Africa - INTER PRESS SERVICE

By Jonathan Rozen
NEW YORK, Feb 19 2020 (IPS)

As reporters for Nigeria’s Premium Times newspaper, Samuel Ogundipe and Azeezat Adedigba told CPJ they spoke often over the phone. They had no idea that their regular conversations about work and their personal lives were creating a record of their friendship.

On August 9, 2018, Ogundipe published an article about a communication between Nigeria’s police chief and vice president. Days later, police investigating his source issued a written summons, CPJ reported at the time.

It was not addressed to Ogundipe and made no mention of his article or the charges he would later face of theft and possession of police documents. Instead, as Ogundipe recounted, police called Adedigba for questioning in connection with a slew of serious crimes, allegations that evaporated after police used her phone to summon her friend to the station.

Ogundipe’s experience is one of at least three cases since 2017 where police from across Nigeria used phone records to lure and then arrest journalists currently facing criminal charges for their work.

In each case, police used the records to identify people with a relationship to a targeted journalist, detained those people, and then forced them to facilitate the arrest.

The police methods reinforce the value of internet-based, encrypted communications at a time when authorities have also targeted journalists’ phones and computers to reveal their sources. Those prosecuted in all three cases are free on bail.

Nigerian journalist Samuel Ogundipe (Photo: Samuel Ogundipe)

“If the police called me and said we have something to ask you, I would go there…this is just their tactics,” Ogundipe said.

Ogundipe and Adedigba told CPJ that police made no secret of the way they had established their relationship, showing them each call records they claimed to have obtained from the pair’s cellphone network providers—Nigeria-based 9mobile, a subsidiary of the UAE-based Etisalat telecom company, and South Africa-based MTN, respectively.

“[Police have] been checking who I’ve been talking to…[in order to] see who was close enough to me to be used as bait,” Ogundipe added.

CPJ’s repeated calls in late 2019 and early 2020 to Nigerian police spokesperson Frank Mba rang unanswered.

The 2003 Nigerian Communications Act mandates that network service providers assist authorities in preventing crime and protecting national security. Regulations for enforcing it grant senior police officials the power to authorize requests to obtain “call data” from telecom companies without a judicial warrant, according to CPJ’s review.

That data includes where and when regular phone calls and SMS messages took place and between which numbers, according to documents reviewed by CPJ and interviews with three individuals with knowledge of police requests for call data in Nigeria. All three requested not to be named for fear of reprisal.

Nigeria has over 184 million active mobile phone lines, with roughly two million lines added every month to service its estimated 190 million people, according to 2019 data released by the national telecom regulator, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC). SIM card ownership for these lines is tracked under a 2011 regulation, which CPJ reviewed, mandating the collection of personal information, including fingerprints and photos, that police can access without a warrant as long as a senior-ranking officer gives written approval.

Other NCC regulations, released in October 2019 and reviewed by CPJ, detail police permissions to intercept communications under certain circumstances.

At the time of publishing, Ogundipe told CPJ his next court date had yet to be scheduled, but two journalists who were taken into custody at the end of 2019–Gidado Yushau and Alfred Olufemi–were preparing for their fifth hearing scheduled in Kwara State for March 4.

Similar to Ogundipe and Adedigba, police used call records to identify individuals that could be used to lead them to their targets, those affected told CPJ.

Nigerian journalist Gidado Yushau (Photo: Gidado Yushau)

Yushau, publisher of The News Digest website, and Olufemi, a freelance reporter, were charged in November 2019 with criminal conspiracy and criminal defamation in connection with a complaint over a May 2018 News Digest report Olufemi wrote about a factory owned by Sarah Alade, now special adviser to Nigeria’s president. Alade and other representatives of the factory did not answer calls or declined comment when CPJ reported on the case.

The first journalist police used to track down Yushau and Olufemi worked in another city for an unrelated news outlet. Wunmi Ashafa, a Lagos-based journalist with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), told CPJ that police tricked her into meeting, then made her summon her colleague, Yusuf Yunus, who in turn was used to facilitate the arrest of the Digest’s web developer, Adebowale Adekoya. The officers claimed to know they were connected from their call records.

Police were “tracking all the people that are calling me, that I’m talking to,” Yunus told CPJ in an interview. “The network provider has said that this line and this line have spoken at this particular hour,” he said police told him. Ashafa and Yunus said they were released after police detained Adekoya.

“I don’t know why they decided to do that,” Ashafa told CPJ, adding that she missed a meeting at her daughter’s school because police involved her. “They apologized to us, to myself and Yunus, that that was the only way they could get [Adekoya].”

Mistaken for the Digest’s publisher, Adekoya described being held for five nights, driven over 1,200 kilometers—including to Abuja and Kwara State—and threatened with detention if he did not lead the officers to Yushau and promise to help bring Olufemi into custody, before his release.

Nigerian journalist Alfred Olufemi. (Photo: Alfred Olufemi)

CPJ reached Peter Okasanmi, a spokesperson with the Kwara State police, by phone in January. He declined to comment on Yushau and Olufemi’s case because the trial was ongoing, but described how police regularly used telecommunications information to make arrests.

“We are able to track the culprits by use of technology through the SIM [cards] that were registered,” Okasanmi said. “Suspects, they are usually like kidnappers…we use all of those gadgets to track their locations and get them arrested…we have our own equipment we are using,” he added, without elaborating.

On November 4, CPJ contacted NCC spokesperson Henry Nkemadu by phone and upon his request sent questions regarding security agencies’ access to communications data, but received no response. Subsequent calls to Nkemadu and other NCC officials went unanswered.

Police used a similar tactic in 2017 to arrest Tega Oghenedoro, the Uyo city-based publisher of the Secret Reporters news website who writes under the pseudonym Fejiro Oliver, CPJ reported this month.

He faces cybercrime charges related to reports alleging corruption in a Lagos-based Nigerian bank and is due in court on May 28, CPJ reported.

Isaac Omomedia, an aide to the governor of Delta State, told CPJ in October 2019 that he did not know Oliver, but that they had a mutual acquaintance, Prince Kpokpogri, the publisher of Integrity Watchdog magazine.

In March 2017, Omomedia arrived at a hotel in Asaba, the Delta State capital where he lives, after receiving a call to collect a parcel from the DHL delivery company, he told CPJ.

Instead, he was met by six police officers who questioned him about Kpokpogri, someone they claimed to know he was in touch with by reviewing his call records. On their instructions, Omomedia said he invited Kpokpogri to a meeting.

Kpokpogri told CPJ that police arrested him upon arrival, drove him over 200 kilometers to Uyo, and told him, in turn, to summon Oliver. The officers had identified him because they had “bugged” both his and Oliver’s phone lines, he remembered them saying. Kpokpogri said police arrested Oliver when he arrived and drove them both over 350 kilometers to Benin City; Oliver was then flown to Lagos and Kpokpogri was released without charge.

Kenneth Ogbeifun, the Lagos-based investigating officer in Oliver’s case, requested emailed questions when contacted for comment by CPJ in January 2020. Follow-up emails and messages went unanswered.

CPJ also reached an officer who confirmed his name as Moses and that he was part of the team that arrested Oliver on behalf of Lagos police, but when asked about how Omomedia and Kpokpogri were used in the arrest, the line disconnected.

Those involved in Oliver’s arrest, and the chain leading to Yushau and Olufemi, told CPJ they relied on the Nigeria-based Globacom, also known as Glo, India-based Airtel, or MTN for their cell phone service.

“I will give you the number used to commit the crime and you have only 60 minutes to produce the details,” the Premium Times quoted Isa Pantami, Nigeria’s minister of communications and digital economy, as saying in late 2019. Operators that failed to produce data would be sanctioned, according to that report.

CPJ called the ministry of communications and digital economy in mid-January. Philomena Oshodin, a deputy director, said that she was not the relevant person to comment before the line went silent; follow up messages went unanswered.

Between November 2019 and January 2020, CPJ reached out to public relations departments at MTN, 9mobile, Airtel, and Glo, and emailed questions to representatives for each about security agencies’ access to telecom user data in Nigeria. None replied with answers by date of publication.

“You’re reporting as a journalist, which is not a crime…[but] you feel you’re being punished,” Ogundipe told CPJ, reflecting on his arrest and prosecution. “It’s very scary…it’s difficult to predict how far these guys will go.”

For information on digital safety, consult CPJ’s Digital Safety Kit.

*Jonathan Rozen is CPJ’s senior Africa researcher. Previously, he worked in South Africa, Mozambique, and Canada with the Institute for Security Studies, assessing Mozambican peace-building processes. Rozen was a U.N. correspondent for IPS News and has written for Al-Jazeera English and the International Peace Institute. He speaks English and French.

The post How Nigeria’s Police used Telecom Surveillance to Lure & Arrest Journalists appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Jonathan Rozen* is Senior Africa Researcher at Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ)

The post How Nigeria’s Police used Telecom Surveillance to Lure & Arrest Journalists appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Feb 18 2020 (IPS)

When UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres addressed the 193-member General Assembly last December, he focused on the smoldering climate crisis– pointing out that the last five years have been the hottest ever recorded.

Ice caps are melting, he said, In Greenland alone, 179 billion tonnes of ice melted in July. Permafrost in the Arctic is thawing 70 years ahead of projections. Antarctica is melting three times as fast as a decade ago.

“Ocean levels are rising quicker than expected, putting some of our biggest and most economically important cities at risk. More than two-thirds of the world’s megacities are located by the sea. And while the oceans are rising, they are also being poisoned,” Guterres warned.

And as the planet burns, one million species in the world’s eco-system are in near-term danger of extinction
According to a new survey of 222 leading scientists from 52 countries conducted by Future Earth, there are five global risks — failure of climate change mitigation and adaptation; extreme weather events; major biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse; food crises; and water crises. And four of them — climate change, extreme weather, biodiversity loss, and water crises — were deemed as most likely to occur?

Asked about the impending disaster, Dr. Anne Larigauderie, Executive Secretary of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) told IPS that climate change, extreme weather events, biodiversity loss and food and water crises are already happening, primarily as a result of human activities, and they are deeply impacting the lives of people around the world.

“It is therefore imperative for the science and expert community to make their voices heard – as Future Earth has done, building on the key messages of the IPBES Global Assessment Report – to provide decision-makers with the evidence and options they need to act.”

Of real significance, however, is that it is not just the voice of science that is now speaking up for nature – consider that the global business community has also become increasingly vocal about the risks of the nature crisis and the need for evidence-informed action.

For example, in the World Economic Forum’s latest Global Risk Report, the top five perceived risks are all environmental and “systems-level thinking,” as called for.

Decision-makers have a wide range of options across sectors, systems and scales to shift to more sustainable pathways.

Dr. Anne Larigauderie

One million species face extinction, but the solutions to the nature crisis are still within our reach, said Dr Larigauderie, in an interview with IPS.

In the run-up to October’s historic UN Biodiversity Conference, officials and experts will convene at FAO headquarters, Rome, 24-29 Feb. for negotiations on the initial draft of a landmark post-2020 global biodiversity framework and targets for nature to 2030.

The new framework will be considered by the 196 Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) at the 2020 UN Biodiversity Conference (CBD COP15), Kunming, China, 15-28 Oct.

Excerpts from the interview:

IPS: How many of the 20 Aichi biodiversity targets—including the integration of biodiversity values into national and local development and poverty reduction strategies – have been achieved so far/will still be achieved even as the 2020 deadline is looming over the horizon?

Dr Larigauderie: The IPBES Global Assessment Report shows that, of the 20 Aichi Biodiversity Targets, good progress has been made towards components of just 4 target, moderate progress towards components of 7 more targets, with poor progress towards all components of 6 other targets. Conservation actions, including protected areas, efforts to manage unsustainable use and address the illegal capture and trade of species, and the translocation and eradication of invasive species, have been successful in preventing the extinction of some species.

Good progress has been made on less than 10% of the 54 total elements. On 39% of the elements, poor progress and even some loss of progress has been seen.

As a result, the state of nature overall continues to decline, with 12 of 16 indicators showing significantly worsening trends.

It has never been more urgent for decision-makers at every level to have the best evidence and heed the warnings of science, for the decisions made now will have direct implications for our shared future.

IPS: How is the world doing on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially as regards the impact of the nature crisis and the likely missing of most of the Aichi Biodiversity Targets on efforts to achieve these?

Dr Larigauderie: Human development depends directly on nature – from food and water security, to jobs, health and general well-being. The rapid declines we are seeing now in biodiversity, and many of nature’s contributions to people, mean that most international development goals will not be achieved – unless we make fundamental, system-wide changes. The IPBES Global Assessment Report found that 80% of assessed SDG targets will be undermined by negative trends in nature.

The Sustainable Development Goals and the Aichi Biodiversity Targets are closely connected, with many of the Aichi Targets having been integrated into the SDGs.

Our failure to achieve the Aichi Targets does not bode well for efforts to achieve the SDGs – unless we see fundamental, system-wide reorganization across technological, economic and social factors, including paradigms, goals and values – to tackle the direct and the indirect drives of the nature crisis.

Besides clear connections to climate, oceans and land, the nature crisis has direct implications for poverty, hunger, health, water, and cities in addition to more a complex relationship to education, gender equality, reducing inequalities, and promoting peace and justice.

Without transformative change addressing both the direct and indirect drivers of biodiversity loss, we will not achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.

IPS: How will the rising global population — from the current 7.6 billion to an estimated 8.6 billion in 2030, with 43 cities reaching over 10 million each by 2030– have an impact on biodiversity targets? There are already warnings that the increase in population will have negative implications on the demand for resources, including food, infrastructure and land use.

Dr Larigauderie: Population growth is a major indirect driver of change in nature. Since 1970, the human population has more than doubled, but at the same time, per capita consumption has also risen sharply [15% since 1980], the global economy has grown nearly fourfold, global trade has grown tenfold, and the environmental and social costs of production and consumption have shifted away from those most directly responsible.

In other words, population growth is important but is only one of many key indirect drivers of change underpinning the unsustainable use of our natural resources. Other important indirect drivers include economy and technology, institutions and governance and conflicts, all of these being dependant on our values and behaviours.

Addressing all of the indirect drivers, including population growth, in an integrated and holistic way, will best enable us to achieve our shared global development goals.

Indeed, as the co-chairs of the CBD’s Open-ended Working Group on the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework note, “the wide-ranging changes that are needed to reach the 2050 Vison will require an unprecedented degree of collaboration and whole-of-society engagement.” (Zero draft, page 3, 6(f))

IPS: In this important “super year” for nature, with major milestones expected on both climate change and biodiversity, what plans are there to bring the science/expert communities from both climate and biodiversity together to help best inform the decisions and actions for the coming decade?

Dr Larigauderie: 2020 has real potential to be a turning point for society, where we can begin to holistically transform our relationship with nature. The ‘Super Year for Nature’ is an opportunity for decision-makers at every level of society to listen and act on the science on both biodiversity and climate change. The stakes could not be higher.

Climate change and biodiversity loss are inseparable challenges that must be addressed together, in the scientific community as well as in policy and business.

From 12 –14 May this year, well before the two major UN biodiversity and climate conferences in 2020, IPBES and the IPCC will co-sponsor a workshop – the first of its kind – to bring leading scientists together to focus on the opportunities to meet both of these challenges and on the risks of addressing them separately from one another.

The workshop report will be an important document informing the CBD and UNFCCC Conferences of the Parties (COP15 and COP 26, respectively) regarding implementation of the Paris Agreement, the post-2020 biodiversity framework and the Sustainable Development Goals.

The IPBES Global Assessment found that nature-based solutions can provide more than one-third of climate mitigation needed to keep warming below 2°C.

Enquiries: Rob Spaull, IPBES Head of Communications Robert.spaull@ipbes.net

The writer can be contacted at thalifdeen@aol.com

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By Anis Chowdhury and Jomo Kwame Sundaram
SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 18 2020 (IPS)

In an annual ritual early in the year, most major economic organizations have released forecasts for the global economy in 2020. Incredibly, almost as a reminder of where financial power resides in this day and age, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) released its forecasts at the World Economic Forum’s 50th annual meeting in Davos.

Anis Chowdhury

Although the IMF revised its global economic growth prognosis slightly downwards from its October 2019 forecast, it still offers the most optimistic prospect of 3.3% growth in 2020. The World Bank’s forecast of 2.5% – identical to the United Nations (UN) estimate – is the lowest, with the OECD’s at 2.9%.

The IMF justified its optimism by improved market sentiments following the Phase One US-China Trade Deal and diminished fears of a ‘no-deal Brexit’. Goldman Sachs describes these developments as ‘A Break in the Clouds’, forecasting global growth at 3.4% in 2020, while Morgan Stanley sees ‘Calmer Waters Ahead’, expecting 3.2% in 2020 and 3.5% in 2021.

Perils of ‘talking up’
It is not unusual for these organizations to be optimistic: after all, they do not want to be seen as naysayers, or prophets of doom, especially if their pronouncements are later denounced as self-fulfilling prophecies.

But ‘talking up the economy’ can have grave consequences, as with the 2008-2009 global financial crisis (GFC). Then, the IMF revised its forecast upward in July 2007, a month before the US ‘sub-prime’ mortgage crisis morphed into the worst global downturn since the Great Depression of the 1930s.

Meanwhile, the OECD was confident that any US ‘soft-landing’ would be offset by robust European economic performance. Such forecasts fostered a false and ultimately dangerous sense of invulnerability and complacence before the storm broke.

Policymakers ignored warnings by the United Nations since 2005 about fundamental weaknesses, including growing global imbalances and the debt-financed US housing bubble. As is now well known, the collapse of the US sub-prime mortgage market brought down world finance and, eventually, the global economy.

Hazards of forecasting
Thankfully, it is customary to include some cautionary notes with these annual forecasts, even when optimistic. For example, the IMF now warns of more downside risks, including geopolitical tensions, social unrest, trade tensions, and developing economies’ financial turmoil.

Both the UN and the IMF fear that the climate crisis can trigger financial stress, further slowing economic growth. To make matters worse, ignoring fundamental weaknesses and focusing excessively on ephemeral short-term trends can be dangerously misleading.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram

To be sure, forecasting is extremely hazardous, and sometimes compared unfavourably to astrology. Forecasters factor in plausible developments, but completely unpredictable ‘black swan’ events, such as the novel coronavirus pandemic, can upset even the best of forecasts.

Meanwhile, the World Bank warns of ballooning debt, both public and private. The UN and the World Bank also note that the sharp productivity growth slowdown since the GFC has reduced long-term growth and poverty reduction prospects; furthermore, high inequality will also delay such progress.

Both the UN and the IMF note that high and rising inequality also engenders greater social and political polarization, unrest and instability. Additionally, the UN also warns of deepening political polarization and growing scepticism about multilateralism as significant downside risks.

But none mention that the long-run effects of income inequality on both consumption and output can be quite large, delaying economic recovery by limiting aggregate demand and capacity utilization.

Policy failure
Such fundamental weaknesses owe much to policy failures. Unlike the New Deal following the Great Depression of the 1930s, all too many contemporary policymakers shy away from addressing core problems, such as financial excesses, rising household debt, exorbitant executive salaries vis-à-vis stagnant, if not declining real wages, that also contributed to the GFC.

Low (negative) interest rates, due to unconventional monetary policy, especially ‘quantitative easing’ (QE), have not promoted productive investments, and allowed less-productive firms to survive. Thus, QE failed to boost productivity.

‘Easy money’ has been used for share buy-backs, mergers, acquisitions and inflated executive remuneration. Thus, as before the GFC, ‘fictitious capital’ is being systemically generated once again, contributing to asset price bubbles and endangering financial stability.

‘Easy money’ from developed economies has also flowed to developing countries in search of better returns, making them more vulnerable, besides raising their indebtedness yet again.

QE has also contributed to rising inequality. Meanwhile, major central banks have exhausted much of their means for lending at very low or even negative interest rates as they have very limited room to cut interest rates further.

No fiscal saviour
Besides reducing overall revenue collection and marginal income tax rates, the longstanding trend from direct to indirect taxation has shifted tax incidence from incomes to consumption, largely at the expense of the middle class.

Pursuing fiscal austerity under various guises, governments have slashed social and infrastructure spending in favour of public-private partnerships skewed in favour of influential corporate interests. Fiscal austerity also slowed economic recovery and technology adoption to the detriment of productivity growth.

Such fiscal reforms have not only exacerbated inequality, but also kept countries and households in debt bondage. And as governments have less fiscal space with rising debt, their ability to respond to crises – financial, climate or pandemic – is severely compromised.

Missed opportunity
Had national policymakers, led by the G20, embraced the UN recommendation for a Global Green New Deal to stimulate recovery, address the climate crisis and reverse growing inequality, the global economy could have been put on a more inclusive and sustainable path.

Such hopes remain even more elusive in an increasingly fractured world where multilateralism itself has been discredited and deliberately undermined by ethno-populism’s relegitimization of jingoism.

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By Angus Wright, Ivette Perfecto and John Vandermeer
OAKLAND, California, Feb 18 2020 (IPS)

When we were children, a long auto trip would require a stop every hour or so to clean the windshield of the insects that had been intercepted.

Today’s windshields are spared this indignity—a convenience for motorists but a terrifying signpost of danger for the well being of the planet and humanity.

It would be difficult to exaggerate the current peril we face as we push forward into what is now understood as the beginning of a new mass extinction. Yet efforts to curb this potential catastrophe are hindered by limited understanding of the relevant sciences, both natural and social.

And a keystone issue is agriculture, both as partial cause of the crisis, and potential contributor to its solution. This is understood technically, but restricted limits of debate continue to force a restricted set of proposed solutions.

To take an extreme example, E. O. Wilson, one of the world’s best-known biologists, recently proposed that half of the Earth’s surface should be put into protected status for the sole purpose of preserving biodiversity.

While his proposal is unusually bold, the general idea of a vast expansion of protected areas is common among some conservationists in the United States and elsewhere. At present, something less than fifteen percent of planetary surface is in some kind of protected status, with various international agencies committed to expanding protected areas to seventeen percent.

Implementation of what Wilson calls a “Half-Earth” strategy would require that more than three times as much land than at present be designated as “protected” areas for the primary purpose of biodiversity protection.1

Wilson acknowledges that a Half-Earth approach would require an extreme intensification of agricultural production on land outside protected areas in order to provide enough food for human needs. He does little to contemplate what kind of intensification would be required.

Neither does he acknowledge the impact conventional intensification would have on biodiversity. Since he relies on previous production gains under industrial agriculture as evidence of the possibility of greater gains using similar techniques, he apparently does not see any serious drawbacks to such techniques.

Some conservationists who favor strategies similar to Wilson’s, speak of agricultural land as “sacrifice zones,” in which intensification, making liberal use of pesticides and synthetic fertilizers and other industrial style techniques, would necessarily reduce non-food organisms to a bare minimum, a “sacrifice” necessary for the pesky species Homo sapiens.

Ironically, these conservationists’ support for land-sparing converges with agribusiness’ interests to increase industrial agricultural intensification.

In the growing scientific literature, this perspective has come to be called “land-sparing,” with the idea that agricultural intensification must be used to spare as much land as possible from human activity in order to leave the rest for the flourishing of non-human species.

In contrast to the land-sparing approach, others who are equally as interested in biodiversity conservation have proposed a “land sharing” approach, in which it is argued that high food production and biodiversity conservation may be achieved most efficiently if pursued simultaneously in a planned fashion.

This point of view is suspicious of what they call the “fortress” protection ideology, in which areas are designated to be free of any human activity, assuming that in such areas all species initially there will survive in perpetuity.

The land-sharing point of view is frequently characterized, perhaps incorrectly, as one in which the agricultural activity itself needs to be sufficiently benign for all the biodiversity in the area, such that purely protected areas are unnecessary.

Either-or Versus Both-and

The land-sparers emphasize increasing agricultural production to minimize land-use devoted to agriculture. The land-sharers emphasize the need to have an agriculture that is favorable for the survival of species.

The first sees the protected area as the only place where biodiversity is conserved; the second sees a benign form of agriculture that itself contains the whole of the biodiversity. In the second edition of our book, Nature’s Matrix, we argue that both sides of this debate are wrong.

Most of Earth’s terrestrial surface contains patches of natural, unmanaged, vegetation. The “landscape” is, by definition, those patches plus the “matrix” in which they are located.

A simplified summary suggests that for one side, the only thing that matters are the patches of natural vegetation (and thus they need to be protected), while for the other side the only thing that matters is a matrix that is conducive to the survival of species. Both sides are wrong.

Very basic ecology acknowledges that local extinctions of species occur regularly, even in the most protected of areas. Local extinctions are, in fact, a normal part of nature. What determines ultimate survival is whether the matrix of the landscape allows for migration and/or reproduction.

Protected areas are very seldom large enough to provide conditions for the survival of most species. If species do not move freely through that matrix, then local extinctions can balloon into regional, and even global, extinctions. Thus, the ability for organisms to migrate and reproduce in agricultural areas is critical. The survival of a species in even the most protected areas will be otherwise undermined by surrounding industrial agricultural “sacrifice zones.”

What we propose in our second edition of Nature’s Matrix is not a strictly “land sharing’ approach, since we recognize the need for maintaining protected areas.

However, we also recognize that the goal of producing enough food to satisfy human nutritional demand does not require the conversion of those protected areas to agriculture, no matter how biodiversity friendly.

We agree with Kremen’s recent analysis of the debate, noting that instead of an either-or approach, we need a “both–and” approach that “favors both large, protected regions and favorable surrounding matrices.”2 We further argue that a matrix favorable to biodiversity can only be achieved by an alliance of diverse social movements and organizations.

Promoting the Nature’s Matrix Approach

In the United States and other industrialized nations, there are a variety of organizations that implicitly or explicitly favor this “nature’s matrix” perspective, including most environmental organizations.

Among the most important are land trust organizations that sign contracts with land owners to create or maintain agriculture that is supportive of relatively high species diversity. Organizations bringing together practitioners and researchers of low input or organic agriculture, agroecology, rotational grazing, and production of perennial crops all usually favor species friendly production techniques.

In Europe, and to a lesser degree in the United States, governments offer cash payments or other reimbursements to farmers who adopt production plans that directly and indirectly favor wildlife.3 These initiatives are complemented in many urban areas by planning for parks, parkways, and greenbelts that offer wildlife-friendly areas within urban boundaries, and in the best of circumstances, connect urban landscapes directly to biodiversity friendly agriculture.

In the biodiverse tropics, support for high quality matrices include organizations of those who are already practicing biodiversity-friendly agriculture, such as those cultivating shade grown coffee and cacao. These organizations are supported by trade certification schemes for “shade grown” and “bird friendly” products.

In Asia, there are smallholder rice systems which support high biodiversity, and organizations which support them. Frequently these organizations include land reform movements, organizations of producers within designated extractive reserves, indigenous peoples, and family farm confederations, most of which have officially adopted policies promoting agroecological farming techniques that tend to create high-quality, biodiversity-friendly matrices.

The organization La Via Campesina, an international alliance of peasant and small-scale agricultural producers, promotes such approaches. There is a general recognition among such organizations that, for a variety of reasons, their members have often practiced agriculture that tends to destroy or degrade species-rich environments, but that understanding strengthens their resolve to support positive change that, they believe, will tend to support more successful, small-scale agricultural production as well as biodiverse landscapes.

As in industrialized countries, a substantial portion of the environmental movement in the global south supports policies promoting agroecological approaches to agriculture that promote complex landscapes friendly to high levels of biodiversity.

New Coffee Plants at a Rainforest Alliance Certified Coffee Farm in Guatemala. Photo courtesy of USAID Biodiversity and Rainforestry (CC BY-NC 2.0).

The Search for Empirical Validation

Empirical study of the two strategies has been less than convincing, due to limitations in both time and space. How long a time period is appropriate? Useful studies must begin with actually occurring landscapes, landscapes in which an intricate dance involving agriculture and species survival has a long history.

Counting insect splats on our windshield over the average period of five years will not likely lead us to the same conclusions as 50 year personal observations. Indeed, there is virtually uniform acknowledgment from the community of scientific ecologists that local extinctions are extensive, leading some to refer to the “extinction debt” of particular landscape patterns.

This reality means that we have little idea of when the dance might be declared over, making it exceedingly difficult to set empirically appropriate beginnings and ends to studies. We may be able to measure population density at a given point in time, but knowing whether any given population is decreasing its numbers to near extinction is a difficult empirical problem.5

Similarly, if two such landscape level approaches are to be compared, where does one draw the boundary between one approach and the other? Most actually occurring landscapes seem to be a blend of the two strategies in ways that make it very difficult to compare because only an arbitrary spatial boundary can be determined, and yet, if none is determined, what should be measured?

In addition, very few advocates of either position insist on a simple either/or dichotomy and are compelled to recognize that all regional landscapes are some kind of a mix. In contrast to Wilson’s sharply arbitrary “half-earth” suggestion, most involved in the debate on both sides understand that it is a matter of emphasis rather than a question of choosing between polar opposites.

Not surprisingly, a proliferation of carefully designed studies meant to compare sparing and sharing approaches have led to conclusions that add detail to understanding the problem but that fall far short of demonstrating the superiority of one approach over the other.

In spite of a very measured and reasonable effort by Kremen in 2015 to put an end to an increasingly polarized debate, Wilson and others continue efforts to sharpen the idea of an “either-or” approach by vastly increasing the territorial ambitions of the land-sparing advocates while avoiding critical discussion of the damaging effects of industrial agriculture.

And the growing attempt to study the problem empirically may confuse rather than enlighten. Despite a significant amount of research, convincing empirical evidence establishing one approach over the other is not to be found.

There are a number of reasons for this lack of resolution, reasons that are fundamental to the nature of the problem and unlikely to be resolved.

For those of us who argue for a landscape approach, where both natural vegetation patches and a high quality matrix comprise the landscape, the essential problem with the land-sparing perspective can be summarized in two related points: first, land-sparing strategies assume that protected areas are far more protective of biodiversity than is the case; and, second, the strategies assume that the negative effect of industrial agriculture on biodiversity is minimal and can remain so even under measures to intensify production. Both of these assumptions rest on an idea of control over nature that is illusory.

The insects flying out of a reserve understand little of the poison that awaits them in the neighboring soybean landscape. This false sense of control over both human life and ecological processes derives at least partially from a particular way of thinking shaped by a particular moment in political time and space, and is not likely to serve either humanity or biodiversity well.

The post Biodiversity & Agriculture: Nature’s Matrix & Future of Conservation appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Angus Wright, Ivette Perfecto and John Vandermeer, authors, Food First, Institute for Food and Development Policy

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Getting the measure of water in a southern Indian village. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS.

By Saahil Kejriwal
Feb 18 2020 (IPS)

Over the last few decades, groundwater has become the major source of irrigation for Indian agriculture. Pumped by millions of privately-owned tube-wells, it contributes 60 percent of the water used for irrigation, having grown by 105 percent since the 1970s.

However, India is now facing a severe crisis of groundwater depletion, and the most vulnerable are the hundreds of millions of small-scale farmers who crucially depend on irrigation water for their livelihoods.

The manner in which these farmers will cope with and adapt to these changes will have dramatic implications for global food security, social stability, and progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals.

India is now facing a severe crisis of groundwater depletion, and the most vulnerable are the hundreds of millions of small-scale farmers who crucially depend on irrigation water for their livelihoods.
There are broadly two views on how farmers might adapt to depletion in groundwater. According to optimists, they may adopt new agricultural practices or technologies, such as rainwater harvesting or drip irrigation, that can enable them to manage with less water and maintain their agricultural income.

Pessimists however warn that as water runs out, farmers may adapt by shifting labour to non-agricultural sources of income generation, or by migrating to areas with better employment opportunities, creating massive waves of ‘water refugees’.

A recent study on adaptation strategies taken post long-term water loss in rural Karnataka helps inform this debate.

The nays have it: there is little evidence that agricultural incomes are maintained

The study collected detailed data from 1,500 farmers in 100 villages across Karnataka—a state that is reeling under the pressure of persistent drought and depletion of groundwater resources. It was found that the drying up of wells was extremely widespread: over 60 percent of farmers in the sample have had their wells dry up.

To understand the effects of this on farmers, researchers compared farmers whose first well had dried up or failed, with those farmers residing in the same village who had drilled equally deep wells in the same year, but whose wells were still functional.

Specialised cameras inserted into the borewells revealed a complex and variable geology, indicating that well failure is random and a matter of fortune. Because of this irregularity, it was possible to find farms with a dried-up well right next to farms still irrigated by active wells.

This allowed the study to attribute differences in the socio-economic status of farmers in the sample to the condition of their wells i.e. whether they were functional or not.

Here are four key findings from the study:

 

There was a decline in agricultural income and not enough adaptation

Households suffered a dramatic decline in agricultural income following the loss of access to groundwater due to the drying up of their first borewell. There was little evidence that households can adapt enough to maintain agricultural incomes.

The study found that though households could potentially have drilled additional wells as a means to adapt to the failure of their first borewell, the cost and risk of doing so prevented most households from pursuing it.

Less than 25 percent of the respondents expressed an intention of attempting to drill another borewell, with 93 percent of them blaming the high costs involved—each failed borewell costs close to INR 50,000.

Failure of the first borewell also led to a decline in the probability that a household uses irrigation at all. There was a decrease in the cultivation of horticultural crops, which require a more controlled, consistent, and reliable supply of irrigation water than most field crops, and a partially compensating increase in the cultivation of field crops.

Horticultural crops—such as fruit and vegetables—generally fetch a better price in the market, and so this shift further impacted agricultural income. Dry-season cultivation, in which irrigation is more important, had a larger change in cropping.

 

Households were able to offset the loss in agricultural income through increased off-farm income

The study showed that households were able to largely offset the loss in agricultural income through increased off-farm income. Failure of the first borewell led to a decline in own-farm cultivation and a compensating increase in employment off the farm. These trends were more pronounced in the dry season.

However, the reallocation of labour was achieved without substantial migration or even employment in nearby villages, arguing against the idea that groundwater decline will result in large waves of ‘water refugees’.

The average borewell failure in the sample occurred about ten years prior to the survey. Hence, these adaptations could be understood as medium- to long-term strategies, rather than temporary, short-term coping mechanisms.

 

There were negative impacts on school enrolment and assets held by the farmers

Even though overall income was maintained post the failure of the first borewell, the lives of these farmers were negatively affected in other ways.

There was a reduction in school enrolment and a rise in employment among children old enough to be employed (12–18 years old). Interestingly, the enrolment rates among younger children (6–11 years old) increased.

One explanation is that borewell failure reduces the potential of young children to contribute to the farms, thereby reducing the opportunity cost of attending school. Another explanation is that borewell failure pushes households to make greater investments in the human capital of their younger children, in order to prepare them for non-agricultural employment.

The failure of the first borewell also affected the assets and debts of farmers. While there was no evidence that farmers sold off land in response to borewell failure, there was a devaluation in non-land assets—specifically a decline in livestock, bicycle, and refrigerator ownership, as well as a substantial decline in gold holdings.

Further, both the probability of having outstanding debt, and the absolute amount of debt, increased. The reasons for this could be attempts to smooth consumption and the costs of drilling another well.

 

Areas with higher industrial development were more likely to maintain incomes

The study categorised the villages in the sample as ‘low-development’ and ‘high-development’, depending on the total number of workers employed by large firms located within 5 kilometres of the village.

Households in both low- and high-development areas displayed a similar decline in on-farm employment. However, households in high-development areas displayed a larger shift toward off-farm employment, and those in low-development areas experienced a larger increase in unemployment.

Additionally, the decline in farm income in high-development areas was smaller, but insignificantly so. The increase in off-farm income, however, was significantly larger in high-development areas. As a result, there was a sizeable difference in incomes in both areas.

To summarise, evidence from the study suggests that loss of access to irrigation water reduced income through agricultural activities, with little indication that households adapted to these losses through shifts in agricultural practices.

On the other hand, they seemed to be relatively successful in off-setting agricultural income losses through a reallocation of labour to off-farm employment, leaving total income little affected. The ability of households to adapt their income through non-agricultural employment, however, depended on the structure of the local economy, specifically the presence of large firms in their vicinity.

 

Know more

• Read the full study with more detailed insights on American Economic Review.
• Watch a short summary of the study, including a snippet from the field.
• Read a similar study on the impact of water scarcity on farmers in the state of Gujarat.

Do more

• Connect with two of the authors of the original study: Ram Fishman and Veena Srinivasan.
• If you are interested in partnerships through which Israeli experience and technology in water use efficiency can be adapted, tested and put to practice in the Indian context, get in touch with Ram’s lab (Nitsan lab) at Tel Aviv University.

 

Saahil Kejriwal is an associate at IDR. He is responsible for sourcing and editing content, along with online and offline outreach. He has completed the Young India Fellowship, a postgraduate diploma in liberal studies, from Ashoka University. Prior to that, Saahil worked as an instructional designer at NIIT Ltd. Saahil holds a BA in Economics from Hansraj College, University of Delhi. He spent his early years in Guwahati, Assam.

 

This story was originally published by India Development Review (IDR)

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Credit: China.org

By James Liang
BEIJING, China, Feb 17 2020 (IPS)

As efforts to contain the Coronavirus epidemic enter a critical stage, it is important to remember that the costs cannot be measured purely in economic terms, as the measures taken will have implications for life expectancy across the entire nation.

Analysis of historical data from various countries gives insight into the relationship between life expectancy and GDP per capita.

In the first place, it is clear that countries with higher per capita incomes have longer life expectancies, owing to the ability and willingness of wealthier nations to invest in healthcare, infrastructure, and environmental governance, thereby increasing life expectancy and reducing fatality rates.

Research suggests that, in general, a 100% increase in per capita income under similar conditions equates to an increase in life expectancy of 1-3 years. Over the past few decades, with the continued increase in per capita income in China, life expectancy has steadily increased in tandem.

On the basis of this, we can make a conservative estimate that a 50% decrease in GDP would see a 1.5 year decrease in life expectancy. Thus, for each 1% reduction in in GDP, life expectancy will decrease by approximately 10 days.

This hypothesis can be tested against the economic theory of the “value of life”. In the realm of economics, “value of life” is a relatively mature concept which refers to the amount that a society is willing to spend in order to increase the average life expectancy.

Some will deem the notion of calculating a value for life to be cynical or even repulsive, as life is priceless. From an ethical point of view, this is entirely correct.

In reality, however, whether in terms of work, business, or social management, a balance must be struck between reducing the risk of fatality and the cost of doing so. In order to identify this balance, a value for life must be calculated in a scientific, if seemingly ruthless, manner.

For example, some jobs inherently entail a far higher risk of fatality than others, such as underground mining and construction of ultra-high buildings. From the perspective of purely reducing the risk of death, these jobs should be eliminated.

But in reality, doing so would both increase the unemployment rate and have adverse impacts on the natural progression of related work, and ultimately, society as a whole will bear the cost of underdevelopment.

In this case, a more rational approach would see the introduction of stronger labor protections for such jobs. Finally, with an income premium determined by the market, high-risk jobs would be rewarded with higher salaries, and an acceptable balance may be achieved.

Similarly, enterprise and government must strike a balance between risk and cost in the provision of transportation infrastructure. For example, in designing a new road, governments can reduce the number of fatalities through the implementation of safety provisions, like extra lanes, non-motorized lanes, and wider sidewalks.

Evidently, however, not all roads are built in this way. Does this mean that the designers of those roads had a disregard safety? Of course, this is not the case.

Even if the proposed road is designed to be impeccably safe, should the cost be RMB 10 billion (approx. USD $1.4 billion), it is likely that the road will not be built at all, leaving people with no transportation infrastructure.

Thus, for such construction projects, the government will issue minimum standards for safety, but it is up to the designer to determine the upper limit.

So, how much is a reduction in fatality worth?

In determining this, an implicit calculation is made to strike a balance with the value of life. In fact, economists have long calculated the value of life in economic terms based on data from various countries.

Generally speaking, the value of life in developed nations is between 10-100 times the GDP per capita. Assuming that the value of life is calculated at 30 times the GDP per capita, the average life expectancy would be around 80 years, or approximately 30,000 days.

This inference can be tested by comparing the GDP per capita and life expectancy of different countries.

In terms of preventing and controlling infectious diseases, with reference to influenza numbers from previous years, in the absence of large-scale compulsory quarantine measures, the infection rate will not exceed 10% of the overall population, and the fatality rate will be around 0.2%.

Thus, the total number of fatalities relative to the entire population will be 2 in 10,000 (0.02%). Assuming that the life expectancy of those who die of influenza is around 60 years, and the average life expectancy across society is 80 years, each person who has died of influenza will have died prematurely, on average, by 20 years.

Calculating on the basis of the fatality rate of 2 in 10,000 (0.02%), the per capita reduction in life expectancy will be 20 multiplied by 0.02, which is four-thousandths of a year, or about 1.5 days. Therefore, on average, the impact of a mass-scale influenza outbreak on human society is a reduction in life expectancy of 1.5 days.

On the basis of this analysis, it is possible to infer a reasonable social policy. If every person infected with influenza, that is, 10% of the population, is quarantined for 14 days, and family members who have been in close contact with them (assuming 20% of the population) are also be quarantined, the loss to GDP due to their inability to participate meaningfully in the creation of wealth for this period will be 30% * 14/365 = 1% of GDP.

As mentioned above, a 1% GDP regression will cause a retrogression across society in medical care, infrastructure and environmental governance, amounting to a reduction in the average life expectancy of about 10 days, a number far greater than the impact of influenza.

Based on this calculation alone, pure isolation is not an effective means of containing influenza, and thus no country or society will implement such measures.

Some may deem the above calculation to be alarmist, but in actuality, this does not even take into account the formidable operation costs of isolating so many people, or the costs of restriction population movement.

A less optimistic estimation of the losses incurred could be 10% of GDP, or even higher, leading to a reduction of the average life expectancy by 100 days or more, possibly amounting to a loss of life equivalent to dozens or hundreds of times the number of deaths attributable to influenza itself.

Of course, if quarantine measures are able to isolate the flu at an early, small-scale stage, for example, 1% of the population, or within one or two cities, then such measures can still be effective.

Once infections spread to over 10% of the population, however, the continued isolation of patients and people in close contact with them will amount to a greater overall toll on lives.

The present epidemic is distinct from previous influenza outbreaks, and therefore, factors such as mortality, the rate of infection, and the proportion of people who need to be quarantined are different, and a significant amount of data is yet to be observed.

The same logic, however, applies to the impact of the economy on life expectancy.

Society has established its determination to beat this epidemic, and such an attitude is undoubtedly correct and necessary, and ultimately, this victory will belong to the entire human race.

However, I also hope that as society strives to beat this epidemic “at all costs”, the above analysis can help society to keep various “costs” to a minimum.

We must adopt a scientific and rational attitude in determining the most appropriate means of controlling and eradicating the epidemic.

In responding to the novel coronavirus, cancer, cardiovascular disease, and other diseases that threaten lives, we must also give comprehensive consideration to social and medical resources, and strike a balance that is conducive to protecting lives.

Regularity and security in everyday life and work is an important and fundamental part of life for every person, and we should strive to minimize the impact to this.

*The opinions expressed are entirely that of the author.

The post Coronavirus Epidemic Has Implications for Life Expectancy appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

James Liang* is co-founder and Executive Chairman of Trip.com Group and professor at Peking University's Guanghua School of Management

The post Coronavirus Epidemic Has Implications for Life Expectancy appeared first on Inter Press Service.

A child wades through water on her way to school in Kurigram district of northern Bangladesh during floods in August 2016. Credit: UNICEF/Akash

By Fairuz Ahmed
NEW YORK, Feb 17 2020 (IPS)

For any riverine country, the state of the water body around big cities and conditions of major rivers hold a leadership position in the overall climate effects and how the water body is protected and preserved impacts the entire economy and living standards of that country. Bangladesh is renowned for the geomorphic features that include massive rivers flowing throughout the country. Within the border of Bangladesh lie the bottom reaches of the Himalayan Range water sources that flow into the Bay of Bengal totaling the number of rivers by a count of 700. The length of river bodies is about 24,140 km. There are predominantly four major river systems: the Brahmaputra-Jamuna, the Ganges-Padma, the Surma-Meghna, and the Chittagong Region river system. The Brahmaputra is the 22nd longest (2,850 km) and the Ganges is the 30th longest (2,510 km) river in the world. (1) The river system works as a backbone for agriculture, communication, drinking water source, energy source, fishing and as the principal arteries of commercial transportation in Bangladesh. During the annual monsoon period between June and October, the rivers flow about 140,000 cubic meters per second and during the dry period, the numbers come down to 7000 cubic meters per second.

As water is vital to agriculture, more than 60 percent of the net arable land, some 9.1 million hectares, is cultivated during the monsoon. (2) Besides having the massive river bodies Bangladesh is also home to nearly 165 million people and is the 8th most populated country with a land area spanning 147,570 square kilometers (56,980 square miles), making it one of the most densely-populated countries in the world. (3)The country’s flat topography, dense population, and weak infrastructure make it uniquely vulnerable to the powerful and unpredictable forces that climate change compounds. The threat is felt from the flood and drought-prone lowlands in the country’s north, to its storm-ravaged coastline along the Bay of Bengal. Along with 6 million climate refugees, around 12 million of the 19.4 million children most affected by climate change, live in and around the powerful river systems which flow through Bangladesh and are regularly affected greatly by river erosion. (4) Coastal residents in Bangladesh are losing their homes and farmland at an astonishing rate due to riverbank erosion, which affects roughly 1 million people and displaces 50,000 to 200,000 every year. (5)

Over 14.8% of the population here live below the poverty line, 3.25% of the rural population lack access to water and almost 53.14% of rural population lack sanitation. (6) Lack of access to safe water and improved sanitation facilities in rural areas, overcrowded conditions, and a lack of healthy ways of disposing of waste in urban centers, all contribute to the water and sanitation crisis in Bangladesh. (7) Although 97% of the total population has access to water, the quality of water is questionable. Groundwater is also not as safe as the threat of arsenic contamination is very high all over the country. (8)

Land degradation, dwindling wetlands, ever-increasing pressure on forest areas, air pollution and climate change has become a major focus for the survival of Bangladesh. In spite of these challenges, Bangladesh has become one of the world’s five fastest-growing economies, averaging more than 6% annual growth over the last decade. (9) The country is moving on a development pathway to becoming a middle-income country and dreams to go beyond.

A man tries to fish in the Meghna while huge metal pipes pour silt on the river to fill it up at Gazaria of Munshiganj. A private petroleum purification plant is filling up the river, defying a High Court order. Such illegal acts have become rampant and the authorities concerned remain oblivious to those. Photo: Rashed Shumon/ The Daily Star

A Pentagon commissioned US military report on climate, points to Bangladesh being the most vulnerable country when it comes to the escalating effects of climate change. As one of the least developed countries in the world, Bangladesh is making one of the smallest contributions to global emissions. (10) Yet, being one of the most densely populated nations on the planet, the huge population os Bangladesh is paying some of the highest prices for intensifying weather patterns.

The Bangladesh government accepted climate change a decade back and has become one of the most proactive governments in the world in dealing with it. They are working on building resilience and adaptation strategies to better cope with the pressing situation. In 2009, the government of Bangladesh brought local experts together and the Bangladesh Climate Change Strategy and Action Plan were created as a result. Over the last ten years, the minister of finance has been putting $100 million into promoting these actions and the research to tackle climate change. Dr. Saleemul Huq, a Bangladeshi scientist, director of International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD) who has been named among the: World’s 100 Most Influential People in Climate Policy for 2019 has remarked that: “In our formulation of the narrative of Bangladesh, we used to be the most vulnerable country in the world. We still are. But, we are on our way to becoming the most resilient country. We are actively going up the learning curve on how to deal with the problem very fast.” (11)

On a visit to Bangladesh in July 2019, the former United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon commented that: “Bangladesh is the best teacher in climate change adaptation. We are here to learn from Bangladesh’s experiences and vision when it comes to adaptation, our best teachers are opened doors who are on the front lines of climate change,” He also said that if the sea level rises just by one meter, almost 17% of the country would be underwater by 2050 and while the rest of the world debate climate change, for Bangladesh adapting to a warmer, more violent, less predictable climate is a matter of absolute survival. (12).

The Government has amped up the efforts of fighting climate change and environmental pollution and undertaken a number of initiatives such as Green Growth Strategy, Bangladesh Environment Conservation Act and the Bangladesh Climate Change Strategy and Action Plan. Rigorous monitoring and enforcement activities are in place to curb environmental pollution by compelling industries to set up and maintain the Effluent Treatment Plant. Much emphasis is also given on the conservation of biological diversity through the implementation of a Coastal and Wetlands Biodiversity Management Project. (13)

Bangladesh is among the few countries that have a separate court on the environment. So if a river is polluted or encroached upon, those affected by it are able to go to court seeking remedial measures. The Government has also intensified drives in the capital city of Dhaka and elsewhere to evict river grabbers. (14) The High Court has declared rivers as a “legal entity” and this is aiding in freeing rivers from enrichment and in combatting pollution. According to an article published in The Daily Star, multiple laws are there in place for river conservation. If the High Court’s judgment per case by case is carried out along with police involvement and empowerment paired with the vigorous implementation of the laws by the custodians, the rivers can be conserved and be protected from grabbers.

Both the government and the people of Bangladesh are recognizing the climate change issue, and are actively trying to tackle it because the problem is large and complex. The government of Bangladesh is open to adaptation and are revising their plans to tackle the situation even better for the future. (15) With community efforts, general awareness of climate change and its effects, proper implementation of laws, along with Government monitoring, intervention and maintaining the acceptable water quality of rivers and the overall water body of Bangladesh can be hoped to be reversed gradually.

1. http://en.banglapedia.org/index.php?title=River
2. http://countrystudies.us/bangladesh/25.htm
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bangladesh
4. https://news.un.org/en/story/2019/04/1036141
5. https://vtnews.vt.edu/articles/2018/03/cnre-bangladesh-river-basin.html
6.https://www.charitywater.org/our-projects/asia/bangladesh?utm_medium=ppc&utm_source=adwords&utm_campaign=geo&utm_content=bangladesh&gclid=CjwKCAiAp5nyBRABEiwApTwjXu4MhD1UJ4h0UG76ZjWNDNCEPni4gYg5q1eJDXegldNaDSiRfwoC2hoCfoMQAvD_BwE https://water.org/our-impact/bangladesh/
7. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6684462/
8. UN: Climate disasters imperil Bangladesh kids’ lives, future By JULHAS ALAM. April 4, 2019
9. https://web.unep.org/environmentassembly/bangladesh
10. https://www.thedailystar.net/environment/climate-change-policy-2019-dr-saleemul-huq-among-world-100-most-influential-1718266
11.https://www.mondaq.com/australia/Environment/881378/Your-PM-is-an-arsonist-An-interview-with-climate-expert-Dr-Saleemul-Huq-of-Bangladesh
12. This story was originally published by The Daily Star, Bangladesh http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/07/bangladesh-best-teacher-climate-change-adaptation-un-ex-chief-ban-ki-moon/)
13. https://www.thedailystar.net/frontpage/news/new-plan-four-rivers-1698151
14. https://www.thedailystar.net/frontpage/river-grabbing-in-bangladesh-183727
15. https://www.dhakatribune.com/climate-change/2019/03/20/dr-saleemul-impact-of-global-warming-inevitable

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Mission 1.5 players will take on the role of climate policymakers trying to keep global warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius. Courtesy: UNDP

By Samira Sadeque
UNITED NATIONS, Feb 17 2020 (IPS)

The United Nations Development Programme is leading a climate change effort that might finally address concerns many advocates have: bridging the gap between people and governments. 

The “Mission 1.5, a campaign” was launched in New York on Thursday, with the purpose of bringing the people closer to their governments with their suggested — and even ambitious — climate action plans.

The campaign is designed around an internet and mobile-based video game, available here, that UNDP is targeting will reach 20 million people around the globe, providing them with an opportunity to voice their solutions.  

“One of the things that has been really important to us about Mission 1.5 is to really ensure that we can reach as many people as possible,” Cassie Flynn, UNDP climate change advisor, told IPS. “What we know that this is a huge industry, and how do we use that industry to tackle one of the biggest problems in the world?”

Jude Ower, founder and CEO of Playmob, a gaming company that works on social advocacy through their games and designed Mission 1.5, told IPS that climate-oriented games are their most popular.

She noted that the gaming industry’s “massive scale” of the industry — with 2.7 billion players around the world — can play a role in moving forward with climate action.

“The number one thing people do on their phone apart from social media is gaming,” she told IPS at the launch. “It’s a great way to reach people in an uninterrupted way and gaming is great for telling stories, for engaging people, for inspiring action as well.”

In this game, the players are asked questions about solutions for climate change in different fields such as green economy, fossil fuels, corporate responsibility, and more. 

The questions have three options for answers — while one of the three is usually an answer that is obviously against a progress towards appropriate climate action, the other two are more nuanced. And based on the answer one picks, they’re awarded either 700 points or 1,000 points. 

At the launch on Thursday, attendees played the game and shared their notes — the collective results were projected on the screen for everyone to see. 

“Mission 1.5 is learning from the world of gaming and digital technology,” Achim Steiner, UNDP Administrator said at the launch, “and together we tried to identify the different ways in which people throughout the world cannot just be spectators of climate change, not just sit in meetings and be lectured at, be told about the science, be told about the challenge, and often be told about the reasons about why we’re not acting.”

After the game, players are asked to vote on key climate actions they want to see adopted. This data will be analysed and delivered to governments, who often lack access to reliable information on public opinion on climate action. 

The game is not for just young kids — the organisers reiterated that this game can be played by anyone around the world, irrespective of their age and location. 

“This is a game for everybody. It’s a game that parents can play with their kids, and for friends to play,” Flynn told IPS. “We’re really excited for this being able to help everyone, no matter whether you know a lot about climate change or a little climate change, you can get something out of it, and you can learn.”

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By PRESS RELEASE
NEW YORK, Feb 17 2020 (IPS-Partners)

In just one week, Education Cannot Wait (ECW), with the Governments of Ethiopia and Chad and implementing partners, launched two new multi-year resilience programmes in Chad (7 February) and Ethiopia (14 February) with US$48 million in seed funding over three years to roll out crucial programme activities and catalyse additional resources.

The budgets for these multi-year programmes total US$216 million and thus call for urgent funding to fill the remaining gaps. When fully funded, the programmes will support quality education for approximately 1 million children and youth affected by conflict, forced displacement, protracted crises and impacts of climate change, including droughts and floods.

With the launch of the government-led programmes in Chad and Ethiopia, ECW and its partners have now realized a proven model for advancing humanitarian-development coherence in 10 crisis-affected countries: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Central African Republic, Chad, Ethiopia, State of Palestine, Somalia, South Sudan, Syria and Uganda.

“In Chad, Ethiopia and other crisis-affected countries, children’s lives have been ripped apart by conflict, forced displacement, climate change impacts and protracted crises. Girls are the most affected and are therefore our top priority. Across these programmes, we must ensure that every child and young person can enjoy their right to inclusive and continued quality education in a protective learning environment – one that caters to all their educational needs and allows them to become who they were meant to be,” said Yasmine Sherif, Director of Education Cannot Wait.

“We must not leave these children behind. They all have the right to develop and thrive. By working together with national governments, UN agencies, donors and other key partners, we are building a global movement to reach these children and to accelerate actions to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals within the UN’s Decade of Action,” continued Sherif.

ECW operates with unprecedented speed and agility in mobilizing partnerships and resources to deliver results for children, helping to advance Sustainable Development Goal 4 – quality inclusive education – for children and youth affected by conflicts, disasters, forced displacement and protracted crises.

In just three years of operation, the Fund has already raised over half a billion dollars and reached over 2.3 million girls and boys, including refugees, internally displaced children, and other children and youth affected by emergencies and protracted crises.

Kickstarting resource mobilization
The programme launches in Chad and Ethiopia kickstart global efforts to fully fund each of the multi-year resilience programmes (MYRPs), and donors are encouraged to help make a transformational difference in the lives of crises-affected children and youth.

• In Chad, ECW plans to allocate a total US$21 million over three years in seed funding grants to catalyse the additional US$30 million required to fully fund the three-year programme and reach 230,000 crisis-affected girls and boys.
• In Ethiopia, ECW plans to allocate a total US$27 million in seed funding grants to catalyse the additional US$138 million required to fully fund the three-year US$165 million programme and reach approximately 746,000 crisis-affected girls and boys.

The ECW-facilitated MYRPs help bridge the gap between emergency response and long-term development and focus on reaching the most marginalized and vulnerable children and youth, such as girls and children with disabilities. MYRPs are developed on the ground in partnership with a wide range of stakeholders – national governments, UN agencies, donors, private sector and civil society.

Interventions are designed to provide whole-of-child solutions and to reintegrate out-of-school girls and boys into learning and training programmes, improve learning environments, train teachers, improve the governance of the education system in emergency situations, provide psychosocial and school feeding services, support early childhood education and to increase enrolment and retention.

Yasmine Sherif meets with girls and boys in Chad in advance of the multi-year resilience programme launch.

Key facts and figures on Chad
The protracted crisis in Chad has pushed 1.2 million children (aged 6 to 11) out of school. Only 19 per cent of girls and 40 per cent of boys access lower-secondary-school education, and only one out of every ten girls complete middle school. Developed under the auspices of Chad’s Ministry of National Education and Civic Promotion (MENPC) with the support of Education Cannot Wait and a range of UN agencies and international and national civil society partners, the new MYRP focuses on refugee, displaced and host community children and youth and those affected by food insecurity and malnutrition.

In advance of the Ethiopia launch, Yasmine Sherif visited with children in Ethiopia’s hard-hit Oromiya Region with the State Minister of Education H.E Tsion Teklu, and representatives from Save the Children and UNICEF

Key facts and figures on Ethiopia
Ethiopia has an estimated 1.4 million displaced, returnee, and refugee children, mostly resulting from conflicts and natural disasters. One million of these children are out of school, 527,000 of them girls. Latest data shows that 728 schools have been damaged by conflict or natural disasters. In Ethiopia, the Ministry of Education will lead the programme in partnership with Save the Children, UNICEF, Education Cannot Wait, and the Education Cluster.

# # #
Notes to Editors

• View online
• Multi-Year Resilience Programme Launch in Ethiopia (Read the full announcement here)
• Multi-Year Resilience Programme in Chad (Read the full announcement here: En, Fr)
• Share our social Chad video on facebook and twitter
• Share our social Ethiopia video on facebook and twitter

About Education Cannot Wait: ECW is the first global fund dedicated to education in emergencies. It was launched by international humanitarian and development aid actors, along with public and private donors, to address the urgent education needs of 75 million children and youth in conflict and crisis settings. ECW’s investment modalities are designed to usher in a more collaborative approach among actors on the ground, ensuring relief and development organizations join forces to achieve education outcomes. Education Cannot Wait is hosted by UNICEF. The Fund is administered under UNICEF’s financial, human resources and administrative rules and regulations, while operations are run by the Fund’s own independent governance structure.

Please follow on Twitter: @EduCannotWait @YasmineSherif1 @KentPage
Additional information at: www.educationcannotwait.org

For press inquiries: Kent Page, kpage@unicef.org, +1-917-302-1735
For press inquiries: Anouk Desgroseilliers, adesgroseilliers@un-ecw.org, +1-917-640-6820
For any other inquiries: info@un-ecw.org

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Excerpt:

TOGETHER WITH PARTNERS, THIS WEEK SAW THE LAUNCH OF TWO MULTI-YEAR RESILIENCE PROGRAMMES TO ACCELERATE SDG 4

 
10 multi-year programmes have been approved to date as ECW – the global fund for education in emergencies – and partners gain momentum to support UN Decade of Action

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Cargo containers at the Port of Mombasa. Kenya is experiencing a shift in the pattern of its exports and imports. Credit: Standard

By Ambassador Amina Mohamed
NAIROBI, Kenya, Feb 17 2020 (IPS)

The rise of the services economy around the world represents a profound transformation that offers significant opportunities for countries’ sustainable development strategies.

Globally, services now comprise the largest share of economic activity and employment, accounting for almost two-thirds of global GDP. In Africa, services have grown and now account for over 50 per cent of GDP, including for almost 60 per cent of GDP in East Africa. For African countries that are not resource-rich, in particular, services have contributed for the greater part of annual GDP growth since 2000, compared to manufacturing and agriculture.

The rise of services is also occurring in the sphere of international trade and investment. Services are increasingly tradable as a result of technological advances and now represent the fastest growing component of world trade, as well as account for the largest share of global foreign direct investment.

Services, Trade and Development

Services trade is important from a development perspective for various reasons. A range of services – from finance to telecommunications or logistics – are essential to facilitate all other economic activities, and are therefore critical to economies’ overall competitiveness and growth. Access to affordable and efficient services, through trade and investment, benefits all other economic sectors and improves export performance in manufacturing and agriculture.

Amb. Amina Mohamed

Services also offer increasing opportunities for exports and diversification. While Africa still only accounts for a small share of total world services trade, the region’s exports grew by 10 per cent in 2018. Services exports of least-developed countries (LDCs), the majority of which are African countries, increased by 15 per cent in 2018, though their share of world services trade remains minute. In the case of Kenya, several services sectors, such as tourism, aviation, finance and ICT, have flourished and boosted the country’s exports and economic growth. Other Industries including, the cut flowers industry have done extremely well as a result of efficient logistics services.

By its very nature, services trade can be instrumental in efforts to promote inclusiveness by providing increased opportunities to women and micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs). Globally, the services sector employs more women than other sectors and hosts large numbers of MSMEs. A dynamic and expanding services sector, encouraged by growing trade and investment, contributes to the empowerment of women and enhances economic and social inclusion.

Finally, services are an essential part of regional integration efforts, as recognized by governments in the context of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). Strengthening economic relationships in Africa – including by facilitating the development of agriculture and industrialization – requires a strong services sector in the region. In Kenya, for example, suppliers and distributors of telecom, transport and financial services play a fundamental role in facilitating broader trade integration in East Africa. Services enable landlocked countries overcome geographical constraints and effectively access regional and global markets for their products.

International Cooperation Matters

At the regional level, trade agreements, in particular the AfCFTA, are indispensable in supporting the sector’s expansion and growth. They will ensure that all countries benefit from such expansion of economic activity by creating new trade opportunities and fostering transparency and predictability through clear and mutually advantageous rules. A key test for the AfCFTA would be whether it promotes inclusive growth and sustainable development of all African countries and not just a few.

At the multilateral level, engagement on services has the potential to complement regional efforts and help advance national objectives, while contributing to building a climate conducive for the advancement of African negotiating interests in agriculture and other areas. WTO Members took a notable step in promoting the further integration of LDCs in the trading system by adopting, in 2011, the services waiver, which allows these economies to receive preferential access for their services exports. But to increase the participation of developing countries, including African countries, the capacity constraints faced by them need to be taken into account.

Trade obligations on services are best complemented by the international community’s efforts, in the context of Aid for Trade, to help build domestic services capacity and support governments’ regulatory and trade facilitative efforts.

Paying due attention to both aspects will be key to ensuring that services trade helps fulfil development aspirations of many developing countries.

The post Why Trade in Services Matters for Development and Inclusiveness in Africa appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Ambassador Amina Mohamed, is the Cabinet Secretary for Sports, Culture and Heritage in the Government of Kenya.

The post Why Trade in Services Matters for Development and Inclusiveness in Africa appeared first on Inter Press Service.

US fighter plane

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Feb 17 2020 (IPS)

When President Saddam Hussein ran one of the world’s most authoritarian regimes in the militarily-volatile Middle East during 1979-2003, US newspapers routinely described him as “the strongman of Iraq” — as most journalists rightly view dictators worldwide.

But one of his political aides, described as “Saddam’s right-hand man” (what if Saddam was left-handed?), took issue with a visiting US journalist when he rather hilariously challenged the description.

“No, no, no”, said the aide, unfamiliar with the nuances of the English language, “Saddam is no strong man. He is the strongest man in Iraq”.

But that prodigious military strength was built on a massive arsenal of weapons, mostly from the then Soviet Union (under a 15-year Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation) and also from France and UK.

Pieter Wezeman, Senior Researcher, Arms and Military Expenditure Programme, at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), told IPS that after 2003, Iraq received large amounts of weapons from the US, partly as aid, and partly paid for by Iraq.

The US has been the largest arms supplier to Iraq during 2003-2018. However, Iraq has looked for alternative suppliers too, he said.

“Already, in 2005 it ordered Russian transport helicopters, about 40 of these were delivered 2006-2011. To integrate these into the Iraqi armed forces was probably not such a big deal, as they were of a type Iraqi had already been operating since the 1980s, when the USSR supplied them,” Wezeman pointed out.

At a press conference at the presidential palace in Baghdad back in late 1981 – where I found myself a captive for over four long hours– the Iraqi president lambasted the Iranians, with whom he was at war (1980-1988), and blasted Israel for the June 1981 sneak air attack on the Osirak nuclear reactor, 128 miles south of the Iraqi capital.

Backed by its arsenal of weapons, Iraq invaded neighbouring Kuwait in August 1990 when its short-lived seven-month occupation ended as a US-led coalition ousted the Iraqis who had defied a Security Council resolution calling for troop withdrawal.

When a US-led coalition invaded Iraq and ousted Saddam Hussein from power in March 2003, the Bush administration transformed Iraq into one of the biggest US arms markets in the Middle East, ranking behind Saudi Arabia, Israel and Egypt.

The US arms included sophisticated jet fighters, combat helicopters, air-to-air and air-to-ground missiles, warships, battle tanks, howitzers, and armoured personnel carriers, along with military assistance—largely under a bilateral Strategic Framework Agreement.

The Wall Street Journal reported last month that Iraq was considering purchasing a Russian air defense system– perhaps to spite the US following a demand by the Iraqi parliament that US troops, numbering over 5,200, leave Iraq.

Credit: Iraqi News

The Trump administration has refused to concede to the demand, prompting Iraq to accuse the US of violating sovereign territory and perhaps the UN charter—largely triggered by the drone-killing of Major General Qassim Suleimani, the commander of Iran’s Quds Force, inside Iraqi territory.

Conscious of American assistance to fight the insurgent group ISIS, one Iraqi official told the New York Times last month: “We don’t want Americans to leave. We want American troops to leave.”

Dr. Natalie J. Goldring, Senior Fellow and Adjunct Full Professor with the Security Studies Program in the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, told IPS it’s logical for the Iraqi government to play off the United States against other Iraqi weapons suppliers.

She said the US and Russia are engaged in an arms race in the Middle East. In stoking violence in the region, the US government is also creating future markets for US arms manufacturers.

“Instead, the US government should be working to reduce conflict and weapons transfers to this volatile region.”

She said the United States continues to dominate the global arms trade, accounting for 36 percent of the global trade in major conventional weapons from 2014-2018, according to SIPRI

Since 2005, the US State Department has approved more than $22 billion worth of Foreign Military Sales (FMS) to Iraq, mostly government-to-government transfers of military systems and equipment using their own national funds.

The US weapons to Iraq included 46 M1A1 battle tanks, 36 F-16 fighter aircraft, 24 IA407 helicopters, 9 C-130 cargo aircraft, F-16 munitions package (including Paveway tail kits, AIM-9M Sidewinder missiles, and AGM-65 Maverick missiles) and Contractor Logistics Support (CLS) packages for various air and ground platforms, according to the State Department.

Wezeman told IPS a bigger change occurred beginning 2012, when Iraq started to supplement US weapons with advanced new Russian equipment.

The Iraqis acquired 19 Mi-28 combat helicopters (the first country to receive this model after Russia itself) instead of US AH-64s and further Mi-35 combat helicopters and Pantsyr-S1 SAM systems (air defence system).

Around 2015, he said, Iraq also ordered a reported 300 BMP-3 tracked armoured vehicles and 73 T-90S tanks, several batches of both types have been delivered since.

Recently, he said, there have been reports that Russia has been ‘offering’ its long-range S-400 SAM system. “It remains unclear if this is just Russia offering the system or if there is serious interest in Iraq to acquire it,” said Wezeman.

To operate Russian and US equipment side by side may not be the best solution from a logistical and training perspective, but despite that Iraq has opted to do so anyway.

The major reason for that choice is likely to be related decreasing reliance on the US, an objective that may increase after the killing of Iranian General Suleimani in Iraq, and possibly lower prices for the Russian equipment.

Operating both Russian and US equipment is not unique for Iraq either. India has been operating Russian (Soviet) and European weapons since the 1960s and over the past decade it has increasingly added US weapons to the mix too.

Jordan has operated US and Soviet SAM systems side by side since the 1980s. NATO member Greece bought Russian SAM systems around 2000 and NATO member Turkey bought Russian SAM systems last year.

“So, it has been done and can thus be considered possible. Which is one more reason for the US to worry about it,” he pointed out.

Dr Goldring told IPS that when the Iraqi parliament recently voted to remove all foreign troops from Iraqi soil, the Trump administration publicly dismissed the vote.

“President Trump continues to engage in a dangerous fallacy – that the United States gets to make the last move in international security issues. Although this resolution wasn’t binding, it suggests the extent of Iraqi anger with the US government’s decision to violate Iraqi sovereignty by assassinating Iranian General Suleimani on Iraqi soil.”

She said President Trump “acts like a bully, both internationally and domestically”. He ignores laws that he finds objectionable and acts as if the US government gets to do whatever it wants wherever it wants.

If the Iraqi government implements this resolution, in addition to removing ground forces, the US would be barred from using Iraqi airspace for overflights, among other restrictions,“ said Dr Goldring, who is Visiting Professor of the Practice in the Duke University Washington DC program and also represents the Acronym Institute at the United Nations on conventional weapons and arms trade issues.

*Thalif Deen is a former Director, Foreign Military Markets at Defense Marketing Services (DMS); Senior Defense Analyst at Forecast International; and military editor Middle East/Africa at Jane’s Information Group.

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By Nayema Nusrat
NEW YORK, Feb 15 2020 (IPS)

In a recent report by World Economic Forum (WEF) shows women suffer a “triple whammy” in the workplace. Without drastic action, gender parity will take more than a lifetime to achieve. This is the challenge that Katja Iversen, President and CEO of Women Deliver is staring down.

“We know that achieving gender equality is not a women’s issue. It is a societal issue. To be successful … boys and men must be involved at all levels and all ages,” said Iversen.

Iversen’s involvement WEF 2020 annual meeting in Davos increased the spotlight on gender equality. She was involved in a myriad of discussions, conversations, panel debates, midnight huddles and a social media drive. As the woman who heads leading global advocate for gender equality, health and rights of girls and women her role at the annual forum was clear cut.

“We provoked discussions using our ‘gender lens’ – a small magnifying glass. We gave this to leaders and influencers to bring down the mountain and apply to their businesses, governments, and lives,” Iversen said in an exclusive interview with IPS.

“Along with our partners, Promundo and Unilever/Dove Men+Care, we released a series of recommendations on male engagement in gender equality, condensed in a catchy infographic.”

Iversen went on to emphasise how “everybody – including the men and women in Davos – must apply a gender lens to every aspect of life, from leadership, to health systems, to schools, the workplace, and at home. That is an important step to change systems, to change harmful norms, and drive progress.”

This may seem a momentous task. The WEF report, released in December 2019, highlighted the factors that fuel the economic gender gap. This included a noticeably low level of women in leadership positions, wage stagnation, labour force participation and income.

The report highlights what it terms a ‘Triple Whammy’ for women in the workplace. Women, the report said, are highly represented in many of the roles that have been hit hardest by automation.

Moreover, not enough women are entering technology-driven professions where wage growth is more profound. This puts women into the middle to low wage categories that have been stagnant since the financial crisis in 2009.

Thirdly, a lack of access to capital prevents them from pursuing entrepreneurial activities, another key driver for income.

WEF aims to close the gender gap by setting up coalitions between relevant ministries and the largest employers to increase female labour force participation, increase women in leadership positions, close wage gaps and prepare women for jobs of the future. Additionally, the global business commitment on Hardwiring Gender Parity in the Future of Work mobilises businesses to commit to hiring 50% women for their five highest growth roles between now and 2022.

Iversen said women must be involved in the development and growth of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and ubiquitous digital technology for them to benefit.

“We know that innovation and technology hold a lot of power and can be used for good – but only if it works for girls and women and identifies the bias that holds them back,” she said.

While there was potential for digital technologies, like AI, to unlock better health access and information, new employment and leadership opportunities, and greater economic security for women – it could “just as likely leave big parts of the population behind and exacerbate existing inequalities”.

This was why the gender lens in the development and implementation of AI and other tech solutions is so critical, said Iversen. Having women involved in the growth of digital technology “can ensure technology is more representative and can eliminate unconscious bias in hiring, promotion, and recruitment”.

It is critical that women’s education, especially in the field of technology, is enhanced, enabling them to participate in future workforce equally.

“We also need to make sure we are investing in women’s lifelong education and training, particularly in science, technology, engineering, and math. It is key to their professional and financial security in the workforce of tomorrow.”

Investment in women and their participation in the economy has a ripple effect.

“Evidence and common sense confirm that when leadership and the workforce represent the population and include women, it leads to better economic, social, and political cohesion and puts us on a better, more sustainable path.”

The Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, noted in his speech at WEF 2020 that while problems were global, the responses were fragmented.

“If I had to select one sentence to describe the state of the world, I would say we are in a world in which global challenges are more and more integrated, and the responses are more and more fragmented, and if this is not reversed, it’s a recipe for disaster,” he warned.

Iversen explains that by putting the gender lens at the centre of the solutions, it would enhance society’s ability to achieve its Sustainable Development Goals. It would also mitigate the ‘fragmented responses’ to global challenges.

“Gender is cross-cutting, it is essential to progress and to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Conservation of our planet; eradicating poverty and ensuring health; education; peace, and prosperity for all need to be integrated. This requires putting a gender lens to the entire development agenda,” Iversen said.

“One of the reasons the world is facing so many challenges right now, including trade wars, conflict, climate change, and growing inequality, is that girls, women, and marginalised groups are prevented from accessing power, both political and financial. Big egos, narrow interests, and profit over people and planet have been, mistakenly, prioritised, and we are paying the price for that.”

Women Deliver’s President was emphatic that “development actors from across the spectrum must abandon siloed approaches. It was essential to work together to drive progress for the people and planet, including girls and women, both through financial investment and multi-sector partnerships.”

Iversen is confident. WEF was “good start to the Decade of Action for the Global Goals and the 2020 Generation Equality push, demanding women’s equal participation in political life and decision-making in all areas of life.”

Involving the younger generation was also paramount to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.

“What was also clear coming down the Davos mountain is that any efforts to push the development agenda over the finish line will fail if they don’t involve young people. Because youth not only have a stake in reaching our ambitious development goals by 2030, they are also well-suited to identify solutions right now.”

To address and improve gender equality, Iversen emphasised that it required a global effort. The private sector has a vested interest and a significant role to play in advancing gender equality. “We want governments and business leaders to use the gender lens in all they do. They should complete a concrete analysis of what progress they have made and what gender gaps remain,” Iversen said.

Both should ask themselves: What policies and procedures are inhibiting or promoting progress? What gender norms are prevalent and need to be addressed? What investments in gender equality could be made?

“And once that analysis is complete – get to work!”

Women Deliver has been relentless in that message and in bringing the evidence to bear with great partners. “And in recent years we have seen that the world – including at WEF – has started to catch on. Our challenge now is to move from talking to mobilising dedicated action.”

Women Deliver continues to be serious advocates, speaking up for girls and women in every setting.

“We’ll continue to advise committees for big corporations and international agencies. We’ll continue to elevate the voices of young advocates and local organisations around the world. We will continue to push back on the pushback to protect our gains and drive further progress,” Iversen said.

“We will continue to communicate from podiums, in boardrooms and hallways of major summits, on the pages of major newspapers, on (television) screens and social media – with the clear message: In a gender-equal world, everybody wins.”

IPS asked about the trend of women participating as policy-makers at WEF. Just how prominent is women’s role? Iversen replied that “24% of the 2,700 formal WEF participants were women. While that is an improvement from previous years, it’s still way too small. WEF has pledged to double female participation by 2030, and we are ready to help to speed it up.”

“We have a long way to go, but I saw progress at WEF,” said Iversen, adding, “More and new world leaders – in business and government – are picking up the gender lens. There is still so much to be done, and progress is slow for an impatient optimist like myself. But I came down the Davos mountain more hopeful than I went up, and more ready than ever to power progress for girls, women and gender equality in the Super Year ahead.”

Iversen remains optimistic. “Ultimately, we want to work ourselves out of a job. Then sit back and see a world where gender inequality is a thing of the past, where it is something people make fun of like the ‘old days’. Where people say, ‘I can’t believe we didn’t do this sooner’.”

The post Coming Down the Davos Mountain with a Gender Lens appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Diogo Vaz, a company in the idyllic island of Sao Tome and Principe in West Africa, is producing organic luxury chocolate from rare cocoa varieties. Courtesy: Diogo Vaz

By Busani Bafana
BULAWAYO, Feb 14 2020 (IPS)

A premium chocolate maker in São Tomé and Príncipe is on a drive to promote the taste for “made in Africa” chocolate, and tap into a $100 billion global indulgence associated with Valentine’s Day.

Diogo Vaz, a company in the idyllic island of São Tomé and Príncipe in West Africa, is producing organic luxury chocolate from rare cocoa varieties. The objective is to promote Africa’s palate for chocolate, a world-loved treat estimated to be enjoyed by one billion people every day.

“For centuries Africa has produced cocoa from wild beans but the consumption of chocolate is really low in Africa,” Willy Mboukem, Plantation Director at  Diogo Vaz, told IPS in a telephone interview.

“Modern consumer habits are a challenge and we know in Africa we are not big consumers of chocolate. People do not have this habit and often buy expensive products with a lot of sugar and missing out of the real taste of chocolate with a higher percentage of cocoa.”

Ivorian chocolate. The Ivory Coast is one of the world’s greatest producers of cocoa. Credit: Busani Bafana/IPS

Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Ghana and Nigeria produce 70 percent of global cocoa but enjoy just five percent of the global value from this market. Cocoa producers are unable to get more value from selling the raw material for chocolate to realise higher prices for farmers.

Worse still, many African cocoa producers have battled with adding value to their beans, — a process that would boost jobs and incomes — because they have little control on their value chains.

Emerging markets consultant Edward George says in an online paper that West Africa is the largest cocoa producer in the world but it exports 75 percent of it as raw beans – a key ingredient in chocolate — giving the lion’s share of value addition to confectioners and retailers at the end of the value chain.

George said that despite Africa’s agricultural sector having many inbuilt advantages of abundant agricultural land, a rapidly-growing population and lower labour costs, it lacked an efficient marketing infrastructure.

This prevented farmers and processors from getting full value from their crop, even in its raw form. In addition, Africa’s agriculture value chains were highly fragmented and face international competition.

George said a solution to poor value addition in Africa was to boost local demand for cash crops, within countries and regionally.

Last November, the African Development Bank (AfDB), Credit Suisse AG, the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Limited and the Ghana Cocoa Board signed a $600-million loan to boost cocoa production in Ghana, the second-largest cocoa producer in the world.

The deal will be extended to other cocoa-producing countries in Africa, according to AfDB President Akinumwi Adesina. Adesina has long bemoaned the fact that Africa is not dominating the cocoa value chain, despite being the leading producer.

Ivorian cocoa framer Abou Ouattara in this file photo dated 2016. Credit: Busani Bafana/ IPS

“African farmers sweat, while others eat sweets. While the price of cocoa has hit an all-time low, profits of global manufacturers of chocolate have hit an all-time high…. It is time for Africa to move to the top of the global food value chain, through agro-industrialisation and adding value to all of what it produces,” Adesina said at the Bank’s Annual Meetings last year.

The AfDB is a strong supporter of agriculture value chains on the continent. The AfDB’s Feed Africa Strategy (2016-2025) marked a shift by the bank towards approaching agriculture on the continent as a business. Agriculture is currently one of the top priorities for AfDB.

“Agriculture is the most important profession and business in the world,” Adesina said last month when he was conferred with an honorary Doctorate of Science by the Federal University of Agriculture in Abeokuta, Nigeria.

Chocolate visions

Diogo Vaz has bucked the trend and is adding value to cocoa beans at source, a risk Mboukem says is paying off thanks to growing demand for high end chocolate in Europe and the United States.

The company operates a 420 hectare farm bought in 2013 which has been replanted with 150,000 cocoa trees, which include the unique Amelonado and Trinitario varieties endemic to São Tomé and Príncipe. The Portuguese introduced cocoa from Brazil to the island nation over 160 years ago.

Mboukem said Diogo Vaz was riding on the rich cocoa-growing history in São Tomé and Príncipe and is establishing itself as a global brand for chocolate. It currently exports bulk and tablet chocolate to France, Portugal and the Gambia. The company, which employs 250 people, exports 12 tonnes of fine chocolate every two months.

“We have looked at what the European and U.S. market needs which is  low fat, low sugar organic chocolate with traceability,” said Mboukem.  “We have maintained producing chocolate from different varieties of cocoa from the farm to factory. This project is an important page in the history of Africa to master the cocoa value chain.”

It is, however, a luxury market item. “You sell units at high price and then you have a lot of different costs like the cost of packing is a big cost for us and then operational costs but chocolates, in general, is a profitable business and is huge all over the world especially in Europe, U.S., and Japan,” he said.

Diogo Vaz holds public tastings and open factory tours to educate the community in São Tomé and Príncipe about chocolate making but importantly to understand the company’s philosophy of making good chocolate through investing in the community.

“People say it is an African chocolate but the packaging and the way it’s presented and the story behind makes them feel proud because it is 100 percent African with international characteristics. They say
the chocolate is good and we have been making good chocolate, we’ve got a professional chocolatier.”

Climate change eating chocolate?

Weather extremes, a result of climate change, will lead to a fall in cocoa production by 2030, a 2011 study by the International Centre for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) predicted.

Climate change, and the resultant change in the rainy seasons, Mboukem said, has forced Diogo Vaz to change production methods in terms planting the beans and the fermentation and grading process to retain the best quality.

Rising incomes are driving the demand for cocoa beans, which is expected to reach 4.5 million tonnes by 2020, up from 3.5 million tonnes in 2016.

Cocoa farming by over five million small holder farmers around the world, a bulk of them in Africa, supports more than 50 million people globally, according to the World Cocoa Foundation.

The International Cocoa Organisation (ICCO) says while the organic cocoa market is less than 0.5 percent of the total global production, there is growing demand for organic cocoa products as consumers worry about food safely and the environmental footprint of food production.

The global chocolate market is projected to grow to $161 billion by 2024 from $103.2 billion in 2017.

“The future is to expand value addition of cocoa beans in Africa and transform the livelihoods of many people who depend on cocoa and ensure Africa enjoys real chocolate,” Mboukem said.

 

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The post From Cocoa to Chocolate, Made With Love in Africa appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

It produces 70 percent of the world's cocoa and yet Africa has very little hand in making the final product - chocolate. But one producer in Sao Tome and Principe is on a drive to become a global brand for African chocolate.

The post From Cocoa to Chocolate, Made With Love in Africa appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Siddharth Chatterjee
NAIROBI, Kenya, Feb 14 2020 (IPS)

Every year Valentines Day is celebrated with great relish & celebration. People show their affection for another person or people by sending cards, flowers or chocolates with messages of love.

But there is a tragic dark side which stays in the shadows, when considering violence against women, one is confronted with an apparent contradiction.

“If you don’t fight, silence will kill you,” says Kenyan musician Wendy Kemunto, explaining why – a month after suffering a sexual assault by two Kenyan rugby players early in 2018 – she finally went to the police. For several weeks Wendy had remained silent, blaming herself, paralysed by a toxic mixture of shame, fear and well-founded dread at the usual & insensitive treatment of sexual assault victims by law-enforcement agencies.

But in November 2019, the two rugby players were each handed 15-year jail terms for rape, and now Wendy is speaking out to encourage more women to report such crimes.

Currently less than a third of victims report their ordeal, but data shows more than one in three women globally have experienced physical or sexual violence. In the face of such figures we can no longer shrug our collective shoulders and ignore the misogyny that fosters and encourages sexual violence.

When you know that only a tiny proportion of reported rapes ever make it to court, it is easy to understand, perhaps, why so few rape victims come forward.

The conviction of Wendy’s attackers is an encouraging sign that the Kenyan justice system is shifting from a trend where such cases – particularly those that involve high-profile individuals – remain in limbo in the courts, leaving a swathe of victims of violent assault not only without sufficient legal protection, but with the additional trauma of facing societal stigma.

The commemoration of the International Day of Zero Tolerance for FGM last week is another reminder that all forms of gender based violence are not merely vestiges of historical harmful cultures, but are practices that continue to impoverish women and their families, and lower the productivity of entire countries.

With ever more studies illustrating the developmental hazards of sexual and gender violence, it is to our collective shame that, in the words of UN Secretary-General Mr. Antonio Guterres, women’s rights are increasingly being “reduced, restricted and reversed”.

Around 120 million girls worldwide have experienced forced intercourse or other forced sexual acts, with current or former husbands, partners or boyfriends the most common perpetrators. Around 700 million women alive today were married as children. Of those women, more than one in three—or some 250 million—were married before the age of 15.

The UNDP Africa Human Development Report for 2016 says, “Gender inequality is costing sub-Saharan Africa on average $US95 billion a year”. The justice system, supported by the necessary legislation, must pursue individuals who commit such acts with the same vigour that we use to go after economic saboteurs.

Countries must begin by fast-tracking the implementation of progressive policy commitments and institutional frameworks on gender equality and women’s empowerment. For instance, the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa has yet to secure universal ratification.

Beyond policies, there is an enormous task ahead in changing the mind-set of insidious male entitlement that finds expression through sexual and gender based violence.

The natural place to begin must be in the home, where husbands must not only set an example of respect for their wives but also raise their sons to value girls and to respect their rights and autonomy. Schools must teach respect and gender equality to both sexes.

Such early formation is invaluable in dealing with societies that see gender based violence and misogyny as expressions of “culture” and “tradition”. In my own country India, culture and concepts such as ‘family honour’ have continued as the distorting lenses through which gender based violence, patriarchy and misogyny are seen.

President Uhuru Kenyatta must be commended for his unequivocal message that such deeply-embedded practices as female genital mutilation and early marriages will not go unpunished.

As the United Nations in Kenya, we believe this leadership is crucial for programmes such as the Government of Kenya and UN Joint Program on the Prevention and Response to Gender-Based Violence, which is supporting the establishment of strong prevention interventions and protection mechanisms for survivors.

While the case of Wendy Kemunto is an encouraging win for assault victims, we must remember that most victims remain invisible, as male-controlled money and power keep their plight hidden. Many are poor and ill-educated. Countless are growing up in cultures where their life chances are severely diminished simply by virtue of their gender.

So on this Valentines Day, Kenya has an opportunity to lead the way in showing that institutions and structures are ready, willing and able to enforce equal and fair treatment of all women.

The post The Hammer of Justice for Sexual Assault Victims Must Be Swift, Loud and Consistent appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Siddharth Chatterjee is the United Nations resident coordinator to Kenya

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Credit: UNDP, Paraguay

By Achim Steiner, Inger Andersen and Qu Dongyu
ASUNCION, Paraguay, Feb 14 2020 (IPS)

Imagine a forest that covered half of your entire country. A biodiverse forest which supports thousands of species from giant anteaters to armadillos to jaguars. A forest that is home to one the world’s last uncontacted tribes.1

That forest is in fact a reality in Paraguay, a South American country of seven million people, landlocked between Argentina, Brazil and Bolivia. It is home to much of the Gran Chaco forest that is considered the second largest forested landscape in South America — second only to the Amazon rainforest.

And like other countries which are home to the great forests of South America, Paraguay too battled raging wildfires in 2019.

But Paraguay’s portion of the Chaco forest is battling an even more existential challenge. This unique ecosystem, characterised by scrub forests, grassy plains, lagoons, marshes and jungles, is under threat from agricultural expansion, driven by cattle and soy production.2

The region has one of the highest rates of deforestation in the world. As NASA satellites have highlighted between 1987 and 2012, the forests in Paraguay lost nearly 44,000 square kilometres through conversion to farmland or grazing land. That’s an area roughly the size of Honduras.3

The scale of that destruction is both frightening and untenable.

Paraguay needed to support to reduce deforestation. And partly as a consequence of that destruction, the country was not able to fully realise the massive potential of its forests to support climate change mitigation.

Thus, Paraguay engaged in REDD+, a voluntary process under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) which encourages developing countries to contribute to climate change mitigation efforts by reducing greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) from deforestation and forest degradation. The process also helps to increase the removal of GHGs from the earth’s atmosphere through the conservation, management, and expansion of forests.

Credit: UNDP Paraguay

Since 2011, partners from across the UN System have collaborated closely to support Paraguay’s national REDD+ process through a range of tailor-made initiatives.

They include the UN-REDD Programme (2011-2016) where the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) provided support to Paraguay to submit its first Forest Reference Emission Level of deforestation (FREL).

This collaboration also resulted in a new a National Forest Monitoring System for the country which allows for the reporting of forest carbon — reliable data on forest area and changes to forest area.4

Following this, and thanks to support from the World Bank’s Forest Carbon Partnership Facility since 2016, Paraguay advanced the elements of the UNFCCC Warsaw Framework for REDD+ – institutional prerequisites that make a country’s emission reductions in the forest sector eligible to exchange for results-based payments.

UN agencies are now jointly collaborating to advise Paraguay on accessing and managing result-based payments from a range of public and private sources thus ensuring robust fiduciary management and compliance with UNFCCC social and environment safeguards.

The first example of this collaboration is Paraguay’s proposal to the Green Climate Fund (GCF) pilot programme for REDD+ result-based payments, which was approved at the GCF board meeting in November 2019.

UNEP will play the role of Accredited Entity for this US $72 million proposal and implementation will be undertaken by the three UN-REDD partner agencies: UNDP, FAO and UNEP. UNDP will build upon the support provided for the development of Paraguay’s National Strategy on Forest for Sustainable Growth and will assist in the implementation of the Strategy’s policies and measures, informed by UNDP’s experience on the ground.

FAO will support improvement of the national forest monitoring system. It will also assist in the application of rigorous methodologies to assess, quantify, monitor, report and verify emission reductions at the national-level.

UNEP will support the definition of incentives to reduce deforestation and forest degradation. It will also boost social and environmental safeguards; and engage in communications and awareness-raising efforts.

Working together for nearly a decade, UN agencies have demonstrated the power of working as one to open the door for Paraguay to access significant international resources to implement its National Strategy on Forest for Sustainable Growth and achieve the mitigation goals set out in the country’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) – or its “promise” towards the Paris Agreement.

The results of these wide-ranging partnerships are producing dividends. In 2019, Paraguay reported 26.7 MtCO2 of emission reductions – or a reduction of nearly 50 per cent for the forest sector.

We hope that Paraguay can serve as a “beacon state” to thrust countries around the world into further positive action to when it comes to the management of its forests as a nature-based solution to climate change — while also helping them to propel forward a range of related Sustainable Development Goals.

1 https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2018/10/isolated-brazil-peru-amazon-tribes-remote-protected/
2 https://www.esa.int/Applications/Observing_the_Earth/Earth_from_Space_An_island_surrounded_by_land
3 https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/92078/deforestation-in-paraguay
https://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/stats/Geography/Land-area/Sq.-km
4 https://redd.unfccc.int/fact-sheets/national-forest-monitoring-system.html

The post Why Paraguay Can Be a “Beacon State” for Forest Management appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Achim Steiner is Administrator, UN Development Programme (UNDP), Inger Andersen is Executive Director, UN Environment Programme (UNEP) & Qu Dongyu is Director-General, UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)

The post Why Paraguay Can Be a “Beacon State” for Forest Management appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Ranton Anjain, 17, from the Marshall Islands, speaks at a press conference announcing a collective action being taken on behalf of young people facing the impacts of the climate crisis. UNICEF/Radhika Chalasani

By Esther Ngumbi
ILLINOIS, United States, Feb 14 2020 (IPS)

Recently, the Associated Press cropped out Ugandan climate change activist Vanessa Nakate from a photo at the World Economic Forum. The remaining activists in the photo, including Greta Thunberg, were all white.

While the AP cited picture composition as the reason for the edit and later apologized for their actions, it still happened. The editing out of Nakate – who said it felt like her story had been erased — calls for a deeper reflection on the issue of diversity, inclusion, and the lack of representation of people of color and other marginalized groups in key global conversations.

In fact, people of color should be the ones we hear from the most when it comes to issues like climate change. According to climate research and many reports, including the recently released IPCC report, the outcomes of climate change disproportionally affects people living in developing countries.

Highlighting activists of color is good for everyone. Convincingly, a growing body of evidence shows that when minorities and underrepresented voices are included, and their voices and actions displayed, including in science, everyone benefits

For example, in March of 2019, flooding events in Malawi and Mozambique brought about by climate change affected and disrupted the lives of nearly 843,000 people. In addition, in the same year, drought, floods, and conflicts brought about by the changing climate, contributed to soaring levels of hunger in the horn of Africa.

According to Save the Children, nearly 13 million people were affected by hunger with children making half the number.

Instead, climate activists and voices from these communities must be centered in global conversations if we are to sustainably mitigate climate change. They bring in firsthand experience which can greatly inform climate change conversations, science, action, and policy.

As an African climate change activist who has greatly benefited from media visibility, I strongly feel we must highlight activists of color in the media – it matters who is featured there. Undoubtedly, Thunberg is a passionate, fearless and determined activist and she deserves to be celebrated.

But we should also hear about the actions of young people like Kaluki Paul Mutuku from Kenya, who has been engaged in conservation work and activism,  Leah Namugerwa, a climate activist from Uganda, also engaged with Friday climate strikes and Ridhima Pandey, a climate activist from India.

Failing to showcase and highlight the contributions, ideas, and actions of these activists from developing countries hurts us all. It actively crops these voices out and reduces the chances that their worthy ideas will help shape policies and the world.

Often those ideas are ingenious, born of necessity and creativity. This is something I saw firsthand while growing up in rural Kenya in a town with no electricity or Internet. People in these regions innovate every day, but their ideas and ways of addressing challenges are rarely featured – and not on a global scale. This should change.

Further, rendering these activists invisible potentially denies them the chance of catching the eye of and benefiting from funding agencies that can finance their ideas and amplify their contributions. It perpetuates the problem by allowing groups with more visibility and funding in the first place to continue to grow through support.

Highlighting activists of color is good for everyone. Convincingly, a growing body of evidence shows that when minorities and underrepresented voices are included, and their voices and actions displayed, including in science, everyone benefits.

It makes our world stronger. It also sends a message to other activists and aspiring young people that they, too, can be the voice on issues of our day.

In contrast, by failing to recognize all activists, we perpetuate the narrative that only certain people can achieve greatness. Only certain people can be activists. Yet, this is not true. Even with the lack of representation, we have examples of people of color who have broken glass ceilings.

The Late Nobel Prize winner, Wangaari Maathai, for example, was an environment activist whose work continues to inspire many people-young and old. Imagine how much more persons of color may be able to achieve if they have more recognition and support.

In the end, we all must make an effort to ensure that diversity and inclusion happens. Small actions like calling out these injustices as they happen would go a long way.  If you see something—say something.

We cannot stand by the perimeter and expect a just and equal world to happen. Evermore, we must continue to be creative and find other avenues to highlight activists of color and those from marginalized groups. We all have a stake in mitigating climate change.

 

Dr. Esther Ngumbi is an Assistant Professor at the Entomology Department, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign. She is a Senior Food security fellow with the Aspen Institute and has written opinion pieces for various outlets including NPR, CNN, Los Angeles Times, Aljazeera and New York Times.

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Credit: Harald Matern from Pixabay.

By Nelson Mandela Ogema
NAIROBI, Feb 14 2020 (IPS)

Widespread hatching and movement of destructive desert locusts will turn into a full-blown crisis in the coming weeks in East Africa and neighbouring countries, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization warns.

“Breeding continues in the Horn of Africa, which will cause locusts to increase further in Ethiopia, Somalia and Kenya with new swarms forming in March and April,” explains the FAO in a forecast.

The desert locusts have destroyed 70,000 hectares of farmland in Ethiopia and Somalia, threatening food security and livelihoods in both countries. According to the FAO, locust swarms of one square kilometer can eat the same amount of food in one day as about 35,000 people.

This is the worst desert locust invasion Kenya has had in 70 years, while Ethiopia and Somalia experienced an invasion of this magnitude 25 years ago, the FAO says.

The region experienced abnormally heavy rains between October and December, with flooding in regions that are normally semi-arid, creating conditions that are favourable for locust breeding.

 

A map dated February 10, 2020 showing Desert Locust spread from Kenya to Uganda and Tanzania. Source: FAO Locust Watch

 

“Locust swarms have started laying eggs and another generation of breeding will increase locust numbers,” says Keith Cressman, a senior locust forecasting officer at the FAO. “Urgent efforts must be made to stop them from increasing to protect the livelihoods of farmers and livestock holders.”

Stephen Njoka, the director-general of Desert Locust Control Organisation for Eastern Africa, tells SciDev.Net: “Climate change could be behind this invasion, for example the current rains in Kenya are very unusual, making vegetation available to the pests and creating suitable egg laying sites in the soil.”

The Horn of Africa, made up of Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia and Somalia, has about 115 million people. Because locusts have been found to be nutritious by some communities and cultures in the region, eating them may be a mild measure of control given the overwhelming numbers of the insects, Njoka suggests.

Njoka says that aerial and ground spraying with safe pesticides are the best ways to control locust invasion. The FAO says US$70 million is needed to support rapid control operations, such as spraying with insecticides.

 

Desert Locust swarm in Kenya. Copyright: FAO/Sven Torfinn (This image has been Cropped).

 

But Daniel Otaye argues that the use of pesticides in the control of locusts is a source of concern, as pesticides might have devastating effects on other beneficial insects such as bees, green lacewings, and dragonflies, which contribute to ecosystem health.

Otaye, an associate professor and chairman in the Department of Biological Sciences, Egerton University in Kenya, says: “The invasion poses disastrous effects on the East African region that is still smarting from insecurity, droughts and aggressive floods.”

According to Otaye, the insects can devour fields of crops, such as maize and sorghum, and ravage pastures meant for livestock. He tells SciDev.Net that if the situation is left unchecked, the region might need additional food aid because of the anticipated crop and forage losses.

This story was originally published by SciDev.Net

 

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By Ebru Gokce Dessemond
GENEVA, Feb 13 2020 (IPS)

Digital platforms are at the centre of the global economy and daily lives of consumers.

A handful of these platforms have become dominant in specific markets without facing meaningful competition. They include Amazon as a marketplace, Facebook in social networking, Google in search engines and Apple and Google in application stores.

Digital platforms rely on big data and are characterized as multisided markets with economies of scale, network effects and winner-takes-all features.

These firms offer their products for “free” on one side of the market and earn revenues from online advertising and selling user data on the other side of the market.

The growing market power of these platforms raises concerns not only for consumers and smaller businesses but also for competition authorities.

Consumers not in control

Consumers can no longer control the use of their data. Smaller businesses face unfair market conditions, where they compete with big platforms that offer services by self-preferencing their own products. It is now widely recognized that these markets cannot self-correct.
What needs to be done?

One effective response is competition law and policy that promotes open and accessible markets with fair and reasonable terms for businesses. This goal is more pronounced in highly concentrated digital markets, where large platforms’ market power is enduring.

The most important competitive threats to monopolists are likely to come from new entrants, which are vulnerable to exclusionary conduct or anticompetitive acquisitions.

Governments should have in place relevant policies and legal frameworks to overcome different challenges of the platform economy. These include competition, consumer protection and data protection policies and legislation.

Adapt to new realities

There is a need for adapting competition law enforcement tools to new business realities by revising laws like in Germany and Austria or issuing regulations or guidelines as has been done in Kenya and Japan.

A 2017 law revision in Germany incorporated in the assessment of the market power of firms in the digital economy such criteria as direct and indirect network effects, parallel use of services from different providers and switching costs for users.

It also factored in economies of scale in connection with network effects, access by firms to data relevant for competition and innovation-driven competitive pressure.

This amendment allowed the Federal Cartel Office in Germany to consider these criteria in analyzing Facebook’s dominance in the social network market during its investigation into Facebook between March 2016 and February 2019.

Merger control regimes should enable competition authorities to scrutinize the acquisition of start-ups by major platforms.

Merger analysis needs to incorporate the role of data in acquiring and sustaining market power and establishing entry barriers to new firms, thereby affecting future competition and innovation.

Not only free but also fair competition

It is important to ensure not only free but also fair competition. This is more so in digital markets, where smaller firms face challenges in their contractual relationship with big platforms.

Competition law provisions on unfair trade practices and abuse of superior bargaining position, as found in competition laws of Japan and the Republic of Korea, would empower competition authorities in protecting the interests of smaller firms vis-à-vis big platforms.

Developing countries could consider this policy measure in revising their competition legislation or introduce a separate regulation concerning digital platforms’ dealings with their business users.

Such measures could facilitate entry of local small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to platform markets, thereby allowing developing countries to reap the benefits of the digital economy.

This is important as SMEs are crucial to job creation and innovation. Both the implementation of fair competition legislation and review of acquisitions of startups by dominant platforms could play an important role in maintaining an inclusive, competitive and fair business environment in the digital economy. This might eventually enhance innovation.

Apt taxation policy needed

Another critical element needed to ensure fair competition is an appropriate taxation policy. A significant proportion of the value created in the digital economy results from users who provide data.

The current international corporate tax system is not adapted to the digital economy. There is not yet a common understanding of “value creation” for taxation purposes in the digital economy.

This leads to a disconnect between where value is generated and where taxes are paid. According to the UNCTAD Digital Economy Report 2019, taxes paid abroad by Facebook represented only 2.9% of the profits it generated outside the United States in 2017.

Ideally, an international taxation system, which is agreed upon by all countries, and recognizes the main aspects of digital businesses that have significant implications for taxation, should be put in place.

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Excerpt:

Ebru Gokce Dessemond is Legal Officer, UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)

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