brad brace contemporary culture scrapbook

The Jubilee Act, a bill currently moving through Congress, would extend debt
cancellation to 67 low-income countries, provided they demonstrate plans to spend the
money wisely on poverty reduction programs.

Despite debt relief agreements in 1999 and 2005, countries of the Global South continue
to spend $100 million every day to pay foreign debts, often incurred by undemocratic
governments and under unfair lending practices. In 2005, Mexico spent $44 billion to
service debt, more than the entire budget allocated for education. Such a tremendous
outflow of money to rich countries clearly contradicts the international community’s
commitment to end poverty. Instead, debt payments limit a country’s ability to create
opportunities for people to live the lives they choose at home and force millions to
migrate in search of work.

Debt cancellation stimulates economies. For example, Uganda has invested its 2006 debt
relief savings of $57.9 million in primary education, healthcare and infrastructure
upgrades. Newly available resources can also support agricultural advancements and
other critical economic development projects. Greater economic prospects result from
debt cancellation and fair economic policies

Three thousand islanders in Papua New Guinea are making preparations to
become the world’s first “climate refugees” and evacuate their home in the
Carteret islands. The UN’s Human Rights Council says the islands are being
eroded by sea waters that are rising due to global warming. Its report
predicts that people will have to abandon the islands over the next few
years and resettle on nearby Bougainville island. The document comes as
delegates from up to 190 nations meet in Bangkok today for UN climate
change talks.

Asian countries curb exports to avoid shortfalls as ‘perfect storm’ nearly doubles price in three months.

Knee-deep in muddy water, her face smeared with sandalwood paste and a broad-brimmed hat for protection against the broiling sun, Samniang Ketia grins broadly at her good fortune to be in the rice growing business as she replants shoots for the next harvest two months off.

The 37-year-old, who leases a small plot of land in Samblong, central Thailand, knows the price of rice has rocketed – in some cases nearly doubling in three months – and that she is about to reap the benefit when she sells what her family does not eat.

But the price rises have a downside and spawned a new phenomenon: rice rustling. One night, one of Samniang’s neighbour’s fields was stripped as it was about to be harvested. Local police have now banned harvesting machines from the roads at night while on the northern plains farmers are camping in their fields, shotguns at the ready.

“I’ve never heard of it happening before, that people have stolen rice,” said Lung Choop, 68, who grows rice on his smallholding. “But it’s happening now because rice is so expensive. I guess I’ll have to guard my own distant fields when they’re ready.”

Across Asia the suddenly stratospheric rice prices have prompted countries to ban exports amid fears that shortages could provoke food riots.

While prices of wheat, corn and other agricultural commodities have surged since the end of 2006, partly because of extra demand for biofuels to offset rising oil prices, rice held fairly steady.

However, prices for the staple food of about 2.5 billion Asian people rocketed two months ago. Thai rice, the global benchmark, which was quoted at just below $400 (£200) a tonne in January rose to $760 (£380) last week.

Aware that shortages of such a vital staple could spell trouble at home, Asian governments have moved to ensure their people get enough to eat at a price they could afford, an insurance policy which has in turn raised prices further.

Late last week, Cambodia banned all exports for two months to ensure “food security”, following the lead of Egypt, a major exporter. Vietnam, which ships 5m tonnes abroad each year, on Friday declared a 20% cut in exports.

India started the ball rolling late last year. With dwindling stocks, the large exporter introduced curbs that effectively banned exports, around 4m tonnes. Pakistan and China also introduced curbs.

Hopes that India would re-enter the market within the next few months were dashed on Thursday when it raised the minimum price for exports from $650 a tonne to $1,000, effectively maintaining the ban, which was escaped only by the foreign currency-earning premium basmati.

The Philippines is potentially among the biggest losers – with 91 million people, it cannot feed itself. After its farmers warned of a looming shortfall Manila’s fast-food outlets offered to serve “half portions” of rice to conserve stocks. The Philippines’ president, Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, has also pleaded with Vietnam to guarantee 1.5m tonnes of rice this year.

While Indonesians took to the streets of the capital, Jakarta, in protest at rising prices even Thailand, the world’s largest exporter, is bracing itself.

The country produces 30m tonnes of rice a year, and aims to export 8.5m tonnes. Last year 9.5m tonnes was sold abroad and more may be exported this year, prompting ministers to consider curbs. “A rice shortage in the local market is very likely,” said Prasert Kosalwit, director general of the Thai government’s rice department.

Rice shortfalls were reported in southern Thailand as traders from the northern rice belt bought up stocks at inflated prices.

With global rice stocks at their lowest level since 1976, analysts expect price rises to continue until the end of next year. Some analysts predict it could hit $1,000 (£500) a tonne before farmers, spurred by the high prices, plant more crops and increase supplies.

Demand outstripped supply by nearly 2m tonnes last year. The predicted shortfall this year is more than 3m tonnes on the 424m tonnes required.

Across Asia, with its vast and growing population, there is little if any extra land to bring into production, and it may take several years for any “supply response” to materialise.

Growing urbanisation over the longer term in countries such as China and India is cited as a key factor in the shortfall, where the increasingly affluent middle classes demand more meat and dairy products, with land turned over to growing feed for livestock.

Rising wealth in Africa has also become a factor. Oil-rich Nigeria is now the largest importer in Africa, a continent which takes the lion’s share of Thai exports, about 40%. Asia soaks up 35%.

Severe weather across Asia has also damaged production. Record icy temperatures were recorded in China and Vietnam, the latter of which also suffered a pest outbreak. Bangladesh endured a devastating cyclone while Australia suffered a prolonged drought.

“It’s been described as a ‘perfect storm’ of factors that have pushed prices to their highest levels since the 1970s,” said Adam Barclay, of the International Rice Research Institute.

The World Food Programme is also alarmed. The extra cost of feeding the 28 million “poorest of the poor” spread across 14 Asian countries will cost $160m a year and it has asked three dozen donor governments for the cash, part of a $500m global appeal to offset rising food prices.

“The real danger with rising rice prices is that the ‘working poor’ will simply be pushed into the category of ‘poor’ who will look to us to feed them,” said Paul Risley, spokesman for WFP Asia. “There are hundreds of millions living at, or just below, the poverty line of $1-a-day, spending 70% of their day-labour wages on food.

“If food costs double they’ve no opportunity to increase their earnings and no alternative but to reduce what they and their families eat.”

GENEVA – Climate change could erode the human rights of people living in small island states, coastal areas and parts of the world subjected to drought and floods, the U.N. Human Rights Council said on Friday.

In its first consideration of the issue, the 47-member forum endorsed a resolution stressing that global warming threatens the livelihoods and welfare of many of the world’s most vulnerable people.

The proposal from the Maldives, Comoros, Tuvalu, Micronesia and other countries called for “a detailed analytical study of the relationship between climate change and human rights”, to be conducted by the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, headed by Louise Arbour.

“Until now, the global discourse on climate change has tended to focus on the physical or natural impacts of climate change,” the Maldives’ ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, Abdul Ghafoor Mohamed, told the session.

“The immediate and far-reaching impact of the phenomenon on human beings around the world has been largely neglected,” he said. “It is time to redress this imbalance by highlighting the human face of climate change.”

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has made the fight against climate change one of his top priorities, and encouraged all U.N. agencies to incorporate it into their work.

Experts say global warming could cause rising sea levels and intense storms, droughts and floods which would restrict access to housing, food and clean water for millions of people.

The Human Rights Council, which wraps up its latest four-week session in Geneva on Friday, also agreed to appoint an independent expert to assess countries’ human rights obligations linked to safe drinking water and sanitation.

Under the resolution introduced by Germany and Spain, that expert will clarify what can be done to stop discrimination in their provision.

“This issue is very important for quite a large number of people,” Doru Romulus Costea, Romania’s ambassador who serves as council president, told a news briefing.

Russia voiced concern that the council’s foray into water and sanitation issues may unduly stretch its agenda and complicate its work, and Canadian diplomat Sarah Geh stressed that setting up the post did not create a human right to water.

U.N. member countries have set a goal of halving the proportion of people who lack access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation services — such as toilets — by 2015.