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The Iranian/Pakistani gas pipeline likely to top agenda for the visit of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi to Pakistan. The visit takes place in an atmosphere of renewed tensions in the Middle East and a threat of US sanctions. Credit: Zofeen Ebrahim/IPS

By Zofeen Ebrahim
KARACHI, Apr 21 2024 (IPS)

When Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi visits Pakistan this week (April 22, 2024), experts say the two issues topmost on his mind that he will want to discuss with his Pakistani counterpart, President Asif Ali Zardari, will be border security and the Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline.

“This visit comes at the most troubling time for the region,” said Senator Mushaid Hussain Sayed, chairman of the Islamabad-based Pakistan-China Institute, pointing to the war in Gaza and the resurgence of terrorism from Afghanistan, which borders both Pakistan and Iran. Added tension comes after retaliatory strikes by Israel and Iran. A suspected Israeli strike on an Iranian consulate in Syria at the beginning of the month was followed by a retaliatory attack by Iran on Israel on April 13. US officials say Israel responded, despite a plea by UN Secretary-General António Guterres for restraint. 

The gas pipeline will be an uneasy conversation to hold for Zardari, but with the lives and livelihoods of over 240 million Pakistanis tied to this fuel, finding a solution is of paramount importance for the rulers.

Hassan Nourain, consul general of Iran.

Pakistan needs gas more for residential, commercial, and industrial purposes now than for power generation, said energy expert Vaqar Zakaria, heading the Islamabad-based Hagler Bailley Pakistan, the environment consultancy company.

“Domestic consumers will be the immediate beneficiaries from the Iranian gas supply,” agreed leading sustainable development practitioner Abid Suleri, heading the Islamabad-based Sustainable Development Policy Institute. He also said the country’s economy will flourish manifold if the industry receives a steady supply of this gas.

Zakaria had been part of the negotiations some 25 years ago, in the 1990s, when conversation on importing gas from Iran through an Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline first started due to the fact that “our gas reserves were fast depleting because we were using up this finite resource as if there was no tomorrow. People would leave the stove on for hours instead of turning off the gas,” Zakaria said, blaming the lackadaisical attitude of the people and the visionless government policy of selling it at “dirt cheap rates to keep the voters happy.”

There was a third partner, India, which decided to exit in 2009, “citing pricing and security issues, and after signing a civilian nuclear deal with the United States in 2008,” Zakaria recalled.

“Iran has huge energy reserves such as crude oil and natural gas and is ready to meet the needs of friendly and neighboring countries,” said Hassan Nourain, the consul general of Iran in Karachi, in an interview to IPS. In 2021, it was estimated that Iran had close to 1,203 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, the second largest after Russia.

Pakistan and Iran continued negotiating, and on May 24, 2009, the project was signed by the Pakistani president, Asif Ali Zardari, and the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, for the supply of gas ranging from 750 million ft3/d to around 1 billion ft3/d, for 25 years, from the South Pars gas field in Iran and delivered at the Pakistan-Iran border, near Gwadar.

The project, having a pipeline length of 1,150-km within Iran and 781-km within Pakistan, was to be constructed by each country in their respective territories. Iran completed its side of pipeline construction by 2012 and was ready to transport gas to Pakistan by 2015, the Nourain said. Pakistan did not start until 2013.

A year later, in 2014, Pakistan’s petroleum minister, Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, told the Iranian government that due to sanctions on Iran, banks and contractors were unwilling to go ahead with the project on Pakistan’s side.

Natural Gas Consumption

Natural gas situation in Pakistan.

Ten years later, Pakistan is toying with the idea of building the pipeline again and in February of this year, Pakistan’s caretaker government approved the construction of the first 80-kilometer stretch from the Iranian border to Gwadar in Balochistan.

Donald Lu, US Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia, immediately censured Pakistan for its plans to import gas from Iran, as it would expose Pakistan to US sanctions.

“If a neighbor is giving us gas at competitive rates, then it is our right [to buy it],” Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif told the media earlier this month.

“The threat of these unilateral sanctions imposed on Iran by the US is illegal,” said Nourain. “In 2006, the United Nations Security Council demanded Iran halt its uranium enrichment programme and imposed certain sanctions but after monitoring it, in 2016, most sanctions were lifted for at least ten years.”

But, pointed out Arif Anwar, an international development practitioner: “The US is entitled to do what it wants with USAID and or any banks, businesses and insurance companies that operate in the US. The sanctions on Iran and on countries trading with it have been around for decades and may even have some UN legitimacy cover.”

Moreover, warned Anwar, given that Pakistan needs support from the International Monetary Fund, which would also require US support, “Pakistan needs to tread a careful path.”

“Pakistan needs gas,” said Lahore-based lawyer Ahmad Rafay Alam, terming the US warning “an unfair US policy.”

“The pipeline is pivotal for Pakistan’s energy independence,” pointed out Sayed. “It cuts costs as it is 40 percent less than imported LNG (liquefied natural gas),” he said.

“The US no longer has the moral authority to impose sanctions on either Iran or Pakistan if both countries exercise their sovereignty and agree to buy and sell anything to one another, not after its support of the Gaza genocide,” Alam said, echoing the sentiments of a vast majority of the South Asian nation of over 240 million that remain staunch supporters of Palestine.

Some analysts believe that the Pakistani population will benefit from a steady supply of gas. This photo was taken at the LPG filling station in Clifton, Karachi. Credit: Zofeen Ebrahim/IPS

But, said Anwar, the Pakistani government needs to reflect on how it arrived at this difficult predicament. “The sanctions against Iran were in place well before the contract was signed. Why didn’t the government insert suitable safeguards in the contract?” and then responded to his own question: “Because political expediency takes priority.”

He was referring to the quandary that Pakistan is in right now—if it does not build the pipeline, Iran can slap a fine of USD 18 billion. The deadline expires in September this year. And if it goes ahead, the US may place sanctions on Pakistan.

“The government of Pakistan asked Iran to extend the timeline in 2014 for ten years and that expires this year,” the Nourain pointed out.

Seeking Waivers

However, there is one option left for Pakistan. “We start with the Pakistani side of the pipeline, and in the meantime, we officially seek a waiver as well,” offers Sayed.

Former Law and Justice Minister Ahmad Irfan Aslam said taking the diplomatic route and seeking support from Saudi Arabia and the UAE may secure Pakistan a waiver, but warned: “In return, the US will have its own set of demands.” It will mean treading smartly and “constructing a package that works for both sides,” he told IPS.

But with the hostile US-Iran relations, Michael Kugelman, director of the Wilson Center’s South Asia Institute in Washington, said Washington may not be in a charitable mood with countries engaging commercially with Iran.

“It won’t be inclined to give Pakistan a sanctions waiver,” he said.

“Some countries are allowed to import gas and petroleum products from Iran; why can’t Pakistan get the waiver?” countered the Nourain.

China, Greece, Italy, South Korea, Japan, Turkey, Iraq, and Taiwan were given waivers by the US in the past for importing oil from Iran but not extended beyond April 2019, leading to a significant drop in Iran’s oil exports. However, China has continued to import Iranian crude oil and has made it clear that it is not willing to comply with US sanctions against Iran.

“The US applies a double standard,” said Nourain, adding: “When the US warns Pakistan of sanctions, it is not on the government, but on the people of Pakistan.”

“We should insist on the same rules for Pakistan as there are for others regarding importing energy from Iran,” Sayed said.

The US mission in the country told IPS that Pakistan has not requested a waiver.

But if Pakistan pursues the pipeline project, Zakaria pointed out that it may find it difficult to look for funders.

Kugelman believed Beijing could be wooed, but Moscow could also be an option. “With Russia enjoying friendly relations with Iran, if the former can help Pakistan on this, Pakistan-Russia relations will also gather strength,” he added.

Anwar had an alternative perspective. “If countries can engage their private sector for space travel, surely Pakistan can do it for a gas pipeline,” he said. “The agreement may be government-to-government but the private sector could manage construction and operation,” he said. “The government should not try everything itself, but rather create an environment for the private sector to invest and deliver goods and services.”

Or, pointed out Kugelman, “Pakistan may focus more attention on legal avenues that bring down the risk of facing a massive fine if it doesn’t end up building it.” He admitted that none of the options were good or easy. “It’s one more policy conundrum for a new government grappling with plenty of them.”

Imported Gas or Domestic Renewables?

Pakistan is getting LNG at USD 13/MMBTu through long-term contracts, while the spot market is currently trending around USD 8/MMBTu. So, Pakistan should negotiate firmly with Iran on pricing to buy it at a “considerably cheaper price for it to make sense for Pakistan to build the pipeline and transport the gas across Pakistan,” said Haneea Isaad, energy finance specialist at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA).

And with predictions of a “supply glut” from 2025 onwards, she pointed out, the price of LNG is expected to continue the downward trend.

Suleri had the same advice. “Securing affordable LNG, irrespective of its source, is Pakistan’s best bet.”

However, Isaad warned that an unprecedented hot or cold spell in Europe and East Asia may “lead to a hike in LNG prices right back in and should be factored in.”

Others ask that if Iran goes off the charts again, perhaps Pakistan can look to Central Asia for supplies of natural gas, to which the US should have no objections. Last year, Islamabad and Ashgabat signed a joint implementation plan to revive the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project, which aims to export up to 33 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year through a proposed approximately 1,800-kilometer pipeline from Turkmenistan to India. “TAPI will not take off until Afghanistan and India do not come on board, and frankly, in the current geopolitical mess that we’re in, this is not going to happen anytime soon,” said Suleri.

With the challenge of ensuring a steady supply of gas at an affordable price and the looming threats of sanctions and penalties from Iran, Suleri also reminded us that Pakistan’s pledge to shift to 60 percent renewable energy by 2030 was just six years away.

“We can switch to solar water heating in homes, like it is done in Kathmandu, instead of using natural gas, with backup electric water heating when the weather is cloudy,” suggested Zakaria. Electricity can also be generated in homes using solar panels, he added. “And instead of expanding the gas network to smaller towns at a high cost, LPG (liquefied petroleum gas) can be cross-subsidized with gas to provide cleaner fuel to houses at an affordable price.”

“Pakistan should look into investing in REs,” agreed Suleri, but pointed out that it may not be commercially viable to supply at a scale that meets the country’s requirements.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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A mini ginnery could ensure the future of the cotton industry in Kenya. Credit: Wilson Odhiambo/IPS

By Wilson Odhiambo
NAIROBI, Apr 19 2024 (IPS)

Kirinyaga University may have just breathed new life into Kenya’s ailing cotton industry as varsity dons develop a portable cotton ginnery.

For an industry that has been struggling to survive, this news came as a relief to cotton farmers, whose lives the invention is expected to change, and to a government pushing for job creation and self-reliance through manufacturing. 

The project, funded by the government through the National Research Fund (NRF), is a portable cotton ginning machine aimed at addressing the problems faced by farmers, by providing them with a means to process their cotton directly on their farms and hence determine their own market prices.

The invention is the brainchild of four professors from Kirinyaga University: Dennis Muchangi, Grace Kiiru, David Kabata, and Agnes Mutiso.

The cotton processing industry has been struggling to recover for decades since its collapse in the 1990s, despite Kenya boasting of being a pioneer cotton miller and having the largest cotton gin in East Africa, Kisumu Cotton Mills (KICOMI).

The famous KICOMI, located in Nyanza province, has been a centre of controversy since its sudden shutdown in the 1990s. The mill, started in 1964, provided jobs for thousands of people as it was strategically located in the country’s largest cotton production region (served the western and Nyanza regions).

The result of this closure was a collapse in the country’s largest cotton production region as the farmers eventually opted for other means of survival. Today, the mill remains a shell of its former glory, despite repeated attempts by the government to revive it.

‘’From our research, we found out that the remaining cotton ginneries in the country were struggling to stay open due to the high cost of maintaining the ginneries, and the ones that were in operation were inaccessible by most cotton farmers across the country,’’ said Dennis Muchangi, project team leader.

‘’The closure of ginneries forced the remaining cotton farmers to rely on middlemen to find a market for their products, which meant exploitation and eventual loss of morale in cotton farming for most of them. Currently, they are forced to sell a kilo of grade 2 cotton at Ksh. 26, while grade 1 goes for Ksh. 52,’’ Muchangi told IPS.

Kirinyaga University’s invention has brought hope to cotton farmers, most of whom had ventured into other sources of income.

According to the academics, their invention will help the government boost the textile manufacturing industry while also creating blue-collar jobs such as artisans and mechanics, as the machine is easy to make with locally available material and the designs for its manufacture will be made open to the public.

‘’The portable ginnery is quite a simple machine with designs that are easy to understand for any local mechanic,’’ said Muchangi. This means that they can be built in any location.

The mini ginnery is a far cry from the large industry ginneries, as it is made out of simple scrap metal and other materials that can be found locally and assembled in any work shop.

‘’Another problem we noted among the available ginneries was maintenance delays, which led to a lot of stalling and shut downs. The big ginnery machines are expensive to maintain and too complex for local mechanics, which meant having to wait for months to get expert engineers from Nairobi to come and fix them. This was bad for the farmers and the cotton industry,’’ Muchangi explained.

‘’With our machines, farmers will no longer have to wait for experts and they can instead call any locally available mechanic.’’

Muchangi added that while the government is expecting to spend billions to revamp the stalled ginneries, their miniature machine requires less than Ksh. 100,000 (about USD 724) to build and even less to maintain.

Grace Kiiru, a project member, explained that the machine is also easy to use and, once taught, can be operated by anyone, both men and women. This, she said, will help empower women and the youth.

‘’While the larger ginneries require experts to operate, our machine is quite easy to learn and use and can be operated by anyone once they get the basic knowledge. This means that they can be operated throughout, thus boosting cotton production,’’ Kiiru told IPS.

The ginnery has also been designed to be able to accommodate farmers who live in areas with limited or no access to electricity.

‘’Given that most farmers are found in rural areas, characterized by limited or lack of electricity, we have made our machine in such a way that it can be operated manually or can be fitted with a petrol-powered generator for those who can afford it. We are also working on enabling it to run using solar energy,’’ Kiiru said.

The ginnery is small enough to be transported on a motorbike, making it accessible even in rural areas where motor vehicle transport may be a problem.

According to Kiiru, the machine has the ability to process up to 500 kg of cotton in a single day, which will make it quite profitable to farmers who can sell their products directly to the textile factories.

‘’Our intention is to help farmers determine their own prices by cutting out the middleman. By processing their own cotton, farmers will be able to sell their product for as much as Ksh. 200 (USD 1.51 per kilo up from the Ksh 25 (about USD 0.19) per kilo that they are currently being forced to accept,’’ she explained.

Kenya currently relies on cotton imports to supplement its textile industry, a fact that Saada Mangi laments has made the cost of some fabric high.

‘’Most clothing designers like myself import fabric from India due to the high cost and sometimes lack of material of the same quality locally. We are forced to sell our finished clothes at high prices, meaning we have to target certain clients who can afford them,’’ Mangi said.

‘’It is sad to see people prefer imported clothes and materials because they are more affordable compared to what we make locally. This is part of what kills our culture as a country,’’ Mangi said.

‘’Rivatex Textiles, Kenya’s largest textile factory, has had to rely on cotton imports from countries like Egypt to sustain its demands. Our machines will give farmers in the western and Nyanza regions a reason to resume cotton farming, which means no more importation and hence reduced prices on textile products,’’ Muchangi concluded.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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The 15-member Security Council-- which includes five veto-wielding permanent members, namely the US, UK, France, China and Russia-- plays a decisive role in the election of a UN Secretary-General. Credit: United Nations
 
With current UN Secretary-General António Guterres set to step down in 2026, who is in the running to replace him? In this seven-part series, Felix Dodds and Chris Spence reveal who might be in the running and assess their chances.
 
The potential candidates include Amina J. Mohammed (Nigeria), Mia Motley (Barbados), Alicia Barcena (Mexico), Maria Fernanda Espinosa (Ecuador), Rebeca Grynspan (Costa Rica) and Michelle Bachelet (Chile). These are names that have come up in conversations with UN insiders and other experts. All six would offer skills and experiences we believe would be valuable in these fast-paced, uncertain times.
 
“The suffering we see around us is a reminder of what is at stake when we lose sight of the long term, when we leave people behind and we lose the ability to put ourselves in others’ shoes. What we’re seeing is a preview of what the world could be in 2030, if the Sustainable Development Goals fail.”

By Felix Dodds and Chris Spence
APEX, North Carolina / DUBLIN, Ireland, Apr 19 2024 (IPS)

This was the stark warning of Rebeca Grynspan, Secretary-General of the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), in 2023.

Grynspan was appointed as the new head of UNCTAD—and its first female leader—in 2021. Before this, she had been Secretary-General of the Ibero-American Summits from 2014-2021, and a deputy head at the UN Development Programme (UNDP) from 2010-2014.

She has also held other UN roles dating back a decade further. These include serving as a subregional director of the Economic Commission for Latin American and the Caribbean (ECLAC), and as UNDP’s regional director for Latin America and the Caribbean.

But her expertise also crosses into government.

During the 1990s she held several high-profile roles in her native Costa Rica, including serving as Vice President from 1994-1998. She also held the housing, economics, and social affairs portfolios at various stages of her career, and was a Vice Minister of Finance in the late 1980s.

Rebeca Grynspan, Secretary-General of the Geneva-based UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)

Grynspan has also been on various boards and high-level panels over the years, dealing either with financial matters, human development, or both. For instance, she chaired the board of the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), served as a delegate to the UN Commission for the Reconstruction of Haiti, and more recently was on the G20 High Level Independent Panel (HLIP) on Financing the Global Commons for Pandemic Preparedness and Response.

She has also served on boards tackling issues such as nutrition and food policy, and women’s political leadership. She is also coordinator of the Task Team of the Global Crisis Response Group on Food, Energy and Finance set up by the UN Secretary-General to help support countries face the economic shocks related to the war in Ukraine.

Could Grynspan’s breadth of experience, and her deep background in finance and economics, be viewed as an asset at a time when financing in general, and particularly support for the Global South, are widely seen as inadequate?

For example, the shortfall in funding for the Sustainable Development Goals in the South is now estimated at $4 trillion. How can we turn this around? Grynspan’s professional experience, including negotiating the debt of her country with the IMF, and her extensive training as an economist (she holds economics degrees from universities in Costa Rica and the UK) could be viewed as timely and valuable in this regard.

Assessing Grynspan’s Prospects

Could economist Rebeca Grynspan become the next UN Secretary-General? Here is our assessment of her advantages and disadvantages should she choose to enter her name into the contest.

Advantages

– Seniority: Grynspan may not have been a president or prime minister, but as Vice President of Costa Rica she climbed close to the summit of her country’s political mountain. Although it is unclear whether the current Secretary-General’s status as a former prime minister will be a one-off event or the start of a trend, Grynspan’s seniority in her native Costa is unlikely to harm her candidature, should she choose to apply, and would likely help it.
– UN Experience: As the first female Secretary-General of UNCTAD, Grynspan has already broken one glass ceiling within the United Nations. She would also bring more than twenty years’ experience within the UN system, something that would surely be viewed as an asset during these uncertain times. Additionally, she is familiar with the internal workings of the UN in Geneva, New York and across Latin America, giving her insights into decision making at both headquarters and regionally. This breadth of experience within the UN could be useful to any future UN leader.
– Proven Impact: Grynspan is viewed as someone who can have an impact, a perception recognized by Forbes magazine, which named her among the 100 most powerful women in Central America four years running. She was also instrumental in the UN-brokered Black Sea Initiative agreed by Russia, Türkiye, and Ukraine that has allowed millions of tons of grain and other foodstuffs to leave Ukraine’s ports, playing an important role in global food security.
– Connections: Grynspan has had many years operating in the regional level and at the global level, too. Her networks may arguably not be as wide as some other candidates, but would still provide a good platform for her to succeed.
– A Woman Leader: As with our other candidates, Grynspan offers the chance to break the glass ceiling and become the first female leader of the UN.

Disadvantages

– Climate and the Environment: Although Grynspan has strong credentials on trade, finance and development, it is only recently that she began to have a higher profile on climate change and some of the other big environmental issues of our time. For instance, she recently co-hosted the first ever Trade Day event at COP28, and has become a strong advocate for reform of the financial and debt architecture to allow developing countries the fiscal space to invest in carbon mitigation and adaptation. Could her relatively recent involvement in this key issue count against her, or will it rather be seen as adding to her impressive credentials in other areas?
– Peace and Security: Peace, security and conflict resolution have not featured prominently in her background. However, as with climate change, they are often front-and-center of international news. If the UN Security Council members are looking for expertise in this area, might Grynspan’s relative lack of experience be considered a possible weakness? Or, would they consider her recent role in the Black Sea Initiative as recent evidence of her engagement in this area?
– Name Recognition: Although she is widely respected in her fields and across the UN, Grynspan may not have the same sort of name recognition among the public as some of the other candidates.

Prof. Felix Dodds and Chris Spence have participated in United Nations conferences and negotiations since the 1990s. They co-edited Heroes of Environmental Diplomacy: Profiles in Courage (Routledge, 2022), which examines the roles of individuals in inspiring change.

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IPS UN Bureau

 

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The UN General Assembly in session.
 
With current UN Secretary-General António Guterres set to step down in 2026, who is in the running to replace him? In this seven-part series, Felix Dodds and Chris Spence reveal who might be in the running and assess their chances.
 
The potential candidates include Amina J. Mohammed (Nigeria), Mia Motley (Barbados), Alicia Barcena (Mexico), Maria Fernanda Espinosa (Ecuador), Rebeca Grynspan (Costa Rica) and Michelle Bachelet (Chile). These are names that have come up in conversations with UN insiders and other experts. All six would offer skills and experiences we believe would be valuable in these fast-paced, uncertain times.

By Felix Dodds and Chris Spence
APEX, North Carolina / DUBLIN, Ireland, Apr 18 2024 (IPS)

Is the rough-and-tumble of leading the UN General Assembly a good preparation for the top UN job?

Maria Fernanda Espinosa served as President of the UN General Assembly from 2018-2019, garnering votes from 128 out of 193 member states. With her victory, she became only the fourth woman—and the first from Latin America—to run this important UN body.

Her time in charge of the General Assembly was eventful. During her year as its leader, Espinosa pushed hard for progress on women’s empowerment and gender equality, particularly in terms of boosting women’s political participation. On several occasions she gathered women heads of state and government, as well as other female leaders, for events aimed at advancing this agenda.

María Fernanda Espinosa Garcés, President of the 73rd session of the UN General Assembly. Credit: UN Photo

She also focused on the rights of refugees, presiding over the adoption of the Global Compact on Refugees, as well as a Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration. Furthermore, she launched an International Year of Indigenous Languages and helped advance the international conversation on single-use plastics, supporting efforts to eliminate their use at UN headquarters in New York and Geneva.

Additionally, she used her tenure to urge greater progress on nuclear disarmament and on diseases like tuberculosis.

But her career began thousands of miles from New York. Her early focus was in the Amazon, working alongside indigenous communities in her native Ecuador. Later, she represented Ecuador as its Ambassador to the UN. She also served twice as her country’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and in several other ministerial positions, including as Minister of Defense and, earlier, as Minister of Natural and Cultural Heritage.

Prior to holding these senior government positions, Espinosa was an associate professor and researcher at the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences. She also served as an advisor on biodiversity, climate change, and indigenous peoples’ policies. Later, she became regional director for South America for the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), a position she held from 2005-2007.

Espinosa’s track record on climate change is also noteworthy, as she has served since 2009 as a key negotiator in several climate conferences, including COP21 in 2015, where the Paris Agreement was signed.

Her early academic life was as broad and eclectic as her later professional career, with degrees in social science, Amazonic studies, anthropology, political science, and linguistics. She even won a national prize in poetry.

Assessing Espinosa’s Prospects

Could Maria Fernanda Espinosa’s wide-ranging experiences qualify her to be the next UN Secretary-General? Here is our assessment of her advantages and disadvantages, should she put her name forward.

Advantages

– Right Region: Like several of our other potential candidates, Espinosa’s Ecuadorian background and an apparent preference for a leader from Latin America and the Caribbean could work in her favor.
– UN Experience: Espinosa has been both the President of the UN General Assembly, where she emerged with her reputation intact, and a UN Ambassador in New York. She has led the Group of 77 developing nations in UN negotiations and been a lead negotiator in key climate talks. These UN experiences should surely burnish her credentials.
– Connections: Espinosa developed strong networks during her time leading the Group of 77 and as President of the UN General Assembly. She has strong connections among leading women’s groups and indigenous peoples. Could this robust set of networks among senior politicians and various important stakeholders help her become Secretary-General?
– A Woman Leader: As noted previously, the UN has never had a female leader during its 80-year history. It is high time this changed. Espinosa would be another capable candidate. In addition, she has a clear track record promoting women’s leadership at the United Nations.

She is current Executive Director of the Group of Women Leaders for Change Inclusion, hosting a successful summit in Madrid early in 2024 that drew leaders from the UN system, as well as high-profile names such as Hilary Clinton.

Disadvantages

– Should Only Prime Ministers Apply? The current Secretary-General, António Guterres, was previously Portugal’s Prime Minister. While earlier UN leaders did not head-up governments, it is an open question as to whether Guterres’ appointment will set a new precedent or expectation for future UN leaders. If it does, Espinosa and other candidates who cannot boast of being a former president or prime minister may have their work cut out. That said, historically the UN Secretary-General’s role often attracted former foreign ministers to apply. If that earlier precedent is restored, Espinosa’s time as Ecuador’s foreign minister (twice) could be an advantage.
– An ‘Outside’ Insider? Like Alicia Bárcena and some other possible candidates, Espinosa can claim both outside experience as a government minister, and ‘inside’ UN expertise heading up the UN General Assembly and playing a leading role at major UN negotiations. However, it is worth noting that Espinosa has never actually worked within the UN as a staff member; most of her UN experience was gained while she was with the Ecuadorian government. This makes it substantively different. Espinosa will likely have less true inside working knowledge than some other possible candidates of how the UN operates internally, possibly meaning her learning curve would be steeper.
– Name Recognition: While those in UN climate circles and at New York headquarters will know her, Espinosa is not a household name. Could this tell against her?

Prof. Felix Dodds and Chris Spence have participated in United Nations conferences and negotiations since the 1990s. They co-edited Heroes of Environmental Diplomacy: Profiles in Courage (Routledge, 2022), which examines the roles of individuals in inspiring change.

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IPS UN Bureau

 

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Works at the Tilenga Development Project operated by TotalEnergies. Some landowners object to what they consider forced evictions with inadequate compensation. Credit: Wambi Michael/IPS

By Wambi Michael
KAMPALA, BULIISA, and HOIMA , Apr 18 2024 (IPS)

When Mugisha Jealousy Mulimba learned that the government of Uganda was dragging him to court, he expected justice. But he says he has realized these courts are being used to deprive him of his rights to a fair hearing and the right to fair and adequate compensation for his land and property.

Mulimba told IPS that within days after the government’s case against him and 41 other landowners in the oil-rich Uganda Albertine region was heard in December 2023, the court ruled that money meant for the expropriation compensation should be deposited with the court and that the government could evict them so that TotalEnergies oil refinery construction could go ahead and the pipes for the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) could be installed.

“It was the fastest trial that I have known of since my childhood. And more so that involving a case when the government sued its citizens,” Mulimba told IPS.

“Justice Jesse Byaruhanga of the High Court in Hoima heard and passed the judgment against us within four days. You can imagine determining a case filed by the government within four days,” he added. Now the landowners are playing a waiting game, not knowing when they will finally be evicted.

Mulimba and hundreds of the dependents of the 42 landowners  are on the brink of homelessness, facing eviction for refusing to accept the unjust, unfair, and inadequate compensation by TotalEnergies, which is acquiring the land from the peasant farmers on behalf of the government.

The threat of forceful eviction of the landowners has been around for years. But this time, it appears to be imminent, with the government armed with an eviction order and determined that the oil, discovered in 2006, should be extracted by 2025.

“Unfortunately, we, the landowners, have been punished since 2018. And now, with their eviction order, they can do anything. But we are determined to die for our rights,” said Fred Balikenda. The government applied and granted a specific order to have Balikenda evicted from his land in Kirama village.

“Each of us is going through the toughest times. You don’t know when they will finally pounce or how they will treat us,” said Balikenda

On December 4, 2023, Uganda’s Attorney General’s Chamber sued 43 landowners. The suit asked the court to grant the government leave to deposit compensation money in the court so that TotalEnergies could take possession of land for the Tilenga oil and gas project.

The government asked that it be discharged from any liabilities arising from any claim from the eviction order.

The High Court ruled on December 8, 2023, that the landowners’ compensation be deposited in court so that TotalEnergies can take possession of the land in dispute. TotalEnergies E&P has since 2020 been trying to acquire a 60-acre piece of land on behalf of Uganda’s Ministry of Energy.

The “hurried ruling” in favor of the government raised eyebrows within the legal fraternity. In Uganda, land disputes stay in the court system for years without resolution.

“All the cases we filed against the government are still rotting in the courts. The same judiciary hears the case against us by the government in four days. Has the devil taken over our government? We are crying in our hearts, wondering who will help poor people like us,” said Kwonka William Mugisa, another landowner.

A human rights lawyer, Eron Kiiza, issued a statement saying that the judge in the matter violated established legal principles by delivering a verdict in the land case within four days, without allowing the accused parties to respond or contest the matter.

“When a judge, oozing impunity, deliberately denies parties to a case/suit an opportunity/right to be heard, to contradict the evidence, to file their submissions, and hastily makes orders for the benefit of TotalEnergies to prejudice Ugandans’ homes, gardens, residences, livelihoods, dignity, and property, he is undermining the rule of law and fundamental human rights and freedoms,” said Kiiza.

Kiiza and other lawyers in January have tried to urge the Uganda Law Society to boycott the Judiciary’s activities in protest against the conduct and the way the judge handled the matter.

He, with the permission of the landowners, appealed the ruling to the Court of Appeal to overturn the High Court eviction order and compensation money deposited in the court.

The Court of Appeal had not fixed the date for hearing the appeal petition at the time IPS was filing this report. Fearing that the government could go ahead with the eviction, Mulimba and four other aggrieved parties traveled to Kampala at the end of February in an attempt to seek an audience with the Minister of Constitutional Affairs and the other leaders in the judiciary to hear their plea.  Mulimba old IPS that they were not allowed to enter any of the offices.

Kwonka William told IPS that, going by the government’s valuation report, he was being forced to accept an equivalent of about USD 9 for his land and assets.

The Energy Ministry’s Permanent Secretary, Irene Batebe, said in an affidavit that compensation due to the respondents was based on approved valuation reports and a 30 percent project uplift by the government.

Meanwhile, Mulimba, flanked by his wife, Pityedi Mugisa, told IPS that the government, through the court, is trying to force them to accept unfair compensation in the form of cash.

“The land is for the family. We asked for land in exchange. If they can find equivalent land, we are ready to leave. But we didn’t ask for cash,” said Mulimba.

The couple said they have attended scores of meetings demanding fair and adequate compensation but have been unsuccessful.

“We had been using that land for many years. We earned money for school fees from it. We get food from it and we got medical support from there,” he said. “So, we are not fighting the government but we are fighting for our rights to be respected.”

Dickens Kamugisha, a lawyer and Chief Executive of the Africa Institute for Energy Governance (AFIEGO), told IPS that the landowners have been trying to meet government officials to ensure that there is fairness and justice.

“Instead of ensuring fair and adequate compensation, they are now using the court. Knowing that these people cannot get the best lawyers to represent them, knowing that they cannot influence the courts. So the government is filing those cases to get those rulings that they want to use to evict the people,” he said.

Kamugisha said AFIEGO supported the oil refinery-affected people in filing a case against the government of Uganda over low, inadequate, and unfair compensation in March 2014.

“Nearly ten years later, hearings on the case have yet to be concluded. That is an injustice. And where there is injustice, you cannot have a settlement that is coming from negotiations,” he asserted.

Besides, Kamugisha told IPS that no law provides that the government can go ahead to acquire land and deposit the landowner’s compensation in court.

“In 2021, the judiciary illegally allowed the government to deposit the households’ compensation in court. This set a bad precedent that should never be repeated. It is also sad that the government has continued to use and misuse courts to destroy citizens’ right to own property and/or get adequate compensation,” Stated Kamugisha.

As the landowners wait for the Court of Appeal to consider their appeal, some of them told IPS that they are being threatened by security operatives who, they said, keep visiting their homesteads.

“That is mainly happening here in Kasinyi, Ngwedo Center, and Kisimo villages, where most of us live. Someone comes and parks a motorcycle or car at your land and then drives away. Isn’t that intimidation?” another landowner said

According to Global Witness, evidence from its undercover investigation in December 2023 showed that state authorities had threatened and detained a number of campaigners.

“In a handful of instances, the state authorities appeared to be in communication with TotalEnergies before reprisals took place,” said the report.

IPS learned from some of the employees at TotalEnergies and EACOP that the oil company was opposed to the idea of forceful evictions because it was not within its rules and that it feared the likely negative publicity.

There are also reports that TotalEnergies was considering hiring an independent firm to look into the claims by the landowners.

But Kamugisha said it is TotalEnergies that is displacing these people.

“It is unfortunate that Total is saying they are bringing here an independent investigator. They are bringing an investigator at a time when they are working with the government to get eviction orders. How is that investigator going to be helpful?”

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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Solar panels line the rooftop of the home of Cuban entrepreneur Felix Morffi, in the municipality of Regla, Havana. Large consumers in the residential sector could find in the installation of solar panels a way to offset the amount of their energy bill through cogeneration for self-consumption or receive a payment for injecting clean energy into the national power grid. CREDIT: Jorge Luis Baños / IPS

By Luis Brizuela
HAVANA, Apr 17 2024 (IPS)

With a bolder policy and flexible payment mechanisms, perhaps Alexis Rodríguez would have opted for solar panels for his home, instead of the portable generator that has made it possible for him to weather the frequent blackouts caused by Cuba’s recurrent energy crises.

“It’s a little noisy, the fuel is expensive, but I can tolerate one and solve the other. What is intolerable is for my family and I to spend nights and early mornings without electricity, without rest, suffering the heat and mosquitoes, and with the risk of the food in our fridge spoiling,” the barber, who lives in the eastern city of Holguín, told IPS."Solar panels are the best, there is no fuel cost or noise. But they need to be sold with real incentives in order for more people to invest in them." -- Félix Morffi

Rodríguez shelled out 850 dollars a few months ago for a 2500 watt (W) gasoline-powered generator.

Marileydis Pérez, a homemaker in Batabanó south of Havana, received a 900 W generator from her son, who sent it from his home in the United States, “to run the fans, the television and turn on the lights on blackout nights.”

Pérez told IPS that although the government created a system of shifts for the sale of gasoline, “just five liters” for those who have registered generators, “I have only been able to buy it that way once in two years.” As a result, she resorts to the black market for gasoline.

Highly dependent on fuel imports, Cuba consumes more than eight million tons annually, of which almost 40 percent is covered by heavy domestic crude oil with a high sulfur content, used mainly in thermoelectric generation.

During the last five years, along with the deterioration of the domestic economic situation, the fall of the main sources of foreign currency and the tightening of the U.S. embargo, the authorities have faced increasing difficulties in meeting fuel demand.

An update of retail prices in the domestic market led to an increase of more than 400 percent in sales rates since Mar. 1.

The price of a liter of regular gasoline climbed from 25 to 132 Cuban pesos (equivalent to 1.10 dollars at the official rate). The same was true for regular diesel.

On the black market, a liter of regular gasoline costs 250 to 300 pesos, or 0.70 to 0.85 cents on the dollar, taking into account the exchange rate parallel to the government’s.

In this country of 11 million inhabitants, the average monthly salary is equivalent to about 40 dollars, which amounts to around 14 dollars in the informal reference market for a significant number of products, goods and services to which families have access in order to satisfy their basic needs.

The problems facing the energy supply have fuelled the importation of generators, as well as their sale on the black market. Government-owned stores that only take foreign currency also sell them at very high prices, far beyond the reach of most families.

An extension for the non-commercial import of up to two generators that produce more than 900 W has been in place since 2022.

 

A man starts up a gasoline-powered generator in the town of Batabanó, Mayabeque province, Cuba. The country’s energy problems have fuelled the importation of portable generators in the face of the frequent power cuts caused by the energy crisis in this Caribbean island nation. CREDIT: Luis Brizuela / IPS

Barriers

People who spoke to IPS expressed misgivings about the use of generators because they are noisy.

They pointed out that they are not always placed outside the houses or in ventilated rooms so that toxic combustion gases can escape and overheating can be avoided.

When IPS asked about the possibility of solar panels, Pérez said that “in addition to being very difficult to find outside Havana, they usually come without batteries, and if they are brought in, they cost half a million pesos (about 4200 dollars at the official exchange rate).”

When the public corporation Copextel, in charge of marketing and after-sales services, began to sell them in late 2021, “they were at 55,000 pesos” (2,300 dollars at the official exchange rate at the time), unaffordable for anyone who depends on their wages or on a pension,” said Rodríguez.

The price covered the purchase, transportation, installation and assembly of the panels and inverters by the company’s technicians.

“I spend less than 200 pesos on electricity a month. With what a solar panel costs I can pay for electricity for more than 20 years,” added Rodríguez.

Another hurdle for the expansion of solar power in the residential sector lies in the electricity tariff subsidy, which is charged in a devalued currency.
According to official figures, around six percent of the more than four million households in Cuba consume more than 500 kilowatt hours (kWh) per month. Above that threshold, the electricity tariff was increased by 25 percent since March to eliminate subsidies.

By installing solar panels, this segment of the population could find a way to offset the amount of the bill through cogeneration for self-consumption or receive a payment for injecting clean energy into the national grid.

“Those who have mainly purchased the panels are people with high incomes, especially owners of hostels and rental houses. It makes it possible for them to provide air conditioning in rooms for tourists and other services during the day,” Dunia Ulloa, commercial manager of Copextel’s branch in the Havana municipality of Plaza de la Revolución, told IPS.

Two people use the flashlight of a cell phone during a blackout in Havana. The government hopes that, from the current five percent, renewable sources will account for around 30 percent of electricity generation by 2030, in order to strengthen national energy security. CREDIT: Jorge Luis Baños / IPS

 

Projects and incentives still fall short

About 95 percent of Cuba’s electricity generation relies on fossil fuels, which include the natural gas produced with domestic oil, offshore oil rigs leased from Turkey, as well as diesel and fuel oil based generators and engines.

The government aims for renewables to account for around 30 percent of electricity generation by 2030, up from the current five percent.

With an installed capacity of 260 megawatts (MW), the solar parks installed in this Caribbean country represented two percent of annual electricity generation at the end of 2023, according to official data.

On Mar. 14, Minister of Energy and Mines Vicente de la O Levy reported that two contracts had been signed for the installation of 92 solar parks in all provinces, with a potential of 2000 MW.

By May 2025, the first of the 1,000 MW contracts must be fulfilled, and the second by 2028. Each one also has an additional 100 MW of storage capacity, he said.

Since 2014 Cuba has had a Policy for the Development of Renewable Energy Sources and their Efficient Use, and in 2019, Decree Law 345 established regulations to increase the share of renewables in the energy mix and gradually decrease consumption of fossil fuels.

In 2023 the Ministry of Finance and Prices issued Resolution 238 which doubled to six pesos (0.05 cents of a dollar at the official exchange rate) the price per kWh from renewable sources delivered to the national grid by independent producers in residential areas.

In addition, the regulations waive for up to eight years the tax on profits for economic actors that carry out electricity generation projects with renewable energy sources, and the customs tax on the importation of equipment to that end.

The results are not very encouraging, pending more attractive proposals for individuals to invest in green energies, in order to sell surplus electricity to the Cuban State.

The regulations do not exempt the import of these technologies for commercialization from customs duties: the cost is the same for materials or equipment, whether they are beneficial or detrimental to energy consumption.

Unlike other countries where people make a living from selling clean energy, in Cuba those who install solar panels essentially seek energy self-sufficiency, that is, to have electric power even during blackouts.

“Solar panels are the best, there is no fuel cost or noise. But they need to be sold with real incentives in order for more people to invest in them,” entrepreneur Félix Morffi, 86, a former mid-level technician in machinery and tool repair and a tenacious advocate of clean energy opportunities, told IPS.

A group of 36 solar panels on the roof of his house provide 10 kWh to support the work of his automotive repair shop, an autonomous enterprise built by Morffi next to his house in the municipality of Regla, in the Cuban capital.

After covering his household needs, the surplus electricity he produces goes to the national grid.

“An essential element is to provide credit. Not everyone has the money to buy the equipment. The other is to not get bogged down in red tape, because it scares people off. Banks must have people who deal only with this issue, who are trained, and who want to get things moving. If that happens, you will see how in the neighborhoods more and more people start to put up panels,” said Morffi.

In his view, “those who produce the most should be recognized, perhaps by giving them household appliances, increasing the rates paid to them for surplus energy or covering part of the investment. In the end, it is a gain for the country and reduces fuel expenses.”

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Dr. Amani Abou-Zeid is the current African Union (AU) commissioner for Energy and Infrastructure. She believes that cross-border approaches are critical for clean energy affordability. Credit: Aimable Twahirwa/IPS

By Aimable Twahirwa
ABU DHABI, Apr 17 2024 (IPS)

Investors, regulators, researchers, policymakers, and representatives of renewable energy companies, acknowledged the key challenges of shifting away from fossil fuels to renewable energy in Africa when they gathered in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates (UAE) this week.

The latest estimates by the African Development Bank show that Africa’s energy potential, especially renewable energy, is enormous, yet only a fraction of it is currently employed. Official projections indicate that the demand for energy could also be around 30 percent higher than it is today over the next decade on the continent. 

Francesco La Camera, the Director-General of the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) stated that the energy transition is accelerating rapidly, but it clearly remains off track, with an unacceptable uneven distribution of renewable growth that still disproportionately affects the Global South.

“African governments and other stakeholders should adopt innovative solutions to overcome pressing challenges and achieve the energy transition,” La Camera told IPS in an interview.

According to him, there is opportunity [for the continent] to prioritize and narrow down collective actions to overcome the structural and systemic barriers that are impeding progress.

In Africa, experts believe that there are multiple dimensions to energy poverty, which is associated especially with the lack of clear plans and a clear understanding of what the continent wants to achieve.

“Electricity remains the backbone of Africa’s new energy systems, powered increasingly by renewables but a large part of the continent is still left out of the energy transition,” said Bruce Douglas, the Chief Executive Officer at the Global Renewables Alliance, one of the global coalitions of leading industry players committed to accelerating the global transition to renewable energy.

Yet several new commitments were made at the latest UN Climate Change Conference (COP 28) that took place in Dubai, UAE, last year, giving further momentum to the energy transition. Experts are now exploring priorities for the energy transition and immediate steps to ensure that current policies on the continent are improved to encourage greater deployment of renewables.

The latest estimates show that, with Africa accounting for around 39 percent of the world’s renewable energy potential, several renewable energy milestones can be achieved.

“Private and public investment is critical to tackling the multiple dimensions of today’s energy crisis on the continent but to ensure energy security, diversification of various sources is also essential,” Douglas told IPS.

Africa, for example, has abundant hydro, solar, wind, geothermal, hydrogen, and bioenergy resources, but still, the continent’s current energy generation mix continues to rely on fossil fuels, while renewable sources account for nearly 18 percent of the electricity output, it said.

Whereas countries committed on the sidelines of last year’s UN Climate Change Conference to accelerate progress towards tripling renewable power capacity globally to at least 11 terawatts (TW) by 2030, some experts believe that this is still not a long-term solution as more than half of the population still lacks access to electricity.

Amani Abou-Zeid, the Commissioner for Infrastructure and Energy of the African Union Commission (AUC) told IPS that a cross-border approach is critical for participating countries in the transition to clean energy affordability.

“Some countries in Africa have embarked on cross-border projects on clean energies but much more effort is needed to develop really sustainable transitions and adequate instruments,” she said.

The Africa Continental Power System Masterplan, a blueprint currently being developed by the African Union Development Agency (AUDA-NEPAD), highlights some key strategies for countries across the continent to identify key components at national and regional levels that will enable the creation of a smart power systems master plan that promotes access to clean, affordable, reliable, and sustainable electricity supplies across the continent by 2040.

Adja Gueye, Director of Promotion and Cooperation at the National Agency for Renewable Energies in Senegal points out that overall, African countries need appropriate plans at the policy level to overcome some key hurdles on the path to clean energies.

“To facilitate this transition, it would be appropriate for African countries to revise their regulatory framework and move towards harmonization, since the continent needs to improve regional and cross-border electricity interconnections,” she told IPS

Both Gueye and Abou-Zeid are convinced that without infrastructure and appropriate green energies policies and strategies at national and regional levels, it is challenging and impossible to buy and sell electricity across borders.

“Top-down governmental policies and long-term plans on clean energies in Africa are essential,” Abou-Zeid said of the current strategy to establish a long-term continent-wide planning process for power generation and transmission involving all five African power pools.

These include the Central African Power Pool (CAPP), East African Power Pool (EAPP), Northern African power Pool (COMELEC), Southern African Power Pool (SAPP) and Western African Power Pool (WAPP).

Dr. Jimmy Gasore, Rwanda’s Minister of Infrastructure, who is also the current chair of the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) points out that Africa’s climate goals necessitate collective recognition that the energy transition is not just about technological change but also about ensuring equity and justice.

“We need to ensure that the benefits of the energy transition are universally accessible, prioritizing the needs of the most marginalized communities,” he said.

To optimize and diversify green energies on the continent, some experts also stress the importance of encouraging effective cooperation between the private and public sectors in renewable energy and energy efficiency projects.

“To prepare for the current transition to renewable energy, partnerships are essential,” said Gueye of the National Agency for Renewable Energies in Senegal, one of the few dedicated national agencies dealing with clean energies in Africa.

 

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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UN Photo/ Manuel Elias
 
With current UN Secretary-General António Guterres set to step down in 2026, who is in the running to replace him? In this seven-part series, Felix Dodds and Chris Spence reveal who might be nominated and assess their chances.
 
The potential candidates include Amina J. Mohammed (Nigeria), Mia Motley (Barbados), Alicia Barcena (Mexico), Maria Fernanda Espinosa (Ecuador), Rebeca Grynspan (Costa Rica) and Michelle Bachelet (Chile). These are names that have come up in conversations with UN insiders and other experts. All six would offer skills and experiences we believe would be valuable in these fast-paced, uncertain times.

By Felix Dodds and Chris Spence
APEX, North Carolina / DUBLIN, Ireland, Apr 17 2024 (IPS)

A third possible candidate for UN Secretary-General is Alicia Bárcena. Mexico’s current Secretary of Foreign Affairs, Bárcena boasts a professional background that is both broad and deep.

Having originally trained as a biologist, she subsequently completed a master’s degree in public administration at Harvard University and has held several important roles within the Mexican government and at the United Nations. Her current role as Mexico’s Foreign Secretary, to which she was appointed in July 2023, marks just the latest relevant role in a long and distinguished career.

Internationally, her 14-year stint as head of the UN’s Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) from 2008-2022 was the most recent example of her involvement in the UN, which dates back to when she served on the Secretariat for the Rio Earth Summit in 1992.

Alicia Bárcena

It also led her to the Earth Council in Costa Rica. A non-profit organization tasked with follow up to the agreements reach in Rio, Bárcena was its Founding Director in the 1990s.

One of the Earth Council’s major achievements was the development of the Earth Charter, an international declaration setting out values and principles for a sustainable, peaceful, and just world.

Bárcena’s subsequent work with the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and UN Development Programme (UNDP)—which focused on sustainable development and environmental engagement—reinforced her sense that complex challenges require connection and cooperation among many stakeholders.

Bárcena later served as UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s chief of staff at UN headquarters in New York. Under Annan’s successor, Ban Ki-moon, she was promoted to Under-Secretary-General for Management. It was during her years in New York that she helped create a UN Ethics Office and set up a whistleblower protection policy and rules on financial disclosures for senior officials.

She also began work on the UN Capital Plan to refurbish and fix UN headquarters. It was during these years that she gained access to the highest levels of decision-making in the organization. As a result of this experience, her knowledge of the internal workings of the UN in New York and elsewhere is almost unmatched.

As head of ECLAC from 2008-2022, she continued to pioneer greater transparency, public participation and justice in decision making, particularly on environmental issues. This culminated in 2021 with ratification of the region-wide Escazú Agreement by more than two dozen countries from Latin America and the Caribbean. The Escazú Agreement contains regional pledges on access to information, public participation and justice in environmental matters.

Bárcena’s belief in mediation and advocacy for peaceful resolution of global disputes—something we need now more than ever—is also firmly held. When taking over as Foreign Secretary in mid-2023, she described Mexico as:

“… a country of peace and, therefore, [we] must continue to help mediate peaceful settlements of disputes and to consolidate peace. This has been our position in the United Nations Security Council and in all multilateral forums.”

Some insiders believe Bárcena offers a rare blend of experience. Like Kofi Annan, she is an ‘insider’ candidate who understands the UN and what it can and cannot achieve. This would likely mean she would need less time to learn on the job than someone unused to the UN’s internal workings.

At the same time, she has also spent time in senior roles in Mexico, so understands governments’ perspective and needs. Such knowledge will likely be viewed positively by member states when assessing what sort of person they would like in the UN’s top job. Could this combination of internal and external experience make her an ideal candidate for the next UN Secretary-General?

Assessing Bárcena’s Prospects

Could Alicia Bárcena become the next UN Secretary-General? Here is our assessment of her advantages and disadvantages should she choose to put her name into the contest.

Advantages

– A Woman Leader: As with our other candidates, Bárcena offers the chance to break the glass ceiling and become the first female leader of the UN.
– Right Place, Right Time: As noted in our previous article on Barbadian Prime Minister Mia Mottley, Bárcena is also from the Latin America and Caribbean region, which many insiders believe should provide the next Secretary-General.
– Breadth of Experience: Bárcena’s decades-long experience with both the UN and Mexican government, as well as her engagement with other stakeholders, might appeal to UN member states looking for a more balanced background. Bárcena has worked with the UN as both an insider and an outsider, which may well be an asset.

Disadvantages

– Public Profile: Bárcena is well known both in Mexico and in UN circles. However, she is not a public name or former head of state like current Secretary-General António Guterres. Could this tell against her?

Prof. Felix Dodds and Chris Spence have participated in United Nations conferences and negotiations since the 1990s. They co-edited Heroes of Environmental Diplomacy: Profiles in Courage (Routledge, 2022), which examines the roles of individuals in inspiring change.

https://www.ipsnews.net/2024/04/next-un-leaderpart-1/
https://www.ipsnews.net/2024/04/next-un-leaderpart-2/

IPS UN Bureau

 

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By Jomo Kwame Sundaram
ACCRA, Ghana, Apr 17 2024 (IPS)

The World Bank has exaggerated probable gains from the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) to promote partial and uneven trade liberalisation that is unlikely to enhance development on the continent.

Free trade, in theory
The Bank report claims significant net employment and income gains for all from joining the AfCFTA. Advocates claim it will accelerate African economic growth and progress, creating millions of jobs and raising incomes.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram

However, even mainstream economic theory and history do not support its claims about expected benefits. Even conventional trade theory does not claim that all trade liberalisation accelerates economic growth.

And even when it does, international trade mahaguru Jagdish Bhagwati noted long ago that the ensuing economic growth could be ‘immiserising’ when productivity gains accrue to consumers, not producers.

Nor does empirical evidence show trade liberalisation necessarily accelerating economic growth. Bhagwati has also shown preferential commercial agreements undermining free trade.

History shows today’s developed countries have been pragmatic and opportunistic. Typically, they only opened up after freer trade would benefit them while ‘kicking away the ladder’ for others trying to emulate them.

Most developing countries had partial trade liberalisation forced on them by modern European colonialism and structural adjustment from the 1980s. Often, they ended up with economic activities with ‘diminishing returns’, keeping them poor.

Alleged gains
Advocates claim trade liberalisation improves economic efficiency, implying production can be costlessly relocated internationally to produce more at less cost. Mainstream theory also maintains freer trade only improves efficiency under certain conditions:

● full employment, i.e., no unemployment or under-employment;
● no supply-side rigidities, with exporting firms able to quickly increase output, lower unit costs, and easily adjust to changing demand;
● an efficient market for risk exists, with affordable insurance for producers to cope with price volatility;
● ‘losers’ are compensated by ‘winners’ of trade liberalisation.

All these conditions have never been met anywhere, least of all in developing countries, especially the poorest ones. Most importantly, there has never been cross-border compensation of losers in the South by winners in the North.

Model distractions
For its report, The African Continental Free Trade Area: Economic and Distributional Effects, the Bank used computable general equilibrium (CGE) models to simulate some AfCFTA economic impacts.

However, the models’ unrealistic assumptions prevent meaningful assessment of their actual impacts. Thus, full employment and unchanging trade and fiscal balances – required by such CGE modelling – are presumed, with actual conditions assumed away and ignored!

The models are typically specified to favour trade liberalisation, invariably generating net positive economic impacts. Nonetheless, the gains are generally modest, sometimes negligible.

Hence, such apparent benefits depend on problematic assumptions and biased model specifications. With different assumptions and model parameters, findings change radically, e.g., changing government revenue affects public spending and, thus, aggregate demand.

The new findings may even undermine the case for trade liberalisation. For example, more realistic elasticities yield less impressive results. Hence, the models’ claims of gains from trade liberalisation have “dubious empirical relevance at best”.

Hence, “developing countries would be ill-advised to follow the radical recommendations of the World Bank’s liberalisation strategy insofar as it rests on results drawn from the current trade models.”

Job gain illusions
The Bank report admits its CGE simulations greatly qualify its claimed impacts on employment, unemployment and wages. It claims trade liberalisation reduces poverty by assuming very high ‘elasticities’ of poverty reduction due to greater foreign market access raising incomes.

It acknowledges the “analysis does not capture the effects of AfCFTA on job creation, but rather its impacts on job reallocation as employment shifts from sectors of comparative disadvantage to sectors of comparative advantage. This analysis, therefore, focuses on workers switching jobs or on labor displacement, not job creation.”

The report assumes total employment in Africa remains unchanged by trade policy effects. Hence, AfCFTA does not increase jobs; it only moves workers from one sector to another, raising incomes with higher wages, not more jobs.

What were this dubious exercise’s main employment results? First, agriculture’s share of jobs is projected to decline from 35.9% to 29.7% between 2020 and 2035. Second, the share of wholesale and retail trade workers will increase from 16.9% to 20.0%.

Third, wages of less-skilled workers will increase faster than for the more skilled, reducing the ‘skill premium’ and poverty among the former. Female wages will rise faster than men’s as more women are employed in labour-intensive activities. But the magnitude and significance of these trends are moot.

The simulations do not show the AfCFTA boosting value-addition and jobs. While manufacturing value-added would increase between 2020 and 2035 in 15 of the 24 countries covered, its share of output would only grow in six!

Learning from mistakes
Like other reports preceding it – including those for the African Union – the Bank study is based on unrealistic assumptions grossly understating the actual risks and costs of trade liberalisation.

Such studies provide a veneer of legitimacy for such policies. Their results depend on the data used and modellers’ choices. While seemingly impressive, they are of dubious relevance and value.

Trade liberalisation from the 1980s undermined Africa’s modest manufacturing capacity and food security, primarily developed post-independence. This worsened its protracted stagnation lasting into this century.

In 2017, economist Ndongo Samba Sylla warned the AfCFTA implies “suicide for African countries”. Regardless of its pan-Africanist pretensions, the AfCFTA risks resuming trade liberalisation’s earlier devastation.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Leide Aparecida Souza, president of the Association of Residents of the Genipapo Settlement in the rural area of Acreúna, a municipality in central-western Brazil, stands next to breads and pastries from the bakery where 14 rural women work. The women's empowerment and self-esteem have been boosted by the fact that they earn their own income, which is more stable than from farming, and provide an important service to their community. CREDIT: Marina Carolina / IPS

By Mario Osava
ACREÚNA/ORIZONA, Brazil , Apr 16 2024 (IPS)

A bakery, fruit pulp processing and water pumped from springs are empowering women farmers in Goiás, a central-eastern state of Brazil. New renewable energy sources are driving the process.

“We work in the shade and have a secure, stable income, not an unsteady one like in farming. We cannot control the price of milk, nor droughts or pests in the crops,” said Leide Aparecida Souza, who runs a bakery in the rural area of Acreúna, a municipality of 21,500 inhabitants in central Goiás."The Network is the link between the valorization of rural women, family farming and the energy transition. We chose family farmers because they are the ones who produce healthy food." -- Jessyane Ribeiro

The bakery supplies a variety of breads, including cheese buns and hot dog buns, as well as pastries, cakes and biscuits to some 3,000 students in the municipality’s school network, for the government’s school feeding program, which provides family farming with at least 30 percent of its purchases. Welfare institutions are also customers.

The bakery is an initiative of the women of the Genipapo Settlement, established in 1999 by 27 families, as part of the agrarian reform program implemented in Brazil after the 1964-1985 military dictatorship, which has so far settled 1.3 million families on land of their own.

Genipapo, the name chosen for the settlement, is a fruit of the Cerrado, the savannah that dominates a large central area of Brazil. Each settled family received 44 hectares of land and local production is concentrated on soybeans, cassava and its flour, corn, dairy cattle and poultry.

Six solar panels will reduce the costs of the women’s bakery, installed on the former estate where 27 families were given land in Acreúna, in the Brazilian state of Goiás, as part of the country’s ongoing agrarian reform program. CREDIT: Mario Osava / IPS

 

Bakery empowers rural women

The women of the Association of Residents of the Genipapo Settlement decided to create a bakery as a new source of income 16 years ago. They also gained self-esteem and autonomy by earning their own money. In general, agricultural and livestock income is controlled by the husbands.

Each of the women working at the bakery earns about 1,500 reais (300 dollars) a month, six percent more than the national minimum wage. “We started with 21 participants, now we have 14 available for work, because some moved or quit,” Souza said.

A year ago, the project obtained a solar energy system with six photovoltaic panels from the Women of the Earth Energy project, promoted by the Gepaaf Rural Consultancy, with support from the Socio-environmental Fund of the Caixa Econômica Federal, the regional bank focused on social questions, and the public Federal University of Goiás (UFG).

Gepaaf is the acronym for Management and Project Development in Family Farming Consultancy and its origin is a study group at the UFG. The company is headquartered in Inhumas, a city of 52,000 people, 180 km from Acreúna.

Due to difficulties with the inverter, a device needed to connect the generator to the electricity distribution network, the plant only began operating in March. Now they will see if the savings will suffice to cover the approximately 300 reais (60 dollars) that the bakery’s electricity costs.

 

Iná de Cubas stands next to the biodigester that she got from the Women of the Earth Energy project in the municipality of Orizona, in the center-east of the Brazilian state of Goiás. The biogas generated benefits the productive activities of small farmers in rural settlements, as do solar plants on a family or community scale. Image: Mario Osava / IPS

“It’s not that much money, but for us every penny counts,” Souza said. Electricity is cheap in their case because it is rural and nocturnal consumption. Bread production starts at 5:00 p.m. and ends at 3:00 or 4:00 a.m. from Monday to Thursday, according to Maristela Vieira de Sousa, the group’s secretary.

The industrial oven they use is low-consumption and wood-burning. There is another, gas-fired oven, which is only used in emergencies, “because it is expensive,” said de Sousa. Biogas is a possibility for the future, which would use the settlement’s abundant agricultural waste products.

Alternative energies make agribusiness viable

Iná de Cubas, another beneficiary of the Women of the Earth Energy project, has a biodigester that supplies her stove, in addition to eight solar panels. They generate the energy to produce fruit pulp that also supplies the schools of Orizona, a municipality of 16,000 inhabitants in central-eastern Goiás.

The solar plant, installed two years ago, made the business viable by eliminating the electricity bill, which was high because the two refrigerators needed to store fruit and pulp consume a lot of electricity.

The abundance of fruit residues provides the inputs for biogas production, an innovation in a region where manure is more commonly used.

The refrigerators in which Iná de Cubas keeps the fruit and fruit pulp that she prepares for sale to schools in Orizona in central Brazil consume a great deal of electricity. CREDIT: Mario Osava / IPS

“I only use an additional load of animal feces when I need more biogas,” said Cubas, who gets the manure from her neighbor’s cows, since she does not raise livestock.

On her five hectares of land, Cubas produces numerous species of fruit for her cottage industry.

In addition to typical Brazilian fruits, such as cajá or hog plum (Spondias mombin), pequi or souari nut (Caryocar brasiliense) and jabuticaba from the grapetree (Plinia cauliflora), she grows lemons, mangoes, oranges, guava and avocado, among others.

For the pulp, she also uses fruit from neighbors, mostly relatives. The distribution of her products is done through the Agroecological Association of the State of Goias (Aesagro), which groups 53 families from Orizona and surrounding areas.

Agroecology is the system used on her farm, where the family also grows rice, beans and garlic. The crops are irrigated with water pumped from nearby springs that were recovered by the diversion of a road and by fences to block access by cattle, which used to trample the banks.

“The overall aim is to strengthen family farming, the quality of life in the countryside, incomes, and care for the environment, and to offer healthy food, without poisonous chemicals, especially for schools,” explained Iná de Cubas.

Biodigesters made of steel and cement, solar energy for different purposes, including pumping water, rainwater collection and harvesting, are part of the “technologies” that the Women of the Earth Energy project is trying to disseminate, said Gessyane Ribeiro, Gepaaf’s administrator.

In the area where Iná de Cubas lives, the project installed five biodigesters and seven solar pumps for farming families, in addition to solar plants in schools, she said.

 

The eight solar panels on the roof of the Cubas family’s house, in the rural area of Orizona, make small agro-industrial processes viable, adding value to the wide diversity of native fruits from different Brazilian ecosystems, such as the Cerrado savannah and the Amazon rainforest, along with species imported throughout the country’s history. CREDIT: Mario Osava / IPS

 

Network of rural women

The Women of the Earth Energy Network, brought together by the project and coordinated by Ribeiro, operates in six areas defined by the government based on environmental, economic, social and cultural similarities. In all, it involves 42 organizations in 27 municipalities in Goiás.

The local councils choose the beneficiaries of the projects, all implemented with collective work and focused on women’s productive activities and the preservation of the Cerrado. All the beneficiaries commit themselves to contribute to a solidarity fund to finance new projects, explained agronomist Ribeiro.

“The Network is the link between the valorization of rural women, family farming and the energy transition,” she said. “We chose family farmers because they are the ones who produce healthy food.”

“We offer technological solutions that rely on the links between food, water and energy, to move towards an energy transition that can actually address climate change,” said sociologist Agnes Santos, a researcher and communicator for the Network.

Recovering and protecting springs is another of the Women’s Network’s activities.

 

Two solar panels run a pump installed in a spring in the forest to pump the water needed by the 29 cows owned by Nubia Lacerda Matias’ family in Orizona, in the state of Goiás, near Brasilia. Thus the cows stopped drinking water in the springs, which are now fenced off, vital to protect the water source for local families living downstream. CREDIT: Mario Osava / IPS

Nubia Lacerda Matias celebrates the moment she was invited to join the movement. She won a solar pump, made up of two solar panels and pipes, which bring water to her cattle that used to damage the spring, now protected by a fence and a small forest.

“It’s important not only for my family, but for the people living downhill” where a stream flows, fed by various springs along the way, she said.

But the milk from the 29 cows and corn crops on her 9.4-hectare farm are not enough to support the family with two young children. Her husband, Wanderley dos Anjos, works as a school bus driver.

Iná de Cubas’ partner, Rosalino Lopes, also works as a technician for the Pastoral Land Commission, a Catholic organization dedicated to rural workers.

In his spare time, Lopes invents agricultural machines. He assembles and combines parts of motorcycles, tractors and other tools, in an effort to fill a gap in small agriculture, undervalued by the mechanical industry and scientific research in Brazil.

Credit: David Peinado/Anadolu via Getty Images

By Inés M. Pousadela
MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay, Apr 16 2024 (IPS)

The Darién Gap is a stretch of jungle spanning the border between Colombia and Panama, the only missing section of the Pan-American Highway that stretches from Alaska to southern Argentina. For good reason, it used to be considered impenetrable. But in 2023, a record 520,000 people crossed it heading northwards, including many children. Many have lost their lives trying to cross it.

People are also increasingly taking to the seas. A new people trafficking route has opened up across the Caribbean Sea via the Bahamas. Growing numbers of desperate migrants – mostly from conflict-ridden Haiti but also from more distant countries – are using it in an attempt to reach Florida. It’s risky too. In November 2023, at least 30 people died when a boat from Haiti capsized off the Bahamas.

The pattern is clear: as is also the case in Europe, when safer routes are closed off, people start taking riskier ones. Millions of people in Latin American and Caribbean countries are fleeing authoritarianism, insecurity, violence, poverty and climate disasters. Most remain in other countries in the region that typically present fewer challenges to arriving migrants – but also offer limited opportunities. The USA therefore remains a strong migration magnet. Its tightening immigration policies are the key reason people are heading into the jungle and taking to the sea.

Dynamic trends

Out of the staggering 7.7 million Venezuelans who’ve left their country since 2017 – greater than the numbers of displaced Syrians or Ukrainians – almost three million have stayed next door in Colombia, with about 1.5 million in Peru, close to half million in both Brazil and Ecuador, and hundreds of thousands in other countries across the region.

Latin American host countries are relatively welcoming. Unlike in many global north countries, politicians don’t usually stoke xenophobia or vilify migrants for political gain, and states don’t usually reject people at borders or deport them, and instead try to provide paths for legal residence. Overall they’ve been pragmatic enough to strike a balance between openness and orderly entry. As a result, a high proportion of Venezuelan migrants have acquired some form of legal status in host countries.

But host states haven’t planned for long-term integration. They face typical global south challenges, such as high levels of inequality and many unmet social needs. That’s why those moving towards the USA include many Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans who were already living in other countries. They are mostly driven by the lack of opportunities, although in the case of Haitians language barriers and racial discrimination are also significant motivators.

While the USA has tightened its migration policies, its porous southern border – the longest border between global north and global south – remains inviting for many. In its 2022 fiscal year, US authorities had a record 2.4 million encounters with unauthorised migrants at the border. Many had come a long way, having crossed the Darién Gap and then headed across Central America and Mexico.

Dangerous journeys

People do so at great risk. According to the United Nations’ Missing Migrants Project reported at least 1,275 people died or went missing during migration in the Americas in 2023.

It’s unclear how many people have perished so far in the Darién Gap. In many cases, deaths go unreported and bodies are never recovered. The crossing can take anywhere from three to 15 days. As they cross rivers and mountains, people suffer from the jungle’s harshness and difficult weather.

According to Doctors Without Borders (MSF), much of the danger is because the Darién is one of the world’s most humid regions and doesn’t have any proper infrastructure. People can easily slip and fall on its steep paths or drown in rushing rivers. Hired guides can leave people stranded. Those who can’t keep up can get disoriented and lost. The difficult terrain forces many to leave their supplies along the way, including food and drinking water.

Migrants also often cross paths with local criminal groups that steal from them, kidnap them or commit rape. In December 2023, MSF recorded a seven-fold increase in monthly incidents of sexual violence. But despite the dangers, the number of people crossing in 2023 almost doubled compared to 2022.

The Darién Gap is only the gateway to Central America – the start of a much longer journey. The dangers don’t stop. Many end up staying somewhere in Mexico, but others keep marching northwards and face many hazards trying to reach the USA – drowning , or dying of heat exposure and dehydration in the desert during the day, or of hypothermia at night. Migrants have also died of asphyxiation in botched migrant smuggling operations. They are often blackmailed by smugglers and experience human rights abuses, including lethal violence, from Border Patrol agents.

US policies

Starting in early 2021, the administration of President Joe Biden made several changes to US immigration policies, such as rescinding the travel ban on primarily Muslim-majority and African countries, restoring the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals programme and granting Venezuelans living in the USA Temporary Protection Status, among other things.

But it was only in May 2023 that the Biden administration finally lifted Title 42, a public health order that, under the cover of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Trump administration used to immediately expel those caught crossing the border, with no right to apply for asylum. At the same time, however, the government issued several new rules that became known as the ‘asylum ban’. Before showing up at the border, people are now required to make an appointment with a smartphone app or have proof they have previously sought and failed to obtain asylum in the countries they’ve travelled through on their way to the USA. If they don’t comply with these requirements, they’re automatically presumed ineligible for asylum and can be subjected to expedited removal.

Civil society points out that it’s very difficult to get an appointment. The app frequently fails and many migrants don’t have smartphones, adequate wi-fi or a data plan. They face language and education barriers and are exploited by people pretending to help. Barriers to seeking asylum have risen to the point that advocates view them as violating the Refugee Convention’s principle of non-refoulment, according to which people can’t be returned to a country where they face serious threats to their life or freedom.

Election politics

Pressure is intensifying as the USA’s November 2024 presidential election approaches.

Republican governors of southern states such as Texas have made a show of bussing newly arrived migrants to far-off cities run by Democrats, dumping them there with no support, treating them as pawns in a political game. Congress Republicans have also repeatedly delayed backing support to Ukraine unless new border control measures are enacted in return.

In October 2023, Biden announced plans to strengthen the southern border and resume deportation flights to Venezuela, which had been paused. But no one has gone lower than Donald Trump, who recently told a rally that ‘immigrants are poisoning the blood of our country’ – a straightforward use of white supremacist rhetoric. His comments have grown increasingly dehumanising – he has repeatedly referred to migrants as ‘animals’.

In his 2023 State of the Union speech, President Biden responded to Trump directly, stating he refused to ‘demonise immigrants’. But in the same breath he urged Republicans to pass a bipartisan immigration bill they’re currently blocking, which would further tighten asylum rules, expand funding for border operations and give the president authority to empower border officials to summarily deport migrants during spikes in illegal immigration. The bill continues to be rejected by hardcore Republicans who see it as not strict enough.

For migrants and asylum seekers, the prospects look bleak. As far as their rights are concerned, the election campaign is a race to the bottom. A Trump victory could only bring further bad news – but a Biden win is unlikely to promise much progress. Election results aside, people will keep taking to the sea or venturing through the jungle, the barbed wire and the desert. Politicians need to recognise this reality and commit to upholding the human rights of all who strive to find a future in the USA.

Inés M. Pousadela is CIVICUS Senior Research Specialist, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.

 

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Tapera Saizi, a carpenter stationed at Juru Growth Point, has managed to take care of his family through his rural business. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo/IPS

By Jeffrey Moyo
JURU Growth Point, ZIMBABWE, Apr 16 2024 (IPS)

With heavy sweat drenching his face and his shirt soaked in the sweat, 39-year-old Proud Ndukulani wrestled with a homemade knife, which he dipped in some used oil, before turning the glistening knife upon a rather tough and dusty tyre obtained from what he said was a forklift.

His assistant stood by his side as he (Ndukulani) cut some tough rubber from the giant tyre lying outside an open shade roofed with aging asbestos sheets at Juru Growth Point, located 52 km east of Harare in Zimbabwe’s Goromonzi district in the country’s Mashonaland East province. 

From these rubber pieces, Ndukulani, operating his entity known as Sinyoro, said he made suspension bushings for vehicles of all shapes and sizes, while he also made the same for engine mountings, a business he said he has been running for the past three years.

At a popular nightclub known as CNN, a dressmaker in his 80s was busy on his sewing machine. A pile of clothes he was mending was scattered on his old wooden table, upon which also sat his old sewing machine, branded Singer, with customers, young and old, swarming around him.

Despite business confidence being at its lowest across Zimbabwe’s towns and cities, backyard entrepreneurs’ activities in remote areas are thriving, although they are contending with their own share of hurdles amid Zimbabwe’s comatose economy.

“I make bushings for vehicle suspension and engine mounting. I have been in this business for the past three years,” Ndukulani told IPS as he wiped some sweat off his face using the back of his right hand.

He (Ndukulani) boasted of making about USD 300 to 400 each month at his workshop, housed in the shade once used as a market for vendors.

Forty-year-old Tapera Saizi, a carpenter also stationed at Juru Growth Point at his workshop named Madzibaba Furnitures, said he had come a long way with his enterprise.

For years, Juru Growth Point has become famed for its bustling activities as it teems with entrepreneurs of all shapes and sizes, some like Saizi, who is making wardrobes, kitchen cabinets, chairs, and beds.

For over two decades since the Zimbabwean government seized land from white commercial farmers in its quest to address land ownership imbalances, the economy has taken a nosedive.

Dozens of industries shut down, leading to ballooning joblessness in the country, with the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) putting the rate of unemployment at 90 percent countrywide.

ZCTU is the primary trade union federation in Zimbabwe.

Yet even so, the southern African nation’s rural dwellers have endured, stepping up with survival means amid the mounting hardships.

Like 46-year-old Mashoko Kufazvinei, a proud owner of a vehicle repair workshop at Juru Growth Point, who said he had been operating his workshop for two decades.

“I started working on this business in 2004. I was working in the Midlands, where I trained as a motor mechanic and I had to come here in 2004 to set up my business,” Kufazvinei said.

From the proceeds of his enterprise, he said he is paying for his children’s education—five of them, while his first-born son, 24-year-old Simbarashe, is already working with him after completing his high school education.

Not only that, but Kufazvinei said that thanks to his motor repair enterprise, he has also built his own rural home, and he now owns a piece of land that he bought at Juru Growth Point to build another family house.

As a Mazda open-truck vehicle drove into Kufazvinei’s workshop, he said, “I have my own car, the one you are seeing arriving here, which I bought using proceeds from this business.”

Like Saizi, who lamented that business was slow at Juru Growth Point, Kufazvinei also acknowledged that these days things were hard as vehicle owners were without money to spend on fixing their cars.

For five years, Saizi said he has been operating as a carpenter at Juru Growth Point, and just like many, such as Kufazvinei, through his carpentry business, he has managed to take care of his family, paying fees for his five school-going children.

“We don’t struggle to find at least a little money, even if we may fail to overcome all the difficulties. We won’t fail to raise money to buy basics like salt and slippers for children and other basics,” Saizi told IPS.

He used an electric planer to refine a wooden bed that he was working on while being interviewed.

But local authorities are not pleased with the rural entrepreneurs’ endeavors, blaming them for triggering disorder, particularly at Juru Growth Point.

“These backyard entrepreneurs are often dirty and they don’t want to work outside the center of the growth point where we allocate them space. They prefer being within the shopping center. Usually, the places we allocate them are far from the shops, but they want where there is activity where they can meet customers,” Rose Hondo, a revenue officer at the council office at Juru Growth Point, told IPS.

As rural entrepreneurs thrive in this southern African nation, the country’s permanent secretary in the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, Mavis Sibanda, has gone on record in the media claiming the government is scaling up rural industrialization.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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Families arrive in South Sudan after fleeing conflict in Sudan. Credit: WFP/Hugh Rutherford

By Charles E. Owubah
NEW YORK, Apr 16 2024 (IPS)

Scarce food and drinking water. Limited and inconsistent healthcare. Rapidly deteriorating mental health. With conflict on the rise globally, this is the grim reality for millions around the world.

April 7th will mark the sixth-month anniversary of the attack on Israel and the subsequent war in Gaza, which has killed over 30,000 people. It has left millions without shelter, medicine, food or clean water. Without intervention, 50% of Gaza’s population is at imminent risk of famine.

While this tragedy understandably dominates global headlines, there are countless hostilities that don’t make the news. Many bear grim similarities to Gaza, but the striking difference is that other places are seemingly invisible, their people left to suffer in conflict’s dark shadow as hunger and an ever-rising death toll becomes the norm.

Though the ups and downs of fighting can be unpredictable, the link between conflict and hunger is not. Over 85% of people experiencing hunger crises worldwide live in conflict-affected countries.

Hunger can be both a trigger and a consequence of conflict; limited resources can drive disputes for food and the means to produce it, and conflict can disrupt harvests and force families from their homes.

Climate change makes it even harder for people to cope, since heatwaves, droughts and floods further lower crop yields and access to support.

Gender-based violence also increases during conflict. This can include sexual based violence, forced or early marriage, and intimate partner violence. Violence against women and girls is sometimes even used as a weapon of war.

For vulnerable populations trapped in forgotten crises, humanitarian aid–or the lack of it–can mean the difference between life and death.

In Eastern parts of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), for example, rampant violence has left nearly 7 million Congolese internally displaced, making it the second-largest crisis of this kind anywhere in the world. Hundreds of thousands are hungry and need immediate humanitarian assistance.

Since January’s upsurge in conflict, Action Against Hunger health facilities in the region have admitted four times the number of severely malnourished children under five years old.

Outside the city of Goma and across North Kivu province, where there are almost 2.4 million displaced people, violence has stopped families from returning to their homes for weeks or months at a time, leaving them largely unable to grow food and few resources to buy it.

The fighting has involved indiscriminate targeting of civilians and infrastructure, militarization of camps for internally displaced people, and blockades on key supply routes.

Many families struggle to find basic necessities, let alone afford them. Humanitarian organizations can’t deliver much-needed assistance. People are increasingly destitute and desperate.

Similarly, in Sudan, a year of conflict has left almost 18 million people – one third of the country’s population – acutely food insecure. The conflict is primarily focused around the capital of Khartoum, with a devastating effect on the whole country. Around 10% of the population is on the brink of famine.

With key trade routes compromised, shortages of food, fuel, medicines and other basic supplies means prices are soaring, and the limited goods are out of reach of most families. A large-scale cholera outbreak is causing the situation to deteriorate further.

The disease leads to diarrhea and worsens malnutrition. It is so contagious even one case must be treated as an epidemic; Sudan has seen more than 10,000 cases, and counting. Cholera can kill within hours if not treated, but medical help is in short supply.

Violence prevents humanitarian workers from accessing hard-hit communities, leaving many without access to food, healthcare and basic necessities.

As a result, millions have fled their homes in search of food and safety. Nearly 11 million people are displaced, whether internally, in neighboring nations or scattered around the world. It is also the world’s largest child displacement crisis, impacting four million children. Some are with family, some entirely on their own.

In Yemen, nine years of war has destroyed huge swaths of the country’s infrastructure and left 17.6 million people, more than half the population, dependent on food aid. Every day, Yemeni families struggle to secure basics like food, clean water, and staples like cooking fuel, soap and other household supplies.

After the outbreak of the Israel-Gaza war, hostilities around the Red Sea and the recent U.S. designation of the Houthis as a terrorist organization are combining to pose new challenges in an already complex region.

The U.S. designation effectively criminalized key transactions necessary for the imports Yemen relies on for 85% of its food, fuel supplies, and almost all medical supplies.

The stress of living under constant pressure to meet their most basic needs, and an estimated 377,000 conflict-related deaths, has meant Yemen also faces a severe mental health crisis.

More than a quarter of Yemenis—over eight million people—suffer from mental health challenges such as depression, anxiety or post-traumatic stress disorder. According to surveys by Action Against Hunger and other data, the continuing conflict, forced displacement, deteriorating economic situation, poverty, and food shortages are exacerbating the prevalence of mental health challenges.

Despite the rising death tolls, unimaginable suffering and ongoing violence, these conflicts are largely forgotten. So are countless others. Funding for hunger-related aid is woefully insufficient.

In 2023, only 35% of appeals from countries dealing with crisis levels of hunger were satisfied, according to the Action Against Hunger 2023 Hunger Funding Gap Report.

Ignoring these crises means a terrible cost, both to the people impacted and also to ourselves. Today, the world is so small and interconnected that massive instability anywhere has ripples everywhere.

Of course, the ideal solution is peace. Until then, we need the international community to advocate for safe humanitarian access in conflict zones. We also need greater funding for the most basic of human rights, such as food and access to healthcare. Bringing attention to these forgotten crises is the first step toward both.

That is why we continue to call on the international community and major donors to prioritize the world’s most vulnerable and to dramatically increase funding, especially through investment in locally-led NGOs that focus on gender in their programming.

While emergency aid is essential, we also need funding for long term approaches that build resilience, helping at-risk populations create their own path to a more secure future.

Dr. Charles E. Owubah is CEO, Action Against Hunger

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Crerdit: UN Photo/Cia Pak
 
With current UN Secretary-General António Guterres set to step down in 2026, who is in the running to replace him? This seven-part series reveal who might be nominated and assess their chances.
 
The potential candidates include Amina J. Mohammed (Nigeria), Mia Motley (Barbados), Alicia Barcena (Mexico), Maria Fernanda Espinosa (Ecuador), Rebeca Grynspan (Costa Rica) and Michelle Bachelet (Chile). These are names that have come up in conversations with UN insiders and other experts. All six would offer skills and experiences we believe would be valuable in these fast-paced, uncertain times.

By Felix Dodds and Chris Spence
APEX, North Carolina / DUBLIN, Ireland, Apr 16 2024 (IPS)

When the conversation turns to who might replace António Guterres as UN Secretary-General, the name of Mia Mottley, Prime Minister of Barbados, is on many insiders’ lips. In addition to being Prime Minister, she also serves as her country’s Minister of Finance, Economic Affairs and Investment, as well as its Minister of National Security and Public Service.

She is Barbados’ eighth Prime Minister and the first woman to hold this office. She has led her country’s Labour Party to two landslide election victories in 2018 and 2022. If UN member states are looking for a head of state to guide the UN and multilateralism in these troubled times, Mia Mottley will be a clear contender.

UN Photo/Cia Pak
“Our world knows not what it is gambling with, and if we don’t control this fire, it will burn us all down … Who will get up and stand up for the rights of our people?” — Mia Mottley, UN General Assembly, 2021. Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley of Barbados addresses the general debate of the General Assembly’s 78th session September 2023

Mia Mottley first appeared on many people’s radars after her impassioned speech at the Glasgow COP26 Climate Conference in late 2021. Her fiery words in Scotland were followed shortly afterwards by her Bridgetown Initiative, which calls for a major reform of the world’s multilateral financial institutions, including the International Monetary Fund and World Bank.

In particular, Mottley wants the IMF and others to ramp-up their work on climate change and other development challenges and provide more support for the most vulnerable countries. She has urged making financing easier to access and available at lower interest rates. For the most vulnerable, she is an advocate for grants, rather than loans that increase a country’s debt.

Working with the government of France and other partners from both North and South, Mottley has been advocating for clear and measurable changes in international funding, including more money for climate resilience and special drawing rights to enable developing countries to access emergency climate funds quickly and easily.

Her vocal calls for a “loss and damage” fund paid off at COP27 in Egypt when, against many insiders’ expectations, Mottley and her allies successfully advocated for the creation of a new funding institution.

This fund, which will support countries suffering loss and damage from climate change, had long been considered unachievable due to opposition in the North. The breakthrough at COP27 and subsequent progress at COP28 in Dubai have burnished Mottley’s reputation as a reformer.

Climate financing is not the only issue where the Barbadian leader has made a name for herself, however. On COVID 19, she resisted calls to restrict cruise ships when the pandemic hit, offering 28 “homeless” vessels entry in 2020 when other countries were turning them away.

More recently, she has been leading efforts on antimicrobial resistance—an issue widely viewed as a major emerging global threat to human health. She has also been a strong advocate for sustainable development and for reparations for slavery.

A Republican and UN Reformer

In 2021, Mottley also took the historic act of transforming Barbados into a republic, bidding farewell to Queen Elizabeth II as the country’s Head of State. More recently, she has set her sights on reforming the UN Security Council and in particular the veto powers granted to the UK, US, Russia, China, and France.

In her speech in 2022 to the UN General Assembly, Mottley said:

“We believe that a Security Council that retains the power of veto in the hands of a few will still lead us to war as we have seen this year, and therefore the reform cannot simply be in its composition but also [must include] the removal of that veto.”

Assessing Mottley’s Prospects

Could Mia Mottley become the next UN Secretary-General? Here is our assessment of her advantages and disadvantages should she choose to enter the contest.

Advantages

– A Woman Leader: Mia Mottley would be a strong candidate to break the glass ceiling and become the first female leader of the UN.
– Location, Location: With the tradition that the UN Secretary-General is chosen by rotating through the various UN regions, Mottley might be in the right place at the right time. Although the last selection broke the cycle (Guterres is from Portugal, whereas an Eastern European was supposed to be chosen), some people believe the convention of rotation should be restored and that it is now the turn of the Latin America and Caribbean region to nominate Guterres’ successor. Given Barbados’ location, Mottley could find herself coming from the right place at the right time.
– Proven Impact: Mottley’s success with the loss and damage fund, as well as her noteworthy move to turn Barbados into a republic, have given her a reputation as someone who can get things done. Given the uncertainty swirling around international diplomacy these days, a figure with a reputation as a dynamic achiever may be welcomed.
– Connections: As a national leader active on the international stage, Mottley is well connected and has developed good relations with leaders both in the North and South. Could her networks and connections with senior politicians help her?

Disadvantages

– A Threat to the Big Five? Mottley is pushing for UN Security Council reform, including ending the veto powers of the Big Five permanent members: the US, UK, China, Russia, and France. And yet it is these countries that must ultimately agree on and nominate a candidate for Secretary-General, which the General Assembly must then approve.

While it seems highly unlikely the UK would hold any grudges at Barbados’ move to become a republic—something other countries have done before—how comfortable would any of the so-called Big Five feel appointing a fiery advocate for curtailing their own UN status and privilege? Would they resist such change … or might they see in Mottley someone with whom they could talk, negotiate, and possibly find some sort of compromise?

Whoever emerges as Guterres’ successor will need to convince all five permanent Security Council members that they are the best person for the job. It will be a difficult line for anyone to walk, especially when even a single veto could scuttle their hopes.

In spite of Mottley’s obvious credentials, it is her advocacy for Security Council reform that may weigh most heavily against any aspirations she may have to take the top job. The powers of persuasion for which she is known will need to be on full display.

Prof. Felix Dodds and Chris Spence have participated in United Nations conferences and negotiations since the 1990s. They co-edited Heroes of Environmental Diplomacy: Profiles in Courage (Routledge, 2022), which examines the roles of individuals in inspiring change.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Apr 15 2024 (IPS-Partners)

The conflict in Sudan is one of the worst in the world today, and millions of children and adolescents bear the brunt within and across the border from Sudan.

As we mark the one-year anniversary of this vicious conflict, we call on world leaders to ensure that all girls and boys impacted by the conflict can access life-saving quality education. Their hope and future hinge on this.

Sudan experiences a humanitarian crisis of epic proportions. Without urgent international action, this catastrophe could engulf the entire country and have even more devastating impacts on neighboring countries, as refugees flee across borders into neighboring states.

The brutal conflict continues to take innocent lives, with over 14,000 children, women and men reportedly killed already. According to the United Nations, half of Sudan’s population – 25 million people, including 14 million children – urgently need humanitarian assistance. An estimated 5 million people are one step away from famine.

Sudan also has the outside Sudan since 15 April 2023, including 4 million children.

Most schools are shuttered or are struggling to re-open across the country, leaving nearly 19 million school-aged children at risk of losing out on their education. To put this in perspective, that’s more children at risk than the total populations of Finland, Ireland and Norway combined.

As the global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises hosted within the United Nations, Education Cannot Wait (ECW) and our global strategic partners have responded with speed, agility and coordination to provide girls and boys impacted by this complex conflict with the safety, hope and opportunity of a quality education.

ECW has provided US$10 million to date in response to the largest forced displacement crisis in the world today. Over 8 million people have been displaced inside and regional refugee education needs, with First Emergency Response grants announced in the Central African Republic, Chad, Egypt, Ethiopia and South Sudan. In Sudan, we have provided US$28 million in funding, including a US$5 million grant announced in August 2023 that will reach over 86,000 girls and boys with access to an inclusive, quality education.

Yet, these investments are simply not enough. We must step up global funding for education in all the world’s forgotten crises, in places like Sudan, Central African Republic, Chad, the Sahel, South Sudan and so many more. In all, over 224 million girls and boys are having their futures ripped from their hands by armed conflict, forced displacement, climate change and other protracted crises around the globe.

This not only threatens global security and efforts to deliver on the Sustainable Development Goals, but it is also an affront to their humanity. Without safe places to learn and grow, girls face a number of grave risks, including child marriage, sexual violence, human trafficking and forced labor. Boys find themselves against impossible odds and risk forced recruitment as child soldiers, forced labor and other assaults on their human rights. It’s an impossible un-ending cycle of violence, displacement, poverty, hunger, chaos and uncertainty.

With school feeding programmes, they have nutritious meals. With gender-inclusive classrooms, they have safe places to learn. With mental health and psychosocial support, they find a way to regain their dignity and build strong, resilient communities. It’s a systems-wide approach that puts children first in our investments in sustainable development and puts humanity first in our global efforts to end war and build a better future for generations to come.

As we build on calls from today’s International Humanitarian Conference for Sudan and its Neighbours, the African Year of Education, and other important efforts to deliver on the Sustainable Development Goals, we appeal to public donors, the private sector and philanthropic foundations to urgently mobilize US$600 million in renewed support for ECW’s 2023-2026 Strategic Plan. With a total of US$1.5 billion, we can reach 20 million children and adolescents.

In South Sudan, education is an opportunity to “change my life” for Living Sunday, a young teenage mother who resumed her education against all odds. In Ethiopia, where prolonged drought made worse by climate change has disrupted education for an entire generation, it means Nakurchel, 12, is attending school for the first time in her life. In her own words: “Education has given me wings to fly.” Still more needs to be done, in sub-Saharan Africa, only 1 out of 9 children can read a simple text.

Sudan cannot wait. Africa cannot wait. The rest of the world needs to be unapologetically impatient in heeding their calls.

 

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Excerpt:

ECW Executive Director Yasmine Sherif Statement on the One-Year Anniversary of Hostilities in Sudan

The annual World Bank-IMF Spring meetings will take place April 17-19 in Washington DC.

By Jaime Atienza
WASHINGTON DC, Apr 15 2024 (IPS)

As leaders gather for the Spring Meetings of the IMF and World Bank amid the cherry blossom trees of Washington, DC, there is some good news to celebrate.

After three years of difficult negotiations within the G20 Common Framework on Debt, with the support of the IMF, Zambia has finally secured serious debt relief and restructuring with both government and private creditors, which will help enable vital and urgent investments in health, education, and social protection.

For too long, Zambia’s plans for ending AIDS as a public health threat by 2030, and for realising crucial development needs, have been held back by constraints in investment caused by the debt crisis. The debt relief and restructuring that has been agreed at last gives the country a fighting chance. All those who have facilitated this agreement have saved and transformed lives.

The leaders gathering in Washington DC, including G20 Finance Ministers and international financial officials, can and should do much more, however. They can secure a much greater legacy than helping one country begin to untie itself from debt distress whilst leaving many other countries choking.

The agreement with Zambia has shown that the debt crisis is not fate but is a man-made situation which people can unmake. But so far, Zambia has been the only country which has benefitted from the new debt framework.

Slow and opaque international negotiations have not resolved the crisis that is leaving half of African economies either facing debt distress or at high risk of doing so.

Sub-Saharan African countries’ debt repayments have unaffordably high interest rates: for years they have been paying rates that are between four to eight times the rates that high income countries pay.

Sub-Saharan African countries are spending far more on debt servicing than on health – indeed, half are paying three times more. Last year, in Angola, Kenya, Malawi, Rwanda and Uganda, debt service obligations exceeded 50% of government revenues.

The damage that fiscal constraints are causing to health security is not only a moral outrage, but also dangerous for the whole world. In contrast, coordinated significant debt restructuring and relief by leading creditor countries, and by the investment firms based in those countries, will be good for the whole world – facilitating health security, stability and sustained prosperity.

Fiscal modelling demonstrates that the costs of inaction would be much larger than the costs of action.It is deeply concerning, therefore, that even at this time of polycrisis, some officials are continuing to pressure countries to maintain fiscal restraints, or even to tie them tighter. Continuing with austerity would be a grave mistake.

As United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has highlighted, the global financial system is perpetuating and exacerbating inequalities, and is failing to provide a global safety net for developing countries.

Reform of the global financial architecture is urgent. This includes the need for a stable and timely debt restructuring mechanism, and for increased aid and sustainable and affordable concessional financing for low and low-middle income countries. It includes also the need for global coordinated action, and global rules, which will help advance fair taxation and the tackling of tax evasion.

There is, rightly, a consensus that low- and middle-income countries need to become increasingly fiscally self-reliant. The evidence is clear: achieving this requires growing new avenues for countries’ domestic revenue collection.

Brazil, host of November’s G20 meeting in Rio de Janeiro, has placed the establishment of new taxes on the agenda as a way for countries to source revenue that can be invested in health and other social priorities.

Needs include taxes on the wealth and on the capital gains of individuals and companies to ensure a reduction in inequality, with revenues collected redeployed for social priorities such as health, HIV, child welfare, gender equality, and social protection.

Investing in health works. The extraordinary advances secured by the global HIV response have proven what can be achieved. Since 2010, AIDS-related deaths have declined by 51% worldwide. New HIV infections have fallen by 38%. And three quarters of the 39 million people living with HIV are on antiretroviral treatment.

But right now, there is significant shortfall in the global investments required to end AIDS as a global health threat by 2030. The US$ 20.8 billion available for HIV programmes in low- and middle-income countries in 2022 was 2.6% less than in 2021, and well short of the US$ 29.3 billion needed by 2025. The final miles are the hardest, and need more investment, not less.

The world can end AIDS as a public health threat by 2030, be well-prepared for the next pandemic, and overcome the world’s dangerous health inequalities. But to ensure sufficient and sustainable resources requires leaders meeting in Washington DC need to be bold.

Now is the moment to frontload investment in health, education, and social protection. Economic stability and health security depend on multilateral coordinated action to drop debt, increase aid and concessional financing, and facilitate progressive taxation.

Decisions that leaders take this year will help determine whether the world successfully navigates the challenges of this decade and beyond. For the health security of everyone, leaders need to break the chokehold of debt and austerity, now.

Jaime Atienza is UNAIDS Director of Equitable Financing

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Andiswa Mlisa, Principal Advisor - Business Development, PIRMO at SPC giving a demo at the Digital Earth Pacific launch. Credit: SPC

By Catherine Wilson
SYDNEY, Apr 15 2024 (IPS)

Winning a battle for survival requires understanding the opponent. And, for the peoples of 22 island nations and territories scattered across more than 155 million square kilometres of Pacific Ocean, the volatility and wrath of the climate are their greatest threats.

The region harbours three of the world’s most disaster-prone countries, while eight are among those that suffer the highest disaster-related losses to Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

But decision-makers at all levels across the region are grappling with a lack of reliable, detailed information about the connections between climate extremes and changes occurring on their islands. In a bid to bridge the deficit of data, the regional scientific and principal organisation, the Pacific Community (SPC), is spearheading a new project, called Digital Earth Pacific, to capture extensive satellite information about climate change and natural disasters in the region.

“This is a real first for the Pacific and will bring incredible value to the region, which is so vast, but managed and stewarded by a small number of overstretched people in our member governments,” Dr Stuart Minchin, Director-General of the Pacific Community in Noumea, New Caledonia, told IPS.

Mary Nipisina cultivating her peanut garden in Tanna, Vanuatu. Farmers will be able to access the DEP for easy access to up-to-date satellite derived information. Credit: SPC

 

Pacific Island communities cannot afford escalating economic consequences of climate disasters. Credit: SPC

“Digital Earth Pacific provides a solution to the tyranny of distance that our Pacific people have to live with every day, allowing operational earth observation satellites to assist in monitoring and management of the vast Blue Pacific Continent,” he continued.

Satellites provide an invaluable timeline of pictures, past and present, of the ways climate change and natural disasters are affecting coastlines, forest cover, population centres, and food production.

The Pacific Islands are home to about 12.7 million people and natural disasters are leading to annual average losses in the region of USD 1.07 billion, reports the Australian Aid Agency.

Digital Earth Pacific, launched by the Pacific Community in October last year, aims to halt that trend. To do this, it will set up far-reaching digital public infrastructure that gives national leaders, decision-makers, policymakers, and citizens, including farmers and local communities, easy access to up-to-date satellite-derived information. It will equip islanders to make better decisions about everything from building climate-resilient infrastructure to planting crops.

The project will draw on the wealth of scientific information from Microsoft’s Planetary Computer and treat it as ‘public goods’ to be used by those who need it. It is now in the last stages of the first phase of development, with significant progress already made in establishing the digital infrastructure and designing products and applications. Minchin said that they had captured “coastline change, mangroves, and surface water resources, and each of these products is available for every island atoll and rock across the entire Blue Pacific Continent.”

This is only “the beginning, though, with a significant pipeline of other products in development, bringing the region not just a historical view of how these issues have impacted local areas but an ongoing operational monitoring tool that will be updated regularly with new satellite observations,” Minchin explained.

The development of products and services has been informed by extensive consultations with Pacific Island countries. “The insights from the consultations gave the project a very good indication of what kind of baseline data is missing and where earth observations can fit in for sound decision-making,” Sachindra Singh, the Geoinformatics Team Leader in the Pacific Community’s Geoscience Division in Suva, Fiji, told IPS.

There is no Pacific Island nation that has not suffered the blow of devastating cyclones, the merciless corrosion of land by the sea or human hardships when the necessities of food and water perilously decline in the face of droughts or saltwater contamination.

This century, the Pacific faces a forecast of relentless temperature increases, extreme rainfall, and floods that risk the perishing of crops and rises in human illness and disease, such as heat stress and dengue fever, reports the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). More destructive cyclones and rising sea levels will lead to continued loss and damage to towns, villages, and basic services, for instance, water, sanitation, power, and roads.

In recent years, the region has been burdened with exorbitant loss and damage bills from cyclones. In 2015, Cyclone Pam cost Vanuatu USD 449.4 million, while Cyclone Winston, which descended on Fiji in 2016, caused damages to the value of US$600 million.

SPC Director General Stuart Minchin at the DEP Launch in Noumea last year. It is hoped that the project will assist in the containment of the impacts of climate disasters in terms of lives and livelihoods. Credit: SPC

 

Destruction from the Hunga Tonga–Hunga Haʻapai eruption and tsunami in 2022. Natural disasters are leading to annual average losses in the region of USD 1.07 billion. Credit: SPC

Pacific Island nations cannot afford the escalating economic consequences of climate disasters. Especially because ‘countries in the Pacific region commonly face low GDP growth, high reliance on grants and external loans and under-development in disaster-resilient infrastructure, the economic impact of natural disasters tends to be larger than for other comparable low-income and emerging economies,’ reports the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The new digital project is, therefore, an essential tool for prevention, ensuring that islanders can act effectively before the next disaster hits and build lives that are resilient to climate excesses in the decades ahead.

At this stage, the project will have operational products ready to use by 2024.

“All this information is made easily accessible through the Digital Earth Pacific website in a user-friendly viewer,” Singh said.

Users can then “identify how their shorelines have changed over time, what areas of their islands are flood-prone or have historically faced droughts. They will be able to identify how the health of their mangroves recovers after a severe tropical cyclone and monitor the progress of replanting efforts over the years,” he continued.

A major beneficiary will be the Cook Islands, a self-governing group of 15 islands, including low-lying coral atolls, located between Tonga and French Polynesia.  It has a population of about 17,500 people who live on a total island landmass of 240 square kilometres. Here, people contend with limited land for food production, an expanding population, and constrained water resources. And, from November to April each year, the country is exposed to tropical cyclones.

John Strickland, Director of Emergency Management in the Cook Islands, told IPS that the country was particularly prone to cyclones, flooding, sea surges, and drought.

“With 30 years of satellite data collected through Digital Earth Pacific…[it] has provided images of how the Cook Islands’ coastal area has been affected by climate change, also indicating water observations during floods,” Strickland said.

“With the data captured, this will assist the Cook Islands in future planning on ensuring that affected coastal and low-lying areas affected by floods are captured and monitored. It will provide us the ability to report on affected areas and forecast, in the future, zones that are vulnerable during a disaster.”

The Pacific Community also believes that access to the data will aid economic growth by informing better investment and planning by local industries and businesses.

Bringing such a massive infrastructure scheme to fruition will take an equally sizeable investment. And the Pacific Community is currently seeking donors and partners who will help the vision become reality.

“We have already received strong support from the National Oceans and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the United Kingdom and New Zealand governments and the Patrick J. McGovern Foundation, allowing us to develop the Digital Earth Pacific capability for the first year or two of operation and we are very grateful for this support to date,” Minchin said. But he emphasised that ongoing financial and technical support is vital in the coming years.

Ultimately, the Pacific Community’s goal is to give islanders the power to forge sustainable lives, limit climate-related poverty, reduce fiscal exposure, and retain their sovereignty.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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Credit: UN Photo/Eskinder Debebe
 
With current UN Secretary-General António Guterres set to step down in 2026, who is in the running to replace him? A seven-part series reveal who might be in the running and assess their chances.
 
The potential candidates include Amina J. Mohammed (Nigeria), Mia Motley (Barbados), Alicia Barcena (Mexico), Maria Fernanda Espinosa (Ecuador), Rebeca Grynspan (Costa Rica) and Michelle Bachelet (Chile). These are names that have come up in conversations with UN insiders and other experts. All six would offer skills and experiences we believe would be valuable in these fast-paced, uncertain times.

By Felix Dodds and Chris Spence
APEX, North Carolina / DUBLIN, Ireland, Apr 15 2024 (IPS)

Could a UN insider take the top job? Amina J. Mohammed is the current Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations. She has been in the role since early 2017, making her something of a veteran within senior circles.

A British-born Nigerian, Mohammed’s UN experience goes back even further. For instance, she played a critical role in the development of the post-2015 Development Agenda as an Assistant Secretary-General within previous Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s office.

In that role, she acted as the link for the Secretary-General and the High-Level Panel of Eminent Persons Annan set up under several global political leaders. This UN experience means Mohammed not only understands the internal workings of international relations, but has interacted with many world leaders for more than a decade.

UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina J. Mohammed. Credit: United Nations

Mohammed’s Nigerian credentials are also noteworthy. Before becoming UN Deputy Secretary-General, she served as her country’s Environment Minister, where she steered the country’s efforts on the Sustainable Development Goals and action on climate change. Her prior experience cuts across government agencies, the UN, and academia, including a spell at Columbia University in New York.

Mohammed’s time as Guterres’ deputy at the UN has seen her carve out an important role for sustainable development. She is Chair of the UN Sustainable Development Group and has attempted to reposition sustainable development and the SDGs at the center of the organization’s work.

She has also overseen reforms that give the UN Resident Coordinators—who are the most senior UN development staff at the country level—greater independence and authority to coordinate UN activities in their country. In an interview with UN News, Mohammed said these changes would allow “a much more independent and impartial leader” at the country level.

“What I would say is that, in previous times, we’ve sort of had a conductor that, through no fault of their own, is conducting a cacophony – the left-hand does not know what the right hand is doing,” she said. “Today, we have an opportunity to make a symphony for the SDGs. That’s really the difference on the ground.”

Assessing Mohammed’s Prospects

Could Amina Mohammed be the next UN Secretary-General?

While a final decision is more than two years away, here is our assessment of her advantages and disadvantages, should she choose to throw her hat into the ring.

Advantages

– A Woman Leader: The UN has never had a woman leader. As the organization approaches its 80th birthday, many observers rightly view this as almost scandalous, especially given the number of strong female candidates over the years.
– UN Experience: Mohammed is a UN veteran. There is an argument that an insider with the right knowledge would be able to hit the ground running more easily than an outsider. What’s more, much of Mohammed’s recent experience has been at UN headquarters in New York, where much of the organization’s key strategic decisions are made. This knowledge of how the UN works at the highest levels would surely be an asset during these uncertain times.
– Proven Impact: Mohammed can point to a number of successes during her time as UN deputy, particularly her internal reforms and championing of the Sustainable Development Goals. Given the headwinds the organization has faced in recent years, a candidate who can point to some genuine successes could arguably make a compelling case for promotion.
– Connections: Mohammed has had many years operating in the rarefied air of global political leadership, shaking hands and making deals with top politicians from around the globe. Could her networks and connections with senior politicians help her?

Disadvantages

– Wrong Region? There is a tradition—or at least, an expectation—that the UN Secretary-General rotates through the different UN regions. In reality, this does not always happen. For instance, António Guterres is Portuguese, whereas it was supposed to be an Eastern European who was appointed last time. This time around, however, many believe it is Latin America and the Caribbean’s turn. If enough people agree, Mohammed’s chances would be significantly diminished.
– Outsiders Usually Win: Internal promotions to the top job at the UN are rare. In fact, a Deputy Secretary-General has never been promoted, ever. Of course, it could be argued that the deputy’s job is fairly new, since there has only been a Deputy Secretary-General since 1998. Furthermore, fans of internal promotions point out that Kofi Annan, a previous Secretary-General, had been a senior UN staff member before taking the top job. However, the lack of a recent precedent for internal promotions and the fact that no former UN deputy has ever taken the top job could well be an obstacle.
– Name Recognition: Amina Mohammed is very well known in international diplomatic circles. Outside them … not so much. Will the fact she is not widely known by the public-at-large tell against her?

Prof. Felix Dodds and Chris Spence have participated in United Nations conferences and negotiations since the 1990s. They co-edited Heroes of Environmental Diplomacy: Profiles in Courage (Routledge, 2022), which examines the roles of individuals in inspiring change.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Teachers protest in São Paulo on Jan. 9, 2024 for better working conditions and remuneration in public education in Brazil. Most teachers are women, and they face complex physical and mental conditions in exercising their profession. CREDIT: Roberto Parizotti / ProfeSP

By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO, Apr 15 2024 (IPS)

Alice went for eight weeks without Portuguese language classes after starting her first year of high school on Feb. 5 in this Brazilian city. Her chemistry teacher taught only two classes and disappeared. But the worst part is the classroom without air conditioning in the heat of more than 35 degrees Celsius some days during the southern hemisphere summer.

Her public school in a central neighborhood of Rio de Janeiro, with more than 500 students, illustrates the conditions of public education in Brazil, with poorly paid teachers and the resulting poor work attendance, as well as precarious infrastructure and other problems."The statistics show a challenging scenario, with many students lagging behind because they flunk or drop out of school. In addition to the 'pe de meia' program and other measures, systemic policies are needed, such as adequate infrastructure, teachers and full-time education." -- Natália Fregonesi

It is precisely in secondary education – the last three years of high school after nine grades of primary and middle school – that the biggest bottleneck in Brazilian education is found, according to an assessment agreed on widely by experts. The first nine years are for students up to the age of 14 and the last three years for students between the ages of 15 and 17.

Since Mar. 27, the Senate has been discussing a reform of the New Secondary Education Law, which came into force only two years ago. The government, in office since January 2023, proposed the modifications whose key points were already approved by the lower house of Congress.

Brazil is thus trying to overcome the shortcomings in education that have placed the country among the lowest ranked in comparative assessments, such as the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), which studies 81 countries.

The new reform raises from 1,800 to 2,400 the number of hours to be dedicated during the three years of high school to compulsory subjects such as mathematics, natural and human sciences, and the Portuguese, English and Spanish languages.

It also provides for the extension of full-time education to a minimum of seven hours per day, and in technical-vocational schools as well.

In full-time primary and secondary institutions, students are at school for at least seven hours a day, attend regular classes in the morning and extracurricular activities, such as technical courses, sports or special subjects in the afternoon, or vice versa.

In addition, they receive two or three meals at school and in some cases can take a shower there – an attraction for students from low-income families in a country marked by huge social inequalities.

Even so, opportunities are not the same for everyone because the nine years of public basic education are in the hands of the municipalities, secondary education is run by the state governments and university education is the responsibility of the central government.

The new reform now depends on ratification by the Senate.

In secondary education, another 600 hours would be allocated to optional subjects, depending on the students’ interests, and may be extended further in the case of technical courses.

Currently, the flexibility applies to 1200 hours, but without adequate management in many educational centers. Alice, the student who preferred to use a fictitious name, complained that the extra hours are used for classes of the regular subjects or without a specific purpose.

“One teacher spent a long time explaining what the colors of the national flag symbolize,” she complained to IPS.

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva announced on Jan. 26, 2024 in Brasilia the “Pe de meia” (savings) program, which will pay poor students in public secondary education 40 dollars a month, as an incentive to stay in the classroom. CREDIT: Ricardo Stuckert / PR

 

Curbing the school dropout rate

The government also created the “pe de meia” program, which in Brazil means savings. It offers 2,000 reais (400 dollars) per year, divided into 10 monthly installments, to high school students whose families are poor and are registered in the government’s Unified Social Assistance Registry. To receive it, they must demonstrate at least 80 percent school attendance.

The aim is to curb the dropout rate, which is higher in secondary education than in primary or middle school.

In 2023, the number of students who dropped out of school totaled 480,000, according to the Ministry of Education’s school census, released on Apr. 2.

In this country of 203 million people, of the adolescents and young people aged 15 to 29, nine million are out of school and have not completed high school, according to 2023 data from the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE).

The savings program seems like little money, but it is important “as a complement” for adolescents, who are generally engaged in informal work, and for low-income families, who benefit from social programs, said Natália Fregonesi, coordinator of Educational Policies at the non-governmental organization Todos pela Educação (Everyone for Education).

The annual IBGE survey points to the need to find work as the main cause of school dropout, which stands at 47.1 percent among young people aged 15 to 29 years. There is a strong contrast between men, with an index of 53.4 percent, and girls and women: 25.5 percent. Pregnancy is the second cause of dropout of girls and women, accounting for 23.1 of all young female dropouts.

Among boys and men, a lack of interest in studying is in second place, accounting for 25.5 percent.

 

Education Minister Camilo Santana released on Jan. 16, 2024 the results of the exam taken by high school students to enter universities. CREDIT: Marcelo Camargo / Agência Brasil

 

More time in school

“The statistics show a challenging scenario, with many students lagging behind because they flunk or drop out of school. In addition to the ‘pe de meia’ program and other measures, systemic policies are needed, such as adequate infrastructure, teachers and full-time education,” said Fregonesi, a chemist who specialized in education policies.

Full-time schools are an efficient model, as they create a different relationship between students and schools, offer other subjects in addition to the regular curriculum, help youngsters think more clearly about their future, and give students a leading role, in addition to having full-time teachers, the expert told IPS by telephone from São Paulo.

The idea is to increase the number of full-time schools, which already exist throughout the country, but in a very unequal manner. While in the state of Pernambuco, in the impoverished Northeast region, 66.8 percent of students are in full-time education, in the Federal District, where Brasilia the capital is located, the proportion is only five percent, and in São Paulo, the richest state, only 25.9 percent.

On average, only 21.9 percent of students in the public education system are in full-time schools.

But increasing the number of full-time schools requires a large investment and Brazil has limited availability of public resources. According to data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which brings together 38 countries, Brazil ranks among the last in terms of spending per basic education student.

 

The National Education Conference, held in Brasilia in January 2024, was one of the hundreds of forums in which the high school reform to be approved by the Senate was discussed. The Chamber of Deputies has already approved a version, with an increase in hours and classes in regular subjects taken by all students and of technical courses. CREDIT: José Cruz / Agência Brasil

 

Putting a priority on technical-vocational education

Another measure being pursued is to expand technical education. In Brazil, only 11 percent of students enrolled in secondary school take technical courses, while the average exceeds 40 percent in the other OECD countries, said Fregonesi.

“There is a certain prejudice in relation to technical education in Brazil, where it is seen as ‘inferior’ to high school, as preparation for university,” he said. But vocational training is lacking in the national economy and prepares students just as well for higher education, he argued.

In Brazil, there is growing unmet demand for skilled labor, for example, in information and communication technologies, which makes it necessary to expand technical secondary education.

The country’s educational challenges are colossal. In 2023, there were 47.3 million students enrolled in primary and secondary education and 6.5 million in university courses. But there were 68 million Brazilians without basic schooling.

Above and beyond these figures, the fact remains that the falling birth rate is reducing the school population. In 2019, the year before the outbreak of the pandemic, 57 million students were enrolled in school. The pandemic reduced that number by 9.5 million.

Education in Brazil operates both as a factor of social ascent and, at the same time, of inequality. Around 20 percent of students from the higher income sectors attend private primary and secondary schools, which generally are better funded and produce better results than public schools.

In higher education, the situation is paradoxically reversed. The children of the higher-income segments, who are better educated in private schools, gain easy admission to public universities, which offer better education than private colleges and therefore better possibilities for professional advancement.

To correct this imbalance, progressive governments in recent decades created racial and social quotas or affirmative action to benefit the generally poorer blacks and students in public elementary and secondary schools.

All these measures and some policies, such as financing systems for basic education maintained by city and state governments, have fomented small advances in Brazilian education, which have fallen far short however.

That process suffered a setback with the pandemic and the far-right government of Jair Bolsonaro (2019-2022). The current administration of left-wing President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is trying to get back on course.

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Credit: Last Generation Germany

By Andrew Firmin
LONDON, Apr 12 2024 (IPS)

The heat records keep tumbling – 2023 was the hottest year in recorded history. Extreme weather events keep mounting up. And yet the voices most strongly calling for action to prevent climate catastrophe are increasingly being silenced.

It’s a sad fact that climate campaigners in the global south – in many countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America – have long faced repression. People have been subjected to incarceration and violence all the way up to murder for resisting climate-harming extractive projects and environmental destruction. In comparison, climate activists in global north countries – including Europe and North America – for a long time enjoyed relative freedom, which they used to protest against their governments and the corporations headquartered in their countries that bear most of the responsibility for causing global warming.

But they no longer enjoy the full freedom to do so. As the latest State of Civil Society Report from global civil society alliance CIVICUS shows, several global north governments are increasingly making it harder for people to take part in climate protests. They’re using anti-protest laws, raids, arrests, jail sentences and violence to try to subdue voices calling for urgent action.

When it comes to the climate, delay is denial, because if action isn’t taken fast, it may be too late. This means the repression of activists demanding immediate action must be seen as a form of climate denial.

Examples are piling up. In Germany last year, authorities used laws intended to combat organised crime to raid the homes of young activists from the Last Generation climate movement, seize their laptops and freeze their bank accounts. The German police also used violence against activists trying to block a coalmine expansion. The imposition of restrictions on climate activism is one the key reasons the CIVICUS Monitor recently downgraded Germany’s civic space rating.

In Italy too, the government has served climate campaigners with criminal conspiracy indictments historically used against the mafia, and it has also introduced a law to criminalise non-violent action at key sites. The Dutch authorities have responded with mass arrests to roadblock protests demanding it fulfil its promise to end fossil fuel subsidies, which amount to around US$39.9 billion a year. Thousands have been detained and the police have used water cannon against protesters.

The UK government has passed a package of laws that criminalise disruptive and noisy protests, clearly targeted at the non-violent direct action used by climate campaigners. In January, the UN Special Rapporteur on environmental defenders, Michel Forst, condemned these new laws. Numerous climate activists have been jailed for peaceful protest actions that until recently would never have received a prison sentence. Meanwhile the UK government plans to grant over 100 new oil and gas licences. Several Australian states have also passed anti-protest laws that have been used to jail climate activists.

Global north states, apparently eager to do the bidding of the fossil fuel giants, can be expected to intensify this repression as the gap between the action needed and the lack of effort being taken becomes increasingly clear. They silence civil society because activists expose the hypocrisy behind the greenwash. As right-wing populists and nationalists who oppose climate action – and often spread climate disinformation – gain influence across the global north, climate activists can expect an even greater wave of vilification.

The impacts of repression are personal. They increase the costs and dangers of activism in an attempt to deter people from getting involved and sap collective energies. However, in response, campaigners are showing resilience. In Germany, frozen funds were quickly replaced with crowdsourced donations. In the Netherlands, attempts to repress roadblocks motivated more people to turn up to protest.

But the opportunity cost is steep. Energy that should be invested in advancing creative climate solutions is instead being spent in fending off restrictions. In the long-term, there’s a danger of attrition, depleting the ranks of climate activists. And without civil society, who will push to keep the climate crisis high on the political agenda?

Civil society has shown it can make a difference. While there was much to be unhappy about with the last global climate summit, COP28, the fact that for the first time states acknowledged the need to transition away from fossil fuel use came as a direct result of civil society’s decades-long advocacy. More institutions are committing to divest from fossil fuel investments due to campaigning pressure: 72 per cent of UK universities have now done so, because student activists demanded it.

And the growing field of climate litigation keeps paying off. A group of Swiss women just won a ruling at the European Court of Human Rights, which found that their government has violated their human rights by not doing enough to tackle climate change, a verdict that sets a strong precedent. Last year, courts in Belgium and Germany insisted on stronger actions to cut emissions following lawsuits brought by campaigners. More are sure to follow.

Civil society will strive to keep working on every front possible, through protest, advocacy and litigation, because the scale of the climate crisis demands a full spectrum of responses. States should stop trying to hold back the tide and put themselves on the right side of history. They must respect the right of everyone to protest and stop the denial they practise through repression.

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

 

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