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By Dr. Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury
SINGAPORE, Jun 9 2020 (IPS-Partners)

Politics have exacerbated the already severe pains that the raging COVID Pandemic have been inflicting on the global population. The spread of Coronavirus coincided with three major developments in the global arena. First was the end of what Charles Krauthammer, the American neo-conservative guru had called, as the title of his book on that subject suggested, America’s “Unipolar Moment”. This was the period, since the implosion of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, when the United states was the only pre-dominant superpower that ruled the roost in the global arena. Though China was rising in the meantime, politically, economically and militarily, it was still coy about it, conforming to the Deng Xia0ping counsel to “hide its capabilities and bide its time”.

Dr. Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury

The second, major development was the assessment of China’s current leader Xi Jinping was that that demure posture was no longer necessary, China was strong and confident enough to assert itself, and seek the position of a peer to the US. So, the US’ “Unipolar Moment” was pretty much over, and a new era of bipolarity was ushered into the international arena.

The third was technically a domestic development, the up-coming US elections, which, however, always have wide enough implications of a global nature. Donald Trump needed an issue to mobilize his support-base, and a conflict with China could be a useful rallying point. A war was too dangerous, with uncertain consequences. At the same time the coronavirus was wreaking havoc in the US, and the Administration’s delayed response was subject to considerable criticism. So a distraction, rendered all the more convenient because many Americans believed it, was created by blaming China for initially concealing the origin and lethality of the disease, and also the world Health Organization (WHO)for kowtowing to China’s directions, endeavouring to exonerate Beijing from the responsibilities. The last point appeared to have a modicum of credibility as the Director General of that international body, an Ethiopian, Tedros Gereyesus, had some reasons to be beholden to Beijing as a source of support to him. But he himself was quick to deny it, claiming that no action of the WHO, in reaction to COVID, was taken at the behest of any member, meaning China.

That was the backdrop against which the key decision making organ of the WHO, the World Health Assembly, which has 194 State-members, met, virtually ,due to the global Corona-induced lock-down, centred in the WHO headquarters in Geneva ,for two days in the third week of May. Weeks prior to the session, the US and China, along with their supporters, locked horns, first through the preparatory process, and thereafter during the session itself. The differences surfaced mainly with regard to two issues: first was the participation of Taiwan, and the second was a resolution pertaining to the reforms of the WHO.

The question of the participation of Taiwan in United Nations and other international conferences where membership constitutes States, has been a perennial bone of contention. An overwhelming membership of the UN, including the US. Conform to the one-china policy, which, by definition, excluded Taiwan’s presence. However, in the WTO, after the SARS pandemic at the turn of the century, Taiwan was invited to sit in as observer at WHA sessions, though under the status deprecating banner of “Chinese Taipeh”. But that was with the approval of China as Taiwan had a pro-unification (with China) government. But currently the government in Taiwan is seen as pro-independence, which has raised Chinese ire, an, consequently China was disinclined to extend invitation to Taipeh. So, despite US insistence that the success of Taipeh’s COVID containment (0nly 440 infections and seven deaths), which would enable it to contribute positively to discussions, the door was closed to Taiwan. An angry Trump, who had already cancelled the current years assessed contribution to WTO budget, criticizing the WHO, calling it to “demonstrate independence from China’ and urging reforms, threatening that if these were not initiated , further US action would follow.

The other major western bloc, the European Union, disassociated itself from the US position, and put out a statement supporting the WHO. Its foreign policy spokesman said: ‘This is the time for solidarity, not the time for finger-pointing or for undermining multilateral cooperation”. Even within the US there were apprehensions that Trump’s posture could lessen the US clout in the global fight against the pandemic, and in fact, cede the leadership in combatting it to China. The head of the prestigious American think-tank the Council on Foreign Relations, said that the US needed to consult others on reforming the WHO if it wanted to do more than just posturing. He observed that “there is no unilateral US answer to global health challenges”.

As to the issue of reforms, it was akin to motherhood, in the sense that everyone was supportive of reform, and no one opposing it; the question was what were the necessary reforms and when were they to be implemented. Australia, a key US ally initially led the charge, beginning with a call for an inquiry into the origin of the virus. But the spirit was somewhat dampened as once again politics came to the fore with China swiftly proposing massive tariffs on Australian barley and blocking meat imports from it (China is Australia’s largest market , lifting nearly 38 percent of its total exports , greater than those of the US, Japan and South Korea combined.) China also wanted reforms, but only those , as Xi Jinping said, “based on science and professionalism, led by the WHO, and conducted in an objective and impartial manner”.

Finally, it was the resolution initiated by the European Union, which eventually attracted a large number of other cosponsors, that was adopted. It had three main components. It called for: First, an impartial, independent and comprehensive evaluation of the international response to the pandemic; second, a probe on the actions of the WTO and their timelines pertaining to COVID-19; and three, requiring the WHO to examine the ‘zoonotic’ (spread from animal to human, thus dismissing some western accusation of a man-made virus) and the route of introduction to human population.

The resolution was adopted by consensus (‘Consensus’ agreement is distinct from ‘unanimous’ agreement -the which though subtle is also significant- in that in the former case no one disagrees, and in the latter case, everyone agrees), which was face-saving for all, since members did not have to publicly state or demonstrate their actual positions. So, the S did not disassociate itself from the consensus as some had feared, but remained content, for the time being, with Trump describing WHO as “puppet of China”. But the US President struck hard on 30 May by ending his country’s relationship with the WHO, accusing it of being “Under the total control of China”.

Despite the fact that by now such announcement was expected, there was world- wide expression of regret. Immediately Germany’s Health Minister, Jens Spah, called it “a disappointing backlash for international health”. A leading British oncologist said there was no “logic” to the decision. However, the WHO is likely to survive the American withdrawal. The contributions will be made up from other sources. China has already committed $ 2 billion over two years to help other countries respond to the virus,

This would help fill the gap. Even US and other western billionaires might step in with their support. But the point is, the development does not augur well for multilateralism broadly, and global cooperation in the health sector specifically. The point to note is that given the fact that we are poised to enter a new era where the world is no longer unipolar, that after three decades the US now has a rival peer, could once again dichotomize the world. In particular, the entire developing world, including Bangladesh, must need take heed and shape behaviour patterns appropriately.

Dr. Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury is Principal Research Fellow at ISAS, National University of Singapore, former Foreign Advisor and President of Cosmos Foundation Bangladesh.

This article was first published in DHAKA COURIER

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Coronavirus pandemic threatens crises-ravaged communities as UN appeals for global support. Credit: United Nations

By Charlotte Petri Gornitzka, Robert Piper and Ulrika Modéer
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 9 2020 (IPS)

The COVID-19 pandemic upended almost every aspects of life as we know it. Even those countries that are supposed to have the means to manage the spread and mitigate the effects are struggling.

Besides the $5 trillion stimulus package that the G20 economies agreed to deal with the pandemic, individual countries are also devising various measures to shore up their health care systems, stabilize their economies, and assist affected workers and businesses.

Even before the full brunt of the coronavirus outbreak reached some of the poorest countries, the economic impacts are already being felt. With declining global demand for raw materials, breakdown of global supply chain, and mounting debt burden, the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is estimated to exceed $220 billion.

The urgent shouldn’t crowd out the important

With greater uncertainty and fear of global recession looming large, governments are looking for resources needed to lessen the socio-economic pains of the crisis. In this process, official development assistance (ODA) won’t be spared and could come under increased scrutiny.

Decisions made now will have potentially devastating – or transformative – impact for years to come. Despite the economic and political pressure, we must protect ODA, which is needed more than ever.

The spread of COVID-19, especially in places with weak governance and health infrastructures, is expected to be overwhelming if the international community does not act now.

For example, in Sub-Saharan Africa, many countries have the lowest number of physicians per capita in the world while some experience ongoing conflicts, making it difficult to fight the virus.

Credit: UNFPA

The collateral impact of COVID-19 on health, education and nutrition systems will be extremely damaging, and in many cases irreversible, for children and society at large. And when the world opens up again, the resilience of the weakest health systems will dictate how well we do against future threats.

The UN Secretary General argued that “this human crisis demands coordinated, decisive, inclusive and innovative policy action—and maximum financial and technical support for the poorest and most vulnerable people and countries.”

It is critical for the international community to fulfil the humanitarian appeal for COVID-19 response while protecting existing commitments to long-term development and other ‘silent’ emergencies.

Doing so will help protect the most vulnerable people from being exposed to the effects of COVID-19 and preserve hard-earned development gains in fighting global poverty and expanding basic services.

Left to their own devises, fragile nations may risk the breakdown of socio-political order, civil unrest and state collapse, further exacerbating the dire situation.

Flexible funding key to tackling COVID-19

COVID-19 is not only a humanitarian crisis, but also a development crisis. Development agencies are supporting countries to prepare for, respond to, and recover from the crisis.

The effectiveness of their response to certain degree depends on the flexibility afforded to them in funding and operational procedures.

To tackle this uniquely complex health and development crisis, the adequacy and flexibility of funding to development agencies are pivotal. Flexible “core” funding is already making a difference in the COVID-19 response to reach people in need faster, empower local actors, deploy essential supplies to the frontline, and protect the most vulnerable – children, refugees, women.

This enabled the affected communities to practice due diligence and self-driven discretion to immediately respond to threats of the pandemic, while waiting for the pledged assistance to arrive. For instance, in Nigeria, funding flexibility allowed UNICEF to come up with an innovative solution to fight misinformation around COVID-19 while UNDP was able to support the government double the ventilator capacity in the country.

Collaboration, not competition

The COVID-19 pandemic is a devastating crisis in history. But it also posits an opportunity to remind the global community why multilateralism is vital to securing the world’s peace, security, and prosperity.

We witness how the health crisis of today’s globalized world interlinks global economy, geopolitics, and social values. Our effective response to the public health crisis should be seen as key to resolving the ensuing economic, humanitarian, and development challenges.

Understanding this interlinked and complex reality of COVID-19, governments need to work together closely to take coordinated actions and share scientific information, resources and expertise.

It is this strong motion for collaboration that underpins the UN agencies commitment to reinforce the humanitarian-development nexus to jointly respond to the COVID-19 crisis, working closely through the UN Crisis team, humanitarian response plan, UN Response and Recovery Fund for COVID-19.

For example, in Guinea-Bissau, WHO, UNICEF, UNDP, and IOM joined hands to help build isolation facilities and triage space, and procure necessary equipment for COVID-19, both for the national hospital as well as for the re-modelling of the UN clinic.

With strong solidarity and effective cooperation, the international community will not only arrest COVID-19, but also use the emergency to build back better health systems and a more inclusive and sustainable economy.

 

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Excerpt:

Charlotte Petri Gornitzka is Assistant Secretary-General and UNICEF Deputy Executive Director, Partnerships; Robert Piper is Assistant Secretary-General, Director of Development Coordination Office; and Ulrika Modéer is Assistant Administrator of UNDP & Director of Bureau of External Relations and Advocacy.

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Protests in cities across the United States including in New York city. Credit: UN News/Shirin Yaseen

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 9 2020 (IPS)

The massive protests in more than 120 US cities over racial injustice and police brutality went global last week– amidst presidential threats of military force on demonstrators in Washington DC.

At the same time, there were continued political demonstrations against the imposition of authoritarianism in Hong Kong by the current dominating military power there: China.

According to Cable News Network (CNN), “sickened,” “shocked and appalled,” “horror and consternation” – “are words we’re used to hearing from US presidents and diplomats to condemn despotic regimes”.

“But these are from leaders in the UK, the European Union and Canada, respectively”, to describe the brutal killing of an unarmed African-American in the streets of Minneapolis which triggered protests worldwide.

But will any UN Secretary-General – past or present – have plucked up courage to condemn the political leadership either in the United States or China, two veto-wielding permanent members in the Security Council, in such harsh terms?

”Never,” says a former Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the UN, “particularly, if a Secretary-General is planning to run for a second term —where the threat of a veto hangs over his head”?

Still, will a limit on his tenure be an answer to the problem, as laid out in a 1996 study, which recommended that the General Assembly adopt a comprehensive new policy, including a single, seven-year term, to free the Secretary-General from re-election stresses and pressures.?

Stephen Lewis, a former Permanent Representative of Canada to the United Nations and Deputy Executive Director of the UN children’s agency UNICEF, told IPS: “I don’t think it much matters whether it’s two five-year terms or one seven-year term”.

That’s not the problem with the Secretary-General’s tenure, he pointed out.

The problem is that both Ban Ki-moon and Antonio Guterres have paid no attention to the three most important words that open the Charter of the UN: “We the peoples”…

“They both pay homage only to governments; it’s as if ‘the peoples’ of the world don’t exist. As a result, there is neither transparency nor accountability”, said Lewis, who was a UN Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa, and later co-founder and co-director of AIDS-Free World.

Guterres, he said, hides behind the Convention on Privileges and Immunities, or with willful arrogance refuses to answer questions put to him.

“Thus, when asked why he’s silent on the turbulence in the United States, and in particular the excessive use of force, he defers to his spokesperson who provides fatuous nonsense in response.”

It was exactly the way Ban never felt the obligation to tell the truth about cholera in Haiti, nor to feel it necessary to explain why the $400 million fund was effectively abandoned, he noted.

Perhaps one of the few exceptions in the 75-year history of the UN was former Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali of Egypt who paid the supreme penalty of being vetoed out of a second term —even though he garnered an overwhelming 14 of the 15 votes in the UN Security Council. But the US ingloriously vetoed his claims for a second term.

As he recounted his running battle with the US in his book titled “Unvanquished: a US UN Saga,” Boutros-Ghali had the singular distinction of being the only UN chief who never received a second term in office because he paid a heavy price for the courage of his convictions—even though he admits he was forced to occasionally cave in to the dictates of the US.

The 1996 study sponsored by two major think tanks implicitly accused some of the world’s big powers of manipulating the election of the Secretary-General so as to ensure that U.N. heads are political creatures with no minds of their own.

“It is impossible to escape the impression, that many governments, including some of the most powerful, do not want a strong, independent leader as Secretary-General,” said the study published under the auspices of the New York-based Ford Foundation and the Dag Hammarskjold Foundation of Stockholm.

The authors of the study – Brian Urquhart and Erskine Childers, both senior UN officials – said the selection of the Secretary-General is quite literally part of “an old-boy network.” “The United Nations is an intergovernmental organisation, and governments have no intentions of giving up control of it.”

Thomas G. Weiss, a Distinguished Fellow, Global Governance at The Chicago Council on Global Affairs, told IPS the same proposal was part of the “1-for-7-billion campaign” (of which Weiss was a sponsor). http://www.1for7billion.org/

“Boutros Boutros-Ghali would have been a perfect candidate, “enfant terrible” for 7 years instead of modestly behaved for 5 years. It made sense in 1990 and in 2016 for the reasons that you cite”.

“Guterres has been running for a second term since January 2017” (ever since he took office), he noted.

“He has disappointed many of us by being so invisible. We should recall former Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon who prided himself being the “invisible man.” He got two terms. Guterres is using the same strategy,” declared Weiss, Presidential Professor of Political Science, Director Emeritus, Ralph Bunche Institute for International Studies, The CUNY Graduate Center.

Lewis argued there is no freedom of information in the UN, and that’s what gets governments like Sweden frustrated and thinking of shortening the SG’s term.

“The Secretary-General should be required to hold an open press conference at least once, preferably twice a week, with a critical media corps to ask questions. If that were the case, the entire culture of his office would change.”

“It’s his behaviour rather than his longevity that needs reform,” declared Lewis, who also launched the Code Blue campaign to end impunity for sexual abuse by UN personnel.

In a hard-hitting article titled “As Protests Sweep the US, the UN Tweets Platitudes”, Dulcie Leimbach, a former editor at the New York Times and founder of PassBlue, a widely-read web publication covering the United Nations, wrote: “Amid curfews in New York City, constant marches and protests, sirens from the streets and helicopters whirring above, the United Nations top leader, António Guterres, has not appeared before the media to say anything directly about the convulsions exploding across the five boroughs and far beyond. Instead, he has relied on his spokespeople to provide responses.”
https://www.passblue.com/2020/06/03/as-protests-sweep-the-us-the-un-tweets-platitudes/

Leimbach also wrote that the lack of direct reference to the killing of George Floyd, and the turn of events here in the city and elsewhere, extends to the UN Security Council, the General Assembly, the US mission to the UN and other national delegations. Only the UN high commissioner for human rights, Michelle Bachelet, a Chilean who is based in Geneva, has directly addressed Floyd’s murder.

“But when it comes to criticizing the US or other great powers who control the UN, Guterres has built a reputation of making vague statements or letting other UN experts, from human-rights chiefs to refugee bosses — not a new reaction — to comment on the latest problem or conflict violating international law or overriding universal rights”.

Asked to comment further on UN leadership, Leimbach told IPS: “For the UN to remain relevant in our ever-increasing polarized world, it needs to have a woman running the organization for a change”

That would show it is flexible and accountable to half the world’s population as women need to be running global organizations to ensure their equal rights.

The symbol of having the UN led by a woman — the right woman — would be profound, she declared.

Asked for the Secretary-General’s views– on whether the attacks on journalists and innocent civilians at US demonstrations last week were violations of human rights– UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric told reporters June 5: “Look, we have already spoken on that.”

“ The Secretary-General, I think, has mentioned that in his tweets, and … our position really is the same globally, is that people have a fundamental right to demonstrate peacefully, that the law enforcement should use restraint, and… but there is a fundamental right of peaceful demonstration that needs to be respected all over the world and that… it’s not … this is something we say whenever we get asked about demonstrations and violence.”

Asked about a proposal by a group of parliamentarians from Canada, the UK, Australia and New Zealand for a Special Envoy on Hong Kong, he said; “Look, we haven’t received anything, as far as I’m aware, officially. There are procedures and precedents on the appointment of… and I speak here in very general terms, on the appointment of special envoys, special representatives and I will… and, obviously, involves all the parties involved in that issue, but I will leave it at that.

The writer can be contacted at thalifdeen@aol.com

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By Jomo Kwame Sundaram
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Jun 9 2020 (IPS)

As governments the world over struggle to revive their economies after the debilitating lockdowns they imposed following their failure to undertake adequate precautionary containment measures to curb Covid-19 contagion, neoliberal naysayers are already warning against needed deficit financing for relief and recovery.

Deficit financing options
The range of deficit financing options has changed little since first legitimized by Roosevelt and Keynes in the 1930s and used extensively to finance wartime government spending.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram

First, debt financing has typically involved government borrowing. More recent understandings of sovereign debt stress the implications of the source of borrowing, domestic or external, e.g., Japan’s total government debt now greatly exceeds double its annual national income, but this is not considered problematic as most of it is domestically held by Japanese.

Second, price controls, general or selective, can cut both ways, and may require subsidies. Price controls on extracted natural resources can also enable governments to capture resource rents to augment revenue.

Third, the widespread use of unconventional monetary measures since the 2008 global financial crisis has forced economists to reconsider earlier monetarist articles of faith about deficit financing by ‘taxing’ everyone via inflation, also giving an unexpected boost to modern monetary theory.

Exchange rate policy
Finally, an overvalued exchange rate has been favoured by elites who travel and purchase abroad wanting strong currencies, which they often portray as cause for national pride. After all, governments collect taxes in domestic currency, but pay for international debt and imports with foreign exchange.

However, a strong exchange rate only provides a temporary solution, worsening balance of payments’ difficulties in the longer term, favouring consumers over producers, and importers over exporters, besides encouraging consumption at the expense of savings. Increasing imports for consumption either deplete foreign exchange reserves or require external borrowing.

Overvalued exchange rates’ potential for fighting inflation is risky as balance of payments deficits cannot be sustained indefinitely. Exchange rate-based currency board and stabilization arrangements in transition and developing economies are similarly problematic. Economies maintaining overvalued exchange rates have often later experienced severe currency crises.

Quasi-nationalist development ideologies and weak elite opposition enabled many East Asian economies to use undervalued exchange rates to discourage imports and promote exports, with effective protection for import-substituting industries conditional on successful exports.

Macroeconomic populism?
Deficit spending supposedly responded to ‘populist’ demands by ‘distributional coalitions’ of interest groups demanding higher wages, cheap housing, public healthcare and free schooling. Undoubtedly, their political support was sought by regimes, elected or otherwise, who were typically unwilling or unable to collect enough revenue to sustain such expenditure.

In recent decades, macroeconomic populism has become a catch-all explanation for deficit financing, ostensibly to finance redistributive government spending, regardless of actual expenditure patterns. But rather than populist redistribution, deficit spending was often for ‘security’ (i.e., the military and police) or physical infrastructure, rather than social expenditure, or corruption.

The narrative implies that regimes could not resist demands for redistribution, presumably the price of retaining political authority and influence. Undoubtedly, government capacities to directly tax incomes and assets have been constrained, with the influential generally better able to evade taxes.

Sovereign debt and fiscal crises, due to borrowing to spend beyond budgetary means, were rarely due to ‘excessive’ populist demands. The actual reasons for budgetary deficits were often multiple as well as historically and politically specific, rather than simply due to regimes succumbing to redistributive claims.

US presidential endorsement of Arthur Laffer’s ‘supply side’ economics’ claim of greater growth due to more investments with lower taxes on the rich fuelled the counter-revolution against progressive taxation. Nevertheless, ‘macroeconomic populism’ became the default explanation for all manner of deficit financing, including ‘soft budget constraints’ in ‘communist’ ‘command economies’.

Latin American populist fables
Although there have been few truly ‘populist’ regimes in Latin America, most famously Peronist Argentina, ‘macroeconomic populism’ has become a catch-all term, used to explain why governments increase spending and run budgetary deficits.

Undoubtedly, many Latin American regimes pursued import-substituting industrialization using high tariffs to protect ‘infant industries’ from the 1930s. But high import tariffs augmented, rather than diminished government revenues, in contrast to the tax breaks and subsidies for export growth.

Although precipitated by then US Federal Reserve Bank chairman Paul Volcker raising bank interest rates from 1980 to kill inflation, the Latin American debt crises from 1982 were again misleadingly primarily attributed to preceding populist macroeconomic policies.

Similarly, the significant improvements in popular wellbeing earlier this century in Brazil under the PT, Uruguay under the Frente Amplio, Ecuador under Correa and Bolivia under Morales primarily involved massive employment generation and secondarily, ‘productive’ social protection, rather than the unsustainable transfers depicted by macroeconomic populism.

Neoliberal ghosts return
Macroeconomic populism thus became the default formulaic Washington Consensus ‘explanation’ for deficit financing from the 1980s to explain away all manner of fiscal deficits, and to justify policies imposed by the Bretton Woods institutions, precipitating the region’s ‘lost decade’.

The International Monetary Fund required short-term macroeconomic (price) stabilization policies to counter often runaway inflation. The World Bank’s typically medium-term ‘neoliberal’ structural adjustment policies sought to liberalize not only goods and services markets, but also those for finance, labour and social services, previously provided by governments and state enterprises.

Reviving ideological ghosts from the past, neoliberal commentators are once again warning against deficit financing. Instead of recognizing the need for consistently counter-cyclical fiscal policies over the duration of business cycles, they dogmatically insist on minimal annual budget shortfalls in the short-term, and on balancing budgets by next year, regardless of the recession’s nature and duration.

The stagnation of the last decade was due to the failure to reform adequately after the global financial crisis. Covid-19 recessions are undoubtedly different from recent financial crises, and will need bolder monetary, supply-side and industrial policy measures to catalyse and sustain economic relief, recovery and restructuring measures to address previous maladies and the post-lockdown malaise.

The crisis presents us with an opportunity to do better, to move forward. There is much to learn and do to progress, including abandoning the very modes of thinking which have led to the mess we are in. Exorcising ghosts from the past will be imperative.

 

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By Stuart Minchin
Jun 8 2020 (IPS)

COVID19 has brought the world to a halt. The devastating impact of the global pandemic on people’s lives and the world’s economy is a jarring and historic turning point for all of us but it is also an opportunity to re-think many of our practices.

As we mark World Oceans Day, the current global slowdown may be the reset our Ocean needs and the Pacific region is asking the world to reflect on our past to inform innovation for our future.

COVID has disrupted the global transport sector massively, and the increasing reliance on global shipping as flights are grounded presents both challenges and opportunities for the safety and livelihoods of the Pacific region.

More than 16,000 Pacific people work in the Maritime sector, many of whom remain stranded in foreign countries or on vessels as a result of COVID19. Across the Pacific, local restrictions have severely curtailed access to supplies like fuel for local fishing boats, bringing to the fore the issue of food security and the need for longer term, sustainable solutions.

As we mark World Oceans Day this year, we should challenge ourselves to find the opportunities inherent in this crisis to improve our ocean management and stewardship. This can only be accomplished by shifting the status quo and the current global slowdown may be just the reset our Ocean needs.

Our Blue Pacific region is 98 per cent ocean and Pacific Islanders are custodians of 20 per cent of the world’s exclusive economic zones with the healthiest tuna stocks globally. This is not by coincidence, as thousands of years of wise and careful stewardship has contributed to the Pacific’s current status as one of the healthiest regions of our global ocean. The world has much to learn from the traditional knowledge developed over time in the Pacific.

Reef fish are a critical protein for many Pacific communities and populations. Fish such as parrotfish, snappers and emperors shown here for sale in Suva markets in Fiji.

As we grapple with the slow degradation of our oceans globally, and recognise the critical importance the ocean plays in driving global weather patterns, addressing climate change and supplying food and protein to the world’s population, we should reflect on how combining traditional knowledge and science can lead us to find effective solutions.

Now more than ever, we need to harness the opportunities within our ocean, not only for economic benefit, but for the sustainable future of our Blue Continent.

Innovation for Sustainable & Safe Maritime Transport

The majority of islands across the Pacific are remote, accessible only by ships or boats. As I write, 75 per cent of all the bulk fuel imported across the Pacific is used for either road or maritime transport. Finding effective ways to transition from the reliance on fossil fuels to cleaner and more effective technology is critical for the development of the region’s blue economy. There are innovative approaches, both in terms of technologies and using aspects of traditional practices, which are already being implemented by countries and partners working towards the protection of our ocean.

In Vanuatu for example, a cargo ferry was fitted with a solar marine system last year (2019). The instalment of this system is now projected to save the ship operator AU$62,000 per year in fuel costs, and results in a 32 per cent reduction in emissions at anchorage. The year before, the Solomon Islands transitioned lighting systems through a ‘Green Ports’ initiative saving the Solomon Islands Ports Authority AU$180,000 annually with a 160-tonne reduction in emissions and a 13% reduction on overall energy consumption. This example increased the safety of ships docking at night, led to the reduction of operational costs and resulted in increased productivity with a significant reduction in carbon emissions and reliance on fossil fuel.

Camakau or outrigger traditional canoe in Moturiki thanks to a partnership with the Uto Ni Yalo Trust.

In Fiji, traditional boatbuilding is making a resurgence as some communities are discovering the benefits of wind-powered canoes over outboard engines for inter-island transport over short distances. Due to COVID19 the communities of Moturiki relied on wind-powered transport to provide food and to access the local health centre as they were unable to access fuel supplies during the lockdown period.

The agreement by the governments of Fiji, the Marshall Islands, Samoa, Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands and Tuvalu to be part of the Pacific Blue Shipping Partnership should be commended. They are setting themselves a target of a 40 per cent reduction in emissions by 2030, and full decarbonisation by 2050.

At SPC, our Pacific Community Centre for Ocean Science (PCCOS) is one arm of the broader effort driving evidence and science-based understanding of our ocean. A better understanding informs targeted and effective decision-making around our oceans and all that lies within it. It is an opportunity to ensure that the action we take contributes directly to the low carbon transition that is so vital for the health of our ocean, our climate and a new, sustainable relationship between humankind and the natural world.

This Oceans Day is a time for us to reflect on the mix of science, innovation and traditional practices we need for stewardship of the Ocean we want. The Pacific region is not just made up of small islands, rather we are large ocean states and we have much to contribute to the global efforts for sustainable management of our Oceans.

 

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The post We Need to Slow down and Reconnect with Our Ocean for the Future of the Planet appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Stuart Minchin, is Director-General Pacific Community (SPC)

The post We Need to Slow down and Reconnect with Our Ocean for the Future of the Planet appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Dr Renata Clarke
ROME, Jun 8 2020 (IPS)

Few things are as natural and as necessary as eating food. However, if food producers, food processors, food handlers and consumers do not follow good food safety practices, food can become contaminated and rather than nourishing us and bringing us pleasure it can make us sick or even kill us.

According to World Health Organization (WHO) Statistics, the public health burden of unsafe food is very high: in 2015 they estimated that over 600 million people fall ill and 420 000 die every year from foodborne diseases. It was at the launching of the WHO 2015 Report on the Burden of Foodborne disease that Awilo Ochieng Pernet, the then Chairperson of the Codex Alimentarius Commission, the global body responsible for developing food safety and food quality standards, made a call for the establishment of a World Food Safety Day (WFSD). She recognized the need for broader ownership of food safety responsibilities and a regular reminder throughout society that “food safety is everyone’s business”. That call was heeded and here we are…

This year, the second annual celebration of WFSD, in the midst of the COVID, the message of WFSD takes on a particular resonance in the Caribbean.

Firstly, the vulnerability of several Caribbean countries to disruptions in global supply chains has led to re-energized calls for attention to resilient food systems and a regional approach to food security. We will not have efficient regional trade of food if countries do not have confidence in the each other’s ability to reliably produce and market food safely. No government wants to be bring sub-standard food into its country. Facilitating intra-regional trade requires that CARICOM countries have transparent, robust and science-based systems of food control. There is considerable work that Caribbean countries still need to do to achieve this: it requires careful planning and appropriate investment. Many countries have weak legal frameworks for assuring food safety, weak and poorly coordinated institutions and under-equipped food safety laboratories. These are the basic elements of national food safety systems.

Several CARICOM countries have launched COVID-19 response and recovery plans to mitigate impacts on food security and agriculture. These plans involve the introduction of new techniques and technologies that enable more competitive and sustainable production systems. Innovations in food production necessarily requires vigilance and proactivity in terms of identifying new patterns of food safety risk and controlling them to ensure that the public’s health is protected. This celebration of WFSD should serve as an instigation for a reflection on the adequacy of current food safety monitoring and surveillance.

Finally, a word about markets. For this year’s WFSD, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and WHO, have put a focus on the theme “Safe food in markets”. I would like to state out front, that there have been no cases of COVID-19 being transmitted by food. It is not a foodborne disease. However, in the context of COVID-19, food businesses and food markets need to re-inforce hygiene practices and enable safe physical distances during all operations. Traditional markets and farmers markets play an important social function both in terms of providing food and in terms of providing income. With loss of jobs in the tourism and service sectors, in some Caribbean countries we have seen upsurge in street vending of food. Very often the management and the infrastructure of the markets do not allow adequate bio-safety and food safety. Repeated incidents of the emergence of zoonotic diseases (caused by germs spread between humans and animals) that are linked to poor sanitation and hygiene in markets demonstrate clearly that we cannot be complacent about hygiene management in markets. Another very visible change in food marketing in the Caribbean during the COVID-19 Pandemic has been the expansion of various forms of on-line food sales. E-commerce has long been considered a potential growth area, particularly in many developing countries. However, it is important for food safety regulators to consider whether legislative frameworks need to be updated to ensure that food chain actors involved in e-commerce have the same responsibilities for food safety as do food businesses operating ”traditionally”.

Dynamism of food systems is going to increase. Caribbean countries must invest in their capacities for effective food control as an essential contribution to building resilience in effort to reduce food insecurity.

 

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Excerpt:

Dr Renata Clarke is Sub-regional Coordinator Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)

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A trawler in Johnstone Strait, BC, Canada. Human activities such as pollution, overfishing, mining, geo-engineering and climate change have made an international agreement to protect the high seas more critical than ever. Credit: Winky/cc by 2.0

By External Source
Jun 8 2020 (IPS)

Oceans cover 70 per cent of the Earth’s surface. But, because many of us spend most of our lives on land, the 362 million square kilometres of blue out there aren’t always top of mind.

While vast, oceans are not empty. They are teeming with life and connected to society through history and culture, shipping and economic activity, geopolitics and recreation.

But oceans — along with coastal people and marine species — are vulnerable, and good ocean governance is critical to protect these expanses from pollution, overfishing and climate change, to name just some of the threats.

The laws, institutions and regulations in place for the oceans are a multi-layered patchwork and always a work in progress.

 

Common heritage of humankind

Some characterize oceans as the “common heritage of humankind.” As such, the United Nations plays a critical role in ocean governance, and the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) is a key international agreement. The agreement grants coastal and island states authority over swaths of ocean extending 200 nautical miles (360 kilometres) from the shore. These are called exclusive economic zones (EEZ).

EEZs are domestic spaces. Countries enshrine law and delegate authority to state agencies that lead monitoring, management and enforcement in these zones.

Indigenous peoples also assert jurisdictional authority and coastal peoples hold critical insight about coastal and marine ecosystems. Governance is improved when state agencies share power and collaborate.

For example, during the Newfoundland cod collapse, inshore fishermen had local ecological knowledge about changing cod stock dynamics that might have helped avoid the disaster.

 

A turtle swims in a Marine Protected Area. Credit: Foreign and Commonwealth Office

 

Areas beyond national jurisdiction

A vast portion of the ocean lies beyond EEZs: 64 per cent by area and 95 per cent by volume. These regions are often referred to as the high seas. The high seas are important for international trade, fishing fleets, undersea telecommunications cables and are of commercial interest to mining companies. The high seas also host a wide array of ecosystems and species. Many of these are understudied or altogether unrecorded.

UN agreements identify high seas using a technical term “areas beyond national jurisdiction” that refers to the water column. The sea floor is identified separately and called “the area.” UNCLOS and other pieces of international law regulate activity in these spaces and are responsible for ensuring that no single country or company dominates or benefits unfairly.

Other multilateral, sector-based arrangements manage particularly complex resources. For example, regional fisheries management organizations bring nation states together to collaborate on monitoring and managing fish stocks, like tuna, that have large ranges and cross multiple borders and boundaries.

 

The biodiversity governance gap

Currently, international law does not meaningfully address biodiversity monitoring and conservation in the high seas. This “biodiversity governance gap” has been of concern for the past two decades.

Without a binding mechanism under international law, countries are not obligated to co-operate on developing and implementing conservation measures in the high seas. In addition, monitoring the impacts of various economic activities, such as fishing and mining, on biodiversity is piecemeal and inadequate. Marine species or even entire ecosystems could be lost before we have had a chance to identify and understand them.

On Dec. 24, 2017, the UN General Assembly voted to convene a multi-year process to develop a treaty on “the conservation and sustainable use of marine biological diversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction.”

Three of the scheduled negotiation sessions have taken place, while the fourth and final one, scheduled for March 2020, was postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic. Some progress has been made. Notably, the draft treaty addresses four key areas: marine genetic resources; area-based management tools, including marine protected areas; environmental impact assessments and capacity building and the transfer of marine technology.

Yet, many disagreements remain.

For example, countries diverge on the extent to which governance should prioritize the principle of oceans as the “common heritage of humankind.” Very pragmatic questions underlie this tension: should marine genetic sequences be commercialized? If so, how would this work and will it be possible to agree on a way to share benefits fairly? These are critical and how they are addressed will determine if persistent inequities between the Global North and Global South are lessened or exacerbated.

Another challenge relates to marine protected areas (MPAs), especially how they are defined and implemented. What levels of protection are needed for an area to count as an MPA? How much should the treaty predetermine processes used to establish new MPAs and how will MPA rules be enforced?

 

Credit: Christopher Pala/IPS

COVID-19: Negotiations cut adrift?

Has postponing the final round of negotiations cut high seas biodiversity negotiations adrift? A European research team is surveying participants and experts to learn what impact the disruption may have. However, it is unlikely that the treaty will fall completely by the wayside. Delegates and negotiators may well continue to informally discuss options with one another and refine positions with an eye towards reaching consensus when rescheduling is possible.

A ratified treaty covering biodiversity in the high seas would be an exciting layer to add to the ocean governance patchwork.

But, delegates and negotiators always have to make concessions during talks, and disagreements often persist after the treaty has been signed. Implementation can be as challenging and contentious as negotiation itself. Various human dimensions and economic challenges will also continue to need attention, including human trafficking, perverse fishing subsidies and our collective responsibility to small island states that may be submerged as sea levels rise.

These challenges point to other international forums — the World Trade Organization, International Labour Organization and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change — and serve to remind us of the myriad ways that we are all connected to, and by, oceans.

 

Jennifer Silver, Associate Professor, Department of Geography, Environment and Geomatics, University of Guelph; Leslie Acton, Assistant Professor, The University of Southern Mississippi; Lisa Campbell, Professor of Marine Affairs and Policy, Duke University, and Noella Gray, Associate Professor of Geography, University of Guelph

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

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By Daud Khan and Leila Yasmine Khan
AMSTERDAM/ROME, Jun 8 2020 (IPS)

As the COVID-19 virus spread rapidly around the globe, so did various theories about what caused the pandemic. According to the standard scientific theory, the virus originated in bats; crossed over to humans, probably via another intermediate host; and then spread rapidly across the globe.

While the mainstream scientific theory sufficed for some, a large number of people saw the pandemic as the work of cold-hearted military or industrial strategists. An equally large number of people saw it as some kind of divine or natural retribution for an increasingly recalcrinant human race. It’s interesting to look at these various alternative theories and to speculate why they have such a strong hold among the public.

In the first of this two part article we looked at the main conspiracy theories – the CIA, the Chinese, Big Pharma, Big Finance, Bill Gates. We suggested that a major factor underlying the popularity of conspiracy theories were primordial fears – fear of illness, of death but, above all, of the unknown.

Given the extent of this fear, which was fanned by the mainstream and social media, many people felt reassured having someone to blame. It meant that someone was in control; that there was a plan; and that once the pandemic had served its purpose, those in control would bring it to an end.

It may take a few cycles while the virus retreats, mutates and returns, but in few years or at most in a decade, we humans will be extinct and the planet will flourish again. The Gaia theory is well captured by some beautiful videos on social media showing how plants and animals are taking over urban areas

In this second part, we turn to look at a second set of theories that we call the apocalyptic theories.  Those who subscribe to these theories see the COVID-19 outbreak as the revenge of God or nature, or both, against the arrogance of humans.

The most radical of these theories is that Gaia – the primordial mother earth of Greek mythology and the self-equilibrating super organism, postulated by James Lovelock in his seminal book – is rebelling against humans.

Rebelling against the pollution and the poisoning of soils, waters and the air; against the plundering of forests and minerals; and against the tens of thousands of aircrafts buzzing around her day and night, and the hundreds of millions of cars constantly crawling all over her. According to this theory, the virus is Gaia’s revenge and marks the end of the age of humans.

It may take a few cycles while the virus retreats, mutates and returns, but in few years or at most in a decade, we humans will be extinct and the planet will flourish again. The Gaia theory is well captured by some beautiful videos on social media showing how plants and animals are taking over urban areas.

Other apocalyptic theorists feel that the pandemic is not a punishment from an ephemeral mother goddess. But rather it is a punishment from an angry and vengeful deity who is seeing his divine project going off track.  Mankind is progressively turning away from religion, from morals and traditions, and from family values.

The pandemic is God’s admonition to us to return to the righteous path.  And, for this reason, it has focused more on the godless and materialistic west, where among other misdeeds, old people are sent to nursing homes rather than being kept in the family.  In these theories, humankind may survive, but in order to do so, they must rediscover their moral compass and return to righteous way of life – whatever that means.

For those who subscribe to these theories, it is anathema to suggest social distancing and the closing of places of worship. In order for humans to survive, we must do exactly the opposite – gather together, preferably in temples, mosques and churches to seeking collective forgiveness from an angry god.  This is despite the fact that mainstream religious leaders, from the Pope to the Grand Mufti of Al-Azhar, have not said a word about Divine Will playing any role in the pandemic.

A more modest version of apocalyptic theories is that humans have overstepped a few boundaries and all we need to do is make some tweaks to our lifestyle to get back on track. One such theory relates to the waves emanating from the 5G telephone systems.

Proponents suggest that these waves facilitate the spread of the virus while also weakening human immune systems.  The fact that Wuhan, where the virus originated, is one of the places with the highest densities of 5G networks, apparently provides clear proof of the link between COVID and telephone waves.  So all we need to do is take a step back and decommission all the 5G towers.  And since the telecom companies will not do this, activists in some countries have taken it on themselves to set them alight.

So why are apocalyptic theories, even the most bizarre ones, so common?  If primordial fear drives conspiracy theorists, what drives the apocalyptic theorists? In our view it is collective guilt.  We have been warned, and warned again, and warned yet again about continued misuse of resources and lack of attention to planetary health.

We have been admonished time and time again about superfluous consumption, about waste of food and other essentials, and of the over use of fossil fuels and plastics.  We all know that our lifestyle is unsustainable and that that we are causing irreversible climate change. But despite this knowledge, and despite thousands of words written, documentaries screened, learned scientific conferences convened,  and hours of speeches by political leaders, we have failed to take the clear and drastic actions needed to make our lifestyles more sustainable. Knowing that we have been collectively misbehaving, it is almost a logical conclusion that a global disaster is a consequence of our bad actions.

Conspiracy and apocalyptic theories are widespread. And if they are related to fear and guilt, then such fear and guilt must also perforce be widespread.  Is this a cause for concern? Very much so. At an individual level, negative thoughts have clear negative effects on our mental and physical wellbeing.

Similarly, collective negative sentiments have quick and direct effect on our collective wellbeing and actions. Conspiracy theories or apocalyptic views of the world create anxiety, fear and depression among millions of people and cause immense harm and pain. More worryingly, this fear, anxiety and depression does not seem to go down as the pandemic abates. It seems it’s here to stay and poison our life for several years, if not decades.

Equally worrying is that there are plenty of local situations where such fears and worries can be easily manipulated as is happening in the USA, where President Trump continues to stroke these fears and uses this to apportion blame; or in India, where Prime Minister Modi is blaming Muslims for deliberately spreading the virus to damage the Hindu nation.

 

Daud Khan is a former United Nations official who lives between Italy and Pakistan. He holds degrees in Economics from the London School of Economics and Oxford University where he was a Rhodes Scholar; and a degree in Environmental Management from the Imperial College of Science and Technology.

Leila Yasmine Khan is an independent writer and editor based in the Netherlands. She has Master’s degrees in Philosophy and in Argumentation Theory and Rhetoric from the University of Amsterdam, as well as a Bachelor’s Degree in Philosophy from the University of Rome (Roma Tre).

 

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Zekiya Louis (R) and Manuela Ramirez (L) handing out free water to protesters in Times Square, New York during a protest over the death of George Floyd. Credit: James Reinl/IPS

By Ignatius Banda
BULAWAYO, ZImbabwe, Jun 8 2020 (IPS)

“As tall as he is, if he continues to do that I will kick him out of the country,” thundered Zimbabwe’s former President Robert Mugabe in 2008, his anger aimed at the then United States ambassador James McGee after the diplomat questioned the results of Zimbabwe’s 2008 general elections.

It was not the first time the late president had threatened a U.S. diplomat. In 2005, Mugabe had threatened to throw out then U.S. ambassador to Zimbabwe, Christopher Dell, telling him “he could go to hell” after Washington’s top man in Harare had criticised the Mugabe administration.

But now, with a new president and administration at the helm, it appears as if the long-running frosty relations between the countries continues.

The recent diplomatic spat between Zimbabwe and the U.S. began after a senior U.S. official accused the southern African country of fomenting unrests across America in the wake of the killing of an unarmed African American man, George Floyd, on May 25.

• Floyd died after a white Minneapolis police officer kneeled on his neck for almost nine minutes. His death resulted in nationwide protests across the U.S. and a nationwide movement against police violence and racism. People across the world have joined in solidarity to the #BlackLivesMatter protests.

Last week, the Zimbabwean government summoned the U.S. ambassador Brian Nichols to “discuss” comments made by the Trump administration’s national security advisor Robert O’Brien that described Zimbabwe as a “foreign adversary.” 

While the current administration under President Emmerson Mnangagwa has shied away from Mugabe’s bellicose tone, the country’s foreign affairs minister Sibusiso Moyo said in a statement released after his meeting with Nichols that comments made by O’Brien were “false and deeply damaging to deeply damaging to a relationship already complicated due to years of prescriptive megaphone diplomacy and punitive economic sanctions”.

• In 2003 the U.S. first imposed travel and financial restrictions on Mugabe, his inner circle and various state companies linked to human rights abuses. They were extended for another year in March.

Moyo added that Zimbabwe had taken note of “the measures deployed by the U.S. authorities to deal with the challenges currently confronting them. At the same time, we recall the harsh U.S. criticism and condemnation of our own response to multiple instances of illegal, violent civil unrest”.

These comments also came days after the U.S. and the European Union had released a joint statement criticising a spate of human rights violations in Zimbabwe where members of the police and the military were accused of assaulting and kidnapping citizens.

However, analysts note that the frosty diplomatic relations between the two countries have come a long way, and it will take time to restore mutual trust and respect.

“Even in the Obama Administration, Zimbabwe was an ‘easy hit’. There were far more authoritarian regimes than Robert Mugabe’s but, with the ending of Apartheid, Zimbabwe in its land nationalisations presented itself as a ‘black/white’ issue, an Apartheid in reverse. So it became an easy country to criticise because what were complex issues could be presented so starkly and simply,” Stephen Chan, Professor of World Politics at the University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies, told IPS.

“Two of America’s recent ambassadors, Johnnie Carson and, currently, Brian Nichols, are black – so there are presentational issues in being too critical. In Zambia, the ‘offending’ U.S. Ambassador who was white was recalled at the demand of the Zambian Government,” Chan told IPS by email.

Despite these concerns and ongoing rift with the U.S. and EU, the Zimbabwean government  has turned to public relations lobbyists to reboot its battered imagine.

“The Zimbabwe regime is propped up by human rights abuses, by repression, by silencing the masses, this is why they continue with abuses while hoping that propaganda and public relations will clean their soiled image internationally,” Dewa Mavhinga, Human Rights Watch’s southern Africa director, told IPS.

“As a result, the Zimbabwe government spends huge amounts paying PR companies in Washington DC in the hope that those companies will help with image issues, but the truth is simply that the Zimbabwe government must stop abuses and start respecting human rights. No-one in the international community will respect a country that allows abductions, torture and rampant rape of women,” Dewa told IPS.

Government spokesperson Nick Mangwana would later tell local media that Zimbabwe was not seeking to be enemies with the U.S., something Chan, the international politics professor, said Zimbabwe cannot afford.

“Zimbabwe desperately needs to retain as good a set of relations as possible with the U.S. as part of the West. The country is basically bankrupt. It almost begs for help. Even in moments of argument, it cannot afford to alienate a country like the U.S.,” Chan said.

While Zimbabwe has in the past threatened to expel “meddlesome” U.S. ambassadors, the current government has resisted the temptation.

“Removing an ambassador would be a major diplomatic step. If the Zimbabwean government were to remove him (ambassador Nichols), the U.S. would likely react by suspending, temporarily at least, Zimbabwean diplomats in the U.S. or reduce its diplomatic presence in Zimbabwean until the government made some meaningful progress on political and economic reforms,” Nathan Hayes, an analyst with the United Kingdom-based Economist Intelligence Unit, told IPS.

“Ultimately, it would not be a game Zimbabwe would win,” he said.

After he was summoned by Zimbabwe’s foreign affairs minister, U.S. ambassador Nichols issued his own statement, looking beyond the ongoing row which served as a reminder of the U.S. continuing humanitarian support of Zimbabwe.

“The American people’s unwavering commitment to the welfare of Zimbabwe’s people has kept us the largest assistance donor,” Nichols said.

In January this year, the U.S. reported that it had provided $318 million to Zimbabwe in 2019, adding “notwithstanding ongoing anti-democratic and repressive practices by the Government of Zimbabwe which continue to affect the bilateral relationship, the United States remains the ‎largest provider of health and humanitarian assistance”.

According to the U.S. Agency for International Aid (USAID), the U.S. has provided “more than $3.2 billion in development assistance to Zimbabwe since its independence in 1980”.

“Zimbabwe must be careful about biting the hand that feeds it,” Piers Pigou, Crisis Group’s Senior Consultant for Southern Africa, told IPS.

“The colourful posturing and allegations from the government that are levelled at successive U.S. Ambassadors, invariably reflect a clumsy ideological posturing that seeks to avoid an empirically rooted engagement on the substantive issues of contestation,” Pigou told IPS.  

“Zimbabwe’s credibility as a commentator and protector of human rights will only develop once it puts in place, develops and invests in the institutional capacity, competencies and independence of its democracy supporting institutions and builds an identifiable culture of accountability,” he said.

As anger against the U.S. swelled across the globe in condemnation of Floyd’s death, in Zimbabwe ruling Zanu PF supporters had planned to hold a demonstration on Jun. 4 outside the U.S. embassy in Harare in what could have done nothing to promote entente between the two countries.

Police denied the ruling party supporters permission to stage the protest, citing COVID-19 restrictions. 

“The U.S. and Zimbabwe have open antagonism. There is a clash of pretentious political ideologies,” William Mpofu, a political analyst and researcher at the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa, told IPS.

“Under Mugabe the ideology was pretentious pan-Africanist radicalism. The U.S. has pretended to democracy and liberalism. These two rhetorics have a natural antagonism but they are both fake and fundamentalist. The U.S. can do without Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe cannot survive without U.S.,” Mpofu said.

With coronavirus lockdown restrictions that have seen countrywide state sanctioned human rights abuses in Zimbabwe in place indefinitely, and with general elections coming in 2023, elections historically marred by state sponsored repression, analysts are watching whether this will further sour relations between the two countries.

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The post Zimbabwe and US Diplomacy – this Time the Fight is About George Floyd appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

A recent diplomatic spat between Zimbabwe and the U.S. began after a senior U.S. official accused Zimbabwe of fomenting unrests across America in the wake of the killing of the unarmed African American, George Floyd.

The post Zimbabwe and US Diplomacy – this Time the Fight is About George Floyd appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Credit: DegreesOfLatitude

By Elena L. Pasquini
ROME, Jun 8 2020 (IPS-Partners)

The COVID-19 outbreak has brought the world back to the essentials: health and food. Fighting the spread of the virus while ensuring access to food has proven to be a challenge in many countries. The loss of income is reducing families’ ability to feed themselves; movement restrictions and lack of labour for planting and harvesting are a strain on the chain that brings food from field to fork. Hundreds of millions of the most vulnerable people are on the brink of acute hunger, and food insecurity is likely to increase globally.

The fragility of the food chain and the role played by agriculture in the multiple, unfolding crises—including climate change, diminishing biodiversity, and nutritional crises in the forms of undernutrition and overnutrition—are not new issues. But the current emergency is adding a sense of urgency to the need of rethinking the way in which food is produced, distributed and consumed.

COVID-19 “is exacerbating a lot of weaknesses in our current food systems,” Emile Frison, member of the International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems, told Degrees of Latitude. “The vulnerability of … large industrial production systems has been clearly shown through this pandemic …,” he stressed.

What strategies exist to build food systems that are resilient to shocks? What alternatives are there to industrial agriculture?

Agroecology is one of those models. No longer niche, it is at the core of global and national legislations, and is increasingly being implemented on farms. Is it economically feasible? Can it feed a growing world population? What are the constraints for the transition to agroecological food systems?

That is what we are going to investigate in our series of articles devoted to the future of food.

This article was first published by Degrees of Latitude

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Padma River Basin, Bangladesh Credit: Nidhi Nagabhatla

By Nidhi Nagabhatla
HAMILTON, Canada, Jun 8 2020 (IPS)

Do migrants willingly choose to flee their homes, or is migration the only option available?

There is no clear, one-size-fits-all explanation for a decision to migrate — a choice that will be made today by many people worldwide, and by an ever-rising number in years to come because of a lack of access to water, climate disasters, a health crisis and other problems.

Data are scarce on the multiple causes, or “push factors,” limiting our understanding of migration. What we can say, though, is that context is everything.

UN University researchers and others far beyond have been looking for direct and indirect links between migration and the water crisis, which has different faces — unsafe water in many places, chronic flooding or drought in others.

The challenge is separating those push factors from the social, economic, and political conditions that contribute to the multi-dimensional realities of vulnerable migrant populations, all of them simply striving for dignity, safety, stability, and sustainably in their lives.

A new report, ‘Water and Migration: A Global Overview,’ (https://bit.ly/3gxDgE7) from UNU’s Institute for Water, Environment and Health, offers insights into water and migration interlinkages, and suggests how to tackle existing gaps and needs.

Its information can be understood easily by stakeholders and proposes ideas for better informed migration-related policymaking, including a three-dimensional framework applicable by scholars and planners at multiple scales and in various settings.

The Report also describes some discomforting patterns and trends, among them:

• • By 2050, a combination of water and climate-driven problems and conflicts will force 1 billion people to migrate, not by choice but as their only option;

 

• • Links to the climate change and water crises are becoming more evident in a dominant trend: rural-urban migration;

 

• • That said, there is a severe lack of quantitative information and understanding re. direct and indirect water and climate-related drivers of migration, limiting effective management options at local, national, regional, and global scales

 

• • Global agreements, institutions, and policies on migration are concerned mostly with response mechanisms. Needed is a balanced approach that addresses water, climate, and other environmental drivers of migration

 

• • Unregulated migration can lead to rapid, unplanned, and unsustainable settlements and urbanization, causing pressure on water demand and increasing the health risks and burdens for migrants as well as hosting states and communities

 

• • Migration should be formally recognized as an adaptation strategy for water and climate crises. While it is viewed as a ‘problem,’ in fact it forms part of a ‘solution’

 

• Migration reflects the systemic inequalities and social justice issues pertaining to water rights and climate change adaptation. Lack of access to water, bad water quality, and a lack of support for those impacted by extreme water-related situations constitute barriers to a sustainable future for humankind.

Case studies in the report provide concrete examples of the migration consequences in water and climate troubled situations:

• • The shrinking of Lake Chad in Africa and the Aral Sea in Central Asia

 

• • The saga of Honduran refugees

 

• • The rapid urbanization of the Nile delta, and

 

• The plight of island nations facing both rising seas and more frequent, more intense extreme weather events.

In addition, the added health burdens imposed on people and communities by water pollution and contamination create vicious cycles of poverty, inequality and forced mobility.

While the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) agenda does not include an explicit migration target, its mitigation should be considered in the context of SDGs that aim to strengthen capacities related to water, gender, climate, and institutions. These issues resonate even as the world deals with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Recent news stories have chronicled the plight of desperate migrant workers trapped in the COVID-19 crisis in India, and of displaced people in refugee camps where social distancing is unachievable, as is access to soap and water, the most basic preventive measure against the disease.

Add to that the stigma, discrimination, and xenophobia endured by migrants that continue to rise during the pandemic.

Even at this moment, with the world fixated on the pandemic crisis, we cannot afford to put migration’s long-term causes on the back burner.

While the cost of responses may cause concerns, the cost of no decisions will certainly surpass that. There may be no clear, simple solution but having up-to-date evidence and data will surely help.

On World Environment Day ( https://bit.ly/3dnKkks) last week (June 5), we were all encouraged to consider human interdependencies with nature.

Let us also acknowledge that water and climate-related disasters, ecological degradation and other environmental burdens causes economic, health and wellbeing disparities for migrants and populations living in vulnerable settings.

The post Water, Climate, Conflict & Migration: Coping with 1 Billion People on the Move by 2050 appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Nidhi Nagabhatla is Principal Researcher, Water Security at the UN University’s Institute for Water, Environment and Health, funded by the Government of Canada and hosted by McMaster University in Hamilton, Canada

The post Water, Climate, Conflict & Migration: Coping with 1 Billion People on the Move by 2050 appeared first on Inter Press Service.

PRESS RELEASE
 

By External Source
Jun 8 2020 (IPS-Partners)

The Commonwealth Secretary-General is urging governments to ensure their countries’ post-COVID economic recoveries are environmentally sustainable and safe for the ocean.

Forty-seven of the Commonwealth’s 54 member countries have a coastline while 25 are either small island developing states or ‘big ocean states’ relying heavily on the ocean for food and income.

On World Oceans Day (8 June), Secretary-General Patricia Scotland calls on countries to reform development strategies in a way that supports vibrant and sustainable blue and green economies.

Patricia Scotland

She said: “The ocean is the life blood of so many Commonwealth countries and our environment should be the cornerstone as we put plans in place to recover our economies. The Commonwealth covers more than a third of coastal oceans in the world, contributing to a global ocean-based economy valued at US$3 to 6 trillion per year.

“COVID-19 impact has radically altered some of our key economic sectors and transformed the way we live, communicate and do business. While the fallout from the pandemic has had a huge impact on our blue economies, it also presents a crucial opportunity to strategise on how to accelerate the transition towards more sustainable economic practices built on climate resilience and ocean sustainability.

“The Commonwealth Blue Charter is one of the most effective platforms for global ocean action in the international landscape today. I commend the work of our member countries through the action groups and welcome the support we have received from national, regional and global partners, enabling us to mobilise together for ocean health.”

The Blue Charter is the Commonwealth’s commitment to work together to protect the ocean and meet global ocean commitments. Ten action groups, led by 13 champion countries, are driving the flagship initiative. More than 40 countries have signed up to one or more of these action groups, and counting.

Commonwealth Blue Charter action groups include: Sustainable Aquaculture (led by Cyprus), Sustainable Blue Economy (Kenya), Coral Reef Protection and Restoration (Australia, Belize, Mauritius), Mangrove Ecosystems and Livelihoods (Sri Lanka), Ocean Acidification (New Zealand), Ocean and Climate Change (Fiji), Ocean Observations (Canada), Commonwealth Clean Ocean Alliance (marine plastic pollution – United Kingdom, Vanuatu), Marine Protected Areas (Seychelles) and Sustainable Coastal Fisheries (Kiribati) .

Members of the private sector, academia and civil society – including Vulcan Inc, Bloomberg Philanthropies, the Association of Commonwealth Universities, Nekton Foundation and many others – are also engaged as Blue Charter partners.

To find out more about the Commonwealth Blue Charter, visit the website.

Notes to Editor

For interviews with the Commonwealth Secretary-General on this issue, please contact Josephine Latu-Sanft via email or WhatsApp +44 7587657269

Media Contact

Josephine Latu-Sanft
Communications Division
Commonwealth Secretariat
T. +44 (0)20 7747 6476
Email: j.latu-sanft@commonwealth.int

Website thecommonwealth.org
Join the conversation Tweets by @commonwealthsec

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Excerpt:

PRESS RELEASE

 

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Jerald Aruldas, a journalist from the southern state of Tamil Nadu, and his colleague, were held by city police for 9 hours for reporting on stories around alleged government corruption around the food aid distribution system and how doctors in Coimbatore faced food shortages while working during the COVID-19 lockdown. Courtesy: Jerald Aruldas

By Samira Sadeque
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 5 2020 (IPS)

Governments have made the media “a scapegoat” across Asia, targeting journalists who are simply reporting on the failures or shortcomings of their leadership during the coronavirus pandemic, press freedom experts have warned.

“Governments have said that the real emergency caused by the pandemic has made it necessary for them to prevent the spread of false information that might, for example, cause panic,” Steven Butler, Asia programme coordinator at the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), told IPS. “Of course, in at least some cases it’s the government decisions themselves that have led to confusion and panic, and the media has simply become the scapegoat.”

Butler spoke to IPS following an appeal by United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet who on Wednesday warned that censorship has become more severe in countries across Asia under the pandemic. She requested governments around the world to take “proportionate” actions in case someone is spreading false information, and that those actions must comply with requirements of “legality, necessity, proportionality, [and serving] a legitimate public health objective”.

“When you have a police official defining necessity of a person’s arrest and detention on the basis that a ruling party politician came to the police station to file a case against the person, there is much to be concerned about how authorities interpret necessity, proportion and legality,” Saad Hammadi, Regional Campaigner of the South Asia division at Amnesty International, told IPS.

He was speaking about the plight of Bangladeshi journalist Shafiqul Islam Kajol who had disappeared for almost two months before he was “found” and taken to police custody — just in time for World Press Freedom Day.

Before Kajol’s disappearance and subsequent arrest, he was already facing charges under Bangladesh’s highly controversial Digital Security Act.

There are similar cases across Asia. 

In May, IPS reported on a number of cases in India where journalists were also arrested or detained for criticising the government.

In India’s southern state of Tamil Nadu, journalist Jerald Aruldas and photographer M Balaji had been detained for 9 hours after a series of pieces that exposed corruption in the government food aid distribution system, and the food issues that doctors in Coimbatore city faced. Their editor, Andrew Sam Raja Pandian, was subsequently arrested and released but was charged under several sections of criminal laws as well as The Disaster Management Act, 2005 for publishing the stories.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) records show governments in 12 countries across Asia are targeting journalists or anyone expressing their criticism about the pandemic response: Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam.

For people in all 12 countries where the arrests have taken place, the stifling of press freedom is not new. According to Reporters Without Borders’ Press Freedom 2020 Index, all 12 countries ranked quite low, with Malaysia and Nepal being the least restrictive among the group, and China and Vietnam being some of the most restrictive.

‘Fake news’ used as an excuse to restrict press freedom

In all these countries, the charges are some variation of the trope that any criticism is “false news”. Governments are making arrests or detaining those speaking up with the excuse that their so-called “fake news” incites panic among communities. In Cambodia, a child as young as 14 was arrested, along with 30 other individuals, for sharing commentary on social media. 

In Bangladesh, China, and India, health personnel, journalists and ordinary citizens have been detained or arrested for voicing similar concerns about their respective government’s response, or lack thereof. In Nepal, a bureaucrat was arrested for criticising the government’s response to the COVID-19 crisis.

“It’s unacceptable that even one person is persecuted for legitimately exercising their right to freedom of expression but since March this year, at least 16 journalists have been detained or sued on charges that are in contravention of the rights protected under international law on freedom of expression,” Hammadi of Amnesty International told IPS.

Bachelet said it’s crucial to remain alert and vigilant about misinformation at this time. During the first few weeks of the coronavirus crisis — even before it was termed a “pandemic” — misinformation surrounding the disease had become a crucial concern. In response to this, the World Health Organisation launched the EPI-WIN, which would provide users information in a timely manner, filtering out an overload of information without solutions.

An already existing problem

While the OHCHR statement came almost six months into the coronavirus crisis, experts have been ringing alarm bells about the issue for some time now.

In May, while observing World Press Freedom Day, Hammadi wrote that it’s important to be vigilant against those who are “exploiting” this moment to spread misinformation, but warned that “some governments are themselves exploiting this moment – to suppress relevant information uncomfortable for the government or use the situation as a pretext to crack down on critical voices”.

Butler of the CPJ told IPS that these are countries that were already armed with the trope of “false news” to charge journalists. And the pandemic only exacerbated that.

“Additional emergency legislation and decrees have increased pressure on journalists as governments boost efforts to control the flow of information,” Butler said. “In many cases, they have used these powers to go after journalists who report shortcomings in the government response to the pandemic. In some cases, the charges against journalists have been incredibly petty.”

In her appeal, Bachelet warned that heads of state must not use the crisis “to restrict dissent or the free flow of information and debate.”

“A diversity of viewpoints will foster greater understanding of the challenges we face and help us better overcome them,” she said. “It will also help countries to have a vibrant debate on the root causes and good practices needed to overcome the longer-term socio-economic and other impacts. This debate is crucial for countries to build back better after the crisis.”

Related Articles

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By Manuel Manonelles
BARCELONA, Jun 5 2020 (IPS)

Six months after the outbreak, the new global scenario resulting from the impact of COVID-19 is gradually becoming much more defined. From the very beginning, we sensed that little good could result from a situation so surprising and unexpected. Now it is becoming increasingly clear that we are entering times of extreme volatility in the international sphere. Times of uncertainty and incandescence as we have not seen for years.

The unrest in the United States and Brazil are clear signs in this direction. It is not by coincidence that they are occurring in the two countries with the highest numbers of COVID-19 cases in the world. The US in its way to the two million cases and with more than 100,000 deaths; and Brazil has exceeded half a million cases and more than thirty thousand dead, without taking into account the underreporting in both cases.

The destabilizing potential of COVID-19 in some of the world's major powers, and in parallel with the relations among them, is substantive; as is the resulting uncertainty

While it is true that the origin of the worst riots in decades in the United States is the death at the hands of the Minneapolis Police of an African-American citizen, it is obvious that the resulting anger has been fuelled by the accumulated frustration of recent months.  A time when structural racism in the United States has been overwhelmingly confirmed by the percentage of coronavirus deaths in the African American population, much higher than in the white one. The result is forty cities in the US with curfews, the deployment of the National Guard and Military Police in various States, and the militarization of the capital, Washington DC; quite serious.

The point, however, is that these are not two isolated situations, and that the destabilizing potential of COVID-19 in some of the world’s major powers, and in parallel with the relations among them, is substantive; as is the resulting uncertainty.

Keeping with the case of the United States, the confrontation between President Trump and several Governors –almost leading to a constitutional crisis -, the attacks on the WHO or the progressive and dangerous escalation of tension with China, always in the context of the coronavirus crisis, do not predict anything good.

And all this in the context of an electoral year in the US, with an epidemiological curve that is resisting to significantly decline, with 40 extra millions of unemployed … and one of the most controversial presidents in history who is running for re-election. Territory paid for by uncertainty.

Moreover, the references from the White House to the “Chinese virus” have had no real effect on Beijing, and rather have helped consolidate the evolution towards a more aggressive foreign policy such as that promoted by president Xi Jinping. In fact, the comparison of how the United States is facing the pandemic with respect to China, with all its shadows and doubts, does not burden Washington.

And after Hong Kong comes Taiwan. Very few days separate the announcement of the new legislation on Hong Kong, with its implications, the Beijing government withdrew the word “peaceful” from its annual call for reunification with this island. In a matter of few weeks, these two events added up to the seventh incident -so far this year – between the Chinese and Taiwanese air forces; new skirmishes between Chinese and Indian troops in the disputed border area in the Himalayas (and the consequent sending of reinforcements to both sides of the border). To this, we have to add the sinking of a Vietnamese fishing boat by the Chinese Coast Guard in waters also under discussion; or reports of incidents with Chinese ships around a Malaysian-managed oil rig.

Nor can we ignore the situation in the Russian Federation. After 400,000 cases of COVID-19, and a growing case curve, Putin is experiencing its lowest popularity in a long time, while the follow-up on social media of its main opponents rises like foam. Even more, this is pending on a referendum on July 1 to approve the constitutional reform that must perpetuate him in power. Referendum that will do little to contain the pandemic.

In this context, the images of a few months ago in which Russia sent cargo planes full of masks to the United States or deployed military support in the fight against coronavirus in northern Italy are far away. Nor has Russia been able to avoid tensions with China, with mutual reproaches over the closure of land borders or the importation of new cases from one country to another.

Latin America is a growing area of concern which, along with the United States, is the new epicentre of the pandemic, bringing over 3 million cases over the 2.3 million in Europe. The paradigmatic case is the aforementioned Brazil, with a “denialist” president, a faithful follower of the Trump doctrine, despite already being the second country in the world in number of COVID-19 cases.

We will see how countries like Chile react now that they have surpassed 100,000 cases, dragging a season of instability with a strongly contested government on the street (which it should be recalled that was forced to move the COP25 Climate Summit from Santiago de Chile to Madrid). Another case is Peru, which, despite having taken stricter measures, is already approaching 180,000 cases. The coronavirus is also growing in the Persian Gulf and India, where the world’s largest confinement is being lifted, affecting approximately 1.3 million people.

It is in a context like this, where there are few countries in the world – and less among the great powers- that can really show off for their management of the pandemic, that incentives and the temptation to find internal or external scapegoats to divert attention or redirect public anger are particularly high. If we add controversial or autocratic leadership, pre-existing tensions or the worrisome short-term forecasts in the economic field, the scenario we face is unpromising, and above all uncertain.

While in Europe the storm (or its first wave) calms down, in the rest of the world the pandemic grows, together with its resulting instability and volatility.

 

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Excerpt:

Manuel Manonelles is Associate Professor of International Relations, Blanquerna/University Ramon Llull, Barcelona

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By Pritha Mitra and Seung Mo Choi
Jun 5 2020 (IPS)

Food security in sub-Saharan Africa is under threat. The ability of many Africans to access sufficient, safe and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs has been disrupted by successive natural disasters and epidemics. Cyclones Idai and Kenneth, locust outbreaks in eastern Africa, and droughts in southern and eastern Africa are some examples. The COVID-19 pandemic is just the latest catastrophe to have swollen the ranks of 240 million people going hungry in the region. In some countries, over 70 percent of the population has problems accessing food.

Sub-Saharan Africa is the world’s most food-insecure region, and in the June 2020 sub-Saharan Africa Regional Economic Outlook, we show that climate change is increasing that insecurity.

The sub-Saharan is particularly vulnerable to the forces of climate change. Almost half the population lives below the poverty line and depends on rain-fed agriculture, herding, and fishing to survive . With each climate shock, whether drought, flood or cyclone, farmers suffer directly, while shortages elevate the price of food for all.

Lives lost, increased vulnerability

Africans are easily pushed into food insecurity because their ability to adapt is limited by many factors, including low savings and access to finance and insurance. As a result, lives are lost, malnutrition rises, health worsens, and school enrollment drops. All this, ultimately damages the economy’s productive capacity.

During these times of COVID-19, we are seeing these challenges play out.

Credit: International Monetary Fund

The measures to contain and manage the COVID-19 pandemic, while critical to saving lives, risks exacerbating food insecurity. Border closures, lockdowns, and curfews intended to slow the spread of the disease are disrupting supply chains that, even under normal circumstances, struggle to stock markets, and supply farmers with seeds and other inputs.

Designing COVID-19–era measures to improve food security

At this critical juncture, sub-Saharan Africa needs to prioritize policies targeted at reducing risks to food security as part of fiscal stimulus packages to counter the pandemic. Our analysis suggests these policies should focus on increasing agricultural output, and strengthening households’ ability to withstand shocks. This would have the added benefit of reducing inequalities while boosting economic growth and jobs.

Boosting agricultural output

Even before the pandemic, many countries in the region were proactive in protecting their food supply by raising crop productivity and reducing their sensitivity to inclement weather. For example, Mozambique is the location of a global pilot for newly-developed, heat-tolerant bean seeds, while in Ethiopia, some farmers’ yields rose by up to 40 percent after the development of rust-resistant wheat varieties (rust is brought on by higher temperatures and volatile rainfall).

Maintaining this momentum calls for continued progress in improving irrigation, seeds, and erosion protection, all of which would substantially boost production. Meanwhile raising farmers’ awareness would also accelerate implementation of these measures.

Withstanding shocks: An outsized impact

Adapting to climate change is critical to safeguarding the hard-earned progress in economic development sub-Saharan Africa has achieved in recent decades. However, adaptation will be especially challenging given countries’ limited capacity and financial resources.

The priority then should be on making progress in select, critical areas which could have an outsized impact in reducing the chances of a family becoming food insecure when faced with shocks from climate change or epidemics.

For instance, progress in finance, telecoms, housing, and health care can reduce a family’s chance of facing food shortages by 30 percent:

• Higher incomes (from diverse sources), and access to finance would help households buy food even when prices rise, allow them to invest in resilience ahead of a shock, and better cope afterwards.
• Access to mobile phone networks enables people to benefit from early warning systems and gives farmers information on food prices and weather—just a single text or voice message, could help them decide when to plant or irrigate.
• Better-built homes and farm buildings would protect people and food storage from climate shocks. Combined with good sanitation and drainage systems, they would also preserve people’s earning capacity by preventing injuries, and the spread of disease, while ensuring safe drinking water.
• Improved health care helps people return to work quickly after a shock; and, along with education, raises their income potential and helps inform their decisions.

Social assistance also has a major impact as it is critical in compensating people for lost income and purchasing power after a shock hits. Insurance and disaster risk financing can be critical too, but the success of these programs in sub-Saharan Africa often relies on government subsidies and improvements in financial literacy.

Concentrating adaptation strategies in sub-Saharan Africa on policies that have outsized impacts, including on food security, will help reduce their costs. Implementation of these strategies will be expensive—$30–50 billion (2–3 percent of regional GDP) each year over the next decade, according to many experts.

But investment now will be far less costly than the price of frequent disaster relief in the future, both for lives and livelihoods. Our analysis finds that savings from reduced post-disaster spending could be many times the cost of upfront investment in building resilience and coping mechanisms.

Securing sources of financing is especially challenging against the background of the pandemic and rising global risk aversion. But by stepping up financial support for adaptation to climate change in sub-Saharan Africa, development partners can make a tremendous difference in helping Africans put food on the table and recover from the pandemic.

Credit: International Monetary Fund

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Senior citizens supervise the construction of a community-run tree nursery and collective farm in Alangalang of Philippine’s Eastern Visayas region. Courtesy: Divisoria Peatland Farmers Association/WEAVER

By Stella Paul
HYDERABAD, India , Jun 5 2020 (IPS)

In the Philippines, May has long been a month of joy when farmers harvest their rice crop and celebrate the Pahiyas harvest festival. But this year, the mood was somber. The food production and supply system also affected, thanks to the coronavirus lockdown, and the economy frozen. As a result, millions of Filipinos, especially senior citizens, are now looking at an uncertain future.

• The country reopened gradually on Jun. 1, with some businesses being allowed to open.

Vulnerable Elderly in a Pandemic

Currently, 8.2 million of the country’s 109 million people are in the 60 and above age group, with almost 5 percent of the population aged 65 years and above. However, according to projections made by the Commission of Population and Development, a government institution, the numbers are growing and by 2030 the Philippines will have an elderly population of above 7 percent, putting it alongside the ageing Asian countries of Japan, China and South Korea.

But the welfare of the elderly has been a matter of public concern in the Philippines.

The country’s Human Rights Commission says that at least 40 percent of senior citizens experience abuse of some kind. This includes verbal, physical and financial abuse, perpetrated mostly by their children and other family members.

The commission, however, admits that there is a dearth of credible research done on the issue. A 2017 presentation by the advocacy group Coalition of Services of the Elderly also mentions that elderly Filipinos often become “the subject of discrimination, ridicule and even abuse. Some consider them merely as objects of charity and not individuals with inherent, equal and universal rights as other members of the society”.

An urban slum in Manila, Philippines. The COVID-19 pandemic has increased the vulnerabilities of the urban poor, especially senior citizens. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS

As part of its current work in Asia, the Asian Population and Development Association is looking primarily into the issue of the advanced ageing of Asian societies.

It’s policy brief on Ageing in Asia acknowledges that “policy responses to population ageing inherently involve questions of values, any responses require both the active involvement of parliamentarians and the creation of platforms for public discussions on these issues”.

Indeed, the abuse of senior citizens has prompted lawmakers in the Philippines to propose a special law to protect them. The “Anti-Elder Abuse Act,” was introduced to parliament last January and proposes to fine and penalise those who abuse senior citizens physically, psychologically, financially or sexually.

The proposed law also recognises senior citizens as a vulnerable sector who should receive a PhP 5,000 to PhP 8,000 (between $100 to $160) in cash assistance. It was approved by the country’s House of Representatives in February but is still to be formally passed into law. 

But in the meantime, the lockdown and subsequent restrictions put into place to fight the COVID-19 pandemic increased the vulnerabilities of the elderly. Local media regularly reported on senior Filipinos suffering from a lack of food and medicine as they remained indoors.

Risa Hontiveros, the Philippines first socialist woman senator and one of the country’s youngest lawmakers, has been a fierce advocate for senior citizen’s rights and protection. Hontiveros tells IPS that the COVID-19 pandemic has magnified the vulnerabilities of the Filipino elderly, particularly the poor.

“Since the government imposed what it calls the Enhanced Community Quarantine (ECQ) under which people are prohibited from leaving their houses except for frontliners and other essential personnel, poor senior citizens who still work, many in the informal sector, have been deprived of their main source of livelihood. They are left with very little choice but to rely on local government food packages that are simply not enough, and in many cases, inconsistent in their distribution,” Hontiveros says.

Fighting Curbs on Working Elderly

The lockdown in the Philippines started on Mar. 8 and and by the end of April the government had announced people over 60 and younger than 20 would be forbidden from leaving their homes even after “enhanced community quarantine” measures were lifted in early May. 

It drew massive protests from senior citizens as an overwhelming majority of them (over 6 million) were still in active jobs. The country currently has a workforce of 45 million.

The regulation was based on the number of COVID-19 patients and casualties aged 60 and above, and initial cases that showed transmission occurred mainly among the elderly who generally have weaker immune systems.

An elderly pedicab driver in Manila. The elderly, especially from poor communities, continue to face multiple vulnerabilities and sustainability challenges in the Philippines, which have increased due to the COVID19 pandemic. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS

But seniors citizens argued that not many of them are sickly or weak and those who were still earning, have to support their families financially.

To put a blanket curb on their mobility served to push them towards acute financial struggle and insecurities.

Finally, in May, the government allowed senior citizen who are part of the formal workforce to return to work. The stay-home order for those outside of the organised job sector, however, still remains valid and continues to be opposed by senior citizens who have taken social media to voice their anger.

According to members of one such group on Facebook “Seniors sa Panahon ng COVID”, the government’s decisions are only hurting the already vulnerable seniors further.

“It only goes to show that our voices are still not being heard by the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Disease (IATF) ) and we will remain in ISOLATION until full quarantine is lifted and by approximating it, it might last until somewhere next year. That is too much already for us to be imprisoned in our homes,” Virgilio Dedeles, one of the group members, says.  

Missing Essentials

For poor senior citizens, locked in their homes and dependent on aid, this means continued uncertainty and vulnerability.

76-year-old Lola Rosita of Malabon city says that since the lockdown began, the government has provided relief goods twice, but it’s still not enough. “We really need medicines to treat our current health conditions, hygiene kits, and face masks but we can’t buy them,” Rosita tells IPS.

The struggles of seniors living with disabilities is even greater.

Lola Paz, 71, from Bagong Silangan in Quezon city has a leg impairment due to avascular necrosis. She says that the government relief works are inadequate and lacking transparency.

“Based on my observation, the government doesn’t make any considerations to older persons. They know that older persons are at risk but we are ignored, especially as we face all these difficulties. We, [senior citizens] should be one of the priorities,” she tells IPS.

Hontiveros also agrees. 

However, the unclear guidelines and their actual implementation have caused much confusion in communities.

Quarantine guidelines failed to consider elderly couples and the elderly living alone, making access to food and other basic commodities difficult.

“My office, in partnership with the Coalition of Services of the Elderly and other senior citizens’ organisation launched a relief mission that provided immuno-packs containing masks, milk, vitamins, rice and other food items,” Hontiveros says.

Mobilising for Food Security

But in some provinces, senior citizens are using innovative ways such as diverse use of land and community farming to save off insecurities.

71-year-old Lola (Grandma) Anita lives in Alangalang, a town in the country’s second-largest peatland — the Leyte Sab-e Basin.

But she is not retired. These days Anita spends hours supervising a plant nursery that is part of a community initiative led by senior citizens to ensure food security for all through environmental conservation.

The nursery is run by Divisoria Peatland Farmers Association (DPFA), a collective that has joined hands with local government to restore the peatlands endangered by indiscriminate agricultural activities, deforestation, land degradation and occasional forest fire.

The restoration of the peatland – originally an initiative of the ASEAN Peatland Forest Project – aims to replant areas to suitable crops for local people and restore the natural, indigenous vegetation in some areas.

In the nursery, Anita is joined by several other senior citizens who are collectively growing plants and vegetables that are indigenous to their province and which can help restore the peatland eco-system.

Since the COVID-19 crisis began, farmers have not able to market their produce due to travel restrictions.

But with their collective subsistence farming, these senior citizens are not just restoring the peatland eco-system, but are sustaining their community, checking potential food loss while doing this sustainably.

The collective nursery is part of a larger plan, explains Paulia Lawsin Naira, founder of a local NGO called WEAVER, which works closely with the peatland restorers by mobilising and training them.

“Each of the plants grown here has multiple uses and can open up more livelihood opportunities for the locals. For example, Lanipao is used both for fuel wood and house construction and Ticog grass is used for handicrafts,” Lawsin tells IPS.

For Anita, being able to sustain their community while doing this sustainably is the need of the hour.

“COVID-19 has affected us [senior citizens] so much. The nursery helps me stay productive and also earn by making meaningful contributions to our environment,” she tells IPS.

 

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Credit: u/USMCinUSA

By Jan Lundius
STOCKHOLM / ROME, Jun 5 2020 (IPS)

Another episode of the spectacular show that could be called The Greatest Story Ever Told: The Saga of the Trump Presidency, scripted and acted by Trump himself, took place on 1st of June.

As U.S. cities were scenes of demonstrations and looting, President Trump declared himself to be ”the president of law and order” and said he was going to dispatch ”thousands and thousands” of law enforcement personell to Washington, to stop the ”destruction of property”. Meanwhile, tear gas, rubber bullets, shields and horses were used to empty the Lafayette Park in front of the White House from demonstrators. When the coast was clear it was time for the President´s photo-op. With a solemn expression Donald J. Trump walked across the park, between rows of police officers in full riot gear. He positioned himself in front of the boarded-up St. John’s Church. The President was handed a bible, which he raised, pointed to and said ”A Bible”. With a grave face he remained silent for a moment, before continuing: ”We have a great country. That’s my thoughts. Greatest country in the world. We will make it greater. We will make it even greater. It won’t take long. It’s not going to take long. You see what’s going on. You see it coming back.” That was all – bad play-acting, nothing more. No substantial message, no mentioning of the fact that the riots were the result of failed social justice, unequal distribution of wealth and benefits, insufficient and inadequate education, health services and housing, and endemic racism that the richest nation on the planet has been unable to tackle and which have become worse during the inept and reckless Trump administration.

To use church and bible as props is just another example of the Society of Spectacle that the former TV show host is trying to promote while he as U.S. President is serving greed and egocentrism instead of trying to bolster a decent living standard for his compatriots and address the greatest threat to humankind – the collapse of our natural habitat. I doubt if Trump ever read much, or anything at all, in the bible. If he began doing so he would already after the first page find that humans were chosen to ”rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground” (Gen 1:28). A task that cannot be compatible with the extinction of the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky and every living creature moving on ground. Whatever Trump intended by his bible waiving it could not have been to convey a message to take care of human lives and nature. Donald Trump, self-proclaimed upholder of Christan faith, is among other things a great supporter of plastic, a product that after having been popular for eighty years now is threatening to choke the world to death.

In 1869, a New York firm offered USD 10,000 to anyone who could find a substitute for ivory. Winner was a certain John Wesley Hyatt, who for the first time in human history invented a material unconstrained by the limits of nature, i.e. it could be manufactured without materials like wood, metal, stone, bone, tusk, and horn. Synthetic polymers were produced through a chemical process based on petrolium as the essential raw material. Plastic could imitate several natural substances and be crafted into a wide variety of shapes. It was improved by several chemists, among them some Nobel Prize winners, and was during the last century marketed as ”the material of a thousand uses”. However, the plastics´ spread all over the world did not begin in earnest until World War II, when the U.S. industry came to consider an increased production of plastic just as important to victory as military success. After the end of the war, production of plastic continued unabated. Considered to be an inexpensive, safe and clean substance, plastic eventually became the symbol of a future of abundant material wealth, finally liberated from the limitations that nature for thousands of years had imposed on human ingenuity. However, the chemical structure of most plastics renders them resistant to processes of natural degradation and they remain as harmful waste for thousands of years.

Approximately, 380 million tonnes of plastic is produced worldwide each year, 10 percent is recycled and 12 percent burned, while at least five million metric tonnes of plastic waste enter the oceans. More than 90 percent of all seabirds contain plastic in their organism and it is estimated that by 2050 it will by weight be more plastic than fish in the oceans.

Compounds used to manufacture plastics are released into air and water and thus enter all organic life, not the least humans. Plastic harms the human endocrine system – phthalates, bisphenol A (BRA), a component used in several plastics, imitates the female hormone estrogen and cause damage to thyroid hormones, which play a vital role in the metabolism, growth and development of the human body. Other chemicals used in the production of plastics cause skin inflammatory diseases and asthma. Children, as well as women in their reproduction age, are most at risk of having their immune- and reproductive systems damaged by hormone-disrupting chemicals used in plastics and regularly released into the environment. Recent studies have also found a link between phthalates and a rise in autism among children.

Unfortunately, plastic production and plastic waste is just one example of our mindless and ruthless destruction of earth’s precious resources. President Trump’s bible waiving in support of his political agenda is both pathetic and offensive. If religion is going to be a useful tool for the salvation of mankind we ought to emphasize compassion and cooperation inherent in the message of several religions, instead of the hate, violence and contempt for others preached by fanatics in support of their own twisted religious ideas. If we were in need of a global faith it ought to be in the form of a religious conviction fomenting support to the protection of the natural resources the entire creation depends upon.

Instead of waiving the bible, and any other scriptures, let us implement what is best for all of us and not follow a leader like Trump who pays homage to greed and profit at the expense of nature. When he in August last year inaugurated a huge plastic producing plant in Pennsylvania, Trump stated that ”elimination of fossil fuels” would not create any new jobs and invited ”the Pennsylvanians” to admire ”his” initiative to bring jobs to ailing areas and consider this to be a valid reason to vote for his re-election as the U.S. president. When asked if it was wise to spend so much money and effort on producing such a harmful product as plastic, Trump did true to form blame China: ”Well, we have a tremendous plastics [sic] coming over from Asia, from China, and various others [sic], It’s not our plastic that’s floating over in the ocean […] No, plastics are fine, but you have to know what to do with them.”

As of May 2020 the Trump administration has rolled back 64 environmental rules and regulations, and an additional 34 rollbacks are in progress. Trump has been a stout supporter of coal and oil production and his administration supports energy development on federal land, including gas and oil drilling in national parks, as well as in nearly all U.S. waters, the largest expansion of offshore oil and gas leasing ever proposed. The Trump administration has pulled the U.S. out of the Paris climate accord, replaced the Clean Power Plan with something called Affordable Clean Energy Rule that does not cap emissions. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s pollution-control policies have been rewritten, something that in particular benefits the plastic industry, since it eases control of its waste management. Furthermore, the Trump administration has repealed the nation’s Clean Water Rule and is currently proposing significant cuts in funding and changes in the implementation of the Endangered Species Act. When he waves his unread bible, Trump probably thinks it might make voters conclude he is God’s chosen candidate. However, it is actually hard to believe if God intended humans to be ”rulers of the earth” he expected that such a rule would contribute to the destruction of our habitat.

Unlike Trump, as a true God´s servant, Pope Francis in his encyclica Laudato si, Praise Be to You, stated that we currently experience a relentless exploitation and destruction of the environment, caused by apathy, the reckless pursuit of profits, excessive faith in technology and political short-sightedness, and declared: ”Here I would state once more that the Church does not presume to settle scientific questions or to replace politics. But I am concerned to encourage an honest and open debate so that particular interests or ideologies will not prejudice the common good.” A message that probably would not suite Donald J. Trump while he for political reasons tries to make use of the bible.

Jan Lundius holds a PhD. on History of Religion from Lund University and has served as a development expert, researcher and advisor at SIDA, UNESCO, FAO and other international organisations.

 

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The post The Bible, Donald Trump and Plastic appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

"I love L.A. I love Hollywood. They're beautiful.
Everybody's plastic – but I love plastic. I want to be plastic."
   &nbsp         &nbsp         &nbsp                                                     Andy Warhol
 

The post The Bible, Donald Trump and Plastic appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Credit: UN Women

By Lan Mercado, Mohammad Naciri, and Yamini Mishra
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 5 2020 (IPS)

COVID-19 has brought the world to a halt. Nations, businesses, and schools have closed, and billions are confined to their homes. Yet millions of care workers step out daily to keep the lights on and support those in need.

The majority of them are women – nurses, community health workers, sanitation workers, and others. They earn little and are grossly undervalued despite keeping our society and economy running.

Other forms of care – looking after families, cooking, cleaning, and fetching water aren’t paid at all. This ‘invisible’ work contributes over US$10.8 trillion a year to the global economy, and before COVID-19, women and girls provided 12.5 billion hours of free care work every day.

On average, women spend over 4 hours for every hour men spend on care work in Asia and the Pacific – over 4 times as much. Women spend nearly 11 times in Cambodia and Pakistan, 10 times in India, and 3 times in Bangladesh, Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam.

Yet, when Asia launched Covid-19 responses and stimulus packages, women and care work’s amiss. This callous neglect is a result of prioritizing the economy above everything else, compounded by social norms that undervalue care work and leave the burden to women and girls.

Care work, with no pay, has deprived women and girls of education, skill development, and gainful employment. It has left women with precarious jobs, insecure incomes, and no social safety. The pandemic has multiplied the load on care systems, already depleted and unfair, falling mostly on women.

Lockdowns have increased child and elderly care for women.

With schools shut in 188 countries,1.5 billion students and over 63 million primary teachers are confined to their homes. Social gender norms have left women and girls spending more time caring and providing educational support to children.

Older people are at greater risk to COVID-19, and in Asia, where elderly often live with their children, women will shoulder the responsibility for looking after them.

Times of uncertainty and disease worsens inequalities for women.

By default, women are more likely to be in poorly paid jobs at the lowest ends of value chains without a chance at education or building skills. With a looming global depression, they are likely to be the first fired and last re-hired.

There’s a high risk of losing fragile yet meaningful gains made in formal workforces – limiting women’s ability to support themselves and families, especially for female-headed households.

80 percent of world’s domestic workers are women. Uncertainty looms for many domestic workers who travel internationally from the Philippines, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and elsewhere.

Women send US$300 billion home yearly, half of total global remittances. Migrant women losing jobs due to restrictions will hit their families back home.

As caregivers, women face higher risks from Covid-19.

Globally, 70% of poorly paid health care workers are women – in frontlines – often without training or proper safety equipment. In China’s Hubei province, 90% of health workers are women.

Each ASHA community health worker from India’s Panjab visits at least 25 homes a day to screen suspected patients; majority without safety equipment, training, and testing, and COVID-19 cases are rising among them.

Within homes too, women hold the main responsibility of care for patients discharged from hospitals or placed in quarantine at home.

Women and girls, locked-down in their homes, are facing escalating domestic violence – likely stuck with their abusers. Life-saving support to survivors from front-line services, such as heath, police, and social welfare may be slow or at a halt altogether as they are overburdened.

We need to act now to protect women and girls and recognize care work that is sustaining us through this crisis:

• Asia must come together to save lives of all including caregivers from COVID -19. The governments must invest in information, training, and safety equipment. All caregivers – whether at homes or hospitals – need access to testing, treatment, and health care. When a vaccine or treatment is available, it must be accessible and affordable to all including women and girls living in poverty.
• Care workers including unpaid carers must have social protection. Employers -government or business – must support childcare for all who need it. Cash aid to those with livelihoods hit must be enough for a decent living – especially for those kept away from jobs due to care burdens. International lenders and governments must make social protection a priority in stimulus packages.
• Businesses must respect human rights and be responsible for workers. While at work, all workers must have safety equipment to protect themselves. Flexible working hours, paid leave, and work from home will ease the extra burdens pandemic has created – especially for the care workers.

Looking beyond, as we build anew our broken economies and societies, we must reduce, redistribute, and represent care work once and for all:

• ASEAN, SAARC, and governments need inclusive Regional Action Groups to develop regional and national policies to recognize, reduce, and redistribute unpaid and underpaid care work. These policies must be backed up by resource and infrastructure investment to create secure and decent care work opportunities.
• We must professionalize care work and create women’s social enterprises to help care workers transition to decent work through training, education, and certification.

Finally, we must promote healthier social norms on care work, share care work equally, mobilize public support, and call for flexible work arrangements to balance work and family commitments.

“Women’s Unpaid and Underpaid Work in the Times of Covid-19: Move towards a new care-compact to rebuild a gender equal Asia,” an online brief/blog by the three agencies detailing issues and recommendation in depth will be made available on the 1st of June at:

• https://asiapacific.unwomen.org/en/news-and-events/stories/2020/06/womens-unpaid-and-underpaid-work-in-the-times-of-covid-19
• https://asia.oxfam.org/latest/blogs/womens-unpaid-and-underpaid-work-times-covid-19

The post Covid-19: Caring for Care Workers appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Lan Mercado is the Regional Director for Oxfam in Asia; Mohammad Naciri is the Regional Director for UN Women Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific; Yamini Mishra is the Director, Global Issues Programme for Amnesty International --- International Secretariat.

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Credit: Unsplash / Gabriel Benois

By Fairuz Ahmed
NEW YORK, Jun 4 2020 (IPS)

Maliha Masud (25), was promised an affluent life and opportunities for higher education. A bright student studying Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, she wanted to complete her studies and become someone her parents would be proud of. She was promised an opportunity to get her Master’s degree from a good university in the United States but, two years later, was left battered and wounded at the doorstep of a shelter.

Maliha was 20 years old when she married an immigrant living in the United States, who was completing his Master’s at a renowned university. A marriage arranged by a “reputable marriage medium,” she was promised the freedom to study and work after the nuptials. For the dowry, her father sold the family’s only property, bore all expenses for the wedding ceremony, and even bought the entire family plane tickets to travel to the United States.

“I was tricked,” Maliha told IPS. “They robbed me and my parents. My marriage only lasted two years and it was the worst two years of my life. As soon as we arrived in the US, they took my passport, wedding jewelry, and all my student documents. I was barred from leaving the house and the only way I could communicate with my parents was on a landline – and I was only allowed to speak when one of my in-laws’ was present in the room. I was trapped.

“My ex-husband had a love affair with a woman here before marrying me. My in-laws tried to make him end it by getting him married to me against his will. They threatened me, telling me that I was nothing but a refugee, here, and after they found me trying to call the police, they burned all my documents.”

Maliha was beaten and left at the gates of a local shelter in California. After months of treatment, she recuperated. She had no papers to prove her identity and her passport, certificates, along with all her belongings, had been destroyed. With the help of community outreach and the government, she could finally establish her identity and retrieve whatever was left at her in-law’s house. Her husband was taken into custody, was tried for battery and now has a permanent criminal record for domestic violence.

After healing with therapy and trauma assistance, Maliha moved to the East Coast. A New York based NGO named SAFEST (South Asian Fund for Education, Scholarship & Training, Inc) supported her with shelter and helped her to complete her studies. Four years later, she was self-sufficient and became actively involved in helping other women manage trauma and in raising awareness within the immigrant community.

According to the New York Times, the number of homicides by intimate partners in the US rose to 2,237 in 2017. This was a 19 percent increase from the 1,875 killed in 2014. The majority of these victims were women. Women often do not report the abuse to police, believing the process is futile.

Credit: Unsplash / Donald Martinez

According to a survey by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), women who had demonstrated a credible fear of being deported to their native country, 40 percent said they experienced sexual assaults, rape, physical attacks, and threats. Yet, they did not report to the police.

Asked by IPS about the top most priorities for ensuring safety for newly arriving immigrants, Mahila says that the main thing she can emphasize on is access to information: “When a girl gets married and comes to the US, she naturally becomes dependent on her husband and in-laws. I could speak English and could reach out for help. But I felt overwhelmed with fear, with the threat of abandonment, and I had no relatives or ties here.”

Mazeda A. Uddin who runs SAFEST in New York, focuses mostly on the immigrant community from South Asia. She has helped more than 120 women survive extreme domestic violence. She also helps men and the LGBTQ community in terms of rehabilitation and job readiness.

Speaking with IPS, Mazeda said: “I get calls not only from New York state, but also from other states, from girls who are desperate for help, but do not have enough courage to call the police or speak up. Most of the cases we deal with are immigrant women who came to this country by marriage and they are denied a normal life or opportunity to integrate. It is common to see isolation as a tactic to keep them indoors and have documents taken away. Also, threats of deportation, threats of harming relatives back home, and using children as a means to inflict more harm are very common for the Asian demographic.”

She stated that most cases her organization deals with are from India, Bangladesh, China, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The victims are mostly between 18 and 35 years old, and come to the US under spousal visas and tourist visas. Many, however, live as undocumented people.

According to the Migration Data Portal, female migrants face stronger discrimination and are more vulnerable to mistreatment than male migrants. The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) no. 5 aims to achieve gender equality and to empower all women and girls. Over the past 25 years, there has been some progress in reforming laws towards improving gender equality, but discriminatory laws and gaps in legal protection persist in many countries.

Mazeda explains that if women are subjected to gender-based violence, they may qualify for protection through the US asylum program. If a man or a woman declares themselves belonging to the LGBTQ community and can show proof of hostility in their own countries, they too can receive asylum in the US.

SAFEST has partnerships with various organizations that cater to various demographics and minority communities and provide extensive mental, financial, and emotional support for them. Erasing the language barrier by providing linguistic training is especially important in combatting domestic violence. Mazeda sees this as a mandatory requirement. Often, women are crippled by the inability to communicate and remain homebound – a condition exploited by oppressors.

Under the Violence Against Women Act, several immigrants and non-immigrant visa categories are available for victims of partner violence, sexual assault, rape, or human trafficking. Spouses of US citizens or lawful permanent residents (i.e. green-card holders) may be eligible for permanent residence on the basis of that abuse, allowing victims to obtain lawful status without their abuser being notified.

Maliha’s case, and those encountered by Mazeda, show just how impactful the information and knowledge gap can be on the lives of the vulnerable arriving in the United States. Without the ability to properly communicate, or understand the new paradigm of law they are going to be living under, many abuse victims fall through the cracks into lives of indignity. As much as we believe in the depth of our civility, we need community-based, grass-roots efforts, to provide assistance to those in need.

The post Migrant Women Exploited by Those They Trust appeared first on Inter Press Service.

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

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

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

Asif Zaman

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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