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Category: poverty

  • Promoting positive peace: 5 ways we can fight the global decline in peace

    Peace. It’s a word that we’ve heard a lot lately.

    With the recent outbreak of conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, the ongoing conflict in Ukraine and Russia, the Nagorno-Karabagh conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, along with the continued conflict in Syria and Yemen, it’s clear that peace – or the lack of – is a global issue on many people’s minds.

    According to research by Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP), the global picture is not looking good.

    In their latest global peace report (2023) – in which they provide a review of 163 countries – we saw the “ninth consecutive year that global peacefulness has deteriorated”.

    Over the last year, peace decreased by an average of 0.42% per country, with 84 countries marked as more peaceful than in 2022, and 79 countries recording a deterioration of peace.

    The global peace index (2023) (Source: Institute of Economics and Peace, 2023).

    So, what lies behind the statistics?

    Well, improvements and deteriorations were driven by changes a range of overlapping factors, including:

    • Conflict: the prevalence of internal and external conflict, along with the number of related deaths
    • Politics: the rate of military expenditure (% of GDP), political instability and relations with neighbouring countries
    • Displacement: the number of refugees and internally displaced people (IDPs)
    • Terrorism: current ranking on the political terror scale and the impact of terrorism
    • Weapons: the number of weapons imported and exported
    • Crime: the homicide rate and levels of violent crime and access to small arms

    In this research, Iceland remained the most peaceful nation (a ranking held since 2008), followed by Denmark and Ireland.

    Likewise, Afghanistan remained the “least peaceful nation” for the eighth year in a row, followed by Yemen and Syria.

    These are countries that have found themselves in both groupings repeatedly. And with the outbreak of conflict, it’s no surprise.

    According to IEP, there have been no changes in the level of global terrorism in the last three years.

    Whilst terrorism-related deaths in the MENA region continue to decline (down by 23% in 2023), the largest increase of deaths has been in sub-Saharan Africa, with a rise of 8%.

    In fact, the Sahel region of Africa has become the “epicentre of terrorism”.

    In this region, 43% of deaths related to global terrorism occur.

    Moreover, we’re also seeing the rise in ecological threats and the cyclical relationship to violence, including terrorism and conflict.

    Whilst populations are increasing, alongside climate-related disasters and the displacement of people, natural resources are decreasing.

    This is and will continue to have a monumental impact on populations, and the level of conflict:

    “…without concerted international action, current levels of ecological degradation will substantially worsen, thereby intensifying a range of social issues, such as malnutrition and forced migration.

    Current conflicts will escalate and multiply as a result, creating further global insecurity.

    IEP estimates that by 2050, 2.8 billion people will reside in countries facing severe ecological threats, compared to 1.8 billion in 2023, with 1.1 billion of these people living in countries with low societal resilience.”

    IEP, Ecological Threat Report (2023)

    As communities are becoming increasingly displaced and lacking in critical resources, conflict and instability will inevitability increase.

    The reality is this: if we want peace, we need to focus on more than ending conflict and violence (what’s known as “negative peace”).

    Instead, we need a local, national and international effort towards “positive peace” – a holistic sustainable effort to prevent (rather than respond to) conflict.

    For positive peace, we need:

    1. Well-functioning governments
    2. Equitable distribution of resources
    3. Free flow of information
    4. Good relations with neighbours
    5. High levels of human capital
    6. Acceptance of the rights of others
    7. Low levels of corruption
    8. Sound business environments

    Source: IEP, Pillars of Peace Report (2015)

    To do this, we must build egalitarian resilient communities and transparent, accountable nations to collaborate on a global scale.

    In short, if we want peace, we need to help communities thrive.

    We have to tackle the rise of global terrorism, address the rise in climate change, promote intercommunal dialogue, address poverty and inequality – including gender inequality – and work on all levels.

    This includes engaging at grassroots (community) level, with civil societies (expert organisations) and governmental and intragovernmental powers, to drive critical change.

    Of course, this requires holistic change globally. And change starts with us!

    Whatever our background, we can all make a difference.

    How? Read on to find out!

    1. Develop dialogue and human rights frameworks

    Building dialogue among different communities is critical to building positive peace (Image credit: Freepik).

    Inter-communal dialogue based on common shared values (our shared humanity!) is critical in building stronger relationships in our communities, regions, nations and globally.

    Working across religious and cultural divides by communicating with each other and carving shared spaces, we build a common sense of citizenship to come together and prevent conflict when disagreements and tensions rise.

    By understanding individuals and communities’ diverse needs, we can better understand different lived experiences and carve more equitable spaces.

    Promoting diversity and inclusion, and ensuring a broader sense of identity and citizenship, we can fight exclusion and develop the tools and understanding to prevent and respond to disagreements and larger-scale conflict:

    “For decades the fields of conflict resolution, mediation and peace studies had been overlooking the positive political role that religion could play in all stages of peacebuilding.

    Today there is growing attention to the contribution that religious peacebuilding can make to the stability, security, and justice of many divided societies around the world… through political application of religious ideals like reconciliation, forgiveness and mercy.”

    Italian Institute for International Political Studies (2023)

    We therefore need to amplify the role of intercommunal dialogue – including interfaith and intercultural dialogue – to unite among shared values, against (perceived) notions of difference.

    These values however must lie within a framework of human rights (shared dignity and humanity).

    In this way, we can build a mutual foundation of common values and unite to promote diversity (amongst all faiths and none).

    We can therefore critically understand and promote the mutual rights of each and every one of us when building initiatives, policies and projects.

    We can also confidently in collaboration reject harm, respecting and promoting cultural and religious diversity.

    In this way, we can confidentially counteract religious extremism and harmful socio-cultural norms together, ensuring that we do not excuse harm under extreme variations of cultural relativism.

    Take action:

    Develop dialogue:

    Start your own interfaith/intercultural dialogue journey today, with some key tips here.

    Local, regional, national or international, the sky’s your limit!

    Plus, if you’re already a keen dialogue practitioner, why not apply for the KAICIID fellowship programme in intercultural and interreligious dialogue to expand your networks, resources and knowledge?

    Keep an eye out on their website for submission deadlines.

    Promote anti-radicalisation:

    Challenge hatred and extremism where you encounter it (when safe to do so).

    Spread a counternarrative by promoting dialogue and humanism in religion, challenging dogmatism and extremism.

    Create positive communities, talk with others inside and outside of the community, and speak out against hate.

    Critically: report hate to relevant organisations and authorities (find out more here)

    Support dialogue in peacebuilding:

    Check out these great organisations working for peace in Israel-Palestine and support their crucial work through advocacy and fundraising.

    Wherever your interest lies, we part of a positive solution!

    Share positive stories, meet new people and promote peace not division

    Promote human rights and peace education:

    Promote the importance of human rights in practice, not just theory!

    Expand your knowledge in human rights (perhaps by taking a course) and incorporate human rights into your work (implementing policies based on equity, inclusivity and no harm).

    Why not also consider becoming and IEP ambassador?

    Dialogue is a key step to preventing conflict, with human rights building a key common framework of equality, justice and human dignity.

    2. Challenge corruption and promote transparency

    If we don’t tackle corruption, we can’t promote peace.

    Bribery, nepotism, corruption are the anthesis to sound business, equity and well-functioning governments – and to peace:

    “Corruption harms the poor and vulnerable the most, increasing costs and reducing access to basic services, such as health, education, social programs, and even justice.

    It exacerbates inequality and reduces private sector investment to the detriment of markets, job opportunities, and economies.

    Corruption can also undermine a country’s response to emergencies, leading to unnecessary suffering and, at worst, death.

    Over time, corruption can undermine the trust and confidence that citizens have for their leaders and institutions, creating social friction and in some contexts increasing the risk of fragility, conflict, and violence.”

    Ousmane Diagana and Mouhamadou Diagne, World Bank (2023)

    So, to tackle the issue of global poverty, inequity of systems and to drive real change, we need accountancy, transparency, development and growth.

    This requires action across society, on all levels.

    We need to call businesses to account for how they treat their employees.

    We need to ensure that governments are investing money where they should be, that justice systems are fit for purpose and that grassroots communities are able to protect the most vulnerable people in our societies.

    This includes people at increasing risk of modern slavery and displacement (see point #3) and gender-based violence (see points #3 and #4) as poverty and inequality meet the increasing drivers of climate change (see point #3) – amongst various other phenomenon.

    It’s a task of monumental scale, but we can’t just sit back and do nothing.

    Here’s how we can start.

    Take action:

    Call for accountability:

    Report corruption wherever you see it. Call for investigations amid the misuse of power and the abuse of systems – be it locally, nationally or internationally.

    Call people and systems to account. Report, fight and expose

    Model the change:

    Be the change in your own networks.

    Whatever your work, position or line of work, ensure your systems are fair, transparent and open to feedback (as well as legally compliant!)

    Support workers’ rights:

    Promote responsible business and workers rights.

    Spot the signs and report modern slavery.

    Call businesses to account, join and support vital trade unions and lobby governments to promote equality and transparency

    Get politically engaged:

    Use your voice! Vote, stand for power, challenge leaders and volunteer at polling stations

    Key drivers of conflict are poverty and inequality which thrive in corrupt environments.

    Change – and the scale of the problem – is of course contextual (as is the level of risk).

    We can all start with ourselves, modelling the change we can see.

    Locally, regionally, nationally, internationally, there is a lot of work to be done! But please, keep safe.

    3. Call for global action against climate change

    Flooding in Shekhpur, Muzaffarpur (Bihar, India) (2021) (Image credit: Deepak Kumar).

    The impact of increasing climate change is devastating to both people and planet.

    As the planet’s temperature is rising, so too is the frequency of climate induced disasters such as floods and droughts.

    And this is having a monumental impact on communities worldwide – in particular the world’s most vulnerable.

    In 2022 alone, a staggering 32.6 million people were displaced as a result of disasters.

    98% of these were weather-related, such as floods, storms, wildfires and droughts.

    And these are increasing the impact of poverty and risk of conflict.

    As crops fail, livestock perish and people lose their livelihoods and homes, families and communities are left displaced – in search of food, shelter and work.

    Such disasters/climatic changes aren’t a one off, they act as a “threat multiplier”:

    “Not only did climate-related disasters trigger more than half of new reported displacements in 2022, but nearly 60 per cent of refugees and internally displaced people now live in countries that are among the most vulnerable to climate change.”

    UNHCR (2023)

    Communities already affected by poverty are facing greater vulnerability to abuse and harm such as:

    With tensions around dwindling resources rising, conflict and displacement are increasingly occurring.

    That’s why we need to tackle climate change to not only protect the planet, but to also promote peace.

    Take action:

    Make personal changes:

    Cut your impact on the planet by changing in your consumption habits, for example:

    • Use less plastic:

    Switch to using a reusable (metal) water bottle, plastic-free food containers and toiletries.

    Re-use any plastic containers you do have for food or toiletries, rather than throwing them away

    • Pollute less:

    Swap your car for public transport, walk more (and get a work out) and limit your air miles where possible by choosing trains and ferries

    • Consume less:

    Consume less meat and dairy, recycle rubbish at home and work and compost organic waste and try thrifting.

    Why not also try vintage shops and apps when you want to have a clear out or add something to your wardrobe?

    Discover more top tips here and here!

    Call on leaders to take action:

    COP 29 is taking place in November 2024.

    Get ready to increase the pressure.

    Add your name to petitions, join a campaigning group and get your voice out there on social media.

    Demand to see what action global leaders are taking to stem the rise of climate change and to support those most affected/at risk.

    Support climate action projects:

    Check out specialist organisations, such as Climate-Network International, to find out how you can make a critical difference.

    Fund climate-resilient projects:

    Support community-resilience programmes which help individuals and families to:

    This will help communities to fight the effects of climate change, decreasing the rate of displacement, scarcity of resources, and ultimately conflict.

    Climate change is about both the planet and people – and stemming the effects are critical to building and maintaining peace.

    4. Fight global gender-based inequality

    Peace requires gender equity – across the board.

    Where poverty thrives and crisis hits, women are worst affected.

    In any crisis (be it climate-related and/or conflict-related) – women and girls are always disproportionately affected.

    At increasing risk of sexual violence, human trafficking and forced marriage (including child marriage), in times of conflict:

    • Teen girls are 90% more likely to be out of education
    • 70% of women will experience gender-based violence

    This however, simple falls in line with overall trends on gender inequality across the board.

    How?

    Well, women and girls worldwide are already more likely than their male counterparts to:

    • Live in poverty and earn less
    • Be illiterate / out of education
    • Experience sexual violence
    • Excluded from decision making
    • Be married as a child

    We also know that when women are involved in peacekeeping efforts, peace is more likely to be sustainable:

    “Female participation in both conflict prevention and conflict resolution enhances security interests.

    Studies have found that a significant inclusion of women and civil society groups in a peace negotiation makes the resulting agreement 64% less likely to fail and 35% more likely to last at least fifteen years. 

    …full and meaningful participation of women in peace operations broadens the perspective on conflict management, allows for more inclusive political resolutions, and, in the end, improves international peacebuilding strategies…”

    Eric Rudberg, Women in International Security (2023)

    So, when it comes to positive peace (preventing conflict) – we need to dismantle the political, social, cultural, religious and economic barriers that discriminate women and harm society as a whole.

    These are barriers that both limit women’s participation in conflict prevention/resolution and also result in a disproportionate impact on conflict on women and girls in crisis situations (pre-, mid and post-conflict).

    Take action:

    Support education for women and girls:

    Education is crucial for fighting the duality of poverty and gender inequality.

    Women with an education are less likely to fight poverty (see point #5), and have greater means to leave abusive relationships.

    When girls go to school, they’re building their future and fighting illiteracy, poverty and harmful practice such as child marriage.

    Differently abled girls, menstruating girls and girls in rural communities all need access to quality education – which requires not just a change in attitudes, but the right resources.

    Pledge your support here

    Challenge harmful norms and practices:

    Stand up against the social, cultural, religious and cultural norms that stigmatise and exclude women and girls from education, income-generation, community building and decision making.

    From period shaming, victim-blaming of survivors of assault, exclusion of women from religious spaces and unfair burden of caring/household responsibilities, women and girls are denied the right to participate and contribute equally to build safer more equal societies.

    Find out more and speak out today!

    Support projects against gender-based violence:

    Abusive practices such as child/forced marriage and Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) deny women and girls the right to education, health (even life), sexual pleasure, bodily autonomy and freedom of choice.

    They perpetuate misogynistic attitudes harmful to women and girls and to society as a whole.

    Speak out, stand up and support crucial projects, such as Grandmother Project who are critically fighting FGM and promoting girls’ education

    Empower women financially:

    Help women to empower themselves financially by supporting microfinance projects, enabling them to fight the effects of gender-based inequality, challenge gender-based discrimination/harmful norms and stand up in their communities and societies.

    This will ultimately help develop more inclusive peaceful societies for all.

    Find out more here.

    Finally, call on your MP to ensure that the UK government puts gender at the heart of crisis-responsive policies.

    5. Take action against poverty

    Poverty is often a major factor behind the eruption of conflict.

    As we’ve already seen, if we want to build peace and prevent conflict, we need to fight corruption, to work to ensure the mutual respect of human rights and to fight gender inequality and the increasing impact of climate change.

    And so, a huge factor is also: fighting poverty.

    Why?

    Because poverty is a major driving factor behind the prevalence of harmful gender-based norms (see point #4), ill health and the exclusion of people in decision making and civil society.

    Individuals and communities living in poverty are also further disproportionally affected by the increasing effects of climate change and risk of displacement (see point #3).

    Taking also these factors into account, we’re left seeing the increased risk of conflict .

    And of course, the further exclusion of women (see point #4) (remembering that women are also in fact key to building inclusive sustainably peaceful environments in pre and post-conflict rebuilding processes).

    Poverty is complex, yet key part of the solution:

    “…extreme poverty is … increasing in countries affected by fragility, conflict and violence (FCV)…by 2030,  up to two thirds of the world’s extreme poor will live in these situations. 

    These challenges threaten to reverse efforts to end extreme poverty, and they affect both low- and middle-income countries…

    Violent conflict has spiked dramatically since 2010 — conflicts now drive 80% of all humanitarian needs and reduce gross domestic product (GDP) growth by two percentage points per year…

    Social and economic exclusion, climate change, gender and other inequalities, demographic challenges, illicit financial flows and other global trends contribute to this complexity.”

    World Bank, People, Peace, Prosperity (2020)

    It’s fundamentally clear that if we want to prevent conflict, we need to fight poverty.

    And if we want to fight poverty, we need to fight conflict.

    Communities need equitable, inclusive, safe and thriving societies to build and promote dialogue, stem the effects of climate change, fight corruption and ultimately prevent conflict.

    Take action:

    Challenge discrimination:

    Speak out against the discrimination which traps people in poverty, makes them vulnerable to radicalisation and/or recruitment in armed groups, and builds tension in communities (see sections #1 and #2).

    Keep refugee children in education:

    Nearly half of school-aged refugee children are not in school.

    Donate towards, volunteer with or share information at projects supporting refugee children’s education to help these children get the critical education every child needs and help break the cycle of poverty.

    Prevent the recruitment of child soldiers:

    Poverty and lack of opportunities are major drivers behind the recruitment of child soldiers.

    Help end this abuse by supporting dedicated work to prevent the recruitment of child soldiers by strengthening child protection systems, promoting peacebuilding and increasing access to education and work opportunities.

    Fight food poverty:

    In times of crisis, food insecurity increases the risk of violence towards those who produce food.

    When communities don’t have adequate access to food, they face ill health and will struggle with accessing work and education.

    Fighting food poverty is therefore one step to creating more participatory societies.

    Donate to food projects, set up your own and speak to political leaders about food poverty in your locality

    We also need to:

    • Tackle the attitudes behind gender-based discrimination and violence (see section #4)
    • Promote and support education (for children and adults) and livelihoods/business (see section #4)
    • Protect workers rights (see section #2)
    • Fund climate-resilience projects (see section #3)

    In this way, we can tackle the cycle and roots causes of poverty and inequality which make individuals and communities vulnerable to conflict.

    Peacebuilding is an ongoing process. A process that we need to be active in building and sustaining.

    As a planet, we need to look beyond non-violence, towards wider building positive peace globally.

    This means going beyond the idea of simply a “lack of violence” (known as “negative peace”).

    Instead, real sustainable peace (“positive peace“) means developing and strengthening societies based on mutual dialogue, equity, diversity and inclusion.

    Higher levels of peace have been proven to lead to:

    1. Stronger resilience and adaptability
    2. Better environmental outcomes
    3. Higher measures of wellbeing
    4. Better performance on development goals
    5. Higher income per capita
    6. Better business environments

    (Source: IEP, 2023)

    Most critically however, positive peace exists in societies that are more just and are fairer.

    These are societies which should have the critical tools, resources and systems in place to embrace pluralism, promote equity and therefore de-escalate potential conflict.

    From breaking the gender bias, supporting displaced communities and fighting for people and planet, we can all make a difference on many levels.

    Whether locally, nationally or internationally, through your work, volunteering or simply in your day-to-day life, the time is now!

    Plus, don’t forget we’ve got the world at our digital fingertips!

    Be part of the change. Today.

    Credits:

    This blog was produced inline with participation requirements on the IEP Ambassador Programme (2023).

    The Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP) is an independent, non-partisan, non-profit think tank dedicated to shifting the world’s focus to peace as a positive, achievable, and tangible measure of human well-being and progress. We aim to create a paradigm shift in the way the world thinks about peace.

    This post was originally published on Voice of Salam.

  • A south London shopping centre is going to be the centre of a protest over energy bills

    A protest over fuel poverty is set to take place in one of south London’s highest-profile shopping centres, the Glades. It’s of little wonder activists are organising it, though – given Tory-run Bromley borough council has refused point blank to help people this winter.

    Warm Ups: taking direct action against fuel poverty

    There’s going to be a protest at Bromley’s The Glades shopping centre on Saturday 2 December:

    Fuel Poverty Action and its allies will be holding ‘Warm Up’ protests across the country on Friday 1 and 2 December, working with trade unions, tenants groups, and the climate movement. The actions are in support of the campaign group’s ‘Energy For All’ campaign. It’s demanding that every UK household is guaranteed the essential energy needed for life and dignity – with the hope of eradicating fuel poverty in the process.

    Warm Ups involve entering and occupying spaces to keep warm together due to unaffordable bills at home. Last winter, the group coordinated two-days of national warm ups in December and January. These helped to win the temporary ban on forced prepayment meters.

    Past warm ups have been carried out in Westminster, Holyrood, energy company HQs, banks, libraries, and department stores. Training and guides to organising warm ups can be found on the group’s website.

    However, in one London borough activists will be warming up against a Tory-run council that is refusing to support people.

    Bromley: Tories letting people freeze

    In Bromley, opposition councillors tried to get the Tory-led council to give support to people this winter. as My London reported:

    A motion was raised to create a £400,000 fund to support charities operating “warm banks” in the borough at a Bromley Council meeting on Monday (October 10). If approved, 100 warm centres could have applied for heating bill grants of up to £2,500 each under the plans.

    The plans would have seen charities and social enterprises being able to set up four to five warm banks in each of Bromley’s wards. However, the Tories on the council effectively poured scorn on the idea. As My London reported:

    Councillor Colin Smith, leader of Bromley Council, said five centres per ward would be a “waste of electricity” and “waste of gas” and one to two hubs would be more preferable…

    It was suggested that residents could keep warm in libraries which are within a mile and a half of 95per cent of residents. Cllr Smith said: “The council’s 15-strong fleet of libraries will be acting as warm places over the course of the winter,” before adding that they would be a “good place to start”.

    The Tories’ claimed the council didn’t have enough money to fund warm banks, either. However, the £400,000 costs for the warm banks represents just 0.16% of Bromley council’s entire net budget for 2023/24. Moreover, the idea that poor people should go and sit in a library all day to keep warm is insulting. Plus, with libraries specifically staff may be going on strike – because the Tories outsourced the running of them to a separate company that is not paying staff properly.

    So, activists will be holding Bromley council to account – as well as the UK government and energy companies, both of whom have overseen spiralling costs to consumers while the corporations rake in huge profits:

    ‘Cold homes are killing people’

    Paula Peters is a disability rights activist and member of both Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC) and Bromley and Croydon Unite Community. She told the Canary:

    Ofgem are rising energy prices by 5.1% in January 2024, with millions unable to heat or eat this is corporate greed causing further misery. Older people are using their bus passes to ride the buses all day and keep warm as unable to heat their homes.

    48% of disabled people in the UK are in energy debt. Rationing powering of equipment, turning off peg feeding, ventilators and turning off the fridge to keep insulin cold putting their lives at risk.

    Our message on Saturday is this cold homes are killing people.

    As part of the fuel poverty day of actions on 1 and 2 December 2023 across the UK, Bromley and Croydon Unite Community Branch supported by South East London People’s Assembly and allies are having a public warm up in the Glades shopping centre Bromley from 11am to 1pm on 2 December 2023, to highlight fuel poverty and that millions of people are having to use shopping Centres, libraries, town halls, and public transport to warm up.

    Please join us on Saturday in Bromley.

    If you live in Bromley, get yourself down to the Glades at 11am on 2 December – and send a message to the Tories in both the council and Westminster.

    Featured image via Paula Peters

    By Steve Topple

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Talk of “Border Crisis” Is Misleading. The Real Crisis Is US-Imposed Poverty.

    Immigration has been a touchstone of United States political debates for decades, and several cities claim to be at a “breaking point” as they struggle to absorb and support arrived migrants. But is there really a border crisis? And why are cities like New York unable to cope with the influx of migrants when their numbers are not unusual by historic standards? Have the Biden administration’s…

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • As Israel continues its assault on Gaza, the people now face the additional threat of winter

    The people of Gaza could be facing an even worsening crisis – on top of Israel’s assault, which has killed over 13,000 people – due to worsening weather conditions and winter setting in. That’s the assessment of Action Against Hunger.

    Gaza: crisis on top of crisis

    Imminent rainwater will add to sewage flowing in the streets, increasing the risk of disease according to NGO Action Against Hunger. The aid agency has been distributing water to civilians, but not enough to cope with the scale of demand

    Action Against Hunger says that current rainfall will add to the sewage already flowing through the streets. Rainwater mixed with sewage is likely to lead to an increase in disease and possible outbreaks, which will spread rapidly due to overcrowding in displaced persons’ shelters.

    The World Health Organisation (WHO) agrees. As Al Arabiya reported, it:

    said on Friday [17 November] it was very concerned about the spread of disease of Gaza as weeks of Israeli bombardments have caused the population to crowd in shelters with scarce food and clean water.

    “We are extremely concerned about the spread of the disease when the winter season arrives,” said Richard Peeperkorn, WHO Representative in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

    He said that more than 70,000 cases of acute respiratory infections and over 44,000 cases of diarrhea had been recorded in the densely populated enclave, figures higher significantly higher than expected.

    In overcrowded shelters in Khan Younis, the international charity has staff supporting civilians facing the highest levels of humanitarian need. Over 750,000 people have fled to the south of Gaza following intense conflict, with 1.5 million people displaced overall. Many of the displaced people rely on water assistance in shelters:

    People in Gaza queuing for water

    Action Against Hunger’s field staff said:

    Lack of access to water is creating a breeding ground for skin allergies and diarrhoea, which easily spread given the crammed conditions in the shelter. Delivery of water happens every five days – even then people only have one bottle of water to wipe their bodies.

    All the water tanks in our house are damaged, so we can hardly store water anymore. We have ended up recycling water from cleaning or washing. With the storms and rain coming, many people living in crowded areas will be unprepared for the drop in temperatures and flooding. If we do go outside, we are greeted by a flood of sewage in the streets, which will become even worse when the rains come.

    Critical health consequences looming

    Action Against Hunger has distributed 5,200 litres of clean water to around 1,700 people sheltering at a primary school in Gaza City, an average of roughly three litres per person. While these provisions curb the risk of fatal dehydration for civilians in Gaza, water supplies are running dangerously low since the conflict began on 7 October.

    The WHO recommends between 50 and 100 litres of water per person per day are needed to ensure that most basic needs are met, while an absolute minimum of 15 litres is required in emergency situations. This includes clean water for drinking, cooking, and personal sanitation and hygiene.

    In fact, there are only about three litres of water per person per day to meet the Gazan population’s needs. This raises fears of dehydration, kidney failure and other critical health consequences, particularly for children.

    With Gaza’s water infrastructure crumbling under the scale of the conflict, people are relying on fuel to transport aid which includes water. Fuel has entered Gaza for the first time since 7th October, but in extremely reduced amounts to the scale of need and only for transport of trucks.

    Action Against Hunger is calling for an immediate ceasefire to ensure the protection of civilians and the unimpeded delivery of humanitarian aid, including access to water, sanitation, fuel and food. The organisation has been working in the Occupied Palestinian Territory since 2002, opening an office in Gaza in 2005.

    Featured image via Reuters – YouTube

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Here Comes the Rain Again

    The rain has been almost constant these early months of 1996. Great storms from the US have arrived even to here, the Caribbean coast of Honduras, thousands of kilometers to the south. At times in Tela, the run-off courses thigh-deep.

    And every day, it seems, some piece of news about those Northern-owned Fruit Companies has flooded the papers. A banana war has begun between them and the European Community. Accusations and denials gust through the pages of El Tiempo and La Prensa.

    In February, I read in La Prensa of some campesinos who have taken over lands of the Tela RR Co. The Company official’s words echo through my mind: “I’m glad the military used no force. I’m glad the government respects private property rights.” I’d like to hear those campesinos’ stories. Tacamiche. I can’t find this village on any maps.1

    Another gust flutters the pages of the dailies in my hands. The Honduran government has said no to any attempt by the Tela RR Co. to decrease train service. The poor need an inexpensive means to travel, argue the politicians. I pull out the maps again.

    The Ferrocarril Nacional owns the lines from Puerto Cortés to Baracoa, and beyond to San Pedro Sula. The Company, the one from Baracoa to Tela—as well as others running deep into the fincas. There are really three Chiquita trains: one that makes a trip through those plantations between El Progreso and La Lima; The Machangay, a weekly service from that Port to the emerald hearts of their lands, carrying merchandise to the Company stores; and, in part, from Puerto Cortés to Tela.

    If I can’t find Tacamiche, I can surely find a railroad.

    The weather, for the first time in weeks, is sunny—and muggy. But I won’t be prepared for the storm that will cast me in a whirlwind for the next thirty-six hours.

    *****

    In the cracking dawn, I gather with many others for a train to Baracoa, then on to Tela. Opposite this Portón Nº 7, is the shell of a building. Its brick and concrete crumble under today’s dry sky. The metal date is still intact: 1922. Its former name is a faint shadow: Hyller Ralston and Son.

    A thin-limbed ladino wobbles from one person to another, showing off his pride. From his front pocket, he pulls out an ancient, long-barreled revolver.

    The train arrives. The rush is on. Quickly the cushioned seats in the lone first-class car are taken. I opt for a wooden one in second. There are three of these wagons, as well as four fruteros converted to passenger use, two baggage cars, and the locomotive.

    Our journey begins, clattering through the awakening city, over a bridge spanning a laguna. Shanties built upon stilts above the marshy ground. In the window of one, a woman washes dishes. The sink hangs off the sill. Soiled water drains to the swamp below.

    Though it is still early, the swelter grows. I tuck my journal into my back pocket, leaving the scenes of small rustic settlements and molded Company towns that slip by my window.

    Through the fruteros, stepping over people’s legs stretched out to the center bench. Perdone … con permiso … To the first baggage car to buy a soda. But the entrance is jammed with passengers and bundles of firewood. I return to my seat, stepping over legs, defeated.

    “What’s the matter?” The words cut through my self-pity. I hadn’t noticed someone’s eyes were watching me on my unsuccessful quest. An Afro-Honduran man studies me with deep brown eyes.

    “Oh, I thought of getting a gaseosa. But the way is blocked.” I shrug and begin turning towards my car.

    “What flavor would you like?” He gets up from his place.

    “Oh, no,” I shake my head, single braid wagging. “It’s all right, señor.”

    “No, I insist. Sit down, please.” He offers the bench with an open hand. “What kind would you like?”

    “Grape would be fine, please.”

    Within minutes, he returns. One chocolate-colored hand embraces the bottle.

    “How much do I owe you?” I reach into my pocket after taking the lukewarm soda.

    He smiles. “Nothing. It’s my treat.” He sits next to me.

    This is Eduardo, going home to San Juan, a Garífuna village near Tela. He farms some land there, in the mountains. For more money, he fishes a few months at a time, out of Puerto Cortés.

    Flashes of sunlight through the slats of this frutero dance within the car. We talk about the railroads here, and their owners. Our conversation flows to the banana companies: who they are and where they rule.

    West of Tela is Chiquita-land with bananas and citrus. It used to be United Fruit. East of Tela—La Ceiba, Trujillo—belongs to Standard Fruit, or Dole. It mainly grows bananas and pineapples. Nueva Tela and Lancetilla were United’s territory.

    “And there are others, too. A new one, also from the United States. … No, it’s independent from the other two.” Eduardo blows the smoke of his cigarette. It swirls in the sunlight slipping in. “There was some old company, Italian.” He shakes his just-beginning-to-grey head. “I don’t remember the name any more. It, too, used to be on the coats. But it got bought up years ago.”

    I take a swig of my grape gaseosa, listening to his melodic voice.

    He wrinkles his brow, eyes squinted in thought. “And there was another—Cuyamel. It worked west of Puerto Cortés. It got bought up, too. There aren’t any fincas that way any longer.”

    I wipe my mouth. “Why’s that, don Eduardo?”

    He shrugs. “I suppose because the soil’s not as good. Lots of small plantations there, though. Some are collectives, others private. They grow bananas, sugar cane, yucca and the like.” His flicked ash falls through a hole rotted in the wooden floor.

    I place the bottle between my feet. “Just on the other side of the river there, in Guatemala, the Company has many large fincas.”

    “Oh, yeh.” His smile is bright. “They’ve got some very good land there.”

    “You know, don Eduardo,” I look him in the eyes, “it’s good to meet someone who knows so much about the bananeras. So many Hondurans have told me differing things. Like Tela had belonged to Estandard Fruit.”

    He laughs quietly. “Well, I know some, because I’ve travelled so much around the country.” He falls serious. “Plus, if I don’t know something, I say I don’t know, instead of pretending I do and misinforming.”

    I nod, picking up my soda. I sip the last of it.

    “And I used to work for the Company many years ago.”

    I glance at him. His eyes are gazing at something in that past. “When was that?”

    “Oh, ’51 to ’66.” He drags his cigarette.

    “Wasn’t there some sort of big strike back then? In ’53 or ’54?”

    “Fifty-four.” His head moves plaintively up and down. “You had to conform.”

    “And how was it?”

    Eduardo turns to me. “Low pay. Had to conform. Step out of line, and you were out.” He tromps his bud. “I decided to get out of that. Went to work in other agriculture and fishing. I devote myself to that now.”

    I hold the empty bottle up. “Well, I guess I should go return this.”

    On my pass back through, Eduardo nods towards the landscape. “We’re already coming into Tela.”

    I peer out between the slats. We’re entering the railyard. This train clatters by the old Tela RR Co. building and decaying frutero cars.

    “Don Eduardo, thanks for the soda—and the lessons.”

    He nods de nada with a smile.

    I go to my second-class seat to retrieve my knapsack. I watch our approach through the open window. We have pulled onto the fractured pier, and now backing along a spur line. Beneath a bridge, the river swirls black-green and tan-grey. We arrive at the Old Tela station.

    I lose sight of Eduardo in the crowd on the road leading past the cheap-dive hotels and market. The mud is crusting into ruts. The late-morning sun is strong.

    I have no interest in spending even a night here. The five weeks I’d spent in February, going into March, was enough. I head straight for the bus terminal. I’ll go to La Ceiba, the cradle of Standard Fruit. Then on to Trujillo.

    *****

    A thin wind whirls dust and litter around my feet. I step through the rear door of this school bus. It is dim inside. Most seats are already taken.

    A young ladino, perhaps mid-20s, offers the one next to him, in the back here. As soon as I sit down, he says with a big smile, “So, are you from the United States?”

    Oh, boy, this is going to be a long ride. “I’m from Alaska,” I respond flatly.

    “Oh.” Disappointment washes over his bony face. “I thought …”

    A heavy silence drifts between us.

    I look away. I feel a hollowness in the pit of my stomach.

    “Well, I work at Estandard Fruit.” He pulls out his worn leather wallet and hands me his identification card. “In a packing plant. Four years now.”

    Bewilderment washes over my face. “That’s strange. On the train from Puerto Cortés just now, I met a man who used to work for the Company. He said wages were low and one had to conform.”

    This young man nods enthusiastically. “Oh, yeh.”

    He leans over the back of the seat, pulling off his ball cap. He fans a banana box in the cargo hold behind us.

    “What you got there?”

    “Oh,” he sits back down with a clunk. “A hen, a rooster—and five chicks. I have my own piece of land now and setting up livestock on it.”

    “Once you get it established, are you going to leave the Company?”

    The cock crows.

    The man’s head bobs with a slight grin. His eyes twinkle.

    “So, how much do you earn?”

    “Oh, 25 lempiras a day. Per month, 750.”

    About minimum wage here. At the present exchange rate, that would be about $70US per month.

    “I saw in the newspapers that the minimum wage will be increasing soon.”

    He shakes his head. The sunlight shimmers on his black hair. “I’m not so certain.”

    “Why’s that?”

    “Lawyers of the big companies are fighting it.”

    I’d read that, too.

    He reaches back to fan his chickens again. “I have to keep my investment cool,” he says with a laugh.

    I smile at him.

    That sunbeam is so warm. This has already been a long day. I begin nodding off….

    I awaken, my shirt damp with sweat. It’s hellaciously hot. I reach for my water bottle.

    My seatmate is cooling his chickens once more. He grins fincas are fading into miles of pineapple groves along either side of the highway. We are nearing La Ceiba.

    *****

    Once settled into this city, I wander through the central park. Caimans and turtles are keeping cool in their tank beneath the massive rubber tree. And I wander across the Avenue to the railroad park in the Company town. Under an ancient mango tree, a couple trysts. A slight breeze rustles its lance-shaped leaves. A mosaic of leaf-shadow and sunlight dances on the brick path.

    I’m reading the sign by the old San José locomotive. A man walks up behind me. He watches me write, I see from out of the corner of my eye, and the holstered pistol he wears.

    Many times during my journeys, I have found my fascination for trains intermeshing with the history of the banananeras.

    I turn around to face him. “Excuse me, sir. Do you work here?”

    “Sí, senora.” This ladino studies me: long hair in a single braid, blue jeans, tennis shoes. His face is official. “I work vigilance in this park.”

    “Pues, perhaps you can help me. I am writing a book on train journeys. I understand there might be cargo service to La Ceiba. Is that true?” I’ve long wanted to travel these lines around here. But a previous visit to Sambo Creek proved it couldn’t run very far east.

    “No, Estandard Fruit doesn’t ship by train any longer. It uses trucks. All the lines now belong to the government. There is, however, a special tourist train every day.”

    “What hours does it run, señor?”

    “From seven in the morning until about six in the evening. Every hour and a half or so.” His arms are crossed. He watches me jot this down.

    “And where does it go to?”

    “To a pineapple plantation about a kilometer from here.”

    Hmmm, this could be a fun ride. “How much does it cost, sir?”

    “Seventy centavos each way.” He turns to a taller, stockier man who just walked up to us. He also wears a pistol.

    “The railroad station here in the park. Is it the original passenger station?”

    The first man shakes his head. “No, it’s out in a neighborhood …”

    “Quite a distance from town,” his co-worker interjects.

    “It’s now in bad disrepair,” the skinnier one finishes.

    “Was this, then, the station for the Company town and headquarters?”

    They shrug.

    The brusquer one responds, “The main Company headquarters has always been elsewhere.”

    I raise an eyebrow. That’s different. “Where is that, señor?”

    “I don’t remember the name of the place. But this,” he nods his head towards the white cookie-cutter buildings, “was a local branch, until two years ago. These offices now handle tourism for this park, and for Cuero y Salado.” Cuero y Salado is a natural reserve about 30 kilometers west of La Ceiba—as the vulture flies.

    I look at him questioningly, “Why did it move?”

    “Well, with the change of president two years ago, the Company pulled out majorly from the area. The previous administration had been funding a new port for Estandard Fruit east of here. But with the change, Estandard said no. So, now the new government has had to abandon the port. It’s not completely built.”

    “Pues, why did the Company decide to pull out of the project?”

    “Oh, the new government only cares about,” his broad face scrunches, “its ‘moral revolution.’” His stubby fingers quote those last two words. “It doesn’t care about the country itself. Just look at the condition of the roads along this coast.” He spits on the ground.

    “When did Standard stop using La Ceiba as a port?”

    The first man looks at his partner before responding, “1986.”

    “You’d said Estandard had majorly pulled out. In what ways?”

    The second ladino wipes his mouth. “Sí, it’s dropped more and more operations. This port …”

    “… the railroad,” adds the other.

    “The port project.”

    “Oh, and it closed down big pineapple fincas to the west.”

    “And those African palm plantations outside of town. To whom do they belong?”

    The two men look at each other. The larger one answers, “They’re mostly Honduran companies.”

    “Well, we should be getting back to work.” The thin man elbows his co-worker.

    “Sí, we have to make sure no-one steps on the grass or anything. Adiós, señora.”

    I stroll across the park, to the Avenida, down to the old pier. This is a quieter Sunday than two years ago. No boats await to go to the Bay Islands. A few families sit on the edge, dangling and swinging their legs. A man pulls up his hand-held line. A silver fish flips on the hook. Until dusk, I lean against a mooring, listening to the music of languages around me—Spanish, English, Garífuna. The sunset colors sparkle the blue-green water.

    A few clouds speckle this new morning. The sun is already an hour or so old. It plays through the leaves, swaying in a now-and-again breeze.

    I sit under the arbor. That finca train should come some time. I must have missed the first one. The time passes. I write. Three women catch their ride to work. I light a cigarette.

    A man comes up to me. His Quimipro ball cap casts his serious eyes in shadow. “Excuse me. May I have a cigarette, please?” He sits next to me, blowing the smoke slowly. “Are you waiting for someone?”

    “The tourist train. And you?”

    “Oh, a lift to Estandard Fruit.”

    “Do you work for it?” My flicked ash scurries across the path.

    He shakes his head. The scattered sunlight catches on his high cheekbones. His skin is pale. “No, for Blanquita. I used to work for it, though.”

    I put my journal under my thigh. “Really?”

    “Sí.” He drags his cigarette. “I began there when I was 8. I trained as a locomotive mechanic. I worked ten years for the railroad—two under Estandard, the rest with the government, until it closed down operation of the lines. From there, I went to work for Blanquita, as a processing assessor.”

    “And Blanquita. Who does own it?”

    “Pues, it’s Honduran-owned and independent. But the real owner is Estandard Fruit. It’s just another arm of it.” He gazes at his hands, then takes another puff. ·The African palm plantations mostly belong to Blanquita. Some, though, are independent farmers who sell the fruits to it.”

    “Are the Standard offices here in La Ceiba?” I step on my butt.

    “Sí. Those buildings over there.” He points to the large white ones across from the railroad park. “It also has other offices. Out on the fincas, in Puerto Cortés, and Puerto Castilla.”

    “Why doesn’t it use the port here anymore?”

    With his long, bony fingers, he flicks his remnant into the grass. “It’s obsolete. Can’t handle the big cargo container ships. Now it’s only used to send produce out to the Islands.”

    “I heard the government had been building a new port for Estandard. But the project had to be abandoned because the Company pulled out.”

    His features become sharper. “It’s a lie.” He glances out to the parking lot. Nothing yet.

    And I watch the railroad shed on that other side. Nothing yet, either.

    I lean forward, arms on thighs. “Why doesn’t Standard use the railroad any longer?”

    One hand rubs a knee of his black pants. “Because of the irresponsibility of the workers.” He looks up. “The Company would hire people to unload boxes from the train when it arrived at the pier.” He nods down towards the seafront. “The workers would stack the boxes four or five high. Many bananas got damaged—more easily done the riper they get. Pues, there were many complaints from the US and Europe. The Company was losing lots of money. So it had to end.”

    A silence blows between us. We both study that lot.

    His eyes fall to his work-worn hands. “Plus, the workers were mañoso.2”

    I wrinkle my brow. “Mañoso? What does that mean?”

    “Pues, for example. There’s a pineapple finca to the west of here,” he turns and points that way. “Montecristo Piñales. It’s very large. Has permanent employees. Well, they’d report in in the morning, then request to see a doctor. They had a pain here,” he points to his side, “a pain there,” to the head, “everywhere. The doctor would write up a one-week excuse, and Estandard would pay wages for that week.” He looks at me. “It wasn’t just one worker who did that, but many. It cost the Company a lot of money.” He straightens up, his gaze fixed out there. “The plantation is still operating, but with different workers. All of them were replaced. Con permiso.”

    He walks off to the parking lot, to a pick-up truck pulled in. I watch him greet a man. They drive away.

    I wait for my train a while longer, passing the time scribbling notes in a small red notebook. The leaf-mosaic waltzes over the page, over my hand.

    It is now almost 10 a.m. Still no train. I decide to pack it in and go to Trujillo.

    *****

    During this bus trip, no conversation interrupts my contemplation of the countryside. West of Savá is a kilometers-long banana plantation. White plastic wraps the racimos. Arrow-straight dirt roads lead into its depths. Workers bow under the already-heavy heat of this day. A yellow-red sun warns not to collect fruit.

    I pick up today’s La Prensa from my lap. An article catches my eye, about the Port of Cabotaje.3 This is the one we’d talked about in La Ceiba. Yes, it was built by the previous government. There’s a lack of funding from this new administration to do the necessary dredging of channels to keep it clear.

    My pen jolts with the rhythm of the bus. My usual chicken scratch is now almost indecipherable. I glance out. We have now left Savá. Fincas of African palm patch the roadside. I turn my attention back to the story: “… and with the pull-out of Standard Fruit Company, this port lost its importance in the country.”

    But there is no mention of why the Company pulled out.

    I fold the paper, giving it back to its owner, and stuff the little notebook in my pocket. We are now near Tocoa. “The Cradle of Agrarian Reform,” proclaims a faded sign. Citrus groves blanket the countryside.

    *****

    Over the next few weeks, those northern storms once more arrive to this coast. The rains muddy the streets of Trujillo. Many days, gusts of wind flutter the pages of the newspapers.

    Tela RR Co. executive Fernando Sánchez (formerly the US consul to this country) makes an offer to the government. The Company will invest $100 million US in finca infrastructure and increase previously fallen banana production by 40%. However … Honduras must decrease taxes by 50 US cents per exported box.4

    More accusations in the Banana War. This in relation to the Stalinsky case. A two-page letter-ad runs, written by a former Chiquita employee. It details the dirty work he claims the Company asked him to do.5

    And Standard Fruit will be returning to Nicaragua, after having left in 1982 (… during the Sandinista Revolution, which instituted an agrarian reform and new labor laws …).

    The drizzle of conversations, too, continues. From public library to the clutter of a museum. From dim market to café. On street corners …

    My little book becomes drenched with the rains….

    ENDNOTES

    1 Four months later, The New York Times (22 July 1996) would publish an article on this.

    2 Mañoso – crafty, cunning, tricky, sneaky

    3 18 March 1996 edition.

    4 El Tiempo, 19 March 1996.

    5 La Prensa, 20 March 1996.

    This post was originally published on Dissident Voice.

  • Somalia’s devastating floods have now caused food prices to rocket – leaving countless people in peril

    Somalia has recently seen the worst flooding it’s had in a century. Dozens of people have been killed, and 1.6 million people have been affected. Moreover, the flooding has cut off communities from essential healthcare as the prevalence of waterborne diseases increases. However, another devastating consequence is that the prices of staple goods has increased by 35%. 

    Somalia: soaring food costs due to flooding

    According to Action Against Hunger, food prices soared in the first few weeks of Somalia’s flooding. The international charity’s Food Security and Livelihoods team confirms that common foods like rice, oil, sugar, and flour have increased by 35 per cent, and vegetable prices are also on the rise. The main road from Mogadishu was washed out by the floods, and many vehicles are reportedly stuck in the road.

    As a result, many food supplies are not making it to the flooded towns – significant damage to crops, roads, homes, and other infrastructure is particularly affecting districts in Baidoa, Bardere, Luuq, and Galkacyo.

    The soaring costs of goods is likely to exacerbate food insecurity across Somalia, a country that has been experiencing climate change-induced droughts that has already pushed millions of people into hunger. El Nino, the recurring weather phenomenon, is one of the reasons why this year’s rains are so heavy.

    Families in Somalia, who recently suffered through a prolonged and severe drought, already had limited access to food, income, and other resources to survive before the floods. Now, the floods have made health services, schools, and markets difficult to reach. Agricultural lands that had dried out in years without rain washed away easily in the deluge. People have nothing left for themselves and their loved ones. 32 deaths have already resulted, impacting more than 1.6 million people, and displacing nearly half a million people from their homes.

    ‘We do not have food’

    In Baidoa, Khadijo Ali Mohamed, a 28-year-old mother of four living in Gofgalol displacement camp, lost all of her belongings including food, mattresses, and kitchen tools. Action Against Hunger teams met her at the camp. It is home to more than 300 displaced people including pregnant women, children and the elderly. Compounding this crisis, her husband fell ill in the middle of the night.

    “The fever was not subsiding and we had no way to take him to the hospital at that hour of the night. Even now, we do not have food,” said Khadijo Mohamed. She and other residents of the displacement camp have been forced to flee to other areas of the town. The rains kept falling, even after they washed away homes, vehicles, and – tragically – people.

    Vulnerable displaced families are exposed to precarious circumstances, as they relocate to find higher ground – areas that may be dry, but where clean water is scarce and sanitation conditions are inadequate. Baidoa, in particular, is an area prone to waterborne diseases such as acute watery diarrhea. The floods aggravate this already challenging situation.

    Vulnerable to disease

    Action Against Hunger emergency officer, Ibrahim Abdirahman, warns that contaminated water poses a significant threat to public health, especially when it rains. “Waste picked up from all over the town by the flooding goes into wells, and this increases chances of infection,” explains Abdirahman, who also responded to the cholera emergency last year in Baidoa.

    When it rains, mosquitoes often breed and malaria cases increase – this impacts vulnerable families and children under five years old.

    As part of its emergency response, Action Against Hunger’s team has begun to decontaminate water points, in addition to providing water treatment tablets, distributing hygiene supplies, and educating people on the importance of good hygiene practices to prevent disease outbreaks in the communities.

    Somalia: more rain forecast

    Action Against Hunger Somalia has also secured a £4m bilateral grant from the British Embassy in Mogadishu. The grant, which is set to run for six months, will help provide crucial life-saving support in health, nutrition and WASH (Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene) to close to one million vulnerable Somalis impacted by the adverse effects of El Niño in South Central Somalia.

    According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), the upcoming days are expected to bring even more rain to communities across Somalia. Action Against Hunger warns that needs are likely to increase.

    As heavy rain could continue to fall in Somalia, Action Against Hunger’s health teams are visiting communities and providing critical support. In addition, the organisation is providing emergency cash assistance for the most vulnerable families, so they can buy food, medicine, and other essential supplies.

    Featured image via BBC News Africa – YouTube

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Fuel poverty will be the subject of nationwide occupations this December as a campaign group ‘warms up’ its actions

    Fuel Poverty Action is planning ‘Warm Up’ protests across the country on Friday 1 and Saturday 2 December, working with trade unions, tenants groups, and the climate movement. The actions are in support of the campaign group’s ‘Energy For All’ campaign. It’s demanding that every UK household is guaranteed the essential energy needed for life and dignity – with the hope of eradicating fuel poverty in the process.

    Warm Ups: taking direct action against fuel poverty

    Fuel Poverty Action has carried out warm ups for over a decade but is calling for its biggest mobilisation yet, as households are crippled by energy debt this winter.

    In Autumn 2023, Fuel Poverty Action announced plans for allies and supporters to ‘#WarmUp This Winter’. The grassroots group is calling for nationwide Warm Up protests on 1 and 2 December to demand energy bills are brought down for good.

    Warm Ups involve entering and occupying spaces to keep warm together due to unaffordable bills at home. Last winter, the group coordinated two-days of national warm ups in December and January. These helped to win the temporary ban on forced prepayment meters.

    Past warm ups have been carried out in Westminster, Holyrood, energy company HQs, banks, libraries, and department stores. Training and guides to organising warm ups can be found on the group’s website.

    Energy bills have still doubled

    Stuart Bretherton, Fuel Poverty Action’s Energy For All campaign coordinator said:

    Last winter, energy bills were at the forefront of headlines and people’s minds. But while the news cycle has moved on, energy bills are still double what we paid two years ago and over 5 million households were in energy debt before this winter even began. We’re not accepting mass poverty as the new norm. The UK Government is passing the buck when there’s concrete policies they can adopt today to reduce poverty and save lives, so direct action is the obvious step for us to push them to do so.

    The protests will put immediate demands to the government to protect lives this winter by making the ban on forced prepayment meters permanent and ditching regressive standing charges, which bear the largest costs for poorer households. It follows Fuel Poverty Action’s protest outside the Department for Energy Security over the return of energy companies being able to force people to have prepayment meters. You can read the Canary‘s report on that protest here:

    Protesters holding a banner that says "energy for all" and a placard that says the same outside a big wooden door

    Along with longer term measures like upgrading poor quality housing and heating systems, and ultimately guaranteeing every household enough energy to ensure essentials needs are covered, as outlined by the Energy For All campaign.

    An ‘unjust’ system

    Holly Donovan, a Unite Community member and spokesperson for the national Unite For Energy For All campaign said:

    Energy For All is a much needed reform to our energy pricing system. Under our current system those who use more energy pay less per unit than those of us who are tightening our belts and cutting down on energy use. This is clearly upside down, unjust and a very simple thing the government could address to help households in the greatest need.

    The Energy For All campaign launched in 2022 with a petition signed by over 660,000 members of the public. Fuel Poverty Action followed this up with a manifesto endorsed so far by almost 250 organisations, community groups, businesses, and elected officials.

    The proposal for energy company profits and subsidies to be redirected, and higher tariffs on luxury household energy use, in order to supply every home with enough energy for adequate levels of heating, lighting, cooking, and so on goes far beyond what other campaigns and parties called for last winter.

    Uniting against fuel poverty

    But in less than two years, the idea pioneered by a small movement is being actively campaigned for by groups ranging from Unite Community to 350.org. Through this mobilisation, Fuel Poverty Action hopes to unite allies of all different backgrounds, experiences and causes.

    Lucia Harrington, Fuel Poverty Action’s lead organiser said:

    Energy For All encompasses so many of the issues we face today and that’s why we’ve received such wide-ranging support from trade unions, tenants groups, the climate movement and MPs. It’s not a choice between meeting people’s needs and saving the planet, we can do both by reversing a system that puts profit first and punishes people for being poor. We need actions across the country this winter to drag this government into fulfilling its duties to prevent deaths from cold and damp this winter.

    If you’d like to organise a local Warm Up, email e4a(at)fuelpovertyaction.org.uk or visit the dedicated website here.

    Featured image via Fuel Poverty Action and additional image via the Canary

    By The Canary

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Today’s inflation figures mean nothing: food prices rocket 30% in 2.5 years while the Tories eye benefit cuts

    Inflation has fallen to 4.6% – down from 6.7% in September, official figures now show. However, a think tank has effectively warned this means nothing in the real world. Meanwhile, the government is also reportedly considering cutting people’s benefits in real-terms now inflation has fallen.

    Inflation: food prices UP 30% in 2.5 years

    With today’s news that inflation is at 4.6%, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s (JRF’s) latest cost of living tracker found a third of all families on a low income – 3.8m households – had to sell something they owned just to cope with rising costs. This is virtually unchanged since May 2023 when inflation was almost double what it is today – 8.7%. Meanwhile, at the same time the government is considering a real-terms cut to benefits.

    In October 2023, half of all low-income households – 5.9m – reduced meals, skipped meals altogether, or just went hungry – the highest since the JRF began its surveys. A quarter of low-income households said they had borrowed money just to buy food.

    This is shocking but not surprising. Using today’s ONS data, JRF calculates overall inflation is 20% higher than in April 2021. Food prices are around 30% higher and energy prices are still up by around two thirds compared to then. Benefits are only 13% higher.

    CPI is the change in prices compared to one year ago and today’s fall is mostly the result of the last big energy price hike being 13, rather than 12, months prior to the most recent data.

    ‘Indefensible’

    Responding to today’s inflation figures, JRF chief analyst Peter Matejic said:

    The people who had to take on debt in order to eat, or the people who took something they cherished to a pawnbroker just to buy warm clothes for their children, are not feeling the financial security Rishi Sunak promises. They live in a world where their income, in many cases, simply doesn’t cover costs while the Government talks about cutting their support further.

    Ministers claim that getting inflation down will make everyone’s money go further but, even after this fall, prices are still far higher than they were last year, rising at more than twice the Bank of England’s target rate. People are still having to go to great lengths just to afford everyday essentials and often are going without.

    It’s indefensible that the Government is reportedly considering cutting the benefits of struggling families worried for their future, with news stories suggesting it plans to use today’s figures, instead of last month’s, to fiddle the figures and hide a big cut.

    In the upcoming Autumn Statement benefits must be increased in line with inflation and Local Housing Allowance (LHA) must be unfrozen to support private renters with their housing costs. The Chancellor should also take steps to ensure that Universal Credit, at a minimum, always enables people to afford the essentials.

    So, what is the government considering doing about benefits?

    A real-terms benefit cut looms

    Bloomberg reported that:

    The UK government is considering using October’s inflation number for next year’s rise in working-age benefits, two people familiar with official thinking said, a move that would hit low-income families.

    Ministers are waiting to see Wednesday’s inflation data before deciding how much to lift support for the roughly nine million households on working-age benefits from April. Convention is that the September data is used but the government has refused to make that commitment. Using October’s inflation rate – predicted to come in about 2 percentage points below September’s – would save roughly £2 billion… a year.

    This would actually be a real-terms cut – as economics professor Jonathan Portes pointed out:

    All eyes will be on chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s Autumn Statement on Wednesday 22 November, where he will reveal whether or not his government will cut people’s benefits.

    Feature image via the Canary

    By Steve Topple

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Five million people driven into poverty by transport costs, a new report from a think tank warns

    Transport costs are keeping five million people (8% of the UK population) below the poverty line, a think tank has found using new research.

    Transport poverty: a new method of measuring this

    The figures come from a first-of-its-kind model (see notes) for tracking transport poverty, developed by the Social Market Foundation (SMF). The SMF’s metric found that out of a total of 13 million individuals in poverty today, relieving them of these costs would lift five million (8% of the British population) above the poverty line.

    The SMF defines transport poverty as occurring when households spend so much on private and public transport that it pushes them below the poverty line.

    According to the SMF, cars are the most expensive mode of getting around, costing the median British household over £5,650 per year in upfront costs, maintenance, fuel, and additional fees. Yet despite over £100bn spent on cuts and freezes to fuel duty have made little impact on transport poverty, the SMF finds.

    Barely changing anything

    The total impact of those policies over the past dozen years has been to cut transport poverty by just 0.3 percentage points according to its model. Although driving is expensive, less than a fifth of that expense is caused by government taxes and charges, thus even a drastic cut to fuel duty will not alleviate families’ transport poverty the SMF notes.

    Far from persecuting motorists, the SMF suggests that the government has coddled drivers, inadvertently hurting them with policies that end up encouraging car use arguing that the bigger issue is a lack of investment in alternatives to driving, keeping people reliant on costly cars.

    For every 10% increase in public transport journey relative to motoring in England, the average household pays over £400 more for transport each year – as they are forced to use the most expensive mode of transport (cars) in order to reach key services.

    Rising prices, increased poverty

    Unlike ‘fuel poverty’, which is a well-established concept and is used by national and devolved governments to shape their policies, there is no robust equivalent for understanding the causes, locations, and depth of poverty due to transportation costs. Despite the high toll these take on household budgets, government has not yet introduced a metric for it, which could be used to help policymakers better target policies, the SMF argues.

    The findings come against a backdrop of rising costs and over a decade of cuts to public transport. Latest ONS figures show a rise in bus and coach costs by 6.7% over the last year. Also last year, almost 10% of bus networks in the UK were cut, and some towns have lost entire bus access.

    The regions that rely most heavily on cars and have suffered the worst public transport tend to have the highest transport poverty rates. Its analysis found that the North West has the most individuals in transport poverty (800,000), though a higher proportion of people in the North East (12.5%) and West Midlands (11.9%) are affected. This compares to just 4% in London. (See notes)

    More to be done

    Most recently, the Government has announced that bus services in parts of England will get a one-time £150 million boost by re-routing funds from the scrapped Manchester HS2 leg. It comes with a promise to address transport issues that “matter most to people”, in the prime minister’s words.

    Whilst this funding is welcome, the SMF urges the Government to use its transport poverty metric to ensure funding is directed where it is most needed and can have the greatest positive impact on transport poverty.

    In the long term, if the Government is to eliminate transport poverty the SMF recommends the following measures:

    • The Department for Transport should begin tracking transport poverty, using the metric the SMF  has delivered, and determine a cost ceiling beyond which households are considered in need of support with transport costs.
    • Policymakers should allow fuel duty rates to rise or replace fuel duty with road pricing to provide a stable source of funding (See notes for details of SMF’s preferred road pricing system)
    • Direct new funding and devolve decision making at the local level, to deliver on both short-term (bus networks) and long-term (passenger rail) plans of increasing in public transport infrastructure.
    • Consider and introduce policies – like direct tax subsidy or social leasing – to increase access for electric vehicles by reducing the upfront costs

    ‘Quantifying the problem’, finally

    Gideon Salutin, Researcher at Social Market Foundation, said:

    Transport is the single greatest household expense for rural homes and the second biggest for urban ones. But we still don’t understand those struggling to pay for it the way we understand other forms of poverty like housing and heating. Understanding and tracking transport poverty is a long overdue endeavour.

    Fuel duty gets all the headlines, especially now that so many policymakers have convinced themselves that they have to defend motorists from fictional attacks. Yet it is far from the best tool at their disposal if they really want to help the hard pressed. Our research shows that transport poverty can be rigorously tracked, and therefore can be alleviated – but only by investing in public transport and making alternative private transport like electric vehicles cheaper.

    Silviya Barrett, from national charity Campaign for Better Transport, said:

    We’ve known for a long time that a lack of good, affordable public transport is forcing people into expensive car ownership which puts a huge strain on household budgets, so it’s good to see this research quantifying the problem. We support the report’s conclusion that government investment in public transport is more beneficial to improving people’s life chances, helping households with the cost of living and levelling up the economy than lowering the cost of driving.

    You can read the SMF’s full report, Getting a measure of Transport Poverty, here.

    Featured image via pxfuel

    By The Canary

  • As Cities Resist Affordable Housing, This Homeless Shelter Fought Back and Won

    On August 5, 2023, advocates for people experiencing homelessness in North Wilkesboro, North Carolina, scored an upset victory. They opened a 20-bed shelter for short-term guests in a donated building that once belonged to a dentist and his wife. The private facility fills a gap that the town ignored for years, despite a prolonged housing crisis that continues to push people onto the streets.

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Fuel Poverty Action knocks loudly on the government’s door over prepayment meters

    Campaign group Fuel Poverty Action held a protest outside the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DfES) on Wednesday 8 November. Clearly, the DfES was rattled – as security ended up locking all the doors. However, Fuel Poverty Action’s protest still highlighted a ongoing scandal: energy suppliers forcing people onto extortionate prepayment meters.

    Prepayment meters: an ongoing scandal

    As the Canary reported back in February, energy companies in the UK could obtain court warrants that allowed them to enter people’s homes and fit the pay-as-you-go (‘prepayment’) meters. This was when customers had fallen into arrears with their energy bills. They were then at risk of companies cutting their gas supply off if they fail to top them up.

    However, an undercover investigation by the Times newspaper looked into this. It found that contractors working for British Gas sent debt collectors to “break into” homes and “force-fit” meters. This prompted uproar from the public and politicians – even though the practice had actually been going on since 1954.

    So, the energy regulator Ofgem and courts stopped energy suppliers from forcing customers to have prepayment meters. However, as the Morning Star reported:

    Ofgem introduced a self-regulating code of practice for energy providers enabling them to resume forced break-ins and installations.

    Scottish Power has now reportedly secured warrants and broken into the homes of mothers with young children to force them onto prepay meters using the code. But the firm claims it was unaware of the customers’ circumstances and would not have installed a meter forcibly had this become clear.

    Now, the government is considering lifting the current pseudo-ban – even thought energy companies are already forcing prepayment meters upon people, regardless. So, Fuel Poverty Action went to the front door of the DfES to make it loud and clear this would be unacceptable.

    Fuel Poverty Action’s protest

    The group delivered a giant (and impressively-created) prepayment meter to the DfES – highlighting the scale of the problem:

    There were banners and speakers – with representatives from Greenpeace UK and 350 org also supporting the action:

    Protesters holding a banner that says "energy for all" and a placard that says the same outside a big wooden door

    You can watch a video round up, with interviews, of Fuel Poverty Action’s protest below:

    Prepayment meters, and energy companies forcing them onto people, are a huge problem. In 2022 alone:

    • Energy companies forced 600,000 people to have meters.
    • 3.2 million people ran out of gas or electric at least once.
    • Older, chronically ill, disabled, and low-income people were targeted.

    Campaign group the Chronic Collaboration was supporting Fuel Poverty Action. It highlighted on X some of the major issues with prepayment meters for chronically ill and disabled people. It noted that:

    One million households on extortionate & poverty-inducing prepayment meters have a chronically ill and/or disabled person living in them

    Plus:

    Last year, around 130,000 homes with a chronically ill and/or disabled person in them were running out of gas and/or electric at least ONCE A WEEK due to prepayment meters.

    And the Chronic Collaboration also noted that 24,000 prepayment homes with a chronically ill and/or disabled person in them went without power for two days or more. Overall, the group said:

    Paula Peters from campaign group Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC) was also at the protest. She noted how Rishi Sunak reportedly splashed out huge sums of money on energy to heat his private swimming pool – while poor older people are forced to sit on buses or go to warm hubs all day just to keep themselves heated in winter:

    Fuel Poverty Action wants the government to ban energy companies from forcing people to have prepayment meters. It is also calling on the government to ban energy company standing charges – which cost us all £25 a month before we even use any gas or electric.

    ‘Energy For All’ this winter

    Overall, the DfES clearly felt rattled by Fuel Poverty Action’s protest – as security ended up locking the doors to the building:

    The protest was an effective display of the issues surrounding prepayment meters. However, this is just the start of Fuel Poverty Action’s campaigning this winter. As well as its ongoing #EnergyForAll campaign, it is holding two days of nationwide actions on 1-2 December. Called ‘Warm Ups‘, Fuel Poverty Action says these local events:

    are a way to highlight fuel poverty and bring about change. They are based on the principle that if we can’t afford to heat our own homes, we have a right to go into any public space and keep warm there – and talk to passers-by, hold a speak-out, or a discussion, or a party! Or just put on woolly hats and gather outdoors to speak our minds!

    The group will be releasing more details on these soon. For now, though, Fuel Poverty Action and its allies sent a clear message to the government and the DfES over prepayment meters: that they won’t be allowing energy companies to continue to force them onto customers without a fight.

    Featured image and additional images via the Canary

    By Steve Topple

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Amazon, DoorDash, Walmart Must Address Labor Violation Allegations, UN Says

    A United Nations (UN) poverty expert has called on the CEOs of Amazon, DoorDash and Walmart to address allegations that inadequate pay, hostile union-busting tactics, and the misclassification of workers as “independent contractors” are trapping workers in poverty. “I am extremely disturbed that workers in some of the world’s most profitable companies — in one of the richest countries on earth…

    Source

  • Shell’s shareholder pay-outs could cover the energy bills of 6.3 million UK households in fuel poverty – and then some

    As fossil fuel major Shell has once again announced obscene profits and shareholder pay-outs, the UK government has issued a new round of oil and gas licences. This time, the company has topped the tables for the number of new awards.

    Of course, the news comes as winter looms and UK households brace for another cold season with extortionate energy bills – of which Shell’s profits could pay for around seven million households’ worth.

    Shell’s staggering profits and shareholder pay-outs

    On Thursday 2 November, Shell published its third quarter profits.

    The fossil fuel giant posted profits of £5.1bn. This adds to its near £11.6bn already this year alone, taking its total to £16.7bn. Meanwhile, the company declared shareholder distributions of £4bn. Again, it builds on £9.3bn announced in the first half of 2023. It took its total shareholder pay-outs to over £13bn.

    Naturally, Shell’s announcement comes at a time when the UK is reeling from the devastating impacts of Storm Babet and in the grip of Storm Ciaran. Of course, scientists have linked the climate crisis to the increased frequency and severity of autumn and winter storms in the UK.

    Accounting company PwC has estimated the insurance costs of Storm Babet for residential and commercial properties at anywhere between £450-650m. Therefore, just the shareholder pay-outs Shell made this quarter alone could pay for this damage at minimum, six times over.

    Fuel poverty versus fossil fuel riches

    To make matters worse, while Shell’s profits pile up, UK electricity and gas prices remain sky high. Shell’s staggering figures stand out once more against the backdrop of soaring energy bills. UK households face another winter of exorbitant energy costs. Analyst Cornwall Insight has estimated that average energy bills will rise by 3.5% in January.

    Already, the average household energy bills between October and December will be 50% higher than in winter 2021/22. Compounding this, the Tories have dropped financial support available to households. Specifically, the government has scrapped the Energy Bill Support Scheme – a £400 winter discount on energy bills it implemented last year.

    Shell’s shareholder dividends for 2023 so far equate to more than the cost of financing this in full. What’s more, it would still leave plenty left over to cover all 1.6m people the Canary’s Steve Topple calculated the government has left out of this year’s cost of living payments.

    Alternatively, its dividends for 2023’s first three quarters could pay the average energy bills of over seven million homes. This is more than a quarter of all UK households, and over the 6.3 million households non-profit National Energy Action has estimated rising costs will push into fuel poverty this winter.

    New oil and gas licences

    So, in the same week the company announced booming profits, it also took the lion’s share of new oil and gas licences.

    On Monday 30 October, the UK government issued its first tranche of new offshore oil and gas licences. These are part of over a hundred the government previously announced in July that it plans to greenlight for this round of licensing.

    In all, it announced 27 new licences, spanning 64 blocks. Shell won the most – with 11 licences across 28 blocks. The majority of these are exploration licences, alongside two for developing wells. In addition, Shell has also obtained one licence it will merge with another it already holds.

    The total size of these blocks together equates to over 5,500km². Of this, Shell’s blocks cover some 3,500km² – over 17 times the size of Equinor’s climate-wrecking Rosebank blocks. However, since these are primarily exploration licences, the amount of oil and gas contained in the new areas is yet to be determined. It means that not all these blocks will necessarily lead to production.

    Even so, the sheer scale of the newly licensed area for oil and gas exploration flies in the face of international climate targets. The International Energy Agency (IEA) had previously warned that the world should develop no new oil, gas, or coal projects past 2021 if it plans to meet net zero by 2050. Given this, its latest licensing round drives another nail in the coffin global decarbonisation goals.

    Windfalls for fossil fuel majors

    Of course, Shell’s new oil and gas licences will bring in further profits for the energy major. Crucially however, it’ll also help to reduce its tax bill too.

    Specifically, the company will benefit from a key loophole in the Energy Profits Levy – otherwise known as the windfall tax on oil and gas. Ostensibly, the government implemented the windfall tax to claw back fossil fuel majors’ outsized profits. Moreover, the government suggested that the revenues would be used to fund measures to address the cost of living crisis.

    When the Tories introduced the windfall tax, it inserted a clause called the “investment allowance”. This stipulates that companies that invest in the UK’s North Sea oil and gas can claim tax relief on these investments. Essentially then, they evade paying the full windfall tax. It’s part of the Tories’ drive for increasing UK oil and gas to shore up its domestic energy security.

    As plenty have pointed out however, this is bogus. This is particularly the case since UK offshore oil and gas does not automatically supply UK demand. Instead, like all oil and gas, it goes on the international market. On top of this, a recent Uplift analysis highlighted that during the last six licensing rounds since the Tories took power in 2010, new blocks have produced just 16 days worth of gas.

    Notably, the windfall loophole means that for every £1 a company spends on new oil and gas, the government will provide tax relief of 91p. Given this, its new haul of North Sea oil and gas licences will help the company lower its windfall bill. Naturally then, Shell has also ditched its decarbonisation plans and ramped up oil and gas production this year.

    Cozy relationships, freezing homes

    A new investigation by Desmog in October found that the oil and gas industry had engaged in an intense lobby campaign to weaken the windfall tax. Predictably, Shell was among the North Sea fossil fuel players involved. It did so partly through trade body Offshore Energies UK (OEUK), alongside direct meetings with ministers. Crucially, the outlet noted that:

    The new research indicates this ‘loophole’ came about following a surge in meetings and lobbying between OEUK and its member companies with the government

    Of course, this cozy relationship is nothing new. It is a by-product of fossil fuel finances flowing into Tory pockets. As Shell comes out on top, it’s worth remembering the fossil fuel major boasts significant ties to politicians in high places. Most notably, Shell is a top client with prime minister Rishi Sunak’s father-in-law’s firm Infosys.

    In short, climate-fuelled storms have wrought destruction, while oil and gas prices have sent household energy bills through the roof. Yet, at the same time, the Tories have gifted Shell new licences and a tax break, as its profits swell.

    It’s Tories’ class war 101. They couldn’t give a crap about people facing exorbitant energy bills, or communities losing homes and livelihoods to extreme climate-intensified weather. As the poorest UK households face one crisis after another, polluters should pay up. Instead, in Tory-wrecked UK, the fossil fuel industry gets a free pass to make an unconscionable fortune, while millions suffer.

    Feature image via Will Lane/Wikimedia, cropped and resized to 1910 by 1000, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0

    By Hannah Sharland

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • Cambodians infected during HIV outbreak facing severe poverty

    Villagers in western Cambodia where a mass outbreak of HIV took place almost a decade ago are facing increasingly poor living conditions and have asked government authorities to renew efforts to help them.

    Nearly 300 people in Sangke district’s Roka commune in Battambang province, contracted HIV – the virus that causes AIDS – from reused unsterilized syringes. A judge in 2015 sentenced Yem Chhrem to 25 years in prison for practicing medicine without a license in Roka between 1996 and 2014. 

    Government workers and civil society organizations often visited the commune to distribute food and other assistance in the two years after the outbreak was discovered, a 66-year-old HIV-positive Roka resident told Radio Free Asia on Thursday.

    But that attention has fallen off in recent years, and in the meantime many infected villagers have become too frail to work, she said. 

    “Nowadays, only young people are OK. But old people like me or my younger brother, are so sick,” she said. “We face a severe shortage of everything.”

    ENG_KHM_HIVPatients_10262023.2.jpg
    Yem Chhrem is escorted by Cambodian police officials at a court in Battambang province on Oct. 20, 2015. He was sentenced to 25 years in prison for practicing medicine without a license in Roka between 1996 and 2014. Credit: AFP

    Several villagers told RFA that a non-governmental organization distributes 40 kilograms (88 pounds) of rice per family and other food items every three months. 

    Medicine also provided

    HIV-positive villagers are also given antiretroviral drugs that help keep the virus under control –  but also have kept younger villagers from going to neighboring Thailand or elsewhere to find more lucrative work, according to one 55-year-old resident.

    Her 19-year-old son works in construction in the provincial capital, but earns a small and unreliable wage, she said. 

    “He is afraid to go far away from home to find a job because he needs the medicine, and the medicine is distributed to patients once a month,” she said.

    RFA couldn’t reach Battambang Provincial Health Department Deputy Director Sou Sanith on Thursday.

    ENG_KHM_HIVPatients_10262023.3.jpeg
    A relative sits by the covered body of Nach Ros, the fifth villager to die of HIV/AIDS in Roka commune in western Cambodia’s Battambang province, Feb. 25, 2015. Credit: RFA

     

    Some 51 people have died from HIV-related causes since 2015, Roka commune chief Sim Pov said. 

    There are currently 246 people living with HIV in Roka, including 36 children, and many of them are indeed living in poverty, she said. Commune authorities have been working to add them to a government program that gives them a monthly subsidy, she said.

    However, that subsidy hasn’t been enough to pay for basic living expenses, according to Yin Mengly, coordinator for the Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association, or Adhoc, in Battambang and Pailin provinces. 

    The government should also seek some kind of long-term employment for the villagers, he said.

    “We should not discriminate and or forget these people. We should take care of them,” Yin Mengly said. “We must not forget that they are also humans like us.”

    Translated by Sok Ry Sum. Edited by Matt Reed and Malcolm Foster.


    This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Khmer.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • ‘Brutal and arrogant’ Tories lifting the bankers’ bonus cap has nothing to do with the economy

    Rishi Sunak’s Tory government has approved the lifting of the cap on bankers’ bonuses. This means that the rule which saw firms limiting bonuses to a maximum of twice a person’s salary is being scrapped. Predictably, there’s been uproar – not least because the decision looks like a political one.

    Bankers’ bonuses: unfettered, once more

    As Sky News reported:

    The policy change was initially announced by former chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng in the infamous September 2022 mini-budget of the Liz Truss premiership.

    Current chancellor Jeremy Hunt and Sunak have kept the policy. Or rather, the Bank of England’s Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) and the Financial Conduct Authority have said they will lift the cap – and the Tories have greenlighted it. It will come into effect on 31 October – and also hit this financial year’s pay packets for bankers.

    As the Financial Times (FT) reported, government thinking is that it will make the UK more competitive and give firms greater flexibility. Without a shred of irony – considering the government brought the cap in to try and stop rogue bankers from taking financial risks – the PRA also said it would give firms more financial stability.

    Predictably, non-bankers have hit back.

    ‘Obscene’ Tory move

    Luke Hildyard, executive director of thinktank High Pay Centre, told Sky News:

    The UK already has more millionaire bankers than the whole of the EU put together yet our economy is stagnant and our public services are in crisis.

    Whether or not the bonus cap was an effective policy measure, we can’t rely on the outsized incomes of a handful of super-rich bankers trickling down to lift slumping living standards for the wider population.

    Trades Union Congress (TUC) general secretary Paul Nowak said:

    This is an obscene decision.

    City financiers are already enjoying bumper bonuses. They don’t need another helping hand from the Conservatives.

    At a time when millions up and down the country are struggling to make ends meet – this is an insult to working people. Rishi Sunak has shown once again that he is more interested in feather-nesting the super-wealthy than helping struggling families. Rampant inequality will do nothing to boost growth or competitiveness – it will just hold our economy back.

    This is why we need to have a national conversation about taxing wealth properly in this country. It is time for those at the top to pay their fair share.

    And others have hit out, too. Lawyer and campaigner Peter Stefanovic blasted the Tories on Twitter, pointing to newly-released destitution figures:

    As the Canary previously reported, since 2017 governments have presided over a 148% increase in destitution. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) found that, in 2022, 3.8 million people were destitute at some point, up 61% since 2019. This figure includes around one million children – up a whopping 88% since 2019.

    However, most shockingly, these figures represent a 186% increase in destitution for children. Looking at the detail, the JRF found that it was marginalised communities that successive governments had been failing the most. For example, 62% of people who were destitute were chronically ill or disabled.

    ‘Brutal and arrogant’

    So, when the rest of us are on our knees, the Tories decide to reward millionaires. Journalist Dave Sumner Smith summed it up – calling the Tories’ move “brutal and arrogant”:

    Of course, speculation is rife as to why Sunak has kept this policy which was formed under Truss. Some pointed out it might be to “appease” her wing of the Conservative Party. Others noted the Tories were running the country for the “benefit of bankers”. What’s also likely is that Sunak is eyeing support for the Tories from the financial services sector in the next general election.

    Let’s not forget that it’s the Tories’ fault the economy is failing in the first place – and by giving bankers a free-for-all, Sunak has done nothing to appease the notion that he serves only the interests of the rich.

    Featured image via David Iliff – Wikimedia, resized to 770×403 under license CC BY-SA 3.0

    By Steve Topple

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • The Tories have presided over a 148% increase in destitution – with the DWP being the main problem

    Successive Conservative governments have presided over a 148% increase in destitution since 2017. Destitution is classed as the most severe form of poverty – in which one can’t afford even life’s essentials like food, heating, and the ability to keep clean. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF), which conducted the research, has slammed the findings as “shameful“. It’s also clear what one of the biggest problems is: the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).

    Destitution: a staggering increase

    The JRF describes destitution as being one of two things:

    1. Lack of access to at least two of six items needed to meet your most basic physical needs to stay warm, dry, clean and fed (shelter, food, heating, lighting, clothing and footwear, and basic toiletries) because you cannot afford them.

    2. Extremely low or no income indicating that you cannot afford the items described above.

    Since the JRF’s last report, the situation has worsened. The think tank found that, in 2022, 3.8 million people were destitute at some point – up 61% since 2019. This figure includes around one million children, up 88% since 2019.

    However, most shockingly, these figures represent a 148% increase in overall destitution since 2017, and a 186% increase for children. Looking at the detail, the JRF found that it was marginalised communities that successive governments had been failing the most.

    Marginalised communities suffering the most

    The JRF found that 62% of people who were destitute were chronically ill or disabled. This is an increase of nearly 15% since 2019. It also noted that:

    The rate of destitution among black, black British, Caribbean or African-led households in the UK is three times their population share. White-led households are underrepresented in the destitute population.

    There appears to be a strong interaction between ethnicity and migration. For black, Asian and other ethnicities, a clear majority of destitute respondents were also migrants (74%, 84% and 80% respectively).

    The JRF also found that 72% of destitute people were reliant on benefits for their main source of income. 35% had been reliant on foodbanks in the month before the JRF performed its survey.

    The DWP: the main driver of destitution

    The JRF was very clear what the issues were with the DWP and benefits.

    The think tank noted that:

    The basic rate of social security is now so low it fails to clear the extremely low-income cash threshold set for destitution. While Universal Credit payments rose in line with inflation in April 2023, most interviewees felt that it had made little difference to them because it was ‘swallowed up’ by the rapidly increasing costs of basic necessities. Similarly, the special ‘Cost of Living Payments’ aimed at people on means-tested benefits, who were disabled or pensioners, were also viewed as welcome but limited by their short-term nature.

    As the Canary previously reported, the DWP’s Universal Credit increases in recent years were barely increases at all. In fact, they haven’t even taken the benefit back to its real-terms 2019 value.

    All of this is unlikely to improve any time soon. The DWP is already considering a real-terms cut to benefits next April. It’s failing to properly tackle the rising price of everything (inflation). So, the next time the JRF reports on destitution, the government will have likely made it worse again.

    Featured image via pixabay and Wikimedia

    By Steve Topple

    This post was originally published on Canary.

  • This Former Child Welfare Investigator Says Family Policing Must Be Abolished

    Horrifying racial and class injustices lie at the heart of contemporary child welfare policies in the United States, as Alan J. Dettlaff demonstrates in his recently released book, Confronting the Racist Legacy of the American Child Welfare System: The Case for Abolition. Among the most shocking is this: Half of all Black children will be subject to a Child Protective Services (CPS) investigation…

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • The US Government Has Abandoned the Nation’s Poor

    On the island of Manhattan, where I live, skyscrapers multiply like metal weeds, a vertical invasion of seemingly unstoppable force. For more than a century, they have risen as symbols of wealth and the promise of progress for a city and a nation. In movies and TV shows, those buildings churn with activity, offices full of important people doing work of global significance. The effect is a feeling…

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Poverty a ‘pull factor’ for child recruitment, early marriage: UN expert

    Poverty and lack of education are pushing boys into joining armed groups and forcing girls to marry way before they should, warns Virginia Gamba, UN Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict.  

    Her latest report documents more than 27,000 instances of grave violations against children caught up in war, including use in conflict, killing and maiming, and rape and sexual violence. 

    The report also reveals a worrisome rise in attacks against schools, with nearly half carried out by government forces.

    Ms. Gamba spoke to UN News’s Felipe De Carvalho about the main drivers of child recruitment and the unique challenges that conflict poses to children and education systems. 


    This content originally appeared on UN News – Global perspective Human stories and was authored by Felipe De Carvalho.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Climate Disasters Displaced 43 Million Children in a 6-Year Period

    The U.N.’s children’s welfare agency released a new report Friday making the case for prioritizing the protection of children from fossil fuel-driven climate disasters — with more than 43 million children across the globe internally displaced in a six-year period due to drought, flooding, wildfires, and other extreme events. In the report Children Displaced in a Changing Climate…

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Poverty in Greece

    New York Times published a news article “Greece, Battered a Decade Ago, Is Booming” by Liz Alderman, with additional reporting from Niki Kitsantonis (Monday, Sept. 25 / in print on Saturday, Sept. 30, Section B, Page 1 with the headline: “A New Era of Prosperity for Greece”).

    The article informs us that Greece was hit by an economic crisis a decade ago. It had, then, a load of debt – (doesn’t it now?) – which it could not repay and almost left the eurozone. So far so good.

    The newspaper informs that today it is one of the fastest growing economies in Europe. Again, so far so good. And clearly, the famous credit rating agencies are upgrading Greece’s debt rating and thus, opening the way for large investors and the economy is growing at twice the rate of the eurozone average. That’s right. CEPR economist Dean Baker, commenting on the article after its publication, wrote with emphasis: “Since the eurozone growth rate for 2023 is projected to be 0.8 percent, growing twice as fast is a rather low bar.”

    The journalist mentions that unemployment is at 11 percent, which one would say, with a dose of humor,  is “Greek statistics” because the probability is that unemployment is much higher. (Greece’s past government falsified fiscal data in order to enter eurozone.) Dean Baker will point out though, “The 11 percent unemployment rate is far higher than the rest of the European Union, which has a 5.9 percent unemployment rate.” Everywhere in Greece there is poverty, and mine conditions in society.

    I am one of the Greeks living in New York, and I have received many messages and phone calls from Greek people who want to immigrate to America because they cannot make ends meet. Friends and family members ask me the same. They are forced to do two-three jobs to survive. The minimum wage is 780 euros (650 net). So, how is it that the article describes “a miracle”? One would say that even the examples of the people mentioned in the article are not typical.

    And the tourists who have returned en masse, as the article states, has not helped to improve incomes. On the popular islands – that the average Greek cannot visit – usually, there are galley conditions for the workers.

    Unfortunately, in Greek society, a small percentage of 5%-10% live well – “the oligarchs eat with golden spoons” – and the rest suffer. Children of the poor go to school hungry. The country has some of the most expensive fuel in Europe, expensive food, high VAT, and very expensive electricity. Many do not have money for dental care, to change tires on the car, or, to start a new family. The journalist writes “misery of austerity is still fresh”, no, it is not fresh; it is still present in the social conditions. Nowhere is mentioned that the government gave, until recently, “Soviet-style” Food Pass and Fuel Pass coupons, which helped the re-election by a landslide of the conservative leader Mr. Mitsotakis. This image is not beautified by the fact that the companies Microsoft and Pfizer are investing in Greece.

    For reasons that are understandable, rating agencies like DBRS Morningstar and Moody’s do their job. Very likely for them, a strong economy means neoliberalism, purchasing power that is getting worse every year, and cheap labor. And Greece is a country that lacks personalities like AOC and Bernie. But the NYTimes should not present these assessments while ignoring the poverty that still exists in the country that gave birth to Democracy. The NYTimes has accustomed us to a more critical look at the suffering of ordinary people.

    In conclusion, “can a dead man dance?” No! So, the information given by the NYTimes should create “a complete picture” and not the opposite. Perhaps, we can accept that somehow, the good American newspaper wants to help improve the desperate economic situation that continues to impoverish the Greeks and stop the transfer of wealth to the few. Good psychology is everything, even in economy. Until then, the country will continue to live its own difficult fate, its own 1929, similar to the conditions America experienced at the start of the Great Depression era.

    This post was originally published on Dissident Voice.

  • NZ election 2023: Green Party pledges to double Best Start payment

    RNZ News

    New Zealand’s Green Party says it will double the Best Start payment from $69 a week to $140 — and it will also make it available for all children under three years.

    Greens co-leader Marama Davidson announced the policy today, saying it is part of a “fully costed plan” paid for with a fair tax system.

    “One in 10 children are growing up in poverty. For Māori, it is one in five. How is it possible that in a wealthy country like ours, there are thousands of children without enough to eat, a good bed, warm clothes, and decent shoes?,” she asked.

    “That is why the Green Party would ensure all families have what they need for these early years, by doubling Best Start from $69 a week, to $140, and make it universal for all children under three years.”

    Currently, families can receive the $69 weekly Best Start payment until their baby turns one, no matter the income.

    However, they do not get that payment while they are receiving the paid parental leave payment. After the first year, only families earning under $96,295 are eligible to receive the payment until their child turns three.

    The doubling of the Best Start payment is part of the Green Party’s Income Guarantee plan.

    “This universal payment for the first three years recognises that just like in our older years through superannuation, the very first years of a new baby’s life are a time when every family needs extra support,” Davidson said.

    Fairer Working for Families
    “Under this plan we’ll also reform Working for Families into a simpler, fairer system.

    “This will provide a payment of up to $215 every week for the first child, and $135 a week for every other child, in addition to the Best Start payments.

    “With the Green Party in government, we can take action to guarantee every whānau has enough to get by no matter what.

    “There is no reason for any child in Aotearoa to go hungry or to live in a damp, cold house. Poverty is a political choice.

    “Our plan will provide lasting solutions that will guarantee everyone has what they need to live a good life and cover the essentials — even when times are tough.”

    Since 2021, the Labour government has increased the Best Start payment from $60 to $69 a week.

    • Monday night’s Newshub-Reid Research poll gave the Greens a boost, rising to 14.2 percent, as the Labour Party dipped slightly to 26.5 percent.

    This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.


    This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Social Security Overpays Then Demands Money Back From People on Disability

    Justina Worrell, 47, works part time as a kitchen helper in an Ohio nursing home. She has cerebral palsy, an intellectual disability, and a cardiac condition that required she get an artificial heart valve at age 20. A year ago, she was earning $862 a month and receiving about $1,065 in monthly Social Security disability benefits when a letter arrived from the federal government.

    Source

  • Child Poverty More Than Doubled in 2022 After Congress Let Tax Credit Expire

    New data shows that child poverty skyrocketed in 2022 after lawmakers allowed pandemic stimulus provisions to expire, leaving millions to languish even as the pandemic and its economic consequences raged on. According to the Census Bureau’s latest report on poverty in the U.S., the supplemental poverty rate among children more than doubled between 2021 and 2022, jumping from 5.2 percent to 12.4…

    Source

  • Tory minister no-showing the energy bills inquiry is more proof the government couldn’t care less about poor households this winter

    On 13 September, the Energy Security and Net Zero Committee held an evidence session for its inquiry into preparations for winter. The committee grilled representatives of Ofgem (Office of Gas and Electricity Markets) on actions the energy regulator was taking to ensure households would not face unaffordable energy bills this winter.

    Originally, the committee was also due to question the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero’s (DESNZ) new lead minister, Claire Coutinho. However, Coutinho pulled out of the meeting.

    This had committee chair and SNP MP Angus Brendan MacNeil wondering why the minister had ditched the session. During the meeting, MacNeil said that:

    She was meant to be here today, but for various reasons—perhaps a lack of confidence or not being on top of her brief or whatever—she is not. I am not sure, but we are very disappointed

    Less volatile market, but energy bills still sky-high

    It’s perhaps not surprising the energy minister ditched the session in light of the stark warnings from the government’s arms-length energy regulator. Chief executive of Ofgem Jonathan Brearley appeared before the committee and sketched out the dire situation for households this winter. Brearley opened with what he described as the “positive news” – namely that:

    the market is more stable; it is less volatile, and prices are lower than they were this time last year.

    By comparison, he also said that:

    This time last year, we were anticipating and seeing prices at around £4,200 a year without Government support.

    June saw a 25.2% drop in gas prices. The Office for National Statistics largely attributed this to Ofgem lowering the energy price cap that month. Ofgem has set the energy price cap at £1,923 for the period between October and December. This is down on the £2,074 between July and September.

    As fuel poverty non-profit National Energy Action (NEA) noted, however:

    This is still around £700 more than in October 2021, when the energy crisis began when 4.5 million UK households were in fuel poverty.

    Energy bills to rise without action

    Moreover, Brearley’s assessment quickly took a negative turn. Crucially, he warned that some households could actually face higher bills than last year. This is because the government has reduced financial support. Brearley stated that:

    That support is not available, so for many people, their bills will be very similar this year and possibly worse for some than they were last year.

    Specifically, the government has scrapped the £400 winter discount on energy bills. In addition, it scaled back its Energy Price Guarantee (EPG) support scheme.

    Invariably, energy price hikes will hit the poorest households hardest. The End Fuel Poverty Coalition has estimated for example that:

    Fewer than 5m of the UK’s 28m households could be classed as being in the “energy elite” and unaffected by the current energy bills crisis. Around 8m have to borrow money to pay their energy bills and over 1m have disconnected for periods this year.

    Moreover, rising energy bills have significant financial impact on chronically ill people, causing increasing debt risk. Fuel poverty also literally kills terminally ill patients faster.

    Plan to abandon the poorest households

    On the news Coutinho would not be attending, committee chair MacNeil also remarked how:

    it is disappointing that the Government can find nobody from the ESNZ department to answer our questions and demonstrate that they do have a plan to help the many facing up to an incredibly harsh time this winter.

    As the government withdrew its support for the EPG in April, it announced a new targeted cost of living payment to fill the gap. However, the Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) found that 1.7 million people in fuel poverty could miss out on the support.

    Of course, as the Canary’s Steve Topple has pointed out before, the Tories do have a plan. Simply put, they plan not to help households out of fuel poverty. Topple argued that energy prices are the “latest weapon” in the Tories’ class war, in that:

    the rich and powerful are knowingly doing things that will suppress the poorest people and keep them in their poverty-stricken place.

    Evading scrutiny

    Moreover, a previous inquiry session laid out clearly the devastating impact the Tories’ class war has had on marginalised communities. On 6 September, the committee met with non-profit groups. A number of organisations provided evidence of where the government had fallen short last winter.

    Notably, National Energy Action (NEA) estimated that the government had failed to reach over a million vulnerable households with vital financial aid. It said that this meant the government didn’t give out £440m allocated towards energy support. Meanwhile, the End Poverty Coalition calculated that cold, damp homes killed nearly 5,000 more people in winter 2022/23 than the average.

    The committee also questioned Ofgem on the failures of the government’s warm homes discount scheme. Committee chair Angus Brendan MacNeil grilled Ofgem about a damning BBC revelation on the plans. The broadcaster found that it had failed to deliver support to over 700,000 people out of the 900,000 eligible.

    At this point, MacNeil cast some shade at Coutinho, noting that:

    We would ask the Secretary of State to answer that herself if she were here.

    Giving up the pretense entirely

    Given these failures of her department, is it any wonder the new energy minister evaded scrutiny? Regardless, the situation spoke volumes of the government’s concern for the most vulnerable this winter.

    In February, regarding the plans to cut the EPG, the Canary’s Alex/Rose Cocker wrote that the govenment seems to be:

    giving up the pretense that it cares about people being able to afford necessities such as cooking and staying warm.

    Coutinho’s absence from the inquiry session brought this point home starker than ever. If the minister for Energy Security and Net Zero can’t even show up to an inquiry to discuss plans for energy bills, she sure as hell isn’t going to turn up for the poorest households when winter starts to bite.

    Feature image via Lisafern/Wikimedia, cropped and resized to 1910 by 1000, image in the public domain.

    By Hannah Sharland

  • An anthropologist predicted the current failings of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals – spoiler, it’s all capitalism

    In part one of this two-part article, we took a look at the UN’s latest Sustainable Development Goals report, and the failings it exposed. Now, we’ll examine why capitalism is exactly the M.O. of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) writ large. In fact, the vital clue is in the oxymoronic name.

    From the get-go, prominent anthropologist Jason Hickel argued the SDGs were doomed to fail. Naturally, now his predictions are proving accurate. At their inception, Hickel had highlighted the blatant contradiction at the heart of the SDG plan. Writing for Jacobin in 2015, he set out what he considered the “mortal flaw” at the centre of the SDG scheme:

    the core of the SDG program for development and poverty reduction relies precisely on the old model of industrial growth — ever-increasing levels of extraction, production, and consumption.

    Essentially, SDGs are a set of solutions premised on continued economic growth and development, and that – of course – is the problem. Penning a separate article for the London School of Economics blog in 2015, Hickel wrote that:

    business as usual isn’t going to deliver the new economy we so desperately need. In this sense, the goals are not only a missed opportunity, they are actively dangerous: they lock in the global development agenda for the next 15 years around a failing economic model that requires urgent and deep structural changes, and they kick the hard challenge of real transformation down the road for the next generation to deal with – by which time it may be too late.

    In other words, the SDGs are an exercise in maintaining the very system that has fuelled these growing world crises. Naturally, this invariably means letting the real offenders off the hook.

    ‘Superficial’ solutions

    Moreover, Hickel highlighted the Sustainable Development Goals’ (SDGs) fixation on “superficial” solutions. He provided the example of the SDGs’ proposal for addressing overproduction and overconsumption. In this, he explained that the goals suggest reducing food waste, improving the efficiency of resource use, and encouraging companies to adopt sustainable practices.

    As a result, Hickel stressed that:

    These proposals explicitly avoid the obvious solution — namely, reduced consumption by the world’s wealthy — and steer clear of actually regulating corporate extraction

    Of course, therein lies the problem: the SDGs are greenwashing 101. Little has changed from their creation in 2015. True to form, the GSDR doubled down on just those types of answers to deepening world concerns. It offered skin-deep suggestions for a so-called ‘sustainable’ path forward.

    For instance, one of the latest report’s core proposals to address the biodiversity crisis provided another prime example of these superficial solutions. It advocated for “nature-based solutions” (NBS) to “protect and restore nature”. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) describes these as:

    actions to protect, sustainably manage, and restore natural and modified ecosystems that address societal challenges effectively and adaptively, simultaneously benefiting people and nature.

    They can include efforts to preserve or restore forests, or agricultural practices that protect soil health. However, as the Global Forest Coalition – among others – has pointed out, corporations have hijacked NBS for their own capitalist ends. In particular, it highlighted that:

    Most of these “solutions” squarely overlook the rights, needs and livelihoods of the Indigenous Peoples, local communities and women that are actually on the forefront of forest conservation.

    What’s more, the coalition also stated that:

    In the last decade or so, we have witnessed an aggressive push for “solutions” like NBS that seem more focused on increasing the financial gains of extractive, agro-industrial and polluting corporations than actually dealing with the structural causes of the environmental and health crises we presently face.

    Protecting the profits of big corporations and wealthy nations, then, seems precisely the point of the UN’s SDGs.

    Corporate capitalism is the point

    It’s almost as if tinkering around at the edges of global crises with yet more capitalism might not be that sustainable after all, and probably won’t actually solve any of the world’s major problems.

    Yet, it’s hardly surprising that the UN’s manifesto for a more equitable and peaceful world hinges on maintaining the economic model that sustains big business. As the Canary recently reported on the United Nations Food Systems Summit (UNFSS), it has lost sight of its goals in the service of corporate capitalism.

    Meanwhile, it was only this summer that a key former UN diplomat came to a long overdue epiphany. Specifically, it was the pretty evident recognition that fossil fuel firms really aren’t going to change their tune. Christiana Figueres was executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) between 2010 and 2016. During her tenure, she helped steer the implementation of the 2015 Paris Agreement.

    Until July this year, Figueres had called for the world to work with the very climate criminals destroying the planet. In 2015, she stood up for the billionaire goliaths, contending that the international community should stop “demonising” fossil fuel companies.

    Only now, as oil company profits soar and emissions rise to match, has Figueres had this revelation. Now, it seems, she has finally woken up and smelled the crude oil. The orchestrators of climate disaster would rather see the end of life on Earth than the end to their fossil fuel fortunes.

    Nevertheless, the Sustainable Development Goals report showed that – at least in the near-term future – the UN has no intention of changing its tune either.  For now, capitalism – and the world crises it manufactures right along with it – reigns supreme.

    Feature image via IAEA Imagebank/Wikimedia, cropped and resized to 1910 by 1000, licensed under CC BY 2.0

    By Hannah Sharland

  • G20 Aesthetics: Modi’s Brutal Delhi Facelift

    Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi really wanted to make an impression for his guests and dignitaries, and coarse realities would simply not do.  The occasion of the G20 summit presented him with a chance to give the city an aggressive touch-up, touching up a good number of its residents along the way, not to mention the city’s animal life as well.  As for those remaining nasties, these could be dressed up, covered, and ignored.  Elements of the Potemkin Village formulae – give the impression the peasants are well-fed, for instance – could be used when needed.

    One Delhi resident, Saroaj Devi, informed The Guardian about the sharp treatment meted out to him and those living in poverty blighted areas.  “They have covered our area so that poor people like us, and poverty in the country, is not witnessed by the people arriving from abroad.”

    These coverings, which could really be said to be barriers, are intended as temporary structures, shielding the G20 delegates from the unsightly as they head to their various abodes, a supreme example of detachment from social realities.

    This attempt at rendering Delhi’s savoury reality anodyne and safe has also extended to policies of animal removal. Delhi police have been reported as seeking out the aid of civic agencies to deal with the presence of monkeys and stray dogs in the vicinity of Rajghat.

    The Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) has not expressly linked the removal of the canines to summitry aesthetics, stating that this is being done “only on an urgent need basis”.  The premise is fanciful, given the MCD’s express order made last month to remove stray dogs “from the vicinity of prominent locations in view of the G-20 summit”.  It was only withdrawn after provoking much opposition.

    This unpleasant picture was not something the opposition was going to let pass.  The Indian government, concluded Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, “is hiding our poor people and animals.  There is no need to hide India’s reality from our guests.”

    Whatever Gandhi’s stance, the slum dwelling Devi is wise enough to realise that poverty is a damn nuisance to all, except when it comes to electioneering opportunities.  In such instances, the invisible are brought to life as votes, tangible opportunities.  “When it is election time, every politician comes to see us.  They eat with us and make promises.  But today, they are ashamed of our presence.”

    There should certainly be some degree of shame, but hardly for the toiling slum dwellers who shoulder the world’s most populous country.  Judging from the figures, the authorities, including the ruling regime, should turn crimson and scurry for cover in burning shame. In Delhi itself, there are 675 clusters populated by 1.55 million people.  But do not fear, suggests the confident Union Minister for State Housing and Urban Affairs, Kaushal Kishore.  Progress is being made.  The Delhi Development Authority (DDA), he recently revealed, had “rehabilitated” 8,379 people in 2022-23.  Not to be outdone, the Delhi Urban Shelter Improvement Board (DUSIB) had also its own set of figures: 1,297 people, according to their books, had been rehabilitated in five years.

    The meaning of rehabilitation in this context is much like pacification.  It is a benign expression enclosed in a fist or, in the Indian context, hidden in a bulldozer.  It entails control, management, and dispossession.  Slum clearance and forced evictions are favourites.  The excitement of G20 summitry has clearly led Prime Minister Modi to speed matters up.

    On July 13, 2023, the Concerned Citizens’ collective, with an eclectic membership, released a report documenting testimonies from those affected by the displacement policy ahead of the G20.  The findings were based on a public hearing held on May 22, 2023, a horror story in the name of India’s beautification drive.  Victims of these projects came forth from Delhi itself, along with Mumbai, Kolkata, Nagpur, Indore, and Udaipur.

    The report reveals that 2.5 to 3 million individuals have been displaced, with Delhi alone bearing witness to the razing of 25 slums to the ground. The displacement has not merely taken the form of bulldozed slums; shelters that would have offered temporary relief have also been destroyed.  Options for resettlement for the evictees have not been made available.

    Residents, according to the report, received the shortest of notices to evacuate; in the case of Delhi’s Bela Estate near Yamuna Floodplains, a mere three hours was offered.  Spitefully, the authorities could not leave it at that.  Handpumps, for instance, were sabotaged as an incentive to abandon the settlement.

    Barriers around the site, according to Akbar, an activist living in East Delhi’s Seemapuri, have also been erected in the immediate aftermath of the evictions to seal off any points or entry or exit.  The account he gives is particularly harrowing: a police arrival time of 4-5 am; the barking of orders to vacate within a few hours; the lack of opportunity to seek court intervention.  The demolition, once commenced, is done under the cover of police protection, a sinister practice designed to prevent documentary evidence from leaking out.

    The police have been particularly mealy mouthed about describing the harsh conditions inflicted on residents.  “Global event, Global responsibility – Not a lockdown,” read a full-page advertisement issued by Delhi police welcoming G20 guests.  But the requirement for businesses, schools, offices, workplaces, markets, restaurants and non-food shops to effectively cease operations for three days, aided by onerous traffic restrictions, has crippled daily wage earners of the hand-to-mouth variety.

    As it happens, the G20 Delhi summit was, as so many of these occasions are, much ado about nothing.  The absence of China and Russia turned the occasion into a G18 gathering, removing a good deal of flavour that would otherwise have been present.  At the very least it provided Modi an excellent excuse to rough up the slum dwellers, using beautification as a strategy to criminalise the poor.

  • To Hell With Poverty

    In his new book, Matthew Desmond argues that abolishing poverty will require an ambitious moral undertaking.

    This post was originally published on Dissent MagazineDissent Magazine.

  • Fiji faces more children being in trouble over ‘ice’, warns FCOSS

    By Rakesh Kumar in Suva

    The Fiji Council of Social Services (FCOSS) has warned that the nation needs to prepare itself to face more children being in conflict with the law.

    Chief executive officer Vani Catanasiga highlighted this while responding to Attorney-General Siromi Turaga’s revelation at the Lomaiviti Provincial Council meeting last week that schoolchildren were being used to peddle the highly addictive illegal drug methamphetamine, commonly known as “ice”.

    She said a concerted and coordinated approach was needed to tackle this issue.

    If the issue was not resolved, there could be a drop in education attainment rates and pressure on national social services systems, she added.

    Methodist Church in Fiji and Rotuma president Reverend Ili Vunisuwai said poverty was the root cause of the problem.

    He said the issue was serious and the government, church and vanua should come together to solve the issue.

    Rakesh Kumar is a Fiji Times reporter. Republished with permission.

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • The Cold War, Desegregation, and Affirmative Action

    As the US Supreme Court aspires to drive a nail into the coffin of affirmative action, it is important to recognize how the Cold War helped to shape the mid-twentieth-century civil-rights people’s victories and the consequent policy of Affirmative Action in education.

    Some may find that connecting the conflict between the US and the USSR to the formal establishment of African American citizen rights is far-fetched.

    But the facts speak otherwise.

    The US ruling class crudely portrayed the Cold War as a contest between those defending freedom and equality versus those imposing tyranny and enslavement. The US launched multiple cultural offensives to reinforce these views, sending books, movies, and diverse artistic figures and athletes throughout the world to signal its commitment to those lofty values.

    But as the great postwar wave of decolonization swept the world and the US appeared too often on the side of the colonists, the moral high ground seemed impossible to maintain in the eyes of the critical non-aligned nations.

    Even more devastating was the ugly face of racial segregation that existed de jure in the Southern, formerly Confederate states, and de facto in the rest of the US, with its accompanying violent enforcement. To the non-white majority of the world, this inhuman practice negated any proclaimed commitment to freedom or equality.

    To meet this Cold War crisis, the US ruling class chose an approach that was both least costly to capital and its minions and most burdensome on the working people. Rather than returning to the unfinished business of post-Civil War Reconstruction, rather than attacking segregated housing patterns (disrupting profits in the finance, insurance, and real estate sector), rather than pressing fair employment (impacting corporate and business profits), rather than guaranteeing voting rights and fair representation (disrupting the political status quo), the US ruling class placed the burden of desegregation on those who were among the most vulnerable in US society: children. It was public schools and not neighborhoods, housing, public accommodations, businesses, government agencies, or corporations that would bear the brunt of desegregation.

    With the Supreme Court decision — Brown versus Board of Education — US elites offered a “victory” against segregation to place before world public opinion. Because it was a court decision made by lifetime appointees, it had little negative impact on elected officials or the fate of their political parties.

    Of course, the court decision was only symbolic unless backed up with enforcement. It is likely that Brown versus Board of Education would have remained symbolic and another gesture of self-righteousness in the cultural Cold War since officials took little interest in forcing it on the bastions of racial segregation.

    But Brown versus Board of Education did elevate racism to a place in the public debate. Also, it energized a growing resistance to segregation, adding a new generation of fighters to the struggle and legitimizing the fight. Without the growth and militancy of the peoples’ struggle, any promise offered by the Supreme Court decision would have faded, however.

    For the most part, officialdom and the Civil Rights movement operated on parallel tracks, with Federal policies focused on school desegregation in the South and the movement tackling voting rights and desegregating public spaces. Elites largely sought to confine and retard the struggle for racial justice.

    Nonetheless, the movement for racial justice forced a series of civil rights acts in the mid-1960s that addressed the harshest aspects of Southern segregation, supporting voting rights and the use of public accommodations, as well as denying workplace and housing discrimination in the US.

    With the murder of the most influential anti-racist leaders, the suppression of urban risings, and the political backlash of Southern reactionaries, the US ruling class called a halt to the school desegregation project. The landmark Millikin versus Bradley Supreme Court decision of 1974 settled the limits of public education desegregation at the border of wealthier suburbs. Desegregation was meant only for poor and working-class schools, and not for the schools of the elite. For US elites — Cold War optics be damned — the costs of racial justice would not be borne by wealth and power. No bus would transport urban Blacks to the rolling hills of suburbia; nor would any children of the petty-bourgeois find seats awaiting in city public schools.

    Class critically intersected race at that juncture, a reality that continues to shape the contours of anti-racism going forward.

    Of course, despite this setback, the struggle against racism continued, but as affirmative action– a project to go beyond formal, level-playing field equality and place material support behind the economic mobility necessary for substantial equality. Behind affirmative action was the understanding that racial justice was an active process and not a static state of affairs, i.e. nominal equality. In other words, those disadvantaged by racism needed substantial advantages to continue their journey to equality.

    Ideally, the impact of affirmative action would be race-neutral. African Americans could gain “advantages” without disadvantaging anyone else: jobs could be created in workplaces where they were underrepresented without denying jobs to any non-Black worker; mentorships and job-training could be made available to all; subsidized new or existing housing could be established; health care could be universal, etc. To use the term popular with pundits, affirmative action could be “win-win.”

    When the win-win logic is true of society at large, it is the basis for socialism.

    But that is not the logic of capitalism. Capitalism is relentless competition: what the same pundits call “zero-sum.” Someone must win, someone must lose. When someone applies to the best public school, there is room for one more. When someone applies to a private school, some win, some lose.

    Consequently, the logic of capitalist society produces smug winners and disgruntled losers. And affirmative action that advantaged African Americans produced many who were or felt they were disadvantaged. Under capitalism, social progress is always the class struggle over who will sacrifice, who will pay.

    Nevertheless, well-intentioned, anti-racist liberals pressed affirmative action on US capitalism with some success. Gertrude Ezorsky, a leading theorist of affirmative action, notes that “A dramatic increase in black employment and promotion occurred at specific companies that adopted affirmative action plans. These companies include AT&T, IBM, Levi-Strauss, and Sears Roebuck,” (Racism And Justice, the Case for Affirmative Action) She also noted that by ”…1982, 20,000 black officers had been added to police forces around the nation.” This squares with the ruling class’s determination to make police and military action against the colored peoples not look like white on Black or white on non-white violence.

    Ironically, one of the greatest successes of the affirmative action era was Richard Nixon’s Justice Department-initiated Philadelphia plan to integrate the building trades. Blacks in the Philadelphia building trades went from one per cent of all workers to twelve per cent by 1982.

    But as Ezorsky concedes, affirmative action declined drastically in the 1980s: “After 1980 there was a dramatic decline in the enforcement of AA [affirmative action] through the federal compliance program. The effectiveness of AA also declined as a result of Supreme Court decisions during the 1980s.”

    With the courts, politicians, and the media fleeing affirmative action remedies that would address material class inequality, liberals and social democrats shaped anti-racism into “glass-ceiling” anti-racism. That is, the battle for racial justice became merely an effort to absorb more African Americans into the petty-bourgeoisie and into elite circles.

    Token or role-model representation is sold as an incentive for working class and poor Blacks. This pick-yourself-up-by-your-bootstrap version of anti-racism reached its zenith with the elevation of Barack Obama into the highest seat of political power. The celebration of Obama, and the relatively robust growth of a Black petty-bourgeoisie, left the inner-city impoverished, powerless, and nourished only by symbolic victories.

    The gap between white and Black income and wealth remains relatively the same as half-century ago — worse for most, better for some. Educational inequities, segregated housing, poor infrastructure, and marginal employment remain the fate of many, if not most African Americans. Urban ghettoization — once a basis for a measure of racial solidarity — has been shattered, not by emancipation, but by colonization: the brute force of gentrification.

    For the “new” anti-racism — with its rejection of the class dimension — language, gestures, symbols, and manners are the target of self-satisfied justice warriors and not material deprivation or class exploitation. Where a leader like Martin Luther King found the continuation of the Black struggle in the fight of Memphis garbage workers seeking better pay, today’s NGO-sponsored “organizers” look to call out verbal clumsiness, historical anachronisms, and “microaggressions.” They look to create “safe spaces” where diversity can be smugly celebrated. They can locate the roots of racism in the twisted minds of white racists, but not in a socio-economic system that benefited, and continues to benefit, from the competition that racism generated and from the super-profits that flowed from a racial division of labor.

    Accordingly, the “new” anti-racists are less attentive to the macro-aggressions of inferior health care, low-paying jobs, substandard housing, and still segregated, poor education. Since exploitation, poverty, and despair have come into existence, privileged reformers have blamed the victims for the evils that exploitation, poverty, and despair spawn. It is no different with today’s liberals who organize marches, seminars, and rallies decrying the violence and drug use plaguing our poorest communities, while overlooking the meager material conditions that are the fertile soil of social self-destruction.

    When commentators announce the death of affirmative action, citing the recent decision, Students for Fair Admissions versus Presidents and Fellows of Harvard College, they are profoundly mistaken. Affirmative action has been dead for a long time, eviscerated, ignored, evaded, and demonized since the 1980s.

    Racial preference is deemed necessary at elite, ruling-class training academies like the Ivies because their admissions policies are so riddled with legacy, athletic, donor, and faculty admissions. As guardians of ruling-class liberalism and custodians of ruling-class mythology, these largely private institutions hide the unjustifiable privilege shown to those without merit behind a cynical veneer of racial and ethnic sensitivity, hoping that it will mask class privilege. The Supreme Court decision was not a blow to long-abused affirmative action, but to a cynical system of elite privilege; it was a reminder of its hypocrisy.

    Affirmative action in higher education — offering, affirming, and sustaining opportunities for Black students — is easily achievable today in community colleges, colleges, and public universities by simply eliminating the huge student-loan debt that burdens those without means now and going forward. The thousands of public institutions of higher learning are eager to accept students.

    Free admissions — a realistic demand for a peoples’ movement — would be a long step toward restoring the promise of authentic affirmative action.

    Rather than indulging the current class-blind anti-racist fashion of policing speech, humor, body language, books, and statues, an authentic anti-racism can seek to remove the material roadblocks to equality, as King and his predecessors sought. Of course, there is a cost to equality, a cost to real, and not fanciful, formal opportunity. And that burden should be borne by those who have benefited from racism: the rich and powerful.

    This post was originally published on Dissident Voice.