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Globally, nine million additional children are at risk of being pushed into child labour by the end of 2022 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, which could rise to 46 million without access to critical social protection coverage. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS.

By Baher Kamal
MADRID, Nov 19 2021 (IPS)

Kailash Satyarthi,  an Indian social reformer and co-recipient of the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize, along with Malala Yousafzai, spoke in a recent international forum about the devastating impacts of child labour.

“Nothing is as brutal as the death of a child’s dream,” said Satyarthi, who campaigned against child labour in his homeland. “We should feel the moral responsibility that we have to fulfill the dreams of these children.”

The Global Solutions Forum was held in the context of the International Year for the Elimination of Child Labour, and it brought together representatives from government ministries, farmers’ organisations, workers’ groups, and development banks, businesses, as well as children, youth advocates, and former child labourers.

The Nobel Peace laureate’s words came ahead of the 2021 World Children’s Day, marked 20 November. The Day’s theme is–ironically: A Better Future for Every Child.

 

The nation of 160 million plus children

These children form a nation of 160 millions plus victims, the double of a big European country’s -Germany- total population. They do not know each other, but they are all victims of the current prevailing human rights abuses.

Half of them -or 80 million– are just 5 to 11 years old, and their number has been rising due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Without mitigation measures, their number could rise to nearly 170 million by the year 2022.

Millions of them are trapped in hazardous work, and they are also easy prey to human trafficking.

 

Two-thirds in the rural sector

Given that more than two thirds plus –or 70%– of all these boys and girls are rural workers, Qu Dongyu, the director general of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), has urged ways to stamp out the practice –which he called “a serious violation of human rights,”– by the year 2025.

For them, Qu stressed that effective action and strong and coherent leadership from agri-food stakeholders across the globe is critical. “Child labour deprives boys and girls of their childhood, their potential and dignity, while also being harmful to their physical and mental development.”

Although not all work carried out by children is considered child labour, “much of it is not age-appropriate, and many vulnerable families, especially in rural areas, have no choice.”

 

Also in services and industry

While the agriculture sector accounts for 70% of children in child labour, it is followed by 20% in services and 10% in industry.

As well, nearly 28% of 5 to 11-year-olds and 35% of those aged 12 to 14 in child labour, are out of school.

Child labour is more prevalent among boys than girls at every age but when 21 hours per week of household chores are taken into account, the gender gap in child labour narrows.

 

Reasons behind

Contributing factors include low family incomes, few livelihood alternatives, limited access to education, inadequate labour-saving technologies, and traditional attitudes surrounding children’s participation in agriculture.

In sub-Saharan Africa, population growth, recurrent crises, extreme poverty, and inadequate social protection measures have led to an additional 16.6 million children in child labour over the past four years, according to this year’s report Child Labour: Global estimates 2020, trends and the road forward, elaborated by the International Labour Organisation(ILO) and the UN Children Fund (UNICEF).

 

More victims

Globally, nine million additional children are at risk of being pushed into child labour by the end of 2022 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, which could rise to 46 million without access to critical social protection coverage, the two world bodies have reported.

“Additional economic shocks and school closures caused by COVID-19 mean that children already obliged or forced to work, may be working longer hours or under worsening conditions, while job and income losses among vulnerable families may push many more into the worst forms of child labour,” according to Guy Ryder, the ILO director general.

 

Not an escape

Ryder also underlined that child labour did not have to continue indefinitely. “Child labour is not an escape road from poverty, it actually prolongs poverty; it makes poverty inter-generational,” he said.

This year’s World Day Against Child Labour, warned in its campaign: ‘Victims’ Voices Lead the Way’ which is aimed at putting a spotlight on victims’ untold stories, and on their roles in the fight against trafficking, warned that progress to end child labour has stalled for the first time in 20 years, reversing the previous downward trend that saw the number put to work fall by 94 million between 2000 and 2016.

 

Cyber crimes

The UN Secretary General urged States to take action against human trafficking, where a third of all victims are children.

“The COVID pandemic has pushed as many as 124 million more people into extreme poverty. And “many millions” have been left vulnerable to the scourge of human trafficking.

“Criminals everywhere are using technology to identify, control and exploit vulnerable people,” the UN chief said, adding that children are increasingly targeted through online platforms for sexual exploitation, forced marriage and other forms of abuse.

Governments are aware, or at least they should. This practice against ten of millions of children is just one of the long list of human rights violations.

This is also the case of 1.000.000.000 child-girls who are either mutilated or forced to be mothers or both. Let alone the discrimination and marginisation against the millions of children who are forced to work… just because they are poor.

Alia Chughtai (standing at the back), a journalist with filmmaker Akhlaque Mahesar (right, behind the table), and others in their team at Aur Chaawal (And Rice). Chughtai believes in using local fresh ingredients that are healthy and planet-friendly. Her method of cooking fits in with the Barilla Center for Food and Nutrition’s Double Pyramid. Credit: Zofeen T. Ebrahim/IPS

By Zofeen Ebrahim
KARACHI, Nov 19 2021 (IPS)

Balance is the absolute key, says Alia Chughtai, a journalist who started a catering service with filmmaker Akhlaque Mahesar, by the name of Aur Chaawal (And Rice), two years ago.

She knows what she is talking about. Suffering from gastrointestinal issues, Chughtai’s journey towards healthy eating started a decade ago. Once she understood the science behind nutrition and what balance of eating meant, she understood what her body had gone through. And thus began her quest for cleansing it.

“I couldn’t have garlic or onions for eight straight weeks,” the two most essential ingredients one cannot imagine cooking desi (slang for Pakistani) food without, she told IPS.

Two years ago, Chughtai decided to turn her food journey into a small side business.

“I got into this because there was a personal need for clean desi food without the bad oil, chemical-laced spices and food colouring,” she said. Today her fight is against processed food which she believes is the reason behind the multitude of ailments in people, and she swears by “heartily grown vegetables and fruits”.

“But it’s not a solo ride,” she said. For a well-oiled business to run successfully and expand, the pair have divided their tasks. While Chughtai oversees the day-to-day operations and “menu ideation”, Mahesar looks after the background logistics.

Surmai (fish) korma and rice with crispy okra and fried chillies on the side. One of the balanced dishes found at Aur Chaawal. Credit: Zofeen T. Ebrahim/IPS

While navigating the ‘farm to fork’ path, trying to find the balance between sustainability, nutrition, and access, Mahesar said they try their best “to use locally grown, locally made products”.

In turn, the duo has become acutely aware of fairer returns for small businesses and farmers.

“Ours is a small business, and we are all for supporting other small businesses,” said Chughtai’s partner.

The pandemic also acted as a catalyst for many Pakistanis to think and produce locally.

“We try to source as much as possible from around Pakistan, including the different types of cheeses and even the pasta,” he said.

But looking for quality produce requires quite a bit of research, which they both enjoy doing.

“We get a month’s supply of spices from small towns in Sindh; a certain species of chillies from Muzaffarabad, in the Punjab province; saffron and buckwheat from Hunza, in Gilgit-Baltistan region and saag (mustard plant) from Lahore, also in Punjab. They substitute ghee (a type of clear butter) for oil to cook in, which they get from Matiari, also in Sindh, weekly.

Fayza Khan, president of the Pakistan Nutrition and Dietetic Society (PNDS), strongly feels those in the food business must preach and practice healthy and sustainable eating, advocate for science-based diets, recommend reduced intake of meat and highly processed foods and demand from the government better labelling on packaged food.

To “reduce the burden of malnutrition and non-communicable diseases”, those in the food business should “play their part” in promoting healthier ways of cooking food and minimizing food waste.

Frowning upon overconsumption of fat-laden food, including bakery products, fast food, and sweetened beverages, she said: “Nutrition and lifestyle-related chronic diseases in Pakistan among adults as well as in children including the prevalence of obesity and an onset of diabetes in young age is spreading fast.”

Khan, therefore, recommends “traditional foods” which are healthier if “home-cooked with better cooking techniques”.

Finding the balance between food systems and the planet. Credit: BCFN

And that is what the Barilla Center for Food and Nutrition (BCFN) advocates: that healthy diets, especially traditional foods, play a significant role in food sustainability as they have a low environmental impact.

For example, the Mediterranean diet of fresh fruit, vegetables, fish rather than red meat, and cereal-based products, such as pasta, and cooked in olive oil, help prevent heart disease. Little wonder Italians are ranked healthiest in the world. Italy has the highest number of centenarians in Europe.

As Chughtai and Mahesar fine-tuned their business model, they have increasingly understood the integrity of sustainable food strategies and started employing caution to minimize any environmental or climate impact it may be causing.

“As an entrepreneur in the food business, it is our responsibility to reduce greenhouse emissions, of animal welfare and protection of small farmers and workers in the food business,” said Chughtai.

“We initially used bagasse bowls and containers,” she explained but had to opt for cheaper recycled packaging boxes because bagasse was too expensive.

“We use regular reusable plastic boxes which we refill with food for 10% discount on the food,” she said, adding: “People don’t want to pay higher costs for desi cuisine!”

They also compost their wet kitchen waste and use it as manure for their vegetable roof garden, where they grow their red bell peppers, chillies, broccoli, tomatoes, eggplant, gourd, and some herbs.
But Chughtai, says Aur Chaawal, is not just a business; it is a quest for “clean food”.

It took her several years to find out that the root cause of her stomach issues, said Chughtai and said everything pointed toward the pre-packaged spices with their overdose of flavourings and colours. Averse to them, at Aur Chaawal, they use the old-fashioned pestle and mortar to pound fresh garlic, smash the ginger or chillies or grind the whole spices into powder.

“Our cooking may be labour intensive, alright,” she admitted, but insisted it was “clean and healthy”.

Chughtai may not be aware of it, but Aur Chaawal has uses Barilla Foundation’s Double Pyramid model of placing the health and climate pyramids side-by-side, encouraging healthy eating for humans and remaining respectful of the planet.

In a city like Karachi, which has a deluge of caterers, food joints and restaurants and a huge population of discerning gourmands, securing 10,000 followers on Instagram, and a steady daily clientele of between 35-45, in just two years, is no mean feat.

“We have to be innovative,” said Mahesar, but puts their success down to the awareness among their regular customers (that include many working women who want her to cook for their family), that the Aur Chaawal menu will be nothing but wholesome.

The business also caters to those who are counting their calories. But Chughtai insisted a one-size-fits-all formula does not work for here.

On average, she said, every body’s plate should be 1/4th filled with protein, 1/2 with greens and 1/4th with complex carbs”.

But she emphasized: “Everyone is different; you have to eat according to your health needs.”

For instance, on her plate, the portion of protein would be 1/3rd protein since she was low on iron. And this, she said, was the mistake many nutritionists in Pakistan make.

“You cannot apply the 1400/1500 calorie rule to everyone!” said Chughtai, who was fortunate to train under Adrian Leunga, a certified nutrition coach and personal trainer and who helped “reconfigure my brain about good food and bad food”.

One day, when her inner writer gets restless, she plans to document her “journey”. She intends to travel from the coastal villages to the mountain peaks and include recipes she picks up “of the unconventional eats and the ones we’ve adapted because Karachi is such a smorgasbord of ethnicities” in a “beautifully designed” compilation.

Till then, having brought up eating home-cooked food made by her mother, she said, Aur Chaawal will continue serving “clean” meals using the healthiest, organically grown produce and spices for their customers.

 

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After extending the COP26 climate negotiations an extra day, nearly 200 countries meeting in Glasgow, Scotland, adopted an outcome document that, according to the UN Secretary-General, “reflects the interests, the contradictions, and the state of political will in the world today”. Credit: UN News/Laura Quiñones

By Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury
NEW YORK, Nov 19 2021 (IPS)

A week has gone by since COP 26 with 197 Parties ended in the Scottish city of Glasgow on extended time last Saturday. Climate change which covers wide array of issues affecting all living beings engaged the people around the world for COP 26 in a way never experienced since COP1 was held in Berlin in 1995.

Extensive and round-the-clock media coverage, huge presence of the civil society, activism by the young people, substantive advocacy by large number of non-governmental organizations, even the creatively decorated conference venue – all gave COP 26 a profile never seen before.

Before Glasgow, 25 annually convened sessions of COPs have been held by Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) adopted in New York in May 1992 which “determined to protect the climate system for present and future generations”. But never in the history of COPs there was an occasion when the Parties publicly negotiated to change the outcome document which was televised around the world as in the Glasgow COP.

As is natural for such multilateral gatherings, reactions to the question whether COP 26 was successful were different from the Parties and other entities engaged in the process. Efforts to gloss over following COP 26 left the common people uncertain and unsure whether there was really any forward movement in Glasgow.

Contradictions

What was somewhat intriguing that speaking for the United Nations system as a whole, the Secretary-General expressed his disappointment about the compromise reached in the outcome commenting “…unfortunately the collective political will was not enough to overcome some deep contradictions.”

He even warned “It is time to go into emergency mode — or our chance of reaching net zero will itself be zero.” At the same time, Secretary-General’s rather confusing, ill-composed comment in his remarks at the conclusion of COP 26 that “We are still knocking on the door of climate catastrophe” left many wondering what he was trying to convey.

Even more intriguing is that where was his leadership as the universally accepted global leader in getting rid of those contradictions he was complaining about.? On the other hand, the Executive Secretary entrusted with the responsibility of organizing COPs was upbeat about the outcome and may be reflecting another contradiction in Glasgow. COP 26 also invited the UN Secretary-General to convene world leaders in 2023 to consider ambition to 2030 dangling the traditional carrot of expectation to the people of the world.

Alok Sharma touch

Let me bring out a very uniquely remarkable thing that happened in COP 26 as its UK-appointed full-time President Alok Sharma openly and visibly choked back tears saying “I am deeply sorry” as he banged his gavel for the adoption of the Glasgow Climate Pact.

His emotions and true feelings came out spontaneously as he was considerably upset by the proposal of India, joined by China, to change the expression “phase out” relating to coal consumption as agreed to by all till the moment of adoption.

India replaced that phrase with “phase down” thereby watering down the consensus intent of the Parties at COP 26. President Sharma expressed his apologies for the way things evolved in changing the agreed COP 26 outcome negotiated under his leadership and which he was about to gavel down. In my half a century of engagement in multilateral diplomacy,

I am not aware of any conference chair apologizing ever for his inability to protect the best interest of the participants in the outcome. Bravo to Alok Sharma for that honesty and integrity! He has shown the way to all future chairs that they can openly and courageously pronounce their failure identifying those who are dragging their feet destroying a forward-looking outcome.

It was also impressive the way President Sharma asserted the reality with his pithy comment that we have kept 1.5 Celsius alive “but its pulse is weak”.

Loss and Damage

The insensitivity of the Parties and their self-centered policy positions were starkly manifested in the decision relating to a major issue known as “Loss and Damage”. Not much media highlight was given to this very relevant item on COP 26 agenda. Even the UN’s Climate Change website does include in its list of topics.

I am sure many readers are picking their brains trying to recall the issue. “Loss and damage” is used within the COP process to refer to the harms caused by anthropogenic climate change. Establishing liability and compensation for loss and damage has been a long-standing goal for vulnerable and developing countries in the Alliance of Small Island States and the Least Developed Countries Group in negotiations.

However, developed countries have resisted this. At Glasgow, the developing countries lamented the outcome on loss and damage. They had called for a financial mechanism for loss and damage, but the outcome on loss and damage only included strengthening the existing technical support functions, and expectedly more empty and rejectionist talks to convene from 2022 to 2024.

The existing UNFCCC mechanism created by COP 19, the Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage, focuses on research and dialogue rather than liability or compensation.
Tasneem Essop, Executive Director, Climate Action Network succinctly described COP 26 as “a clear betrayal by rich nations – the US, the EU and the UK- of vulnerable communities in poor countries.”

She went on to say that by blocking the proposal of the developing countries representing 6 billion people, on the creation of a Glasgow Loss and Damage Finance Facility “rich countries have once again demonstrated their complete lack of solidarity and responsibility to protect those facing the worst of the climate impacts.

Referring to close-door pressure tactics, Saleemul Huq, Director, International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) regretted that “The COP Presidency has overnight been bullied into dropping the Glasgow Loss and Damage Finance Facility. The UK’s words to the vulnerable countries have been proven to be totally unreliable.”

Natalie Lucas, Executive Director, Care About Climate very forcefully spoke about the loss and damage issue and expressed total disappointment commenting that “Developed nations, including the US, have not risen to the challenge to do what is necessary to protect people. We have missed the train on mitigation, on adaptation, and now it is colliding into the most vulnerable people.”

At the end the Glasgow Climate Pact pitifully agreed “to enhance understanding of how approaches to averting, minimizing and addressing loss and damage can be improved”. It clearly reflects how the “powerful” of the world impose their totally irrelevant and illogical position on the poorest and most vulnerable humanity.

About the Glasgow outcome, globally respected eminent economist Jeffrey Sachs rightly opined “That leaves us stuck between the reality of a devastating global climate crisis and rich countries’ nationalist politics…” He articulated further that “The financial failures at COP26 are both tragic and absurd … Financing for “losses and damages,” that is, to recover and rebuild from climate disasters, fared even worse, with rich countries agreeing only to hold a “dialogue” on the issue.”

Kowtowing to the obstinacy of the developed countries, UN Secretary-General insensitively tried to console the developing world by his non-committal words saying “I want to make a particular appeal for our future work in relation to adaptation and the issue of loss and damage.”

He was oblivious that the Climate Change Convention of 1992 of which he is the depository asserts that “The extent to which developing country Parties will effectively implement their commitments under the Convention will depend on the effective implementation by developed country Parties of their commitments under the Convention related to financial resources and transfer of technology and will take fully into account that economic and social development and poverty eradication are the first and overriding priorities of the developing country Parties.”

Civil society

At Glasgow, the civil society engagement and advocacy for forward-looking actions fell on deaf ears of the leaders and negotiators. The civil society was separated from the so-called Blue Zone at the conference center where the wheeling-dealing was taking place.

If the civil society seriously wants a space to be heard and make an impact on the outcome of COP processes, it should ask for that opportunity clearly offered to them in all future climate negotiations. Protesting outside and commenting on the social media have limited value in influencing the decision-makers.

Even Greta Thunberg’s disparaging slogan “blah, blah, blah …” was laughed away by the leaders. COP 26 outcome proves that in a terribly frustrating manner. For COP 27 next year, the mode of operations for the civil society participation needs to change.

American climate scientist and author Peter Kalmus articulated that “The one thing the climate summit in Glasgow made clear is that human society remains in business-as-usual mode, with no meaningful curb on fossil fuel use. The soft pledges made at COP 26 might have been acceptable decades ago, but not now.”

He went on to highlight that “Unless COP26’s failure is recognized as failure, there is no way to learn from it. Allowing global leaders to feel that what happened in Glasgow was acceptable – and spinning it as some sort of success – would be a disastrous mistake.”

The whole COP process is flawed if the powerful Parties can brush aside the wishes of countries representing a huge majority of the world population just like that. Developing countries need to join together to stop this circus and find another approach.

“Phase down” – the new mantra

There has been strong criticism of the last-minute and veto-like proposal to replace “Phase out” by “Phase down” at the final moments of the Glasgow gathering. But “phase down” has always been the position of the worst and historically responsible polluters of the world who would prefer to follow their own pace for addressing the climate crisis.

Be it emissions control, be it fossil fuels, be it financing, be it adaptation, be it mitigation, be it loss and damage, be it transfer of technology, “phase down” mode has always been the preferred way of doing business by the developed world. India has only taken a dubious lead in actually introducing the phrase in a formal COP outcome.

The global community would find more and more such instances as the climate change negotiations evolves in the coming years. “Phase down” is the new mantra of the climate change negotiators. Be prepared for that. Sorry!

Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury is former Permanent Representative of Bangladesh to the United Nations and former Under-Secretary-General and High Representative of the United Nations.

 

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By Marty Logan
KATHMANDU, Nov 18 2021 (IPS)

The illicit trade in idols and other historical treasures looted from temples, archaeological digs and various sites globally has been estimated at $100 billion a year.

A more telling figure might be the nearly 18,000 villagers in India’s Tamil Nadu state who turned out to welcome home a god figure stolen from one of their temples. More revealing still is the image of a single villager who, seeing a stolen god displayed in a Singapore Museum, falls to the ground and starts to pray.

Vijay Kumar accompanied that villager to the museum, and has witnessed idols lovingly replaced to their ages-old spots in Tamil Nadu temples.

For 16 years he has been working to repatriate gods and goddesses looted from India over the years, and the challenges remain huge, he tells us in today’s episode. For example, in 2020, police seized 19,000 stolen artefacts in an international art trafficking crackdown. 101 suspects were arrested with treasures from around the world, including Colombian and Roman antiquities. One activist estimates that in France alone there are 116,000 African objects that should be returned.

But Vijay is encouraged by the successes of citizen-led movements like his own, which began with a blog, Poetry in Stone, then the launch of the group India Pride Project.

Success can be measured in the growing number of artefacts returned to India: 19, from 1970-2000; 0, from 2000-2013; but 300+ after 2013. That includes roughly 250 items valued at about $15 million, which were repatriated in October, among the treasures looted by disgraced art dealer Subhash Kapoor, the subject of Vijay’s book, The Idol Thief.

Today’s conversation is packed with information, including Vijay’s opinion that countries like India and Nepal, where idols are part of the living heritage and still prayed to daily, should be treated differently than countries whose artefacts are looted from buried remains. He also has advice for would-be activists — in the murky world of art repatriation, be very, very wary about accepting money from anyone.

 

 

In many countries reporting mental health issues is frowned upon – even though statistics show there is a massive need for therapy and support. This illustration is by Dilselekhika Prerna explores mental health and identity. Credit: Fuzia.com

By Fairuz Ahmed
New York, Nov 18 2021 (IPS)

“I was told to wait and cry it out. How could I explain to them that I have been crying for years? That was not the solution,” asks Azra Zeng, a divorced mother of four in an interview with IPS. “I wanted to speak to someone. I wanted to seek help where I could feel whole again. It felt that I was dying from inside, but no one could see.”

Zeng was trying to make a living and look after her children while fighting a one-woman battle with mental health issues.

She was the sole breadwinner, and her parents also depended on her. Depression and mental health issues plagued her, but due to social stigma associated with mental health issues, she could not seek help from counsellors.

“My parents were lecturers at universities, I was earning, but I could not seek help. My boss told me that it shows me as weak at work, and my record will be marked negatively if I mention that I feel depressed at times. After trying to cope for four years, I left my job and moved to another country with my children. The first thing I did was to seek therapy from a licensed professional, and now after two years, I feel alive and thriving.”

Mental health awareness and making therapy, counselling normalized and unstigmatized is a massive step for many countries, cultures and demographics.

According to an article published in Kaiser Family Foundation on February 10, 2021, one in ten adults surveyed before the pandemic reported anxiety and depressive disorder symptoms in the United States.

In 2018, over 48,000 Americans died by suicide. The numbers skyrocketed during the pandemic, and nearly eleven million adults reported having serious thoughts of suicide in 2019, and 47 million people reported having any mental illness.

A 2019 study by a British charity, Mental Health Research U.K., found that 42.5 percent of India’s corporate sector employees suffer from depression or an anxiety disorder.

The number of people reaching out for help or reporting mental health issues is not the same globally. The low-income countries and higher-income countries have massive gaps in treatment facilities, support systems, and acceptance. This is also highly influenced by cultural beliefs, norms and social acceptance.

Juniper Barua, a counsellor, working with underprivileged communities and minorities in New York for the last nine years, says, “it has been incredibly difficult to explain to parents of youth that it is acceptable to seek out counselling.”

In an exclusive interview with IPS, she said that spouses and parents often see mental health as taboo.

“They speak of how they feel and getting treatment. Counselling or even text support during a triggering phase is deemed negative. I have seen hundreds of patients who requested to keep the service secret and gave other excuses while coming to my office. Cultural and religious biases also play a major role in opening up.”

Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) surveyed adults across the U.S. in late June of 2020. U.S. adults reported considerably elevated adverse mental health conditions associated with COVID-19. About 31% of respondents reported symptoms of anxiety or depression, 13% reported having started or increased substance use, 26% reported stress-related symptoms, and 11% reported having serious thoughts of suicide. It was also alarming that younger adults, racial and ethnic minorities, essential workers, and unpaid adult caregivers reported having experienced disproportionately worse mental health outcomes, increased substance usage, and elevated suicidal ideation.

Fuzia’s co-founder Shraddha Varma says, “it is interesting to notice that most people focus on physical health when it comes to health. But when it comes to mental health, there is not much awareness. We at Fuzia understand that going through a rough time alone can make things difficult. Through our ‘Fuzia Wellness’ initiative, community support groups and paid counselling sessions, we want to stand by as a friend, sister, guide and companion”.

Fuzia.com has more than 5 million followers and an active user base on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Fuzia uses its extensive global presence to create a safe and creative space for users. For World Mental Health Day in October, Fuzia held many support sessions, drawing competitions, supporting podcasts and blogs. It used creative avenues where users could seek information about mental health, learn ways to cope, ask for help, and express themselves in a safe and judgment-free way.

Fuzia’s co-founder Riya Sinha says, “there may be off days and days when you feel like the world is crumbling down. You need to seek help from family and experts for well-round mental and physical health. As a social media platform supporting female health, we want to be there for you for your emotional and mental wellbeing. Academics, relationships, careers or other issues can be hard to deal with, and we are there for you to cope”.

In many countries, mental health is stigmatized, and because of this, people are hesitant to seek help. Innovative awareness building, ways to connect online and offline, involvement in workshops, educational institutes, workplaces and communities can promote mental health awareness.

A teenager currently in therapy, Laibah Ahmed, comments that she finds it extraordinarily comforting when celebrities speak of mental health issues.

“I have seen superstars like Park Jimin of BTS speak freely of his insecurities, saying that he felt shrunk to a room, felt hopeless, and everything was falling apart during the #BTSLoveMyself campaign by UNICEF. This gave me hope. Many of my friends and I got inspired to seek mental health support and open up about our needs. I am now seeking youth counselling through a New York-based NGO. It is great to be able to speak without judgment and have a safe space.”

The CDC states, it has been noticed that helping others is a coping strategy that can reduce the mental health impacts. Spreading messages of support by the Government and making mental health accessible can curb many issues later. Online portals like Fuzia, local NGOs, volunteers and influencers can create a significant impact in making mental health services accessible to the masses.

• This article is a sponsored feature.

 

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Poverty and hunger are on the rise in Lebanon. The World Food Programme estimates food prices have increased by 628 percent in two years. Credit: Mona Alami /IPS

By Mona Alami
Beirut, Nov 18 2021 (IPS)

On the streets of Beirut, Hadi Hassoun begs for a few pounds to feed his five children. He has little hope of a job, especially now that the economic crisis in Lebanon has destroyed wealth.

The country already significantly lagged with UN Sustainable Development Goals of poverty and inequality, but the situation has gone from bad to worse.

In the past year, poverty has tripled, and one in every four children in the country are skipping meals. The Lebanese pound (LP) has witnessed a devaluation exceeding 90%, dropping from 1,500 LP to the dollar to over 22,000 LP to the US dollar. At least half of the population is suffering in extreme ways because of this situation, experts say.

The streets of Beirut are an illustration of Lebanon’s dire situation. Hassoun sits begging on the streets of Hamra. “I have five kids, and my youngest daughter has a congenital heart problem,” he explains. “So, I do my best to raise some money every day to try catering to their basic needs.”

In Beirut, the UNICEF office reported that three out of 10 children go to bed hungry or skip meals.

A few meters away, Khalid, using a pseudonym, is a garbage collector for one of Beirut’s main waste management companies. The man, in his sixties, hails from Wadi Khaled, a border town over 150 km away from Beirut.

“I do not have the means to visit them anymore because of rising fuel prices, so I send them money every two weeks, which allows them to eat basic staples such as rice and lentils,” he says. Khalid makes 60,000 LP per day, which amounts to less than $2.5 a day.

The World Food Programme (WFP) estimated that food prices have gone up by 628 percent in just two years.

According to Nassib Ghobril, chief economist for Lebanese Byblos Bank, the CPI rose by 144% in September 2021 compared with the same month in 2020, while it registered its 15th consecutive triple-digit increase since July 2020.

“The cumulative surge in inflation is due, in part, to the inability of authorities to monitor and contain retail prices, as well as to the deterioration of the Lebanese pound’s exchange rate on the parallel market, which has encouraged opportunistic wholesalers and retailers to raise the prices of consumer goods disproportionately,” Ghobril says.

He adds that the smuggling of subsidised imported goods has resulted in shortages of these products locally, which also contributed to price increases.

“Further, the emergence of an active black market for gasoline during the summer has put upward pressure on prices and inflation.”

The prices of fresh or frozen cattle meat in Lebanon jumped by 118.6% in the period, constituting the highest increase in the price of this item in the region, reported Ghobril.

In parallel, the price of bread and other manufactured articles sold went up by 32.8%, representing the third-highest increase in bread prices among MENA countries.

The impact is devastating.

“My family can barely afford bread,” says Khalid.

Lebanon falls short on the UN SDGs at every level, particularly when it comes to poverty and inequality.

Economist Kamal Hamal Hamdan explains that while there are no credible governmental statistics, at least 55% of the Lebanese population live under the poverty line.

“However, estimates actually point to 75% of the Lebanese population falling under the poverty line. This number goes up to 85% in extremely poor areas such as North Lebanon or the Baalback Hermel area,” points out Adib Nehme, a Lebanese development and poverty consultant.

However, both Ghobril and Hamadan believe these statistics may not consider the various sources of income of Lebanese in the form of aid and remittances. Lebanon received last year $ 6.5 billion in remittances from Lebanese expatriates.

Before the crisis, the wealthiest 10 percent of the population owned almost 70 percent of total wealth. Nehme underlines that around 73% of the Lebanese population earned 2.4 million LP per month before the crisis.

“If these people managed to keep their jobs despite Lebanon’s meltdown, this means that around three-quarters of the population earns around $120,” says Nehme.

Additionally, Hamdan underlines that around 60% of wage earners in the pre-crisis era contributed to 25% of the Lebanese GDP, which has worsened.

The financial crisis plaguing Lebanon has created further inequality. The poor and the middle class have been the hit hardest. When they have the luxury have bank accounts, their funds are frozen, and when withdrawn, the funds earn a lower than the black-market rate.

The richest and politically connected have been able to transfer their funds despite the unofficial capital control imposed by Lebanese banks.

“One has to keep in mind that around 963 depositors own $23billion, that is not considering these people’s wealth in land and investments. There is growing polarisation because of concentration of wealth, with Lebanon’s economic collapse,” says Nehme.

Hamdan and Nehme believe this is leading to the disintegration of the country’s social and economic fabric.

“This could lead to growing social pressure and transient violence across the country,” says Hamdan.

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Maize drying in San Cristóbal de las Casas, in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas. Credit: Mauricio Ramos/IPS

By Ernesto Hernández-López 
ORANGE, California, US, Nov 18 2021 (IPS)

Last month México’s Supreme Court provided hope for biodiversity, especially in the Global South, while flaming fear for seed companies. In a historic step, it ruled for corn advocates and against genetically modified (GMO) corn. The decision was a momentous act in country where maíz (corn) carries daily and sacred significance.  

This promises a way out of stale GMO debates that plague us. One side argues that genetic changes to seeds increase harvests. Seed companies and industrial agriculture make up this side. Another side says GMOs damage plant DNA.

Small-scale farmers and environmentalists stand on this side. Neither addresses the other. This standstill keeps GMO policies ineffective. The court’s decision offers a path out of this by cutting at seed company positions. We should follow slow grown Mexican resistance to GMOs.

By emphasizing biodiversity, the ruling fuels sustainable farming worldwide. In legal terms, the decision found that it is constitutional for courts to block commercial permits for GMO corn. Seed companies, like Monsanto, Syngenta, Dow, and PHI, need these to sell seeds in México. They lost.  

But much more is at stake than permits and court orders. These agrochemical companies pursue a global push for GMO agriculture, not just in México. Farmers worldwide worry that companies control GMO seed use (not growers) and that seeds cause permanent environmental harm. Frustrations persistently spread, evident at this year’s UN COP26 and UN global food summit.

The fear is that wind carries pollen from genetically modified plants to mix with non-GMO corn, called maíz nativo. Even if unintentional, this can’t be undone and threatens corn’s genetic variety. GMOs threaten biodiversity, required for plants to adapt to drought, climate change, and varied soil conditions

Luckily law and science are on the side of anti-GMO advocates. Because of this, México offers an example of effective legal resistance. The court stated that biodiversity is needed to allow corn plants to grow, mix genes, and adapt, as done for centuries. In other words, biodiversity is necessary for corn as a plant species to survive.

GMOs permanently hurt this. The fear is that wind carries pollen from genetically modified plants to mix with non-GMO corn, called maíz nativo. Even if unintentional, this can’t be undone and threatens corn’s genetic variety. GMOs threaten biodiversity, required for plants to adapt to drought, climate change, and varied soil conditions.

GMO proponents paint this reasoning as unscientific and emotional. They are wrong. They prejudge one country’s democratic and scientific process used to support sustainable farming.

This debate is not new. GMOs have lost in Mexican courts for years. In 2013, the Colectividad del Maíz, representing farmers, indigenous communities, environmentalists, and scientists, sued in court to halt government review of permit requests.

They argued that there were unauthorized releases of GMO genes surpassing levels permitted by México’s biosecurity law. Their central claims were that genetically modified plants mix with maíz nativo. This risks permanent damage to México’s over fifty maíz nativo varieties. Eight years ago, a trial court sided with the Colectividad. Last month, the Supreme Court unanimously agreed, after giving the Colectividad and seed companies since 2017 to make their case.

The court explained that the Precautionary Principle authorizes GMO controls to protect biodiversity. With this international law principle, governments prohibit technologies if their safety is scientifically uncertain. Think of it as way for governments to address risks in environmental, public health, or biosecurity predicaments.

Employing it, México blocks seed permits as a precaution to curtail GMO damage. This is explicitly permitted in México’s biosecurity law, passed with agrochemical industry backing in 2005. Precautionary measures are similarly supported by international laws on GMOs (2003), biodiversity (1993), and the environment (1992). In fact, Global South countries insisted that the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety explicitly include Precautionary Principle provisions.

GMO interests discount these laws to evade biosecurity measures. They deflect and tout innovation. Insisting GMOs are safe,seed companies refute environmental impacts. Deny, deny, deny, does not work.

GMO proponents flout science. Colectividad lawyers explain that seed companies preferred to not submit scientific evidence on GMO safety. This was an unforced litigation error, signaling larger problems. Observers label company justifications as fake science, because they show that GMO controls on farms fail.

For decades, multilateral organizations and scientific studies show how GMOs threaten corn. Moreover, there is no scientific consensus on GMO safety. Put simply, GMOs damage plant genes. Scientists say that they hurt the environment and are harmful to eat.

The power of México’s ruling goes way beyond permits. It emboldens national plans to phase-out GMO corn and glyphosate, not just seeds, by 2024. So far, GMO voices stick to losing playbooks, saying this plan is not based on science. Controversies over toxic glyphosate raise more alarm. GMO farming needs this chemical herbicide. A UN agency and American courtsfound it to be carcinogenic. This has resulted court ordered payouts, creating a headache for Bayer that acquired glyphosate’s producer Monsanto.

All of this inspires sustainable farming globally. Hundreds of countries have agreed to treaties with Precautionary Principle provisions. The principle was central to crafting Mexican biosecurity measures. It can guide more governments to implement effective GMO, biodiversity, and environmental policies. Seed companies agonize thinking if more courts, regulators, or legislatures copy México.

In short, sustainable farmers, environmentalists, lawyers, and most importantly policymakers across the globe should follow México’s example. Evident in the Colectividad’s determination, resistance is the seed to sustainable success, when it combines legal, cultural, and political efforts.

Seed companies should learn that there are bigger losses than unrealized seed sales. In the long term, markets for popular legitimacy and trust from governments are far larger than demand for myopic tales on science and laws. Discussing corn, free trade ideologue David Ricardo explained the law of diminishing returns, when business choices become counterproductive. This should inspire seed makers to stop opposing precaution.

Ernesto Hernández-López is a Professor of Law at the Fowler School of Law, Chapman University (California, United States) who writes about international law and food law. 

A Dalit woman stands outside a dry toilet located in an upper caste villager’s home in Mainpuri, in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. Credit: Shai Venkatraman/IPS

By Baher Kamal
MADRID, Nov 18 2021 (IPS)

Did you know that half of the world’s population do not have toilets? And that, globally, at least 2 billion people use a drinking water source contaminated with faeces? And that every day, over 700 children under five years old die from diarrhoea linked to unsafe water, sanitation and poor hygiene?

This is the dramatic, hushed reality of 3.6 billion people who don’t have one that works properly.

“Who cares about toilets? The UN raises this question as the starting point of this 2021 Campaign for World Toilet Day, marked every year on 19 November.

The advantages of investing in an adequate sanitation system are immense, says the UN. For instance, every 1 US dollar invested in basic sanitation returns up to 5 US dollars in saved medical costs and increased productivity, and jobs are created along the entire service chain

The World Day raises awareness of all these 3.6 billion people living without access to safely managed sanitation, posing dangerous health problems.

It is as simple as staggering: when some people in a community do not have safe toilets, everyone’s health is threatened, as poor sanitation contaminates drinking-water sources, rivers, beaches and food crops, spreading deadly diseases among the wider population.

 

Devastating consequences

This year’s theme is about valuing toilets. The campaign draws attention to the fact that toilets – and the sanitation systems that support them – are underfunded, poorly managed or neglected in many parts of the world, with devastating consequences for health, economics and the environment, particularly in the poorest and most marginalised communities.

On the other hand, the advantages of investing in an adequate sanitation system are immense, says the UN. For instance, every 1 US dollar invested in basic sanitation returns up to 5 US dollars in saved medical costs and increased productivity, and jobs are created along the entire service chain.

For women and girls, toilets at home, school and at work help them fulfill their potential and play their full role in society, especially during menstruation and pregnancy, the world body informs.

Even though sanitation is a human right recognised by the United Nations, a massive investment and innovation are urgently needed to quadruple progress all along the ‘sanitation chain’, from toilets to the transport, collection and treatment of human waste.

“As part of a human rights-based approach, governments must listen to the people who are being left behind without access to toilets and allocate specific funding to include them in planning and decision-making processes.”

 

Need to know more?

According to World Toilet Day, an estimated 673 million people have no toilets at all and practice open defecation as of 2017, while nearly 698 million school-age children lacked basic sanitation services at their school.

“At the current rate of progress, it will be the twenty-second century before sanitation for all is a reality.”

But there is another added problem: the plight of sanitation workers. In fact, countless sanitation workers in the developing world work in conditions that endanger their lives and health, and violate their dignity and rights.

To mark World Toilet Day, the International Labor Organization (ILO), World Bank, World Health Organization and WaterAid launched a joint report highlighting the unsafe and undignified working conditions of sanitation workers around the world.

Sanitation workers involved in cleaning toilets, emptying pits and septic tanks, cleaning sewers and manholes, and operating pumping stations and treatment plants, are typically at high risk from faecal pathogens in their daily work. They may also be exposed to chemical and physical risks, adds the report.

“Manual scavengers, for instance, are exposed to serious health hazards such as cholera, typhoid and hepatitis, as well as toxic gases such as ammonia and carbon monoxide.”

In South Asian countries, manual scavenging is widespread.

Tim Wainwright, CEO of WaterAid, on this issue said that it is shocking that sanitation workers are forced to work in conditions that endanger their health and lives and must cope with stigma and marginalisation, rather than have adequate equipment and recognition of the life-saving work they carry out.

“People are dying every day from both poor sanitation and dangerous working conditions – we cannot allow this to continue.”

 

Alarmingly off-track

The UN Children Fund (UNICEF) warns that the world is alarmingly off-track to deliver sanitation for all by 2030.

In its State of the World’s Sanitation Report, it also warns that despite progress in global sanitation coverage in recent years, “over half the world’s population, 4.2 billion people, use sanitation services that leave human waste untreated, threatening human and environmental health.”

Obviously, this drama is hitting the world’s poorest the most. While in rich societies people afford two or even three toilets –one of them as a guest restroom — and have auto-heating toilets which warm as they sit, half of the world’s population do not have any or at least any proper one. It is much, much more than about just a toilet.

 

By Rebeca Rios-Kohn
DUBAI, Nov 18 2021 (IPS)

In the whirl of effort nations are making to combat COVID-19, the powerful role that children and young people can play in overcoming the harmful effects of school closures is too easily overlooked.

Children are making a difference on their own within their families, schools, and communities, while also joining forces with adults in countless compelling ways. Their efforts offer us all much hope and inspiration. But we need to do so much more to ensure they can all get back to school, and safely.

At EXPO 2020 DUBAI, now underway after a postponement, the spotlight is on the grassroots efforts and remarkable actions children themselves are taking to mitigate the global learning crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The Wear My Shoes” Award, organized by Arigatou International and sponsored by the Interfaith Alliance for Safer Communities, will be given on 19 November at the EXPO to five grassroots organizations who made outstanding contributions to mitigating the educational crisis during the pandemic in 2020-21; four of these projects were co-led by children.

The award is one part of a larger campaign organized for this year’s World Day of Prayer and Action for Children, celebrated globally on and around November 20.

https://prayerandactionforchildren.org/world-day-of-prayer-and-action/

Rebeca Rios-Kohn, J.D.

The award specifically recognizes exceptional efforts that focused on the most vulnerable and excluded children who were hit hardest by the pandemic and had no access to education, and which also explicitly addressed their mental, emotional, and spiritual well-being. Each winner will receive US$5,000 to support their continuing activities.

Increasingly, organizations working to improve the lives of children are involving them in shaping and implementing the decisions affecting their lives, fulfilling one of the key child rights set out in the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

By recognizing the participation and engagement of children, the award also seeks to empower other children to claim their right to education, and to step forward to insist that their best interests be put at the heart of all policymaking, including COVID-19 responses.

If we listen, it is not difficult to discern the message. Children are saying it loud and clear: they want to be in school, learning, with their peers – and safely. We owe them no less.

Children are among those most affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, yet they are emerging around the world as key agents of change by taking concerted action to help improve the lives of their peers. Innovative activities co-led by children are taking place in many countries in response to the unprecedented crisis, with school closures leaving millions of children without access to learning.

With the support of their faith communities, in countries like Bhutan, Cuba, Ecuador, Mexico, Myanmar, Pakistan and Serbia, for example, children are taking action to help their peers access education even when schools are closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

We should celebrate children are finding their own solutions, including to help their peers access online classes and educational materials during the education crisis, but we also need to recognize that public policy has a major impact. As inspiring as they are, children’s efforts alone will of course not be enough and the support of their local faith leaders and faith communities adds value to their efforts.

As of the end of October 2021, UNESCO warned that nearly 800 million students around the world were still affected by full or partial school closures. UNESCO further warns that school closures during the past two academic years have resulted in learning losses and increased drop-out rates, impacting millions of children, particularly the most vulnerable students.

Dr. Najat Maalla M’jid, the Special Representative of the United Nations Secretary General on Violence against Children, has recently expressed concern stating that “school closures contributed to increased anxiety and isolation among children, along with sadness, frustration, stress, disruptive behavior, hyperactivity, and sleeping and eating disorders.”

Together with Arigatou International and UNICEF, some 18 international organizations (including faith-based organizations such as the World Council of Churches, World Vision, Religions for Peace and the International Network of Engaged Buddhists), joined forces this year on the Wear My Shoes Campaign to draw global attention to the urgency of getting children back to school.

The aim is to mobilize children and adults – including religious leaders, policymakers, parents/caregivers, and educators – to take immediate action for students’ safe return to school and to prioritize addressing the grave impact of school closures during the COVID-19 pandemic on children’s mental, emotional, and spiritual well-being.

The Wear My Shoes Campaign is part of this year’s celebration of the World Day of Prayer and Action for Children 2021, an annual event initiated by Arigatou International to engage diverse faith communities to raise the status of children’s rights and help take action to end violence against children on November 20, the anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

The Wear My Shoes Award event at EXPO 2020 DUBAI falls within the Week of Tolerance and Inclusivity at the EXPO, which seeks to foster greater common understanding to create more tolerant societies under the theme, “Connecting Minds, Creating the Future,”

Indeed, our future depends on the children of today, and they depend on access to education to develop their minds and help them acquire the broad capacities for global citizenship they will need to build the better world we all dream of and which they deserve.

The message from Dubai today is that children themselves are taking urgent action to address the harms caused by the continuing education crisis. So should we.

Rebeca Rios-Kohn, J.D. is Director, Arigatou International – New York

The link to the online event on Nov. 19 at 8:30 AM EST (UTC – 05:00):
https://arigatou-worlddaylive.layoutindex.net/en/front-register

Arigatou International is “All for Children” and works with people from diverse religious and cultural backgrounds to build a better world for children. Believing that every girl and boy is a precious treasure of humanity, Arigatou International draws on universal principles of common good found in religious and spiritual traditions and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.

https://arigatouinternational.org/

The Interfaith Alliance for Safer Communities was established to empower faith leaders to work for the safety and security of our communities, tackling issues such as child sexual abuse, extremism and radicalization and human trafficking. It aims to facilitate the building of bridges between faiths, NGOs and experts in various domains.

https://iafsc.org/

 

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By Anna Shen
NEW YORK, Nov 17 2021 (IPS)

Once again, the U.S. faces a test case along racial lines. Will the courts mete out justice in the case of Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man who was shot and killed by three white men while jogging in Georgia?

The case is one in a long line of prominent trials with similar racial undertones, highlighting the divide in America’s legal system when it comes to race. Recent cases with mixed and highly charged verdicts include: George Floyd, Trayvon Martin, Walter Scott, and Breonna Taylor.

Anna Shen

Despite widespread attention — the national movement of Black Lives Matter, widespread protests, and federal laws intended to provide equal access — systemic racism in the legal system is flagrant and persistent. Put simply, it must be eradicated, said a new report by the LexisNexis Rule of Law Foundation.

Tackling the ugly truths about the US legal system from all angles – within law school, legal practices, the judicial system, legislation, and representation — the 100-plus page report contains deep insights on the situation in America.

A few pressing questions in the report: How does cash bail punish the poor and impact society at large? How are law school admissions and standardized tests biased? Why are there so few Black partners in law firms? What about women in law?

Twelve LexisNexis Foundation Rule of Law Fellows from the company’s African Ancestry Network (AAN) produced the report, with a goal of shedding light on the underlying causes of racism in the legal system.

The Historically Black Colleges and Universities Law School Consortium joined forces with LexisNexis to award the fellowships, a commitment to eliminate systemic racism in legal systems and foster diversity and inclusion within the company. It is also an acknowledgement of LexisNexis’ membership in the UN Global Compact.

A few of the topics included:
Cash Bail: Minorities are disproportionately jailed due to an inability to pay bail fees, according to the report. Those held in pretrial detention are presumed innocent but are incarcerated until they “purchase their freedom.” The cash bail system — ineffective as a crime deterrent — also penalizes the poor. Many cannot afford to pay, no matter how small the amount. What if the person held is a single parent who loses their job and then can’t pay their rent? The report proposes alternatives such as a model legislative bill that sets conditions for a detainee’s release, as well as an Equality Bail Fund supported by corporations, non-profits, and other.

Bankruptcy: African Americans are more likely advised to file Chapter 13 than Chapter 7. Chapter 7 discharges debts within six months and requires attorneys’ fees up front. Chapter 13 attorneys’ fees are paid over time, debts are not typically discharged, and can take up to five years to settle. The report discussed providing tools to reduce racial bias in bankruptcy, and educating attorneys to provide effective advice.

Law School Admissions: The legal profession is one of the least diverse fields in America, according to the report. This inequality is due to the dominance of the Law School Admissions Test (LSAT), its flawed logic, and the institutional racism that it creates. The report recommends wider selection criteria than the LSAT’s quantitative measures. For example, adding criteria based on leadership, community involvement, and overcoming adversity.

Law Firms: Black lawyers account for slightly over 10 percent of partners at major U.S. law firms, according to the report. Lawyers leave firms due to retention and promotion issues, isolation, lack of guidance, and little professional growth. The report proposes diversity training, championing diverse leaders, and metrics-based approaches to diversity.

Women: Black women attorneys are vastly underrepresented in law firm leadership across the US. How can this be changed? Amplifying their voices, as well as fostering the conditions that help attain partnership can combat underrepresentation.

Access: Consider that less than 6 percent of lawyers are Black, yet they represent over 13 percent of the total U.S. population. Access to a legal education and to the tools needed to become successful in the legal field are different for minorities as for their white counterparts, said the report.

In conclusion, the link between ending systemic racism in the legal system and the mission to advance the rule of law is clear: equal treatment under the law. “When the legal process treats parties unequally in the application of laws, there is an inherent lack of fairness in the system,” said Ian McDougall, President of LexisNexis Rule of Law Foundation.

 

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BCFN's double pyramid encourages the adoption of eating styles that are people and planet focused. Credit: Joyce Chimbi/IPS

By Joyce Chimbi
NAIROBI, Nov 17 2021 (IPS)

For the last ten years, Angeline Wanjira’s food stall at Kirigiti Market in Kiambu County has featured the same foods, cabbages, potatoes and carrots, keeping with the community’s most preferred food types.

Over in the Lake Victoria region County of Homabay, Millicent Atieno has sold fish at the Mbita market since 2015. A pattern that Nairobi-based food safety and security expert Evans Kori says replicates itself throughout Kenya’s 47 Counties.

“Our food consumption patterns are in line with their respective food production activities. In Central Kenya, for instance, the community shuns nutrient-rich traditional vegetables in favour of cabbage. Among pastoralist communities, the diet is predominantly animal-based,” he says in an interview with IPS.

“The Lake Victoria region diet is centred on fish. All these foods are important, but we have to adopt diets that include more food types. Our current food habits are not balanced, healthy or sustainable.”

Kori says the imbalance is common the world over, hence the negligible progress towards eradicating global hunger, food insecurity and all forms of malnutrition.

UN experts, in the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World report 2021, reveal that the world has not progressively moved towards ensuring access to safe, nutritious sufficient foods for all people or toward eradicating all forms of malnutrition.

The report cites climate variability as a key concern in slowing down progress towards access to healthy and sustainable diets for all people.

The double food and environmental pyramid model developed by the BCFN Foundation emerged from research and an evolution of the food pyramid, which forms the basis of the Mediterranean diet. Photo courtesy BCFN.

Using the latest evidence on food, health, and the environment to devise the Double Health and Climate Pyramid model, the Barilla Center for Food and Nutrition illustrates that global food goals cannot be achieved within current broken food systems and ecosystems.

Until the escalating food and climate crisis is resolved jointly and not independently and in isolation, progress towards a sustainable, food secure and healthy planet will be slow.

Kori agrees, adding that current “food production systems are not sustainable because they accelerate climate change, biodiversity loss and land degradation. Consequent outcomes affect our health and essentially, human survival”.

He stresses that people worldwide will not access the nutrients they need and sustainably within existing food systems.

In 2020, between 720 and 811 million people faced hunger, according to the UN’s Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO).

Driving home the urgency for nature-positive food production systems because current systems are broken, FAO estimates show the agricultural sector accounts for one-third of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Food production accounts for the largest share of freshwater withdrawals at 70% on average and 90% of the water footprint of humanity, as well as 12% of land use.

Barilla’s evidence-based Double Pyramid illustrates the linking between climate change and food systems. This promotes health and longevity and reduces the impact of food choices on the ecosystem, and more specifically, on climate change.

The Health and Climate pyramids are placed side by side. The health side shows features of a balanced, healthy, and sustainable diet. The climate side shows the associated impact on health and the climate.

Based on scientific evidence linking food choices in the adult population to health outcomes, the health pyramid arranges food into 18 food groups across seven layers according to the recommended frequency of consumption for people’s health.

Foods such as fruits, vegetables and whole-grain cereals, which should be consumed most often, are placed at the bottom of the pyramid. The second layer includes nuts and seeds, non-tropical vegetable oils, refined low glycaemic index cereals and fermented milk. The third layer comprises pulses and fish as preferred sources of protein. The fourth food layer has poultry, eggs, milk and cheese. The fifth layer includes high glycaemic index foods like white bread, refined rice and potatoes. No more than two servings of this food should be eaten per week.

Animal fats, including butter, tropical oils like palm oil, red meat and sweets and baked goods made with refined flour and sugar are in the sixth layer of the pyramid because eating them is associated with a significantly higher risk of cardiovascular events. The advice is to eat these no more than once a week. There are foods like processed meat like sausages, bacon, and salami in the seventh layer, associated with a high risk of cardiovascular diseases and other chronic diseases and should only be eaten occasionally.

The climate pyramid then classifies different foods based on their carbon footprint or carbon dioxide equivalent emissions. Again, foods are arranged into 18 groups and seven layers, starting with a very low carbon footprint to a very high footprint.

The pyramid shows animal-based products, especially red meat, followed by cheese and processed meat, which causes the highest GHG emissions compared to plant-based products.

As per research by FAO, “cattle raised for both beef and milk, and inedible outputs like manure and draft power are the animal species responsible for the most emissions, representing about 65 percent of the livestock sector’s emissions.”

Barilla’s Double Pyramid is, therefore, an illustration of how people can eat varied, balanced, and healthy diets and, at the same time, reduce their contribution to climate change.

The pyramid recommends a consumption frequency for all food groups and shows their impact on health and the climate.

Additionally, the Barilla Foundation devised seven cultural double pyramids in line with different geographical contexts, including Nordic countries and Canada, USA, South Asia, East Asia, Africa, Latin America and Mediterranean countries.

Each of the seven pyramids reflects and celebrate the global value of diversity while promoting healthy, sustainable eating and consideration for planet health.

On the one hand, the double pyramid summarises key knowledge gained from medicine, nutrition studies, and the impact of people’s food choices on the planet. And, on the other hand, a consumer education tool.

 

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Antimicrobial resistance is a consequence of overusing and misusing antimicrobials. This is a worldwide problem. But in developing countries antibiotics are easily available without prescription. Credit: Adil Siddiqi/IPS

By External Source
Nov 17 2021 (IPS)

The cost of infectious diseases is somewhere between staggering and incalculable. Around $8 trillion and 156 million life years were lost in 2016 alone. Throughout human history, pestilences have wiped out more lives than famine and violence.

Then, in 1941, the antibiotic age was born when doctors at the Radcliffe Infirmary and the Dunn School of Pathology in Oxford first tested penicillin in a patient. When I was a medical student there in the late 1970s, we felt a reverence for this world-changing achievement. Penicillin and its successors have saved millions of lives.

It can take 15 years and a billion dollars to develop a new antibiotic. And then, either the poor can’t afford them or consumption must be restricted to stave off future resistance. Meanwhile, companies that have monopoly rights over niche antimicrobials profit with abandon
So, 50 years later, as a doctor visiting Uganda’s Gulu Hospital, I was heartbroken to see patients die despite treatment with antibiotics. Sara, for example, a young Sudanese refugee, died from puerperal sepsis because she was resistant to first-line antibiotics. And modern, expensive versions were unavailable.

Antibiotics are part of a group of drugs called antimicrobials – including antivirals, anti-fungals and anti-parasitics – that prevent and treat infections in humans, animals and plants. But, as coronavirus has reminded us, all living organisms mutate. When that leads to resistant “superbugs”, we get antimicrobial resistance – the drugs are no longer effective.

Antimicrobial resistance is a consequence of overusing and misusing antimicrobials. This is a worldwide problem. But in developing countries antibiotics are easily available without prescription. The residents of Kibera, a low income settlement in Kenya, for example, consume more antibiotics than typical American families. When a poor patient cannot afford the full course, however, they make do with a few pills. That may be harmful if an infection is not fully treated, and antimicrobial resistance may follow.

Meanwhile, the parallel lack of hygiene, water and sanitation in crowded, deprived communities means more sickness. That pushes up the need for antimicrobials.

Antimicrobial resistance also compromises human health via food. Two-thirds of all antibiotics are used in farm animals. Intensive use to fatten up animals and hide poor animal husbandry is a potent source of resistance. Powerful drugs leached into soil and water recycle into us via the food chain. Antimicrobial residues in milk, eggs, meat and fish are worrisome for our health.

Antimicrobial resistance kills around 700,000 people worldwide annually. This could increase to 10 million annually by 2050, at a cost of $100 trillion. It is a top-ten global health threat.

It’s now time for a bold effort on antimicrobial resistance. That requires a dedicated organisation with the universal legitimacy of a UN body, political clout of a G20, deep pockets of a global fund, brainpower of a space agency, campaigning zeal of an NGO, mould-breaking power of a social movement, and leveraging capacity of a public-private partnership.

 

Drug resistance and health

Antimicrobial resistance has devastating consequences. For the ill, it means getting sicker for longer, wasting money they cannot afford, and impoverishing desperate families. Or succumbing to ordinary chest and urinary infections that were easily treatable earlier. Traditional public health threats such as tuberculosis, malaria and HIV are also returning as serious conditions resist first-line drugs.

Drug resistance is especially bad news for seriously ill patients with diseases ranging from COVID-19 to chronic bronchitis who are prone to secondary infections. It also becomes riskier to do organ transplants or give cancer therapy because immune-suppressed patients need antimicrobial cover.

 

A broken market

Drug resistance satisfies the definition of a pandemic and comparison with other pandemics is instructive. Investing massively in coronavirus research was worth it because there are billions of permanent customers for COVID-19 vaccines and treatments. In contrast, nothing new has entered the antibiotics cupboard since the 1980s.

It can take 15 years and a billion dollars to develop a new antibiotic. And then, either the poor can’t afford them or consumption must be restricted to stave off future resistance. Meanwhile, companies that have monopoly rights over niche antimicrobials profit with abandon.

In contrast, 20 preventable and treatable tropical diseases that debilitate 1.7 billion poor people – mostly in Africa and South Asia – are neglected. This is because the remedies are often too cheap for sufficient profit to be extracted. They include river blindness, guinea worm, leprosy, and elephantiasis.

The particular circumstances around antimicrobial supply and demand mean that inequity prevails, as with COVID-19 vaccines where developing countries are denied the intellectual property rights to make them.

An earlier generation struggled similarly at the height of the AIDS epidemic. South Africa and India led the fight to waive restrictive trade rules on generic medicine production, when public health emergencies warrant. That saved thousands of lives as cheap antiretrovirals became available.

A comparable approach is now urgent to help all countries get effective, affordable antimicrobials. But prospects are not good, if the current battle over increasing COVID-19 vaccine supplies – led again by South Africa and India – is a pointer. Polarised geopolitics is not helpful to fix the broken market for essential medicines.

 

One health

The painful lesson from pandemics such as Ebola, HIV, and COVID-19 is that human, animal, and planetary health are intertwined. That is because animals are getting closer to humans. Their habitats get compromised by development practices that create wide scale deforestation. Thus, their microbes jump to us more easily. This is exacerbated by environmental shifts due to climate change. The trend necessitates new antimicrobials to be found for diseases yet to come.

Siloed approaches won’t work in inter-connected contexts. Integrated working is needed to tackle the multi-dimensional causes and consequences of our sickening humanity, ecosystem, and planet. This “one health” approach could tackle antimicrobial resistance. But the concept remains nebulous. Society and institutions don’t have incentives to work across sectoral and disciplinary boundaries.

 

A technocratic approach is not enough

The World Health Organisation has joined up with the World Organisation for Animal Health and the Food and Agriculture Organisation to sound the alarm on antimicrobial resistance with a global action plan, several resolutions of the World Health Assembly, and a high-level global leaders group. Technical tools and guidance are available to national action plans: 89 countries have them but only 18 in Africa and 23 in Asia-Pacific. They include strengthening surveillance, promoting antimicrobial stewardship, training and capacity building.

All this is worthwhile. But there is no time to wait. A technocratic approach and sparse funding have not created the necessary momentum.

The early AIDS activists realised the same in the 1980s when many countries were devastated, especially in Africa. A massive global movement arose to shift social morays, shake up stodgy establishments, galvanise massive funding for research, prevention, and treatment. And it triggered extraordinary innovations in biological and behavioural sciences.

Its legacy has gone well beyond HIV. It also led to the creation of UNAIDS and the Global Fund To Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria as specialised institutions to energise and orchestrate an unprecedented global endeavour.

The hugely disruptive COVID-19 crisis has sparked comparable effort with record-time technological breakthroughs, overturned economic orthodoxy, and unprecedented financing. Also innovations in how we work, design social safety nets, re-configure international co-operation, generate solidarity, and hold policy makers accountable. But we also deepened inequalities, and realised that globalisation itself needs a makeover.

There are excellent examples of the elements that could make up a dedicated global organisation to combat antimicrobial resistance. To connect them is the necessary organisational innovation. That means challenging petty institutional turf battles and sectoral boundaries, and overcoming small mindsets.

Mukesh Kapila, Professor Emeritus in Global Health & Humanitarian Affairs, University of Manchester

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

President Jair Messias Bolsonaro of Brazil addresses the general debate of the UN General Assembly’s 76th session last September. Credit: UN Photo/Cia Pak

By Noam Titelman
SANTIAGO, Nov 17 2021 (IPS)

At the United Nations General Assembly meeting in September, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro used his allotted time at the podium to recount his views on Covid-19. He extolled the virtues of treatments that have been rejected by scientists and proclaimed that he had benefitted from the anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine.

Bolsonaro’s support for such ‘miracle cures’ is well known. He has appeared regularly in the Brazilian press and on social networks promoting the use of off-label treatments that have no basis in scientific fact. And he is not alone.

During his administration, former US President Donald Trump advocated for a variety of unproven remedies, and the president of Madagascar, Andry Rajoelina, has sponsored a drink derived from the herb artemisia to treat Covid-19.

To the despair of the scientific community, these politicians and others have successfully convinced a large swath of the public of such treatments’ efficacy and safety.

Misinformed people are not ignorant

Misinformation has run rampant during the pandemic, but it is not a new phenomenon. In their seminal work on the perception of welfare in the United States, the political scientist James Kuklinski and his colleagues showed that significant portions of the American population held inaccurate beliefs about the recipients of state support and the benefits they received.

Misinformation is a prime example of motivated reasoning.

They also found that the prevalence of misinformation prevented accurate information from gaining traction. Misinformed people do not simply have inaccurate information; they are heavily invested in their misconceptions.

Noam Titelman

And this is what makes misinformation so powerful: it combines misperceptions about the world with a high degree of confidence in their accuracy.

People do not believe false information because they are ignorant. There are many factors at work, but most researchers would agree that the belief in misinformation has little to do with the amount of knowledge a person possesses. Misinformation is a prime example of motivated reasoning.

People tend to arrive at the conclusions they want to reach as long as they can construct seemingly reasonable justifications for these outcomes. One study published in 2017 has shown that people who have greater scientific knowledge and education are more likely to defend their polarised beliefs on controversial science topics because of ‘nonscientific concerns.’

The role of partisan identity

One of the most powerful of these concerns is the preservation of identity. Political leaders are most effective in pushing misinformation when they exploit citizens’ fear of losing what they perceive to be defining aspects of their culture, particularly its language, religion, and perceived racial and gender hierarchies and roles.

In polarised political environments, the purchase that misinformation gains has little to do with low levels of knowledge or engagement, but rather with how information is interpreted in a way that dovetails with partisan identity. The ‘us versus them’ lens means that the different bits of information people receive are processed in a way that is amenable to their worldview.

This is why individuals can draw strikingly divergent conclusions from the same facts. When political leaders peddle unproven treatments for Covid-19, they are capitalising on this polarising tendency.

But an excessive focus on these leaders may obscure the main reason people buy into these messages. The willingness to believe misinformation is rooted in underlying aspects of cultural identity, which politicians manipulate.

The case of Brazil

Recent research by Mariana Borges Martins da Silva, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Oxford, has shown that one reason Brazilians trust treatments like the ones promoted by Bolsonaro is a deep cultural belief that a ‘serious doctor’ is one who prescribes medicine.

Bolsonaro didn’t have to convince Brazilians of the benefits of ivermectin and chloroquine. He needed only to confirm the norm that potentially serious diseases always must be treated with drugs. He provided a narrative that allowed segments of the population to arrive at their desired conclusion. And that was enough.

Understanding the drivers of misinformation is critical to preventing its spread. To keep people safe from Covid-19 and encourage vaccination, it is not enough to denounce politicians who promote false information. We also must understand the underlying motivations that lead people to believe it.

Noam Titelman is an associate researcher at the Center for Public Systems at the Universidad de Chile, and a PhD candidate in social research methods at the London School of Economics (LSE).

Source: International Politics and Society, Bruxelles, Belgium

 

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Korea is one of the world's top economies. Yet, behind the success, many feel alienated. Does the recent hit show Squid Game, reflect the underbelly of the society's success? Credit: Ori Song/Unsplash

By Ahn Mi Young
Seoul, Nov 16 2021 (IPS)

Immediately after its release, the Squid Game went viral, grabbing the attention of the world’s entertainment stage. The grotesque and hyper-violent thriller has reportedly become Netflix’s biggest show, the world’s most-watched and the most-talked-about streaming entertainment. Is it a case of art imitating life?

The global rise of Korean entertainment is reminiscent of South Korea’s rags-to-rich story. The once war-stricken country with per-capita GDP of 67 US dollars after the 1950-53 Korean War has become one of the world’s top economies with a per-capita GDP of 32,860 US dollars in 2020.

South Koreans enjoy high-tech conveniences, and many of their enterprises are sought after internationally, including home electronics, vehicles and ships.

Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, success stories abound about its business, technology or entertainment industries.

K-pop BTS is now a global star who often tops the Billboard charts. A few years ago, it was unthinkable that Korean entertainment could surpass the content produced in the United States.

Squid Game has become a global success. Is it a case of art imitating life?

“The Squid Game has become a hope for our students to go to the global stage,” Kim Sang-Hoon, a professor at Cheju Halla University who teaches future talents video-making or filmmaking or broadcasting, told IPS.

However, the storyline suggests that success is not the only parameter with which to measure Korean society. Squid Game is a story of the “losers” who dropped out from the success story.

The hero, Gi-Hoon, was in debt after losing his job and squandering his money on a horse-racing game. He got divorced and missed his ten-year-old estranged daughter. Sang-Woo was once a brilliant stockbroker but went broke after gambling away his money.

The drama director Hwang Dong-Hyeok told local media: “In fact, I used to be one of the losers.”

He elaborated that “as a boy of a single-mother at the backstreet of Seoul, I used to be a boy at the back street spending almost the whole day playing the games (all of which) appear in the Squid Game”.

Although many more South Korean people live the “most affluent life” ever in the country’s history, many people feel like they are playing the squid game, where a few winners take all at the expense of many losers.

In the Squid Game, an elderly character Ilnam said to another character, Gi-Hoon, while playing marbles: “Cheating on others is OK, but being cheated, is not OK?”

This soundbite is one that many South Koreans identified with.

“I felt thrilled when I heard this because it sounds like our reality,” said Ko June-Ho, a South Korean fan and a university student told IPS. He added he identified with so much in the story. “When the elderly character Il-Nam met Ki-Hoon after the squid game, Il-Nam said: ‘Life here (outside the game) is more hellish (than the life I spent in the squid game)’.”

In the death game, the losers are separated from their family, friends and community. Like Sae-Byok, a North Korean woman defector struggles to rebuild her lost family connections but all in vain. Or, Ali, a worker from Pakistan, is in debt because his Korean employer didn’t pay him. Even the elderly character Il-Nam, the Squid Game host, is wealthy but misses his old family ties. He tells Gi-Hoon: “I used to live with my family”.

Some experts say that the squid game losers are like South Korean losers, who feel isolated from the glory story.

Ironically, South Korea, one of the world’s most affluent countries, records one of the world’s top suicide rates. South Korea’s suicide rate in 2020 was the average of 25.7 suicides per 100,000 persons, compared with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries average of 10.9 suicides.

While technology businesses, like the online selling platform Coopang, have become successful during the COVID-19 pandemic, restaurant owners were forced to shut down because of regulations. The impact is clear.

Dr Park Chanmin, Seoul Central Mental Health Clinic, reflects this in a recent interview here.

“Since the start of the pandemic, people have become more and more worried about their jobs, they are seeing their incomes falling, and that is having an impact on their day-to-day lives.”

Asia Nikkei reported that a study by the Korea Economic Research Institute found that sales by independent merchants were down 78.5% in the first half of the year from the same period in 2020, with 58% of respondents attributing the decline to COVID.

Sanjog Lama, a Nepali student who studies hotel management in South Korea, believes the show was excellent.

“The cast and crews have done such an outstanding job. On top of that, the content of the series is just superb. It is thrilling, many scenes are gruesome, yet there is meaning in it.”

Another South Korean fan, Lee Ji-Hyeon, said: “The drama was like a puzzle game. I felt thrilled as I was putting the pieces of actors’ talk and each scene together so that I kept thinking about what it means and how it will be related to the next move.”

However, even in the extreme death game, the underlying warmth of the South Korean traditional culture is reflected.

The thriller’s punch line, with “Kkak-Ttu-gi” or “Kkan-Bu”, demonstrates Korean culture. The elderly Il-Nam says to Gi-Hoon: “Let’s make ‘Kkan-Bu” friendship between two of us.”

Kkan-Bu is a life-long friendship that lasts unchanged regardless of whether a person is a loser or a winner. Some characters made decisions that touched the heart of the fans.

Gi-Hoon did not give up their heart even in the live-or-die moment. Ji-Young gives up her life to let her game partner Sae-Byok can win the game. Even the hardened heart of the elderly Il-Nam softens as the senior and becomes friends with warm-hearted Gi-Hoon.

Another female character Mi-Nyo said: “They call me Kkak-Ttu-gi” In Korean children’s games.”

Kkak-Ttu-Gi shows how Korean culture values human connection. Even though the player is poor and cannot contribute, the team won’t kick them out.

There is irony in the money matters. Even though Gi-Hoon emerges as the winner of the game, grabbing $40 million, his life did not change. When he returns home after the game, he finds his mother dead. He remains a divorced, lonely man. Even though he has the prize in his bank account, he doesn’t spend it. Instead, he borrows Won10,000 from a banker and gives it to a street flower-selling woman.

“The drama makes me think about what matters in my life. People risk their lives for money, which turns out to be no solution,” said South Korean fan Lee Ji-Hyeon.

 

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An offshore oil rig drilling platform. Globally, fossil fuel subsidies amounted to 5.9 trillion US dollars in 2020, according to an IMF report. Credit: Bigstock

By Baher Kamal
MADRID, Nov 16 2021 (IPS)

It sounds incredible: while politicians have been cackling about the climate emergency and profiling in empty promises to halt it, they have spent six trillion US dollars from taxpayers’ money to subsidise fossil fuels in just one year: 2020. And they are set to increase the figure to nearly seven trillion by 2025.

Add to this that governments will double the production of energy from these very same, highly dangerous, global warming generators.

IMF study reports that globally, fossil fuel subsidies were 5.9 trillion US dollars in 2020 or about 6.8 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). And that such subsidies are expected to rise to 7.4 percent of GDP in 2025

In a 2021 study: Still Not Getting Energy Prices Right: A Global and Country Update of Fossil Fuel Subsidies, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) reports that globally, fossil fuel subsidies were 5.9 trillion US dollars in 2020 or about 6.8 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). And that such subsidies are expected to rise to 7.4 percent of GDP in 2025.

According to the study, 8 percent of the 2020 subsidy reflects undercharging for supply costs (explicit subsidies) and 92 percent for undercharging for environmental costs and foregone consumption taxes (implicit subsidies).

Efficient fuel pricing in 2025 would reduce global carbon dioxide emissions 36 percent below baseline levels, which is in line with keeping global warming to 1.5 degrees, while raising revenues worth 3.8 percent of global GDP and preventing 0.9 million local air pollution deaths. Accompanying spreadsheets provide detailed results for 191 countries, IMF adds.

Commenting on this fact, António Guterres, the UN Secretary General, said that “… promises ring hollow when the fossil fuels industry still receives trillions in subsidies, as measured by the IMF. Or when countries are still building coal plants…”

Every country, city, company and financial institution must “radically, credibly and verifiably” reduce their emissions and decarbonise their portfolios, starting now, said Guterres.

 

Time running out for oil and gas?

Hard to believe when just 11 countries presented the Beyond Oil and Gas Alliance at November’s UN Climate Conference in Glasgow.

Ireland, France, Denmark, and Costa Rica. among others, as well as some subnational governments, launched a first of its kind alliance to set an end date for national oil and gas exploration and extraction.

One of the Alliance members’ representative, Andrea Meza, Minister of Environment and Energy for Costa Rica commented: “Every dollar that we invest in fossil fuel projects is one less dollar for renewables and for the conservation of nature…” she added.

 

Energy Devourers

By 2050, 1.6 billion people living in cities will be regularly exposed to extremely high temperatures and over 800 million people living in cities across the world will be vulnerable to sea level rises and coastal flooding.

According to UN Habitat, which deals with human settlements and sustainable urban development, cities consume 78 percent of the world’s energy and produce over 60 percent of greenhouse gas emissions – while accounting for less than two per cent of the Earth’s surface.

Inger Andersen, the head of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) reported that “We build the equivalent of new buildings the size of Paris every week, and if that is the way we are expected to expand we need to think about how we do it because of climate, biodiversity, livability, quality of life. We need to build better.”,

According to Andersen, building and construction are responsible for 37 percent of CO2 emissions with construction materials like cement, accounting for 10 percent of global emissions.

She also pointed out that over half of the buildings that will be standing in 2060 haven’t been constructed yet.
According to UNEP, only 19 countries have added codes regarding energy efficiency for buildings, and put them in place, and most of future construction will occur in countries without these measures.

“For every dollar invested in energy efficient buildings, we see 37 going into conventional buildings that are energy inefficient. We need to move from these incremental changes because they are way too slow, we need a real sector transformation. We need to build better,” Andersen said, calling for more ambition for governments if they are to fill the promise of net-zero.

 

Cars, buses, trucks, ships…

The transport sector is responsible for approximately one quarter of global greenhouse gas emissions, according to the Intergovernmental Panel of Experts on Climate Change (IPCC).

The sector’s emissions have more than doubled since 1970, with around 80 percent of the increase caused by road vehicles. The United Nations environment programme UNEP calculates that the world’s transport sector is almost entirely dependent on fossil fuels.

“A world where every car, bus and truck sold is electric and affordable, where shipping vessels use only sustainable fuels, and where planes can run on green hydrogen may sound like a sci-fi movie.”

This is how governments spend trillions of taxpayers’ pockets to subsidise fossil fuels that can only aggravate the ongoing climate emergency.

By Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana and Gillian Triggs
BANGKOK, Thailand, Nov 16 2021 (IPS)

Most countries in the Asia-Pacific region are on track to reach universal birth registration by 2030: an incredible achievement and a significant milestone in realizing human rights and equality. However, as the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed, many weaknesses remain in official recording systems, creating gaps in knowledge about the population and affecting how authorities respond to crises and reach those in greatest need.

Civil registration and vital statistics (CRVS) systems record births and other key life events such as deaths and marriages. Birth registration is fundamental for accessing a wide range of social services, benefits and rights. It provides an individual with a legal identity and a proof of age, which are often requirements to enrol in school, receive healthcare, apply for formal work, register to vote, inherit property, obtain a passport and social protection, or open a bank account. And often it is the hard-to-reach and marginalized populations that are least likely to receive official documentation, including those living in rural, remote, isolated or border areas; minorities; indigenous persons; migrants; non-citizens; asylum-seekers; refugees and people who are stateless or of undetermined nationality.

As regional leaders gather this week for the 2nd Ministerial Conference on Civil Registration and Vital Statistics in Asia and the Pacific,1 the focus will be on regional and country-level achievements, obstacles and challenges in realizing the shared commitment that all people in the region will benefit from universal and responsive CRVS systems by 2024. It marks the midpoint of the Asia-Pacific CRVS Decade (2015-2024) and is an important milestone in the pursuit of creating national CRVS systems that are universal and responsive to the needs of entire populations.

Since 2014, more than 70 million more children in the region have greater access to education, health and social protection because their birth has been officially recorded and recognized through the issuance of a birth certificate. This is a notable achievement and testament to the resolve and commitment of governments to the shared goals made in 2014, the strength of regional cooperation, and the support of 13 development partners, including the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) and UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency.

Still, there is work to do. Robust and universal marriage registration systems are needed to prevent girls from being coerced into early marriage, which often threatens their lives and health. The region also has an opportunity to reduce the risk of statelessness and human trafficking, as well as to promote solutions for refugees and asylum seekers by documenting links to the country of origin. UNHCR’s work with national governments to strengthen and broaden civil registration systems to formally register people considered stateless or of undetermined nationality has led to profound policy changes across Central Asia and the legal recognition of every birth, irrespective of parents’ status.

Furthermore, as we have witnessed during the global pandemic, when civil registration systems fail to reach everyone in the country and not everyone is counted, a public health crisis intensifies. Whereas robust CRVS systems enable governments and health authorities to track the pandemic and respond quickly and in an informed manner, a poorly functioning civil registration system masks the true impact of a crisis: deaths go uncounted — especially among the poorest and most vulnerable — and individuals are unable to access humanitarian relief or benefit from financial stimulus measures and, more recently, national vaccination programmes.

Governments that are unable to account for the entire population face barriers to creating and implementing effective public policy and responding to a crisis in an equitable manner. A comprehensive approach to civil registration, with timely and accurate data that are put to the right use, has the power to benefit every individual and inform public policy simultaneously, including by reducing statelessness across the region.

Leaving no one behind through universal birth and death registration demands bold and ambitious outcomes from the upcoming ministerial conference. We have the knowledge, experience and technical ability to create registration systems that are responsive to the needs of the population and can guide us through current and future challenges.

1The 2nd Ministerial Conference on Civil Registration and Vital Statistics in Asia and the Pacific will take place from 16 – 19 November.

Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana is Executive Secretary, ESCAP
Gillian Triggs is Assistant High Commissioner for Protection, UNHCR

 

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January 2021 marked a historic event for African economic development –the launching of free trading under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).

By Mosh Matsena
UNITED NATIONS, Nov 16 2021 (IPS)

The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement promotes socio-economic growth and development in Africa through liberalised trade processes and structures. So far, the 54 African countries have signed the agreement, resulting in immense potential for the growth of trade between African countries.

In fact, it has been hailed as perhaps the “most ambitious free trade project since the creation of the World Trade Organization itself” by Martyn Davies, the managing director of Emerging Markets at Deloitte Africa.

The question is: are African countries harnessing this potential offered by the AfCFTA? According to the African Development Bank (AfDB), intra-Africa exports amount to only 16.6% of total trade.

Lwazi Mboyi, the Acting CEO of the Southern African Cross-Border Road Transport Agency (C-BRTA), says there is a need for strategic partnerships between regional and corridor-based institutions, trade and transport stakeholders (such as the Cross-Border Road Transport Regulators Forum – a regional forum of regulatory authorities) and related bodies.

This would leverage collaborative efforts towards resolving the bottlenecks affecting cross-border transport and regional trade.

“It is imperative that we decisively deal with operational constraints and Non-Tariff Barriers which negatively affect the performance of the cross-border transport system and in the corridors linking the COMESA-EAC-SADC tripartite and beyond,” said Mboyi.

He added: “As we do this, we must aim to ensure that cross-border road transport operations are underpinned by firstly, a harmonised regulatory environment and secondly; a predictable operating environment.”.

Mosh Matsena

The reality is that it’s not just policies and procedural shortcomings that have resulted in limited cross-border trade volumes in Africa. We have to look deeper into why intra-African trade has been slow to gain traction, leading to Africa’s ongoing heavy reliance on foreign imports.

The unfortunate truth is that African countries don’t always view their counterparts on the continent in a favourable light. This is due various reasons such as historical conflicts between countries or regions, as well as poor political and trade relationships.

There are also negative perceptions about doing business in Africa, including lack of basic infrastructure for trade, not living up to global quality standards, having weak governance structures and simply not being a viable choice for successful business operations.

While some of these views do hold some merit (especially in terms of past trade environments), a lot has changed over the last decade. Many African countries have continually, and consistently enhanced and improved their systems and processes relating to trade and economic development.

Sadly, negative perceptions have not always shifted in line with these positive changes and advancements despite data and projections showing huge potential for such countries, and the continent as a whole. This lack of recognition of socio-economic growth indicators negatively impacts intra-African trade.

Stimulating trade

To stimulate intra-African trade, we need to understand the current limitations and opportunities on the continent. There is need to change the narrative about Africa. The narrative needs to be future-forward and reflective of where the continent is headed.

For transformation to truly happen in Africa, we need the buy-in and support of all stakeholders, not just government and policymakers.

Private sector needs to be open to the conversation of doing more and more business on the continent and explore local partnerships to an exponentially larger extent.

However, for this to work, stakeholders and decision-makers need to be committed to tangibly improving trade and development in Africa in terms of raising the bar when it comes to excellence, service delivery, infrastructure, ethical business practice, policies and other related factors.

According to a 2021 white paper released by the World Economic Forum (in collaboration with Deloitte), the current insufficient and inert interlinkages between African economies have exacerbated the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the continent’s supply chains.

The report states that “the continent can do little to counter the global forces inclining towards deglobalization, but it can itself embrace a self-supportive regionalism through enhanced intra-African trade, not to mention promoting Africa as an enhanced destination for investment from multinationals”.

Communication is key

In order to successfully boost intra-African economic trade, we need to put in a lot of work to improve trade, development and business systems that promote trade across the continent.

Most importantly, we also have to communicate effectively in order to get the message across and really change the narrative. To achieve this, we need more open channels of communication and dialogue regarding connecting African businesses and organisations to each other.

Platforms such as webinars, round-table discussions, cross-border trade shows such as the upcoming 2021 Intra-African Trade Fair in Durban, South Africa this November, and networking events are effective ways to stimulate interaction that leads to collaboration.

In fact, we all as players within the African economic eco-systems need to be “ambassadors” when it comes to brand building for the continent. Such an approach will benefit businesses, countries, and Africa as a whole – and this “bigger picture” vision is what will move the continent forward in a very intentional and tangible manner.

This communication process should be a productive cycle – make positive changes, communicate about these changes, this then leads to more positive shifts in perceptions, which comes back again to more positive changes.

The bottom line is that, as Africans, we need to take more responsibility for how we see each other, and how others see us.

Let us all rise to the challenge, using the AfCFTA as a springboard to stimulate business relations with our African counterparts. Africa’s time is now, so let’s make it happen – together.

Source: Africa Renewal, United Nations.

Mosh Matsena is the founder and CEO of 1Africa Consulting, a South African-based strategic communications and business solutions agency.

 

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By Jomo Kwame Sundaram and Anis Chowdhury
KUALA LUMPUR and SYDNEY, Nov 16 2021 (IPS)

Quickly enabling greater and more affordable production of and access to COVID-19 medical needs is urgently needed in the South. Such progress will also foster much needed goodwill for international cooperation, multilateralism and sustainable development.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram

The World Trade Organization (WTO) will soon decide on a conditional temporary waiver of Trade-Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). The waiver was proposed by South Africa and India on 2 October 2020. Two-thirds of the 164 WTO members – mainly developing countries – support it.

But sustained European efforts – of Switzerland, the UK and the EU, led by Germany – have blocked progress ahead of the WTO ministerial starting 30 November. Meanwhile, ongoing text-based discussions seem to be leading nowhere.

IP not needed for innovation
Affordable vaccines and drugs have been crucial for eliminating infectious diseases such as tuberculosis, HIV-AIDS, polio and smallpox. But despite strong evidence to the contrary, advocates insist intellectual property rights (IPRs) are needed to incentivize innovation.

Development of COVID-19 vaccines and other therapeutics have been accelerated by considerable government financing. Only six major vaccine developers received over US$12 billion in public funding. Projected revenue from their IP monopolies will exceed tens of billions.

Supply shortages have disrupted vaccine supplies. IP monopolies block competition, making it hard to quickly increase supplies. Thanks to patent protection, for example, only four companies produce plastic bioreactor bags needed to make vaccines.

Cross-border IP enforcement has been enhanced by TRIPS in 1995. The African walkout from the 1999 Seattle ministerial highlighted the WTO’s rich country bias. As part of the compromise to revive WTO talks, TRIPS has included a ‘public health exception’ since 2001.

Anis Chowdhury

Subject to onerous conditions and paying fair compensation, ‘compulsory licensing’ allows making patented products using processes without patentholder consent. Yet, European negotiators still insist that voluntary licensing provisions are enough.

All licensing requires case-by-case, patentholder-by-patentholder, country-by-country negotiations. But licensing is only limited to patents, without requiring sharing ‘industrial secrets’ needed to make complex biochemical compounds.

Time consuming, onerous and costly, such negotiations are beyond the means of most poor countries. Worse, some high-income country (HIC) governments have blocked such licensing, even when agreed to by companies.

IP deepens inequalities
The World Health Organization Director-General has noted four-fifths of vaccine doses went to HICs or upper middle-income countries (MICs). Rich countries – with a seventh of the world’s population – had bought over half the first 7.5 billion vaccine doses by November 2020.

Meanwhile, only 1.5% in low-income countries (LICs) were vaccinated by August 2021. Much of the variation in infection and death rates is due to unequal access, not only to vaccines, but also diagnostic tests, medical therapies, protective equipment, devices, equipment and other needs.

The private-public COVAX facility had promised to deliver two billion vaccine doses by end-2021, and to reach a fifth of the people in 92 LICs. But less than half a billion doses have been delivered so far.

Australian academic Deborah Gleeson warns that even as promising new treatments become available, they will be too costly for most in LICs and many MICs. Diagnostic tests are unequally distributed, with HICs averaging over a hundred times more than LICs.

And even when governments and companies are willing to license others to supply small LICs with low-cost generics, most MICs are excluded. Worse, some high-income country (HIC) governments have blocked such licensing, even when agreed to by companies.

Some HICs have been embarrassed into sharing millions of their unused excess vaccine doses. But of the 1.8 billion doses promised so far, only 14% has gone to LICs. Such donations of funds and other needs undoubtedly help.

But such unpredictable acts of charity – e.g., by HICs who bought far more than they needed – are hardly enough. Manufacturing capacity in the developing world must still be enhanced to meet overall needs. This requires the waiver.

Contrary to the claim that the South lacks manufacturing capacity, vaccines have long been made in over eighty developing countries. Although novel, mRNA vaccine manufacture involves less steps, ingredients and physical capacity than traditional vaccines. MSF has identified many capable producers in the South.

TRIPS waiver urgently needed
TRIPS provides 20-year monopolies for patents. These have often been ‘evergreened’, i.e., extended, sometimes indefinitely, ostensibly to reward additional innovation. Thus, most developing countries have been prevented from meeting their health needs more affordably.

The temporary waiver would allow companies everywhere to produce the required items and use patented technologies without infringing IP. Supplies would increase and prices fall. Currently, access to COVID-19 needs is very inequitable, deepening the yawning gap between HICs and LICs.

The revised 21 May text clarifies the proposed waiver is for at least three years from the decision date, subject to annual review. It would cover products and technologies – including vaccines, therapeutics, diagnostics, devices, protective equipment, materials, components, methods and means of manufacture.

The proposal also covers the application, implementation and enforcement of TRIPS provisions on patents, copyrights, designs and other protected information, e.g., undisclosed manufacturing blueprints and industrial secrets.

Thus, the waiver has long been urgently needed to contain the pandemic worldwide. But rich countries have successfully blocked progress thus far despite the heavy human and economic toll it has taken.

Game changer
Unlike the more flexible arrangements of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, the WTO framework and negotiating priorities have undermined developmental aspirations.

The South has been undermined by rich countries’ betrayal of the 2001 Doha compromise. After ‘softly’ killing the ‘Development Round’ promised then, rich countries can now redeem themselves by supporting the waiver.

Almost two years after COVID-19 was first recognized, the pandemic continues to threaten the world, with poor countries and people now worse affected. The devastation could be partly mitigated if developing countries could meet their pandemic needs without fear of litigation for IP infringement.

A TRIPS Council meeting is scheduled for 16 November, before the four-day WTO Ministerial Council meeting from 30 November. The waiver would also encourage renewed international cooperation, long undermined by destructive rivalry and competition.

By refusing to make concessions, rich countries would not only jeopardize the WTO, but also the world’s ability to urgently contain the pandemic. With complementary financial resource transfers, they can restore the goodwill urgently needed for international cooperation and to revive multilateralism.

 

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Georgina Wabano and her mother cooking traditional food for school children in Peawanuck, ON, December 18, 2019. : © 2019 Daron Donahue

By Shantha Rau Barriga
Nov 15 2021 (IPS)

“Nothing about us without us” – that was the call from the indigenous rights advocate Ghazali Ohorella from the Alifuru people in the Maluku Islands, Indonesia during a panel at the climate summit in Glasgow.

This plea was echoed by many activists from groups marginalized by systemic oppression whom I met at COP26: young activists, women, people with disabilities, older people, refugees, people from the Global South – all of whom are the most affected but have contributed the least to the climate crisis.

These experts spoke firsthand of the impacts of the climate crisis on their communities, the ongoing struggle to have their voices heard, and the concrete actions needed to solve this existential crisis which affects us all.

Worldwide, women farmers make up nearly half of the agricultural labor force, and produce up to 80 percent of food crops in developing nations yet, in many countries, women have less access to resources, such as land rights, credit, markets, education and technology

Instead of shutting out these voices, governments should listen and learn from them.

The slogan I heard from Ohorella has long been used by disability rights advocates and the session reminded me of the negotiations toward the UN treaty on the rights of people with disabilities, which was adopted in 2006.

During that process, I saw firsthand the benefits of inclusion. Governments came to respect and recognize the expertise of people with lived disability experience, which led to major advancements on their rights. It also resulted in changed mindsets, where people with disabilities were no longer seen as objects of charity, but holders of rights.

Fifteen years later, climate activists at COP spoke about the disconnect between the knowledge held by those with lived experience and the governments seated at the table making decisions on their behalf. Activists like Gabriele Peters from British Columbia and Ayakha Melithafa from South Africa urged world leaders to work with them and learn from them.

We should listen to and incorporate this know-how to build the kind of systems change we need to respond to the climate crisis, with equity. For example, involving women in local forest management has had positive effects for both livelihoods and conservation. This is already happening in Indonesia and Brazil.

Worldwide, women farmers make up nearly half of the agricultural labor force, and produce up to 80 percent of food crops in developing nations yet, in many countries, women have less access to resources, such as land rights, credit, markets, education and technology.

By leveling the playing field through legal reforms, targeted investments, and increased women’s meaningful participation, according to Project Drawdown, a resource for climate solutions, farm yields will rise and there is less pressure to deforest. Ensuring that women are included in the design and implementation of climate planning would heighten chances of success.

Overall, lands securely held and managed by Indigenous peoples also have lower rates of deforestation than comparable areas, evidencing their successful forest management practices. Advancing the rights of marginalized groups – an urgency in and of itself – has major climate benefits for the planet.

Not every impact of climate change can be solved with new technologies. Front line communities with deep knowledge of their lands are also carrying out successful adaptation strategies. In Australia, first responders are learning from aboriginal people, who lower the risk of bushfires by reducing fuel levels on the forest floor. In Mexico, farmers hit by increasingly long droughts and diminishing crop yields are developing groundbreaking solutions to restore degraded land to productivity.

In Canada, some First Nations maintain strong traditional food sharing networks that have helped address climate-driven loss of food through sharing harvests with at-risk members of the community, while others have built up community science programs that monitor climate change impacts on their environment.

Frontline communities are also developing healing practices to process grief caused by the permanent loss or alteration of ecological features that once sustained livelihoods and cultural practices. Artists are also leading the movement from artistic expression to policy change. As the climate crisis increasingly takes a toll on mental health, particularly among youth, we should support the arts, culture, and healing advanced by climate and environmental justice and Indigenous rights movements.

Meaningful participation in decision-making processes that affect citizens’ lives is not only a demand, it’s a right. While the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Paris Agreement recognize the importance of participation, including “a country-driven, gender-responsive, participatory and fully transparent approach” for adaptation, states (and COP organizers) aren’t meeting these requirements. For Indigenous people, their free, prior, and informed consent is required for implementation to be successful.

As Ridhima Pandey, a youth climate activist from India, told us this week: “If we really want to treat the climate crisis as a crisis, it’s really important for the governments, organizations and activists to all come together, to start taking concrete action.”

Wise words from a 14-year old. Will governments listen?

Excerpt:

Shantha Rau Barriga is the disability rights director and the lead on Strategy Development at Human Rights Watch

Credit: EBRD

• EBRD Transition Report 2021-22 highlights growing gaps in the use of online services and digital skills since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic
• Investment returns on digital services are far higher in economies with greater digital skills
• A “brain drain” of digitally skilled workers is affecting some countries’ prospects

By Richard Porter
LONDON, Nov 15 2021 (IPS)

A growing digital divide is emerging as a major threat to a robust recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic, according to new research by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD).

The Bank’s Transition Report 2021-22 ‒ System Upgrade: Delivering the Digital Dividend reveals the increasing gap between economies that have stepped up their use of online and digital services and those that have fallen further behind.

The report focuses on the 38 economies in which the EBRD invests. The Bank found that, since the start of the pandemic, people who are wealthier, living in cities and more advanced economies are better able to order goods and services online, do their banking through the internet and work from home.

Elsewhere, large parts of the population remain excluded from these opportunities and are more at risk of losing their jobs as digital technology becomes more widely used. Furthermore, many economies in the EBRD regions are experiencing significant “brain drain”, as people with strong digital skills move abroad.

While highlighting the digital divide, the report also shows how much progress has been made on the provision and use of digital and online services since the start of the Covid-19 crisis.

EBRD Chief Economist Beata Javorcik said: “In many countries, large parts of the economy, as well as schools and universities, went online in a matter of days when the Covid-19 pandemic hit. The digitalisation process is destined to continue and will remain one of the key forces shaping our world. Yet there are large digital divides between the EBRD regions and the advanced economies, between the various economies in the EBRD regions and within individual economies. Addressing these divisions is vital to their success.”

Helping countries and clients with their transition to digital technology is one of three strategic priorities for the EBRD, along with tackling climate change and supporting economic inclusion.

The EBRD announced its new strategic approach on accelerating the digital transition setting out how it will use all the instruments at its disposal ‒ policy, investment and advisory activities ‒ to unleash the transformational power of digital technology in the economies where it invests.

A new index of digital transformation

The Transition Report 2021-22 introduces a new index of digital transformation as a way of assessing the divide between and within countries. In the economies where the EBRD operates, only Estonia scores in excess of the average of more developed economies. The index calculates a score based on 22 different measures of the availability and use of digital technologies.

Estonia’s index score of 92.2 is the highest in the EBRD regions. Turkmenistan’s is lowest, at 16.1, while Tajikistan’s is next, at 23.7. The quality of regulation and online access to government services is one of the main reasons for these low scores.

Among other EBRD investee economies, Egypt, Tunisia and Morocco post low scores for digital skills, while Lithuania and Slovenia come in higher, alongside Estonia.

The key constraint on digital development is insufficient skills. There is evidence that more educated people in the EBRD regions have been improving their digital skills, catching up with the most developed nations. However, older people and those with lower levels of education and income are increasingly being left behind.

This is having an increasing impact as digital technologies are used more widely in all industries. Occupations that are more exposed to automation through the use of artificial intelligence have seen more job losses. Workers with fewer digital skills find it harder to adapt to new roles that become available.

The report also looks at the effect on economies and on financial services of investing in digital technologies.

On investment, it finds that the returns on digital-intensive capital are significantly higher in economies with stronger digital skills. A case study looking at high-speed broadband in Turkey shows that firms with better connectivity are more likely to export and introduce new products.

In Russia, smaller firms have increased staff numbers by about 19 per cent, on average, following the roll-out of 4G mobile technology.

Access to financial services for households and small businesses has been improved by the growth of digital finance. However, at the same time, banks have been reducing the number of physical branches.

And while some alternative finance platforms have emerged, they have been primarily focussed on debt rather than equity funding – unlike some more developed markets.

Beata Javorcik said: “The future is digital, and our task is to deliver the digital dividend as quickly and smoothly as possible. I firmly believe that with the right kind of digital transition, the economies of the EBRD regions will enjoy increased prosperity, better social outcomes and greater environmental sustainability.”

Lack of trust and low levels of digital skill constrain remote working

Richard Porter is Director of Communications at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD)

 

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