Global megatrends such as income inequality, climate change, demographic shifts, technological progress, and urbanisation are shaping the future of societies. Yet, their quantitative impacts on development are neither well understood nor established. This paper examines the individual and combined effects of these global forces on poverty, using both cross-section and …
BRITISH aid agency Oxfam has flayed the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank (WB) for their complacent approach to the problems caused in sub-Saharan Africa because of its huge external debt, which is in excess of $183 billion. "After a decade of structural adjustment programmes implemented under the …
DESPITE being warned about the pitiable plight of the Uru Eu Wau Wau Indians in northwest Brazil, the World Bank (WB) did not stop to consider the effect on the tribals of a road construction project it was financing in the region. And now, unfortunately, the warnings are coming true. …
MADAGASCAR has been steadily losing its market share for vanilla, one of its major export commodities. In the early 1970s, 70 per cent of the vanilla consumed worldwide came from Madagascar. This has declined now to 50 per cent as high prices and illicit shipments of poor quality vanilla are …
BOREAL forests -- consisting of mostly coniferous and some deciduous trees in the northern hemisphere -- are being destroyed faster than before and may be making the world a hotter place. Boreal forests comprise one-third of the world's forests and cover almost 8 per cent of the land surface. About …
WHAT HAPPENS when a tiny nation's only tradeable natural resource runs out? It gets a ravaged environment, some compensation and a bleak future. This is exactly what happened to the Pacific island-state of Nauru, whose only natural resource, phosphate, was mined by Australia. After a 30-year battle, Australian Prime Minister …
THE VICUNA, South America's graceful camelid coveted for its soft, silky hair, is falling prey to well-organised gangs of international rustlers "working for brokers within Latin America who then ship the fibre in bales to Europe and Asia", according to an expert with Conacs, Peru's quasi-government agency for camelids, which …
UNDER pressure from women's groups, the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) is under orders to ensure that women and minorities are adequately represented in federally-funded clinical research projects. The requirement, imposed by the US Congress on June 10, 1993, would not apply if the NIH director determines such an …
FISHERFOLK in Alaska set up a floating picket line of about 100 fishing boats and other vessels, blocking tankers heading for Prince William Sound, for three days in August. They were protesting Exxon's failure to deal with the after effects of the March 1989 oil spill from the Exxon Valdez, …
THOUGH under increasing pressure from conservation groups, Kathmandu is yet to impose a moratorium on giving away baby rhinoceroses to friendly countries as gifts. Animal lovers contend the government is actually selling the animals, because they are being shown as gifts against payments for rehabilitation and conservation. Conservation groups also …
US PRESIDENT Bill Clinton was right when he predicted not everyone would be pleased with his solution to the timber crisis in the northwestern states (Down To Earth, May 31, 1993). Both environmentalists and timber workers are up in arms against his proposal, which calls for reducing logging to 25 …
BRITAIN is to spend L29.5 million over the next 10 years on an international project to enable astronomers to witness the birth of a planet. The project, Gemini, involves setting up two eight-metre telescopes that will detect both planets in the making as well as stars being formed in galactic …
IN A BID to protect its forests from a voracious, microscopic pest called the pinewood nematode, the European Community (EC) has banned imports of untreated softwood lumber from Canada. The ban affects the bulk of Canada's $388.50 million yearly export of untreated lumber to EC states. Now all Canadian lumber …
WHAT DOES the International Monetary Fund have to do with land degradation? On the face of it, nothing. But in reality, quite a lot. A degraded landscape in an increasingly integrated world is the end-product of a long chain of economic processes. Debt leads to debt repayment, which in turn …
PAKISTAN plans to expand the controversial uranium enrichment plant at Kahuta near Islamabad to provide fuel for a nuclear power reactor being bought from China, according to senior government officials. Abdul Qader Khan, director of the research laboratories at Kahuta, said, "We believe that by the time we have the …
CHINA'S plan to build the Three Gorges dam across the Yangtze river with a 185-m-high reservoir level "would not be an economically viable proposition", according to the World Bank. Probe International reports the World Bank endorsed a Canadian feasibility study of the dam, which contained evidence that raising the water …
A BIBLIOGRAPHY is useful not only as a guide to further study and research, but also because it gauges the current attitudes and obsessions prevalent in academia. Researchers in the North are slowly waking up to a fact long recognised by activists and writers in the South: that environmental issues …
ONE OF Bangladesh"s leading environmental NGOs, the Bangladesh Centre for Advanced Studies (BCAS), has taken the lead in rectifying a major lacuna in the Rio agenda. Dealing with poverty should have been the first item on the global agenda in Rio, but issues such as global warming and biodiversity, supported …
MEMBER-states of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation have drawn up a joint action plan to combat AIDS. At a recent seminar in New Delhi, delegates stressed the need to share information, provide guidelines on policy matters and develop a uniform surveillance system. The seminar was the first of …
THREE months have passed since the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation adopted the Dhaka Declaration pledging to alleviate poverty drastically in the region. However, the United Nations University on South Asian Perspectives, in Colombo, says nothing much has been done. SAARC leaders propose to identify what more needs to …
LAST MONTH, 40 Aztec Indians led a march from downtown Vienna to the Austria Centre, venue of the World Conference on Human Rights, to highlight the plight of the world's 300 million indigenous people. Lobbying for the rights of indigenous people at the conference was appropriate, 1993 being the Year …
