability of refugees is primarily to the nature of displacement and the loss of community safety networks that accompany it.

“When fleeing many refugees sell or are forced to leave behind their assets their journey to safety is often full of dangers. Family and community support systems breakdown. They usually lose their income and often find themselves with no option but to employ harmful strategies as coping mechanisms.”

Coping mechanisms refer to tactics a family or community employs to compensate for a loss in income. In response to COVID-19 lockdowns, UNHCR reported instances of transactional sex, early marriage, child recruitment, and trafficking in person across its operations.

For Mazou, these challenges point to a need to center protection in efforts to address food security by governments and NGOs.

Special attention must also be paid to the specific plights of women and girls, he argued. In searching for food, displaced women and girls are at an increased risk of sexual violence, intimate partner violence, and child and forced marriages.

In Somalian regions affected by drought, gender-based violence has gone up 200 percent since 2021, Mazaou noted. He pointed to several factors that may lead to violence when a community is facing food insecurity.

“Food insecurity increases the risk of violence, neglect and exploitation and abuse of children. Girls may drop out of school at a higher percentage rate than boys when families are unable to afford school fees for all their children. Household sent children in search of food work on pasture for livestock exposing them to increased risks.”

The food crisis is also affecting the ability of host countries to provide for refugees.

Ethiopia, the third largest refugee-hosting country in Africa, is on the brink of famine. The country is reckoning with the historic drought hitting the Horn of Africa region, which is severely threatening its food networks.

Yoseph Kassaye, Deputy Permanent Representative of Ethiopia to the UN, underscored the crisis and its strain on the nation’s ability to protect refugees.

The drought has wiped away important nutrition sources that refugees rely on, such as cattle and water wells. Kassaye explained that the lack of natural resources means refugees can only rely on humanitarian assistance.

Yet, this is also at risk. As a result of funding constraints, in June, the WFP had to reduce its rations for refugees in Ethiopia by 50 percent.

“It is indeed troubling to learn that the level of support by international humanitarian agencies is reported to have decreased due to the funding shortages. In our view, urgent measures are needed if we’re to respond to the people in need of assistance in a timely and effective manner,” Kassaye said.

Citing related statistics, Guarnieri emphasized the importance of more humanitarian aid. But, she also underscored initiatives that increased the capacity of refugee populations and host countries.

“We have to do everything as WFP and UNHCR, as an international community to meet these urgent food needs and these desperate protection needs, but we’re never going to be able to catch up with the situation unless we are also investing in building the resilience in supporting the livelihoods and strengthening the self-reliance of populations who have forcibly displaced population who are seeking refuge in other countries.”

She also stressed the power of collaboration across sectors. One example of this was the WFP-UNHCR’s Joint Hub, a collaboration between agencies and governments to support refugees through innovative solutions and policies.

Established in 2020, the hub has worked on several projects. One with the Government of Mauritania resulted in Malian refugees being included in its national social protection plan—making refugees eligible for cash transfer funds for vulnerable households.

Dorte Verner, the lead agricultural economist in the Agricultural and Food Global Practice with the World Bank, brought up another innovative solution to boost food production: insect farming.

According to Verner, insect farming has enormous potential for tackling food insecurity in vulnerable communities as it requires no arable land and very little water and will not lead to any biodiversity loss. These characteristics mean it can even be practiced in refugee camps, Verner stated.

“Insert farming can provide displaced people with the skills that they need to produce where they are, and they can take these skills to human capital with them to where they go afterward. [It] can contribute to alleviating the world’s food and nutrition insecurity for forcibly displaced people and the host community.”

Closing the meeting, participants coalesced around the need to leverage the commitments being made to meaningfully tackle food insecurity.

Several participants also noted the opportunity to continue the conversation at the Security Council meeting to be held later that afternoon, where more concrete action on food insecurity could be examined.

A representative from Ireland stated that overall action from the Security Council was needed to meaningfully tackle the issue at its core.

“If we don’t look at what’s driving these prices in the first place, what’s driving this insecurity in the first place? Then, you know, we’re going to be chasing our tails all the time because the problems are getting worse.”

He called for the Security Council to address the matter further.

“[The humanitarian] part of the UN system is playing its part, but the UN Security Council needs to play its part as well. That means responding early when we see the signs of crises coming, but it also means responding, particularly to protect civilians, and crises and meeting to make sure that things are put at the center of our response.”

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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By Stefan Löfven
STOCKHOLM, Sep 21 2022 (IPS)

As world leaders gather in New York for the opening of the 77th session of the United Nations General Assembly this week, the security horizon is undoubtedly dark.

From the geopolitical shockwaves of the war in Ukraine, to military spending, nutrition and food security, to our stewardship of the planet, far too many key indicators are heading in a dangerous direction.

We can, and must, turn them around. In the words of UN Secretary-General António Guterres in his 2021 report Our Common Agenda, ‘the choices we make, or fail to make, today could result in further breakdown, or a breakthrough to a greener, better, safer future’.

Making the right choices requires political will and leadership, based on the best available knowledge. That last aspect is SIPRI’s stock in trade.

A ‘watershed moment’

The theme for the 77th General Assembly session is ‘A watershed moment: transformative solutions to interlocking challenges’.

Evidence of these interlocking challenges is everywhere: the floods in Pakistan, war and insecurity afflicting every region of the world, the erosion of arms control and stagnation in disarmament, rising hunger, the economic and political turmoil that has followed the Covid-19 pandemic, and the list goes on.

These interlocking challenges share some common features. Their consequences, and often their drivers, do not respect borders or alliances. They are characterized by uncertainty and volatility. They tend to cut across traditional policy domains.

This has a clear implication: the only realistic path towards a ‘greener, better, safer future’ on this planet lies through cooperation. Countries, societies and sectors must work together to meet global challenges, put aside tensions and political polarization, and restore their faith in institutions and the rules-based international order.

Earlier this year, Secretary-General Guterres invited me to become co-Chair of his High-Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism, alongside Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and former president of Liberia.

The Advisory Board’s task is to come up with concrete suggestions for how to improve cooperation at the multilateral level, how we can ensure it is fit to meet the challenges of an unpredictable future and the urgently needed transition to more sustainable, peaceful societies. To accomplish this mission, we will rely heavily on science and expertise.

Addressing the crisis of the biosphere

SIPRI’s Environment of Peace report explores the most dangerous sets of interlocking challenges we face: the complex and unpredictable ways that climate change and other environmental crises are intertwining with more human-centred aspects of security.

Besides providing policy insights, the Environment of Peace report documents the indirect pathways linking climate change impacts and insecurity, and the interactions between climate, conflict and food security, thus continuing SIPRI’s contributions to working out how UN peace operations must adapt to climate change.

The biosphere crisis can only be successfully addressed through cooperation. Countries need to share green technologies and innovative solutions.

They need to agree on fair ways to share vital natural resources and settle disputes peacefully. There must be give and take; action in one society to mitigate impacts on another.

Countries also need to agree on fair ways to distribute the burdens, costs and benefits of a green transition. From South Asia to sub-Saharan Africa to Indigenous communities around the world, those most vulnerable to the impacts of the crisis of the biosphere are often those least responsible for causing it—something illustrated starkly most recently by the devastating floods in Pakistan.

There is a clear moral case for wealthier, industrialized countries to meet their climate finance commitments and to compensate the most affected countries for loss and damage. But there is also a strong security case for doing so. Localized insecurity can quickly spread.

From national security to common security

A logical response to such threats to their shared interests would be for countries to put differences aside and pull together. Instead, they have, by and large, followed a path of division and militarization.

Even before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine this year, that was clear. SIPRI data shows large increases in global military expenditure in the last two years, as well as in arms imports to Europe, East Asia and Oceania.
All of the nuclear-armed states are modernizing or expanding their arsenals.

At the same time, we are also seeing rapid and radical developments in weapon systems, technologies and even ways of executing a conflict.
A new, expensive and risky arms race is well under way. There is an urgent need to breathe new life into nuclear disarmament, non-proliferation and arms control.

Disappointingly, the recent 10th Review Conference of the 1968 Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) ended without agreement on the way forward. However, there were signs of hope.

The conference produced much to build on in the next five-year review cycle. Notably, all of the five NPT-recognized nuclear weapon states (China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States) agree on the necessity of measures to reduce strategic risks.

These will be important steps. However, what is needed most of all is a shift away from the pursuit of security through military capability to investing in peace and common security. Once again, cooperation will be key.

How evidence underpins cooperation

Successful cooperation needs to be underpinned by reliable, non-partisan information and analysis. As Secretary-General Guterres declares in Our Common Agenda: ‘Now is the time to end the “infodemic” plaguing our world by defending a common, empirically backed consensus around facts, science and knowledge.’

The Secretary-General correctly characterizes ‘facts, science and knowledge’ as a public good that it is in everyone’s interest to protect. They provide valuable common ground for discussion—even when trust between the parties is lacking.

They inform effective solutions. They make it possible to verify that others are following rules and living up to commitments. They give early warning of emerging challenges and imminent dangers.

The Environment of Peace report highlights the fact that risks and uncertainty lie not just in the external challenges we face, but also in the actions taken to address them in the transition towards sustainability.

This transition needs to happen at unprecedented scale and speed, using novel solutions in an environment of uncertainty. There will inevitably be setbacks, unintended, unanticipated consequences of well-intentioned policies.

There will also be resistance, parties who need convincing that the costs justify the benefits.
To keep the transition just and peaceful will demand communication, cooperation, trust and agility to deal with unexpected risks and change course quickly to avert them.

For this, we will need to produce and disseminate even more reliable and verified information. SIPRI will continue to be a resource in this regard.

Opportunities for change

The UN General Assembly has a highly ambitious agenda for transformative change. The landmark Summit of the Future, scheduled for September 2024, has been billed as ‘the moment to agree on concrete solutions to challenges that have emerged or grown since 2015’.

The COP27—the 27th Conference of the Parties to the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change—coming in November, and the much-postponed 15th Conference of the Parties of the 1992 Convention on Biological Diversity in December are other important opportunities to reduce future security risks at the multilateral level.

However important intergovernmental forums like this are, the task of tackling our interconnected challenges is continuous and society-wide. Solutions need to come at the multilateral, national and subnational levels.

And they need to engage a broad range of stakeholders, from youth to Indigenous Peoples to the private sector. Reliable information and expertise must be available to guide all of this.

I am both proud and daunted to be picking up the mantle of Chair of the SIPRI Governing Board as we confront these difficult challenges ahead.

SIPRI’s core mission as a source of freely available, reliable evidence, fair-minded analysis and balanced assessment of options, as a convenor of dialogues, and as a provider of support to the formulation and implementation of international agreements and instruments remains as important as ever.

Stefan Löfven (Sweden) is Chair of the Governing Board of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).

IPS UN Bureau

 

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One of the voting centers of the popular consultation held on Sunday, Sept. 18 in Asunción Mita, a town of 50,000 people in eastern Guatemala. The majority of the people who voted said no to the Cerro Blanco mine, due to its environmental impacts. CREDIt: Edgardo Ayala/IPS

By Edgardo Ayala
ASUNCIÓN MITA, Guatemala , Sep 21 2022 (IPS)

The majority of the Guatemalan population continues to oppose mining and other extractive projects, in the midst of a scenario of socio-environmental conflict that pits communities defending their natural resources against the interests of multinational corporations.

The most recent rejection of mining projects in this Central American country took place on Sunday Sept. 18 in the town of Asunción Mita, 350 kilometers southeast of the capital of Guatemala, in the department of Jutiapa.

The “No” vote wins

Here, through a citizen consultation, 88 percent of the more than 8,503 people who voted said “no” to the operations of the Cerro Blanco gold mine, owned by Elevar Resources, a subsidiary of Canada’s Bluestone Resources.

“In my view we can’t allow this to go ahead, we are getting older, but we don’t want the children and young people to suffer from the environmental impact of the mine,” said Petronila Hernández, 55, after voting at a school on the outskirts of Asunción Mita.

Hernández added to IPS that “we don’t agree with the mine, it affects our water sources, we carry the water from the water source, and the mine contaminates it.”

Hernández was accompanied by her daughter, Marilexis Ramos, 21.

“Hopefully our ‘No’ vote will win,” said Ramos during the voting. At the end of the afternoon the counting of votes began, and by Monday Sept. 19 the results began to be clear.

Mother and daughter live in the Cerro Liso hamlet, on the outskirts of Asunción Mita, very close to the mine.

Marilexis Ramos (r), 21, voted on the continuity of the Cerro Blanco mining project, located near Asunción Mita, 350 kilometers southeast of the Guatemalan capital, in the department of Jutiapa. A full 88 percent of the more than 8,503 people who voted said “no” to the gold and silver mine. CREDIT: Edgardo Ayala/IPS

The Cerro Blanco underground mine was licensed to operate in 2007 for a period of 25 years, but since then it has not been able to extract gold and silver, due to unforeseen issues.

The project encountered thermal water veins in the subsoil that released heat that made it impossible to work for long enough inside the two tunnels built in the mine, activist Juan Carlos Estrada, of the Water and Sanitation Network of Guatemala, told IPS.

“The mine has been stranded for almost 15 years without extracting a single ounce of ore,” Estrada said.

However, the community struggle continues because, despite the setback it suffered in Sunday’s vote, the company still intends to operate the mine and to do so it aims to modify the original plan and turn it into an open pit mine.

People vs. transnational corporations

Guatemala, a nation of 17.4 million inhabitants, has experienced socio-environmental conflicts in recent decades as a result of the communities’ defense of their territories against the advance of mining and hydroelectric projects and other extractivist activities.

Many of the conflicts have taken place in the territories of indigenous peoples, who make up 60 percent of the total population. Members of affected communities have put up resistance and have faced crackdowns by police and soldiers.

This has earned them persecution and criminalization by the authorities.

Dalia González, of the Salvadoran movement Green Rebellion, on the banks of the Ostúa River in eastern Guatemala, talks about the impact that pollution from the Cerro Blanco mine will have on the river, which in turn will end up polluting the Lempa River in El Salvador. CREDIT: Edgardo Ayala/IPS

In February, IPS reported on the struggle of indigenous Maya Q’eqchi’ communities in the municipality of El Estor, on the outskirts of Lake Izabal, in the department of the same name in eastern Guatemala.

The only active mine in Guatemala operates there, as similar projects have been blocked by the communities through citizen consultations or by court rulings, after the communities requested injunctions complaining about the lack of such votes, which are required.

The nickel mine in El Estor has been operated since 2011 by the transnational Solway Investment Group, headquartered in Switzerland, after purchasing it from Canada’s HudBay Minerals.

“Almost 100 consultations have been held, in 100 municipalities around the country, and in all of them mining and hydroelectric projects, mainly, have been rejected,” said José Cruz, of the environmental collective Madreselva.

The high number of consultations expresses the level of struggle of the population and the companies’ interest in the country’s natural resources.

“The only mining project currently operating is El Estor,” Cruz told IPS. And it is still active thanks to a “mock” consultation, manipulated by the company, which apparently endorsed the mine.

The Oxec I and Oxec II hydroelectric projects have also been a source of socio-environmental conflict.

The first plant began operations in 2015 and the second has been under construction since two years later. Both are owned by the Energy Resources Capital Corporation, registered in Panama.

In 2015, local Q’eqchi indigenous communities launched a struggle against the two hydroelectric power plants on the Cahabón River, located in the municipality of Santa María de Cahabón, in the department of Alta Verapaz in northern Guatemala.

After suffering persecution for his active participation in defense of his people’s territories, Q’eqchi leader Bernardo Caal was imprisoned in January 2018 and sentenced the following November to seven years in prison by a court “without any evidence,” as denounced at the time by Amnesty International, which considered him a prisoner of conscience.

However, he was released in March 2022 for good behavior and because there was essentially no evidence against him.

An anti-mining banner hangs on the façade of the church in Asunción Mita, in eastern Guatemala. The company operating the Cerro Blanco mine called the consultation process held in the town on Sept. 18 illegal. CREDIT: Edgardo Ayala/IPS

Projects that pollute across borders

Although the victory of the “no” vote in Asunción Mita represents an achievement for local residents, the project still presents a pollution risk, not only for this town of 50,000 people, but also for neighboring El Salvador.

Asunción Mita is located near the border with El Salvador.

Environmental organizations in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador have warned that heavy metal pollution from the mine would end up impacting the Ostúa River on the Guatemalan side.

The waters of that river, in turn, would reach Lake Guija, on the Salvadoran side. And a segment of that lake is reached by the Lempa River, which provides water to more than one million people in San Salvador and neighboring municipalities.

The Lempa River is 422 kilometers long and its basin covers three countries: It originates in Guatemala, crosses a small portion of Honduras and then zigzags through El Salvador until flowing into the Pacific Ocean.

El Salvador passed a law in March 2017 prohibiting mining, underground or open pit, but the proximity to the Cerro Blanco mine makes it vulnerable to pollution.

“We are concerned, our main source of water is under threat,” Salvadoran activist Dalia González, of the Green Rebellion movement, told IPS.

González added that the governments of Guatemala and El Salvador have an important role to play in protecting natural resources and the health of the local population.

“Because the effects of the mines cross borders,” said the young activist on the banks of the Ostúa River, where she had arrived along with Salvadoran environmentalists and journalists after witnessing the consultation process.

González called on Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele to engage in a dialogue with his Guatemalan counterpart Alejandro Giammattei to find a solution to the problem of pollution that would also affect El Salvador.

“The situation is serious and requires urgent action,” said the Salvadoran activist.

After learning the results of the citizen consultation in Asunción Mita, the company behind the Cerro Blanco mine, Elevar Resources, called the process illegal, according to a press release made public on Monday Sept. 19.

The company’s managing director, Bob Gil, said, “this consultation process is clearly illegal and full of irregularities,” according to the statement.

In the company’s view, the process was flawed by what it called “anti-mining groups”.

“We are disappointed with the actions of these groups who use biased referendums to create doubt and uncertainty regarding responsible mining projects such as Cerro Blanco,” he added.

The consortium said the aim is to continue developing the project and to produce 2.6 million ounces of gold during the life of the mine.

Due to the problems it has had with the tunnels and the heat that prevents it from working and extracting the minerals, in November 2021 the company submitted a request to the authorities to transform the current underground mine into an open-pit mine.

The company “spoke of updating the Environmental Impact Study, but what was needed was a new study, because it was a completely different project,” said Madreselva’s Cruz.

Related Articles

• Struggle in Guatemala Offers Hope for Latin America’s Indigenous People
• Mining Grabs Up Land, Deals Blow to Agriculture in Central America

Mary Maker chairing a session on “Education in Crisis Situations – A Partnership for Transformative Actions for Learners” on the final day of the Transforming Education Summit. Credit: UN

By Naureen Hossain
United Nations, Sep 20 2022 (IPS)

Refugee youth advocate, Mary Maker, called on UN member states to honor their commitments to transform education from the foundation up to the top, starting with those living in the direst and fraught circumstances.

Maker, a South Sudanese refugee who fled her country and found hope while attending a school in Kukuma Refugee Camp in Kenya, chaired a session called “Education in Crisis Situations – A Partnership for Transformative Actions for Learners” on the final day of the Transforming Education Summit (TES).

The session focused on education and learning in crises and the forced displacement that often results from these situations.

“I am really excited about this session because this is my story. This is the story of so many other refugees,” Maker, who also supports the UNHCR, said. “And as we’ve conversed over the last few days, I hope that this Call to Action becomes actually something we can implement after this session.”

She spoke on the significance of the session, “given the increased displacement around the world, and the added need for collective effort to transform the provision and financing of quality education.”

Member states affirmed their commitment to transforming education on the third and final day of the Transforming Education Summit. The TES Leaders Day, September 19, was dedicated to the Heads of State and Government to present their National State of Commitment to the summit’s goals in Leader Roundtables. Concurrently, thematic sessions were hosted with the intent of cross-cutting priorities for transforming education and reaffirming commitments and plans for action from multiple stakeholders, including world governments, UN partners, and civil society organizations.

The session launched “Education in Crisis: A Call to Action,” a commitment to transform education systems so that they can prevent, prepare for, respond to, and recover from crises and so that all crisis-affected children have access to continuous, inclusive, and safe learning opportunities. The Call to Action asks countries, multilateral organizations, civil society groups, and education partners to work toward the agreement by improving education access and learning outcomes in equality and inclusivity; protecting and improving external financing; working together to build resilient education systems in the spirit of international cooperation; to scale and mainstream high-impact and evidence-based interventions into policy and programme efforts.

“This Commitment to Action is the result of extensive consultations with over 45 crisis-affected countries from five continents, more than 100 civil society organizations, as well as other stakeholders, including youth,” Estefania Giannini, Assistant Director-General UNESCO, said.

UN agencies, represented by its leaders, emphasized the urgency of education in crisis.

Filippo Grandi, High-Commissioner of UNHCR, spoke on the impact of compounding crises, such as climate change, famine, and armed conflict.

“Across all these underlying aspects of crises, forces of crises, you have forced displacement,” he said. “People flee or are obliged to flee their homes because there is fighting. They’re obliged to flee their homes because there is hunger, and they are now increasingly obliged to flee their homes because of climate change. More importantly, all these factors are interlinked.”

He added, “And all these faces of crisis are multipliers for vulnerability…These challenges, or crises as we should see them, challenge education.”

Due to ongoing crises, climate-induced disasters, and forced displacement, 222 million children and youth have experienced disruptions to their education, affecting their learning access or continuity.

Yasmine Sherif, Executive Director of Education Cannot Wait, is concerned that the world now has the highest number of displaced people since World War II. Credit: UN

“We have reached a historical – a sad historical – number of forcibly displaced peoples, the highest number of peoples since World War II,” said Yasmine Sherif, Executive Director of Education Cannot Wait (ECW), during a panel discussion.

“Despite the enormity of this challenge, we have to reach every one of these, and we have to make sure they have foundational learning,” said Catherine Russell, Executive Director of UNICEF.

Appealing directly to Heads of State and Government, Russell asked them to prioritize education, especially its access during times of crisis. “We need your help to deliver domestic and humanitarian funds to education. We need you to help prevent or stop attacks on education. We need your commitment to build resilient education systems so that they can withstand the future shocks that we know for sure are coming. And we need your commitment to safeguard education for the most vulnerable children.”

Member states represented in the session, including Qatar, Ecuador, South Sudan, Pakistan, Norway, Switzerland, the European Commission, and the State of Palestine, affirmed their support of the Commitment to Action, and shared their states’ implementations toward improving access to education.

“We know that education systems must be resilient enough to prevent, prepare, repel, and recover from armed conflict. Our Call to Action will hopefully do that,” said Virginia Gamba, Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, as she closed the spotlight session.

“The alignment between national priorities and international commitments is critical to making education systems more resilient and can ensure the protection of children and their rights, including the Convention on the Rights of the Child.”

This spirit of international cooperation across multiple stakeholders will indeed be critical to transforming education on a fundamental level. In the global conversation, this will be revisited with the ECW High-Level Financing Conference, slated for 16 and 17 February 2023. The conference will take place in Geneva, with co-conveners South Sudan, Niger, Germany, and Norway.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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Between 2010 and 2020 the number of state-based armed conflicts roughly doubled (to 56), as did the number of conflict deaths, finds new report. Credit: James Jeffrey/IPS

By Baher Kamal
MADRID, Sep 20 2022 (IPS)

Day after day, the world’s scientific community, based on solid investigations, elaborates dozens of studies identifying the causes of the existing emergencies facing humanity. They also prepare understandable summaries and conclusions and propose feasible solutions to the current crises and ways to prevent major future risks.

Such studies are promptly submitted to politicians, both directly and through hundreds of summits, conferences, forums and meetings.

Are they just unable to read and understand these texts?

In combination, the security and environmental crises are creating compound, cascading, emergent, systemic and existential risks. Without profound changes in approach by institutions of authority, risks will inevitably proliferate quickly

If so, they should probably be added to the shameful finding that up to 70% of children –or nearly 250 million– are illiterate, sentenced to ignorance as revealed by numerous findings, including those of the Education Cannot Wait (ECW), the UN global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises.

 

Unpredictable risks

Meanwhile, the world is “stumbling into a new era of unpredictable risks,” while the ongoing multiple and deepening crises have “pushed 9 out of 10 countries backwards in human development.”

Both facts unveil the failure of the world’s politicians to act for people rather than announcing decisions that end up benefiting big private businesses.

Two major reports have revealed such a stark failure. One of them was released on 8 September 2022 by UNDP–the UN Development Programme’s Human Development Report: “Uncertain Times, Unsettled Lives: Shaping our Future in a Transforming World.”

The other one “Environment of Peace: Security in a New Era of Risk” was published on 23 May this very year by the prestigious Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).

 

Failure

“World leaders are failing to prepare for a new era of complex and often unpredictable risks to peace as profound environmental and security crises converge and intensify,” highlights SIPRI, the independent international institute dedicated to research into conflict, armaments, arms control and disarmament.

Its report paints a vivid picture of the escalating security crisis. For example, it notes that between 2010 and 2020 the number of state-based armed conflicts roughly doubled (to 56), as did the number of conflict deaths.

“The number of refugees and other forcibly displaced people also doubled, to 82.4 million. In 2020 the number of operationally deployed nuclear warheads increased after years of reductions, and in 2021 military spending surpassed $2 trillion for the first time ever.”

Regarding the environmental crisis, SIPRI warns that around a quarter of all species are at risk of extinction, pollinating insects are in rapid decline and soil quality is falling, while exploitation of natural resources such as forests and fish continues at unsustainable levels.

“Climate change is making extreme weather events such as storms and heatwaves more common and more intense, reducing the yield of major food crops and increasing the risk of large-scale harvest failures.”

 

Uncertain times, unsettled lives

For its part, the Human Development Report warns that the world is lurching from crisis to crisis, trapped in a cycle of firefighting and unable to tackle the roots of the troubles that confront the world.

The report argues that “layers of uncertainty are stacking up and interacting to unsettle life in unprecedented ways.”

 

Devastating impacts

The last two years have had a devastating impact for billions of people around the world, when crises like COVID-19 and the war in Ukraine hit back-to-back, and interacted with sweeping social and economic shifts, dangerous planetary changes, and massive increases in polarisation, says UNDP.

“Without a sharp change of course, we may be heading towards even more deprivations and injustices.”

For the first time in the 32 years that UNDP has been calculating it, the Human Development Index, which measures a nation’s health, education, and standard of living, has declined globally for two years in a row.

 

Universal reversal of human development

“The reversal is nearly universal as over 90 percent of countries registered a decline in their Human Development Index score in either 2020 or 2021 and more than 40 percent declined in both years, signalling that the crisis is still deepening for many.”

While some countries are beginning to get back on their feet,it adds, “recovery is uneven and partial, further widening inequalities in human development.” Latin America, the Caribbean, Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia have been hit particularly hard.

 

Scrambling

“The world is scrambling to respond to back-to-back crises. We have seen with the cost of living and energy crises that, while it is tempting to focus on quick fixes like subsidising fossil fuels, immediate relief tactics are delaying the long-term systemic changes we must make,” says Achim Steiner, UNDP Administrator.

“We are collectively paralyzed in making these changes. In a world defined by uncertainty, we need a renewed sense of global solidarity to tackle our interconnected, common challenges.”

The report explores why the change needed isn’t happening and suggests there are many reasons, including how insecurity and polarisation are feeding off each other today to prevent the solidarity and collective action to tackle crisis at all levels.

 

Insecurity and political extremism

New calculations show, for instance, that those feeling most insecure are also more likely to hold extreme political views, it also reveals.

“Even before COVID-19 hit, we were seeing the twin paradoxes of progress with insecurity and polarisation. Today, with one-third of people worldwide feeling stressed and fewer than a third of people worldwide trusting others, we face major roadblocks to adopting policies that work for people and the planet,” says Achim Steiner.

To chart a new course, the report recommends implementing policies that focus on investment — from renewable energy to preparedness for pandemics, and insurance—including social protection— to prepare our societies for the ups and downs of an uncertain world.

 

Climate and armed conflicts

The environmental crisis is increasing risks to security and peace worldwide, notably in countries that are already fragile, explains SIPRI’s Environment of Peace – Security in a new era of risk.

Indicators of insecurity such as the number of conflicts, the number of hungry people and military expenditure are rising; so are indicators of environmental decline, climate change, biodiversity, pollution and other areas, warns SIPRI.

“In combination, the security and environmental crises are creating compound, cascading, emergent, systemic and existential risks. Without profound changes in approach by institutions of authority, risks will inevitably proliferate quickly.”

Evidence shows that politicians are capable of reading and understanding those texts elaborated by economic, financial and markets experts.

Meanwhile, and despite the above and other readable – and understandable texts, they seemingly continue to neglect an essential fact, i.e., ‘By Deliberately Ignoring Risk, the World Is Bankrolling Its Own Destruction’.

 

By Anisa Ismail and Tan Yen Lian
BANGKOK / PENANG, Sep 20 2022 (IPS)

Economic recovery since the COVID-19 pandemic has been uneven amidst a cautious loosening of restrictions. But even at the height of the pandemic, it was business as usual for the tobacco industry.

Tobacco companies remain profitable, making US$ 912.3 billion in 2022 and capitalizing on the situation by promoting and selling their lethal products while convincing governments that their industry should not be penalised during the pandemic, claiming tobacco is a good investment.

This is an industry that perpetuates an annual loss of US$ 1.4 trillion in global health costs and lost productivity, amounting to 1.8% of the world’s GDP. 14% of all deaths globally (over 8 million deaths annually) are due to non-communicable diseases (NCDs) directly caused by tobacco consumption and exposure to secondhand smoke.

Yet, total healthcare spending is not prioritized enough and remains scarce in many low- and middle-income countries, leaving precious little funds for health promotion programs to counter the devious marketing tactics of the tobacco industry. In low-income countries, health expenditures as a share of government spending fell to 6.8% in 2016 from 7.9% in 2000.

Low- and middle-income countries must increase their health expenditures to achieve the SDGs. Credit: SEATCA

In addition to its destructive impact on our bodies, tobacco is also horrible for the environment. With about 1.3 billion smokers consuming an estimated 6.25 trillion cigarettes worldwide each year, tobacco smoke releases significant amounts of cancer-causing substances, poisons, and pollutants into the air.

In fact, tobacco causes significant damage throughout its cycle – from cultivation, manufacture, and distribution, to consumption and post-consumption. Cigarettes are reportedly the most pervasive single-use plastic product on Earth, costing about US$ 20 billion per year in ecosystem losses from the plastic waste that enters our oceans.

COVID-19 has been an unshakable constant in our lives for more than two years now, and it is far from over. But we cannot forget that tobacco is a pandemic too.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), investing in tobacco control offers the best returns on investment for protecting public health. The Secretariat of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) has worked with governments, the UN Development Program, and WHO to develop country-tailored investment cases that quantify the economic benefits of implementing tobacco control policy measures.

And on the flipside are the costs of inaction. Aggregated across 25 countries, these investment cases show that urgent action will potentially save 1.4 million lives and US$ 74 billion.

Tobacco control is not only essential for achieving Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Target 3.4, a one-third reduction in premature mortality from NCDs by 2030, it is also important for the achievement of all the SDGs.

182 countries are Parties to the international tobacco control treaty – the WHO FCTC – and are legally bound to allocate national funds and identify bilateral/multilateral funding sources to support the implementation of treaty measures.

However, governments are only allocating an average of US$ 15 million in annual domestic funding per country for tobacco control, only half of what is required, and mostly in high-income countries. A WHO FCTC Investment Fund was authorized in 2021 to raise additional funds to support treaty implementation as well, but finances remain tight.

Establishing a tax-based health promotion funding mechanism is an innovative way to generate sustainable and transparent financing for health and development. But it is not entirely new.

Health taxes on tobacco, alcohol, and sugar-sweetened beverages are the most cost-effective measure for reducing NCDs. These taxes reduce consumption of these products and their related healthcare costs and are a reliable domestic funding stream for health spending.

In 2021, at least 39 countries reported earmarking a percentage of tobacco taxes to be used specifically for various health promotion programs, in effect making the polluter pay for its pollution instead of cutting into existing government budgets.

Pre-emptively, dedicating tax revenues for health promotion programs can garner public support for regular tax increases. Such taxes can steadily and consistently diminish the investment gap as well as inequitable access to health promotion and disease prevention services.

In Thailand, approximately US$ 150 million in annual revenue from a 2% surcharge on tobacco and alcohol excise taxes is dedicated for the implementation of multiple health promotion plans including tobacco control, alcohol and substance abuse control, road safety, and in recent years, COVID-19 prevention.

This funding is managed by the Thai Health Promotion Foundation, an autonomous government agency formed by the passage of the 2001 Health Promotion Foundation Act.

The ThaiHealth model earmarks revenue collected from alcohol and tobacco tax surcharges for health promotion programs. Credit: SEATCA

Vietnam’s Tobacco Control Law in 2012 established the semi-autonomous Vietnam Tobacco Control Fund (VNTCF) within the Ministry of Health. VNTCF also derives its funding through a 2% compulsory contribution from excise tax levied on tobacco product manufacturers and importers.

These examples show that health promotion funding mechanisms can thrive despite a pandemic. Legislative measures are critical to establish the legitimacy of these funding mechanisms, provide transparency and accountability measures for the proper management of funds, and protect against interference from harmful businesses with vested interests.

Tobacco control makes sense from a health, economic, sustainable development, and environmental perspective. When governments are strapped for cash, dedicated health taxes are an innovative way of ensuring adequate financing for public health.

More info at: https://hpfhub.info/
#ActOnNCDs

Anisa Ismail is the Sustainability Manager & Tan Yen Lian the Knowledge and Information Manager of the Southeast Asia Tobacco Control Alliance (SEATCA).

About SEATCA

SEATCA is a multi-sectoral non-governmental alliance promoting health and saving lives by assisting ASEAN countries to accelerate and effectively implement the tobacco control measures contained in the WHO FCTC. Acknowledged by governments, academic institutions, and civil society for its advancement of tobacco control in Southeast Asia, the WHO bestowed on SEATCA the World No Tobacco Day Award in 2004 and the WHO Director-General’s Special Recognition Award in 2014.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Young climate activists from civil society organizations take part in demonstrations at the COP26 Climate Conference in Glasgow, Scotland, December 2021. Credit: UN News/Laura Quiñones

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Sep 20 2022 (IPS)

When world leaders, numbering over 150, make their annual political pilgrimage to address the General Assembly in the third week of September, the security at the world body is exceptionally tight.

And this year is no exception.

After two years of on-again and off-again lockdowns due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the UN Secretariat is back in full swing – but in a virtual high security war zone.

The weeklong high-level meeting is scheduled to take place September 20-26, but civil society organizations (CSOs) have been barred from the UN premises September 16 through 30.

Mandeep S. Tiwana, Chief Programmes Officer at CIVICUS, the global civil society alliance, told IPS the note (http://csonet.org/?menu=86) issued by the NGO branch of UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA) states that “as per standing practice”, access to the UN premises is restricted.

From 16-30 September, says the circular, UN headquarters will be accessible only to UN staff and member delegations.

“Suspension of the annual and temporary grounds passes of NGOs in consultative status with the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) during the UNGA session is not just perplexingly discriminatory but also counter-intuitive as it deprives the international community of the benefits of civil society engagement in times of immense mayhem, disruption and contestation globally,” said Tiwana.

It’s a lost opportunity for the UN and state diplomatic delegations to interact freely with civil society representatives who bring with them a wealth of expertise, on the ground experience and deep commitment to resolving global challenges in line with UN Charter principles, he argued.

“This cavalier attitude of the UN establishment once again highlights the critical need for civil society to have a champion within the system in the form of a UN Civil Society Envoy,” he noted.

Appointment of such an envoy, he pointed out, can help unblock bottlenecks that inhibit civil society engagement at the UN, promote best practices on people’s and civil society participation across the UN and also drive the UN’s outreach to civil society at the regional level.

During an event marking the 75th anniversary of the UN Charter in 2020, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said civil society groups were a vital voice at the San Francisco Conference (where the UN was inaugurated).

“You have been with us across the decades, in refugee camps, in conference rooms, and in mobilizing communities in streets and town squares across the world.”

“You are with us today as we face the COVID-19 pandemic. You are our allies in upholding human rights and battling racism. You are indispensable partners in forging peace, pushing for climate action, advancing gender equality, delivering life-saving humanitarian aid and controlling the spread of deadly weapons”.

“And the world’s framework for shared progress, the Sustainable Development Goals, is unthinkable without you”, he declared.

Still, all CSOs have been barred from the UN building during one of the most politically crucial General Assembly sessions.

Louis Charbonneau, UN Director of Human Rights Watch said: “As you know, the UN Secretariat has an unhelpful policy of barring civil society organizations (CSOs) from UN headquarters during high-level week, so we won’t be in the building. But we will be around to answer questions or do interviews, when possible, outside of UNHQ.”

“We’re also asking member states and the UN secretariat to end the senseless exclusion of civil society during one of the most important weeks on the UN calendar,” said Charbonneau.

In a subsequent email interview, he told IPS: “We have complained publicly about the terms of the UN General Assembly period ban on NGOs in the past, because it is arbitrary and sometimes extends past high-level week, which makes no sense”.

“We are now calling on the UN to end the UNGA period ban altogether.”

He said: “Our experience with the outrageous ban on civil society on the pretext of Covid when everyone else – including tourists – was allowed back in the building made us realize there’s an urgent need for civil society to push back against attempts to marginalize NGOs at the UN.”

“The way Covid was used to keep civil society out of the UN when diplomats, UN officials and journalists were allowed back in confirmed our belief that it is high time for us to push to end the UNGA high-level ban and other senseless restrictions.”

He pointed out that the Secretary-General’s “Common Agenda” is full of language about the importance of civil society.

“Now it’s time the UN made their actions reflect the rhetoric, declared Charbonneau.

Jens Martens, Director, Global Policy Forum Europe, told IPS the behavior of the UN and Member States towards NGOs has often been hypocritical.

“On the one hand, they praise NGOs and declare that engaging civil society in the work of the UN is a top priority. On the other hand, they restrict or even prevent access for NGOs, as just now during the high-level week of the UN General Assembly,” he said.

If Member States and the UN Secretariat are serious about their appreciation for NGOs, they should not treat them as potential security risks, said Martens.

“Instead, they should facilitate access and create better working conditions for NGOs at UN headquarters”.

The UN clampdown triggers the question: Are NGOs deemed security risks?

While visiting heads of state, heads of governments, foreign ministers, ambassadors and other diplomats are permitted to move around freely and avoid security checks, most UN staffers resident UN correspondents and visiting journalists are deemed security risks and their movements curtailed and subject to restrictions— while UN retirees are barred.

Incidentally, the only “terrorist attack” on the UN came from the outside, not from the inside.

When the politically-charismatic Ernesto Che Guevara, once second-in-command to Cuban leader Fidel Castro, was at the United Nations to address the General Assembly sessions back in 1964, the U.N. headquarters came under attack – literally. The speech by the Argentine-born Marxist revolutionary was momentarily drowned by the sound of an explosion.

The anti-Castro forces in the United States, backed by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), had mounted an insidious campaign to stop Che Guevara from speaking.

A 3.5-inch bazooka was fired at the 39-storeyed Secretariat building by the East River while a vociferous CIA-inspired anti-Castro, anti-Che Guevara demonstration was taking place outside the U.N. building on New York’s First Avenue and 42nd street.

But the rocket launcher – which was apparently not as sophisticated as today’s shoulder-fired missiles and rocket-propelled grenades – missed its target, rattled windows, and fell into the river about 200 yards from the UN building.

One newspaper report described it as “one of the wildest episodes since the United Nations moved into its East River headquarters in 1952.”

As longtime U.N. staffers would recall, the failed 1964 bombing of the U.N. building took place when Che Guevara launched a blistering attack on U.S. foreign policy and denounced a proposed de-nuclearization pact for the Western hemisphere. It was one of the first known politically motivated terrorist attacks on the United Nations.

After his Assembly speech, Che Guevara was asked about the attack aimed at him. “The explosion has given the whole thing more flavor,” he joked, as he chomped on his Cuban cigar.

When he was told by a reporter that the New York City police had nabbed a woman, described as an anti-Castro Cuban exile, who had pulled out a hunting knife and jumped over the UN wall, intending to kill him, Che Guevara said: “It is better to be killed by a woman with a knife than by a man with a gun.”

As a longstanding former UN staffer, long retired, remarked jokingly last week: “This must be the first known instance of gender empowerment at the UN.”

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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By Anis Chowdhury and Jomo Kwame Sundaram
SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, Sep 20 2022 (IPS)

Policymakers have become obsessed with achieving low inflation. Many central banks adopt inflation targeting (IT) monetary policy (MP) frameworks in various ways. Some have mandates to keep inflation at 2% over the medium term. Many believe this ensures sustained long-term prosperity.

Anis Chowdhury

The now universal 2% inflation target “was plucked out of the air”. This was acknowledged by Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) Governor Don Brash who first adopted IT. The target was due to NZ Finance Minister Roger Douglas’ “chance remark” of achieving “genuine price stability, around 0, or 0 to 1 percent”.

IT discord
Heads of major central banks – such as the US Federal Reserve Bank (Fed), Bank of England (BoE) and German Bundesbank – committed to keep inflation at 2% soon after NZ. Although typically ‘medium-term’, IT’s high costs are portrayed as necessary, but brief. Worse, promised growth benefits have not materialized.

The Articles of Agreement of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) never endorsed any fixed inflation target. Article IV states, “each member shall: (i) endeavor to direct its economic and financial policies toward the objective of fostering orderly economic growth with reasonable price stability, with due regard to its circumstances”.

This makes clear much depends on conditions and circumstances. The sensible priority then would be to sustain prosperity with “reasonable price stability”, and not to commit to an arbitrary universal IT at any cost. Yet, many IMF officials promote the 2% target.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram

During the 2008-09 global financial crisis (GFC), the IMF Managing Director appealed for more imagination in designing monetary policy, appreciating “just how intricate the global economic and financial web had become”.

For him, “Monetary policy needs to look beyond its core focus on low and stable inflation” to promote balanced and equitable growth, while minimizing adverse spill-overs on developing economies.

An IMF chief economist even asserted low inflation and economic progress was a “divine coincidence”, and insisted a 2% inflation target was too low. After the GFC, an IMF working paper argued for a long-run inflation target of 4% for advanced countries.

A Bank of Canada working paper concluded, “the current state of economic research – both empirical and theoretical – provides little basis for believing in significant observable benefits of low inflation such as an increase in the growth rate of real GDP”.

IT benefits?
Any objective consideration of actual IT experiences would have led to its rejection long ago. IT is clearly inimical to growth and equity, let alone the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Four central bank (CB) experiences offer valuable lessons about IT’s likely consequences.

The US Fed is, by far, the most important CB globally, while the BoE has been historically important. The Bundesbank has been the most inflation averse in the post-war period, while the RBNZ was the world’s IT pioneer.

NZ’s inflation during 1961-90 averaged 9%, more than the US’s 5.1% and the UK’s 8%. Yet, the mighty Fed and the venerable BoE sought to emulate the miniscule RBNZ! Germany’s well-known inflation-phobia is attributed to its inter-war ‘hyperinflation’ and its bloody aftermath. Inflation there averaged 3.4% over 1960-90, i.e., even before IT.

None achieved sustained economic prosperity despite reaching inflation targets of 2% or less. Average per capita GDP growth declined sharply in the US, UK and Germany, while rising negligibly in NZ (Table 1).

Table 1. Pre- & post-IT average per capita growth & inflation (%)

Long-term declines in their growth rates followed declining investments (Table 2). IT advocates claim high inflation causes uncertainty, thus reducing investments, but lower inflation has clearly done worse.

Table 2. Pre- & post-IT investment/GDP (%)

As the investment rate declined with IT, so did productivity growth in the UK, Germany and NZ (Table 3). While productivity growth has risen negligibly with IT in the US, it has trended down in all four economies (Figures 1-4). US hourly output grew at only 1.4% after 2004, “half its pace in the three decades after World War II”.

Table 3. Pre- & post-IT productivity growth (%)


Figures 1-4. Declining productivity growth, 1990-2021

Most advanced economies have experienced productivity slowdowns since the 1970s. With the European Central Bank’s strict IT framework, the euro zone also saw marked slowdowns in productivity growth during 1999-2019.

Declining productivity growth often becomes the pretext for depressing real wages and working conditions, compelling workers to work more to compensate for lost earnings. Productivity and growth slowdowns are seen as “secular stagnation”.

All this has been blamed on inflation. But lowering inflation has not reversed this trend, which has actually accelerated since the GFC. Many explanations have been offered, but the reasons for this failure remain moot.

IT, low inflation, tax cuts and market reforms are supposed to improve economic performance. Weaker investment and economic growth, due to contractionary macroeconomic policies, slowed US productivity growth.

Similarly, The Economist observed, “Drooping demand crimped incentives to invest and innovate”. It ascribed declining UK productivity growth to cuts in innovation investments due to “austerity policies” and “severe reduction in credit”, inter alia.

Concluding “no doubt … the cost … was huge”, it estimated, “Britain’s GDP per person in 2019 would have been £6,700 ($8,380) higher than it turned out to be” had productivity growth not fallen further after the GFC.

There is growing acknowledgement that widespread “unconditional” CB commitment to 2% inflation targets – in the face of the current inflationary upsurge – is likely to worsen slowdowns. This is likely to compound debt crises in many developing countries.

The adverse socio-economic impacts of recessions are well documented. Policy-induced recessions – supposedly to curb inflation – will compound the effects of pandemic, war and sanctions.

Pragmatism, not dogma
Central bankers should not be dogmatic. Instead, pragmatic approaches are urgently needed to address the current inflationary surges. This is especially necessary when inflation worldwide is mainly due to supply shocks.

Western policymakers must consider the adverse spill-over impacts on developing countries, already on the brink of debt crises due to protracted slowdowns. Government debt – with more higher cost commercial borrowings – has been rising since the GFC, Western ‘quantitative easing’ and Covid-19.

Almost all central bankers know it is almost impossible to achieve 2% inflation in current circumstances. Yet, they insist not raising interest rates now will cause much economic damage later.

But such claims clearly have no theoretical or empirical bases. Hence, it is recklessly dogmatic to enforce a 2% target by falsely claiming inaction would be even more harmful.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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The Mexico City government is increasing the number of electric buses in its fleet, such as the trolleybuses pictured here on a street in the south of the capital. But their energy source is still fossil fuels and the deployment of electric cars remains slow in the country. CREDIT: Emilio Godoy/IPS

By Emilio Godoy
MEXICO CITY, Sep 19 2022 (IPS)

The Mexico City government began testing an elevated route for electric buses with great fanfare on Sept. 11, in a bid to promote more sustainable transport. The initiative is part of an incipient promotion of electromobility in the country, amidst pro-fossil fuel energy policies.

Mexico, a country of some 129 million people, lacks a national road transport strategy, considered vital for reducing polluting emissions and for the path to a low-carbon economy, which restricts the adoption of policies.

Experts consulted by IPS highlighted the limitations of the measures introduced regarding road transportation. “There is a lack of a coherent enabling framework and a national program to promote electric vehicles.” -- Gustavo Jiménez

“Electric mobility is still not very developed, both in terms of facilities for acquiring vehicles and infrastructure. We are not advancing as fast as other Latin American cities. There is a lack of cutting-edge projects,” Bernardo Baranda, director for Latin America of the non-governmental Institute for Transportation and Development Policy, based in Mexico City, told IPS.

Mexico City, home to more than 20 million people when its suburbs are included, seeks to promote electric public transport with the new route for an elevated track exclusively for buses. It is also pushing other initiatives, such as the conversion of buses from diesel to electric, announced in July.

Only two other major cities in the country, the western city of Guadalajara and the northern city of Monterrey, have electric public transportation buses.

In the Latin American region, capitals such as Bogota, Montevideo and Santiago de Chile have large electric public transport fleets and countries such as Chile, Costa Rica, Panama and Uruguay already have sectoral plans in the region.

The Mexican vehicle fleet exceeds 53 million units and has been constantly growing since 2000, according to figures from the National Institute of Geography and Statistics.

Sales of electric and hybrid cars are on the rise: in 2016, dealerships sold 254 electric units, compared to 1,703 in the first half of this year alone.

Self-charging hybrids that do not need to be plugged in (they use their gasoline engines to charge the batteries) have been the most popular, with the number purchased climbing from 7,490 in 2016 to 19,060 in the first half of 2022. Sales of plug-in vehicles grew from 521 to 2,263 in that same period.

Since 2018, the government’s Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) has held at least two tenders for the installation of so-called electrolineras, charging stations, in the country, where more than 2,000 points are already operating. But not all of them are working, as IPS found in a tour of several areas of the Mexican capital.

Be that as it may, the government’s plan to deploy this infrastructure has not sufficed to boost the purchase of electric vehicles.

An electric charging point in a neighborhood in south-central Mexico City. The state-owned Federal Electricity Commission has installed more than 2,000 electric vehicle charging centers in Mexico, but this and other measures have not encouraged their spread in the country. CREDIT: Emilio Godoy/IPS

Gustavo Jiménez, director of the consulting firm Grupo E-mobilitas, acknowledged “slow progress” in the deployment of public transportation, cab fleets and delivery companies, as well as vehicle assembly projects.

“For the last two years there have been no export and import tariffs for electric vehicles, which reduces the cost by 20 percent. There is also a reduction in value added tax. But progress has not been as fast as we would like. It is complicated to charge your vehicle as you drive around the country,” he told IPS.

The National Electric Mobility Strategy, which the government of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador froze when he took office in December 2018, created a comprehensive framework and incentive schemes for electric vehicles.

In addition, the current government, described as “pro-fossil fuels” by environmentalists critical of its defense of hydrocarbons, maintains record levels of gasoline subsidies, which will exceed 15 billion dollars in 2022, according to official estimates.“Electric mobility is still not very developed, both in terms of facilities for acquiring vehicles and infrastructure. We are not advancing as fast as other Latin American cities. There is a lack of cutting-edge projects." -- Bernardo Baranda

Latin America’s second-largest economy is the world’s 12th biggest oil producer and 17th biggest gas producer. In terms of proven crude oil reserves, it ranks 20th and 41st, according to data from the state-owned oil giant Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex), in an industry protected by López Obrador despite the country’s climate commitments.

Among the measures of the stalled Strategy were the installation of charging infrastructure in streets and homes, the introduction of green license plates and the exemption of import and export taxes for electric vehicles.

During the 2nd Annual Meeting of the U.S.-Mexico High Level Economic Dialogue, held in Mexico City on Sept. 12, the United States invited its neighbor and trading partner to participate in an integrated electric vehicle supply chain – an essential link in the economic-environmental program implemented by the U.S. government.

White smoke

The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) lists 10 electromobility projects in the region, one of which involves the manufacture and sale of electric three-wheeled vehicles in Mexico.

Mexico City, Guadalajara and Monterrey, together with three Colombian cities and five Brazilian cities, are also participating in the TUMI E-Bus Mission project, aimed at supporting 500 cities by 2025 in their transition to the deployment of 100,000 electric buses in total.

Funded by German economic cooperation and six international organizations, the project is part of the Transformative Urban Mobility Initiative (TUMI).

The decarbonization of transportation is fundamental to the fight against the global climate crisis. In Mexico, CO2 emissions from that segment totaled 148 million tons in 2019, equivalent to 20 percent of the total, according to the government’s National Institute of Ecology and Climate Change (Inecc).

Mexico and the United States are seeking to integrate the electric vehicle manufacturing value chain. In the image, Mexico’s foreign minister, Marcelo Ebrard, shows an electric unit manufactured in Mexico in February 2022. CREDIT: Secretariat of Foreign Affairs

Estimates by the Ministry of the Environment and Natural Resources put life-cycle emissions (from fuel extraction to combustion in the engine) at 358 grams of CO2 per kilometer for gasoline-burning vehicles, 166 for hybrid cars (using fuel and electricity) and 77 for solar energy users.

The study “Estimation of costs and benefits associated with the implementation of mitigation actions to meet the emission reduction targets assumed under the Paris Agreement”, presented on Sept. 13 by Inecc, indicates that six sectoral policies would contribute a mitigation of 36.5 million tons by 2030.

It also outlines 35 emission reduction actions with which the country would obtain total benefits of 295 billion dollars.

In the case of electromobility, the average cost of pollution abatement amounts to 500 dollars per ton, with an investment of nearly 5.9 billion dollars, gross benefits of 3.1 billion dollars and a reduction of 600,000 tons of CO2.

By replacing diesel buses with electric buses, the average cost would add up to 152.90 dollars per ton of CO2. The benefits of fuel savings would amount to 3.2 billion dollars.

By 2030, emissions cuts would contribute one million tons, but this potential would increase as domestic power generation incorporates more clean energy.

The CFE estimates that by 2041 some 700,000 electric vehicles will be in circulation in the country and will require 40,000 charging stations, which also means strengthening the domestic electric power grid.

Last November, during the Glasgow climate summit, Mexico adopted a voluntary goal to sell only non-polluting cars by 2035.

However, at the same time, the Mexican government has provided for the legalization of used cars coming from abroad in 2021, which experts see as a negative step in the fight against pollution.

Baranda the transportation expert said gasoline subsidies, the promotion of fossil fuels and the lack of energy transition are barriers to electromobility.

“You need public policies, at the federal and state level, such as incentives and infrastructure. Many countries are doing this. Mexico is not on the way to making good on international commitments. It’s a good opportunity to invest in electric transportation,” he said.

For his part, Jiménez questioned the current energy policy, which has an impact on sustainable mobility.

“There are no clear incentives for public transportation, significant subsidies are required. There is not so much infrastructure, there are no regulations for chargers, there are no measures for the circulation of electric cars. There is a lack of a coherent enabling framework and a national program to promote electric vehicles. Mexico has no coordination at the national level,” he complained.

The nonacceptance of the climate change crisis persists despite its increasingly visible worldwide consequences. Credit: Manipadma Jena/IPS

By Joseph Chamie
PORTLAND, USA, Sep 19 2022 (IPS)

Many people around the world, especially those among the political far-right, do not accept the climate change crisis. Over the years their thinking, behavior, and policies dismissing climate change have largely continued and impaired global efforts to address global warming and environmental degradation.

The unequivocal findings of numerous reports on the consequences of climate change by international and national scientific committees have not been sufficient to counter climate change skepticism. On the contrary, the reactions of skeptics to the climate change reports can be summed up in the phrase “Don’t confuse me with the facts”.

The rise of right-wing populism in many countries also constitutes a potential obstacle to addressing climate change. Right-wing parties and politicians frequently voice climate change skepticism, denials, and opposition to climate change policies, such as carbon taxes.

The nonacceptance of the climate change crisis persists despite its increasingly visible worldwide consequences. It’s indeed difficult to avoid news reports of climate change events, including extreme heat, flooding, droughts, destroyed crops, wildfires, melting glaciers, rising sea levels, biodiversity loss, environmental degradation, smog, pollution, and increasing rates of human morbidity and mortality.

Even the signed petitions to government leaders from thousands of scientists from around the world warning of a climate emergency and the concerns, demonstrations, and protests of younger generations calling for urgent action have not been enough to convince skeptics of the climate change threat, especially among the political right.

In general, the majorities of most populations are concerned about the climate change crisis. A global survey by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) of public opinion in 2021 covering 50 countries and over half of the world’s population found that nearly two-thirds of those surveyed believed climate change is a global emergency.

The proportion of the population believing climate change is an emergency ranged from a low of 61 percent in sub-Saharan Africa to a high of 71 percent in Western Europe and North America. The proportions of the remaining four regions varied from 63 to 65 percent (Figure 1).

 

Source: United Nations Development Programme.

 

In addition to the UNDP study, a 2022 PEW survey of nineteen countries across North America, Europe, and the Asia-Pacific region found a median of 75 percent viewing global climate change as a major threat to their country.

However, views concerning the climate change threat differed considerably across political groups. By and large, surveys find that those of the political right are less likely than those of the left to believe in the reality and anthropogenic nature of the climate change crisis.

In the 2022 PEW survey, for example, those on the political right in fourteen countries were found to be consistently less likely to consider climate change a major threat to their country than those on the political left (Figure 2).

 

Source: Pew Research Center.

 

The largest difference among those fourteen countries was in the United States where 22 percent of the political right considered climate change a major threat to their country versus 85 percent on the political left. Other countries with a large difference between those on the political right and left were Australia with 47 and 91 percent, Canada with 46 and 80 percent, and Germany with 59 and 83 percent, respectively.

Moreover, the differences in the views of political groups concerning climate change in some major countries have widened over the recent past. In the United States, for example, the difference between Republicans and Democrats has increased substantially over the past quarter century.

Near the start of the 21st century 20 percent of Republicans and 36 percent of Democrats believed that global warming will pose a serious threat in their lifetime. By 2021, the difference between Republicans and Democrats had widened substantially to 11 percent versus 67 percent, respectively (Figure 3).

 

Source: Gallup Survey.

 

Also, differing views about climate change are reflected in the statements and policies of political parties and their leaders. For example, the Vox party in Spain dismissed climate change as “a hoax”, the National Front in France promoted climate skepticism, and Sweden’s Democrats described the climate debate as “weird” in budget discussions, arguing that the seriousness of climate change is exaggerated, and scientific evidence is being distorted.

The unequivocal findings of numerous reports on the consequences of climate change by international and national scientific committees have not been sufficient to counter climate change skepticism. On the contrary, the reactions of skeptics to the climate change reports can be summed up in the phrase “Don’t confuse me with the facts”

In Germany the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) challenged the global scientific consensus on climate change, describing it as “hysteria”. In addition, the AfD abandoned the previous cross-party consensus on the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)

In the United States, the world’s second largest emitter of CO2 producing about 14 percent of the world’s CO2 emissions, the former Republican president said that he was not a believer in man-made global warming, called climate change “a hoax” invented by China, and said scientists were “misleading us” on climate change. Moreover, he dismissed federal scientific reports on climate change and sought to roll back climate regulations, including increasing U.S. coal mining and reconsidering fuel efficiency standards for vehicles.

In China, the world’s top emitter of CO2 producing about 30 percent of the world’s CO2 emissions, some report that the Communist Party’s climate change skeptics are mostly shunned and may chatter in the shadows. After decades of rejecting climate change and its visible consequences, such as choking smog hanging over most of the country, no higher-up Chinese officials are saying that climate change is a hoax and while some may have that view, they won’t say it.

In India, which the IPCC highlights as a vulnerable hotspot, some find politicians denying or ignoring climate change. They note that in the election manifestos of the two leading national parties, the Indian National Congress and the BJP, neither of them mentioned the Paris Climate Change Agreement. Also at the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, India reportedly found the IPCC’s recent report too gloomy and requested a section on mitigation be removed.

A preliminary draft of the Glasgow pact called on countries to “accelerate the phasing out of coal and subsidies for fossil fuels”. In the final negotiations, however, India and China, whose coal-fired power stations provide approximately 70 and 60 percent of their electricity, respectively, said they would agree only to “phase-down unabated coal” and the phase-out of inefficient fossil fuel subsidies.

In addition, when heading to COP26, Australia, Japan, and Saudi Arabia were among those countries lobbying the United Nations “to play down the need to move rapidly away from fossil fuels”. Some wealthy nations also questioned paying more to poorer states to move to greener technologies.

In preparatory meetings for the November COP27 climate summit in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, African nations pushed back against abrupt moves away from fossil fuels. They stressed the need to avoid approaches that encourage abrupt disinvestments from fossil fuels, which would threaten Africa’s development. For example, Nigeria, Africa’s largest population, indicated that gas was a matter of survival for the country.

The latest report of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) shows greenhouse gas emissions are continuing to rise. The IPCC report also states that current plans to address climate change are not ambitious enough to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, which is a threshold necessary to avoid even more catastrophic impacts.

A number of social and psychological explanations have been offered for climate change crisis nonacceptance and skepticism, especially among the right-wing conservatives. In the past, the lack of knowledge about the causes of climate change was believed to play a major role. More recently, political ideology and party identification are believed to strongly influence how people selectively seek and interpret information about climate change.

Political beliefs and motivations have also been found to guide people’s attention, perceptions, and understanding of climate change evidence and mitigation efforts. In addition, some are not willing to accept the climate change crisis and proposed mitigation measures because they challenge their need to protect existing socioeconomic structures and traditional lifestyles, raise their anxieties about declines in living standards, and threaten development efforts, particularly in less developed countries.

In sum, it is certainly the case that the majority of most populations worldwide, especially the younger generations, are concerned about the climate change crisis. However, it is also the case that despite the overwhelming unequivocal evidence, many people, especially far-right conservatives, continue their nonacceptance of the climate change crisis.

Such a political divide with vocal opposition from the political far-right with the continuing support, political lobbying, and extensive efforts of various extractive industries is worrisome and consequential. It undermines global plans to address climate change and thwarts more ambitious efforts to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, the goal set in the Paris Agreement to avert the worst effects of global warming

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.”

 

UN General Assembly Hall. This year’s meeting of world leaders is scheduled to take place September 20-26. Credit: UN Photo/Manuel Elías

By James Paul
NEW YORK, Sep 19 2022 (IPS)

The high-level segment of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) is famous for its fiery speeches and the colorful personalities assembled in the GA Hall. But much more goes on beyond the hall itself –the frenzy of the press in the broadcast trucks, security personnel on every sidewalk, military aides in dress uniforms, and an endless round of receptions and parties of every kind.

One of the best-known events in this vast theater is the showy motorcade that brings the President of the United States to the UN. Motorcycles from the New York police department, fifty or more in all, roar along in advance of the main presidential limousines. Police barricades line the streets. The sirens and roar of the engines reverberate wherever they go.

The motorcade makes a great impression as it approaches UN Headquarters. No other leader comes even close to such a mighty entry scene. The UN itself faces temporary paralysis as the Presidential security system takes over.

Once, I was standing on the corner of First Avenue and 45th Street when I saw a high-level UN official hurrying up. A policeman stopped him as he tried to get past the barricade and cross the avenue.

“No one crosses the street now,” said the cop. “But I’m Under Secretary General Peter Hansen,” the man replied, “and I have a meeting in ten minutes with the Secretary General.”

“Sorry, buddy,” said the cop, “I have my orders and no one, not even God Himself, goes across this avenue until I say so.” Hansen had to wait for at least twenty minutes until the US President arrived and disappeared inside. Then the Under Secretary-General was finally allowed to go across and carry on with his business.

The impression made by a grand entry like this is well-known in the world of politics. During the colonial era in India, the British Viceroy famously entered the city of Delhi on grand occasions seated with his wife on an enormous, elaborately-bedecked elephant, accompanied by a whole cavalcade of other elephants, carrying maharajas and senior British officials.

The grandest of these events were reserved for the investiture of the British sovereign and were known as darbars. Today, motorcycles create the awe and the President gets a smooth ride in an armored limousine.

Hundreds of lunches, dinners and grand receptions take place during the high-level period. The most unusual event I ever attended was a reception held in the Central Park Zoo, in honor of Denis Sassou Nguesso, the President of the Republic of Congo.

The Wildlife Conservation Society, operator of the zoo, put on the event to “thank” the Congolese strongman for accepting a large sum of money to “protect” a part of the Congolese rainforest. The reception took place outdoors, around the famous sea lion pool. There were African drums, costumed dancers, musicians playing flutes, bright-colored spotlights and a very restricted guest list.

As I strolled around the pool, chatting with a few of the ambassadors present, I noticed a man standing at some distance from the others, apparently by himself. I walked over to speak to him when suddenly four heavily-armed security guards jumped out of the shadows and confronted me, their automatic weapons pointed menacingly.

I soon realized I was heading towards President Sassou Nguesso himself, in his military dress uniform. His scowl turned to a smile and he waved away the guards, who disappeared again into the trees as I stepped forward. After some pleasantries about protecting rainforests, I took my leave. From Fifth Avenue, as I headed home, I could still hear the drums and see the orange spotlights.

What were the sea lions thinking, I wondered?

Jim Paul was longtime Executive Director of Global Policy Forum, based across the avenue from UN Headquarters. He was founder of the NGO Working Group on the Security Council and the Working Group on Food and Hunger. He was an editor of the Oxford Companion to Politics of the World and his most recent book titled Of Foxes and Chickens: oligarchy and global power in the UN Security Council.

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The leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), Yasser Arafat, arrived at UN Headquarters by helicopter. A view of the helicopter as it approached the North Lawn of the UN campus on 13 November 1974. But Arafat was denied a US visa for a second visit to the UN in 1988. Credit: UN Photo/Michos Tzovaras

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Sep 19 2022 (IPS)

When the United Nations decided to locate its 39-storeyed Secretariat in New York city, the United States, as host nation, signed a “headquarters agreement” in 1947 not only ensuring diplomatic immunity to foreign diplomats but also pledging to facilitate the day-to-day activities of member states without any hindrance, including the issuance of US visas to enter the country.

But there were several instances of open violation of this agreement by successive US administrations.

Stephen Zunes, Professor of Politics and International Studies at the University of San Francisco, who has written extensively on the politics of the United Nations, told IPS the U.S. broke its commitment to the UN by refusing to allow Yasser Arafat, leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), to come to New York to speak, forcing the entire General Assembly to convene in Geneva back in 1988.

““And there is the periodic US media obsession with visits by foreign leaders Americans love to hate, such as (Iranian President) Ahmadinejad (while ignoring more moderate Iranian leaders before and since speaking of peace and reconciliation),” said Zunes.

And, of course, there are the bizarre and misleading addresses by various U.S. presidents over the years, he added

The move to Geneva was a first in UN history– but it provided a less-hostile political environment for the PLO leader— as the General Assembly, the UN’s highest policy-making body, stood defiant and delivered a resounding slap to the US, momentarily abandoning its New York city home.

Palestine is one of two permanent, non-member observer states, the other being the Holy See (Vatican).

Arafat, who first addressed the UN in 1974, took a swipe at Washington when he prefaced his statement by saying “it never occurred to me that my second meeting with this honorable Assembly, would take place in the hospitable city of Geneva”.

Meanwhile, there were reports last week that visas for Russian diplomats, including Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, were either denied or delayed in the run-up to the high-level meeting of the General Assembly September 20-26.

Asked about the complaints by the Russians, UN Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric told reporters last week: “This is an issue that we have repeatedly brought up with the Host Country”.

“This is an issue that was raised to us by the Russian Federation. I think the Secretary General feels very much that visas should be delivered to the Russian delegation and to delegations who have business to be done at the United Nations, especially during the General Assembly.”

Asked at what level this was being discussed, he said: “It’s one that we have been repeatedly raising because, as you say, it’s been going on for quite some time. The Legal Counsel is the point person on this”.

“It’s done through our legal office because they support the Host Country committee, but I know this is an issue the Secretary General, I think, has raised in a number of phone conversations with senior US officials, as well, and one that has been raised with him by Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov, as well as the Russian Permanent Representative Nebenzia.”

During his first visit in 1974, the PLO leader avoided hundreds of pro and anti-Arafat demonstrators outside the UN building by arriving in a helicopter which landed on the North Lawn of the UN campus adjoining the East River.

Arafat was escorted by security men into the UN building and to the Secretary-General’s 38th floor where he spent the night in a make-shift bedroom.

But that bedroom had not been used for years, and the color of water was brown when the bathroom’s faucet was opened. Mercifully, it was not an attempt by Israeli intelligence to poison the PLO leader.

There was also a legendary story of how Arafat, who was on an Israeli hit-list, never slept on the same bed on two consecutive nights – in order to outwit assassins trying to kill him in Israeli-occupied Palestinian territory.

But whatever the reason, Arafat spent only a single night in the UN building.

Since Arafat, several political leaders—mostly antagonistic towards the US or heading regimes under American sanctions– have either been denied visas or implicitly declared persona non grata (PNG).

As a result, heads of state from “rogue nations,” including North Korea’s Kim Il Sung, Iraq’s Saddam Hussein and Syria’s Hafez al Assad, never addressed the UN – and perhaps never tried for a US visa either, which may have been refused.

When former Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, accused of war crimes, was refused a US visa to attend the high-level segment of the General Assembly sessions in September 2013, Hassan Ali, a senior Sudanese diplomat, registered a strong protest with the UN’s Legal Committee.

“The democratically-elected president of Sudan had been deprived of the opportunity to participate in the General Assembly because the host country, the United States, had denied him a visa, in violation of the U.N.-U.S. Headquarters Agreement.”

“It was a great and deliberate violation of the Headquarters Agreement,” he said.

The refusal of a visa to the Sudanese president was also a political landmine because al-Bashir had been indicted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court (ICC).

But the question that remained answered was: Does the United States have a right to implicitly act on an ICC ruling when Washington is not a party to the Rome Statute that created the ICC?

Meanwhile, some of the military or autocratic leaders who addressed the UN in a bygone era included Fidel Castro of Cuba, Col Muammar el-Qaddafi of Libya, Amadou Toure of Mali (who assumed power following a coup in 1991 but later served as a democratically elected President), and Jerry Rawlings of Ghana (who seized power in 1979, executed former political leaders but later served as a civilian president voted into power in democratic elections).

Libyan leader Qaddafi, made a dramatic appearance at the UN in September 2009.

In its report, the London Guardian said he “grabbed his 15 minutes of fame at the UN building in New York and ran with it. He ran with it so hard he stretched it to an hour and 40 minutes, six times longer than his allotted slot, to the dismay of UN organizers”.

Qaddafi lived up to his reputation for eccentricity, bloody-mindedness and extreme verbiage, said the Guardian, as he tore up a copy of the UN charter in front of startled delegates, accused the Security Council of being an al-Qaida like terrorist body, called for George Bush and Tony Blair to be put on trial for the Iraq war, demanded $7.7 trillion in compensation for the ravages of colonialism on Africa, and wondered whether swine flu was a biological weapon created in a military laboratory.

Incidentally, according to one news report, there were 112 different spellings of the Libyan leader’s name, both in English and Arabic, including Muammar el-Qaddafi, Muammar Gaddafi, Muammar al-Gathafi, Muammar El Kadhafi, Moammar el Kazzafi, Moamer, El Qathafi, Mu’Ammar, Gadafi, and Moamar Gaddafi, amongst others.

The Wall Street Journal ran a cartoon making fun of the multiple spellings, with a visiting reporter, on a one-on-one interview in Tripoli, told the Libyan leader: ”My editor sent me to find out whether you are Qaddafi, Khaddafi, Gadafi, Qathafi or Kadhafi?”

This article contains excerpts from a book on the UN—a motley collection of hilarious anecdotes– titled “No Comment – and Don’t Quote Me on That,” available on Amazon. The link to Amazon via the author’s website follows: https://www.rodericgrigson.com/no-comment-by-thalif-deen/

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