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Les Balkans, antichambre de l'Occident pour les évacués d'Afghanistan
Afghans évacués : en camps fermés au Kosovo, à l'hôtel en Albanie et en Macédoine du Nord
117 ressortissants d'Afghanistan quittent le Kosovo pour la Grande-Bretagne
Afghanistan : les témoignages des premiers évacués transférés en Albanie
L'Albanie et le Kosovo vont accueillir « plusieurs milliers » de réfugiés d'Afghanistan

/ Populations, minorités et migrations, Courrier des Balkans, Défense, police et justice, Kosovo, Albanie, Macédoine du Nord, Balkans Syrie

Die neue Coronavirus-Variante Omikron stellt Regierungen in aller Welt vor enorme Herausforderungen. Deutschland müsse sich wegen Omikron auf eine "massive" neue Corona-Welle vorbereiten, sagte Bundesgesundheitsminister Karl Lauterbach (SPD) am Freitag.

Weekly schedule of President Charles Michel 19 - 23 December 2021

Le Danemark est puni sur la scène internationale pour l’efficacité de ses tests Covid, selon des experts danois qui estiment que le pays devrait plutôt être félicité pour sa capacité à détecter le variant Omicron.

Der Bekleidungskonzern H&M ruft eine Haarklammer mit LED-Lämpchen zurück. Es bestehe die Gefahr von inneren Verletzungen, teilten die Beratungsstelle für Unfallverhütung (BFU) und H&M am Montag mit.

Der UN-Menschenrechtsrat hat am Freitag (17. Dezember) eine internationale Untersuchung zu möglichen Menschenrechtsverletzungen in dem Konflikt in Äthiopien beschlossen. Die Mehrheit des Gremiums trug den Beschluss trotz Protests der Regierung in Addis Abeba mit.

Le chef des urgences de l’OMS, Michael Ryan, veut croire à un avenir meilleur. Il se dit optimiste quant à l’évolution de la situation sanitaire.

« L'économie italienne connaît une croissance plus rapide que jamais au cours de ce siècle », a déclaré Ursula Von der Leyen lors d'un discours à l'Université Cattolica de Milan, tout en soulignant le problème du chômage élevé chez les jeunes.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson appointed the foreign minister to lead talks with Europe Sunday (19 December) after the resignation of the Brexit minister sent shockwaves through the already troubled London administration.

By Paul S. Teng and Genevieve Donnellon-May
SINGAPORE, Dec 20 2021 (IPS)

While the COVID-19 impact has been predominantly negative, the pandemic appears to have sparked increased interest in developing agricultural technology (agtech) to improve the efficiency of food systems, from input supplies through farming and processing to delivery and retail.

Paul S. Teng

The COVID-19 pandemic has admittedly upended economic activity in the Asia-Pacific region, but a recent event in Singapore (Asia-Pacific Agri-Food Innovation Summit, 16-18 November 2021 — https://agrifoodinnovation.com/ ) showed that, in the case of agriculture and food, it has greatly spurred investments in technology to scale up food production sustainably. During 2020-21, momentum has been building up among financial institutions such as venture capital companies to invest in startup companies that produce technological innovations to address the shortcomings in food production and food supply chains. The UN Climate Summit COP26 further spurred activity before and after it was held, to focus on farming with reduced carbon footprints, reduced greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and valorization of food waste, all aimed at promoting more sustainable and circular food systems.

During the pandemic, the international media highlighted phenomena like farmers dumping milk and feeding quality produce to cattle, vegetables rotting in fields due to lack of labour to harvest, increased food waste in urban environments, delays in supply of inputs for growing crops or feeding fish, and supermarkets with empty shelves. The pandemic has highlighted the need to produce more food locally and to use techniques which both minimize the use of labour and avoid a high carbon footprint. Governments have responded to some of these through policies and action. The private sector has responded even quicker, having detected investment opportunities to support solutions to these problems. Venture Capital funds like AgFunder and Yield Lab have set up their Asian bases in Singapore to support initiatives throughout the Asia-Pacific.

Some of the exciting new agtech developments deal with ensuring new sources of inputs for farming crops and fish. This is exemplified by waste valorization to extract valuable elements from water and biowaste that can be used to grow plants. Many new ventures use the Black Soldier Fly, a ubiquitous insect that feeds on food waste, to harvest larval protein directly or indirectly for use as feed supplements for fish and chicken. Countries like Singapore and Malaysia, which import almost all their agricultural inputs, have provided incentives to spur these activities so that they have more resilience in their supply of fertilizers and animal feed.

Genevieve Donnellon-May

For on-farm production, digital farming is another area which has seen much progress during the pandemic to safeguard food production. Applications of remote sensors for environmental factors such as temperature, light and water quality increased. These sensors included both stationary and mobile sensors mounted on drones. Many now utilise cloud technology to send data back to a centralized processing facility which, among the more “intelligent” sensors, further have capabilities to take action. In Indonesia, one new company in Java has implemented among several hundred shrimp farmers an “Internet of Things” (IoT) system which not only monitors the water in which the shrimps grow for any danger signs, but also the growth of the shrimps and ultimately links the farmer to a potential buyer. In Singapore, Camtech Diagnostics has created Aquafarm, a remote water management tool for aquaculture farmers, which uses wireless sensors to maintain optimal water quality for their stocks. The remote monitoring and wireless communication system allows farmers to monitor the water quality in real-time, reduce labour costs, and increase the yield rate due to the prevention of stock loss. In India, likewise, a startup company has enabled several hundred fish farmers with ponds and indoor tanks to optimize their stocking density of fish and therefore increase their final harvest with minimized mortality. This company also helps the farmers secure credit from banks by providing risk profiles of the fish farmers. These startups are run by relatively young “agropreneurs” and illustrate the growing phenomenon of younger graduates entering farming by providing value-added services.

There are also exciting developments to help farmers make better use of increasingly scarce or expensive inputs like water and fertilizer. Precision technologies, such as drip-irrigation which are supported by the monitoring of soil moisture and plant water status, are now available in several countries. One company has even developed technology to supply chilled, oxygen-enriched water to stimulate plants growth in the tropics.

In land-strapped countries like Singapore, the number of high tech vegetable and fish farms using vertical farming technology with multiple stacks of vegetables or fish tanks, and supported by digital tools to monitor the growing environment, and plant and fish growth, has increased dramatically during the pandemic. The Singapore government in fact enacted a “30 by 30” strategy to produce 30% of its nutrition needs (vegetables, fish and eggs) by 2030 and incentivized an accelerated research and development programme (called the Singapore Food Story) with some Singapore $144 Million to create new technologies that enable high-density farming. This follows on achievements in other Asian countries, notably Japan, China and South Korea, to increase their share of controlled-environment farming using indoor plant factories, a form of “Smart farming”. Moving forward, these indoor plant factories will also allow countries to address weather patterns attributable to climate change.

One of the significant set of activities precipitated by the pandemic has been on e-commerce – using telecommunications and the internet to link farmers to retailers, manufacturers to traders and food and beverage outlets to consumers at home. The growth of this sector has been spectacular in Asia as movement control measures to reduce the spread of the virus encouraged households to use the internet to order raw and cooked food. It is likely that this practice will continue even after the pandemic has become an endemic.

Apart from agtech, there has been similar growth in fintech and foodtech. Using digital technology and the widespread use of mobile phones and other portable personal devices, even giants like MastercardTM have entered this space of providing financial services to small farmers. Others have linked financial services to marketplace information. Likewise, foodtech is providing food processors and ultimately consumers with many new offerings, such as extending the shelf-life of vegetables and fruits with environment-friendly sealants and packaging are now in use. Precision fermentation technology has also seen an upsurge to produce more diverse plant-based protein, and in the near future, also cellular meat. Concern for the negative effects of producing animal protein on the environment and climate have spurred innumerable startup companies to venture into the “Alternative Protein” space. Furthermore, nutrition-enhanced food, such as with vitamin and essential minerals, is also likely to see an increase in the marketplace.

It can be argued that all the above would have happened even without the stimulus provided by the pandemic. But the pandemic has convincingly increased awareness on food security worldwide, and coupled with the COP26 climate summit urgings, has led to this increase in activity to use modern agtech, fintech and foodtech in sustaining our food systems.

Paul S. Teng is Adjunct Senior Fellow, Centre for Non-Traditional Security Studies at Nanyang Technological University Singapore and concurrently Managing Director of NIE International Pte. Ltd. Singapore. He has worked in the Asia Pacific region on agri-food issues for over thirty years, with international organizations, academia and the private sector.

Genevieve Donnellon-May is a research assistant with the Institute of Water Policy (IWP) at the National University of Singapore. She is also a master’s student in Water Science, Policy and Management at the University of Oxford. Genevieve’s research interests include China, Africa, transboundary governance, and the food-energy-water nexus.

 

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Die Menschenrechtsorganisation Amnesty International hat neue Beweise für Gewalt und Menschenrechtsverletzungen gegen Flüchtlinge an der belarussisch-polnischen Grenze gesammelt.

En Finlande, l'autorité de sûreté radiologique et nucléaire a autorisé le cinquième réacteur nucléaire du pays à lancer et à réaliser des essais à faible puissance. Olkiluoto 3 (OL3) devrait commencer à produire régulièrement de l'électricité en juin 2022.

Thousands of people protested outside the Polish president's palace on Sunday (19 December) against a new media law that critics say is aimed at silencing the country's main independent news channel.

Zur Eindämmung der Omikron-Variante des Coronavirus hat Österreich am Montag seine Einreisebestimmungen verschärft.

Euronews: Magyar rekord született a Virág Judit Galéria árverésén.

In an interview with EURACTIV, Vsevolod Chentsov, the Ambassador of Ukraine to the EU, discussed last week’s Eastern Partnership summit and EU summit, tensions with Russia, Nord Stream-2, NATO aspirations, and his country's security strategies.

Az önkéntes alapú, fizetett katonai szolgálat bevezetését fontolgatja a védelmi minisztérium – jelentette be Vasile Dincu tárcavezető.

Kolozsvári sajtótájékoztatóján a miniszter kifejtette, egyre több ország vezeti be az önkéntes alapú katonai szolgálatot, ugyanis sok fiatal szeretne ilyen típusú képzésben részesülni. Azokban az országokban, ahol ez a rendszer működik, a szolgálatra jelentkező személyeket megfizetik. „Tehát száz százalékban önkéntességen alapul. De a társadalom is nyer, a résztvevők is nyernek, és nem kötelező szolgálat” – mondta a Dincu. Hangsúlyozta, hogy egyelőre csak egy ötletről van szó, amelyet meg kell vitatni. „Személyesen úgy gondolom, hogy nem rossz az ötlet” – tette hozzá.

Dincu leszögezte, jelenleg Romániában hivatásos katonákból álló hadseregbe toboroznak jelentkezőket. A hadsereg bővítésről Európa-szerte komoly viták zajlanak jelenleg – emlékeztetett a miniszter.

The post Megfontolják az önkéntes alapú, fizetett katonai szolgálat bevezetését Romániában appeared first on .

Patients wait for their COVID-19 vaccination at a health centre in Kabale District, Uganda. More than 5.7 billion COVID-19 vaccine doses have been administered globally, but only 2% of them in Africa, says World Health Organization (WHO) chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. Credit: UNICEF/Catherine Ntabadde

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Dec 20 2021 (IPS)

The 21-month-long corona virus pandemic has triggered three new phrases in the UN lexicon: “vaccine famine, vaccine apartheid and vaccine nationalism”.

And the largest number of victims facing the triple threats are from developing countries, mostly in Africa, as reflected in grim statistics.

Dr Richard Mihigo, coordinator for the WHO’s Immunization and Vaccines Development Programme in Africa, is quoted as saying that high-income countries are administering more booster doses than even vaccines that are being given in developing countries.

“Remember that we only have 8% — 8% — of people who have been fully vaccinated in this region,” he said, referring to Africa. “This represents around 103 million people in a continent of 1.3 billion.”

Achim Steiner, Administrator, UN Development Programme (UNDP), says that vaccines delayed is “development denied” for Africa. “Therefore, we must ensure vaccine equity which is the fastest way to end this pandemic”.

Rallying around the unifying strength of the UN, he pointed out, “we need the urgent cooperation of vaccine manufacturers, vaccine-producing countries and countries that already have high vaccination rates to tackle the acute vaccine supply shortage.”

Doing so will help to open-up economic and social opportunities across the (African) continent — boosting GDP and driving forward human development,” Steiner told a recent African Economic Conference in Cabo Verde.

Worldwide, says the New York Times, about 73% of shots that have gone into arms have been administered in high- and upper-middle-income countries, according to the Our World in Data project at the University of Oxford. Only 0.8% of doses have been administered in low-income countries.

Dr Djibril Diallo, President & CEO of the African Renaissance and Diaspora Network Inc, told IPS Article 25 of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, ratified in 1948, recognized that the right to health is a human right.

“Now is a time when nations claiming to respect and uplift human rights are being tested. But, more so, it is in their own national interest to pass the test,” he said, pointing out that low inoculation rates are a root cause of the mutation of COVID-19 into new variants.

“From our experience with Delta, and now Omicron, we have seen, in our globally connected world, how swiftly and uncontrollably new variants spread’.

“It is a political fiction to believe that these variants can be contained before they reach a nation’s shore. Instead, we need to shift towards reducing the risks of new variants developing by ensuring that no one is left behind in receiving vaccines,” said Dr Diallo.

As a new COVID-19 variant has just been discovered, says UNDP, flights are being cancelled, travel bans are reinstated, and several countries are closing their borders, African countries are once again most directly affected by the impact of the pandemic has on economies, particularly most vulnerable people.

Despite calls from various international institutions, African countries are still facing critical inequality regarding access to COVID-19 vaccines, leading to what many have called a “COVID-19 vaccine famine”.

According to the World Bank, African countries are still struggling to inoculate all eligible citizens, and vaccine delays are costing Africa $14 billion in lost productivity each month.

When they need additional resources to protect their citizens and plan for a post-pandemic recovery, the cost of borrowing for African countries has increased. African countries pay more than five times more in interest payments for commercial lending than the rest of the world.

“There is an increasingly looming risk of losing more than a decade of efforts to strengthen African countries’ economies and human capital”, the UN agency said.

WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters December 14:

• 77 countries have now reported cases of Omicron, and the reality is that Omicron is probably in most countries, even if it hasn’t been detected yet. Even if Omicron does cause less severe disease, the sheer number of cases could once again overwhelm unprepared health systems.

• Let me be very clear: WHO is not against boosters. We’re against inequity. Our main concern is to save lives, everywhere. It’s really quite simple: the priority in every country, and globally, must be to protect the least protected, not the most protected.

• There remains a vast gap in rates of vaccination between countries. 41 countries have still not been able to vaccinate 10% of their populations, and 98 countries have not reached 40%. If we end inequity, we end the pandemic. If we allow inequity to continue, we allow the pandemic to continue, he warned.

Asked about WHO trying to have 60/70 percent of the world population vaccinated by next June, and whether this is possible?, British Ambassador Barbara Woodward told reporters December 13: “I think it is possible. As we’ve discussed before, there’s really three elements to this.”

“The first is the manufacture of vaccines, and we are seeing that come on stream now much faster. The second is shipping the vaccines and that is happening, although sometimes with quite short lead-in times”.

“Then the third is the simple logistics of health systems getting needles into people’s arms. And that’s an area where we still need to accelerate work. But again, an area where we can work with UN agencies and with NGOs to help that happen,” she declared.

In a statement released November 29, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres commended the Government, scientists and the health community of South Africa for acting early to identify the emergence of a new COVID-19 variant.  

He is deeply concerned about the isolation of southern African countries due to new COVID-19 travel restrictions.   Low vaccine rates are a breeding ground for variants

“The people of Africa cannot be blamed for the immorally low level of vaccinations available on the continent – and they should not be penalized for identifying and sharing crucial science and health information with the world,” Guterres said.

He appealed to all governments to consider repeated testing for travellers, together with other appropriate and truly effective measures, with the objective of avoiding the risk of transmission so as to allow for travel and economic engagement.

Samantha Power, Administrator of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) told a virtual meeting on December 6 that for the past year, the story of COVID-19 around the world has been a struggle for vaccine equity—rich nations replete with doses while poorer nations fought to secure vaccines for their people.

But thanks to the efforts of many people and many institutions and nations, including the United States, thanks to the tireless work of COVAX, the African Union, and other regional leaders, that story is now changing fast, she said.

Over the past year, she pointed out, the United States has committed 1.2 billion vaccines to partner countries and delivered more than 290 million of those.

“We have invested in vaccine production capacity in countries like India, South Africa, and Senegal, so that in the future, fewer people would have to depend on vaccine donations from wealthy countries. All of this has been done with no strings attached or expectations—we do it because it is the right thing to do but it is also, we know, the smart thing to do.”

Today, at this critical inflection point, Power said: “I’m pleased to announce that the U.S. is building on this work by introducing a new effort to get a shot in every arm: the Initiative for Global Vaccine Access”.

“We’re going to spend an additional $400 million to double down on our efforts to help countries raise vaccination rates and save lives. This money will speed efforts both to get shots in arms and to support vaccine manufacturing in low-and-middle-income countries,” she declared.

 

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Azerbaijan handed over 10 captured Armenian soldiers to Armenia on Sunday (19 December) for the second time this month following talks last week between both sides and European Council President Charles Michel, the two countries said.

Poland has risked annoying the US and EU by rushing through a bill banning non-EU firms from being majority owners of media companies. The law will force US-owned independent broadcaster TVN24 to sell off shares. "The United States is deeply troubled by the passage in Poland today of a law that would undermine freedom of expression ... and erode foreign investors' confidence in their property rights," the state department said.