Lessons From Michelle Obama And The 2019 Obama Foundation Summit: Empowering Communities Through Education

Chicago’s South Side Bronzeville neighborhood, a center of African-American life and culture, hosted the 2019 Obama Foundation Summit at the Illinois Institute of Technology on October 29, 2019. The Advancing Women in Product (AWIP) team was invited to cover the Summit as press, and from the perspective of a female empowerment and advocacy NGO. (Kira Alvarez from the AWIP team covered the Summit.)

The South Side of Chicago was a deliberate choice. This region boasts a visionary past that has witnessed Ida B. Wells, President Obama, and Michelle Obama among others working toward social change. The Summit aptly chose the phrase “Places Reveal Our Purpose” as the conference theme, and touched on a number of pressing societal issues such as racism, poverty, and gender inequality. It showed that the South Side of Chicago is full of hope, love and energy that can inspire other places throughout the world. The critical role that communities and networks can play in supporting and promoting social advancement and opportunity was a powerful message from the 2019 Obama Foundation Summit.

Women leaders including Michelle Obama and Academy award nominee filmmaker Ava Duvernay spoke about their personal and professional journeys. These women showed that ambition and drive alone are not enough in pursuing a successful and fulfilling career. Support networks are key to achieving broader social change, especially for female advancement. This is in line with what researchers like Herminia Ibarra have remarked on the topic, that sponsors (both within and outside an organization) can help to accelerate careers and create opportunities. For Michelle Obama, support came from her family and a strong belief in self, which helped her overcome the prejudice she experienced growing up. For those who are looking to create their own support networks, search within your current social and professional networks – optimizing for those that will generate new opportunities.

An example of community engagement from the Obama Foundation is the Girls Opportunity Alliance (GOA), a program that seeks to empower girls and their respective communities through education. AWIP was invited to the intimate GOA roundtable with Michelle Obama, which featured international educators from countries including Cambodia, Guatemala, and Malawi who tirelessly work on the front lines to improve girls’ lives. According to Michelle, the lack of investment in female education is an international emergency: “What a waste. What a waste for society, what a waste for a family. What a waste for that girl’s soul to be trapped by her fate and not by her ability.”

The Girls Opportunity Alliance (GOA) empowers young girls in three dimensions: By growing an online network of grassroots leaders, by providing financial support for individual projects through GoFundMe, and by encouraging young people throughout the developed world to join the cause of promoting greater educational opportunities for women. GOA sees its work as not limited to a local or national context and therefore requires a transnational approach.  Creating an alliance of young women’s opportunities is ultimately about human rights. Investment in a network of girls’ education programs is key not just for the advancement of individual women, but also for the long-term advancement of societies. Being aware of opportunities outside one’s immediate surroundings, especially if those surroundings are limited by lack of resources, can be extremely freeing. According to the Gates Foundation 2019 Goalkeepers report, “the lack of access to education and jobs is destructive for everyone. It keeps women disempowered, limits their children’s life chances, and slows down economic growth.”

The Summit also featured other Chicago leaders who stressed the creation of strong networks and equality in education. Among them, Obama Foundation Scholars, Aimée Eubanks Davis and Dominique Jordan Turner, are founders of organizations that promote education and network creation. Ms. Davis, a 2018 Obama Fellow, is the CEO of Braven, an organization that works with universities and businesses to assist low-income, first-generation university students find employment post-graduation. Ms. Turner, a 2019 Obama Fellow, is the CEO of Chicago Scholars, a seven-year mentorship program that assists underprivileged Chicago youth in the college application process and subsequent employment search. Both Braven and Chicago Scholars are exemplary models of how organizations can provide disadvantaged students greater opportunities in the American educational system.  

Many of the students that participate in the Chicago Scholars or Braven program have the talent and ambition to succeed, but lack networks to help them create and sustain a career and might otherwise fall through the cracks. The programs therefore closely mentor underprivileged students by leveraging a large network of support including college counselors, potential employers, and alumni. Ms. Davis stressed, “referral networks are important in order to achieve career success.” Simply having a college degree and talent is no longer fully sufficient for gainful employment in the American workforce – that is the important lesson that these students are learning. Having the right skills through education is the first step but is much more effective when combined with a powerful support network. 

We find a similar root cause with the lack of women representation in tech leadership and executive ranks: many women already have their foot in the door and are often highly educated – but are often encountered with a glass ceiling. Organizations like Advancing Women in Product, Pink Innov, and the Operator Collective serve to stack the cards in the other direction: by creating opportunities where senior women can take a high-potential, rising leader under their wing. In a similar vein, these organizations are also creating communities and networks that encourage women to stay in the workforce and also introduce them to open leadership roles within the company as well as board seats for other companies. 

The 2019 Obama Foundation Summit ultimately demonstrated that social change requires not just hard work, but also the creation and sustainment of networks. Girls Opportunity Alliance, Braven, and Chicago Scholars are important models that utilize networks to help women and minorities achieve their goals. Let’s bridge the gap by building strong networks for ourselves and take our destiny into our own hands.

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Water Is Worth More than Milk in Extrema, Brazil

Biodiversity, Civil Society, Development & Aid, Economy & Trade, Editors’ Choice, Environment, Featured, Food & Agriculture, Green Economy, Headlines, Integration and Development Brazilian-style, Latin America & the Caribbean, Projects, Regional Categories, TerraViva United Nations, Water & Sanitation

Water & Sanitation

Elias Cardoso is proud of the restored forests on his 67-hectare farm, where he has protected and reforested a dozen springs as well as streams. "I was a guinea pig for the Water Conservator project, they called me crazy," when the mayor's office was not yet paying for it in Extrema, a municipality in southeastern Brazil. Credit: Mario Osava/IPS

Elias Cardoso is proud of the restored forests on his 67-hectare farm, where he has protected and reforested a dozen springs as well as streams. “I was a guinea pig for the Water Conservator project, they called me crazy,” when the mayor’s office was not yet paying for it in Extrema, a municipality in southeastern Brazil. Credit: Mario Osava/IPS

EXTREMA, Brazil, Nov 29 2019 (IPS) – “They called me crazy” for fencing in the area where the cows went to drink water, said Elias Cardoso, on his 67-hectare farm in Extrema, a municipality 110 km from São Paulo, Brazil’s largest metropolis.


“I realized the water was going to run out, with cattle trampling the spring. Then I fenced in the springs and streams,” said the 60-year-old rancher. “But I left gates to the livestock drinking areas.”

Cardoso was a pioneer, getting the jump on the Water Conservancy Project, launched by the local government in 2005 with the support of the international environmental organisation The Nature Conservancy and the Forest Institute of the southeastern state of Minas Gerais, where Extrema, population 36,000, is located at the southern tip.

The project follows the fundamentals of the National Water Agency‘s Water Producer Programme, which focuses on different ways to preserve water resources and improve their quality, such as measures to conserve soil, preventing sedimentation of rivers and lakes.

But at the core of the project is the Payments for Environmental Services (PES), which in the case of Extrema compensate rural landowners for land they no longer use for crops or livestock, to restore forests or protect with fences.

The “Water Conservator” (Conservador das Águas) began operating in 2007, with contracts offered by the PES to farmers who reforest and protect springs, riverbanks and hilltops, which are numerous in Extrema because it is located in the Sierra de Mantiqueira, a chain of mountains that extends for about 100,000 square km.

“Then everyone jumped on board,” Cardoso said, referring to the project in the Arroyo das Posses basin, where he lives and where the environmental and water initiative began and had the biggest impact.

View of the new landscape in the hilly area around Extrema, after the reforestation of thousands of hectares in three basins in this municipality in southeastern Brazil, where the local government has fomented the process of recovery by paying landowners for environmental services. The priority is to restore the forests at the headwaters of the rivers and on hilltops and protect them with cattle fences. Credit: Mario Osava/IPS

View of the new landscape in the hilly area around Extrema, after the reforestation of thousands of hectares in three basins in this municipality in southeastern Brazil, where the local government has fomented the process of recovery by paying landowners for environmental services. The priority is to restore the forests at the headwaters of the rivers and on hilltops and protect them with cattle fences. Credit: Mario Osava/IPS

In the 14 years since it was launched, the project has only worked fully in three basins, where two million trees were planted and close to 500 springs were protected. It is now being extended to seven other watersheds.

“The goal is to reach 40 percent of forest cover with native species” in the municipality and “so far we already have 25 percent covered, and 10 percent is thanks to the Water Conservator,” said Paulo Henrique Pereira, promoter of the project as Environment Secretary in Extrema since 1995.

“Planting trees is easy, creating a forest is more complex,” the 50-year-old biologist told IPS, stressing that it’s not just about planting trees to “produce” and conserve water.

The project began with the prospecting of areas and the training of technicians, after the approval of a municipal PES statute, since there is no national law on remunerated environmental services.

“The bottleneck is that there is no skilled workforce” to reforest and implement water conservation measures, Pereira said.

The project now has its own nursery for the large-scale production of seedlings of native tree species, to avoid the past dependence on external acquisitions or donations, which drove up costs and made planning more complex.

Since 2005 Paulo Henrique Pereira, Secretary of Environment in Extrema since 1995, has promoted the Water Conservator Project, which has won national and international awards for its success in recovering and preserving springs and streams, by paying for environmental services to rural landowners who reforest in this municipality in southeastern Brazil. "Planting trees is easy, creating a forest is more complex," he says. Credit: Mario Osava/IPS

Since 2005 Paulo Henrique Pereira, Secretary of Environment in Extrema since 1995, has promoted the Water Conservator Project, which has won national and international awards for its success in recovering and preserving springs and streams, by paying for environmental services to rural landowners who reforest in this municipality in southeastern Brazil. “Planting trees is easy, creating a forest is more complex,” he says. Credit: Mario Osava/IPS

The success of Extrema’s project, which has won dozens of national and international good practice awards, “is due to good management, which does not depend on the continuity of government,” said the biologist, although he admitted that it helped that he had been in the local Secretariat of the Environment for 24 years and that the mayors were of the same political orientation.

“It is a well-established project that is not likely to suffer setbacks,” he said.

The fact that the project offers both environmental and economic benefits helps keep it alive.

“My grandfather, who spent his life deforesting his property, initially rejected the project. It didn’t make sense to him to plant the same trees he had felled to make pasture for cattle,” said Aline Oliveira, a 19-year-old engineering student who is proud of the quality of life achieved in Extrema.

“When I was a girl, I didn’t accept the idea of protecting springs to preserve water either. I thought it was absurd to plant trees to increase water, because planting 200 or 300 trees would consume a lot of water. That was how I used to think, but then in practice I saw that springs survived in intact forest areas,” she said.

Later, when the PES arrived in the area, her grandfather gave in and more than 10 springs on the 112-hectare farm were reforested and protected. The payment is 100 municipal monetary units per hectare each year, currently equivalent to about 68 dollars.

Aline Oliveira studies engineering and lives on her family's farm in southeastern Brazil. She is proud of the way life has improved in Extrema, a process that began with the establishment of the Payments for Environmental Services system, which guarantees income to farmers and ranchers for reforesting watersheds. It is a secure income at a time of falling milk prices and in a town far from the dairy processing plants. Credit: Mario Osava/IPS

Aline Oliveira studies engineering and lives on her family’s farm in southeastern Brazil. She is proud of the way life has improved in Extrema, a process that began with the establishment of the Payments for Environmental Services system, which guarantees income to farmers and ranchers for reforesting watersheds. It is a secure income at a time of falling milk prices and in a town far from the dairy processing plants. Credit: Mario Osava/IPS

“The PES is a secure income, while milk prices have dropped, and everything has become more expensive than milk in the last 10 years. In addition, there were losses due to lack of transportation, since there is no major dairy processing plant within 50 km,” she told IPS.

Thanks to the municipal payments, “we were able to invest in cows with better genetics, buy a milking parlor and improve health care for the cattle, thus increasing productivity,” which compensated for the reduction in pastures, added the student, who works for the project.

The programme coincided with a major improvement in the economy and quality of life in Extrema. “I was born in Joanópolis, where there were better hospitals than in Extrema. But now it’s the other way around” and people from there come to Extrema, 20 km away, for heath care, Oliveira said.

This is also due to the industrialisation experienced by Extrema in recent decades, which becomes evident during a walk around the town, where many new industrial plants can be seen.

The water conservation project has also contributed to the water supply for a huge population in the surrounding area.

Arlindo Cortês, head of environmental management at Extrema's Secretariat of the Environment, stands in the nursery where seedlings are grown for reforestation in this municipality in southeastern Brazil. "Building reservoirs does not ensure water supply if the watershed is deforested, degraded, sedimented. There will be floods and water shortages because the rainwater doesn't infiltrate the soil," he explains. Credit: Mario Osava/IPS

Arlindo Cortês, head of environmental management at Extrema’s Secretariat of the Environment, stands in the nursery where seedlings are grown for reforestation in this municipality in southeastern Brazil. “Building reservoirs does not ensure water supply if the watershed is deforested, degraded, sedimented. There will be floods and water shortages because the rainwater doesn’t infiltrate the soil,” he explains. Credit: Mario Osava/IPS

The Jaguari River, which crosses Extrema, receives water from fortified streams and increases the capacity of the Jaguari reservoir, part of the Cantareira system, which supplies 7.5 million people in greater São Paulo, one-third of the total population of the metropolis.

“If the watersheds are deforested, degraded and sedimented, merely building reservoirs solves nothing,” said Arlindo Cortês, the head of environmental management at Extrema’s Secretariat of the Environment.

Extrema’s efforts have translated into local benefits, but contributed little to the water supply in São Paulo, partly because it is over 100 km away, said Marco Antonio Lopez Barros, superintendent of Water Production for the Metropolitan Region at the local Sanitation Company, Sabesp.

“No increase in the capacity of the Cantareira System has been identified since the 1970s,” he said in an interview with IPS.

“Thousands of similar initiatives will be necessary” to actually have an impact in São Paulo, because of the level of consumption by its 22 million inhabitants, he said, adding that improvements in basic sanitation in cities have greater effects.

São Paulo experienced a water crisis, with periods of rationing, after the 2014 drought in south-central Brazil, and faces new threats this year, as it has rained less than average.

Extrema also felt the shortage. “Since 2014 we have only had weak rains,” said Cardoso. The problem is the destruction of forests by the expansion of cattle ranching in the last three decades.

“The creek where I used to swim has lost 90 percent of its water. The recovery will take 50 years, the benefits will only be felt by our children,” he said.

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IDB Modernises Crucial Social and Environmental Safeguards

Civil Society, Development & Aid, Economy & Trade, Editors’ Choice, Environment, Eye on the IFIs, Global Governance, Green Economy, Headlines, Integration and Development Brazilian-style, Latin America & the Caribbean, Projects, Regional Categories, TerraViva United Nations

Development & Aid

The IDB finances sustainable transportation projects in Latin America and the Caribbean, but these and other works to which the bank provides loans must meet social and environmental standards. The picture shows part of Mexico City's Metrobus public transport system, which runs on a dedicated lane with bi-articulated units. Credit: Emilio Godoy/IPS

The IDB finances sustainable transportation projects in Latin America and the Caribbean, but these and other works to which the bank provides loans must meet social and environmental standards. The picture shows part of Mexico City’s Metrobus public transport system, which runs on a dedicated lane with bi-articulated units. Credit: Emilio Godoy/IPS

MEXICO CITY, Nov 27 2019 (IPS) – The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) is in the process of modernising the social and environmental safeguards that govern the financing of projects considered vital for the construction of sustainable infrastructure in the Latin American region.


The participation of social organisations and local communities in the analysis of projects, dissemination of information, gender perspective and the focus on climate change are major challenges in this process of reforming the safeguards.

The Washington-based IDB will begin regional consultations with civil society organisations in January to upgrade the standards of those safeguards, approved between 1998 and 2010, after it closed the public consultation for the draft of the new environmental and social sustainability policy for its private sector lending arm IDB Invest on Oct. 15.

Vanessa Torres, deputy director of the Colombian NGO Environment and Society, told IPS that a Latin American coalition of NGOs and local communities asked for adequate time to coordinate their positions and exchange and study information.

“There will be an opportunity to update the risks and comment on the substance. They will have to be adapted to the characteristics of the region. We have not yet seen the draft of the update. Our concern is that substantial aspects, which are already in the current safeguards, not be watered down.” — Carolina Juaneda

“The communities affected by the projects must be informed in order for them to participate. This is a positive process, because the bank has been very open, but we are waiting to see what was included in the draft,” said Torres, an environmental lawyer.

The IDB, whose president is Colombian businessman Luis Moreno, will disseminate the draft at the end of November and stage consultations in 2020 in Argentina, Panama, Jamaica and Peru.

In September 2020, the bank’s Board of Executive Directors, made up of 14 representatives from several blocks of countries, will receive the final version and the implementation plan.

Among other measures, at the end of the process, in terms of environmental and social policy in project finance, the IDB will adopt the eight principles of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private lending arm of the World Bank, on issues such as environmental impacts, labour issues, biodiversity conservation and indigenous peoples, and will apparently incorporate a gender approach and stakeholder participation and information dissemination.

The multilateral institution proposes an integrated policy framework, with a socio-environmental statement and 10 technical standards for the management of environmental and social risks.

“There will be an opportunity to update the risks and comment on the substance. They will have to be adapted to the characteristics of the region. We have not yet seen the draft of the update. Our concern is that substantial aspects, which are already in the current safeguards, not be watered down,” said Carolina Juaneda, a consultant for the Latin America Program of the non-governmental Washington-based Bank Information Center.

The current IDB Environmental Safeguards and Compliance Policy consists of environmental, population resettlement, disaster risk management, gender equality, indigenous peoples and access to information requirements.

In 2018, the IDB approved 96 sovereign guaranteed (backed by a government) loan projects with total financing of 13.4 billion dollars, and disbursed more than 9.9 billion dollars.

The bank ranks the level of risk in terms of a project’s environmental and social sustainability. In 2018, eight percent of the loans were granted to high risk projects, 24 percent substantial risk, 31 percent low risk and 37 percent moderate, according to the 2018 Sustainability Report.

 The IDB will investigate whether IDB Invest, its private finance arm, failed to comply with the safeguards in the loan for the Ituango hydroelectric plant, which is being built on the Cauca River, 170 km from the city of Medellín, Colombia, after a serious accident with the dam in 2018. Credit: Courtesy of Colombia's Attorney General's Office

The IDB will investigate whether IDB Invest, its private finance arm, failed to comply with the safeguards in the loan for the Ituango hydroelectric plant, which is being built on the Cauca River, 170 km from the city of Medellín, Colombia, after a serious accident with the dam in 2018. Credit: Courtesy of Colombia’s Attorney General’s Office

Ten percent of the projects failed to meet the standards, 20 percent adhered to the guidelines, 21 percent required immediate corrective action, and 49 percent had partially consistent compliance with the requirements.

The IDB has 2,596 active projects worth 60.8 billion dollars, most of which are being implemented by Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico and Paraguay in areas like transportation, energy, water and sanitation. In addition, it is evaluating 225 projects for another 19.8 billion dollars.

The ravages of the climate emergency in Latin America and the Caribbean, such as more intense hurricanes, rising temperatures, loss of biodiversity and rising sea levels, make the construction of sustainable infrastructure an imperative.

Safeguards as a tool

Beginning in the 1990s, multilateral financial institutions began to design safeguards that their clients – governments and companies – and the projects they finance must respect, thanks in part to pressure from affected social organisations and communities demanding that the impacts of these ventures be taken into account.

They also put in place mechanisms to process complaints of non-compliance with the standards or requirements set by the safeguards in projects financed by the multilateral banks.

Since last decade, financial institutions have revised these guidelines to adapt them to a changing social and environmental context, such as the worsening of climate change and its effects, including intense storms, droughts and rising temperatures. Currently, the greatest pressure on the banks is for them not to finance hydrocarbon projects, due to the climatic urgency to stop using fossil fuels.

Moreno, who assumed the presidency of the IDB in 2005, will conclude his term in mid-2020 and wants to do so having put in place updated social and environmental standards.

In updating the safeguards, the IDB has developed more than 60 new environmental, social, economic and institutional criteria to be applied in the design, construction, operation and final conclusion of a project financed by the institution.

The update stems from recommendations made in 2018 by the IDB Office of Evaluation and Oversight, which found that a large percentage of IDB projects that were reviewed did not fully comply with the initial safeguards requirements prior to loan authorisation and that the requirements were not addressed during execution.

The organisations involved in the update process mention, as an example of unsustainable infrastructure, the Ituango hydroelectric dam, built by Empresas Públicas de Medellín on the Cauca River, Colombia’s largest river. The IDB provided 550 million dollars for the project and administered part of the one billion dollars provided by other banks.

In May 2018, torrential rains overflowed the river, causing the collapse of the tunnel built to divert that flow, and as a result landslides, floods and the displacement of thousands of people from their homes, raising serious questions about the sustainability of the country’s largest hydroelectric project and one of the biggest in Latin America.

In June of that year, 477 residents of eight municipalities in the northwestern department of Antioquia requested that the Independent Consultation and Investigation Mechanism (Mici), the bank’s autonomous body responsible for evaluating performance against its standards, investigate whether the IDB and IDB Invest respected their own socioenvironmental safeguards.

The IDB Board of Directors resolved on Oct. 29 that it would inquire whether IDB Invest had complied.

Between 2010 and September 2019, Mici received 151 complaints, of which 144 referred to the IDB, four to IBD Invest and four to IDB Lab, a platform that seeks to mobilise capital, knowledge and connections to promote innovation in the region. Thirteen are active, of which seven are in the consultation phase, five in the compliance review phase and one is being assessed for eligibility.

This year, Mici has three cases open from Argentina and two from Brazil, while it rejected two complaints from Argentina and Brazil, and it has one each from Barbados, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana and Paraguay, respectively, while it declared a complaint from Chile ineligible.

The organisations say the bank’s sustainability framework should include a comprehensive approach embodied in the operational strategy and safeguards, with an exclusion list of hydrocarbon projects.

The IDB has an active regional initiative to promote the reduction of polluting emissions and improvements in efficiency through the use of gas, backing for Guyana’s oil sector and other support for the “sustainable and responsible development” of mining and hydrocarbons in Colombia.

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We Shouldn’t Expect Philanthropists to Fund Activism

Asia-Pacific, Civil Society, Democracy, Featured, Global Governance, Headlines, TerraViva United Nations

Opinion

Philanthropists who are genuine givers are not able to explain clearly why they don’t fund ‘activist-y’ work | Photo courtesy: Pexels

Philanthropists who are genuine givers are not able to explain clearly why they don’t fund ‘activist-y’ work | Photo courtesy: Pexels

Nov 22 2019 (IPS) – Since philanthropists are unlikely to fund anything that destabilises their businesses, building independent institutions can be an effective approach to create lasting impact.


The vibrancy of a democracy, and the health of a society, is significantly influenced by civil society. It comprises an entire spectrum from community-based collectives and voluntary organisations to NGOs and nonprofits of other sorts. Philanthropy plays a critical role in supporting that space, building it, keeping it alive, and growing it.

What is the role of civil society?

What is civil society’s specific contribution? One part of it is keeping the market and state honest. It is a counterbalance to the market and the state, and it must act as one.

Civil society is the champion of the social and public good. On the other side, civil society also tries to work with the market and the state to make them more effective and useful to society. Both functions co-exist—not as a dichotomy but as a spectrum.

Philanthropy can play a specific role in this spectrum, by taking the kinds of risks that the state system finds hard to take because of operational reasons, and by helping develop civil society institutions.

To keep the state and market balanced, civil society should—and it doesn’t do enough of it right now—build institutions. This has to be supported by philanthropy. India doesn’t have enough civil society driven institutions, but if it did, they would play a very important role in balancing the market and the state

For instance, the state is likely to find it difficult to recruit good, highly-capable people at the beginning of an initiative, or when something is at an experimental stage, because of the its large systems, which have their internal logic. To help solve for this, the state can collaborate with civil society.

If you look at many sectors—health, education, environment—we’ve seen that very often civil society leads in motivating people to take risks and/or championing the public good. Once proven, accepted or established, that gets taken up by the government in some sense or the other.

This is because civil society by its very nature is focused on the public good (or should be). It can be more flexible and can engage people in a way that the state cannot. It’s not a lacuna on part of the government system; it’s just the way the system is structured.

To keep the state and market balanced,  civil society should—and it doesn’t do enough of it right now—build institutions. This has to be supported by philanthropy. India doesn’t have enough civil society driven institutions, but if it did, they would play a very important role in balancing the market and the state.

Philanthropy in India isn’t playing an adequate enough role

There is certainly some philanthropy happening in India, we know that; people are giving money–some are giving a lot, and some are giving smaller amounts, but it’s still a significant percentage of their wealth. And all this is good.

But it is clearly not at the scale that the country needs, or comparable to that in some other countries or what the wealthy of India could be giving.

Consider an example from the USA: If you look at the strength of the American higher education system, not just as a teaching powerhouse but also as a place of intellectual ferment and knowledge creation, that keeps society on a certain path, it has been significantly funded by philanthropy.

We don’t have anything like that in India. One can count on one’s fingertips the significant universities or research institutions that have been funded by Indian philanthropy.

One big reason is that they just don’t want to do it. It’s not merely a question of needing large amounts of money to support higher education; it certainly can be done with smaller amounts of money, in interesting ways like setting up a research chair at a university or funding a research program. But all this presumes that someone actually and genuinely wants to give for such matters. Those who do, find ways of doing it.

Today, when people do give, they prefer to give money for tangible things like scholarships, grants for buildings, donations to hospitals, because they believe that they can see the direct benefit. It seems simple and clear. Funding institutions, on the other hand, takes more patience, understanding, and perspective. And not many philanthropists seem interested in going down that path.

India hasn’t always been like this. We’ve had remarkable philanthropists in the first several decades of the 20th century—the Tatas, Birlas, Sarabhais, people like Jamnalal Bajaj, and other lesser known names—who built institutions, and helped build the nation with their social capital and a version of Gandhian trusteeship.

When you compare what they did to what today’s wealthy are doing—from the perspective of the wealth that they have generated in the past 20-30 years—are they giving enough? And are they supporting development of institutions? If you take corporate social responsibility (CSR) out of the equation—because CSR is not philanthropy—the answer is probably no.

Business money is likely to be risk-averse

Business money of any sort—including money that has created wealth for individuals—is likely to be risk-averse. This is sensible, and the wealth owners cannot be faulted for this.

To put it simply, business money will find it hard to fund ‘activist-y’ things. This is because activist-driven work by its very nature destabilises the socio-political status-quo. And business money will not want to do that.

That is just the nature of the beast. There were perhaps unusual times, as during the Indian independence movement, when this general principle did not hold true—but those were exceptions.

Since business money will not fund activist-driven work, the alternative is for institutions to do this. When you help create an institution and you let go—because you have to let go—it becomes an important player in civil society, and over time, not in one generation but in the next generation and for generations to come, it truly becomes an independent voice and force that can question, or contribute to upending the status-quo.

Therefore, one of the most powerful routes to complement markets and state in any society is through building institutions.

The Tatas are a good example of this. Early on, they built many institutions. Today, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Indian Institute of Science (IISc), and other smaller institutions are not bound by the commitments that any individual, or organisation that has business money, would otherwise be.

They will do whatever it takes to fund innovation, cutting edge research, and so on. This is our own live history that clearly demonstrates what institution building can help achieve versus the ‘project funding’ approaches that are currently generally supported by philanthropists.

It’s illogical and unfair to expect philanthropists to fund any sharp forms of activism. Why would they fund anything that destabilises their existing business and its social fabric? The question they need to ponder over is why aren’t they funding and building institutions.

It will not happen in their generation, but there will come a time in 20-30 years when such institutions will be separated from any business interests and will become very important players in civil society. And that’s what philanthropists today aren’t doing enough.

Today, the philanthropists who are genuine givers—and there are many of them—are not able to explain clearly why they don’t fund ‘activist-y’ work. They get defensive. But the rationale is clear. They should do what is right for them, and for the source of the money (their business), which is what allows them to be philanthropic. Nonetheless they should also fund institutions that outlive them and support the range of roles that civil society must play.

This article has been written based on an interview conducted by IDR with Anurag Behar.

Anurag Behar is CEO of Azim Premji Foundation and the founding Vice Chancellor of the Azim Premji University. He has been a vocal advocate for the critical importance of public systems, in particular the public education system. Anurag is also closely involved with Azim Premji Philanthropic Initiatives, a grant-making organization supporting not-for-profit organizations working on certain specific issues in the social sector.

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Achieving the Possible: “Weapons of Mass Destruction Free Zone in the Middle East”

Armed Conflicts, Civil Society, Featured, Global Geopolitics, Headlines, IPS UN: Inside the Glasshouse, Middle East & North Africa, Nuclear Energy – Nuclear Weapons, Peace, TerraViva United Nations

Opinion

Tariq Rauf, former Head of Verification and Security Policy Coordination, Office reporting to the Director General, International Atomic Energy Agency (2002-2011), was responsible for safeguards and security policy, the Director General’s annual report on the Application of Safeguards in the Middle East and for the IAEA Forum on the Experience of NWFZs relevant for the Middle East.

Credit: United Nations

VIENNA, Nov 20 2019 (IPS) – A historic conference on the Middle East opened at the United Nations in New York on 18th November and will continue until 22nd November. The Conference on the Establishment of a Middle East Zone Free of Nuclear Weapons and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction is presided over by Ambassador Sima Bahous of Jordan.


This matter has been before the international community since 1974 and remains controversial and unresolved to this day. On the one side, the Arab States of the region of the Middle East and Iran have called for the establishment of a nuclear-weapon-free zone in the Middle East and the dismantlement of Israel’s clandestine nuclear weapon programme.

On the other side, Israel supported by the EU member States, Canada and the US, maintain that regional peace and security is a pre-condition for any negotiations on such a zone and that concerns about nuclear programmes in certain Arab States also need to be resolved first.

Thus, this matter has simmered for decades, plagued the proceedings and outcomes of the review conferences of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, the annual General Conferences of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), as well as the First Committee and the United Nations General Assembly.

Now finally, pursuant to a decision by the General Assembly in December 2018, this conference is going ahead albeit without the participation of Israel and the United States.

Nuclear-weapon-free zones

The original concept of establishing nuclear-weapon-free zones (NWFZs) was conceived with a view to preventing the emergence of new nuclear-weapon possessor States.

Efforts to ensure the absence of nuclear weapons in other populated parts of the world have led to five regional denuclearization agreements—the 1967 Treaty of Tlatelolco covering Latin America, the 1985 Treaty of Rarotonga covering the South Pacific, the 1995 Treaty of Bangkok covering Southeast Asia, the 1996 Pelindaba Treaty covering Africa, and the 2006 Central Asian NWFZ treaty, all are in force—thus the entire southern hemisphere below the Equator is covered by NWFZ treaties.

In addition, in 1992 Mongolia declared itself to be a nuclear-weapon-free space that was approved by the Great Hural in 2000 and endorsed by UNGA in 2002.

Also, certain uninhabited areas of the globe have been formally denuclearized. They include Antarctica under the 1959 Antarctic Treaty; outer space, the moon, and other celestial bodies under the 1967 Outer Space Treaty and the 1979 Moon Agreement; and the seabed, the ocean floor, and the subsoil thereof under the 1971 Seabed Treaty.

General Assembly resolution 3472 B (1975) defines a Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone as

    • any zone recognized as such by the General Assembly of the United Nations, which any group of States, in the free exercises of their sovereignty, has established by virtue of a treaty or convention whereby:
    a) The statute of total absence of nuclear weapons to which the zone shall be subject, including the procedure for the delimitation of the zone, is defined;
    b) An international system of verification and control is established to guarantee compliance with the obligations deriving from that statute.

NWFZs ban the production, testing and stationing of nuclear weapons, permit peaceful uses, include verification provisions and in some cases an institutional set up; and require security assurances from nuclear-weapon States.

Article VII of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) affirmed the right of States to establish NWFZs in their respective territories and the 1995 NPT Review and Extension Conference (NPTREC) expressed the conviction that regional denuclearization measures enhance global and regional peace and security.

The NPTREC adopted a Resolution on establishing a zone free of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction as well as delivery systems in the region of the Middle East. The 2000 NPTRevConf reiterated the importance of the 1995 Resolution, and the 2010 RevConf mandated that a conference be held on such a zone by 2012; and the 2015 RevConf came to an inglorious end over disagreements on the Middle East zone.

Earlier in 2000, the IAEA General Conference adopted a Resolution for the IAEA Director General to convene a Forum on Experience of NWFZs Relevant for the Middle East. On joining the IAEA in 2002, the Director General assigned me the task to make the arrangements for holding this Forum – during the course of the summers of 2002-2004, I was able to get agreement on the Agenda but the Forum itself was convened only in November 2011.

Representatives from all five zones and Mongolia attended and made presentations at the IAEA Forum; however, under the-then Director General the Agency acceded to pressure from certain sources to ensure that the Forum was a one-off event and that there would not be any follow-up activities.

In terms of new NWFZs, the Middle East remains an old unfulfilled aspiration. First jointly proposed by Egypt and Iran in 1974 through a General Assembly resolution, the concept was broadened in 1990 through the Mubarak Initiative to cover all weapons of mass destruction.

There is as yet no general agreement on the contours and details of a WMD-free zone (WMDFZ), however keeping to basics it is possible to identify practical measures and elements – as is endeavoured in the draft treaty text prepared by The METO Project.

Middle East

Traditionally, Egypt has taken the lead in promoting efforts for the implementation of the 1995 NPTREC Resolution on the Middle East in the NPT review process, as well as at the IAEA General Conference and at the First Committee of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) on the establishment of a NWFZ in the region of the Middle East.

Last year, UNGA First Committee adopted by voting (103 yes :3 no : 71 abstentions) decision (A/C.1/73/L.22/Rev.1) co-sponsored by Algeria, Bahrain, Comoros, Djibouti, Egypt,* Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, Yemen and State of Palestine on Convening a conference on the establishment of a Middle East zone free of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction.

The UNGA decision A/73/546, adopted on 22 December 2018 by a vote of 88 to 4 with 75 abstentions, called on the UN Secretary General to:

    • convene a conference for the duration of one week to be held no later than 2019 dealing with the establishment of a Middle East zone free of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction;
    • the conference shall take as its terms of reference the 1995 NPTREC resolution;
    • all decisions emanating from the conference shall be taken by consensus by the States of the region;
    • all States of the Middle East, the three co-sponsors of the 1995 resolution on the Middle East, the other two nuclear-weapon States and the relevant international organisations (IAEA, OPCW, BTWC ISU) to participate;
    • the Secretary-General to convene annual sessions of the conference for a duration of one week at United Nations Headquarters until the conference concludes the elaboration a legally binding treaty establishing a Middle East zone free of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction, on the basis of arrangements freely arrived at by the States of the region ; .

Accordingly, Under-Secretary General and High Representative for Disarmament Izumi Nakamitsu and the Department for Disarmament Affairs made the preparations to hold the conference on 18-22 November 2019.

The main areas of contention between the Arab States and Israel can be summarized as follows: that there still continues to be a long-standing and fundamental difference of views between Israel, on the one hand, and other States of the Middle East region, on the other hand, with regard to the establishment of a zone free of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction in the region of the Middle East (MENWFZ/WMDFZ).

Israel takes the view that MENWFZ/WMDFZ and related regional security issues, cannot be addressed in isolation from the regional peace process and that these issues should be addressed in the framework of a regional security and arms control dialogue that could be resumed in the context of a multilateral peace process.

These should help reduce tensions, and lead to security and stability in the Middle East, through development of mutual recognition, peaceful and good neighbourly relations and abandonment of threats and use of force by states as well as non-State actors as means to settlement of disputes.

Following the establishment of full and lasting peaceful relations and reconciliation among all nations of the region, such a process could lead to the adoption of confidence-building measures, discussion of arms control issues, and eventually pave the way to regional negotiations of a mutually and effectively verifiable regime that will establish the Middle East as a zone free of chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons as well as ballistic missiles.

Israel also holds the position that any modalities, obligations or provisions should be solely addressed by the states concerned through direct negotiation.

The other States of the region maintain that there is no automatic sequence which links the establishment of the zone, the application of IAEA comprehensive safeguards to all nuclear activities in the Middle East, to the prior conclusion of a peace settlement, and that the former would contribute to the latter.

The Arab States maintain that all of them have acceded to the NPT, while Israel continues to defy the international community by refusing to become a party to the Treaty or to place its installations under the Agency’s comprehensive safeguards system, thus exposing the region to nuclear risks and threatening peace.

Israel’s possession of nuclear weapons is likely to lead to a destructive nuclear arms race in the region; especially if Israel’s nuclear installations remain outside any international control.

Most Arab States of the region of the Middle East consider that:

    • the 2018 UNGA decision A/73/546 on convening a conference on the zone was a breakthrough;
    • the new initiative through the UNGA is directed at all States of the region of the Middle East, the three co-sponsors of the1995 NPTREC Resolution are invited and no States of the region shall be excluded;
    • while the UNGA route was not ideal, it was resorted to as there was no realistic alternative due to the prevailing situation regionally and globally; and
    • the initiative shall be fully inclusive, involve direct dialogue, be based on arrangements freely arrived at, there will be no singling out of any State of the region; however, if any State of the region does not attend, this cannot prevent other States of the region to attend the conference slated for November this year.

Regarding the question of how to deal with the Middle East issue at the 2020 review conference of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the following points are relevant:

    (a) the NPT review process remains the primary focus and the UNGA initiative is not an alternative to the NPT process but should be regarded as parallel and complementary;
    (b) it can alleviate pressure on the 2020 review conference;
    (c) there is no intention to hold the review conference hostage to the Middle East issue and the NPT States of the region want the review conference to be successful;
    (d) the UNGA conference shall be open to all States and now it is important to start engagement and preparations on the modalities and procedural aspects;
    (e) the assertion is incorrect that Israel was not consulted in advance on the 2018 resolution at UNGA, in fact it was consulted in advance of the decision;
    (f) the decision garnered more than 100 affirmative votes at UNGA, which was a clear majority;
    (g) the 2019 NPT PrepCom should take factual note of the UNGA decision to convene the conference in November;
    (h) the Middle East zone issue remains within the NPT process and the 2020 review conference would have to reaffirm and recognize this;
    (i) the November conference provides an opportunity to all States to meet and discuss zone matters, express views, all decisions shall be by consensus, it is an opportunity for direct consultations among the States of the region of the Middle East, and it is up to the States of the region to decide whether to sign/ratify a future MEWMDFZ treaty;
    (j) the Middle East zone now can be considered as the fourth pillar of the NPT;
    (k) it is regrettable that some States (Israel and the United States) had urged the IAEA (and other relevant international organizations) not to attend the November conference;
    (l) the NPT States of the region believe in collective not selective security and this calls for the universalization of the NPT and the cessation of granting privileges to States not party to the Treaty (Israel);
    (m) regarding the three co-sponsors (Russia, UK, USA) of the 1995 NPT Review and Extension Conference Resolution calling for the establishment of a zone free of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction: the UK has voiced support for the vision of a MEWMDFZ and is attending the November conference; the Russian Federation endorsed the convening of the conference also is attending the November conference which it regards as easing pressure at the 2020 review conference; while the US has indicated support for the goal of a Middle East free of WMD based on direct dialogue and consensus but has condemned the General Assembly decision of 2018 to convene the November conference as “illegitimate” and is boycotting the conference; and
    (n) Israel too has decided not to attend the November conference.

The METO Project

The Middle East Treaty Organization (METO) Project for a zone free of WMD in the Middle East represents a civil society initiative on “Achieving the Possible” was launched and sustained by Sharon Dolev of the Israeli Disarmament Movement and has attracted support from experts from States of the region of the Middle East as well as from other countries. The METO project has developed the elements of a text of a MEWMDFZ treaty that has been shared with the States of the Middle East region and is designed to serve as a catalyst for them to jump start discussions on such a treaty.

Ii is hoped that the States attending the current conference can draw motivation, ideas and elements from the draft treaty text prepared by the METO Project as they discuss the possible elements and provisions of a future treaty that can garner the support of the States of the region.

Some may find shortcomings or omissions in the draft text but States of the region and other concerned parties are invited to further develop, enhance and enrich the elements presented in the draft text.

This effort needs to be joined not by sceptics nor naysayers but by optimists and those who are serious about promoting the cause of a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction and of its transformation into a region of peace, justice and security.

Conclusion

The Conference on the Establishment of a Middle East Zone Free of Nuclear Weapons and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction now underway at the United Nations in New York provides a belated but important opportunity to address regional security, non-proliferation and disarmament matters in the region of the Middle East.

It sets into place an annual process focusing on discussing matters pertaining to eliminating the threats, dangers and risks of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons in the region; achieving universal adherence in the region to the NPT through the verified elimination of Israel’s nuclear weapon programme, and also securing universal adherence in the region to and compliance with the Biological and Toxin Weapon Convention and the Chemical Weapons Convention that prohibit biological and chemical weapons, and signature and/or ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) that prohibits all types of nuclear explosive tests.

Bringing peace and security to the region of the Middle East should be accorded the highest priority by the States of the region as well as by all other States.

The views expressed are the writer’s personal observations.

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Climate Change and Loss of Species: Our Greatest Challenges

Biodiversity, Civil Society, Climate Change, Environment, Featured, Global, Headlines, Health, Indigenous Rights, Sustainability, TerraViva United Nations

Opinion

Farhana Haque Rahman is Senior Vice President of IPS Inter Press Service; a journalist and communications expert, she is a former senior official of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and the International Fund for Agricultural Development.

Nature is declining globally at rates unprecedented and the rate of species extinctions is accelerating. Credit: UN

ROME, Nov 19 2019 (IPS) – Mottled and reddish, the Lake Oku puddle frog has made its tragic debut on the Red List, a rapidly expanding roll call of threatened species. It was once abundant in the Kilum-Ijim rainforest of Cameroon but has not been seen since 2010 and is now listed as critically endangered and possibly extinct.


Researchers attribute its demise to a deadly fungal disease caused by the chytrid fungus. As noted by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the skin fungus has devastated amphibian populations globally and holds the distinction of being the world’s most invasive killer, responsible for the decline of at least 500 amphibian species, including 90 presumed extinctions.

The IUCN’s Red List has expanded to cover more than 105,000 species of plants and animals, and its most recent update in July found that 27 percent of those assessed were at risk of extinction. No species on the list was deemed to have improved its status enough since 2018 to be placed in a lower threat category.

Human exploitation is often responsible, as with the now endangered red-capped mangabey monkey hunted for bushmeat while its forest habitat in West Africa is destroyed for agriculture; or the East African pancake tortoise critically endangered because of the global pet trade. Thousands of tree species now make the list too.

Farhana Haque Rahman

In its multi-faceted approach towards combating species loss, the IUCN has launched its First Line of Defence against Illegal Wildlife Trade program in eastern and southern Africa, engaging rural communities as key partners in tackling wildlife crime. But this is just a small part of a much wider challenge.

As Grethel Aguilar, IUCN acting director general, noted: “We must wake up to the fact that conserving nature’s diversity is in our interest, and is absolutely fundamental to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. States, businesses and civil society must urgently act to halt the overexploitation of nature, and must respect and support local communities and Indigenous Peoples in strengthening sustainable livelihoods.”

Jane Smart, global director of the IUCN Biodiversity Conservation Group, said the Red List update confirms the findings of the recent IPBES Global Biodiversity Assessment: “Nature is declining globally at rates unprecedented in human history.”

More than one million animal and plant species are now threatened with extinction, many within decades, “unless action is taken to reduce the intensity of drivers of bio-diversity loss”, according to a landmark report by IPBES, the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services.

It bleakly warns that the global rate of species extinction is already at least tens to hundreds of times higher than it has averaged over the past 10 million years, and the rate will accelerate if action is not taken.

A summary was released in May and the full report is expected to be approved soon, assessing changes over the past 50 years and offering possible future scenarios.

Frightening statistics detail how 32 million hectares of primary or recovering forest were lost across much of the highly biodiverse tropics between 2010 and 2015 alone. Put in perspective that totals an area nearly the size of all Germany.

“Ecosystems, species, wild populations, local varieties and breeds of domesticated plants and animals are shrinking, deteriorating or vanishing. The essential, interconnected web of life on Earth is getting smaller and increasingly frayed,” said Professor Josef Settele, co-chair of the report. “This loss is a direct result of human activity and constitutes a direct threat to human well-being in all regions of the world.”

Crucially, for the first time on such a scale of evidence, the report’s more than 400 authors rank the five main drivers of this global disaster. In descending order they are listed as: (1) changes in land and sea use; (2) direct exploitation of organisms; (3) climate change; (4) pollution and (5) invasive alien species.

Clearly such challenges are interwoven and cannot be tackled in isolation. Some species are affected by all of these main drivers, or a deadly combination. Researchers into the fungal diseases wiping out amphibians like the Lake Oku puddle frog believe the most important factor in the spread of the pathogens is the global trade in wildlife. Some have also suggested that local changes in climate have also enabled the chytrid fungus to flourish in new habitats.

That governments are failing to address these warnings comes as little surprise, however.

“Despite 40 years of global climate negotiations, with few exceptions, we have generally conducted business as usual and have largely failed to address this predicament,” declared 11,258 scientists grouped under the Alliance of World Scientists in a recent report, warning that the climate crisis is accelerating faster than most of them had expected and could reach potential irreversible climate tipping points, making large areas of Earth uninhabitable.

The UN Climate Change Conference, COP25, is to be held in Madrid from 2-13 December amidst severe signs of leadership stress. Brazil was to have hosted the summit but President Jair Bolsonaro ruled that out on his election and in the first nine months under his government over 7,600 sq km of rainforest were felled. The baton was then passed to Chile which pulled out because of ant-government unrest. And then this month President Donald Trump formally launched the process to withdraw the US from the 2015 Paris Agreement.

COP25 has unfinished business from COP24, held in Poland’s coal-mining area of Katowice, namely negotiating the final elements of the Paris Agreement ‘rulebook’. Work must also start on future emissions targets ahead of the crunch 2020 conference next November in Glasgow, in the knowledge that commitments submitted by governments and current greenhouse gas emission trajectories fall far short of what is needed to achieve the long-term goals of the Paris Agreement.

“Loss of species and climate change are the two great challenges facing humanity this century,” warns Lee Hannah, senior scientist in climate change biology at Conservation International. “The results are clear, we must act now on both…”

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