The IMF’s April 2025 Regional Economic Outlook for Sub-Saharan Africa presents a clear warning: regional growth is slowing, debt pressures are mounting, and donor assistance is declining. Yet the report outlines critical opportunities particularly in domestic revenue mobilization, structural reform, and private sector activation that can shape a more resilient …
Basing methodology on global justice N S Jodha THE ESSENCE of the conclusions of the World Resource Institute is aptly reflected in the Gujarati proverb, "What is mine is mine and what is yours is ours." Anil Agarwal and Sunita Narain question this conclusion. In the first place, they find …
THE MANAGEMENT of water quality is closely related to almost all human activity and, therefore, is of great concern for all. Wastewater, or water polluted to a degree that is harmful to the environment and useless for human beings, is the result of several natural processes as well as all …
THE SWEDISH city of Malmo has carefully landscaped an area of about 10,000 ha, which functions as a natural stormwater treatment plant. In Malmo, on the southern Swedish coast, several projects involving the natural treatment of stormwater are being implemented. One of them is the Toftanas Project in which stormwater …
The figure shows the elements of a small-scale wastewater treatment system in use at Stensund high school in Sweden. First, a sedimentation tank stores the wastewater produced over two days (1). The water then is led to a soil filtration tank (2) with sulphuric bacteria under anaerobic (non-oxygen) conditions, which …
TRADITIONAL communities developed ingenious ways of making use of wastewater. And, experts involved in the modern science of ecological engineering can learn a great deal from them. There is a growing realisation that the term "wastewater" is a sign of human inability to recognise a valuable resource. Traditional societies throughout …
UN SECRETARY general Boutros Boutros-Ghali's suggestion that the North and South should share equally the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the UN Commission for Sustainable Development (UNCSD) leadership has failed to enthuse Europeans and Americans. Mustafa Tolba (?), enjoying the support of UNCSD secretary general Maurice Strong, is virtually …
"A plant in the backyard has no value," says an Indian proverb. This attitude, which has been the bane of Indian society -- and that of the nations of the South -- repeatedly tends to overlook the traditional in pursuit of the modern. These societies often forget that modern technology, …
LEADERS of developing countries today find in environment a cause of great worldwide concern -- a concern that is steadily growing in their own countries and one that already has deep roots in the rich North. Political leaders from the South, who attended the recent 10th summit of the Non-Aligned …
A MAJOR preoccupation of developing countries that have undergone the colonial experience is to avoid, at any cost, the substitution of political colonialism with economic colonialism. An important and influential theoretico-ideological position of the post-colonial era has been the "dependency theory" of social scientists Immanuel Wallerstein and Andre Gunder-Frank, that …
EFFORTS of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) to create a gene bank appear to have stalled barely a year after steps were taken to start it. The proposal to start the gene bank was accepted at the 1990 Male meeting of SAARC and was taken up at …
I HAVE been uncomfortable with the "transfer of technology" demands of developing countries during their environmental dialogue with the North. Let me explain: We do stress, based on irrefutable data, that the North is responsible for the bulk of the perturbation that human beings have caused to the properties of …
PRODDED by fears that the ozone layer is being depleted at a much faster rate than reported initially, representatives of 56 countries met in Geneva recently and largely agreed on a proposal to bring forward the date for phasing out use of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) from 2000 to the end of …
A US high-level military planning group has issued a report strongly recommending the development of nuclear weapons for specific use against Third World enemies. Some of the proposed weapons include an electromagnetic pulse bomb that can knock out enemy communications and other electronic gear at low risk to human beings …
AGRIDYNE Technologies, a US biotechnology company, recently announced a major project involving the genetic-engineering of pyrethrins, an insecticidal compound derived from the pyrethrum flower ( Chrysanthemum cinerariaefolium). The US $3 million, three-year project is expected to produce unlimited" supplies of pyrethrin, an environmentally friendly insecticide, in the laboratory. According to …
In this issue, we carry two reports: One on the subject of human rights suppression and environmental degradation, and the other on trade bans against environmentally harmful products. Both trade and human rights are being used today as sticks to beat the South. Northern NGOs have repeatedly raised these issues …
• SEVERAL northern governments and large northern NGOs have proposed the idea of a global forest convention or agreement. We wish to place on record our strong and total opposition to this idea. We believe this step will be anti-poor, lead to highly bureaucratic and ecologically unsound forest practices, and …
AT RIO, while the forest convention was being resisted tooth and nail by developing countries, yet another idea was being floated. This was to establish a World Commission on Forests on the lines of the Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change (IPCC). This would help broaden the scientific consensus and sort …
The forest convention got its impetus from a group of northern NGOs who have consistently pushed and prodded their governments to support this idea. The largest groups have been the Sierra Club and the National Audubon Society in the US and the Friends of the Earth (FOE) and the World …
THE WORLDWIDE consciousness about environment is now demanding action. And Rio was an important staging post in this global effort to set up a framework for future action. In many ways, the framework set up in Rio is extremely inimical to the long-term interests of the South and goes counter …
