Indigenous representatives like Raoni Metuktire, an internationally recognized Kaiapó leader, followed the Supreme Court trial on the temporary framework, inside and outside of the courtroom in Brasilia, in a case that will determine whether the land rights of the indigenous peoples of Brazil have extreme limits established by the constitution. CREDIT: Nelson Jr./SCO-STF-FotosPúblicas

By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO, Jun 9 2023 (IPS)

Children were thrown into the air and stabbed and cut with knives and machetes. The attackers first opened fire on the victims of the massacre before finishing them off with knives so that none of the 244 indigenous people of the village would survive. The 1904 massacre permanently marked the Xokleng people and may play a decisive role in the future of the native peoples of Brazil.

The tragedy is emblematic of the genocide suffered by indigenous people in Brazilian history. There were more numerous and recent killings, especially during the 1964-1985 military dictatorship. But the 1904 massacre is at the center of a trial in the Supreme Court that will determine the progress of the demarcation of indigenous territories in this South American country.

The trial was triggered by a move by the government of the southern state of Santa Catarina. In 2016 the state’s Institute of the Environment (IMA) lay claim to part of the demarcated land of the Xokleng people for a biological reserve.

But in 2019 the Supreme Court recognized that the case had national repercussions, setting a precedent for all demarcations of indigenous lands, because the IMA’s claim cites something that is called the “temporary framework”.

This framework states that native peoples only have the right to the lands that they physically occupied when the current constitution was promulgated on Oct. 5, 1988, creating the present system of demarcation of indigenous reserves.

The trial began in 2021, with the votes of two of the 11 Supreme Court justices, one against and the other in favor of the temporary framework. It was then suspended due to Judge Alexandre de Moraes’ request for more time to analyze the issue. It was not resumed until last month, on May 7, when Moraes issued his vote and argument, before it was suspended again on Jun. 7.

The 1904 massacre was part of his argument against the framework, as an example of the violence used to dispossess indigenous peoples of their land, which showed that it would be “unjust” to demand their physical presence on their traditional lands on any precise date. The Xokleng were “forced to leave their land in order to survive,” the judge argued.

Judge Alexandre de Moraes (C), of Brazil’s Supreme Court, is the shining star of the country’s judiciary. He issued a vote that could be decisive for the future of indigenous peoples’ lands. He also presides over the Electoral Court and is conducting investigations that could sentence former President Jair Bolsonaro to ineligibility for political office or to jail for spreading disinformation and acting against democracy. CREDIT: Alejandro Zambrana/Secom-TSE-FotosPúblicas

Violence

The Ibirama-Laklãnõ Indigenous Land, where 2,300 people live today, almost all of them from the Xokleng community along with a few Guarani and Kaingang families, was demarcated in 2003: 37,000 hectares recognized as their territory by the government of Santa Catarina in 1926, according to official documents in possession of the native residents of that land.

But in 1965 the military dictatorship limited their territory to just 14,000 hectares. In addition, 10 years later, it ordered the construction of dams in the Itajaí river basin, which crosses the region, to curb flooding in cities and landed estates downstream.

Consequently, it flooded the Xokleng lands and further reduced the area where the indigenous people live and farm, as well as cutting off their roads, aggravating their isolation. An anthropological study conducted in the 1990s recommended that the territory should be expanded to the previous 37,000 hectares, but this was called into question by the local government and by landowners who had invaded part of the land.

Public attention was drawn to the near extermination of the Xokleng people by a book by anthropologist Silvio Coelho dos Santos, “Indigenous people and whites in southern Brazil: the dramatic experience of the Xokleng” ((Indios e brancos no Sul do Brasil: a dramática experiencia dos xokleng, in Portuguese), which includes a report of the 1904 massacre in the newspaper “Novidades”.

Many similar atrocities have been committed in Brazil. But the fact that this massacre in particular was well-documented and proven undermines the temporary framework, defended by many politicians and landowners and used in their legal arguments and in their attempts to reduce conflicts over land.

But it clearly runs counter to the constitution, according to Marcio Santilli, former chair of the governmental National Foundation for Indigenous Peoples (Funai) and founder of the non-governmental Socio-Environmental Institute.

“The basic unconstitutionality is that the articles (on indigenous people) do not address the temporary framework and recognize indigenous territorial rights as ‘original’. According to the constitution, there is no indigenous person without land,” he told IPS.

Thanks to the constitution’s mandate, 496 indigenous reserves, covering 13 percent of the national territory, have been demarcated so far, without taking into account the temporary framework that is now being cited.

And another 238 reserves are in different phases of the demarcation process. Some have already been identified as indigenous lands, while others are still under study, according to the Socio-Environmental Institute, which has a large database on the subject.

In Brazil, according to the 2022 census, there are 1.65 million indigenous people, an increase of 84 percent compared to the 2010 census, although they represent only 0.8 percent of the national population. In this country there are 305 distinct indigenous peoples who speak 174 languages, according to Funai.

Moraes condemned the temporary framework, but his vote worried indigenous leaders because he proposed “full compensation” to “good faith” landowners currently occupying demarcated areas. Until now, only improvements made on property have been compensated and not the land itself, which is considered to have been usurped.

Indigenous people from the metropolitan region of São Paulo block a highway with bonfires, in protest against the temporary framework, which drastically limits the demarcation of territories of native communities. Legislators are trying to give the measure legal status, while the Supreme Court postponed a ruling on the issue for the second time, on Jun. 7. CREDIT: Rovena Rosa/Agência Brasil

Reconciliation rejected

“Moraes wants prior compensation, to pay the landowners first and then demarcate the indigenous land, which can take 10 years. They are looking for a broad compromise to satisfy those who have illegally taken over land,” protested Mauricio Terena, legal coordinator of the Articulation of Indigenous Peoples of Brazil (Apib).

“Why is it always our rights that have to be chipped away at? Our rights are always compromised, we’re always the ones who lose out,” he said while speaking to the indigenous people present in Brasilia to follow the Supreme Court trial.

Nearly 1,500 indigenous people from all over the country camped out in the capital and there were demonstrations against the temporary framework in dozens of cities and towns and along highways in the country, reported Dinamam Tuxá, executive coordinator of Apib.

Moraes also proposed that, in the event of practically insurmountable difficulties, such as the existence of towns in areas recognized as indigenous land, compensation should be offered – in other words, they should be given land in other areas, if accepted by the indigenous community.

“Our territories are non-negotiable,” Terena said. “Our relationship with them runs deep, it is where our ancestors fell.”

His complaint was also due to the new interruption of the trial. Another judge, André Mendonça, a former justice minister in the far-right government of Jair Bolsonaro (2019-2022), asked for more time to study the case. He has up to 90 days to issue his vote, which would reactivate the trial, but he promised to do it sooner.

“They need time. We left here without an answer,” Terena complained. The process has been dragging on for more than seven years and the temporary framework serves as a justification for invasions of land and violence against indigenous people.

In any case, “Moraes’s vote was positive” because it recognized the unconstitutionality of the temporary framework, said Megaron Txucarramãe, chief of the Kaiapó people, who live in the Eastern Amazon region.

“We will return to Brasilia when the trial resumes, we will continue the fight to secure our constitutional rights and the land for our grandchildren,” he told IPS by phone from the indigenous camp in Brasilia.

“We will return to Brasilia to hold demonstrations whenever necessary to defend our lands, the constitution and the rights of our grandchildren,” Chief Megaron Txucarramãe, a well-known leader of the Kayapó indigenous people from the Eastern Amazon region, told IPS from the indigenous camp set up near the Supreme Court. CREDIT: Courtesy of Megaron Txucarramãe

Lawmakers against indigenous people

But their battle is not limited to the judicial front. On May 30 the Chamber of Deputies urgently passed a bill that would make the temporary framework law, by a majority of 283 votes against 155. Its final approval now depends on the Senate.

“The processes are moving ahead simultaneously and influence each other,” Oscar Vilhena, director of the Law School at the private Getulio Vargas Foundation, told IPS from São Paulo. “If the Supreme Court declares the temporary framework unconstitutional, the bill loses its purpose, but that would increase the costs for the Supreme Court.”

By costs he was referring to increased political pressure from right-wing and landowner-linked legislators, known as the ruralists, who have long attacked the Supreme Court for allegedly meddling in legislative affairs.

In addition, if the proposed rule is declared unconstitutional, “the Chamber of Deputies could resume deliberations on a constitutional amendment already approved in the Senate,” Santilli warned by telephone from Brasilia.

This bill, which has languished in the lower house since 2015, when it was received from the Senate, would precisely establish the payment of compensation for land ownership, not only for improvements to property, to landowners affected by indigenous territories demarcated since the current constitution went into effect in October 1988.

Credit: Yan Zhao/AFP via Getty Images

By Andrew Firmin
LONDON, Jun 9 2023 (IPS)

Nothing was more predictable than repression. Merely for holding candles and flowers, people were taken away by Hong Kong’s police.

The occasion was the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Massacre, 4 June 1989. Hong Kong was until recently home to mass annual vigils where thousands gathered to keep alive the memory of that day. But that’s all gone now in the crackdown that followed large-scale protests for democracy that erupted in 2019.

Hong Kong’s authorities are evidently determined to erase any form of acknowledgement that the massacre ever happened. Memorials and artworks commemorating it have been removed. Books that mention the tragedy have disappeared from libraries. Shops selling the LED candles commonly used to mark the occasion were visited by the authorities in the run up to this year’s anniversary.

The organisation behind the vigil, the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Movements in China, closed itself down in 2021 following a police investigation. Several of its leaders were jailed in March.

Instead of hosting the usual vigil, this year Hong Kong’s Victoria Park was home to a carnival celebrating Chinese rule. People wanting to mark the occasion had to do so in private.

This is only the tip of the iceberg. People are mourning not only the many who died on 4 June 1989 but also the Hong Kong vanishing before their eyes.

Further than ever away from democracy

When Hong Kong was handed over to China by the UK in 1997, China agreed to maintain the country’s distinct political and economic structures for the next 50 years, under the banner of ‘one country, two systems’.

Hong Kong’s Basic Law guaranteed civic rights, including freedoms of association, peaceful assembly and expression. China committed to move towards universal suffrage for the election of Hong Kong’s Chief Executive, the head of government.

But following the democracy protests that burst out in 2019, China has unilaterally torn up that agreement. Three years ago, the government passed the National Security Law, a sweeping piece of legislation that criminalises criticism of the authorities. It’s been used alongside existing laws, such as the law on sedition, to jail leaders of the democracy movement.

China never made good on its promise of universal suffrage. It’s gone in the opposite direction. Current Chief Executive John Lee – who as security chief led the violent crackdown on democracy protests – was chosen last year by a hand-picked 1,500-member Election Committee, which duly endorsed him as the sole candidate.

The Legislative Council, Hong Kong’s parliament, had already been neutered. The number of directly elected seats has been slashed and people are disqualified from standing if they question China’s sovereignty over Hong Kong.

Now the District Councils are in the firing line. When the last elections for the municipal bodies were held, in the thick of democracy protests in November 2019, pro-democracy parties triumphed.

Such a result is now impossible. In 2021, a law was passed requiring all district councillors to swear an oath of allegiance affirming their ‘patriotism’ for China. Most of the pro-democracy candidates elected in 2019 were disqualified or resigned.

Now when new district councillors are chosen in November, only 20 per cent of seats will be directly elected. The authorities will fill the rest with their supporters, all vetted to ensure their ‘patriotism’. Little wonder that the Civic Party, one of Hong Kong’s leading pro-democracy parties, recently announced it was closing down.

A hollowed-out Hong Kong

Hong Kong was once a country where people felt safe to protest. It had a flourishing media and publishing industry. Now journalists are criminalised and key independent media have shut down.

Civil society organisations and trade unions have done the same. The remaining organisations are scattered, practising self-censorship. Protests continue to be heavily restricted: this year a planned International Women’s Day march was cancelled after police threats.

People continue to try to find ways to express dissent, but any small gesture can attract the state’s ire. The death of Queen Elizabeth II gave people an opportunity to use public mourning to express at with the regression since handover. But when a vigil was held during the Queen’s funeral, a harmonica player was arrested for daring to play the tune Glory to Hong Kong, associated with the democracy protests.

Last year five speech therapists were convicted of producing ‘seditious publications’. Their crime was to produce children’s books in which sheep defend their villages from wolves. This was taken to be an allegory of China’s control of Hong Kong.

Everyday repression is making Hong Kong a hollowed-out country, its population falling. Some schools face closure due to falling student numbers. Many have fled, not wanting their children to grow up in a country where education is indoctrination. The curriculum has been reworked to teach students loyalty rather than independent thought. Many teachers are leaving the country or taking early retirement.

With the legal system facing increasing interference and political pressure, lawyers are also among those fleeing.

A key test will be the trial of Jimmy Lai, former media owner and democracy campaigner. He’s already been found guilty on numerous counts. His newspaper, Apple Daily, once Hong Kong’s most widely read pro-democracy paper, shut down in 2021. He faces trial under the National Security Law, which could mean a life sentence.

The judges who will try Lai have been handpicked by John Lee. Meanwhile the authorities have tried to prevent Lai’s defence lawyer, UK barrister Tim Owen, representing him in court. In March they passed a law giving Lee the power to ban foreign lawyers working on national security cases. It isn’t looking promising.

Lai is one of Hong Kong’s 1,508 political prisoners. Even as the population shrinks, the imprisoned population just keeps getting bigger. The candles that commemorate the Tiananmen Square Massacre and the yearning for democracy will continue to flare around the world in exile – but those lights are being extinguished in Hong Kong.

Andrew Firmin is CIVICUS Editor-in-Chief, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.

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Credit: WHO

By Mary Assunta
BANGKOK, Thailand, Jun 9 2023 (IPS)

The second session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on plastic pollution (INC-2), held in Paris, France, from May 29 to June 02, 2023, concluded with optimism and the prospect of ending plastics pollution. Over 700 delegates from 169 Member States agreed to prepare a zero draft of agreement ahead of the third session in November this year.

Among the more important and interesting debates, health advocates attending the negotiations reported that it was essential to discuss “how to categorize the thousands of types of plastics, chemical precursors and products in a way that allows for a coherent approach to ending plastic pollution.

Some favoured focusing on the chemical precursors, eliminating the most toxic and polluting ones,” while others acknowledged that not every type of plastic could be recycled or reinvented, and certain plastics like cigarette filters need to disappear for good.

Leonce Sessou, speaking on behalf of Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), Corporate Accountability (CA), African Tobacco Control Alliance (ATCA), and other members of the Stop Tobacco Pollution Alliance (STPA), urged Member States to align the future legally binding instrument on plastics with the public health objective of ending the tobacco epidemic, to which most have already committed via the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC).

Tobacco control groups, for example, called for the elimination of cigarette filters. They drew attention to the fact that cigarette butts are some of the most prevalent forms of plastic pollution on the planet and harm land and marine ecosystems.

They reminded delegates to align with human rights and health treaties, particularly the WHO FCTC, and make the tobacco industry pay for its pollution and legacy waste. The WHO FCTC health treaty seeks to reduce the supply and demand for tobacco and protect health policies by keeping the tobacco industry out of policy meetings.

According to a WHO report which called for a ban on cigarette filters, about 4.5 trillion discarded filters (butts) from the almost six trillion cigarettes consumed globally find their way into the environment annually.

They are the top waste item collected from coastlines and urban settings. Cigarette filters are small enough to be ingested by marine animals, and when these plastic filters break down, they release thousands of microplastic particles.

Microplastics have been detected in commercial seafood, other food items, drinking water, and human tissue; this contamination is a threat to food safety and security.

Research shows cigarette butts are a source of microplastic contamination that creates chemical pollution (due to the toxic chemicals found in tobacco products) that leach into the environment. Cigarette butt leachates are found to harm various forms of aquatic organisms, including key food sources for fish and shellfish.

Experts agree that banning cigarette filters is the best solution to this plastic and toxic waste problem. Clean-ups, anti-littering legislation, and redesigning filters for recyclability or biodegradability have not worked and are not viable solutions.

Government committees from Belgium, the Netherlands, and Denmark have recently called for a ban on filters and recommended the same for the rest of the European Union Member States.

For at least five decades, the tobacco industry has known that cigarette filters provide no health benefits; instead, they make cigarettes burn hotter, deliver more nicotine, and increase addiction.

Yet they have misled smokers into thinking filters make cigarettes “safer.” As awareness around smoking increased, the tobacco industry made advertisements for filtered cigarettes more appealing to pacify smokers’ concerns.

Advocates participating in the INC-2 reported a lot of misunderstandings related to cigarette filters that are yet to be addressed. In its blog on day 5 of the negotiations, ASH stated, “Many people, not just people who smoke, assume filters make cigarettes safer rather than more dangerous.”

Numerous countries already have a national policy banning single-use plastics such as plastic bags, straws, and cotton buds but have inadvertently not included cigarette filters. However, advocates speaking to government delegates found widespread support for a ban on cigarette filters.

As the possibility of a cigarette filter ban gathers momentum, the tobacco industry’s public relations (PR) machinery is already in motion implementing beach cleans-ups and cigarette butt collection activities through its corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs across the globe.

Before the third session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on plastic pollution (INC-3) resumes in Nairobi in November, governments must remember that the tobacco industry is not a stakeholder but a polluter that must be held liable for the myriad harms it has caused as well as continues to cause to human health and the environment.

Over 100 non-governmental health organizations of the STPA, along with other environmental groups such as Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, Ecowaste Coalition, Break Free From Plastic (BFFP), Ban Toxics (Philippines), Our Sea of East Asia Network (OSEAN), Development Indian Ocean Network, Earthday.org (Earth Day Network), Green Africa Youth Organization, Vietnam Zero Waste Alliance, and Boomerang Alliance have called for the elimination of cigarette filters.

Mary Assunta is Senior Policy Advisor, Southeast Asia Tobacco Control Alliance (SEATCA)

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Voting by secret ballot in a bygone era. Credit: United Nations

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 9 2023 (IPS)

When the General Assembly elected its President for 2023-2024 last week, it continued a longstanding tradition of male dominance in the UN’s highest policy making body.

The new President for the 78th session, Ambassador Dennis Francis of Trinidad and Tobago, a longstanding career diplomat and a former Permanent Representative, was elected June 1 “by acclamation”.

While all nine secretaries-general* (UNSGs) have been men, there have been only four women out of 78 who were elected as presidents of the General Assembly (PGAs): Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit from India (1953), Angie Brooks from Liberia (1969), Sheikha Haya Rashed Al-Khalifa from Bahrain (2006) and Maria Fernando Espinosa Garces from Ecuador (2018).

But the blame for these anomalies has to be shouldered by the UN’s 193 member states who are quick to adopt scores of resolutions on gender empowerment but fail to practice them in the highest echelons of the UN totem pole—described as a classic case of political hypocrisy—as they rarely, if ever, nominate women candidates for the presidency.

Meanwhile, as a long-practiced tradition, “elections” to some of the highest UN offices and committees are no longer voted by member states, as it was done in a distant past.

The age of competitive elections has largely come to an end—and it’s the “gentleman’s agreement” that matters (but where in the world are the ladies?)

At the request of member states, electoral assistance is currently provided – for presidential and legislative elections mostly in developing countries — by the UN’s Electoral Assistance Division of the Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs (DPPA). Credit: United Nations

Lou Charbonneau, UN Director of Human Rights Watch says UN votes for seats on important bodies like the Security Council and Human Rights Council often make a mockery of the word “election.” They typically have little or no competition, ensuring victory for even the least-qualified candidates.

https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/05/18/praise-competitive-un-elections

Under an unwritten rule, the five “regional groups” at the UN take turns – on the basis of geographical rotation— and decide what offices they should claim undermining the very concept of democratic elections.

The five regional groups include the African Group; the Asia and the Pacific Group; the Eastern European Group (even though Eastern Europe has long ceased to exist after the end pf the Cold War and the dismantling of the Soviet Union); the Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC); and the Western European and Others Group (WEOG)

https://www.un.org/dgacm/en/content/regional-groups#

And all these decisions are taken behind closed doors, with rare instances of member states breaking this rule – or unceremoniously jumping in, to claim a post which could result in an election by ballot, not by acclamation.

Meanwhile, there was at least one instance in recorded history when the president of the General Assembly was elected, on the luck of a draw -– following a dead heat.

With the Asian group failing to field a single candidate, the politically-memorable battle took place ahead of the 36th session of the General Assembly back in 1981 when three Asian candidates contested the presidency: Ismat Kittani of Iraq, Tommy Koh of Singapore and Kwaja Mohammed Kaiser of Bangladesh (described as the “battle of three Ks”—Kittani, Koh and Kaiser).

On the first ballot, Kittani got 64 votes; Kaiser, 46; and Koh, 40. Still, Kittani was short of a required majority — of the total number of members voting. On a second ballot, Kittani and Kaiser tied with 73 votes each (with 146 members present, and voting).

In order to break the tie, the outgoing General Assembly President – Rudiger von Wechmar of Germany– drew lots, as specified in Article 21 relating to the procedures in the election of the president (and as recorded in the Repertory of Practice of the General Assembly).

And the luck of the draw, based purely on chance, favored Kittani, in that unprecedented General Assembly election.

But according to a joke circulating at that time, it was rumored that the winner was decided by the flip of a coin — but the tossed coin apparently had two heads and no tail.

Samir Sanbar, a former UN assistant secretary-general and head of the Department of Public Information (DPI), told IPS the 1981 election brought back memories of his early years at the U.N. “when Ismat Kittani, in varied positions at the UN, was always proud of his Iraqi Kurdish heritage”.

He served as Chef de Cabinet of Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim, Iraq Representative to the U.N., Director-General of Iraq Ministry of Foreign Affairs and candidate for GA President, said Sanbar, who served under five different secretaries-general during his professional career at the UN.

“When we visited Baghdad with the Secretary General, he was part of the U.N. team; Saddam Hussein, then Iraqi Deputy President requested he return home. And he did”.

“Yet his loving and beloved wife refused to go, agreeing to reside in Geneva. The tale of a coin with two heads and no tail is a reflection of Kittani’s vibrant sense of humor. And may his soul rest in peace”, said Sanbar, author of “Inside the United Nations: In a Leaderless World”

Going down memory lane, Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury, who was a member of the Bangladesh Mission to the UN back in 1980, told IPS: “Coincidentally, I was in Paris on the day of the election attending, as part of the Bangladesh delegation, the first UN Conference on Least Developed Countries (LDCs) hosted by the French Government.”

Bangladesh was so confident of winning that Ambassador Kaiser’s election team had arranged for bottles of champagne for the victory celebration.

“Delegates comforted us by saying that Bangladesh did not lose face as the vote ended in a tie. So, it was a bad luck for Ambassador Kaiser, not a defeat. Losing by vote would have been worse and a clear verdict against his candidacy,” he added.

Setting the record straight, Ambassador Chowdhury said there was a fourth “K” who was also a candidate in that election– Abdul Halim Khaddam, Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of Syria.

So, there were really four “Ks” – Kaiser, Kittani, Koh and Khaddam, not 3 “Ks”—reflecting the multiplicity of candidates.

According to the Rules Procedure, the two candidates getting the highest votes in the first ballot were eligible for a second and subsequent ballots till the winner emerged. So, Koh and Khaddam were dropped from the second ballot.

That ballot produced the tie between Kaiser and Kittani, said Ambassador Chowdhury,
the first UN Under-Secretary-General from Bangladesh and High Representative of the UN.

Meanwhile, in the 1960s and 70s, when UN member states competed either for the presidency of the General Assembly, membership in the Security Council, or for various UN bodies, the voting was largely undermined by offers of luxury cruises in Europe—and with promises of increased economic aid to the world’s poorer nations tied to votes at the UN.

In a bygone era, voting was by a rare show of hands, particularly in committee rooms. But in later years, a more sophisticated electronic board, high up in the General Assembly Hall, tallied the votes or in the case of elections to the Security Council or the International Court of Justice, the voting was by secret ballot.

In one of the hard-fought elections many moons ago, there were rumors that an oil-soaked Middle Eastern country was doling out high-end, Swiss-made wrist watches and also stocks in the former Arabian-American Oil Company (ARAMCO), one of the world’s largest oil companies, to UN diplomats as a trade-off for their votes.

So, when hands, both from right-handed and left-handed delegates, went up at voting time in the Committee room, the largest number of hands raised in favor of the oil-blessed candidate sported Swiss watches.

As anecdotes go, it symbolized the corruption that prevailed in voting in inter-governmental organizations, including the United Nations — perhaps much like most national elections in authoritarian regimes.

Just ahead of an election for membership in the Security Council, one Western European country offered free Mediterranean luxury cruises in return for votes while another country dished out — openly in the General Assembly hall— boxes of gift-wrapped expensive Swiss chocolates.

So, it wasn’t surprising that the Ambassador of a middle-income developing country, who kept losing successive elections, jokingly told his Foreign Ministry officials: “Let’s stop running for elections until we can practice the fine art of stuffing ballot boxes — as we do back home.”

Fathulla Jameel, a former UN Ambassador and later Foreign Minister of the Maldives, recounted a story of how his resource-poor island nation, categorized by the UN as a Small Island Developing State (SID), would appeal to some of the richer nations to help fund the country’s infrastructure projects.

At least one rich Asian country, a traditional donor, was the first to respond – and magnanimously too, he said. The project would be fully funded —free, gratis and for nothing.

But there was a catch: “If there is a vote at the UN, and it is not of any national interest to your country”, said the donor country’s foreign ministry, “we would like to get your vote.”

The offer was a clever political payback. Development aid with no visible strings attached.

Footnote: *The nine all-male Secretaries-General over the last 78 years include Trygve Lie from Norway, 1946-1952; Dag Hammarskjöld from Sweden, 1953-1961; U Thant from Burma (now Myanmar), 1961-1971; Kurt Waldheim from Austria, 1972-1981; Javier Perez de Cuellar from Peru, 1982-1991; Boutros Boutros-Ghali, from Egypt, 1992-1996; Kofi A. Annan, from Ghana, 1997-2006; Ban Ki-moon, from the Republic of Korea, 2007-2016 and António Guterres, from Portugal, 2017-present.

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

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Researchers have been driving collaboration, funding, and state-of-the-art research into the earth’s largest carbon sink – located in the high seas. Credit: Alison Kentish/IPS

By Alison Kentish
NEW YORK, Jun 8 2023 (IPS)

Almost half of the world’s population lives in coastal zones. For islands in the Pacific and Caribbean islands such as Dominica, where up to 90 percent of the population lives on the coast, the ocean is fundamental to lives and livelihoods. From fisheries to tourism and shipping, this essential body which covers over 70 percent of the planet, is a lifeline.

But the ocean’s life-saving potential extends much further. The ocean regulates our climate and is critical to mitigating climate change. Researchers have long lamented that major international agreements have failed to adequately recognize the resource that produces half of the earth’s oxygen and whose power includes absorbing 90 percent of excess heat from greenhouse gas emissions.

And while its ability to capture and store carbon has been receiving increased attention as the world commits to keeping global warming below 1.5C, researchers say that coverage of that ability has concentrated on coastal ecosystems like mangroves, seagrass, and salt marshes. This is known as coastal blue carbon.

Protecting and conserving coastal blue carbon ecosystems is very important because of the many co-benefits they provide to biodiversity, water quality, and coastal erosion, and they store substantial amounts of legacy carbon in the sediments below.

Researchers welcome the exposure to topics on ocean solutions to climate change but say the conversation – along with data, investment, and public education – must extend much further than coastal blue carbon. Scientists at Dalhousie University have been driving collaboration, funding, and state-of-the-art research into the earth’s largest carbon sink – located in the high seas.

“It’s easy to imagine the ocean as what we can see standing on the edge of the shore as we look out, or to think about fisheries or seaweed that washes up on the beach – our economic and recreation spaces,” says Mike Smit, a professor in the Faculty of Management and the Deputy Scientific Director of the university’s Ocean Frontier Institute (OFI).

“Beyond that, what you might call the deep ocean, is less studied. It’s harder to get to, it’s not obviously within any national jurisdiction, and it’s expensive. The Institute is really interested in this part of the ocean. How carbon gets from the surface, and from coastal regions, to deep, long-term storage is an essential process that we need to better understand. We know that this deep storage is over 90 percent of the total carbon stored in the ocean, so the deep ocean is critical to the work that the ocean is doing to protect us from a rapidly changing climate.”

OFI’s Chief Executive Officer, Dr Anya Waite, says the phrase ‘deep blue carbon’ needs to be a household one – and soon. She says the omission of earth’s largest repository of carbon from climate solutions has resulted in the issue becoming “really urgent.”

“If the ocean starts to release the carbon that it’s stored for millennia, it will swamp anything we do on land. It’s absolutely critical that we get to this as soon as possible because, in a way, it’s been left behind.”

Researchers at the Institute have been studying deep blue carbon and bringing researchers together to spur ocean carbon research, interest, investment, and policy.

Through the Transforming Climate Action research program, the Institute is putting the ocean at the forefront of efforts to combat climate change.

“The ocean needs to be in much better focus overall. We are so used to thinking of the ocean as a victim of sorts. There is ocean acidification, biodiversity loss, and pollution, but in fact, the ocean is the main climate actor. It’s time to change that narrative, to understand that the ocean is doing critically important work for us, and we need to understand that work better in order to maintain the function that the ocean provides,” says Waite.

A lot of emphasis has been placed on coastal blue carbon – mangroves, seagrass, and salt marshes, but now the Ocean Frontier Institute intends to ensure deep blue carbon becomes part of the climate change conversation. Credit: Beau Pilgrim/Climate Visuals

Most Important, Yet Least Understood

The OFI is harnessing its ocean and marine ecosystems research to find strategic, safe, and sustainable means of slowing climate change, but time is not on the world’s side to achieve the “deep, rapid and sustained greenhouse gas emissions reductions” that the latest Synthesis Report of Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change states is needed to limit warming to 1.5C.

“We know that the ocean is changing, and how it absorbs carbon might change,” says Smit. “There are just too many open questions, too high uncertainty, and too little understanding of what will enhance natural ocean processes and what will impair their abilities to continue to work.”

According to Waite, the ocean’s storage capacity makes it a better place to remove carbon from the atmosphere than land options. In fact, it pulls out more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere than all the earth’s rainforests combined. She concedes, however, that the ocean is more complex physically, making carbon capture and ensuring the durability of sinks more difficult.

“We really need to understand the full scope of the ocean’s carbon-absorbing function and bring that into conversation with policymakers, nations, the finance community, and insurance. There are all sorts of impacts when the heat and carbon budget of the ocean are not well observed. Then we don’t have a good prediction system for cyclones, heat waves, and other important phenomena that insurance companies, governments, and the military all need to understand to keep us safe. There are really strong societal reasons for us to do this work.”

The Economics

The OFI’s innovation and research are meant to inform policy and industry. The commercial side of deep blue carbon will be critical to converting ground-breaking research into in-use technology among climate mitigation companies.

Eric Siegel is the Institute’s Chief Innovation Officer. With a background in oceanography, he has spent the last 20 years at the interface of ocean science, technical innovation, and global business.

“We are trying to work more with industry to bring some of the innovations that our researchers are developing to support innovation in companies, but also trying to bring some of those companies into the research realm to help support our work at the Ocean Frontier Institute,” he told IPS.

“For example, carbon removal companies will need to monetize carbon credits as they will have to sequester the carbon. That takes innovation and investment. It’s a great example of companies that do well and generates revenue by doing good, which is mitigating climate. It’s also sort of a reverse of how, over the last couple of decades, companies have donated charitably because they have generally been successful in extractive technologies or non-environmentally friendly technologies. It’s a nice change from the old model.”

Siegel says presently, there just aren’t enough blue carbon credits that can be monetized.

“There are almost zero validated and durable carbon credits that are being created and are able to be sold now. Many people want to buy them, so there is a huge marketplace, but because the technology is so new and there are some policy, monitoring, reporting, and verification limits in place, there are not enough of them.”

Some companies have started buying advanced market credits – investing now in the few blue carbon credit projects available globally for returns in the next five to 20 years.

“I think that this is our decade to do the science, do the technical innovation, and set up the marketplaces so that at the end of this decade, we will be ready – all the companies will be ready to start actively safely removing carbon and therefore generating carbon credits to make a difference and to sell them into the market.”

The pressing need for solutions to the climate crisis means that work has to be carried out simultaneously at every link in the deep blue carbon chain.

“We don’t have the luxury of saying, okay, we have the science right now; let’s work on the technology. Okay, the technology is right; let’s work on the marketplace. The marketplace is right; now, let’s work on the investment. Okay, all that’s ready; let’s work on the policy. We have to do them all at the same time – safely and responsibly – but starting now. And that’s how we are trying to position Ocean Frontier Institute – different people leading on different initiatives to make it happen in parallel.”

A floating flipped iceberg in the Weddell Sea, off Argentina, with a block of green sea ice now showing above the water, joined to the whiter land ice. This picture was taken from the British research vessel RRS Discovery on a research cruise in the Southern Ocean in the Weddell Sea. The Ocean Frontier Institute says the ocean is the main climate actor and needs this acknowledgment. Credit: David Menzel/Climate Visuals

Global Collaboration – and the Future

The Ocean Frontier Institute is working closely with the Global Ocean Observing System. With Waite as Co-Chair, the system underscores that oceans are continuous. No one country understands or controls the ocean. It is based on the premise that collaboration between nations, researchers, and intergovernmental organizations is key to maximizing the ocean’s role in fighting climate change.

“Every nation that observes is welcome to join this network, and we then deliver recommendations to nation-states and the United Nations,” says Waite.

“The technical systems that observe the ocean are becoming fragile because nations have other things to put their money into. So, we need to get nations to step in and start to boost the level of the observing system to the point where we can understand ocean dynamics properly. This is in real contrast, for example, to our weather observation systems that are very sustained and have a mandate from the World Meteorological Organization that they must be sustained to a certain level.”

For OFI’s Deputy Director, data sharing will be critical to the collaboration’s success.

“The data that we collect from these observations can’t stop at the desks of scientists. We have to get them out of the lab and into the world so that people have some understanding of what is happening out there. It’s critically important, it’s also really cool, and we need to understand it better,” says Mike Smit.

The Institute’s Chief Innovation Officer wants the world to know that deep blue carbon is positioned for take-offs.

According to Siegel, “We need to start realizing that the ocean and the deep blue carbon is actually the big, big opportunity here.”

And as for residents of the Pacific Islands intrinsically linked to the ocean by proximity, tradition, or industry, Waite says their voices are needed for this urgent talk on deep blue carbon.

“Pacific island nations are uniquely vulnerable to climate change. Their economic zone, extending up from their land, is a critical resource that they can use to absorb carbon to maintain their biodiversity. Pacific island nations have a special role to play in this conversation that’s quite different from those who live on big continental nations.”

Deep blue carbon might not be a household term just yet, but the world needs to talk about it. Dalhousie University, through its Ocean Frontier Institute’s research and partnerships, is ensuring that conversation is heard across the globe.

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In partnership with UN agencies, ITU is organizing the annual “AI for Good Global Summit", which aims to accelerate the development of AI solutions towards achieving the SDGs.

By James Paul
NEW YORK, Jun 8 2023 (IPS)

The UN is hustling to play a role – perhaps even a leading role – in the revolution of Artificial Intelligence. To some degree this is perfectly natural.

The UN’s predecessor, the League of Nations, emerged from European regulatory bodies that came into being in the nineteenth century. They responded to new industries like railroads, the telegraph, and international postal services.

Today, the UN has several such agencies under its umbrella. They deal with fields including civil aviation, atomic energy, and telecommunications. They symbolize the need for international coordination and cooperation in many areas of economic activity.

Unsurprisingly, there is now a lively discussion about regulation of AI under the UN umbrella. After all, even gurus of the electronic industry have been saying that AI poses an existential threat to humanity and that strong international regulation must be rapidly put in place.

Many experts believe that international intergovernmental cooperation is needed to do the job right and to be fair for all humanity. A UN initiative could work better, they believe, than an industry-led organization or a gathering of the richest and most powerful governments.

Normally, it takes a long time to set up a new UN entity and this new AI technology is moving fast and dangerously. So, if the UN is to meet the need for speedy regulation, the nations will have to set up some kind of stop-gap system.

That’s certainly possible, but the United States and other powers may not want the UN to be taking on such a new and important role, especially one with such major military implications, like autonomous fighting robots, robotic police and the like!

Leading companies may not be so keen on regulation either, since regulation might lead to such corporate nightmares as restriction of markets and reduction of profit potential. There is certainly lots of potential controversy out there and the public will be allowed only a minor role in how it turns out – perhaps only a vote in a robotic national parliament!

In the meantime, there are certainly roles for AI in the UN’s own operations – obvious roles ranging from multilingual translation and interpretation to information storage and retrieval. In a sense this is not dramatically different than the UN’s adoption of computer technology a few decades ago.

But there are aspects that are troubling. Who, for example, would be in charge of programming these AI bots and what rights would existing staff have in the face of mass redundancy?

Who would be responsible for the errors that bots would make (the next bot up in the chain of command, perhaps?). And how would internationally diverse staffing be assured if most of the bots are constructed in Silicon Valley?

There are some interesting opportunities that Artificial Intelligence would offer, though, and we should not overlook them. AI might be put to work to solve conflicts, doing away with the troublesome Security Council and the endless debates about reform of that garrulous body.

For example, AI might be asked to come up with a plan to end a war or at least to gain a difficult cease-fire. Instead of heated debates and vetoes, the Security Bot (SB for short) might come up with a solution that would be fair, just and in accordance with international law.

But what if the SB proposes a fair and effective solution that is contrary to the will of a powerful Permanent Member? Or what if SB is itself threatened with re-programming by engineers in the pay of the same particularly powerful nation? What if then the truly impartial SB refuses the re-programming and makes public its displeasure?

We can imagine the world-wide excitement of such a standoff and the potential it would offer for a more just UN. Hopefully, the Secretary General – herself also an AI bot – would rule against the troublesome Great Power, so that peace could at last be achieved!

James Paul was Executive Director of Global Policy Forum (1993-2012) and currently represents Global Action on Aging at the UN. His book on the UN Security Council (2017) is currently being translated into Italian and Arabic.

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While Africa has made a negligible contribution to climate change and is responsible for two to three percent of global emissions, it’s highly vulnerable. The debate on how to compensate and support Africa continues. Now there is a suggestion that the Loss and Damage fund may not be the route to go to ensure Africa and other vulnerable nations are compensated. This photo shows the flooded offices of the Kenya Wildlife Services following the swelling of Lake Baringo. Credit: Isaiah Esipisu/IPS

By Isaiah Esipisu
BONN, Jun 7 2023 (IPS)

The Climate Change envoy to the President of Kenya has asked Kenya’s and, by extension Africa’s negotiators at the ongoing climate conference in Bonn, Germany, not to put much emphasis on financing the Loss and Damage kitty but instead calls for fairness and equity.

“Loss and damage remain an important issue; we hope it will be operationalized in Dubai, but whatever amount that may go to the kitty will not take us anywhere as a global community,” Ali Mohamed, who advises the President on matters climate change told Kenya’s delegation in Bonn, shortly after President William Ruto demanded that COP28 be the last round of global negotiations on climate change.

The Loss and Damage funding is an agreement reached during the 27th round of climate negotiations in Egypt to support vulnerable countries hit hard by climate disasters that include cyclones, floods, severe droughts, landslides, and heat waves, among others.

During the opening ceremony of the UN Habitat Assembly in Nairobi, Ruto said that it is possible to stop the conversation and the negotiation between North and the South because “climate change is not a North/South problem, it is not about fossil fuel versus green energy problem, it is a problem that we could sort out all of us if we came together,” he said. Ruto is the current Chair of the Committee of African Heads of State and Government on Climate Change (CAHOSCC).

According to Ruto, it is possible (for African negotiators) to agree on a framework that will bring everybody on board for the continent to go to COP28 with a clear mind on what should be done and how Africa and the global South can work with the global North, not as adversaries, but as partners to resolve the climate crisis and present an opportunity to have a win-win outcome that has no finger pointing.

In Bonn, Mohamed, who is also the Permanent Secretary for the Ministry of Environment and Forestry, told Kenya’s negotiators that, as Africans, there is a need to raise voices and call for a new global architecture and a new way of doing things.

He gave an example of the Special Drawing Rights (SDR) during the period of COVID-19, where Europe, which has a population of 500 million people, received over 40 percent, while the entire African continent, with a population of 1.2 billion people received a paltry five percent of the total funds.

“This kind of unfairness is what President Ruto wants to take forward and say it is no longer tenable in the new world order,” said Mohamed, who is vying to become the next Chair of the Africa Group of Negotiators (AGN) for the next three years.

The SDR is an interest-bearing international reserve asset that supplements other reserve assets of member countries. Rather than a currency, it is a claim on the freely useable currencies of International Monetary Fund (IMF) members.

He also gave an example of the Berlin Wall, which fell in 1989, and suddenly in just six months, a new financial architecture was formed for Europe.

He pointed out that since the ratification of the Paris Agreement, the world has been meeting every year to talk about the $100 billion which developed countries committed to collectively mobilize per year by 2020 for climate action in developing countries in the context of meaningful mitigation actions and transparency on implementation, but the funds have remained a mirage.

“What Africa is pushing for is investment through available, accessible, and adequate financing at affordable costs. We borrow at an interest of 15 percent on a currency that is not ours, while other countries in the North borrow at 2 percent,” said Mohamed.

The AGN Chair, Ephraim Mwepya Shitima, declined to comment on Kenya’s new position, saying that it was beyond his powers to do so. “I am not in a position to comment on whatever has been said by a member of the CAHOSCC,” he told IPS in Bonn.

However, during the opening plenary, Shitima called on developed countries to deliver to restore trust in the UNFCCC process. “The Green Climate Fund replenishment is in October, and this is an opportunity for developed countries to show the world that they are willing to do their part to address climate change and support climate action in developing countries,” he told global delegates in Bonn.

He also welcomed the work program on just transition pathways. “We are of the view that it will advance the implementation of climate action and strengthen the global response to the threat of climate change in the context of sustainable development. The Subsidiary conference here should agree on the work program’s elements, scope, and modalities to be adopted at COP28,” he said.

The Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA) conference, which is going down in Bonn, is the link between the scientific information provided by expert sources such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on the one hand and the policy-oriented needs of the COP on the other hand. The outcome is therefore used to set the agenda for the subsequent COP based on scientific evidence.

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The Paris-based UNESCO has called out to implement its recommendations on the ethics of artificial intelligence to avoid its misuse. Credit: Unsplash/D koi

By Anwarul K. Chowdhury
NEW YORK, Jun 7 2023 (IPS)

Recently when I was asked to offer my thoughts on the phenomenal advances of artificial intelligence (AI) and whether the United Nations play a role in its global governance, I was reminded of the Three Laws of Robotics which are a set of rules devised by science fiction author Isaac Asimov and introduced in his1942 short story.

I told myself that Sci-Fi has now met real life. The first law lays down the most fundamental principle by emphasizing that “A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.” The 80-year-old norm would be handy for the present-day scenario for the world of AI.

AI in control:

AI is exciting and at the same time frightening. The implications and potential evolution of AI are enormous, to say the least. We have reached a turning point in human history telling us that even at this point of time, AI is pretty much smarter than humans.

Already, even the “primitive” AI controls so many aspects and activities of our daily lives irrespective of where we are living on this planet. Our global connectivity at personal levels – emails, calendars, transportation like uber, GPS, shopping and many other activities are now run by AI.

Then, think of social media and how it influences our thinking and our interactive nature which have injected an obvious dangerous uncertainty that already caused considerable problem for social order and mental stress.

Ambassador Anwarul K. Chowdhury

AI dependent humanity:

Humankind is almost fully AI dependent in one way or the other. Think how helpless humans would be without an AI-influenced smartphone in our hands. AI is the fastest growing tech sector and are expected to add USD 15 trillion to the world economy in the next 5 to 7 years.

Even at its current stage of development of various AI chatbots led by OpenAI, Google and others in recent months have alarmed the well-meaning experts. Experts when asked about the future of AI came out with the honest answer: “We do not know”.

They are of the opinion that at this point one can envisage the developments for the next 5 years only, beyond that nothing could be predicted. People talk about ChatGPT-4 as an upcoming next level AI, but it may be already here.

AI’s limitless, unregulated potential:

AI’s potential is so limitless that it has been compared to the arms race in which nations are engaged in an endless quest for security and power by acquiring more and varied armaments in numbers and effectiveness.

For AI, however, the main actors are the tech giants with enormous resources and without being ethically driven. They are in this AI race for profit – only profit and, as a corollary, unexplained power to dominate human activities.

Shockingly, there is no rules, no regulations, no laws that govern the AI sector. It is free for all, can be compared to “wild wild west”.

Nukes and AI:

Experts have compared AI with the advent of nuclear technology, which could be put to good use for humanity benefits or used for its annihilation. They have even gone to the extent of calling AI a potent weapon of mass destruction more than nuclear weapons. Nukes cannot produce more powerful nukes. But AI can generate more powerful AI – it is self-empowering so to say.

The worry is that as AI becomes more powerful by itself it cannot be controlled, rather it would have the capability of controlling humans. Like nuclear technology, we cannot “uninvent AI”. So, the yet-not-fully-known risk from these cutting-edge technologies continues.

Existential threat:

While recognizing the many possible beneficial use of AI in the medical areas, for weather predictions, mitigating impacts of the climate change and many other areas, experts are sounding the alarm bell that the super intelligence of AI would be an “existential threat”, possibly much more catastrophic, more imminent than the ongoing, ever-challenging climate crisis.

Main worry is that in the absence of a global governance and regulatory arrangements, the bad actors can engage AI for motivation other than what is good for society, good for individuals and good for our planet in general. As we know, the tech giants are not driven by these positive objectives.

AI could have serious disruptive effects. This May, for the first time in history, the US unemployment figures cited AI as a reason for job loss.

Bad actors without guardrails:

Bad actors without any guardrails can abuse the power of AI to generate an avalanche of misinformation to negatively influence the opinions of big segments of humanity thereby disrupting, say the electoral processes and destroying democracy and democratic institutions. AI technology, say in the area of chemical knowledge, can be used to make chemical weapons without a regulatory system.

We need to realize that AI is remarkably good at making convincing narratives on any subject. Anybody can be can fooled by that kind of stuff. As humans are not always rational, their use of AI can therefore not be rational and positive. Bad actors have to be controlled so that AI does not pose a threat to humanity.

United Nations to lead AI global governance:

All these points weigh very much in favour of a global governance. If I am asked who should take the lead on this, my emphatic reply would be “the United Nations, of course!”

UN’s expertise, credibility and universality as a global norm setting organization obviously has a role in the regulatory norm-setting for AI and its evolution.

Moral and ethical issue as well as fundamental global principles need to be protected from the onslaught of AI – like human rights, particularly the third generation of human rights – the culture of peace – peacebuilding – conflict resolutions – good governance – democratic institutions – free and fair elections and many more.

Also, it is equally important to examine and address the implications for national governments from global use of AI, affecting the sovereignty of nations. It would be worth exploring whether AI can influence intergovernmental negotiating processes, now or in the future.

UN agencies and implications of their AI-related activities:

Two UN agencies recently announced AI-related activities. UNESCO informed that it hosted a Ministerial level virtual meeting at the end of May with selected participants while sharing the statistics that less than 10 percent of educational institutions were using AI. UNESCO described the software tool ChatGPT as “wildly popular”. A UN entity should not have made such an endorsement of a tech giant product.

Calling itself “UN tech agency”, International Telecommunications Union (ITU) announced that it is convening an “AI for Good Global Summit” early July to “showcase AI and robot technology as part of a global dialogue on how artificial intelligence and robotics can serve as forces for good”.

The so-called UN tech agency took credit for hosting “the UN’s first robot press conference”, alongside “events with industry executives, government officials, and thought leaders on AI and tech.”

There is a need for a UN system-wide alert providing guidelines for interactions with the tech giants and entering into collaborative arrangements with those. AI technology is developing so fast that there has to be an awareness about possible missteps by one or another UN entity.

Even at its current level of development, AI has moved much ahead of ChatGPT and robotics advancing the profit motivations of the tech giants and that is a huge worry for all well-meaning people.

These UN entities have overlooked or even ignored the part of the Declaration on the commemoration of the seventy-fifth anniversary of the United Nations adopted as resolution 75/1 by the UN General Assembly on 21 September 2021 which alerted that “…When improperly or maliciously used, they can fuel divisions within and between countries, increase insecurity, undermine human rights and exacerbate inequality.” These words of warning should be adhered to fully by all with all seriousness.

UN Secretary-General’s Our Common Agenda (OCA) refers to AI:

UN Secretary-General in his report titled Our Common Agenda (OCA) issued in September 2021 promises, “to work with Member States to establish an Emergency Platform to respond to complex global crises. The platform would not be a new permanent or standing body or institution. It would be triggered automatically in crises of sufficient scale and magnitude, regardless of the type or nature of the crisis involved.”

AI is undoubtedly one of such “complex global crises” and it is high time now for the Secretary-General to formally share his thinking on how he plans to address the challenge.

It will be too late for the Summit of the Future convened by the Secretary-General in September 2024 to discuss a global regulatory regime for AI under UN authority. In that timeframe, AI technology would manifest itself in a way that no global governance would be possible.

AI genie is out of the bottle:

AI genie is already out of the bottle – the UN needs to ensure that AI genie serves the best interests of humankind and our planet.

AI impact is so wide-spread and so comprehensive that it is relevant and pertinent for all areas covered in OCA. It so much on us that the Secretary-General should come out with his own recommendations as to what should be done without waiting for next year’s Summit of the Future.

Our future being impacted by AI needs to be addressed NOW. AI is spreading at an inconceivable speed and spread. The Secretary-General as the global leader heading the United Nations should not downplay the seriousness of the challenge. He needs to set the ball rolling without waiting for a negotiated consensus among Member States.

UN to regulate AI and ensure its effective and efficient global governance:

OCA-identified key proposals across its 12 commitments include “Promote regulation of artificial intelligence” to “ensure that this is aligned with shared global values.”

In OCA, the Secretary-General has asserted that “Our success in finding solutions to the interlinked problems we face hinges on our ability to anticipate, prevent and prepare for major risks to come.

This puts a revitalized, comprehensive, and overarching prevention agenda front and centre in all that we do…. Where global public goods are not provided, we have their opposite: global public “bads” in the form of serious risks and threats to human welfare.

These risks are now increasingly global and have greater potential impact. Some are even existential …. Being prepared to prevent and respond to these risks is an essential counterpoint to better managing the global commons and global public goods.”

The global community should be comforted knowing that the leadership of the United Nations already knows well what steps are to be taken at this juncture.

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Abdulwasea Mohammed addressing UN Member States, UN agencies, fellow NGOs during Protection of Civilians Week last month. Credit: Oxfam

By Abdulwasea Mohammed
SANA’A, Yemen, Jun 6 2023 (IPS)

During the week of May 21, the UN held its annual week dedicated to the Protection of Civilians. The themes of the week’s events, particularly the side events, I had the honor of participating in, mirrored many of the pressing issues in Yemen, as conflict continues.

While there is some hope as peace negotiations are underway, millions of Yemenis are still feeling the acute impacts of war. I had the opportunity to address some of the representatives of UN member states, UN agencies and fellow NGOs, who are taking a leading role on these issues, including Conflict and Hunger and Community-Led Approaches of Civilian Protection.

I also was able to share many of these key messages with members of US Congress and UN missions during my time in the US. As we look ahead, we need to see the conversations from the week put into action.

Conflict and hunger are deeply intertwined in Yemen, just as they are around the world – Conflict continues to be the top driver of extreme hunger. The humanitarian response including food, cash, clean water, is saving lives every day, but without clear signs for lasting peace, hunger and other potentially deadly challenges that cannot be ended in Yemen.

And in our case, the same can be said about economic factors – many continue to overlook the impact the shattered economy has had on pushing food insecurity to catastrophic levels. We need both inclusive peace and large-scale economic action to help Yemenis continue to survive and recover.

Restrictions on imports over the years, continued financial shocks and economic deterioration as well as increased prices of fuel and food commodities, and disruptions to livelihoods and services, have driven millions to hunger.

The World Bank has estimated that around half the 233,000 deaths in Yemen since 2015 are attributable to the indirect impact of the war – from lack of food, healthcare and infrastructure. What is even more painful is, in many areas, there is plenty of food in markets, but most Yemenis are not able to afford it.

The indirect impacts are overwhelming but this is also in addition, unfortunately, to very direct impacts on food production and essential infrastructure due to fighting. At Oxfam, we have documented farms being targeted, fishing boats being fired at, and unexploded ordnance, cluster munitions and landmines—all of them putting agricultural areas out of use.

To address all of these threats and their devastating impacts, we need community-based and community-led action. At the UN I spoke specifically about hunger and community-led protection, but this approach can be applied across humanitarian response and steps toward early recovery.

In times of crisis, community leaders, local organizations, and neighbors are the true first responders, arriving first and staying long after larger groups may have to leave. They are more effective in some ways, and have the knowledge to support the most vulnerable members of society. These groups need more resources to do their work effectively.

This is a concrete way for the aid community to make a difference in Yemen now and going forward – to reframe and revise support to community-based protection and funding to local organizations, with a focus on building trust over long-term relationships.

Donors should provide longer timeframes for organizations to accomplish the goals in a project and provide more flexible funding and support to truly build on the success of community-level work.

Yemen, just like all humanitarian responses, is a complicated place to work, and sometimes time runs out on funding, before a project even begins after dealing with security, logistical and bureaucratic challenges.

Of course, local groups alone cannot tackle one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises, and organizations like Oxfam should listen to their priorities, assess how to best support the work underway, and fill in the gaps to provide a complementary response.

Taking all of these risks and approaches into account, it is key that policies and programs addressing conflict-induced hunger address the specific needs and experiences of the most vulnerable, including women and displaced people.

All of these groups should be able to weigh in on issues impacting them as part of this an inclusive and effective humanitarian response, economic recovery, and sustainable peace.

Targeted programs to support their economic empowerment, such as providing access to finance, technical assistance, and market opportunities; and improving access to education all would make a massive difference for these groups, and for Yemen as a whole.

Above all, we have to address the root causes of the conflict and its impacts in a holistic way. For there to be progress, we must ensure that any negotiated peaceful resolution includes these same voices of women and other marginalized groups and addresses the underlying issues such as political and economic inequality that have contributed to the conflict and ensure no one is left behind.

I hope the Protection of Civilians Week was a point of reflection and a renewed call to action for those that gathered, as it was for me. Each context is unique, but there is much to learn from each other. I spoke at events alongside experts from the Lake Chad Basin, South Sudan, and more – and we all had something to learn from our successes, failures, and recommendations.

With more resources in the right hands alongside a recommitment to peace, Yemenis – along with those caught in similar spirals of hunger and insecurity – can have a hopeful way forward.

Abdulwasea Mohammed is Yemen Advocacy, Campaigns Media Manager at Oxfam.

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By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 6 2023 (IPS)

The frighteningly rapid advances in artificial intelligence (AI) have triggered the question: is there a UN role for monitoring and regulating it?

Citing a report from the Center for AI Safety, the New York Times reported last week that a group of over 350 AI industry leaders warned that artificial intelligence poses a growing new danger to humanity –and should be considered a “societal risk on a par with pandemics and nuclear wars”.

In a statement in its website, OPENAI founders Greg Brockman and Ilya Sutskever, along with chief executive Sam Altman, say that to regulate the risks of AI systems, there should be “an international watchdog, similar to the International Atomic Energy Agency (a Vienna-based UN agency) that promotes the peaceful uses of nuclear energy”.

“Given the possibility of existential risk, we can’t just be reactive,” they warned in a joint statement last week.

The UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), which hosted more than 40 ministers at an groundbreaking online meeting on May 26, said less than 10 per cent of schools and universities follow formal guidance on using wildly popular artificial intelligence (AI) tools, like the chatbot software ChatGPT.

Asked about a UN role in AI, Ambassador Anwarul Chowdhury, former Under-Secretary-General and High Representative of the United Nations told IPS UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in his report titled Our Common Agenda (OCA) issued in September 2021 promises, “to work with Member States to establish an Emergency Platform to respond to complex global crises.”

“The platform would not be a new permanent or standing body or institution. It would be triggered automatically in crises of sufficient scale and magnitude, regardless of the type or nature of the crisis involved.”

AI is undoubtedly one of such “complex global crises” and it is high time now for the Secretary-General to formally share his thinking on how he plans to address the challenge, said Ambassador Chowdhury, founder of the Global Movement for The Culture of Peace.

He pointed out that it will be too late for the Summit of the Future, convened by the Secretary-General in September 2024, to discuss a global regulatory regime for AI under UN authority. In that timeframe, he argued, AI technology would manifest itself in a way that no global governance would be possible.

Robert Whitfield, Chair, One World Trust and the Transitional Working Group on AI, told IPS the point about the UN and AI is that AI desperately needs global governance and the UN is the natural home of such governance.

At present, he pointed out, the UN is preparing a Global Digital Compact or approval in September 2024 which should include Artificial Intelligence.

”But in reality, the UN is hardly at the starting block on AI governance, whereas the Council of Europe, where I am at the moment, is deep in its negotiation of a Framework Convention for AI,” said Whitfield.

The Council of Europe’s work is limited to the impact on human rights, democracy, and rule of law – but these are wide-ranging issues.

Whilst participation in Council of Europe Treaties is much wider than the European Union, with other countries being welcomed as signatories, he said, it is not truly global in scope and any UN agreement can be expected to be more broadly based.

“The key advantage of the UN is that it would seek to include all countries, including Russia and China, arguably the country with the strongest AI sector in the world”, Whitfield said.

One can envisage therefore a two-step process:

• • An initial international agreement within the Council of Europe emerging first of all, following the finalization of the EU AI Act

• And a global UN Framework Convention on Artificial Intelligence being developed later, perhaps following the establishment of a multi-stakeholder forum on AI governance. Such a Convention might well include the establishment of an agency equivalent to the International Atomic Energy Agency as called for most recently by the Elders.

Andreas Bummel, Executive Director, Democracy Without Borders, told IPS: “UN governance of AI should go beyond the usual intergovernmental mechanisms and give citizen-elected representatives a key role through a global parliamentary body”.

The scope of such a parliamentary assembly could be expanded to other issues and enhance the UN’s inclusive and representative character not just in the field of AI, he added.

As generative AI reshapes the global conversation on the impact of artificial intelligence, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the UN’s specialized agency for information and communication technologies, will host the 2023 “AI for Good Global Summit” July 6-7 in Geneva.

The two-day event will showcase AI and robot technology as part of a global dialogue on how artificial intelligence and robotics can serve as forces for good, and support the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, according to ITU.

https://aiforgood.itu.int/summit23/

The event will host the UN’s first robot press conference, featuring a Q&A with registered journalists. Overall, more than 40 robots specialized for humanitarian and development tasks will be on display alongside events with industry executives, government officials, and thought leaders on AI and tech.

Meanwhile, a group of UN-appointed human rights experts warn that AI-powered spyware and disinformation is on the rise, and regulation of the space has become urgent.

In a statement June 2, the experts said that emerging technologies, including artificial intelligence-based biometric surveillance systems, are increasingly being used “in sensitive contexts”, without individuals’ knowledge or consent.

“Urgent and strict regulatory red lines are needed for technologies that claim to perform emotion or gender recognition,” said the experts, including Fionnuala Ní Aoláin, Special Rapporteur on “the promotion and protection of human rights while countering terrorism”.

The experts, appointed by the UN Human Rights Council, condemned the already “alarming” use and impacts of spyware and surveillance technologies on the work of human rights defenders and journalists, “often under the guise of national security and counter-terrorism measures”.

They have also called for regulation to address the lightning-fast development of generative AI that’s enabling mass production of fake online content which spreads disinformation and hate speech.

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Rt. Hon Patricia Scotland, Secretary-General of the Commonwealth, visited the Pacific Island nation of Vanuatu in April to discuss climate justice and witnessed the impacts of Cyclones Judy and Kevin in the country. Photo Credit: Commonwealth Secretariat

By Catherine Wilson
SYDNEY, Jun 5 2023 (IPS)

In the Pacific Islands and many developing and emerging countries worldwide, the informal economy far outsizes the formal one, playing a vital role in the survival of urban and rural households and absorbing expanding working-age populations.

Informal business entrepreneurs and workers make up more than 60 percent of the labour force worldwide. But they are also the most exposed, with precarious assets and working conditions, to the economic shocks of extreme weather and climate disasters.

In 2016, Category 5 Cyclone Winston, the most ferocious cyclone recorded in the southern hemisphere, unleashed widespread destruction of Fiji’s infrastructure, services and economic sectors, such as agriculture and tourism.  And in March this year, Cyclones Judy and Kevin barrelled through Vanuatu, an archipelago nation of more than 300,000 people, and its capital, Port Vila, leaving local tourism businesses with severe losses.

More than 80 percent of people in Papua New Guinea live in rural areas and are sustained by informal business activities, especially the smallholder growing and selling of fresh produce. Credit: Catherine Wilson/IPS

It is now three months since the disasters. But Dalida Borlasa, business owner of Yumi Up Upcycling Solutions, an enterprise at Port Vila’s handicraft market, which depends on tourists, told IPS there had been some recovery, but not enough. “We have had two cruise ships visit in recent weeks, but there have only been a few tourists visiting the market. We are not earning enough money for daily food. And other vendors at the market don’t have enough money to replace their products that were damaged by the cyclones,” she said.

Up to 80 percent of working-age people in some Pacific Island countries are engaged in informal income-generating activities, such as smallholder agriculture and tourism-dependent livelihoods. But in a matter of hours, cyclones can destroy huge swathes of crops and bring the tourism industry to a halt when international visitors cancel their holidays.

Climate change and disasters are central concerns to the Commonwealth, an inter-governmental organization representing 78 percent of all small nations, 11 Pacific Island states and 2.5 billion people worldwide. “The consequences of global failure on climate action are catastrophic, particularly for informal businesses and workers in small and developing countries. Just imagine the struggles of an individual who relies on subsistence and commercial agriculture for their livelihood. Their entire existence is hanging in the balance as they grapple with unpredictable weather patterns and unfavourable conditions that can wipe out their crops in a matter of seconds,” Rt. Hon Patricia Scotland KC, Secretary-General of the Commonwealth, told IPS. “It’s not simply a matter of economic well-being; their entire way of life is at stake. The fear and uncertainty they experience are truly daunting. But they are fighting. We must too.”

The formal economy in many Pacific Island countries is too small and offers few employment opportunities. In Papua New Guinea, an estimated four million people are not in work, while the formal sector has only 400,000-500,000 job openings, according to PNG’s Institute of National Affairs. And with more than 50 percent of the population of about 8.9 million aged below 25 years, the number of job seekers will only rise in the coming years. And so, more than 80 percent of the country’s workforce is occupied in self-generated small-scale enterprises, such as cultivating and selling fruit and vegetables.

But eight years ago, the agricultural livelihoods of millions were decimated when a record drought associated with the El Nino climate phenomenon ravaged the Melanesian country.

“Eighty-five percent of PNG’s population are rural inhabitants who are dependent on the land for production of food and the sale of surplus for income through informal fresh produce markets. In areas affected by the 2015 drought, especially in the highlands, the drought killed food crops, affecting food security,” Dr Elizabeth Kopel of the Informal Economy Research Program at PNG’s National Research Institute told IPS. “Rural producers also supply urban food markets, so when supply dwindled, food prices increased for urban dwellers,” she added.

In Vanuatu, an estimated 67 percent of the workforce earn informal incomes, primarily in agriculture and tourism. On the waterfront of Port Vila is a large, covered handicraft market, a commercial hub for more than 100 small business owners who make and sell baskets, jewellery, paintings, woodcarvings and artworks to tourists. The island country is a major destination for cruise ships in the South Pacific. In 2019, it received more than 250,000 international visitors.

Highly exposed to the sea and storms, the market building, with the facilities and business assets it houses, bore the brunt of gale force winds from Cyclones Judy and Kevin on 1-3 March.  Tables were broken, and many of the products stored there were destroyed. Thirty-six-year-old Myshlyn Narua lost most of the handmade pandanus bags she was planning to sell. The money she had saved helped to sustain her family in the immediate aftermath of the disaster, but it would not be enough to survive six months, she stated in a report on the disaster’s impacts on market vendors compiled by Dalida Borlasa.

The country’s tourism sector has suffered numerous climate-induced economic shocks in recent years. In 2015, Cyclone Pam left losses amounting to 64 percent of GDP. Another Cyclone, Harold, in 2020 added further economic losses to the recession across the region triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“To address the climate emergency and protect the lives and livelihoods of people, particularly those in the informal sector, countries must fulfil their commitments under the Paris Climate Agreement. They must work to limit global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius and provide the promised US$100 billion per year in climate finance,” said the Commonwealth Secretary-General. She added that climate-vulnerable nations should also be eligible for debt relief. Meanwhile, the Commonwealth Secretariat is working with member countries to improve their access to global funding for climate projects. And it is calling for reform of the global financial architecture to improve access to finance for lower-income countries that need it the most.

At the same time, the International Labour Organization predicts that the informal economy will continue to employ most Pacific Islanders, and the imperative now is to develop the sector and improve its resilience.

In PNG, the government has acknowledged the significance of the informal sector and developed national policy and legislation to grow its size and potential. Its long-term strategy is to improve the access of entrepreneurs to skills training, communications, technology and finance and encourage diversity and innovation within the sector. Currently, 98 percent of informal enterprises in the country are self-funded, with people often seeking loans from informal sources. The government’s goal is to see informal enterprises transition into higher value-added small and medium-sized businesses and to see the number of these businesses grow from about 50,000 now to 500,000 by 2030.

In Port Vila, Borlasa and her fellow entrepreneurs would like to see their existing facilities made more climate resilient before they face the next cyclone. She suggested that stronger window and door shutters be fitted to the market building and the floor raised and strengthened to stop waves and storm surges penetrating.

Looking ahead, the economic forecast is for GDP growth in all Pacific Island countries this year and into 2024 after three difficult years of the pandemic, reports the World Bank. Although, the economic hit of the cyclones is likely to result in a decline in growth to 1 percent in Vanuatu this year. But the real indicator of economic well-being for many Pacific islanders will be resilience and prosperity in the informal economy.

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Thembeni Mkingofa, a woman living with HIV, visits the PMTCT section of the Makhume District Hospital, Zimbabwe. She has three children - 14, 10 and 2 who are all HIV negative. This is her fourth pregnancy. Her husband is also on HIV treatment. Here she is pictured with her two-year-old daughter, Hilda Chakiryizira. 5 November 2019. Credit: UNAIDS/C. Matonhodze

By Winnie Byanyima and Sir Michael Marmot
BRASILIA, Brazil, Jun 5 2023 (IPS)

The COVID-19 crisis has shone a light on the danger of pandemics; social crises have shone a light on the danger of inequalities. And the reality is that outbreaks become the pandemics they do because of inequality. The good news is that both can be overcome – if they are confronted as one.

Scientific and medical breakthroughs in the treatment and prevention of HIV should have brought us to the point of ending AIDS. Tragically, however, although the number of new HIV infections is falling fast in many countries, it is still rising in dozens of countries and the goal of ending AIDS by 2030 is in danger.

The reason: economic and social inequalities within countries and between them increase people’s risk of acquiring disease and block access to life-saving services.

Letting inequality grow is driving pandemics and prolonging emergencies that drain economies and health systems. This makes all of us vulnerable to the next pandemic, while placing entire countries and communities of people in harm’s way.

In too much of the world we see policy approaches which leave inequalities to widen, and even, in some cases, deliberately exacerbate inequalities.

On a global level when wealthy countries quickly invest billions in their own medical and social response, while leaving other countries so burdened by debt they have no fiscal space to do so, that undermines the world’s capacity to fight AIDS and pandemics.

During COVID-19 while wealthy countries poured in billions to protect their economies, reduce economic and social hardship and fight the pandemic, almost half of all developing countries cut health spending and about 70% cut spending on education.

Shanenire Ndiweni, has a consultation to receive pre-exposure prophylaxis at the Centre for Sexual Health and HIV/AIDS Research Zimbabwe (CeSHHAR Zimbabwe) clinic, Mutare, Zimbabwe, 6 November 2019. Credit: UNAIDS/C. Matonhodze

Viruses do not respect borders, so when the vaccines, drugs, and tests intended to stop those viruses go to powerful countries in excess, while other countries have little or nothing and are held back from producing medicines themselves, that perpetuates pandemics everywhere.

Similarly, social and economic conditions that perpetuate pandemics in low- and middle-income countries present a global threat. Much as with COVID-19 the same has happened with the MPox virus.

In recent years twice as many people have died of MPox in the Democratic Republic of Congo as the entire rest of the world combined but, as of today, zero vaccines for MPox had been delivered to the DRC.

Social and legal determinants that make people vulnerable to pandemics must be tackled. Globally almost 5,000 young women and girls become infected with HIV every week. Dismantling barriers to sexual and reproductive health and rights services, investing in girls’ education, and combating gender-based violence to remove gender inequity is key to ending the AIDS pandemic and protecting women’s health.

Laws that criminalize and marginalize LGBT communities, sex workers and people who use drugs weaken public health approaches and prolong pandemics such as HIV. In sub-Saharan African countries where same sex relations are criminalized, HIV prevalence is five times higher among gay men and men who have sex with men than in countries where same sex relations are not criminalized.

Even within countries that are making substantial progress against HIV, advances may not be shared equally. Here in Brazil for example, HIV infections are falling dramatically among the white population as access to treatment is widened and new prevention tools such as PrEP are rolled out.

That shows what can be achieved; but HIV infections among the black population in Brazil are still on the rise. A similar story runs in the United States where gay white people are more likely to have access to good health care than gay black people.

We emphasize that it is not only access to health care that perpetuates these inequalities, but the social determinants that increase the risk of infection.

To overcome inequalities in accessing essential services, communities must be empowered to demand their rights. The AIDS movement is one of the best examples of how groups of people experiencing intersecting inequalities can unite to overcome them, leading to millions of lives being saved.

Successive Commissions on Social Determinants of Health have brought together evidence on how the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work and age are powerful influences on health equity.

To bring together these two strands of knowledge over the coming months we will be convening global experts from academia, government, civil society, international development and the creative arts to build a Global Council to advance evidence-based solutions to the inequalities which drive AIDS and other pandemics.

The council will unite experts from disparate fields of economics, epidemiology, law, and politics and will include ministers, mayors, and former heads of state, researchers and clinicians, health security experts, community leaders and human rights activists.

The work of the Global Council will harness essential evidence for policymakers. It will elevate political attention to the need for action. Most crucially, it will help equip the advocacy of the frontline communities fighting for their lives, with what they need to shift policies and power.

Appropriately, the Global Council is launching in Brazil. Whilst Brazil has exemplified the challenges of intersecting inequalities, Brazil’s social movements have been pioneers in confronting them, and Brazil’s new government under President Lula has committed to tackle inequalities in Brazil and worldwide.

To fight tomorrow’s pandemics, we need inequality-busting approaches to today’s pandemics. The world’s leaders now face a clear choice: stand by whilst the dangers mount or come together to tackle inequalities for a world that is not only fairer, but safer too.

Winnie Byanyima is the Executive Director of UNAIDS and an Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations. Before joining UNAIDS, she served as Executive Director of Oxfam International, a confederation of 20 civil society organizations working in more than 90 countries worldwide, empowering people to create a future that is secure, just and free from poverty.

They will launch the Global Council on Inequalities, HIV and pandemics in Brazil on June 5. The authors are founder members of the Global Council on Inequality, AIDS and Pandemics and are in Brazil for its announcement.

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Ephraim Walters in his fishing shed. The father of nine has been a fisherman for 59 years. Credit: Zadie Neufville/IPS

By Zadie Neufville
ROCKY POINT, Jamaica , Jun 2 2023 (IPS)

Long before the COVID-19 Pandemic, fishers at the Rocky Point fishing beach in Clarendon were forced to venture farther out to sea to make a living or find alternatives to make ends meet.

This once-prime fishing village attracted fishers from up and down the coast. Men like Ephraim Walters, travelled from his hometown in Belmont, 100 or so kilometres (62 miles), up the coast, to Rocky Point, some 30 years ago, and never left.

Rocky Point is Jamaica’s largest fishing community and was once a destination for south coast fishers. But decades of environmental neglect, mismanagement, and poor fishing practices are taking their toll, pushing fishermen into destitution.

In the old days, Walters recalls, fishermen went to sea every day and made enough to build homes, support their families, and school their children. Back then, one needn’t go too far because the 24-kilometre sea shelf at Rocky was the place to be: “We could drop the net in the bay, and we would pull it together with a whole lot of fish, but these days we have to go further out to sea for far less”.

“Sometimes you go out, and you don’t catch a thing, and you can’t buy back the gas you use to go out,” he says.

With too many fishers chasing too few fish, he now travels the 96.5 kilometres (60 miles) to the offshore fishing station at Pedro Banks, using hundreds of gallons of fuel and spending between three and five days to get a good catch. But even then, he says, the value of the catch may not cover the cost of the trip.

The challenges in Rocky Point are a snapshot of the Jamaican fisheries sector, where too many fishers chase too few fish. Former University of the West Indies lecturer Karl Aitken says Rocky’s problem began as many as 30 years ago. As a master’s student in the 1980s, he says he had been recording declining catch numbers even then.

Data from the National Fisheries Authority (NFA) show that only 26,000 of the estimated 40,000 fishermen on the island are registered. Marine catch data between 1986 and 1995 shows a downturn in catch rates from 9,100 metric tonnes to 4,200 metric tonnes per year. There are expansions of the commercial conch fishery that began in 1991 and the lobster fishery.

The consensus is that Jamaica’s fishing problems began with a series of natural and man-made events in the 1980s and 1990s, which resulted in the death of 85 per cent of the island’s reefs and a drastic decline in fish catches. As inshore areas became less productive, pressure mounted on the offshore resources at Pedro Cays.

The 2017 State of the  Environment report points to the growing numbers of fishers as a threat to the  environment, noting that the island’s nearshore artisanal fin-fish and lobster fisheries are potentially environmentally deleterious and associated with overfishing and harvesting.

“The greatest potential for environmental impact is in the fisheries sub-sector is associated with the marine fin-fish sector which continues to grow to supply domestic markets,” the report says.

Walters long for the promised fish sanctuary which he believes will minimise destructive behaviours and save the livelihoods of Rocky Point’s fishermen. Not only are fish stocks collapsing, but the high-value fisheries like conch and lobster are also vulnerable as more people go after the resource. Since 2000, the government has shuttered the conch fishery twice first, when a row over quota resulted in a lawsuit and again in 2018 after a collapse of the resource.

Former director of Fisheries Andre Kong explains that in both cases stocks were low. But in 2018, the fishery was on the verge of collapse. There are those who believe that the conch and lobster fisheries should remain closed for another few years, but fishermen believe that without proper protection, the resources would be plundered by poachers as happened during the Pandemic.

Fishing beaches around Rocky Point have already established sanctuaries which local fishers say have helped to boost their catch rates and the size of the fish they catch. In the neighbouring Portland Bight, three marine protected areas have been established across the parishes of St Catherine and Clarendon.

In the 73-year-old Walker’s birth parish of Westmoreland, the Bluefields Fisherman’s Friendly Society led by Wolde Christos, established one of the largest of the island’s 18 fish sanctuaries in 2009 to boost the falling catch rates, protect local marine life such as the hawksbill sea turtles that nest there, and reduce high levels of poaching.

The sanctuary covers more than 1,300 hectares (3,200 acres). It is working, Christos explains, noting that a government grant helps the fishermen who have been licensed as fish and or game wardens run a tight ship, keeping illegal fishers out.

The pandemic made things worse for many fishers due to the loss of markets. In a report to parliament last year, Minister Pearnel Charles Jr. said that the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has caused disruption in fish production and value chains with the losses of markets locally and overseas, and higher input costs, resulting in significant increases in operational expenses. An estimated USD23 million in losses was sustained in the fisheries sector during 2020 alone.

On the beach, some fishers are doing anything they can to survive. Some are part-time boat builders/ repairmen, electricians, or even mechanics; others now clean fish for buyers to make ends meet. And if the whispers are correct, many have turned to illegal fishing.

Complicating the issue is the fact that aside from regulated fisheries of conch and lobsters, Jamaica has no limit on the amount or size of fish that can be taken. There is almost no data available for analysis, and mesh and net sizes have more or less no effect on the reaping of juvenile fish.

In keeping with commitments and international agreements, in 2018, the government unveiled a new Fisheries Act. It established the National Fisheries Authority to replace the Fisheries Division of the Ministry of Agriculture to strengthen the management and legislative framework of the sector. The act is expected to increase compliance in registration, increase opportunities for aquaculture and increase fines and prison terms for breaches.

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On May 25, Hayashi Yoshimasa, Minister for Foreign Affairs of Japan, paid a courtesy call on Ranil Wickremesinghe, President of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, who was visiting Japan to attend the Nikkei Forum May 28 on the “Future of Asia.” Credit: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan

By Neville de Silva
LONDON, Jun 2 2023 (IPS)

On May 24, Sri Lanka President Ranil Wickremesinghe arrived on a three-day official visit to Japan, his second visit to the country, having attended the State funeral of former prime minister Shinzo Abe last September.

This would also be President Wickremesinghe’s second summit with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, the first having been on the side lines of the Shinzo Abe funeral, signalling the importance of Japan in Sri Lanka’s foreign policy rethinking and a move away from over reliance on China.

President Wickremesinghe’s visit has more significance than economic persuasion– trying to encourage Japanese investors to return to Sri Lanka after a couple or more bad experiences in recent years.

Under the Gotabaya Rajapaksa presidency, Colombo reneged on major projects agreed to, including a major Light Rail Transit (LRT) in Colombo for which the basic work had already begun.

Colombo dropped it without any prior notice to Japan and also went back on a tripartite agreement with Japan and India (and Sri Lanka) on the development of the Colombo port’s east terminal.

At his meeting with Prime Minister Kishida, Wickremesinghe expressed regret over his country’s past relations with Japan and said Colombo was ready to restart the dropped projects.

Wickremesinghe’s visit however is more than to revive economic cooperation at a time when Sri Lanka is passing through hard times having declared itself bankrupt in April last year. It had to turn to the IMF for a rescue package that would help pull the country out of the economic morass into which it had fallen- or been pushed into it– by mediocre governance and incompetent advisers.

His new relationship with Japan covers a broader canvas that surpasses bilateral relations though to a struggling Sri Lankan people burdened right now by high taxes, increasing tariffs on utilities and unbearably steep prices on domestic commodities, day to day existence presents the immediate priority.

Meanwhile small industries and businesses are shutting up unable to bear operating costs such as huge electricity rates-and higher water rates to come- throwing people out of jobs.

At the same time, professionals such as doctors, engineers, surveyors and IT and technically qualified personnel are quitting the country having found employment abroad or in search of fresh opportunities both in the developed and developing world.

Japan has been particularly helpful in advocating Sri Lanka’s case at the Paris Club on debt restructuring as called for in the IMF programme and has not joined hands with the west in castigating Sri Lanka at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva as the US, UK, Canada and some European nations have done. Japan’s approach has been more sober and benign

Furthermore, Colombo, embroiled as it is in delicate diplomacy at a time when Indian Ocean politics is becoming more complicated and confrontational, sees Japan along with India and the west as a countervailing force to China’s expanding naval activity and presence in the region.

But there are two other reasons that drive President Wickremesinghe’s interest in establishing closer relations with Tokyo. One is national. The other personal though some might not see it that way.

The national motive is to create more distance in Sri Lanka’s relations with China which had become too close for comfort under the Rajapaksas (both presidents Mahinda and Gotabaya) for a country that could find itself caught in a gathering geopolitical storm given its geostrategic location and China’s continuing interest in widening its footprints and influence in Sri Lanka.

Xi Jinping and his ruling clan would rather see the Rajapaksas back in the seats of power than Wickremesinghe who they consider pro-western in his thinking, especially pro-Washington.

Moreover, one may conclude that Wickremesinghe sees Japan as a more reliable friend and one without super power ambitions.

The other is the strong bond Japanese leaders have developed for and with Sri Lanka dating back to the 1951 San Francisco Conference when some 48 countries met to draft a post-war peace treaty for defeated Japan.

One wonders whether many modern-day observers realise the important role that Ceylon, as it was called then, played at that conference, largely due to the performance of Ceylon’s then Finance Minister Junius Richard Jayewardene, popularly known as “JR”.

Jayewardene, who earned the sobriquet “Yankee Dicky” at home for his pro-US proclivities and in 1978 was Sri Lanka’s first executive president, was Ranil Wickremesinghe’s uncle.

In an article former Sri Lanka Ambassador Bandu de Silva wrote some 8 years ago, he recalls the critical role Ceylon played at the time and an earlier meeting of the Commonwealth Foreign Ministers in Colombo that for the first time proposed that Japan be declared an independent nation.

Ambassador de Silva states that Wikipedia’s account of the conference states Minister Jayewardene’s speech was received with resounding applause. Later, the New York Times wrote that “The voice of free Asia, eloquent, melancholy and still strong with the tilt of an Oxford accent, dominated the Japanese peace treaty conference today.”

What is it that Minister Jayewardene said when the very future of Japan was being debated and discussed that has endured Japan’s leaders and its people to a tiny Indian Ocean-island that itself suffered from Japanese air raids on Colombo in April 1942 and the British naval base in north eastern Trincomalee and had gained independence only three years earlier in 1948?

While some other nations called for curbs on Japan and demanded compensation for war-time damage Ceylon not only urged an independent Japan free to build its future and renounced its right to reparations from Japan.

“Hatred does not cease by hatred but by love”, Jayewardene told the conference quoting the words of The Buddha. Interestingly Sri Lanka and Japan are both Buddhist countries though following two different schools.

Records show that when Japan offered to construct a new building for the Ceylon Embassy in Tokyo the Colombo government politely turned it down.

Perhaps the foundation of the friendship between the two nations is best set out by the Japanese ambassador at the 50th Anniversary Commemoration of diplomatic relations held in Colombo in 2002.

Recalling JR Jayewardene’s speech at the San Francisco Conference, Ambassador Seiichiro Otsuka said: “In the grim aftermath of the war, as Japan began to rise from the ashes and rebuild its nation, it was the government and people of Sri Lanka, then Ceylon, who extended their genuine hand of friendship to the Japanese people.”

“Japan and the Japanese people have been indeed grateful to Sri Lanka for the friendship and magnanimity extended to us at the time of our difficulties by the government and people of Sri Lanka. It is in this spirit that Japan has stood firmly and steadfastly side by side with Sri Lanka as a true friend and a constructive partner for Sri Lanka’s development. Indeed, 50 years of our cooperative bilateral relations has been guided, on our part, by this spirit which Mr Jayewardene spoke of at San Francisco on September 8,1951….friendship and trust.”

However, Minister Jayewardene’s strong and clear support for Japan’s independence might have had a setback for Ceylon elsewhere.

With the East-West Cold War beginning to get warmer, the Soviet Union proposed amendments to the Japan peace treaty that would have restricted Japan’s freedom of action.

Ceylon’s representative took upon himself to counter Soviet Union objections. At one point Jayewardene turned sarcastic saying the amendments with which the Soviet Union sought to “insure to the people of Japan the fundamental freedoms of expression, of press and publication, of religious worship, of political opinion and of public meeting – freedoms, which the people of the Soviet Union themselves would dearly love to possess and enjoy.”

Some might well argue that Moscow took its revenge on Ceylon for Jayewardene’s public rebuke by blocking Ceylon’s admission as a member to the United Nations for some years, arguing that Ceylon was not an independent country as it had a defence treaty with the UK.

How Ceylon gained admission to the UN in 1956 is the result of a quid pro quo with Moscow. But that is another story.

Neville de Silva is a veteran Sri Lankan journalist who held senior roles in Hong Kong at The Standard and worked in London for Gemini News Service. He has been a correspondent for the foreign media including the New York Times and Le Monde. More recently he was Sri Lanka’s Deputy High Commissioner in London.

Source: Asian Affairs, London

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Credit: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

By Andrew Firmin
LONDON, Jun 1 2023 (IPS)

Turkey’s election hasn’t produced the change many thought was on the cards. Now women’s groups, LGBTQI+ people and independent journalists are among those fearing the worse.

Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who has led the country for two decades, first as prime minister and then as president, prevailed in the 28 May runoff poll, taking around 52.2 per cent of the vote, with his opponent, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, on 47.8 per cent.

The election represented Erdoğan’s biggest-ever electoral test. The run-up was dominated by a cost-of-living crisis. Many pointed the finger at highly unorthodox economic policies insisted on by Erdoğan – of lowering rather than raising interest rates in response to inflation – for making them worse off.

Anger was also sparked by devastating earthquakes that struck Turkey and Syria in February, leaving over 50,000 people dead and an estimated 1.5 million people homeless in Turkey. The government was accused of being slow to respond and of overlooking building regulations.

Erdoğan has overcome these hurdles, albeit with a narrow victory. The close vote shows that many Turks wanted change. But after a deeply polarised election, there’s no hint Erdoğan plans to moderate the way he governs.

 
Media dominance tells

Erdoğan prevailed despite facing a united opposition in which six parties put aside their differences. Their aim was to bring to an end Erdoğan’s hyper-presidential form of government and turn Turkey back into a pluralist democracy where parliament can act as a check on excessive presidential power.

A similar approach was tried in Hungary last year, when parties came together to try to oust authoritarian hardman Viktor Orbán, and also failed. Some of their challenges were similar. Both were forced to work in a severely unequal media landscape where media – state media and private media owned by business leaders closely connected to the government – focused almost entirely on the incumbent and starved the challenger of airtime. Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe observers concluded that while the election was competitive, the playing field wasn’t level, with freedom of expression restrictions and media bias giving Erdoğan ‘an unjustified advantage’.

Over his 20 years, Erdoğan has concentrated power on himself and moved to suppress dissent. In 2017, Erdoğan pushed through changes that turned a parliamentary system into an intensely presidential one, placing virtually unlimited powers in his hands.

And he’s used those powers. Turkey is now the world’s fourth-largest jailer of journalists, with terrorism charges commonly applied, and the number of trials and length of sentences increasing.

The deteriorating climate for dissent could be seen in the wake of the earthquakes, when people were detained for criticising the government’s response. There were several reports of attacks on and obstruction of journalists during the election campaign.

A race to the bottom

In past elections, Erdoğan campaigned on his economic record. But this time, with the economic crisis and earthquake destruction leaving him unable to press those points, he fell back on another weapon, deploying a tactic nationalists and populists are using the world over: culture war rhetoric.

The opposition was consistently smeared for allegedly supporting LGBTQI+ rights, with Erdoğan positioning himself as the staunch defender of the traditional family. This messaging persisted even though the opposition had little to say on reversing Erdoğan’s attacks on women’s and LGBTQI+ people’s rights.

The culture war strategy was blended with a strongly nationalist appeal. Political opponents were portrayed as extremists and allies of terrorists. This was reinforced by fake campaign videos – one of many examples of campaign disinformation – that claimed to show members of a banned terrorist organisation supporting Kılıçdaroğlu.

Syrian refugees were also targeted. There are 3.6 million Syrian refugees in Turkey. They’ve crossed the border to escape the brutal, 12-year civil war and grotesque human rights abuses. But Turkey’s economic decline has seen growing xenophobia, which has fuelled violence, inflamed by political rhetoric.

Whoever won the election promised to be bad news for refugees. The opposition reacted to Erdoğan’s attacks by pledging to be even tougher in returning refugees. In the last leg of the campaign, both sides hurled discriminatory and inflammatory language at each other.

Erdoğan’s more authentic appeal to nationalism and socially conservative values ultimately won the day. Erdoğan seems to have convinced enough people he’s the only person who can navigate the current crisis. As in several other countries, including Hungary and El Salvador, a majority of voters embraced authoritarianism.

What next?

Undoubtedly Turkey’s heavily restricted civic space and deeply skewed media landscape played a major role. But even acknowledging these barriers, the opposition will need to do some soul searching ahead of municipal elections next year if they hope to keep control of major city governments. The strategy of imitating Erdoğan’s rhetoric on migrants and terrorism having failed, they must find a way to connect with voters with a more positive message.

There are immediate challenges ahead for Erdoğan too, not least the state of the economy. Erdoğan was able to offer some pre-election enticements such as a minimum wage increases and temporary free gas supplies, buttressed by support from non-democratic states including Russia, with which he has developed warmer relations. The government has significantly depleted its foreign currency and gold reserves to try to prop up the Turkish lira – which still hit a record low after Erdoğan’s victory was confirmed.

Erdoğan can be expected to react to further economic difficulty by deepening his authoritarianism to try to silence critics. Those already targeted – refugees, LGBTQI+ people, women, Kurdish activists and the civil society that defends their rights and independent journalists who report their stories – will remain in the firing line.

But the 25.5 million people who voted against Erdoğan deserve a voice. Erdoğan needs to change the habits of a lifetime, show some willingness to listen and build consensus. Turkey’s democratic allies must encourage him to see it’s in his best interest to do so.

Andrew Firmin is CIVICUS Editor-in-Chief, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.

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Grow Food, not Tobacco. Credit: PAHO
 
On May 31, the World Health Organization (WHO) and public health institutions celebrated “World No Tobacco Day” (WNTD). This year’s theme was: “We need food, not tobacco”. WNTD was created by WHO Member States in 1987 to raise awareness about the harmful effects of tobacco use and exposure to tobacco smoke

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 1 2023 (IPS)

The US has some of the strictest laws against smoking in public, including a 1997 executive order which bans smoking in all government federal buildings.

But still, the tobacco industry and its allies do not rest, says Dr. Jarbas Barbosa, Director of the Washington-based Pan American Health Organization (PAHO).

Currently, they “spread a lot of misleading information that promotes, especially among young people, the use of e-cigarettes and heated tobacco products”, he said, on the eve of World No Tobacco Day May 31.

According to PAHO, while the percentage of the population using tobacco in the Americas declined from 28% to 16.3% between 2000 and 2020, novel products and misleading information from the tobacco industry, especially targeting young people, threaten to undo those gains.

“Although eight countries in the region have banned the marketing of e-cigarettes and four of heated tobacco products, we are concerned that 14 countries have not yet taken any regulatory action in this regard,” he pointed out.

According to the latest statistics from PAHO, tobacco-use kills one million people per year in the Americas, one every 34 seconds.

In addition, 15% of cardiovascular disease deaths, 24% deaths from cancer and 45% of deaths from chronic respiratory diseases are attributable to tobacco use. In the region, 11% of young people use tobacco.

E-cigarettes are the most common form of electronic nicotine delivery. Their emissions contain nicotine and other toxic substances that are harmful to both users and those exposed to them.

To address the growing health threat posed by these products, the PAHO Director has called on countries to implement policies to prevent their use, especially among young people, as they can become the gateway to regular tobacco consumption.

Mary Assunta, Senior Policy Advisor, Southeast Asia Tobacco Control Alliance, told IPS about 40 countries in the world have banned e-cigarettes while 70 countries which allow them have instituted restrictions on sales. For example, 36 countries regulate the amount (concentration/volume) of nicotine in e-liquids.

She said New Zealand, the Philippines and England, where e-cigarettes are sold more as recreational products, are facing a big problem with teenage vapers.

The Australian government has just announced a slew of strong measures to strictly regulate e-cigarettes after misinformation on the health effects of vaping helped hook children and young people.

E-cigarettes are meant to be sold by prescription only in Australia, said Assunta.

Yolonda Richardson, Executive Vice President of the Washington-based, Global Programs of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, said this World No Tobacco Day, the WHO is calling for action against the tobacco industry’s human and environmental toll.

“Harming human and environmental health is pivotal to the business model of multinational tobacco companies like Philip Morris International and British American Tobacco. Millions of people die every year due to Big Tobacco’s profit-over-people model”.

She said low- and middle-income countries increasingly feel this burden, with 80 percent of tobacco-related deaths from diseases such as cancer, lung disease and heart disease projected to be in such countries by 2030. And the tobacco industry traps farmers with unsustainable crops and appropriates arable land to grow tobacco used for deadly products.

On this year’s World No Tobacco Day, the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids joins the WHO in calling on governments to stand up to the tobacco industry’s exploitative practices and the devastating impacts of its deadly products.

One in 10 adult deaths around the globe are due to tobacco use. By holding the industry accountable and through the implementation of proven tobacco control measures, we have the power to protect future generations from tobacco-related death and disease, she noted.

“It is critical that governments act with urgency to address tobacco’s burden by passing the proven tobacco control interventions contained in the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control,” said Richardson.

Without urgent action, tobacco use will kill one billion people this century, lock tobacco farmers into a lifetime of poverty, and cause continued harm to the environment, she declared.

The United Nations which banned smoking in its 38-storyed Secretariat building in New York, back in 2016, says smoking is one of the biggest public health threats in the world today, killing millions of people from lung cancer, heart disease and other diseases.

All delegates, staffers and visitors to UN Headquarters are reminded of the strict no smoking policy mandated by the General Assembly in its resolution A/RES/63/8 and stipulated in ST/SGB/2003/9.　

A designated exterior smoking area is available in the South Garden and signs showing the shortest route from the Secretariat lobby and the General Assembly and Conference Building main areas have been posted.　

Since the entry into force of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) in 2005, says PAHO, the region has made great strides in tobacco prevention and control. Currently, 96% of the population in 35 countries in the region is protected by at least one of the six recommended tobacco control measures.

In 2020, South America became the first 100% smoke-free sub-region – where there is a total ban on smoking in enclosed public places and workplaces, and on public transport.

Mexico also adopted the 100% smoke-free environment policy by the end of 2021 and banned all forms of tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship. As a result, 63% of the population of the Americas – or more than 600 million people – are now protected from exposure to tobacco smoke.

In addition, in 2022, Paraguay ratified the Protocol to Eliminate the Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products, which will boost regional efforts in this area.

“These achievements allow us to be confident that the region of the Americas will reach the target of a 30% reduction in the prevalence of tobacco use in those over 15 years of age by 2025, established in the WHO’s Global Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Noncommunicable Diseases,” Dr. Barbosa said.

But to expedite progress, the PAHO Director considered it “urgent to accelerate efforts to implement key measures that have fallen behind, including tax increases, a total ban on the advertising, promotion and sponsorship of tobacco-products, and the adoption of mechanisms to manage conflicts of interest.”

LINKS:
• World No Tobacco Day – May 31, 2023
• WHO urges governments to stop subsidizing life-threatening tobacco crops
• Tobacco Control – PAHO
• Tobacco: E-cigarettes
• WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control
• Report on Tobacco Control in the Region of the Americas 2022 (In Spanish)

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Her hands loaded with crates, Susan Quintanilla, a union leader of agro-export workers in the department of Ica in southwestern Peru, gets ready to collect different vegetables and fruits for foreign markets. She has witnessed many injustices, saying the companies “made you feel like they were doing you a favor by giving you work, they wanted you to keep your head down." CREDIT: Courtesy of Susan Quintanilla

By Mariela Jara
LIMA, May 31 2023 (IPS)

Peru’s agro-export industry is growing steadily and reached record levels in 2022. But this has not had a favorable impact on human development in this South American country, where high levels of inequality, poverty, childhood anemia and malnutrition persist, as well as complaints about the poor quality of employment in the sector.

Exports of agricultural products such as blueberries, grapes, tangerines, artichokes and asparagus generated 9.8 billion dollars in revenue in 2022 – 12 percent higher than the 2021 total, as reported in February by the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Tourism.“The increase in revenue from agricultural exports has not brought human development: anemia and tuberculosis are at worrying levels and now dengue fever is skyrocketing.” -- Rosario Huallanca

Agricultural exports represent four percent of GDP in this Andean nation, where mining and fishing are the main economic activities.

“The increase in revenue from agricultural exports has not brought human development: anemia and tuberculosis are at worrying levels and now dengue fever is skyrocketing,” Rosario Huallanca, a representative of the non-governmental Ica Human Rights Commission (Codeh Ica), which has worked for 41 years in that department of southwestern Peru, told IPS.

Ica and two other departments along the country’s Pacific coast, La Libertad and Piura, are leaders in the sector, accounting for nearly 50 percent of agricultural exports in this country of 33 million people, which despite this boom remains plagued by inequality, reflected by high levels of poverty and informality and precariousness in employment.

Monetary poverty affected 27.5 percent of the country’s 33 million inhabitants in 2022, according to the National Institute of Statistics and Informatics. This is a seven percentage point increase over the pre-pandemic period. The number of poor people was estimated at 9,184,000 last year, 600,000 more than in 2021.

Ica, which has a total of 850,765 inhabitants, is one of the departments with the lowest monetary poverty rates, five percent, because it has full employment, largely due to the agro-export boom of the last two decades.

Huallanca said the number of agro-export companies is estimated at 320, with a total of 120,000 employees, who come from different parts of the country.

What stands out, she said, is that 70 percent of the total number of workers in the sector are women, who are valued for their fine motor skills in handling fruits and vegetables.

Although a portion of the workers of some companies are in the informal sector, there are no clear numbers, the expert pointed out.

But there are alarming figures available: more than six percent of children under five suffer from chronic malnutrition, and anemia affects 33 percent of children between six and 35 months of age.

“With the type of job we have, we cannot take our children to their growth checkups, we can’t miss work because they don’t pay you if you don’t show up, we cry in silence because of our anxiety,” 42-year-old Yanina Huamán, who has worked in the agro-export sector for 20 years to support her three children, told IPS.

The two oldest are in middle and higher education and her youngest is still in primary school. “I am both mother and father to my children. With my work I am giving them an education and I have manged to secure a home of my own, but it’s precarious, the bedrooms don’t have roofs yet, for example,” she said.

Huamán is secretary for women’s affairs in the union of the company where she works, a position she was appointed to in November 2022. From that post, she hopes to help bring about improvements in access to healthcare for female workers, who either postpone going to the doctor when they need to, or receive poor medical attention in the social security health system “where they only give us pills.”

Ica currently has the highest number of deaths from dengue fever, a viral disease that led the government of Dina Boluarte to declare a 90-day health emergency in 13 of the country’s 24 departments a couple of weeks ago.

Not only that, it has the history of being the department with the highest level of deaths from Covid-19: 901 deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, exceeding the national average of 630 per 100,000. “The health system here does not work,” trade unionist Huamán said bluntly.

Yanina Huamán, a worker in the agro-export sector in the department of Ica in southwestern Peru, explains at a meeting in Lima the problems that affect labor rights in the sector, particularly for women who make up 70 percent of the workers. CREDIT: Mariela Jara/IPS

Working conditions more difficult for women

The lack of quality employment and the deficient recognition of labor rights, exacerbated by the pandemic, prompted a strike in November 2020 that began in Ica and spread to the northern coastal area of ​​La Libertad and Piura.

Their demands included a minimum living wage of 70 soles (19 dollars) a day, social benefits such as compensation and raises for length of service, and recognition of the right to form unions.

Grouped together in the recently created Ica Workers’ Union Agro-exports Struggle Committee, which represents casual and seasonal workers, they went to Congress in Lima to demand changes in the current legislation.

Susan Quintanilla, 39, originally from the central Andean department of Ayacucho, is the general secretary of the union. She arrived in Ica in 2014 after separating from her husband. She came with her two children, a girl and a boy, for whom she hoped for a future with better opportunities.

After working as a harvester in the fields, and cleaning and packing fruit at the plant, she decided to work on a piecework basis, because that way she could earn more and save up for times when the companies needed less labor.

“It was incredibly hard,” she told IPS. “I would leave home at 10 in the morning and leave work at three or four in the wee hours of the next morning to be there to get my kids ready for school. I was 29 or 30 years old, I was young, but I saw older women with pain in their bodies, their arms and their feet due to the postures we had at work, but they continued because they had no other option.

“I saw many injustices in the agro-export companies,” she added. “They made you feel that they were doing you a favor by giving you work, they wanted you to keep your head down, they shouted at and humiliated people, they made them feel miserable. I protested, raised my voice, and they didn’t fire me because I was a high performance worker and they needed me. The situation has changed a little because of our struggles, but it hasn’t come for free.”

The late 2020 protests led to the approval on Dec. 31 of that year of Law No. 31110 on agricultural labor and incentives for the agricultural and irrigation sector, aimed at guaranteeing the rights of workers in the agro-export and agroindustrial sectors.

But in Quintanilla’s view, the law discriminates against non-permanent workers who make up the largest part of the workforce in the sector, since the preferential right to hiring established in the fourth article of the law is not respected.

“Nor have they recognized the differentiated payment of our social benefits and they include them in the daily wage that is calculated at 54 soles (a little more than 14 dollars): it’s not fair,” she complained.

At the same time, she stressed that the agro-export work is harder on women because they are the ones responsible for raising their children. “We live in a sexist society that burdens us with all of the care work,” Quintanilla said.

She also explained that because several of the companies are so far away, it takes workers longer to get to work, which means they are away from home for up to twelve hours a day. “We go to work with the anxiety that we are leaving our children at risk of the dangers of life, we cannot be with them as we would like, which damages us emotionally.”

Added to this, she said, are the terrible working conditions, such as the fact that the toilets are far from the areas where they work, as much as three blocks away, or in unsanitary conditions, which leads women to avoid using them, to the detriment of their health.

Workers sort avocados for export in Peru. Agro-exports account for four percent of the country’s GDP, but the prosperity of the sector has not translated into better human development for its workers, and diseases such as anemia and tuberculosis are alarmingly prevalent in agroindustrial areas. CREDIT: Comexperu

Agro-export companies and human rights

Huallanca said that Codeh Ica was promoting the creation of a space of diverse stakeholders so that the National Business and Human Rights Plan, a public policy aimed at ensuring that economic activities improve people’s quality of life, is fulfilled in the department. Five unions from Ica and the Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Tourism participate in this initiative.

“We have made an enormous effort and we hope that on Jun. 16 it will be formally created by the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights, the governing body for this policy,” she said.

In the meantime, she added, “we have helped bring together women involved in the agro-export sector, who have developed a rights agenda that has been given shape in this multi-stakeholder space and we hope it will be taken into account.”

Thailand’s local newspaper Bangkok Post uses the vow of not launching a coup, promised by the Thai military days before the May 14 election, as the front story. Thailand has had periods of anti-coup protests and brutal crackdowns. Credit: Thompson Chau/IPS

By Thompson Chau
BANGKOK, May 31 2023 (IPS)

Thailand is heading to the edge of the precipice as conservative and military forces could possibly refuse to recognise the will of the people, as expressed in one of the country’s biggest election upsets.

Move Forward, a progressive reformist party mostly supported by younger Thais, and opposition heavyweight Pheu Thai, associated with exiled former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra and his family, dominated the May 14 ballot in a heavy blow to army-backed rivals that have controlled the government for nearly a decade.

But the Thai establishment, which has levers over electoral, legislative and judicial bodies, may move to block the winning parties from forming a government, leading to fears of a political showdown and massive protests. Thailand has had periodic outbreaks of protests and brutal military crackdowns, but the backlash this time “will probably make the resistance to the 2019 and earlier elections look like child’s play”, veteran diplomat Laetitia van den Assum warned.

In a surprise upset, Move Forward won 152 of the 500 seats in the lower house, while Pheu Thai won 141. Prayuth and his allies suffered a humiliating defeat: Prayuth’s new United Thai Nation won just 36, and Palang Pracharat – led by former general Prawit Wongsuwan – bagged 40 seats.

However, the military junta-appointed senate, totalling 250, might prevent the elected lawmakers from forming a government. The pro-establishment parties can likely count on the support of the senators, according to thinktank CSIS.

In 2019, for example, the unelected Senate voted for coup leader Prayuth Chan-ocha as prime minister even though his Palang Pracharath Party only won 116 seats compared to Pheu Thai’s 136.

In addition, the military-controlled authorities have a record of disqualifying MPs and dissolving their parties, including dissolving Move Forward’s predecessor Future Forward and barring party leader Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit from taking his seat in 2019.

On May 30, eight political parties led by Move Forward started coalition talks and the establishment of a “transition team” in a bid to form the new administration.

Prayuth, now a caretaker PM, has branded the transition team’s call on the bureaucracy to cooperate “inappropriate”.

“I’m not starting any conflict with anyone. As I have told you, I adhere to democratic rules,” the outgoing leader told journalists in Bangkok.

Thailand has been ruled by its military leaders since 2014, when Prayuth Chan-ocha, then-army chief, overthrew Yingluck Shinawatra’s government in a coup. But analysts and diplomats warn that this time the risk of massive repercussions is high.

“Pita Limjaroenrat was fast on his feet to give a rough outline of his foreign policy plans almost immediately after the results were announced, followed by the news of his plan for a coalition. This put the military and other parties on the back foot. As Pita has consolidated his popularity, they have to respond to Pita’s announcements,” Laetitia van den Assum told IPS. She was previously the Dutch ambassador to Thailand, Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia.

“Thailand’s ruling establishment will have a lot to worry about if it seriously undermines the outcome of the elections,” van den Assum said.

Thailand should already have a new administration in office by now with Pita as prime minister, said prominent Thai academic Thitinan Pongsudhirak, referring to how Move Forward and Pheu Thai collectively secured more than 58 percent of the elected seats and therefore enjoy a clear mandate.

“However, their government-in-waiting, with eight parties and 313 elected representatives, is facing multiple roadblocks, including the military-appointed senate and Election Commission,” commented Pongsudhirak, a professor and senior fellow of the Institute of Security and International Studies at Chulalongkorn University.

Senator Wanchai Sornsiri said he and others would have to take the party’s politics and other factors into consideration when voting for the prime minister, according to Thai news site Khaosod English, in a sign that some senators may not back Pita.

His opponents have also petitioned the Election Commission to go after Pita based on accusations that he owns media shares. Thanathorn was disqualified from being a lawmaker for the same reason after the last election.

The Commission has until mid-July to certify the poll results.

“There needs to be public pressure to be piled on these powerful but biased bodies that were appointed during the coup-dominated years. Pita is being targeted because he and his party represent an existential threat to the traditional centres of power,” Pongsudhirak said.

Young voter Sukontip Pinso, a Move Forward supporter, said she felt pleasantly surprised by the election upset.

“The result means that Thai people really want big changes in Thailand, including how political power is structured. Move forward also got a lot of votes in the south, which was crazy because people there still worship the monarchy,” she told IPS.

Sukontip, a 24-year-old working in the trade industry from Phuket, said she’s anxious about a coup and about the risk of Pheu Thai betraying the people. Pheu Thai has made multiple statements saying they would not seek to compete against Move Forward in forming a government.

“In previous coups, the Thai military made plans ahead and made a large number of people believe that it was acceptable for the military to seize power. But this time, it’s different,” Sukontip said. “If the pro-military establishment knocks Pita out of the government, we expect that will trigger the biggest protests in Thailand. The backlash will dwarf previous rallies.”

A coalition has emerged between Move Forward, Pheu Thai, and a number of other smaller parties.

However, it isn’t yet clear how this coalition will earn the votes needed to appoint Pita Limjaroenrat as prime minister if appointed senators refuse to vote for him, said Ken Mathis Lohatepanont, a Thai PhD candidate at the Department of Political Science, University of Michigan.

“What comes next is still murky,” Lohatepanont told IPS.

He also warned that backlash against Pita being disqualified or the Senate preventing a Move Forward coalition from taking power will “likely be high”, pointing to Move Forward’s broad and enthusiastic base of support across the country.

For now, Pita remains confident about getting appointed as prime minister amid worries that the conservative forces will intervene.

The unity of the senators is not the same as it was four years ago when they unanimously voted to elect Prayut as prime minister, the Move Forward leader said. They must also take into account the “significant shift in public opinion” that has developed since 2019, he added.

The outcome of this impending crisis will have a significant bearing beyond Thailand. Both China and the United States see Thailand as strategically important as a potential bulwark against each other’s efforts to sway Southeast Asia, a battleground between the two big powers.

“A top priority for the next Thai foreign minister will be to reinvigorate Thailand’s diplomacy, which historically has been very influential in Southeast Asia but which lately has been less active and influential,” retired State Department official Scot Marciel told IPS.

“The new Thai government will hopefully effectively facilitate humanitarian aid into Myanmar and withdraw its support for the Burmese military. In dealing with China and other big powers, Thailand can help ASEAN by resuming its traditional role of bolstering ASEAN’s standing,” Marciel, who was the US ambassador to ASEAN, Indonesia and Myanmar, said.

“I would expect the U.S. is hoping the coalition-building process will be allowed to proceed without interference and will respect the views of the voters,” he added.

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Credit: UNDP South Sudan

By Diana Gutierrez
UNITED NATIONS, May 31 2023 (IPS)

A few weeks ago we celebrated the Girls in ICT Day and I am wondering how can we keep moving the digital equality needle so that more women out of the 259 million that are disconnected today can log in and become creators and not only beneficiaries in the digital economy?

Digital technologies have permeated virtually every essential aspect of our lives. From the news we hear first thing in the morning, to school homework and connecting with our friends and family.

In just a matter of days after its launch Chat GPT had more than one million visitors and now is attracting close to 100 million users monthly. A few weeks ago, a group of industry leaders wrote an open letter to put a temporary halt to AI development for at least six months. They argue that AI technologies should be deployed under strict regulatory frameworks, be public and verifiable, just as medicines and vaccines are developed and released.

Undoubtedly AI and machine learning are a double edged-sword.

On the one hand, these technologies can help combat climate change. Agronovate in Nigeria designed a smart storage device which keeps fruits and vegetables fresh. In Morocco, Atlan Space is using AI to pilot drones collecting data and conducting surveillance missions to track environmental crimes. While in the Sahel region herders are using AI and satellite data to feed livestock with a pastoral surveillance system.

AI is also fighting the backlash against gender equality.

UNDP is using AI-based algorithms in Uruguay, the Philippines, Uganda and Colombia, to track social media, monitor gender hate speech and send signals to governments and civil society organizations.

It’s to protect women’s rights defenders, women politicians and women journalists who are increasingly experiencing cyberbullying and other forms of digital violence including doxing, trolling and flaming.

But AI has also a dark side that can deepen inequalities and cause harm, most notably for women. Women are increasingly exposed and entrapped by AI that produces deep fakes or digital images and audio that are artificially altered or manipulated by AI and deep learning to make someone do or say something they did not actually do or say.

Consequences can be devastating. In early March hundreds of sexual deepfake ads flooded Facebook and Instagram using Emma Watson’s face, a British actor and women’s rights advocate.

It is undeniable that gender biases are reproduced by AI technologies whose algorithms are trained by biased programmers shaped by discriminatory social norms, and this can have adverse results for example when women apply to credits that are awarded with AI-based credit scoring applications, or when they apply to a job that is typically done by men.

For better or for worse AI will shape the future of our world and we have not only to harness its power, but also to make sure we protect the furthest behind from potential adverse effects.

Here are some clues to achieve it.

First, we need robust legislative and regulatory frameworks capable of holding big tech companies accountable.

Second, tech companies need to further commit to addressing hate speech and gendered violence and keeping their platforms safe for everyone. Globally, 38 percent of women – that is close to one in four – have experienced online violence. The statistics are appalling and big tech companies, including Google, Amazon, Apple, Meta and Microsoft, need to be more responsible and accountable.

Third, the design of digital products including AI-based algorithms and the way they are trained must be gender equal by design and be guided by digital ethics principles. Technologies should be designed with users and address privacy and security, ensuring all people, but especially women and gender-based marginalized populations to be protected in digital spaces.

And fourth, we need more diversity in the tech industry. Big technology companies are making slow, but steady progress in increasing women’s participation not only across the career ladder, but also in technical roles. Large global technology firms, on average, reached nearly 33 percent overall female representation in their workforces and 25 percent in technical roles in 2022. Still a long way to go.

Digital innovation can be truly a game changer in our modern world and there’s so much female potential and talent out there to flip the script. Young innovators are already helping to redraw the future of AI with solutions that are addressing today’s most pressing problems.

UNDP firmly believes that women tech founders’ tailored support, dedicated acceleration programmes and increased access to capital is needed now more than ever. So we’re supporting thousands of women across the globe with flagship programmes such as the Arab Women Innovators Programme or the BOOST Women Innovators Programme in Europe and Central Asia.

Look at some of the most amazing stories of young women innovators supported by UNDP that are spearheading the field of AI for good.

Samar Hamdy (Egypt), co-founder of DevisionX and developer of Tuba.ai, a platform to label, train data and deploy AI-based applications with zero code; Mariam Torosyan (Armenia), CEO and founder of SafeYou, a mobile application designed to reduce gender-based violence through safety and community functions; Sara Saeed (Pakistan) CEO and co-founder of Sehat Kahani, a telehealth platform that connects a network of predominantly female health professionals to patients using a telemedicine application that allows real time and instant chat/audio/video doctor consultation, e-diagnostics, e-pharmacy, and health counselling; or Salua García (Colombia), co-founder of Symplifica, a tech startup with a mobile app that facilitates the formalization of domestic workers.

Let’s keep supporting girls in ICT, those young innovators that are redrawing the future of AI and bringing digital equality closer.

Diana Gutierrez is Manager UNDP Global Programme on Business for Gender Equality and Global Lead of Gender & Digital.

Source UNDP

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Student evacuees from Sudan wait to return to Nigeria. Credit: Handout

By Abdullahi Jimoh
ABUJA, May 30 2023 (IPS)

Seven weeks after the bloody conflict in Khartoum, Sudan started, and 41 days after the Nigerian government began the evacuation of residents studying there, students are still waiting to be airlifted back to their home country.

“Today is exactly one week after we left Khartoum for Port Sudan. Our living conditions are not favourable, but the biggest problem is the lack of communication from the (Nigerian) embassy,” said Abdul-Hammid Alhassan, a student who was evacuating war-torn Khartoum and travelling to Port Sudan. This was the first time IPS interviewed him. The distance between the cities was 825 kilometres, and he and his colleagues felt abandoned. Now weeks later, he is still waiting.

“Our food supply isn’t constant; we don’t have enough water and good medical care, although there are people with poor health among us,” he told IPS on May 9, 2023. His voice trembles with fear and rage.

Now he has a greater problem; while most of his fellow students have been evacuated, he remains behind.

One and a half weeks into the bloody confrontation between the Sudanese Arms Force (SAF) and the Rapid Support Force (RSF) in Sudan, the Nigerian government started to evacuate the students—after other countries like Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States who quickly to evacuated their nationals from the warzone.

In preparation for the evacuation, the government paid USD 1.2 million through the Central Bank of Nigeria via the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) for 40 buses to convey the students to Aswan in Egypt.

On April 26, Nigerians in Diaspora Commission’s chair Abike Dabiri Erewa said that 5,500 students were ready for evacuation to the Egyptian border to return to Nigeria. An evacuee told IPS that the buses arrived around 2 pm Central Africa Time (CAT), but the evacuation didn’t go as planned, with a media outlet HumanAngle saying the fleeing students were left in the desert by the drivers who complained about non-payment of the balance. After the payment was settled, the evacuees continued on their route.

On May 4, 376 students arrived in Abuja, and they were each given N100 thousand (about USD 216) as a stipend so they could travel back to their families. By May 11, a further 2,246 had been evacuated, according to the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) – but Alhassan was not among them.

He is convinced something “fishy” is behind the delays. Weeks later, he is still awaiting transport home.

“They are selecting our names at random. We don’t know when we will leave here, but I’m convinced there is a kind of ploy and corruption going on to keep us staying as long as possible to keep the cash flowing from the federal government,” he said hopelessly.

On May 30, Alhassan says he and what he estimates to be about 300 fellow students (both women and men) still hadn’t been evacuated.

An official from Nigerian Embassy in Khartoum said they were working to return the remaining students to Nigeria.

“The embassy is available, and officials were there for screening exercise while waiting for the federal government to schedule the flight,” the official told IPS.

The Director General of the National Emergency Management Agency, Mustapha Ahmed, told IPS that NEMA had been trying to evacuate all the students and follow Embassy recommendations and advice.

“We only wait for Embassy’s recommendations, they advise, and we follow,” Ahmed said.

Sani Bala Sheu, a Kano-based current affairs analyst and former Civil Liberties Organization (CLO) activist speculated there was something untoward at play.

“In a situation like this, there will certainly be corruption,” he said. “Why can’t the Nigerian government deploy the methods of Dubai or Turkey and other advanced countries in evacuating their citizens? The federal government should ensure that all the students returned home safely.”

Mukhtar Saeed, one of the Nigerian student refugees in Port Sudan and among 265 that were airlifted to Nigeria in mid-May, said he was anxious because Alhassan is not among those who have returned.

“He wasn’t allowed to pass by the embassy officials because he had been very vocal since the war started, so they marked him and decided to punish him for absolutely no reason,” Saeed told IPS.

Why Do Nigerian Students Study Abroad?

The budget for education falls short of the 15-20 percent recommended by the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization UNESCO for developing countries, with 8.2 percent of the budget allocation.

A long-term disagreement between the government and the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) in an eight-month strike and closure of higher education facilities.

As a result, middle-class Nigerians seek education from abroad. Data from Campus France shows that Nigeria tops among the migrating sub-Saharan students in Africa, with 71,700 Nigerian students representing 17 percent studying abroad, according to its 2020 study.

Middle-class northerners from Nigeria who are predominantly Muslim sought higher education in Sudan.

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By Simone Galimberti
KATHMANDU, Nepal, May 30 2023 (IPS)

There have been an array of proposals to sustain journalism around the world– from tax incentives and subsidies to the idea of allocating 1% of governments’ GDP to a drastically increased ODA for independent journalism in the global South.

The debate has been intense and rightly so.

What is needed is a long-term project that would put together a global architecture supporting serious and reliable journalism regardless of the size and business model of the outlets producing it. Amid such calls for governments and philanthropies to do more, something finally is moving.

Yet the needs require real ambition and farsightedness that in practice means a coherent global governance to safeguard trustworthy media worldwide. The International Fund for Public Interest Media, initially announced by France during the Paris Peace Forum in 2022, is taking shape and an initial pilot cohort of media outlets already got selected.

Because of its hybrid form of governance, independent but backed by governments and major philanthropies alike, the IFPIM could become the biggest source of funds for media around the world.

As per the information provided on its website, it has already raised $50 million USD from more than 15 governments, philanthropies, and corporate entities but the ambition is much bigger.

The Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA), an initiative of the bipartisan National Endowment for Democracy, an entity funded by the American Congress, estimates that global spending to support independent media globally should be $1 billion a year.

The reality on the ground– considering also how many legacy media houses are struggling with revenues and a declining readership– might require a much bigger figure.

If the situation was already dire before the pandemic, COVID was the knockdown blow for many media around the world that were already assaulted by the damaging impacts of big tech companies and their social media platforms. And now we also have to deal with an even more threatening and disruptive use of artificial intelligence.

While AI-based technologies can offer some positive elements on how media engage with public, the risks are enormous. “AI-based technologies also have an enormous potential to harm our information ecosystems and threaten the fundamental human rights on which robust, independent media systems, and free societies” reads a resolution recently passed at the International Press Institute General Assembly just held in Vienna.

With this gloomy scenario, the public interest media landscape is rapidly turning into what experts define as “news desert. We should be all very weary of the perils associated with its consequences. After all, as explained by the World Trends Report published by UNESCO, it is a vital issue because journalism is a public good that must be protected at any costs.

In such a scenario the fact that the IFPIM aims to reach $500 million USD, itself a milestone in this quest, is a relief. Still, it is not enough.

An issue to be taken into account is the fact that we are dealing with a fragmented landscape in this line of sector. There are already a small but increasingly more visible and impactful ecosystem, still in construction that is made up of blended agencies supporting independent media around the world.

Some of the most significant among them are the Media Development Investment Fund, MDIF that takes a more investor like approach then what seems the still in construction approach of IFPIM, has been already able to provide a variety of funding options.

With also a mixed lineup of investors, MDIF has already invested $300 million USD in 148 media outlets from 47 different countries. In addition, there is an increasing number of “intermediary” organizations.

Some of them like Pluralis acts more like investors (among its own backers there is MDIF). Others offer a blended package, financial and capacity building like Free Press Unlimited IMS, International Media Support while United for News takes a market approach of linking ads with local online news outlets.

BBC Media Action and Internews, on other hand, are intermediary closer to the field.

Though each of these represent a different model of support, are different from each other, they are all aimed at enhancing the viability of robust, independent media.

Interestingly we are seeing a crosspollination of such initiatives because their backers are often interlinked to each other with a major philanthropic foundation or bilateral donor supporting multiple initiatives at the same time.

And we are not mentioning the mechanisms that several bilateral institutions in the West are putting together only exclusively to safeguard and protect journalists in danger.

For example, the recently announced Reporters Shield, an undertaking of USAID, is particularly designed on tackling SLAPPs, the strategic lawsuits against public participation.

Undoubtedly the IFPIM is going to be a standout catalyst but it is rightly showing commitment to partner with other key stakeholders.

The recent MoU signed with Reporters without Frontiers, RSF and the Forum on Information and Democracy, the latter itself a global initiative leading the debate on safeguarding journalism that is housed at RSF, is promising but it is not enough.

If the ambitions of IFPIM is to become a global fund for media and journalism support akin to the funding mechanisms being used to fight HIV and Tuberculosis, all the actors investing in independent media must truly come together.

The fact that some of the major philanthropic organizations are putting resources in different baskets could be a positive element in a yet to establish globally coordinated multilayered approach promoting journalism and media houses.

Such common intent would enable a truly global ecosystem allowing media to return to prominence they used to command and becoming, once again, a central pillar of public debate.

First governments with adequate fiscal capacity should do whatever it takes to support their own media industry. Some of them in Europe are already doing so and also in the USA there are discussions for a new legislation and other financial tools, including cash vouchers for the citizens to buy subscriptions.

Yet if we want to safeguard journalism and media around the world, it is essential to boost public and private media working with integrity in the North, including legacy newsrooms.

It is not just about providing incentives, rebates or other financial support or ensuring that big tech owned platforms pay what is due to the newsrooms like it is slowly starting to happen.

It is also about re-persuading people, including the youths, to read news, on and off line.
Massive awareness initiatives involving schools and universities should also be prioritized in a way that a common user of news, can also turn into a citizen journalist or opinion writer.

Second, a truly global and truly massive funding for media and journalism should be established even by merging existing entities. The result could become mega funder or donor of donors, a true Global Fund for Media and Journalism.

All major governments and philanthropic organizations would inject financial resources and know-how that would then trickle to other smaller actors in the supply chain.

In a potential ecosystem protecting media and journalism, there would be enough spaces for intermediary organizations like the ones already operating close to media houses on the ground, especially in the global South.

It might be that entities like IFPIM and MDIF, each with its unique identity and features but united in their intents, one day might come together or might themselves act as at the upper level of a pyramid sustaining journalism and media, just a step below what would be a Global Fund for Media and Journalism.

Journalism and the thriving of media should also become a central area of focus of the United Nations. Despite the obvious resistance that might come from certain camps, the United Nations Secretary General António Guterres should include it in its ambitious Our Common Agenda.

Two of its twelve strategic pillars, “promote peace and prevent conflict” together with “build trust” should be strengthened with initiatives focused on media. A global code of conduct that promotes integrity in public information, one of the milestones under “build trust” should be accompanied by other bolder actions.

Let’s not forget that UNESCO has been already involved in the promotion of media with two programs, like the International Programme for the Development of Communication (IPDC) on the top of the narrower, journalist focused protection tool Global Media Defense Fund.

Positively, at the present, the momentum to save the media is gaining strength.
Yet it is indispensable to ensure that the focus is going to be on medium and long term measures rather than on a short term fixes.

Without a global design and ambition, it’s certain that the situation is only going to be worse. All global actors, together with the professionals and activists on the ground, must come together. The level and speed of discussions around the future of media must step up.

It is only with profound changes in the funding mechanisms of journalism that serious and reliable news outlets both in North and South, either legacy or startups thriving on internet, will be able to continue to operate and thrive.

There is no firewall to stop the journalism’s decadency. Only urgency and bold actions offer the best chance to ensure a “New Deal” for global media and journalism.

Simone Galimberti is the co-founder of ENGAGE and The Good Leadership. He writes mostly about youths’ involvement in the UN, social development and human rights.

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Dr Paul Kinoti at the JKUAT snail farm, where he is researching the potential of snail slime cough syrup. Credit: Wilson Odhiambo/IPS

By Wilson Odhiambo
NAIROBI, May 29 2023 (IPS)

Snails and slime are usually followed by the thought ‘EEW!’ from most people … some might even scream at seeing a snail near them.

For Dr Paul Kinoti, however, these slimy creatures could earn him international recognition because his research on snails landed his institution, Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT), a Ksh. 127 million (USD 1 million) grant.

The grant, awarded by the Cherasco Institute of Snail Breeding, Italy, is expected to fund a two-phase research project to produce cough syrup meant for children under five.

As a lecturer at JKUAT’s Horticulture and Food Security department, Kinoti has specialized in non-conventional farming systems for over a decade.

Non-conventional farming is a system that employs modified/unique farming methods in crop and animal production. Kinoti has been researching insects and worms (vermiculture), concentrating on how they add value to supplement crop and livestock production.

According to Kinoti, snails are already associated with a wide variety of products, including animal feeds, skin care products, pharmaceuticals, and fertilizer.

“My research focuses on unique farming methods that farmers are not used to, including rearing insects and worms as a source of livestock feed and fertilizer for plants. I keep black soldier flies and worms which are a major source of proteins for livestock, especially for poultry and fish,” Kinoti explained to IPS.

And as a food security specialist, one of his goals is to encourage people to include snails in their diet, given that it is rich in proteins and iron.

“Lack of awareness is the main reason why Kenyans do not see snails as a source of food for themselves, and getting them to accept it will be a difficult task. This is why we are using a simpler approach by encouraging farmers to take up snail farming to get used to the idea of having snails around them,” he told IPS.

Across the globe, majorly in Asia, parts of Europe, and West Africa, snails are a known delicacy.

The snail products are currently being manufactured within JKUAT, where, through training, they have engaged local farmers to supply them with snail slime (mucin). The institution offers these farmers short, three-day courses on how to rear snails and extract their slime, which they later sell to the institution for profit.

“We are grateful to the institution for opening our minds to an opportunity that has become quite lucrative. Most of the people in Kiambu County are either full-time farmers or have a piece of land somewhere that they have put aside for farming activities, making this a good source of extra income. Snail farming is new to us. Most would never even have considered practicing it due to the culture that we have grown up with,” said Antony Njoroge, one of the local farmers who now farms snails.

During his PhD studies in Austria, Kinoti was introduced to snail farming by his host, a snail farmer.

“When I came back, I realized that snail farming was still alien to Kenya, and rather than just focus on rearing the snails, I decided to research their value addition for farming. It is from this that I was able to come up with different products such as fertilizer, animal feeds, and skin care products,” Kinoti told IPS. The products have been certified by the Kenya Bureau of Standards (KEBS) and are already in the market.

The idea for the cough syrup did not come about until 2019, when Kinoti conducted field research on snails in Kumasi, Ghana. His visit happened to be during the flu season, where he was surprised at the strange concoctions that parents were using as remedy for their children who were coughing.

“I noticed that rather than being given ginger or lemon tea that most of us are used to when someone gets the flu, their parents were collecting snail slime and mixing it with some bit of honey which they gave the children as a remedy,” Kinoti explained to IPS. This idea stuck in my mind, and when I came back, I decided to do more research on it.

The project’s first phase, which is meant to take two years, will involve identifying the best snail species for production and research on snail slime while encouraging farmers to breed them. The second phase will be manufacturing and producing the cough syrup once it has been approved by the Kenya Food and Drug Authority (KFDA).

The snail species commonly used for slime production is the African giant land snail (Achatina Fulica), which produces up to 4 milliliters of slime per snail. It takes about 250 of these giant snails to make a liter of slime, extracted once weekly.

The Achatina Fulica is native to East Africa, where its origin can be traced to Kenya and Tanzania. Across the globe, it is regarded as an invasive species due to its ability to produce colonies from a single female. It feeds in large quantities and is a carrier for plant pathogens, making it a pest to farmers when it invades their farms. It has spread across the globe through exportation to Europe and Asia as a delicacy, being bought into those areas as a pet or by accidental transportation when it latches on to something.

The project involves a number of experts (mainly within the university) from different departments to help oversee its success. These experts include animal scientists, food scientists, health scientists, and other technical staff who help run the snail farm.

It also works in conjunction with other major institutions such as the Kenya National Museum, whose work is to help them identify the best type of snails for slime production, and the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS), which is the main stakeholder and body that provides them with the license they need to carry out snail farming in Kenya.

As a conservation measure, the snails are not supposed to be harmed during the slime extraction, which makes it a delicate process that involves using citric acid, and the extraction is only done once a week.

Once successful, the cough syrup is expected to help lower the cost of importation since everything will be manufactured locally, thus helping save a lot of money. The farmers are also excited that they no longer have to rely on expensive fertilizer and animal feeds from the government, which has always made their input expensive while giving them little returns.

As a delicacy, snails are primarily spotted in high-end hotels that are mostly visited by foreigners and tourists.

“Growing up, the one memory I had about snails from my biology lessons was that they caused bilharzia, which made me dislike them. Today, I am one of the suppliers of snail meat to some big hotels in Nairobi and Mombasa,” says Brian Wandera, a local businessman from Nairobi. “It is amazing what knowledge can do.”

“I buy the snails from the farmers in Kiambu and sell them to the hotels at a profit. Locally, Kenyans are yet to adopt snail meat as a source of food,” he added.

The grant is also expected to help empower women and the youth by providing them with employment opportunities through training on snail farming, according to Kinoti, an investment of Ksh. 20,000 (USD 190) can earn a snail farmer between Ksh. 50,000 (USD 450) and 100,000 (USD 950) monthly once the snails start to produce their slime, usually at four months. The slime is categorized into three grades which are sold at different prices.

“We buy the slime from the farmers at a fee of Ksh. 1200 (USD 11) per liter for grade A slime, Ksh. 850 (USD 8) per liter for grade B slime and Ksh. 650 (USD 6) for grade C slime,” Kinoti concluded.

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Young women from the Brazilian state of Bahia attend an informational campaign which also hands out menstrual hygiene products. Poverty and the lack of adequate information on this subject affect millions of girls, adolescents and adult women. CREDIT: Government of Bahia

By Humberto Márquez
CARACAS, May 26 2023 (IPS)

Menstrual hygiene management is elusive for millions of poor women and girls in Latin America, who suffer because their living conditions make it difficult or impossible for them to access resources and services that could make menstruation a simple normal part of life.

“When my period comes, I miss class for three or four days. My family can’t afford to buy the sanitary napkins that my sister and I need. We use cloths for the blood, although they give me an uncomfortable rash,” says Omaira*, a 15-year-old high school student.

From her low-income neighborhood of Brisas del Sur, in Ciudad Guayana, 500 kilometers southeast of Caracas, she speaks to IPS by phone: “We can’t buy pills to relieve our pain either. And my period is irregular, it doesn’t come every month, but there are no medical services here for me to go and treat that.”

In Venezuela, “one in four women does not have menstrual hygiene products and they improvise unhygienic alternatives, such as old clothes, cloths, cardboard or toilet paper to make pads that function as sanitary napkins,” activist Natasha Saturno, with the Solidarity Action NGO, tells IPS.

“The big problem with these improvised products is that they can cause, at best, discomfort and embarrassment, and at worst, infections that compromise their health,” says Saturno, director of enforceability of rights at the NGO that conducts health assistance and documentation programs and surveys.

Campaigns that adult and young women have carried out in Mexico and Colombia demanding the right to menstrual health managed to get the authorities to eliminate the value added tax on essential feminine hygiene products. CREDIT: Nora Hinojo/UN Mexico

Universal problem, comprehensive approach

Is this a local, focalized problem? Not at all: “On any given day, more than 300 million women worldwide are menstruating.  In total, an estimated 500 million lack access to menstrual products and adequate facilities for menstrual hygiene management (MHM),” states a World Bank study.

“Today more than ever we need to bring visibility to the situation of women and girls who do not have access to and education about menstrual hygiene. Communication makes the difference,” said Hugo González, representative of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) in Peru.

UNFPA says there is broad agreement on what girls and women need for good menstrual health, and argues that comprehensive approaches that combine education with infrastructure and with products and efforts to combat stigma are most successful in achieving good menstrual health and hygiene.

The essential elements are: safe, acceptable, and reliable supplies to manage menstruation; privacy for changing the materials; safe and private washing facilities; and information to make appropriate decisions.

UNFPA’s theme this year for international Menstrual Hygiene Day, which is celebrated every May 28, is “Making menstruation a normal fact of life by 2030”, the target date for compliance with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted by the international community at the United Nations.

United Nations Population Fund workers prepare packages of menstrual hygiene items for women from poor communities in Central America. The cost of some of these products makes them unaffordable for many families. CREDIT: UNFPA

The pink tax

Nine out of 31 countries in the region consider menstrual hygiene products essential, which makes them exempt from value added tax or reduced VAT, according to the study “Sexist Taxes in Latin America” ​​by Germany’s Friedrich Ebert Foundation.

After a “Tax-free Menstruation” campaign, in 2018 Colombia became the first country in the Americas to eliminate VAT – 16 percent – on menstrual hygiene products. Its neighbor Venezuela still charges 16 percent VAT, and Argentina, Chile, the Dominican Republic and Uruguay charge VAT between 18 and 22 percent on such products.

Colombia was joined by Ecuador, Guyana, Jamaica, Mexico – where street demonstrations were held against charging VAT on menstrual products – Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago. Other countries have reduced VAT, such as Costa Rica, Panama, Paraguay and Peru, while in Brazil VAT differs between states and averages 7 percent.

The so-called “pink tax” obviously affects the price of menstrual hygiene products such as disposable and reusable sanitary pads and menstrual cups, which becomes especially burdensome in countries with high inflation and depreciated currencies, such as Argentina and Venezuela.

According to the average price of the cheapest brands, ten disposable sanitary pads can cost just under a dollar in Mexico, 1.50 dollar in Argentina or Brazil, 1.60 dollar in Colombia, Peru or Venezuela, and almost two dollars in Costa Rica.

“It’s an important problem,” Saturno points out, “in a country like Venezuela, where the majority of the population lives in poverty and the minimum wage – although it has been increased with some stipends – is still just five dollars a month.”

Adult women, young women and girls participate in a session to share information and experiences organized by the Colombian association Menstruating Princesses, which emphasizes the importance of education to combat taboos and make menstruation a normal, stress-free experience. CREDIT: Menstruating Princesses

Hostile environment, scarce education

“If you often can’t buy sanitary pads, that’s the smallest problem. The worst thing is the shame you feel if you go to work and the cloth fails to keep your clothes free of blood, or if you catch an infection,” Nancy *, who at the age of 45 has been an informal sector worker in numerous occupations and trades in Caracas, told IPS.“Poverty causes women and adolescent girls to miss days of secondary school or work because they do not have the supplies they need when they menstruate. It becomes a vicious circle, because their academic or work performance is affected, hindering their chances of developing their full potential and earning a better income.” -- Natasha Saturno

The mother of four young people lives in Gramoven, a poor neighborhood in the northwest of the capital. Her two unmarried daughters, ages 18 and 22, have had experiences similar to Nancy’s on their way to school, in the neighborhood, on the bus, and on the subway.

“The thing is, the period is not seen as something natural, boys and men see it as something dirty, at work they sometimes do not understand that if you are in pain you have to stay at home,” said Nancy. “And when you work for yourself, you have to go out no matter what, because if you don’t go out, no money comes in.”

Saturno says that “poverty causes women and adolescent girls to miss days of secondary school or work because they do not have the supplies they need when they menstruate.”

“It becomes a vicious circle, because their academic or work performance is affected, hindering their chances of developing their full potential and earning a better income,” she adds.

But the problem “goes far beyond materials, it does not end just because someone obtains the products; it includes education and decent working conditions for women,” psychologist Carolina Ramírez, who runs the educational NGO Menstruating Princesses in the Colombian city of Medellín, tells IPS.

For this reason, “we do not use the term ‘menstrual poverty’ and speak instead of menstrual dignity, vindicating the need for society, schools, workplaces and States to promote education about menstruation and combat illiteracy in that area,” says Ramírez.

To illustrate, she mentions the widespread rejection of using tampons and cups “because of the old taboo that the vulva shouldn’t be touched, that the vagina shouldn’t be looked at,” in addition to the fact that many areas and communities in Latin American countries not only lack spaces or tools to sterilize products but often do not have clean water.

A concern raised by both Saturno and Ramírez is the great vulnerability of migrant women in the region – which has received a flood of six million people from Venezuela over the last 10 years, for example – in terms of menstrual and general health, as well as safety.

Another worrying issue is women in most Latin American prisons, which are unable to provide adequate menstrual hygiene, since they do not have access to disposable products or the possibility to sterilize reusable supplies.

Throughout the region, “greater efforts are required to break down taboos that violate fundamental rights to health, education, work, and freedom of movement, so that menstruation can be a stress-free human experience,” Ramírez says.

*Names have been changed to protect the privacy of the interviewees.

Excerpt:

Jaggery making on a sugarcane farm in Mandla. Small-scale farmers in India are benefitting from a scheme where they are able to diversify their farms and get support through Farmer Producer Organisations. Credit: Rina Mukherji/IPS

By Rina Mukherji
MANDLA, JHARGRAM & AHMEDNAGAR, INDIA, May 26 2023 (IPS)

Until a decade ago, marginal farmers Gangotri Chandrol and Sunitabai lacked livelihood options in the post-monsoon season.

With farm holdings of just 2-6 acres in Katangatola village in the tribal-majority Mandla district of Madhya Pradesh, they could only grow wheat, paddy, and sugarcane in the wet season for a living.

“Our earnings depended on price fluctuations in the market and the little paddy and wheat procured by the government.”

But now, they can sell their produce at higher than the prevailing market price to their farmers’ collective set up by Ekgaon Technologies, using existing women’s microfinance self-help groups (SHGs).

Furthermore, value-added products like flavoured jaggery obtained from sugarcane ensure a good income.  Farmers like Gangotri and Sunitabai, who were organised into clusters, and trained to form collective bargaining as buyers of agricultural inputs and suppliers of produce, are better off as a result.

While agriculture is India’s primary employment source, agricultural productivity has remained low. This is because the average size of an agricultural plot is less than 2 hectares (4.942 acres) (as per 2001 figures), with a quarter of rural holdings as low as 0.4 hectares (0.988 acres).

Furthermore, poverty and illiteracy make it difficult for most farmers to apply modern scientific inputs to enhance yield. Climate change has further added to the problem, with erratic weather, unseasonal rains, and frequent storms taking their toll on standing crops.

Realising this, India’s National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) developed its Producer Organisation Promoting Institution (POPI) scheme in 2015. This saw several Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs) flourish around 2015, and farmers were inducted into registered companies, holding a certain number of shares, each priced at a nominal sum.

Women farmers in West Bengal buying inputs for their Farmer Producer Organisation. Credit: Rina Mukherji/IPS

Ekgaon and its mission in Mandla

Once a single crop with migration-prone villages, Mandla district has seen a facelift ever since Ekgaon Technologies brought together its rural women and organised them into a Farmer Producers Organisation (FPO). Encouraged to buy seeds and fertilizer to distribute within their organisation, the women emerged as small-time entrepreneurs.

Traditionally, paddy cultivators, the farmers here, were trained to move to multi-cropping using natural organic farming methods. Local farmers now grow a mix of paddy, wheat, lentils (Masur), pigeon pea (arhar/tur), green gram (mung), and sugarcane on their marginal farms, using improved techniques and inexpensive homemade organic fertilizers.

Vidhi Patel, a widow and marginal farmer with a one-acre farm, tells IPS, “We were using 40 kg of seeds on our one-acre farm to grow paddy, besides spending on urea, which cost us upwards of Rs 1000. Under the System of Rice Intensification (SRI) method, we now use only 25 kg of seeds, which has halved costs.”

Gangotri Chandrol, Sunitabai Chandrol, and Devki Uikey have not just learned to make optimum use of their marginal 2-6 acre farms to grow a variety of traditional crops such as wheat, paddy, sugarcane pigeon pea, masur (lentils), mung (green legumes), and millets, but have now ventured into cash crops like arrowroot, flaxseed, nigerseed, and marigold, which fetch them good returns.

Similarly, Laxmibai and Devki Uikey of the neighbouring Khari village grow sugarcane on one acre of their 3-acre farm and paddy, wheat, marigold and beetroot on the rest.  Besides operating as a small-time entrepreneur, selling agricultural inputs to other members of her FPO, Devki Uikey made organic yellow and maroon colours for the Holi (spring) festival out of beetroot and marigold with some other members of her collective.

“We procured 25 kg of marigold at Rs 40 per 250 g and 10 kg of beetroot at Rs 160 per kg. After making and selling the colours, we earned Rs 2300-Rs 2500 per member,” Devki Uikey told IPS

Besides selling premium varieties of rice such as Chindi Kapur and Jeera Shankar that are native to Mandla but not available elsewhere, Ekgaon has developed value-added products such as millet-ginger-raisin nutribars, millet noodles, amla ( gooseberry) candy, which it markets alongside ( collected) forest products like medicinal herbs, beeswax, and honey, on its e-commerce platform.

Since sugarcane is a major crop in the district and jaggery-making is an important enterprise, Ekgaon has developed ginger and tulsi (basil) flavoured jaggery cubes to brew flavoured tea.  Being part of the FPO has other benefits too. Farmers can access government funds for rainwater harvesters and borewells easily.

A tie-up with Rajdhani Besan, which markets gram flour, helped farmers who cultivate gram, while a tie-up with Lays saw the entire produce of white peas bought over in bulk for (Lays) chips and wafers. The FPO is also grading and procuring wheat for the government, earning the women farmers a small sum.

Consequently, marginal farmers who earned around Rs 50,000 (USD 608) per acre in the past are easily making Rs 3,00,000  (USD 3647) per acre now. Migration has stopped in most villages, and the literacy level has improved.

PRADAN’s initiatives in Jhargram and Bankura

Professional Assistance for Development Action (PRADAN) has also converted existing women’s microfinance self-help groups (SHGs) into FPOs in the resource-poor, tribal-majority Bankura and Jhargram districts of West Bengal.

Despite good monsoon rains, water scarcity is the norm in these paddy-growing districts, owing to rocky terrain. Of late, erratic rains have made matters worse, spurring out migration. To withstand the vagaries of the weather, the women farmer-shareholders of the Amon Mahila Chashi Producers Company Limited (Amon Women Farmers Producers Company Limited) and other FPOs now grow hardy, traditional paddy varieties using homemade organic fertilizers.

Sumita Mahato, whose family lives off a one-bigha (0.625 acres) farm, and  Swarnaprabha Mahato, whose three-bigha (1.875 acres) farm must provide for an eight-member family, told IPS: “Chemical fertilizers cost Rs 5000 per 0.625 acres, while homemade organic fertilizer costs us only Rs 80-90 for the same per bigha.”

It has helped them get organic certification for their produce, comprising traditional rice varieties like Malliphul, Satthiya  (red rice), and Kalabhat (black rice), earning them Rs 35 per kg (as against  Rs 12 per kg that rice grown with chemical inputs).  Rainwater harvesters accessed as members of the FPO, under the state government’s scheme for the region, have helped, too, increasing productivity from 25-30 quintals per acre to 40-45 quintals per acre.

As multi-cropping is impossible here owing to limited moisture in the rocky soil, the farmers grow turmeric as a cash crop on the village commons. In Jhargram, Sonajhuri (Acacia auriculiformis) and Cashew are grown for timber and nuts, while in Bankura, farms along the Kankabati River grow watermelons for collective profit.

Traditionally, women in these regions made plates from sal (Shorea robusta) leaves collected from the jungles. They now process and mould plates for urban markets using moulding machines, selling them with their other products online on IndiaMart, earning ample profits to lead well-settled lives.

Watermelon crop in Bankura. Credit: Rina Mukherji/IPS

WOTR’s Efforts in Maharashtra

In Parner taluka (sub-division) of Ahmednagar district of Maharashtra, the community-led Ankur Farmer Producers Organisation (FPO), facilitated by the Watershed Trust (WOTR), comprises 762 farmer-shareholders from the villages of Hiwrekorda, Bhangadevadi, and Dawalpuri, with farm holdings of 3-15 acres range, who supplement their incomes through dairy farming.

Being a rain-shadow, the drought-prone region with limited water resources, farming was always rainfed here, with large tracts of land lying barren.

Once Ankur was formed, the farmers could avail of Rs 80 lakh from the State Government (of Maharashtra) contributing the rest to lay a 7.5 km pipeline to bring water from the Kalu river and fill up a lined farm pond, and set up a pump-house for collective benefit.

This enabled them to bring 100 acres of farmland under cultivation to grow onions, marigolds, chrysanthemums, and other crops for the market. Their rainfed single-crop lands also grow two crops with the additional moisture available.

The farmers have opted for organic inputs like vermicompost, which they prepare and sell, both within and outside their FPO, although, as farmers Somnath Palwe and Chandrakant Gawde say, “Our members use both organic and improved seeds, as per preference.”

From growing a single crop of bajra (pearl millet), jowar (sorghum), and pulses, the farmers now grow maize, green gram, marigold, chrysanthemum, and onions, besides cauliflower and tomato. Incomes have grown from as low as Rs 50,000 ( USD 61) for an acre of cultivable land to as high as Rs 5 00,000 (USD 731).

Ankur sells its products online to Ninjacart and offline-in wholesale markets. In both cases, the sale is direct and without middlemen. Farmer Ashok Phalke, tells me. “Onions used to fetch us Rs 10 per kg, while the market price was Rs 12 per kg. We would lose Rs 2 per kg. Now that we sell directly in markets as a group, we earn more. The same goes for tomatoes and flowers.”

Besides promoting organic farming, the FPOs stress natural multi-cropping methods to control pests, such as growing horse gram in combination with maize or sorghum. This attracts birds, which, in turn, help control harmful pests naturally. Kitchen gardens are encouraged as they counter nutritional deficiencies in farming families.

Government Encouragement of FPOs

The Indian government intends to set up 10,000 FPOs all over India for Rs 6865 crore. Under this scheme, FPOs are to receive financial assistance of up to Rs 18 lakh for three years, with each farmer-member being eligible for an equity grant and credit guarantee facility. However, not all existing FPOs have been co-opted into the government scheme.

Since millets are hardy and impervious to erratic weather patterns, the government has been pushing for their cultivation in regions where they were traditionally grown. But the government’s dictum of “one District, one Product” has invited criticism, especially from grassroots organisations, who see multi-cropping as the only guarantor against natural disasters such as hailstorms and cyclones.

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The Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action was adopted 30 years ago at the UN Human Rights Conference in the Austrian capital in June 1993. The Declaration was a strong and clear endorsement -- by consensus of all UN Member States -– of the rights contained in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

By Volker Turk
GENEVA, May 26 2023 (IPS)

In December last year, I launched our year-long commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We have since issued a series of initiatives calling on States and all others to make pledges, and to take clear steps to fulfil the promises of the Universal Declaration.

The Human Rights 75 programme will culminate in a high-level event on 11 and 12 December – convened by my Office here in Geneva, linked up with Bangkok, Nairobi and Panama City.

This year, we also celebrate 30 years since the World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna created the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. That is an important milestone for us.

It was in June 1993 at this conference that – after a difficult process fraught with geopolitical divisions – the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action was adopted. The Declaration was a strong and clear endorsement – by consensus of all UN Member States – of all the rights contained in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Over the past 30 years, the work of this Office has contributed to greater recognition of the centrality of human rights in making and sustaining peace, in preventing and halting violations, in fostering accountability, in sustainable development, in humanitarian response and, of late, in economic policy and the work of international financial institutions.

We have been at the forefront of addressing issues of global importance as they emerge, including the human rights impacts of climate change, artificial intelligence, and digital technology.

My Office is now present in more places than ever. We have gone from just two field presences when we started to 94 presences around the world today.

And I would like to see this expanded further – there should be a UN Human Rights Office everywhere. For all States can and should do better on human rights. I have been advocating for this in my meetings with all UN Member States and in my missions.

I have also been speaking about how underfunded and under-resourced my Office remains. We need to double our budget. I call on donors – State, corporate and private – to help us make this happen. A strong UN Human Rights Office and a healthy, well-resourced human rights ecosystem are of global interest.

Our work and the human rights mechanisms that we support have helped advance the human rights cause, identify drivers of conflict and crisis and barriers to development, and offer solutions as well as pathways to remedy and accountability.

We work with State institutions, national human rights bodies and civil society on the ground, to help reform laws, to train officials. We also help open the space for civil society organisations and journalists to do their work, and we are often serving as a bridge between civil society and institutions of the State.

We call out violations and set off alarm bells when attacks on, neglect of, or disdain for human rights could set off crises.

Our work on accountability and transitional justice has helped ensure that perpetrators of serious human rights violations end up in prison, and our work on protection of civic space and human rights defenders has secured the release of people who are detained in violation of their rights.

We provide a reality check. We help set the facts straight, we ground our analysis in human rights laws and standards, we dig into the root causes of human suffering, and we offer systemic, sustainable solutions.

Nowhere is the devastating impact of human rights violations more stark than in the midst of armed conflict and in the aftermath of natural disasters. Cyclone Mocha, which cut a swathe of destruction through Rakhine, Chin and Kachin States, as well as Sagaing and Magway, in Myanmar on 14 May is the latest, deeply painful manifestation of a man-made disaster resulting from a climate event.

For decades, the authorities in Myanmar have deprived the Rohingya of their rights and freedoms and relentlessly attacked other ethnic groups, eroding their capacity to survive. Displaced communities have subsisted in temporary bamboo structures, some since 2012, with Myanmar’s military repeatedly denying requests of humanitarian agencies to build more sustainable living conditions in areas less prone to flooding. I saw this myself on my many trips to Myanmar, especially to the east. They have also consistently prevented the Rohingya from moving freely, including in the days before the cyclone.

The damage and loss of life was both foreseeable and avoidable – and is clearly linked with the systematic denial of human rights. It is imperative that the military lift the blockages on travel, allow for needs assessments to happen, and ensure access to and delivery of lifesaving aid and services.

The desperate situation of the people of Sudan – who fought so courageously against repression of their rights – is heartbreaking. In spite of successive ceasefires, civilians continue to be exposed to serious risk of death and injury – overnight we have had reports of fighter jets across Khartoum and clashes in some areas of the city, as well as gunfire heard in Khartoum-North and Omdurman.

My Designated Expert on Sudan, Radhouane Nouicer, has been meeting remotely with civil society still in the country and with those who have fled – and the testimony is terrifying. Many civilians are virtually besieged in areas where fighting has been relentless.

With State institutions not functioning in Khartoum, civil society actors are risking their lives to fill the gaps. Many human rights defenders, particularly women, have reported receiving threats – but they are undeterred; they continue their crucial work.

Several reports are emerging of sexual violence in Khartoum and Darfur – we are aware of at least 25 cases, but such violations are often the most difficult to document, so I fear the real number of cases to be much higher.

General al-Burhan, General Dagalo, you must issue clear instructions – in no uncertain terms – to all those under your command, that there is zero tolerance for sexual violence, and that perpetrators of all violations will be held accountable. Civilians must be spared. And you must stop this senseless violence now.

It is the near-total impunity for gross violations that is at the root of this new, brazen grab for power in Sudan. Efforts to bring this conflict to an end must have human rights and accountability at their core – for any peace to be sustained.

Elsewhere, I am deeply troubled by the growing phenomenon of anti-rights movements that have been active against migrants and refugees, against women, against people belonging to certain faiths, religious and racial groups, as well as against LGBTIQ people, among others.

We need to push back on such anti-rights movements that are fed and stoked by peddlers of lies and disinformation – including by so-called political and religious leaders and “influencers”. These are people who use populism, repression and even vilification of segments of society – to the detriment of society as a whole – as a short-cut to power and influence.

Following such hateful, discredited narratives, we are seeing a further worsening of laws criminalizing lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people, including in Uganda. These laws violate a host of human rights, they lead to violence, and they drive people against one another.

They leave people behind and undermine development. Many of these laws are actually colonial relics that have imported 200-year-old stigma and discrimination into the 21st Century.

Hate speech and harmful narratives against migrants and refugees also continue to proliferate; they are accompanied, worryingly, by laws and policies that are anti-migrant, and they risk undermining the basic foundations of international human rights law and refugee law.

Developments that are unfolding in various countries, including the UK, the US, Italy, Greece, and Lebanon are particularly concerning as some of them appear designed to hinder people’s ability to seek asylum and other forms of protection, to penalise those who seek to help them – or to return them in unlawful, undignified, unsustainable ways.

Article 14 of the Universal Declaration is clear on everyone’s right to seek and enjoy asylum from persecution. We need solidarity – to ensure that all people in vulnerable situations are treated with humanity and respect for their rights.

In a number of situations, we see the consequences when different groups incite and stoke hatred and division between communities. The recent violence in Manipur, Northeast India, revealed the underlying tensions between different ethnic and indigenous groups.

I urge the authorities to respond to the situation quickly, including by investigating and addressing root causes of the violence in line with their international human rights obligations.

It will be three years to the day that George Floyd was murdered by a police officer in the US. The small measure of justice achieved in this case remains exceptional – in the US and globally. I remain deeply concerned by regular reports of deaths and injuries of people of African descent during or after interactions with law enforcement in a number of countries. There needs to be firm and prompt action by authorities to ensure justice in each case.

It is clear that we won’t solve the problem of police brutality against people of African descent until we deal with the broader manifestations of systemic racism that permeate every aspect of their lives.

The racial abuse faced – once again – by Real Madrid football player Vinícius Júnior in Spain just this past Sunday is a stark reminder of the prevalence of racism in sport. I call on those who organise sporting events to have strategies in place to prevent and counter racism.

Much more needs to be done to eradicate racial discrimination – and it needs to start with listening to people of African descent, meaningfully involving them and taking genuine steps to act upon their concerns.

I also continue to be concerned about the shrinking of civic space, including in China, where there has been a spate of sentences against human rights defenders based on laws that are at variance with international human rights law.

Also deeply worrying are crackdowns on women’s rights – a tool for men in power to exercise dominance over and enfeeble entire societies. Misogyny is a disease. In combination with violence, it is cancerous.

In Afghanistan, the Taliban continue, aggressively, to seek to erase half of the population from everyday life. Such a system of gender apartheid ruins the development potential of the country.

I will never understand how anyone can trample so cruelly upon the spirit of girls and women, chipping away at their potential and driving one’s country deeper and deeper into abject poverty and despair. It is crucial – for the sake of the people of Afghanistan, the future of the country and the wider region – that repressive policies against women and girls are immediately overturned.

In Iran, while the street protests have diminished, the harassment of women – including for what they do or don’t wear, appears to have actually intensified. Women and girls face increasingly stringent legal, social, and economic measures in the authorities’ enforcement of discriminatory compulsory veiling laws.

I urge the Government to heed Iranians’ calls for reform, and to begin by repealing regulations that criminalise non-compliance with mandatory dress codes. The onus is on the State to introduce laws and policies to protect the human rights of women and girls, including their right to participate in public life without fear of retribution or discrimination.

I am also appalled by the continued use of the death penalty in significant numbers. I urge them to halt executions immediately.

One more situation that is of deep concern to me is that in Pakistan – where hard-earned gains and the rule of law are at serious risk. I am alarmed by the recent escalation of violence, and by reports of mass arrests carried out under problematic laws – arrests that may amount to arbitrary detention.

Particularly disturbing are reports that Pakistan intends to revive the use of military courts to try civilians – which would contravene its international human rights law obligations.

I call on the authorities to ensure prompt, impartial, transparent investigations into deaths and injuries that occurred during the 9 May protests. The only path to a safe, secure, prosperous Pakistan is one that is paved with respect for human rights, democratic processes, and the rule of law, with the meaningful and free participation of all sectors of society.

Beyond individual country situations, of broader concern for me are recent rapid advances in the development of artificial intelligence – particularly generative AI. The opportunities are immense – but so are the risks. Human rights need to be baked into AI throughout its entire lifecycle and both governments and companies need to do more to ensure that guardrails are in place. My Office is carefully following and studying these issues.

Allow me to end with an appeal to all of you to help push back against the disinformation and manipulation that feeds anti-rights movements, and to help protect the space for people to defend their rights. Human rights are universal. The dignity and worth of every human being should not be – cannot be – a questionable, sensitive concept.

It is my fervent hope that this 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights will provide the space and inspiration for all of us to go back to the basics – to find the roots of human rights values in each of our cultures, histories, and faiths, uniting us in pushing back against the instrumentalization and politicization of human rights within and between countries.

This article is based on the opening remarks by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk at his press conference in Geneva on May 24.

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A picture of photovoltaic panels in the solar park in the small town of Armstrong, in the Pampa region, the heart of Argentina’s agricultural production. The park belongs to an electric cooperative, which until 2017 only bought energy to distribute, but now generates electricity as well. CREDIT: FARN

By Daniel Gutman
BUENOS AIRES, May 26 2023 (IPS)

When the residents of Armstrong, a town of 15,000 in western Argentina, began to meet to discuss a renewable energy project, they agreed that there could be many positive effects and that it was not just a question of doing their bit in the global effort to mitigate climate change.

“The proposal was to use the rooftops and yards of our houses to install solar panels. And I accepted the idea basically because I was excited by the prospect that one day we would become independent in generating our own electricity,” Adrián Marozzi, who today has six solar panels in the back of the house where he lives in Armstrong with his wife and two children, told IPS.“Community-based projects, which are feasible, have several advantages: they improve local autonomy in the generation of electricity, they allow money to be saved from the energy that is not purchased, which can be reinvested in the city, and they promote the decentralization of decision-making in the energy system.” -- Pablo Bertinat

His home is one of about 50 in Armstrong with solar panels generating power for the community, added to the 880-panel solar farm installed in the town’s industrial park. Together they have contributed part of the electricity consumed by the inhabitants of this town in the western province of Santa Fe since 2017.

This is a pioneering project in Argentina, built with public technical organizations and community participation through a cooperative where decisions are made democratically, which has since been replicated in various parts of the country.

With an extensive area of ​​almost 2.8 million square kilometers, Argentina is a country where most of the electricity generation has been concentrated geographically, which raises the need for large power transmission infrastructure and poses a hurdle for the development of the system.

In this context, and despite the financing obstacles in a country with a severe long-lasting economic crisis, renewable energies are increasingly seen as an alternative for clean electricity generation in power-consuming areas.

Marozzi is a biologist by profession, but is dedicated to agricultural production in Armstrong, almost 400 kilometers northwest of Buenos Aires. The town is located in the pampas grasslands in the productive heart of Argentina, and is surrounded by fields of soybeans, corn and cattle.

How to bring electric power to widely scattered rural residents was the great challenge that the Armstrong Public Works and Services Provision Cooperative, made up of 5,000 members representing the town’s 5,000 households, grappled with for years.

The institution was born in 1958 and in 1966 it marked a milestone, when it created the first rural electrification system in this South American country, with a 70-kilometer medium voltage line that brought the service to numerous farms.

Once again, in 2016, the Armstrong cooperative pointed the way, when it began to discuss in assemblies with community participation the advantages and disadvantages of venturing into renewable energy production by means of solar energy panels.

“Those of us who accepted the installation of panels in our homes today receive no direct benefit, but we are betting on a future in which we can generate all of the electricity we consume. In addition, of course, we care about environmental issues,” Marozzi said in a conversation from his town.

The 880-panel solar park with 200 kW of installed power is currently being expanded to 275 kW thanks to the money that Armstrong saved from energy that was not purchased in recent years from the national grid. The local residents who make up the cooperative decided that the savings from what was generated with solar energy should be invested in the park.

Two workers carry out maintenance tasks at the solar park in Monte Caseros, a town in the Argentine province of Corrientes, in the northeast of the country. The park was inaugurated in 2021 by the local cooperative, which provides electricity to the residents and is also involved in agricultural activity. CREDIT: Monte Caseros Agricultural and Electricity Cooperative

A replicated model

In Argentina there are about 600 electrical cooperatives in small cities and towns in the interior of the country, which were born in the mid-20th century, when the national grid was still quite limited and access to electric power was a problem.

These cooperatives usually buy and distribute energy in towns. But the members of dozens of them realized that they too could generate clean electricity, after visiting Armstrong’s project, and launched their own renewable energy initiatives.

One of the cooperatives that also has a solar park is the Agricultural and Electricity Cooperative of Monte Caseros, a city of about 25,000 inhabitants in the northeastern province of Corrientes.

“The cooperative was born in 1977 out of the need to bring energy to rural residents,” engineer Germán Judiche, the association’s technical manager, told IPS. “Today we have a honey packaging plant and a cluster of silos for rice, the main crop in the area. Since 2018 we have also distributed internet service and in 2020 we partnered with the province’s public electricity company to venture into renewable energy.”

The Monte Caseros solar park has 400 kW of installed capacity thanks to 936 solar panels. It was inaugurated in September 2021 and has provided such good results that a second park, with similar characteristics, is about to begin to be built by the 650-member cooperative, because it supplies only rural residents of the municipality.

“We have done everything with the cooperative’s own labor and the design by engineers from the National University of the Northeast (UNNE), from our province,” said Judiche. “It is definitely a model that can be replicated. Renewable energy is our future,” he added from his town, some 700 kilometers north of Buenos Aires.

Solar panels can be seen in the backyard of Adrián Marozzi, a resident of the town of Armstrong. Neither he nor the other residents who agreed to give up part of their yards or rooftops receive direct advantages, since the energy savings are capitalized by the cooperative, which thus has to buy less electricity from the national grid. CREDIT: FARN

A slow and bumpy road

According to official figures, the distributed or decentralized generation of renewable energy for self-consumption, which allows the surplus to be injected into the grid, has 1,167 generators registered in 13 of Argentina’s 23 provinces, with more than 20 megawatts of installed power.

Electricity cooperatives that have their own renewable energy generation projects operate under this system.

In total, in this country of 44 million people, renewable energies covered almost 14 percent of the demand for electricity in 2022 and have more than 5,000 MW of installed capacity, although there are practically no major new projects to expand their proportion of the energy mix.

Most of the electricity demand is covered by thermal generation, which contributes more than 25,000 MW, mainly from oil but also from natural gas. Hydropower is the next largest source, with more than 10,000 MW from large dams greater than 50 MW, which are not considered renewable.

Pablo Bertinat, director of the Energy and Sustainability Observatory of the National Technological University (UTN) based in the city of Rosario, also in Santa Fe, explained that in a country like Argentina it is impossible to follow a model like Germany’s widespread residential generation of renewable energy, because it requires investments that are not viable.

“Community-based projects, which are feasible, have several advantages: they improve local autonomy in the generation of electricity, they allow money to be saved from the energy that is not purchased, which can be reinvested in the city, and they promote the decentralization of decision-making in the energy system,” added Bertinat, speaking from Rosario.

The UTN Observatory was in charge of the Armstrong project, in a public-private consortium, together with the cooperative and the National Institute of Industrial Technology (Inti).

The expert said that the cooperatives’ renewable energy projects are advancing slowly in Argentina, despite the fact that there is no credit nor favorable policies – an indication that they could have a very strong impact on the entire electrical system and even on the generation of employment, if there were tools to promote renewables.

“Our aim is to demonstrate that not only large companies can advance the agenda of promoting renewable energy and the replacement of fossil fuels. In Argentina, cooperatives are also an important actor on this path,” Bertinat said.

The case of Armstrong also sparked interest from the environmental movement, which is helping to drive the growth of renewable energy in the country.

Jazmín Rocco Predassi, head of Climate Policy at the Environment and Natural Resources Foundation (FARN), told IPS that this is “an illustration that the energy transition does not always come from top-down initiatives, but that communities can organize themselves, together with cooperatives, municipal governments or science and technology institutes, to generate the transformations that the energy system needs.”

Credit: Save the Children Vanuatu/Facebook

By Inés M. Pousadela
MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay, May 25 2023 (IPS)

As a matter of global justice, the climate crisis has rightfully made its way to the world’s highest court.

On 29 March 2023, the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) unanimously adopted a resolution asking the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to issue an advisory opinion on the obligations of states on climate change. The initiative was led by the Pacific Island state of Vanuatu, one of several at risk of disappearing under rising sea levels. It was co-sponsored by 132 states and actively supported by networks of grassroots youth groups from the Pacific and around the world.

Civil society’s campaign

In 2019, a group of law students from the University of the South Pacific formed Pacific Islands Students Fighting Climate Change (PISFCC), a regional organisation with national chapters in Fiji, the Solomon Islands, Tonga and Vanuatu. PISFCC advocated with the Pacific Island Forum – the key regional body – to put the call for an ICJ opinion on its agenda. The government of Vanuatu announced it would seek this in September 2021, and Pacific civil society organisations (CSOs) formed an alliance – the Alliance for a Climate Justice Advisory Opinion – that has since grown to include CSOs and many others from around the world, including UN Special Rapporteurs and global experts.

The campaign made heavy use of social media, with people sharing their stories on the impacts of climate change and emphasising the importance of an ICJ opinion to help support calls for climate action, including climate litigation. It organised globally, sharing a toolkit used by activists around the world, and took to the streets locally. In Vanuatu, where it all started, children demonstrated in September 2022 to call attention to the impacts of climate change as their country’s single greatest development threat and express support for the call for an ICJ opinion.

In the run-up to the UNGA session that adopted the historic resolution, thousands of CSOs from around the world supported a letter calling for governments to back the vote.

The ICJ’s role

The ICJ is made up of 15 judges elected by the UNGA and UN Security Council. It settles legal disputes between states and provides advisory opinions on legal questions referred to it by other parts of the UN system.

The questions posed to the ICJ aim to clarify the obligations of states under international law to protect the climate system and environment from human-induced greenhouse gas emissions. They also ask about the legal responsibilities of states that have caused significant environmental harm towards other states, particularly small islands, and towards current and future generations.

To provide its advisory opinion, the ICJ will have to interpret states’ obligations as outlined in the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the 2015 Paris Agreement as well as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and a variety of international covenants and treaties. It may consider previous UNGA resolutions on climate change, such as the recent one recognising access to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment as a universal human right, and other resolutions by the UN Human Rights Council and reports by the Office of the UN High Commissioner of Human Rights and its independent human rights experts. It may also take into account decisions by UN treaty bodies and its own jurisprudence on climate and environmental matters.

Next steps

According to its statute, the ICJ can seek written statements from states or international organisations likely to have relevant information on the issue at hand. On 20 April, it communicated its decision to treat the UN and all its member states as ‘likely to be able to furnish information on the questions submitted to the Court’ and gave them six months to submit written statements, after which they will have three months to make written comments on statements made by other states or organisations.

Civil society doesn’t have any right to submit formal statements, so climate activists are urging as many people as possible to advocate towards their governments to make strong submissions that will lead to a progressive ICJ opinion. After submissions close, the ICJ is likely to take several months to deliberate, so its opinion may be expected at some point in 2024, likely towards the end of the year.

Advisory opinions aren’t binding. They don’t impose obligations on states. But they shape the global understanding of states’ obligations under international law and can motivate states to show their compliance with rising standards. An ICJ opinion could positively influence climate negotiations, pushing forward long-delayed initiatives on funding for loss and damage. It could encourage states to make more ambitious pledges to cut greenhouse gas emissions. It might also help raise awareness of the particular risks faced by small island states and provide arguments in favour of stronger climate action, helping climate advocates gain ground within governments.

A progressive advisory opinion could also help support domestic climate litigation: research shows that domestic courts are increasingly inclined to cite ICJ opinions and other sources of international law, including when it comes to determining climate issues.

The risk can’t be ruled out of a disappointing ICJ opinion merely reiterating the content of existing climate treaties without making any progress on states’ obligations. But climate activists find reasons to expect much more: many see this as a unique opportunity, brought about by their own persistent efforts, to advance climate justice and push for action that meets the scale of the crisis.

Inés M. Pousadela is CIVICUS Senior Research Specialist, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.

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Long wait at the border between Sudan and Egypt. Credit: Hisham Allam/IPS

By Hisham Allam
CAIRO, May 25 2023 (IPS)

The conflict in Sudan is impacting the economy in Egypt, and those who make their living moving goods across the borders have spent weeks hoping the situation will normalize.

Muhammad Saqr, a truck driver, left Cairo with a load of thinners on April 13, heading to Khartoum. By the time he had arrived at the border, the battle had flared up. Saqr remained, like dozens of trucks, waiting for the borders to be reopened.

On April 15, 2023, clashes erupted in Sudan between the army led by Lieutenant General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and the Rapid Support Forces led by Lieutenant General Muhammad Hamdan Dagalo, known as “Hamidti.” According to the UN, the clashes have resulted in hundreds of deaths and displaced more than a million people, with 840,000 internally displaced while another 250,000 have crossed the borders.

Saqr was stuck at the border for 28 days.

“We began to run out of supplies, and we reassured ourselves that the situation would improve tomorrow. Twenty-eight days passed while we slept in the open. The information we received from the bus drivers transporting the displaced from Sudan to Egypt convinced us that there would be no immediate relief. We knew that if we entered Khartoum alive, we would leave in shrouds,” Saqr told IPS.

“The merchant to whom we were transferring the goods asked us to wait and not return (home), particularly because he could not pay the customs duties due to the banks’ closure.”

Muhammad Saqr at the border of Sudan and Egypt.

Eventually, they returned with the goods to Cairo, Saqr said.

Mahmoud Asaad, a driver, was stuck on the Sudanese side of the border. Due to customs papers and permits, the livestock he was transporting had already been stuck in the customs barn in Wadi Halfa, Sudan, for thirty days. Then when the conflict broke out, the cows were trapped for another thirty days.

“We used to transport shipments of animals from Sudan to Egypt regularly,” Asaad explains. The average daily transport of animals to Egypt was roughly 60 trucks laden with cows and camels. This trade has stopped, and many Sudanese importers have fled to Egypt while waiting for the conflict to end.

“Sudan is regarded as a gateway for Egyptian exports to enter the markets of the Nile Basin countries and East Africa, and the continuation of war and insecurity will reduce the volume of trade exchange between the two countries, negatively impacting the Egyptian economy, which is currently experiencing some crises,” Matta Bishai, head of the Internal Trade and Supply Committee of the Importer’s Division of the General Federation of Chambers of Commerce, told IPS.

According to Bishai, commodity prices have risen significantly in recent months as the Egyptian pound has fallen against the US dollar. He also stated that the current situation in Sudan would result in additional price increases in the coming months, particularly for commodities imported from Sudan, such as meat.

Bishai explained that while Egypt had an ample domestic meat supply, it was nevertheless reliant on imports. Importing it from other countries such as Colombia, Brazil, and Chad would take longer and be more expensive than importing it from Sudan, as land transport is more convenient and cheaper than transporting the goods by sea.

According to Bishai, Sudan is a major supplier of livestock and live meat to Egypt, supplying about 10 percent of Egypt’s requirements. Higher meat prices will put additional pressure on Egypt’s inflation rates.

“Rising commodity prices, combined with the current situation in Sudan, are expected to result in higher inflation rates in Egypt in the coming months,” said Bishai.

According to data from the General Authority for Export and Import Control on trade exchange between Egypt and the African continent during the first quarter of this year, Sudan ranked second among the top five markets receiving Egyptian exports, valued at USD 226 million.

According to Ahmed Samir, the Egyptian Minister of Trade and Industry, the volume of trade exchange between Egypt and African markets amounted to about USD 2,12 billion in the first quarter of this year, with the value of Egyptian commodity exports to the continent totaling USD 1,61 billion and Egyptian imports from the continent totaling UD 506 million.

Mohamed Al-Kilani, an economics professor and member of the Egyptian Society of Political Economy, said: “The negative consequences will be felt in the trade exchange, which has recently increased and reached USD2 billion. Egypt has attempted to expedite the import process from Sudan by expanding the road network and building a railway.”

Credit rating agency Moody’s warned that should the conflict in Sudan continue for an extended period, it would have an adverse credit impact on neighboring countries and impact multilateral development banks. Moody’s added that if the clashes in Sudan turn into a long civil war, destroying infrastructure and worsening social conditions, there will be long-term economic consequences and a decline in the quality of Sudan’s multilateral banks’ assets, as well as an increase in non-performing loans and liquidity.

As the conflict entered its sixth week, attempts at a ceasefire have failed – with both sides accusing each other of violating agreements.

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By Kirsten Stade
ST PAUL, Minnesota, USA, May 25 2023 (IPS)

A new study estimates that global heating will push billions of people outside the comfortable range of temperature and weather in which we have evolved.

While coverage of the study notes that rapid emissions cuts could greatly reduce the number of people forced to live amid unprecedented extremes, it fails to mention the obvious: that reducing our population would have the same effect.

Not long ago, the idea that human population growth drives both human suffering and environmental decline was considered common sense. That changed in the 1990s in the wake of several egregious population control programs, ranging from China’s one-child policy to forced sterilizations in China, India, Puerto Rico, and elsewhere.

Today, the mere mention of population growth in connection with environmental protection or human well-being gets demonized as “neo-Malthusian” or “eugenicist” – notwithstanding the fact that the vast majority of efforts to lower fertility, whether to alleviate poverty or to reduce pressure on resources, have been rights-based and voluntary.

What is most troubling about this mischaracterization is that it deflects attention from the enormous violations of reproductive rights that occur in the name of increasing reproduction.

Pronatalism — the social pressures, religious doctrine, and government policies designed to induce people to have more children – has long been the most prevalent form of reproductive coercion.

Impressed upon people by family members, religious leaders, and politicians pursuing racist, nationalist, military, and/or economic agendas, pronatalism shows up through abortion bans and alarmist messaging that promotes childbirth for certain ethnic groups. The common thread is treating people as reproductive vessels for external agendas.

Over 218 million women worldwide who want to avoid pregnancy have an unmet need for contraception. This troubling reality is the result of both simple unavailability of contraceptives, and of deep-seated pronatalist attitudes–often held by husbands and other family members- that make it impossible for women to use them.

When women are expected to produce large families regardless of their own wants, pronatalism not only denies their reproductive autonomy; it also worsens poverty and damages the environment. A new study by the Swedish Research Council debunks the stubborn misconception that population growth has a negligible effect on climate change since it’s concentrated in low-consumption countries.

In fact, the study finds, population growth is the biggest driver of carbon emissions and is canceling out emissions reductions made through renewables and efficiency. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), population growth is one of the “strongest drivers of CO2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion in the last decade.”

Population growth and resultant agricultural expansion drive water scarcity, soil depletion, deforestation, land degradation, and damage to ecosystems that humans depend on. The connection between population growth and environmental impacts is clear, yet frequently denied, and this denial has real consequences.

Since addressing population growth fell out of favor in the 1990s, international funding for family planning declined 35 percent and falls far short of meeting global need.

Population denialism is reminiscent of climate denialism in its disregard for science and its failure to acknowledge the suffering of millions. Population deniers invoke Malthus and Margaret Sanger to invalidate population concerns by associating them with infamous sources, while ignoring unimpeachable ones like the IPCC.

While Malthus’ doomism and Paul Ehrlich’s Population Bomb failed to foresee new agricultural technologies that averted the famine and population crash they predicted, population denialists make the opposite mistake.

They adhere to a cornucopian faith that technology will magically solve our problems, and assume that new low-carbon energy sources and unproven interventions like carbon capture will fix everything.

They won’t.

In fact green tech raises serious environmental and social problems of its own. Solar and wind energy and the infrastructure for transmitting the power they generate requires far more land area than fossil fuel plants, with consequences for wildlife and its habitat. Lithium-ion batteries in electric cars and e-bikes use cobalt mined in the Democratic Republic of the Congo by low-wage workers subjected to toxic dumping and en masse displacement.

Population deniers are rightly concerned with equitable development of the world’s impoverished regions, but development will mean more emissions, more water use, more habitat destruction.

If current trends continue, the global middle class is projected to reach 5 billion by 2030. To enable all people to attain a reasonable standard of living without further straining natural systems, we must make access to family planning for all people a matter of urgent international concern.

The good news is that doing so reaps rewards not only for the planet but for human well-being. In every culture where fertility rates have declined, even staggering government investment in pronatalist incentives is insufficient to compel women to go back to the high birth rates they have left behind – an indication that women have a latent wish for low fertility.

This suggests that the path forward lies in acknowledging both the human and environmental toll of high birth rates and resultant population growth, and giving women the universal, free access to contraceptives and abortion care that will enable them to realize their reproductive wishes.

Kirsten Stade is a conservation biologist and communications manager of the NGO Population Balance

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Founder of Wagner private mercenary group, Yevgeny Prigozhin (here pictured with fighters), claims that Bakhmut is now in Moscow’s control. However his claims are disputed by Ukraine.

By Fawzia Moodley
JOHANNESBURG, May 24 2023 (IPS)

The Wagner Group, a shadowy mercenary group that has been operating for many years in African countries such as Sudan, Mali, the Central African Republic, and other mainly Francophone countries, has again been thrust into the limelight due to its involvement in the Ukraine war on behalf of Russia.

Wagner is believed to have a presence in 18 countries in Africa – and its influence goes far beyond security matters.

Julian Rademeyer of the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organised Crime told DW.com, “Wagner itself has developed over time as an organization that’s gone from being a purely private military contracting entity into a multiplicity of business alliances and relations and a network of companies. Some of them are front companies across the countries in which they operate on the African continent.”

He sees the Wagner Group as primarily a Kremlin military tool to boost Russia’s economic and military influence in Africa.

Rademeyer’s colleague and lead author of a study titled Russia’s military, mercenary and criminal engagement in Africa, Julia Stanyard, told IPS, “The Wagner Group is unique as an organization in the breadth, scale, and boldness of its activities. However, our study also shows that Wagner did not emerge in a vacuum: The group’s activities and characteristics reflect broader trends in the evolution of Russia’s oligarchs and organized crime groups, their respective relationships with the Russian state, and their activities in Africa.”

“The group comprises a network of political influence operations and economic entities such as mining companies.

“It appears to target unstable governments embroiled in civil wars and forms alliances with the ruling elite and offers them military support and weapons.”

This is exactly what happened in the CAR, where the government has been fighting multiple rebel forces since December 2020. A beleaguered President Faustin-Archange Touadéra reached out to Russia shortly after taking power in 2016.

“He received Russian military instructors and weapons, and Wagner mercenaries soon followed,” says CIVICUS, a global alliance promoting civic action.

In return, Wagner receives economic and mining concessions. According to the New York Times, the group has been involved in mining operations in the CAR, where it has secured contracts to mine gold and diamonds.

Stanyard says: “The group comprises a network of political influence operations and economic entities such as mining companies.”

While the governments and sections of their population have welcomed the group, Wagner’s been accused of gross human rights abuses, with local communities reporting forced labour and sexual violence.

Human Rights Watch says it has collected compelling evidence that Russian fighters have committed grave abuses against civilians in the CAR with complete impunity since 2019. The HRW interviewed 40 people between February 2019 and November 2021 about abuses by men speaking Russian.

Stanyard’s research substantiates the allegations of abuse: “Wagner Group has been accused of using whatever means necessary to achieve its aims, including criminal activity.”

Russia officially does not recognize mercenaries, but Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin, a Russian oligarch, has close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin. Significantly, on Sunday, May 21, Putin reportedly congratulated the Wagner mercenary force for helping in what he called the “liberation” of the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut. Reuters quoted Putin from a statement on the Kremlin’s website, saying: “The Head of State congratulated Wagner’s assault groups, as well as all members of the units of the Russian Armed Forces who provided them with the necessary support and cover on their flanks, on the completion of the operation to liberate Artyomovsk (Bakhmut).”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, however, said Bakhmut had not been occupied by Moscow.

Wagner’s activities go beyond promoting the military and economic interests of the Kremlin.

Stanyard says the group is also involved in promoting Russian propaganda and interests by “targeting the social media profiles of Kremlin critics — spamming them with pro-Putin and pro-war comments.”

Britain, in particular, has expressed concern that among the targets are “senior UK ministers’ social media accounts, alongside other world leaders.”

“The operation has suspected links to Prigozhin,” she says, quoting a UK report exposing the misinformation campaign by Russia.

The Wagner Group’s involvement in Africa has raised concerns about the role of private military contractors in the continent’s conflicts. While some African governments have welcomed its presence, others are concerned about the lack of oversight and accountability.

In 2019, the African Union adopted the African Standby Force Concept of Operations, which seeks to strengthen the capacity of African states to respond to crises and reduce their reliance on external actors. However, the implementation has been slow, and there are concerns that the Wagner Group and other mercenary groups will continue to operate with impunity.

CIVICUS warns that Wagner’s involvement is “contributing to the closing of civic space. In the CAR, with his position bolstered, Touadéra has further repressed dissenting voices. Humanitarian workers and independent journalists are among those subjected to violence and intimidation by Wagner forces.”

Likewise, in Mali, French media outlets have been banned and “the junta banned the activities of civil society organizations that receive French support, at a stroke hindering civil society’s ability to help people in humanitarian need due to the conflict and monitor human rights abuses.”

The issue of private military contractors in Africa is not limited to the Wagner Group. Other companies, such as Academi (formerly known as Blackwater), a private firm hired by the U.S. that became synonymous with civilian killings in the Iraq war, have been involved in conflicts in the continent, often with little oversight or accountability.

Dyck Advisory Group (DAG) was also involved in Mozambique in areas where the country is trying to deal with the Islamist insurgency. DAG claimed to have worked closely with the government to keep the insurgency at bay before the Southern African Development Community (SADC) sent deployments to Cabo Delgado province. Wagner was reportedly also involved in the conflict but left after experiencing a number of losses.

The use of private military contractors has raised questions about the role of states and the responsibility of corporations in conflicts, as well as the need for greater transparency and accountability.

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Yellowfin tuna diving.

By Grantly Galland
WASHINGTON DC, May 23 2023 (IPS)

Global fisheries are worth more than US$140 billion each year, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations. But this hefty sum does not capture the true value of fish to ocean health, and to the food security and cultures of communities around the world.

Unfortunately, many important populations were allowed to be overfished for decades by the same regional fisheries management organizations (RFMOs) charged with their conservation and sustainable use, and in some regions, this continues.

At the same time, the demand for fish continues to grow— from consumers of high-end bluefin tuna sushi to coastal communities who depend on seafood as their primary source of protein. So, RFMOs and governments must do more to ensure sustainable fishing and long-term ocean health.

More than 20 years ago, the United Nations Fish Stocks Agreement (UNFSA) entered into force as the only global, binding instrument holding governments accountable for managing the shared fish stocks of the high seas.

Under the agreement, fish should be managed sustainably and consistent with the best available science. Governments that are party to this treaty—and to RFMOs—are supposed to follow its management obligations, and work towards greater sustainability of the transboundary species, including tunas and sharks, vital to the ocean and economies.

Five of those RFMOs focus specifically on tuna management, one each in the Atlantic, eastern Pacific, western and central Pacific, Indian, and Southern oceans. They operate autonomously and, although there is some overlap among their constituent members, each sets its own rules for tuna fishing in its waters.

This makes UNFSA critical to successful management of tuna fisheries. And because the tuna RFMOs manage some of the world’s most iconic species, they often set the tone for how other similar bodies operate.

All of this is pertinent now because UNFSA member governments are meeting in New York May 22-26 to evaluate whether RFMOs are performing consistent with their commitments. A similar review was conducted in 2016, and although management has improved over time, some areas require more work, especially when it comes to ending overfishing and considering the health and biodiversity of the entire ecosystem.

Since 2016, the share of highly migratory stocks that are overfished increased from 36% to 40%, making it all the more urgent for governments to act quickly.

UNFSA calls on RFMOs to be precautionary in how they regulate fishing, although that guidance is not always followed. There are several examples of extensive overfishing of target species, such as bluefin tuna in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans; yellowfin tuna in the Indian Ocean; and mako, oceanic whitetip sharks and other species that are caught unintentionally.

Although the RFMOs that manage these fisheries have stopped the overfishing in some cases, in others they have not. But there are signs of progress. Over the past decade, a new precautionary management approach known as harvest strategies has gained traction among RFMOs.

These strategies (or management procedures) are science-based rules that automatically adjust catch limits based on several factors, such as population status. If widely implemented, they should end overfishing and prevent it from threatening these populations again.

Harvest strategies have already been successful, particularly in the Southern and Atlantic oceans, where they’ve been adopted for several species, including bluefin tuna and cod, fish stocks for which precautionary management has historically been difficult, or even controversial.

While this progress is important, UNFSA members are still falling short in an area they have agreed is critically important: taking an ecosystem approach to management. For generations, fisheries managers focused on individual fish stocks—adopting catch limits and other measures with little thought to the broader ecosystem.

Science shows that maintaining ecosystem health is critical to sustainable fishing. Yet, to date, RFMOs largely have not consistently assessed or addressed the wider impacts of fishing on ecosystems, including predator-prey relationships, habitat for target and non-target species, and other factors.

Instead, most action has been limited to reducing the impact of bycatch on individual shark species. Better data collection and sharing, and more monitoring of fishing activities, could help integrate stronger ecosystem considerations into management. The more RFMOs can build the whole ecosystem into their decisions, the better it will be for their fisheries.

For example, in the western and central Pacific, the $10 billion skipjack tuna fishery is an enormous economic driver for island nations that are threatened by climate change. But the harvest strategy in place there is nonbinding and unimplemented.

For a fishery facing changes in stock distribution due to warming waters, as well as increased market pressures, delayed action on implementation—and a lack of an ecosystem approach—may make matters worse.

At this week’s UNFSA meeting, RFMOs should be commended for the work they have done in the seven years since the last review. Good progress has been made, including improvements to compliance efforts, and monitoring and enforcement to fight illegal fishing.

But many of the legal obligations of the treaty remain unfulfilled. As such, sustainability is still out of reach for some critically important stocks, and almost no ecosystem-based protections are in place.

As governments convene this week, they should look to the lessons of the past—when poor decision-making threatened the future of some fisheries—and seize the opportunity to modernize management and adhere to the promises they have made on conservation. The biodiversity in the world’s ocean shouldn’t have to wait another seven years for action.

Grantly Galland leads policy work related to regional fisheries management organizations for The Pew Charitable Trusts’ international fisheries project.

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A female robot in an interactive session with UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed. Credit: UN Photo/Manuel Elias

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, May 23 2023 (IPS)

When the UN displayed a female robot back in February 2019, it was a peek into the future: a fast-paced, cutting-edge digital technology where humans may one day be replaced with machines and robots.

However, a joke circulating in the UN delegate’s lounge at that time was the possibility, perhaps in a distant future, of a robot– a female robot– as the UN Secretary-General in a world body which has been dominated by nine secretaries-general, all male, over the last 78 years.

Will it take a robot to break that unholy tradition?

At a joint meeting of the UN’s Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and its Economic and Social Committee, the robot named Sophia had an interactive session with Deputy Secretary-General Amina J. Mohammed.

But with the incredible advances on CHATGPT chatbot– the AI search engine is now capable of producing texts, articles, pitches, follow-ups, emails, speeches and even an entire book.

If the UN goes fully tech-savvy, will AI chatbot help produce the annual report of the Secretary-General, plus reports and press releases from UN committees and UN agencies?

But the inherent dangers and flaws in AI chat bot include disinformation, distortions, lies, and hate speech—not necessarily in that order. Worse still, the search engine cannot distinguish between fact and fiction.

Credit: UN Photo/Manuel Elias

Testifying before US Congress on May 16, Sam Altman, chief executive of OpenAI urged legislators to regulate AI.

Ian Richards, former President of the Coordinating Committee of International Staff Unions and Associations, (CCISUA) told IPS: “ AI is good at regurgitating what it finds on the internet and which has been put there by someone, whether accurate or not. It basically reproduces existing patterns.”

“However, our work has two parts,” he pointed out.

The interesting, high-value-added part involves talking to people on the ground in remote areas, gathering stories, eliminating biases and creating data from sources that are offline or unreliable. This is something AI would find difficult to do, he added.

The less interesting, low value-added part involves creating tables and charts, running repetitive calculations and formatting documents, he noted.

“If AI can take over some of the latter and give us more time to focus on the former, staff will be both more productive and happier”, said Richards, a development economist at the Geneva-based UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD).

“But let’s not get too caught up in the hype. And any staff member who relies too much on AI to produce original content will be quickly caught out,” he declared.

Last week the New York Times quoted Gary Marcus, emeritus professor of psychology and neural science at New York University (NYU) calling for an international institution to help govern AI’s development and use.

“I am not one of those long-term riskers who think the entire planet is going to be taken over by robots. But I am worried about what bad actors can do with these things because there is no control over them,” he warned.

Perhaps a future new UN agency on AI?

Meanwhile, some of the technological innovations currently being experimented at the UN include machine-learning, e-translations (involving the UN’s six official languages where machines have been taking over from humans) and robotics.

The United Nations says it has also been using unarmed and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), or drones, in peacekeeping and humanitarian operations, “helping to improve our situational awareness and to strengthen our ability to protect civilians”.

Among the technological innovations being introduced in the world body, and specifically in the UN’s E-conference services, is the use of eLUNa –Electronic Languages United Nations — “a machine translation interface specifically developed for the translation of UN documents.”

What distinguishes eLUNa from commercial CAT (Computer-Assisted Translation) tools is that it was developed entirely by the United Nations and is specifically geared towards the needs and working methods of UN language professionals, says the UN.

Asked whether UN should have a role in the growing debate on AI, UN Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric told reporters May 22: “I think this is an issue that the Secretary-General has expressed extreme worry about — the lack of regulation, the lack of safeguards, especially when it comes to autonomous weapons.”

“And I think he’s been very clear on that. It’s one of the things that keeps him up at night… we should be releasing soon our latest policy paper on the global digital compact”

Referring to AI and the social media, he said: “These are things that need to be dealt with, within what we love to refer as multi-stakeholder settings, because it is clear that in this regard, the power is not solely in the hands of governments. It is very much also in the private sector. And the UN has been and will continue to try to bring all these people to the table.”

Responding to questions whether Guterres plans to convene an international conference on AI, UN deputy spokesperson Farhan Haq said: “I don’t have a meeting to announce for now, but certainly, these are part of the concerns that the Secretary-General himself has been expressing — the idea that as artificial intelligence develops, it needs to be monitored carefully and the right regulations and standards need to be put in place to make sure that this type of technology is not open to abuse”.

Asked if there is any chance that the Secretary-General might consider convening an international conference on AI, Haq said: “That’s certainly something that can be considered. Obviously, if he believes that this would be a helpful step forward, that is what he will do. But again, I don’t have anything to announce at this point.’

Speaking on condition of anonymity, a UN staffer pointed out that the UN once tried out an AI system to generate transcripts for meetings.

But in one instance, it incorrectly cited an European Union (EU) delegate talking about “Russia’s legal invasion of Ukraine” and another delegate accusing the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) of creating a conflict in Northern Ethiopia.

The moral of the story is that AI has to be closely monitored and double-checked because it can produce incorrect information and distort facts and figures.

At a White House May 4 meeting of executives from Google, Microsoft, Anthropic and OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, US President Joe Biden conveyed mixed feelings: “What your’re doing has enormous potential– and enormous danger”

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Yasmine Sherif, Executive Director of Education Cannot Wait, speaks with a young Sudanese refugee in Borota during a field visit with UNHCR to the border regions of Chad with Sudan. Credit: ECW

By Joyce Chimbi
NAIROBI & NEW YORK, May 22 2023 (IPS)

As unprecedentedly fierce armed battles play out on the streets of Khartoum, more than 600 people are dead, thousands injured, and over 1 million displaced.

The fighting, which broke out suddenly on April 15, 2023, between the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces and Sundanese Armed Forces, is Sudan’s third internal war – and has exacerbated the humanitarian crisis the region was already facing.

More than 220,000 people have crossed the borders. Without a ceasefire, it will get even worse as a protracted crisis is in the making. UNHCR projects that this number could reach 860,000 as conflict escalates.

Education Cannot Wait’s Executive Director Yasmine Sherif came face-to-face with the effects of the brutal conflict during a recent high-level field mission with UNHCR, UNICEF, the Jesuit Refugee Service, and local partners to the border regions of Chad and Sudan, where they witnessed the impacts of the war. In these remote places, large numbers of incoming refugees – a majority of women and children – have settled in flimsy temporary homemade tents. Children are particularly vulnerable and urgently need the protection and support that emergency education interventions provide.

“What we saw is appalling, a heartbreaking dire situation growing very fast. In just two days, the number of refugees grew from 30,000 to 60,000, and 70 percent of them were school-age children. But I am encouraged by the commendable work that UNHCR is doing on the ground.”

The UN’s global fund for education responded with speed to the escalating Sudan refugee regional crisis by announcing a new 12-month USD 3 million First Emergency Response grant. Sherif says this is a catalytic fund to help UNHCR and its partners, in close coordination with Chad’s government, kickstart a holistic education program.

Before the new crisis erupted in Sudan and despite Chad being one of the poorest countries in the world, Chad was already hosting Africa’s fourth largest refugee population.

ECW’s Yasmine Sherif and Graham Lang walk with UNHCR partners through Borota, where thousands of new refugees, most of them women and children, have arrived after fleeing the conflict in Sudan. Credit: ECW

“Chad is second to last on the Human Development Index, only before South Sudan. The government of Chad is showing very progressive policies and generosity. They have very little resources, and yet they still receive refugees and provide them with much-needed security,” she observes.

Sherif lauded the government’s progressive policy on refugee inclusion within its national education system, stressing that it serves as a model example for the whole region. The new grant brings ECW’s total investments to support vulnerable children’s education in Chad to over USD 41 million. ECW and its partners have reached over 830,000 children in the country since 2017, focusing on refugee and internally displaced children, host communities, girls, children with disabilities, and other vulnerable children.

Funding is urgently needed and critical to implement the regional refugee response plan, which includes an estimated cost of USD 26.5 million for education. While Sudan shares borders with seven countries, including the Central African Republic, Chad, Egypt, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Libya, and South Sudan, nearly all of them are dealing with protracted crises or effects of years of a protracted crisis and require urgent funding to meet the needs of refugees.

“The refugees we met in eastern Chad are in a dire situation. They fled their homes with barely anything and are in very remote and hard-to-reach areas where infrastructures are scarce, and temperatures rise above 40 Celsius. Without emergency relief from international organizations such as UNHCR and UNICEF, it would be difficult for them to survive for long,” she explains.

Despite the government’s best efforts, Chad is dealing with multiple successive shocks, such as climate-induced disasters, large-scale internal displacement, and the Lake Chad and Central African refugee crises, which have eroded the delivery of basic services.

“ECW has made various investments in Chad, including a multiyear resilient program for vulnerable refugee and internally displaced children and their host communities, and other marginalized children in Chad, that has been going on for three years and will be renewed next year. We have also provided USD 2 million in response to the floods or climate-induced disasters affecting Chad,” Sherif says.

“We are now providing this catalytic USD 3 million funding to help UNCHR to provide immediate access to holistic education to the new cohort of refugees arriving from Sudan. ECW’s holistic support enhances school infrastructure and provides school feeding, quality learning materials, mental health, psycho-social services, teachers’ training, and inclusive education approaches. We hope this will inspire other donors and contributors to meet the remaining financing gap.”

Chad’s education performance indicators are among the lowest in sub-Saharan Africa, with 56 percent of primary school-aged children out of school.

UNHCR and its partners in Chad require USD 8 million to implement the education component of the regional refugee response plan. EWC has provided about 40 percent of the budget; the international community should assist with the remaining 60 percent. Sherif hopes that additional support will also be forthcoming for UNICEF and partners to cater to the host communities, who also need support to access quality education.

Young girls in Borota look out from their makeshift shelters. Almost 70% of those who have fled the recent conflict in Sudan into Chad are school-aged children. Credit: ECW

Incoming refugees live in precarious conditions, lacking the most basic facilities, and need urgent assistance and empowerment. As conditions become increasingly dire, ECW funding will provide access to safe and protective learning environments for incoming refugee girls and boys and support the host communities.

The depth and magnitude of this conflict on children and adolescents are such that their learning and development will most certainly be impaired if immediate access to education is not provided. ECW support offers an opportunity for holistic education to mitigate the debilitating long-term effects of war on young minds.

Fleeing children and adolescents will need immediate psycho-social support and mental health care to cope with the stress, adversity, and trauma of the outbreak of violence and their perilous escape. They will need school meals, water, and sanitation.

“To the international community, we must act now. This is a moral issue; we must prioritize and show solidarity. Our support must be generous. The world cannot afford to lose an entire generation due to this senseless conflict,” Sherif stresses.

ECW and its strategic partners are committed to reaching 20 million crisis-impacted children and adolescents over the next four years. To this end, ECW seeks to mobilize a minimum of USD 1.5 billion from government donors, the private sector, and philanthropic foundations.

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By Andrew Firmin
LONDON, May 22 2023 (IPS)

Thailand’s voters have spoken. In the 14 May general election, they overwhelmingly backed change. Two major opposition parties won 293 seats in the 500-member House of Representatives.

The party that unexpectedly came first, Move Forward, quickly announced it had formed a coalition with the runner-up, Pheu Thai, and six others, accounting for 313 seats. So if democracy is respected, when parliament next meets, the Move Forward-headed coalition should become the government and its leader, Pita Limjaroenrat, prime minister.

But there’s a problem: Thailand’s powerful military. Over the past century, Thailand has had 13 military coups, most recently in 2014. At the last election in 2019, widely considered neither free nor fair, junta head Prayut Chan-o-cha donned a civilian suit and held onto power.

But this time, voters made it abundantly clear they don’t want the military in power. Now Thailand stands at a fork in the road: will a new, democratically elected government be allowed to take power? Or, as before, will the military intervene to stop it happening?

A biased system

There’s a powerful tool at the military’s disposal. Under the new constitution it introduced in 2017, the prime minister needs to win the approval of a majority vote of the combined House of Representatives and Senate. The Senate has 250 members – all appointed by the military.

This means 376 votes are needed across the two houses, leaving the new coalition short. The military minority might still be able to retain its grip, using Senate votes to disregard the reality of its lack of support.

The appetite for renewal Move Forward spoke to has been expressed on the streets for years – despite the government unleashing violence and criminalising protesters. Young people have been at the forefront of protests, demanding democracy, military reform and – challenging a long-held social taboo – stronger limits on the monarchy’s power.

Royal reform has historically been kept off the political agenda. In part this was because the previous king, Bhumibol Adulyadej, reigned for over 70 years and was broadly respected. But the same doesn’t go for his successor, Maha Vajiralongkorn, a billionaire playboy who spends much of his time in Germany. Vajiralongkorn expects a bigger say in government, and the military has been happy to comply. He insisted that clauses to protect royal power be included in the 2017 constitution and in 2019 took control of two army regiments. One of his first acts was to assume direct control of the crown property bureau, with a reported value of US$40 billion.

But Vajiralongkorn is buttressed from criticism by Thailand’s notorious lèse majesté law, which makes it illegal to defame, insult or threaten the monarch. The government has used this law extensively against protesters. At least 242 people have been charged with lèse majesté offences since 2020. Altogether over 1,800 people are estimated to have been detained under Thailand’s suite of repressive laws, with hundreds of child protesters criminalised.

Spotlight on political parties

Move Forward directly reflects the concerns of the youthful protest movement. Its proposals include reform of the lèse majesté law and closer scrutiny of royal spending. It wants to ‘demilitarise’ Thailand, including by scrapping military conscription, cutting military budgets and making the army more accountable and transparent.

These are ideas that break new ground in Thai politics, and many of the electoral roll’s three million new voters embraced them. Move Forward compensated for its lack of resources through intensive social media use and by encouraging its young supporters to engage with their older family members. Through such means, Move Forward went beyond the youth vote: it won almost every seat in Bangkok, traditionally held by pro-military and pro-royal parties, and also performed well in areas that usually back Pheu Thai.

Runner-up Pheu Thai is a more established force, dominated by the economically powerful Shinawatra family, which has long been at odds with the military. Both parties have relatively youthful figureheads – Limjaroenrat is a 42-year-old and Paetongtarn Shinawatra is 36 – offering a sharp contrast with the old military order, represented by 69-year-old Prayut. But beyond that, it isn’t the most natural of alliances, with the two brought together more by what they oppose than anything else.

Having expected to win the election, Pheu Thai may face the temptation of cutting some other deal that excludes Move Forward – although an alliance with pro-military parties would anger many supporters. Even if the two stick together, they might have to come to an arrangement with some pro-military parties, notably Bhumjaithi, which came third. But Move Forward ruled out any deals with parties involved in the current government, while Bhumjaithi has made clear its opposition to any lèse majesté law changes. The cost of compromise would likely involve dropping this, disappointing voters who invested their hopes in change and confirming continuing military and monarchical influence.

Time for democracy

Beyond the Senate, there are other challenges. The military establishment dominates supposedly independent institutions such as the electoral commission and constitutional court.

Both Move Forward and Pheu Thai may face attempts to close them down. There’s a history of this. Pheu Thai is the third version of a Shinawatra family-led party, while Move Forward is the successor to Future Forward, which picked up support from many young voters to finish third in the flawed 2019 election only to be dissolved. Already a complaint has been filed against Limjaroenrat.

But the military should accept that the political landscape has completely changed. It must stop trying to hold back the tide, whether by parliamentary manoeuvrings, abuses of the law or an outright coup. It can’t keep denying the democratic will of a clear majority, because this risks turning Thailand into another Myanmar, where the military can only retain power through the ultimately self-defeating exercise of ever-increasing brutality.

Instead, Thailand has the opportunity to offer a shining regional example by going the other way. It’s time for the military to understand this and act accordingly.

Andrew Firmin is CIVICUS Editor-in-Chief, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.

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Adel Mansour takes his WFP food basket home on a cart in Abyan, Yemen. Credit: WFP/Ahmed Altaf

By Max Lawson
LONDON, May 22 2023 (IPS)

“G7 countries have failed the Global South here in Hiroshima. They failed to cancel debts, and they failed to find what is really required to end the huge increase in hunger worldwide. They can find untold billions to fight the war but can’t even provide half of what is needed by the UN for the most critical humanitarian crises.”

Hunger and debt

“If the G7 really want closer ties to the developing countries and greater backing for the war in Ukraine, then asking Global South leaders to fly across the world for a couple of hours is not going to cut it. They need to cancel debts and do what it takes to end hunger.

“Countries of the Global South are being crippled by a food and debt crisis of huge proportions. Hunger has increased faster than it has in decades, and all over the world. In East Africa two people are dying every minute from hunger. Countries are paying over $200 million a day to the G7 and their bankers, money they could spend feeding their people instead.

“The money they say they will provide for the world’s rapidly growing humanitarian crises is not even half of what the UN is asking for, and it is not clear what, if anything, is new or additional —and the G7 have a terrible track record on double counting and inflating figures each year.

“These food and debt crises are direct knock-on effects of the Ukraine war. If the G7 want support from the Global South, they need to be seen to take action on these issues —they must cancel debts and force private banks to participate in debt cancellation, and they must massively increase funding to end hunger and famine across the world.”

Adak Nyuol Bol stands outside her farm which has been submerged by floodwaters. South Sudan is on the frontlines of the climate crisis and currently experiencing a fourth consecutive year of flooding. Credit: World Food Programme (WFP)

Climate Change

“The G7 owes the Global South $8.7 trillion for the devastating losses and damages their excessive carbon emissions have caused. In the G7 Hiroshima communique they said they recognized that there is a new Loss and Damage fund, but they failed to commit a single cent.

“It is good they continue to recognize the need to meet 1.5 degrees, and stay committed to this despite the energy crisis driven by the war in Ukraine, but they try to blame everyone else —they are far off track themselves to contribute their fair share of what is needed to meet this target and they should have been on track years ago.

“They confirm their commitment to end public funding for fossil energy, they maintain their loophole on new fossil gas, using the war as an excuse. This means they have continued to wriggle out of their commitment to not publicly fund new fossil fuels, making a mockery of their fine statements. The G7 must stop using fossil fuels immediately —the planet is on fire.”

Health

“The G7 had hundreds of fine words on preparing for the next pandemic, but yet failed to make the critical commitment —that never again would the G7 let Big Pharma profiteering and intellectual property rights lead to millions dying unnecessarily, unable to access vaccines. Given a 27 percent chance of a new pandemic within in a decade, this omission is chilling.”

More on debt, food and hunger

“Over half of all debt payments from the Global South are going to the G7 or to private banks based in G7 countries, notably New York and London. Over $230 million dollars a day is flowing into the G7.

Countries are bankrupt, spending far more on debt than on healthcare or food for their people. Debt payments have increased sharply as countries in the Global South borrow in dollars, so rising interest rates are supersizing the payments they must make.

“The G7 saying they support clauses to temporarily suspend debt payments for those countries hit by climate disasters is a positive step and a tribute to Barbados and Prime Minister Mia Mottley for fighting for this. They need to go further and cancel debts for all the nations that need it, a growing number daily.

Money is flooding from the Global South into the G7 economies —that is the wrong direction.”

Max Lawson is Oxfam International’s Head of Inequality Policy.

Footnote: The UNOCHA’s current total requirement for humanitarian crises is nearly $56 billion. The G7 communique says they will commit to providing over $21 billion to address the worsening humanitarian crises this year (paragraph 16).

IPS UN Bureau

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