Fewer than 1 in 2 disabled adults were in employment in the European Union (EU28) in 201,1 and almost a third were at risk of poverty or social exclusion in 2013, according to data from Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union.

At EU28 level, the employment rate of disabled people aged 15-64 was 47.3% in 2011.

According to Eurostat, around 44 million people aged 15 to 64 in the European Union (EU28) have reported a disability, often preventing them from taking part fully in society and the economy. Whether in the labor market, in the education system or for social inclusion indicators, the situation of disabled persons in the EU28 is less favorable than that of non-disabled people, Eurostat noted.

More specifically, Eurostat noted that while the employment rate of people aged 15 to 64 without disability was 66.9%, this rate was much lower (47.3%) for those with disabilities. The pattern was the same for access to education and lifelong learning in the EU28: the participation rate in education and training of non-disabled people aged 25-64 was 9.8% in 2011, compared with 6.9% for those with disabilities.

The gap existing between non-disabled and disabled persons was also noticeable for social inclusion: while the at-risk of poverty or social exclusion rate was just over 20% for non-disabled people aged 16 and over (21.4%) in the EU28 in 2013, this share stood at almost 30% for disabled persons (29.9%).

Highest employment rate for disabled people in Sweden, lowest in Hungary

In all EU28 Member States, the employment rate of persons aged 15-64 was higher in 2011 for non-disabled people than for disabled.

The employment rate of disabled people was less than a third in Hungary (23.7%), Ireland (29.8%), Bulgaria (30.7%), Romania (31.8%), Slovakia (31.9%) and Croatia (33.0%).

On the contrary, employment rates above 60% were recorded in Sweden (66.2%), Luxembourg (62.5%), Finland (60.8%) and Austria (60.3%).

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In October 2014, compared with September 2014, industrial producer prices fell by 0.4% in the euro area (EA18) and by 0.5% in the EU28, according to estimates from Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union.

In September, prices rose by 0.2% in the euro area and by 0.1% in the EU28.

In October 2014, compared with October 2013, industrial producer prices decreased by 1.3% in the euro area and by 1.5% in the EU28.

The 0.4% decrease in industrial producer prices in total industry in the euro area in October 2014, compared with September 2014, is due to falls of 0.9% in the energy sector, of 0.6% for non-durable consumer goods and of 0.1% for intermediate goods, while prices rose by 0.1% for both capital goods and durable consumer goods. Prices in total industry excluding energy decreased by 0.2%.

In the EU28, the 0.5% decrease is due to falls of 1.6% in the energy sector, of 0.5% for non-durable consumer goods and of 0.1% for intermediate goods, while prices remained stable for capital goods, and increased by 0.1% for durable consumer goods. Prices in total industry excluding energy fell by 0.2%.

Industrial producer prices fell in nearly all Member States, with the largest decreases observed in Denmark (-2.3%), Estonia, Greece and the United Kingdom (all -1.4%) and the Netherlands (-1.2%), and the only increases in Bulgaria (+1.3%), Belgium (+0.5%) and Sweden (+0.3%), while prices remained stable in Cyprus, Malta and Slovenia.

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An International Monetary Fund (IMF) staff team, led by Paul Ross, met with the authorities of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan from November 10-21, 2014 to discuss macroeconomic policies and a structural reform agenda that could form the basis of a possible nine-month Staff-Monitored Program (SMP).1

Mr. Ross issued the following statement on the outcome of the discussions:

“The Afghan authorities and the IMF staff team held constructive discussions on Afghanistan’s recent economic performance, the new administration’s policy framework, and reform plans. The authorities have indicated their desire to move with energy and determination to address the challenges Afghanistan faces, and the IMF staff team very much looks forward to supporting their efforts.

“Political and security uncertainties have weighed on Afghanistan’s 2014 economic performance. Afghanistan has maintained macroeconomic stability. However, the uncertainties weakened confidence, hurt economic activity and, combined with an inadequate policy response, led to the emergence of macroeconomic vulnerabilities.

“The new administration is resolved to lay the foundation for a vibrant economy that benefits all Afghans. The conclusion of the presidential elections and agreement on a national unity government helped reduce the uncertainties and restored confidence. We welcome the authorities’ determination to maintain macroeconomic stability and to implement reforms that promote sustainable and inclusive growth. A possible SMP would support their macroeconomic policy and reform agenda for 2015 with a framework to address economic vulnerabilities and facilitate engagement with the international community to sustain donor support. It will focus on mobilizing revenue, strengthening the financial sector enforcement, improving economic governance, and laying the basis for high growth.

“Good progress was made in discussions on an SMP. Understandings were reached on macroeconomic policy objectives and on several key structural reforms. Provided that a common understanding is reached on the 2015 budget, the macroeconomic framework will maintain buffers of low debt, a comfortable international reserves position, and the current account financed by continued donor grant financing. Exchange rate flexibility will help protect competitiveness and the international reserves position. On structural issues, understandings were reached on measures to safeguard financial sector stability and strengthen the financial sector as well as the need for domestic revenue mobilization. Also, the authorities plan to strengthen further the anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism framework and step-up anti-corruption efforts.

“Discussions are ongoing on the 2015 budget, medium-term revenue mobilization, and the state banks. On the 2015 budget, discussions focus on tax policy and expenditure measures. Introducing broad-based tax measures and improved compliance are essential to mobilize revenue to move toward fiscal sustainability. Regarding state banks, IMF staff has recommended restarting the sale of New Kabul Bank and recommended steps to address problems in other state banks.

“Given Afghanistan’s big development and security needs, donor financing will be needed over the medium term. Continued provision of substantial external grant financing is needed to support the move toward fiscal sustainability and to enhance confidence in the Afghan economy.

“The IMF staff team met with National Economic Advisor and Acting Finance Minister Omar Zakhilwal and Da Afghanistan Bank Governor Noorullah Delawari, and other senior officials. We will resume discussions with the authorities on a possible SMP after the London Conference on Afghanistan. The staff team will remain closely engaged with Afghanistan and continue to provide policy advice and capacity building assistance.”

1. An SMP is an informal agreement between country authorities and IMF staff to monitor the implementation of the authorities’ economic program. SMPs do not entail financial assistance or endorsement by the IMF Executive Board.

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By Manoj Joshi

Change seems to be afoot in China’s dealings with the world. At a major conference on foreign affairs in Beijing on November 28-29, President Xi Jinping called on his colleagues to create a “more enabling environment” for China’s development.

Xi’s remarks are nuanced and balanced and seek to distance China from its brash and assertive posture which has generated considerable unease in the regions neighbouring China.

At another level, China is signalling that it is a big power and wants to be seen in a more benign light as one, rather than being feared and distrusted , as it is at present.

At a third level, it also reflects a Chinese understanding that despite its impressive capabilities, it is still a relatively passive power as is evident from the Chinese absence in dealing with any of the serious global crises like Ukraine, Syria or Afghanistan.

The “Central Conference on Work Relating to Foreign Affairs” is a special one, being held for the first time since Xi was anointed supreme leader of the party, military and government in November 2012 and March 2013.Its aim was to provide the leadership new ways and means of furthering China’s global interests.

The work conference was organised by the Central party leadership, meaning the entire Standing Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Politburo, the highest decision-making body of the country: Li Keqiang, who is also Premier, Zhang Dejiang who is Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress or the Chinese parliament, Yu Zhensheng, who is also chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference a kind of upper house of Parliament; Liu Yunshan, member of the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the CPC and czar or propaganda and ideology; Wang Qishan, the head of the powerful Central Commission for Disciplinary Inspection which is leading the anti-corruption campaign and Zhang Gaoli who is also Vice Premier.

In addition, the entire Politburo, Central Military Commission, Central Committee Secretariat, State Councilors, ministers, Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, ambassadors and personnel of international organisations and other high functionaries were also present.

In essence, according to Xinuha, Xi “underscored the importance of holding high the banner of peace, development and win-win cooperation, pursuing China’s overall domestic and international interests and its development and security priorities in a balanced way, focusing on the overriding goal of peaceful development and national renewal, upholding China’s sovereignty, security and development interests, fostering a more enabling international environment for peaceful development and maintaining and sustaining the important period of strategic opportunity for China’s development.”

If you deconstruct this, it means that China will avoid confrontation and promote cooperation because of self-interest. It will not compromise on issues of security and sovereignty, but also ensure that it will use diplomacy and dialogue to attain its goals, rather than force. The message Xi is sending out is that peace and stability are important for China in its current stage of development and any confrontation and tension will actually undermine China’s development.

His thrust was to get the party brass “to have a keen grasp of global developments and follow the underlying trend of the times is a crucially important and constant task that requires our abiding attention.”

The remarks pointed to both the strengths and weaknesses of contemporary China. Xi constantly referred to the need to ensure that nothing disrupted China’s period of “strategic opportunity” and march to the “two centenary goals” – doubling the 2010 GDP and per capita income of rural and urban citizens by 2020, and by building a moderately prosperous society by 2049.

The global environment, Xi noted was changing and it was important to get a grasp of the “long term trend.” His own view on this was that:

1. “The growing trend toward a multi-polar world will not change.”As part of this China should advance multilateral diplomacy and the reform of the international system and global governance.

2. “Economic globalization will not stop.”

3. While the direction of reform of the international system will remain unchanged” there will be a protracted contest over the international order.

4. There will be “uncertainty in China’s neighbouring environment”.

5. But “the general trend of prosperity and stability in the Asia-Pacific region will not change.”

In the ultimate analysis, “Today’s world is changing… the international system and international order are going through deep adjustment…” and “international forces are in profound shift in favour of peace and development [read China]“.

What China needed was a clear understanding of these developments, as well as diplomatic skills to “skilfully defuse potential crises and turn them into opportunities for China’s development.”

However, and this is significant, Xi called on China to behave like a major power. Even while upholding its core interests, China should be able ” to form a network of high interdependence and mutual benefit through extensive and mutually beneficial business and technological cooperation. ”

Xi made the usual references to the need to “firmly uphold China’s territorial sovereignty, maritime rights and interests and national unity, and properly handle territorial and island disputes,” but he also spoke of the need to “promote peaceful resolution of differences and disputes between countries through dialogue and consultation, and oppose the wilful use or threat of force.”

Xi is painfully aware of the fact that China’s assertiveness has only served to scare its neighbours into enhancing defence expenditures and seeking reassurance from the United States. In his view, this is often a consequence of the inability of the world to understand the Chinese perspective and so, he noted that “We should increase China’s soft power, give a good Chinese narrative, and better communicate China’s message to the world”. In line with this there was need to promote neighbourhood diplomacy, promote neighbourhood ties and connectivity with neighbours.

Leading officials from the CPC International Department, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Culture, Information Office of the State Council, Headquarters of the General Staff of the PLA, Zhejiang Province and the Chinese Embassy in the US spoke at the conference.

Background of the meeting

In the last one year, Xi has set a frenetic pace in his foreign travels. Beginning with Russia in March 2013, he has virtually visited every continent in the world except Antarctica. Some visits are aimed at building strategic ties, such as those to Mongolia, Maldives, Sri Lanka, Fiji, or the four Central Asian republics. Others are to shore up business and trade ties, such as those to Latin American and African countries. Others, such as those to Central and South-east Asia are aimed at both targets. The goal of the US visit in June 2013—a summit with US President Barack Obama, was to persuade the US to take relations with China to a special “new type”.

In the past two months, Xi has hosted leaders of nearly two dozen Asian and Pacific nations at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit meeting in Beijing; had a summit with President Obama; attended the G-20 meet and made official visits to Australia, New Zealand and Fiji.

At the same time, Chinese policies have led to heightened tensions between China and its neighbours. China and Japan have faced off several times off the Senkaku/Diayouisland and last year, China took the unprecedented step of declaring an Air Defence Information Zone (ADIZ) around the islands over Japanese controlled air space, demanding that all flights through the zone be notified to Beijing.

In the South China Sea, it threw out Philippines from the Scarborough Shoal and has strengthened its military presence there. China has also started building islands in disputed reefs to strengthen its claims. China has also started asserting its authority by issuing fishing permits in what it claims is its EEZ.

These developments have led countries in the region to seek US help and in turn, the US has beefed up its presence in the area. However, this has led to serious confrontations between the US and China.

In December 2013, a Chinese ship abruptly came to a stop in front of a US navy ship and compelled it to take evasive steps. In August 2014, a Chinese fighter buzzed a US aircraft in a dangerous manoeuvre.

These events ratcheted up tensions to the point where there was serious concern over an actual clash, especially between China and Japan.

In the light of this, the current steps taken by Beijing appear to be a step back from the brink. On the sidelines of the APEC summit, Xi Jinping had a short meeting with his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe and prior to that a four point plan was agreed upon to reduce tension, promote dialogue and create crisis management mechanisms.

Simultaneously, China also signed two important military confidence building agreements with the US. One provides a mechanism for notifying the two countries of each other’s activities, including military exercises. The second sets rules of behaviour in cases of encounters in the sea and air.

The work conference makes it clear that China still views the US as its main rival as evidenced by Xi’s reference in his speech to the belief that the “growing trend” was towards a multipolar world. Not surprisingly, during the period of the work conference, the People’s Daily overseas edition ran a series of articles between November 25 and 30 criticising the US.

Assessment

The work conference must not be seen as a softening of the Chinese approach towards security issues. Xi was quite emphatic about the zeal with which he intended to protect China’s core interests. Actually, it probably represents changed tactics to deal with neighbours in a more sophisticated manner. China, Xi claimed, was pursuing a “neighbourhood policy featuring amity, sincerity, mutual benefit and inclusiveness.” This is more of a promise of what China now planned to do, rather than what it has been doing.

At one level, it reflected a growing confidence of the Xi team in its ability to handle foreign and security policy issues and to shape events in the manner Beijing desired. No doubt, Chinese leaders have been made aware in the last three years, that despite their growing capabilities, they do not quite have the ability to influence events in any region, but that most proximate to them.

The work conference was carefully timed after the successful APEC summit where the Chinese got the Japanese to back off a bit, and were able to restore their military relations with the US. At the same time, they were able to get an endorsement from the APEC of their plan for a Free Trade Area in Asia Pacific (FTAAP).

The APEC meeting itself came in the wake of the initiation of moves by China and its BRICS partners, to set up the New Development Bank, headquartered in Shanghai. Simultaneously, Beijing has also initiated moves to set up a new Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) with participation of a number of key Asian countries. Around this time, China has also announced massive investment plans within the country, as well as $40 billion for the Silk Road initiative to develop railways, roads, pipelines and ports in areas of its interest.

The aim of the conference is to set the stage for a “new type” of foreign policy which will emphasise Chinese economic powers through new institutions like the New Development Bank, the AIIB, the Silk Road Fund or the proposed FTAAP. It will also see a focusing of Chinese outward bound foreign investment and trade.

Given the language of the speeches, we may see a new thrust in China trying to resolve its disputes with its neighbours through diplomacy and negotiation, rather than brute force. In the South China Sea, China has already changed the facts on the ground, with regard to India it already has what it considers important—Aksai Chin. In the case of Japan, however, it may have realised that it has bitten off more than it could chew and is now seeking to shelve the dispute for some time.

(The writer is a Distinguished Fellow at Observer Research Foundation, Delhi)

The post Is China’s Dealing With World Set To Change?- Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

The Valle de Aguán spiny-tailed iguana is a critically endangered species found in Honduras. A recent survey of people living in the region shows that, although residents are aware of the endangered status of the species, the iguana continues to be hunted for food.

Of particular concern is the preference for the consumption of female iguanas that are gravid (carrying eggs in their body).

“In this study we worked to gain a better understanding of how humans are harvesting the species for food,” said Stesha Pasachnik, Ph.D., a lead researcher on the study and a postdoctoral research associate for the San Diego Zoo Institute for Conservation Research. “The information we gained indicates a use that is not only not sustainable but is likely to accelerate this species’ extinction due to the loss of gravid females.”

Published in the December issue of Herpetological Conservation and Biology, the study gained firsthand information regarding the hunting, harvesting and consumption of the species. Although the study, supported by the Bay Islands Foundation and San Diego Zoo Global, highlights an area of serious concern, it also recommends work to educate residents about the species and ways that harvesting can be made more sustainable.

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The rate at which glaciers are melting in West Antarctica has tripled in the last decade, according to a 21-year analysis of the fastest-melting region of Antarctica.

The glaciers in the Amundsen Sea Embayment in West Antarctica are hemorrhaging ice faster than any other part of Antarctica and are the most significant Antarctic contributors to sea level rise. This study is the first to evaluate and reconcile observations from four different measurement techniques to produce an authoritative estimate of the amount and the rate of loss over the last two decades.

“The mass loss of these glaciers is increasing at an amazing rate,” said scientist Isabella Velicogna, jointly of the UC Irvine and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Velicogna is a coauthor of a paper on the results, which has been accepted for Dec. 5 publication in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

Lead author Tyler Sutterley, a UCI doctoral candidate, and his team did the analysis to verify that the melting in this part of Antarctica is shifting into high gear.

“Previous studies had suggested that this region is starting to change very dramatically since the 1990s, and we wanted to see how all the different techniques compared,” Sutterley said. “The remarkable agreement among the techniques gave us confidence that we are getting this right.”

The researchers reconciled measurements of the mass balance of glaciers flowing into the Amundsen Sea Embayment. Mass balance is a measure of how much ice the glaciers gain and lose over time from accumulating or melting snow, discharges of ice as icebergs, and other causes. Measurements from all four techniques were available from 2003 to 2009. Combined, the four data sets span the years 1992 to 2013.

The glaciers in the embayment lost mass throughout the entire period. The researchers calculated two separate quantities: the total amount of loss, and the changes in the rate of loss.

The total amount of loss averaged 83 gigatons per year (91.5 billion U.S. tons). By comparison, Mt. Everest weighs about 161 gigatons, meaning the Antarctic glaciers lost a Mt.-Everest’s-worth amount of water weight every two years over the last 21 years.

The rate of loss accelerated an average of 6.1 gigatons (6.7 billion U.S. tons) per year since 1992.

From 2003 to 2009, when all four observational techniques overlapped, the melt rate increased an average of 16.3 gigatons per year — almost three times the rate of increase for the full 21-year period. The total amount of loss was close to the average at 84 gigatons.

The four sets of observations include NASA’s Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellites, laser altimetry from NASA’s Operation IceBridge airborne campaign and earlier ICESat satellite, radar altimetry from the European Space Agency’s Envisat satellite, and mass budget analyses using radars and the University of Utrecht’s Regional Atmospheric Climate Model.

The scientists noted that glacier and ice sheet behavior worldwide is by far the greatest uncertainty in predicting future sea level.

“We have an excellent observing network now. It’s critical that we maintain this network to continue monitoring the changes,” Velicogna said, “because the changes are proceeding very fast.”

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Environmentalists dispirited by the Republicans’ dominance of the recent midterm elections can take heart: non-Tea Party Republicans’ views on science and environmental issues are closer to those of Independents than to Tea Party supporters. That’s the primary finding of new research by University of New Hampshire sociologists, published this week in the journal Environmental Politics.

“Across a range of science and environmental issues, non-Tea Party Republicans are more similar to Independents than they are to Tea Party supporters, and those divisions are surprisingly stable over the last four years,” said UNH professor of sociology Lawrence Hamilton, first author of the paper, titled “A four-party view of US environmental concern.”

While researchers – Hamilton a leader among them – have examined the interplay between education, political party and environmental concerns in recent years, this is the first study to separate out Tea Party supporters as a fourth party. Hamilton was surprised to find more significant divisions between Tea Party supporters and Republicans, and fewer divisions between non-Tea Party Republicans and Independents, on a range of questions about science and the environment.

The study also finds that Tea Party supporters with higher levels of education are less likely to trust scientists or accept scientific consensus on topics like evolution or climate change, which runs opposite to the positive effect education has on trust in science among Independents and Democrats.

Hamilton suggests that’s because well-educated individuals actively acquire information, but they also choose their sources. Those who trust scientists are more influenced by research findings or major science organizations, but those who don’t trust scientists know where to find alternative sources that better fit their beliefs.

“People with more education could have greater awareness of their political leaders’ and parties’ positions, or take more initiative themselves to acquire information that reinforces their worldview,” Hamilton said. “When it comes to climate change, for example, there are many excellent real science sources, but also many political or pseudo-science sources that sound convincing to some people.”

The implications of these findings on politics, particularly within the Republican Party, are those that some pundits have already noted: “If you want to win the center, you should be closer to them than to either extreme,” Hamilton says.

For scientists, the finding that non-Tea Party Republicans are more receptive to scientific findings is encouraging. Regarding the rejection of scientific results by others, however,

“Public understanding is stalled,” Hamilton said. “It’s a bafflement to scientists, who are speaking as clearly as they can. But they’re seeing that science communication gets caught up in a political spin cycle that can counter years of data with a few days of blogging.”

Hamilton and co-author Kei Saito (a Ph.D. student in sociology at UNH) used data from 12 science, environment or climate questions asked on the Granite State Poll, conducted by the UNH Survey Center. Responses on national polls asking some of these same questions have been similar to those from New Hampshire, suggesting the New Hampshire results could provide a rough proxy. However, because the Granite State is more secular, better educated and less racially diverse compared with some other regions, Hamilton notes that some party contrasts might even be stronger elsewhere.

The post Republicans Closer To Independents Than Tea Party On Environment appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Valentina Gasbarri*

Despite significant progress made over the previous decades, persistent and unacceptable levels of malnutrition pose a formidable global challenge.

According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the prevalence of hunger has declined since 1990. But some 805 million (1 out of 9 persons) remain chronically hungry, FAO data for 2012-2014 shows.

The prevalence of stunting in children has also decreased from 40 to 25 percent, but 161 million children are still affected. At the same time, more than 2 billion people are deficient in micronutrients like Vitamin A, iodine, iron and zinc.

Most of the world’s undernourished people are found in Southern Asia, followed by sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean.

At the same time, the other face of hunger is represented by the massive increase in the rates of obesity, both in children and adults. An estimated 42 million children under the age of five were overweight in 2013. More than 500 million adults are obese.

The World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Dr Margaret Chan explained this paradoxical situation at an international conference in November in Rome: “The world’s food system with its reliance on industrialised production and globalised markets, produces ample supplies, but creates some problems for public health.”

She added: “Part of the world has too little to eat, leaving millions of vulnerable to death or disease caused by nutrient deficiencies. Another part overeats, with widespread obesity pushing life-expectancy figures backwards and pushing the costs of health care to astronomical heights.”

This puzzling situation drew the focus of ministers of agriculture, health and other relevant ministries and agencies, representatives of United Nations agencies and other intergovernmental organizations as well as the civil society, including NGOs, academics and the private sector, from over 170 countries, gathered at the Second International Conference on Nutrition (ICN2) November 19 to 21 in Rome. ICN2 was organised jointly by FAO and WHO at the FAO Headquarters.

Pope Francis, Queen Letizia of Spain, Nadine Heredia, First Lady of Peru, King Letsie III of Lesotho and Princess Haya Bint Al Hussein of the United Arab Emirates addressed the conference as special guests.

Pope Francis said, the fight against hunger and under-nutrition was being handicapped by “the priority of the market and the pre-eminence of profit, which have reduced food to a thing to be bought and sold, and subject to speculation”. He highlighted the need to care for the environment and protect the planet. “Humans may forgive but nature does not,” he said, adding: “We must care for Mother Nature, so that she does not respond with destruction.”

22 years after the First International Conference on Nutrition (ICN1), held also in Rome in 1992, ICN2 provided an occasion to review the progress made, focusing specifically on country-level achievements in scaling up nutrition. Indeed, in order to properly address the problem of malnutrition, interventions are needed throughout the entire food system, from production to processing, transport, consumption and waste management as FAO Director-General José Graziano da Silva said. “Government must lead the way,” he added. “But the push to improve global nutrition must be a joint effort, involving civil society organisations and the private sector.”

The Rome Declaration

The immediate challenge at ICN2 was to reach a consensus on ways to ensure a high degree of policy coherence between food supply and public health to guarantee food and nutrition security for all. Endorsing the ‘Rome Declaration on Nutrition’ and an accompanying technical Framework of Action to guide its implementation was yet another challenge. And all this with a view to setting out a number of concrete commitments and recommendations for policies and programmes to address nutrition across multiple sectors.

The Rome Declaration on Nutrition is a political document, which reaffirms the commitments made at ICN1 in 1992, pledges countries to eradicate hunger and prevent all forms of malnutrition worldwide, particularly under-nutrition in children, anaemia in women and children among other micronutrient deficiencies, as well as to reverse the trend in obesity. It obliges countries to take 10 fundamental steps to translate their commitments for nutrition into action.

“Our responsibility is to transform the commitment into concrete results”, Graziano da Silva said.

“We must redouble our efforts,” United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a video message addressed to ICN2 participants, “looking forward to learning of the national commitment that each of you will make. In turn, the UN system pledges to do all that it can to provide effective support,” he added.

The Framework for Action

The Framework for Action, on the other hand, provides a set of voluntary policy options and strategies for use by governments in cooperation with other stakeholders for the implementation of commitments of the Rome Declaration on Nutrition, The Framework provides a list of 60 policy and strategy recommendations, which may be incorporated into national nutrition, health, agriculture, development and investment plans to achieve better nutrition for all. It advocates the creation of an enabling environment for effective action and strengthening sustainable food systems.

By endorsing these documents, countries are committed to implementing the Declaration through the Framework for Action, as well as ensuring accountability and monitoring progress in the existing global nutrition targets to be met by 2025. Moreover, the commitment includes possibly introducing a related global goal into the post-2015 development agenda.

“We have before us a decade of nutrition,” Graziano da Silva added, referring to the upcoming Expo Milan 2015 with its theme “Feeding the planet, energy for life.”

Expo Milan 2015 falls in a crucial year for the United Nations: it will on the one hand review overall progress in meeting the Millennium Development Goals (the first of which is to eliminate extreme poverty and hunger), and on the other adopt the new Post-2015 Development Agenda.

There was agreement at ICN2 that Expo Milan’s theme “Feeding the planet, energy for life” will provide an ideal opportunity to foster dialogue and raise public awareness about food security and nutrition, rural development and the sustainable management of natural resources.

In order to maximize this impact, the UN has chosen the theme “The Zero Hunger Challenge ∙ United for a sustainable world”, to make visitors understand that together we can build a world where everyone has access to safe, sufficient, and nutritious food, and can lead a healthy and productive life without compromising the needs of future generations.

When talking about hunger, the only acceptable number according to the UN is zero. In order to achieve this goal, the Zero Hunger Challenge has proposed five objectives or pillars: Zero stunted children under 2 years of age; 100 percent access to adequate food all year round; All food systems are sustainable; 100 percent increase in smallholder productivity and income; Zero loss or waste of food.

An integral part of all five pillars is that these highlight the issue of women’s empowerment considering the fundamental role that they play in the fight against hunger and malnutrition. In many countries, women represent [Valentina Gasbarri] the backbone of the agricultural sector and food systems and make up the bulk of the work force in the primary sector. Women also play a key role in guaranteeing food security for the whole family: when women suffer from hunger and malnutrition, so do their children.

*Valentina Gasbarri is a Junior Expert of the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR). She has a strong background in East-Asia geo-strategic relations, development issues and global security studies.

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By Nazim Fethi

Three years after government talks on constitutional reform were boycotted by the opposition, President Bouteflika is giving the project another try.

“Algeria will move ahead with reforms to its constitution,” the president said on November 24th.

The goal is to “facilitate the process of opening up Algerian society, working to preserve its stability and saving it from the upheaval that has been seen in other countries around the world at a time of profound change”, Bouteflika added in the statement read on his behalf at an Algiers meeting on African constitutional law.

The amendments will be based on the results of extensive consultations involving all groups of society, Bouteflika said.

While Algeria’s president intends to revise the constitution, it is unclear what the opposition plans to do.

Having already been amended in 2008 to lift the limit of two presidential terms, the constitution was meant to see a “profound revision” in 2011 in the wake of the Arab Spring. Consultations took place at the time, led by the Senate President Abdelkader Bensalah and involving political parties and associations, but they were not followed up.

Then came a special commission set up by Prime Minister Abdelmalek Sellal, but again, no action followed until the leader of the presidential cabinet, Abdelmalek Ouyahia, took the initiative of consulting with the parties over the same issue.

The opposition, which boycotted those consultations, has since toughened its stance, openly calling for an early presidential election, in which Bouteflika would not stand.

But parties supporting the president leaped to defend his choices and criticise the opposition’s attitude.

The Front of Socialist Forces (FFS), the oldest established party in the opposition, then offered its services as a mediator. But the opposition rejected the offer, accusing the FSS of siding with the government.

“The FFS is no longer in the opposition. It’s become a tool for the government to break us,” said Jil Jadid (“New Generation”) patry chief Soufiane Djilali.

The president’s plans for reform should be discussed in the forthcoming Council of Ministers, according to Mourad Medelci, president of the Constitutional Council.

Bouteflika’s announcement has received a mixed response from the political parties.

The National Liberation Front (FLN), which holds the majority, said that the president had “chosen the ideal moment” for constitutional reform.

“The president has not closed the door to the opposition, as we have said, so that they can bring forward their proposals,” FLN Secretary-General Amar Saadani added. “He’s holding out his hand to the opposition, and we feel they should respond.”

Amara Benyounès, Secretary-General of the Popular Movement for Algeria (MPA), said the reform process would “encourage openness, whilst ensuring the country’s stability is maintained”.

Benyounès described the opposition’s call for an early election as an “attempted coup”.

However, things are clear for those in the opposition’s ranks. Mohcène Belabbas, chairman of the Rally for Culture and Democracy, reiterated the opposition’s position that constitutional reform would come only after an early presidential election.

Mohamed Douibi, secretary-general of the Ennahda movement, called the reform discussions “a monologue”.

“The government is talking to itself. … For the Constitution to be Algeria’s Constitution, it has to be discussed by all political players, and that’s an essential thing,” Doubi said.

Fatiha Benabbou, an expert on constitutional law, said Bouteflika’s announcement would only deepen the rift between the government and the opposition.

“The opposition’s absence from the consultations has not prevented the president from going ahead with his work to reform the constitution,” she said.

“But that reform cannot be consensual as he is claiming, because the opposition hasn’t been involved,” she added.

The post Algeria: Constitutional Reform Re-Launched After Three Years appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Deeparghya Mukherjee

In an age with multiple threats to multilateral economic cooperation, the progress and achievements of a G20 summit (accounting for 80% of world trade and 85% of world GDP) generate natural interest. Before we look at the developments at the recent summit in Brisbane (Australia) and implications for India, a quick look at the preceding developments may be useful.

Countries like the United States and the United Kingdom have had climate change and energy efficiency at the top of the agenda apart from trade facilitation. With China agreeing to deliver on emission targets, the world is looking at India to address this issue. With coal being the major source of power in India, the country is placed far from appeasing the West on such expectations. The recovery of the global economy with the exception of the US is still to gather steam. Trade facilitation at the World Trade Organization had reached a potential deadlock over food security-related disagreements between India and the US. India struck a deal with the US on the eve of the summit allowing it to independently address its concerns on food security within the WTO framework for the time being. India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi was stressing the need to steer home the black money stashed in foreign banks, besides appropriate tax information sharing.

The major theme of this G20 summit centred round increasing the G20 GDP by at least two percentage points by 2018. Lowering of trade restrictions and managing both supply and demand side obstacles are critical to achieving this goal, supported by infrastructure and employment growth. Job creation is especially important as 200 million people remain unemployed, i.e. around 30 million more than when the crisis began. Unemployment rates across G20 member-countries vary, with the European Union as a whole experiencing an overall unemployment rate of 11.5% in September 2014. EU industrial production saw a meagre growth of 0.7% over the last one year, and GDP growth was 1.2% in the last one year. In fact Germany, Austria, France, Italy, Netherlands and Portugal have seen minor contractions in industrial production in the last twelve months. Till date the encouraging signs in the world economy are the US’s recovery with fiscal and monetary policies expected to facilitate short- to medium-term growth.

Previous G20 summits stressed the need to curb protectionism in a global economy recovering from the shocks of the financial crisis and thereafter the economic crises in the EU. In reality however, economies have turned protectionist through tariff and non-tariff barriers, and this remains a concern for the G20 countries as the global economy struggles to get back on track.

In the latest summit, the leaders agreed on three broad fronts, namely: acting together to lift growth and create jobs; building a stronger, more resilient global economy; and strengthening global institutions.

Employment generation and building greater infrastructure for world trade is of top priority. The “Global Infrastructure Hub” shall be established with a four-year mandate to facilitate networking among governments, private sector and development banks etc, and it will act as a knowledge-sharing platform. Undoubtedly, infrastructure development kick-starts employment growth and improves economic prospects. A detailed action plan is noticed for each country to facilitate employment growth. The recognition of global value chains and the need for better transport infrastructure for contributing to the new age of “made in the world” products has implications for countries like India. Currently, India’s participation in the global or regional value chain remains limited, and the potential for India to mobilise resources in the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) region to reap trade benefits is to be explored. An action plan to reduce remittance costs to 5% of the amount of remittance (from its current levels of nearly 10%) is also in India’s interest since the quantum of foreign remittances entering India has gone up steeply.

A commitment to build a globally strong financial architecture is echoed in the communiqué, and it is here that the Indian concerns on black money and transparency-related issues of tax legislations are evident. While mention is made of the Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) Action Plan and the automatic exchange of tax information (AEOI), no detailed road map is provided to this effect. Greater coordination on tax laws has been called for so as to infuse transparency in funds transfers that would ensure taxation of profits in the geography where they are earned. Adherence to Basel III norms with additional loss-absorbing capacity for global-systemically important banks will increase financial resilience.

On strengthening global institutions, quicker implementation of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) quota- and governance-reforms and of the 15th General review for quotas with reference to the new quota formula agreed in 2010 has been stressed. This should increase the influence of countries like India and China over the IMF policies in addition to coordination between the IMF and the New Development Bank which the BRICS forum (consisting of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) has recently agreed to establish.

Energy efficiency and climate change at a world level are stressed with separate action plans for each to foster global cooperation on the usage of renewable energy.

On the whole, this G20 summit has rolled out action plans to build the base for sustainable and inclusive economic growth. Most of the focus areas resonate well with India’s development agenda of increasing employment through investment in infrastructure, especially through the public-private partnership (PPP) route, and facilitating trade. While India remains one of the highest-taxed countries in the world, it would be interesting to see the developments on transparency, sharing of tax legislation and repatriation of black money. As the stage is set for negotiations to facilitate world trade at the WTO, the progress of the G20 action plans, with increasing participation of India in regional trade-value chains, would shape India’s goal of inclusive growth as well as establish it as a major economy in the world.

About the author:
Dr Deeparghya Mukherjee is a Visiting Research Fellow at the Institute of South Asian Studies (ISAS), an autonomous research institute at the National University of Singapore (NUS). He can be contacted at isasdm@nus.edu.sg. Opinions expressed in this paper, based on research by the author, do not necessarily reflect the views of ISAS.

Source:
This article was published by ISAS as ISAS Brief No. 352 – 1 December 2014 (PDF).

The post G20 Agenda And India’s Priorities: An Appraisal appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Saudi authorities detained two women on the Saudi side of the border with the United Arab Emirates on December 1, one of whom tried to drive a car across to Saudi Arabia, according to Human Rights Watch.

Saudi activists told Human Rights Watch that Lujain al-Hathloul, 25, and Maysa al-`Amoudi, 33, both Saudis holding valid UAE driving licenses, are in detention but do not know whether they will face criminal charges.

Given that both women appear to be detained because they were driving, Saudi officials should immediately release them and end the discriminatory driving ban on women, Human Rights Watch said.

“After years of false promises to end its absurd restrictions on women, Saudi authorities are still arresting them just for getting behind the wheel,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director. “The Saudi government’s degrading restrictions on women are what bring shame to the country, not the brave activists standing up for their rights.”

Saudi driving activists told Human Rights Watch that al-Hathloul drove to the Saudi border from Abu Dhabi on November 30 and attempted to cross into Saudi Arabia, but authorities confiscated her passport and held her at the border crossing in her car overnight. She was joined on December 1 by al-`Amoudi, who drove to the border from Dubai to bring al-Hathloul supplies, but did not intend to enter Saudi Arabia.

The activists said both were detained by Saudi officials on the Saudi side of the al-Batha border crossing and transferred to the Bureau of Interrogation and Prosecution in the Eastern Province city of Hufuf for questioning. Activists reported that the authorities are holding al-Hathloul at a juvenile center for girls and al-`Amoudi in the al-Ahsa Central Prison.

Both women have vocally supported an end to the driving ban. Since 2013, al-Hathloul has posted numerous videos of herself calling for women’s rights reforms and encouraging women to drive in defiance of the ban.

Since 2011, women have defied the ban and published online videos of themselves driving the country’s roads, including footage showing Saudi men driving by and giving the thumbs-up sign to show their support.

The informal prohibition on female driving in Saudi Arabia became official state policy in 1990. During the 1990-91 Gulf War, female American soldiers were permitted to drive on military bases in Saudi Arabia, and Saudi women organized a protest demanding the right to drive in Saudi Arabia as well. Dozens of Saudi women drove the streets of Riyadh in a convoy to protest the ban, which then was just based on custom. In response, officials arrested them, suspended them from their jobs, and the Grand Mufti, the country’s most senior religious authority, immediately declared a fatwa, or religious edict, against women driving, stating that driving would expose women to “temptation” and lead to “social chaos.” Then-Minister of Interior Prince Nayef legally banned women’s driving by decree on the basis of the fatwa.

Saudi Arabia’s discriminatory male guardianship system remains intact despite government pledges to abolish it. Under this system, ministerial policies and practices forbid women from obtaining a passport, marrying, travelling, or accessing higher education without the approval of a male guardian, usually a husband, father, brother, or son. Authorities also fail to prevent some employers from requiring male guardians to approve the hiring of adult female relatives or some hospitals from requiring male guardian approval for certain medical procedures for women. Women cannot protest or establish independent organizations to address women’s rights, as the kingdom bans protest and does not permit nongovernmental human rights organizations to operate freely.

“It’s time for Saudi Arabia to end its status as the only country in the world that locks women up for driving,” Whitson said.

The post Call For Saudi Arabia To Release Women Driving Activists appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Nick Simeone

With less than a month to go before the U.S-led NATO combat mission ends in Afghanistan, a senior Defense Department official said today Afghan security forces will be ready to take over the job of securing their country come January first.

“We believe that we have achieved the mission of getting Afghan national security forces to that level,” Pentagon Press Secretary Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby told reporters. “They are in the lead right now and by the end of this month they will have full responsibility.”

Some 9,800 U.S. troops are set to remain in Afghanistan next year, as part of Operation Resolute Support. That NATO mission follows 13 years of NATO’s International Security Assistance Force, and will no longer include a combat role but will instead focus on training, advising and assisting Afghan forces.

“There’s still some enabling capabilities that they may need going forward and we’re talking about that. That’s part of the Resolute Support NATO mission,” Kirby added.

In recent days, there has been an increase in attacks claimed by the Taliban on key sites around the country, including in the capital, Kabul. Kirby said the attacks did not signal a Taliban resurgence but were to be expected during periods of transition.

“Those attacks have had no strategic effect and I might add that the Afghan national security forces and police reacted bravely and quickly to each one,” he said.

The post Pentagon Confident Afghans Can Take Full Security Control Next Month appeared first on Eurasia Review.

The head of Iran’s Football Federation reports that Sepp Blatter, the head of the International Federation of Football Associations (FIFA), has announced that some of Iran’s money for football activities, which has been blocked due to the International sanctions, will now be released.

Ali Kafashian told reporters, after his return from the meeting of the Asian Football Confederation in the Philippines marking its 60th anniversary, that he had met on the sidelines of the event with Sepp Blatter and informed him that Iran’s Football Federation finds it difficult to support the national football team without access to FIFA funding.

Blatter has reportedly promised to release some of the blocked funding.

Iran is eligible for $7 million to $8 million in FIFA funds, which are allotted to teams that reach the World Cup. The funding is aimed at helping prepare the team for the games.

Sanctions on Iran’s financial sector have significantly restricted Iran’s ability to be a part of any international transaction.

The interim deal reached in November 2013 between Iran and the world powers entails some easing of sanctions, which has allowed the release of some of Iran’s frozen assets in foreign banks and let some of Iran’s debtors make payments.

The post Blocked FIFA Funds Could Now Flow To Iran’s National Soccer Team appeared first on Eurasia Review.

The Russian government has warned the economy will fall into recession next year as Western sanctions, in response to its role in eastern Ukraine, and falling oil prices begin to bite.

According to BBC News, Russia’s economic development ministry estimates the economy will contract by 0.8% next year.It had previously estimated the economy would grow by 1.2% in 2015.

Russia’s reliance on tax revenues from the oil industry makes it particularly sensitive to price movements.

Household disposable incomes are also forecast to decline by as much as 2.8%, compared with a previous estimate that they would grow by 0.4%.

The sharp revision in Russia’s economic forecast is the first admission from the government that the economy will contract.

“The current prognosis is based on a drop in GDP by 0.8% in 2015, against the previous prognosis of growth by 1.2%,” Deputy Prime Minister Alexi Vedev said.

On Monday, Dec 1, the ruble suffered its biggest one-day fall since 1998.

The currency slid almost 9% against the dollar before rallying after suspected central bank intervention. The currency has already lost 40% in value this year.

The price of oil has fallen nearly 40% since the summer because of oversupply caused by rising U.S. shale oil production.

Demand has also fallen, particularly in China, the world’s second largest consumer of the commodity, where industrial production has slowed in recent months.

Last week, OPEC ministers met to discuss a possible cut in oil production in order to stabilize the oil price, but the meeting broke up without agreement.

OPEC secretary general Abdallah Salem el-Badri said: “There’s a price decline. That does not mean that we should really rush and do something.”

The fall in the oil price has been causing concern for several members of the oil cartel, as most require a price above $80 a barrel to balance their government budgets and many need prices to be above $100 a barrel.

The post Russia Says Economy Could Fall Into Recession Next Year appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Naser Khader

Sadly, there is sharp rise in anti-Semitism currently happening across Europe. It is becoming more and more violent and the number of assaults on Jews is radically increasing. President of Germany’s Central Council of Jews, Dieter Graumann, reported to The Guardian “these are the worst times since the Nazi era.” These hate crimes are serious incidents and a threat to basic human rights.

Israel-Palestine is a factor, but not the only factor

History has proven that each time the Israel-Palestine conflict escalates, there is a rise in anti-Semitism, especially in regards to hate crimes. During Israel’s Operation Cast Lead, in a three-week period of time spanning late-2008 and early 2009, 66 anti-Semitic incidents happened in France alone. This proves that the Israel-Palestine conflict carries over into European countries. However, experts say that the current increase in anti-Semitism all over Europe isn’t entirely due to the conflict in the Middle East; there are other factors triggering this latent hatred. Instead of seeing banners with ‘Death to the Israelis’, the banners now spell ‘Death to Jews’.

Several countries are experiencing violent anti-Semitism, including France, Germany, and the Netherlands among many others. In Austria, a pre-season friendly soccer match between Maccabi Haifa and SC Paderborn had to be rescheduled due to an attempted assault on one of the players from the Israeli team in the previous match. Last month Cidi, which is the biggest anti-Semitism watchdog in the Netherlands, reported 70 calls in one week from worried Jewish citizens. That number is alarming given that they usually receive three to five per week.

Furious groups unite around anti-Semitism

The causes for the dramatic rise in anti-Semitism are highly complex and not completely understood. France is an example of how various groups, whose members share a rather angry outlook, unite around their hatred towards the Jewish community. Yonatan Arfi, vice president of France’s Crif, says that the anti-Semitism in France had become “a portmanteau for a lot of angry people: radical Muslims, alienated youths from immigrant families, the far right, the far left”.

While previously they would have been alone and disconnected from society, the popularity of social media has unfortunately helped anti-Semitism, as it is easier for extremists to communicate with each other. Social media also demonstrates that the current anti-Semitic trend is not based solely around the conflict in Israel-Palestine. A hashtag, such as #HiterWasRight, shows how serious the situation is. It also suggests that this rise in anti-Semitism will not stop, even if an end to the Israel-Palestine conflict is reached.

Forced to move

France has a massive Jewish population of 500,000. France’s Society for Protection of the Jewish Community reports that compared to the 1990s, the number of anti-Semitic incidents in the 2000s is seven times higher. That is a dramatic increase. The consequence is more and more Jewish people moving away from France. Indeed, 3,288 French Jews moved from France to Israel in 2013, which is an increase of 73% from 2012. The majority listed anti-Semitism, as well as the massive electoral success for the far-right party Front National, as their reasons for leaving France. They felt that they have no other choice.

Recent Danish incidents

In the past few months all Nordic countries have been affected by anti-Semitism. In Denmark, two incidents with a clear anti-Semitic message occurred recently.

First, there was a vandalism of a Jewish school in Cøpenhagen, Carolineskolen. During the night, a group of people broke into the school premises and wrote aggressive anti-Semitic messages on the walls. The school principal disclosed that the messages had clear references to the ongoing clash between Israel and Hamas. Children as young as the age of one attend the school. It was reported that several of the children asked to go home from school, because they were frightened and didn’t feel safe. Furthermore, they were advised not to wear Jewish symbols publically. The school principal explicitly stated how the school has absolutely nothing to do with the current fight between Israel and Hamas, and how he had never experienced anything like that.

Secondly, a reporter wearing a kippah through the Nørrebro neighborhood got surrounded, threatened and verbally assaulted. The six-eight young people surrounding him took his kippah and never returned it. The majority of Hamas supportors in Denmark live in Nørrebro. When the pro-Hamas people realized he was a reporter doing an experiment for his radio show, they forced him to agree that ‘all the money he had been given to do this should be given to Hamas’. Nowadays you will never see a person wearing a kippah through Nørrebro, simply because they fear for their own safety.

Needles to say, these incidents prove that the ongoing fight between Israel and Hamas has traveled all the way to Denmark.

Other Nordic countries following along

Denmark is not the only Nordic country that has experienced a rise of anti-Semitic incidents. All the other Nordic countries are affected as well, especially the city Malmø in Sweden.

Some decades ago, Malmø was known for its welcoming attitude and environment regarding the Jewish community. Now, the picture looks radically different. Few Jews remain in Malmø as many left the city for good due to the escalation of anti-Semitic incidents. Malmø is facing serious issues with immigration, and this has affected the Jewish community. As it turns out, a big part of the anti-Semitic people terrorizing Jewish people in Malmø are immigrants, especially from the Middle East and the northern part of Africa. That pattern is also seen in other European countries, including France and Germany.

Schneur Kesselman, Malmø’s rabbi, has been forced to buy a car, as he otherwise often would be harassed on his way to the synagogue. He is determined not to give in to the anti-Semitists, but had made it clear that the situation has become increasingly unsafe and uncomfortable for the Jewish people living in Malmø the past few years.

One of the biggest challenges is how some of these violent anti-Semitic people equate Jews all over the world and Israel. By doing so, many Jewish people suffer from the hatred towards Israel, a place that many have never traveled to or even agree with politically. Extremists are impossible to talk sense into, and this is yet another terrifying example of that.

About the author:
Naser Khader is a Senior Fellow at Hudson Institute.

Source:
This article was published at Hudson Institute.

The post Increasing Anti-Semitism In Europe – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Nick Cunningham

China’s run as the world’s most voracious consumer of coal may be coming to an end.

A recent report from Greenpeace found that China’s coal consumption declined in the first half of this year and new Chinese government data suggests that the country’s coal imports have dropped. Estimates indicate that by the end of the year, China’s coal imports could be 8 percent below 2013 levels.

China imported 18.86 million tonnes of coal in August, the lowest level since September 2012.

Part of the reduced demand is due to a slowing Chinese economy. After years of double-digit growth rates, China’s GDP expanded by just 7.7 percent in 2013, and it could struggle to hit its 7.5 percent target this year. Some analysts are predicting an average growth rate of only 6 percent in the next few years.

But a lower GDP growth rate is only part of the reason. As the Sierra Club’s Justin Guay points out, China may be beginning to “decouple” its growth from coal consumption. In other words, China’s economy could continue to expand even while its coal consumption drops – something unthinkable not long ago.

That’s due in large part to China’s declared “war on pollution,” announced earlier this year.

Years of increasingly choking smog have sparked public anger and even led to protests. In 2013, a government survey of 74 Chinese cities found that all had pollution levels that exceeded levels the World Health Organization deems safe.

“We will resolutely declare war against pollution as we declared war against poverty,” Premier Li Keqiang said in March. The plan calls for the closure of old and dirty steel, cement, and coal plants: An estimated 1,725 small-scale dirty coal plants are expected to be shuttered. The government also declared it would spend $275 billion in the next three years to reduce pollution.

China has also set up environmental courts, instituted fines for offenders of environmental standards, granted non-governmental organizations the right to sue polluters, and now requires the nation’s largest factories to disclose pollution data to the public.

The efforts are starting to pay dividends, as evidenced by declining coal import levels. This is a major reason that international coal prices have reached their lowest levels in six years. And the low prices are not succeeding in stoking a resurgence in demand.

And more declines could be coming, thanks to a series of proposed new laws. The central government released a draft version of a law on Sept. 10 that amounts to an outright ban on coal with a high sulfur and ash content. This could significantly hurt coal exporters, like Australia and South Africa.

The government is also seeking to cut coal production by 10 percent because low demand is causing economic losses for 70 percent of China’s coal companies.

Moreover, China is considering a permanent limit on the overall consumption of coal. The current five-year plan aims for consumption of 4.1 billion tonnes of coal in 2015, up from 3.7 billion tonnes in 2013. But in the next five-year plan, which will run from 2015-2020, China could cap its coal consumption at the same 4.1 billion tonnes-per-year level, and even ratchet it downwards.

And in 2016, efforts to slash coal demand will likely only accelerate, considering China’s announcement that it will introduce a nationwide cap-and-trade program. Details are murky, but if successfully implemented, major producers will be incentivized to improve efficiency and switch to cleaner sources of energy.

As the world’s largest consumer of coal, as well as the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases, the significance of China’s policies on coal use cannot be overstated. Thanks to a concerted effort by the government to improve air quality, the era of insatiable Chinese demand for coal could be over.

Source:
http://oilprice.com/Energy/Coal/Why-Chinas-Insatiable-Appetite-For-Coal-Has-Likely-Peaked.html

The post Why China’s Insatiable Appetite For Coal Has Likely Peaked – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By James Stafford

What does it take to build up a new region for oil and gas development? Obviously, the resources have to be in place and economically recoverable. But it is not as easy as just sticking a drill into the ground and pumping out oil and gas.

Even with significant oil and gas reserves trapped in shale, a variety of factors need to come together to turn a given region into a significant producer. To begin with, there needs to be enough companies willing to take risks on major drilling projects. Next, there needs to be enough capital behind those companies to make projects viable. And once explorers find and prove commercial quantities of oil and gas, there needs to be infrastructure in place to move the energy to market.

That last piece – building the storage tanks, compressor stations, and pipelines that will transport product to refineries – is a sure sign that a region is starting to make a name for itself. Only when it becomes apparent that oil and gas will be recovered in significant volumes will companies put millions of dollars on the line for the infrastructure.

This combination of full exploration and development along with infrastructure build out is beginning to happen in the Montney Shale, a formation that stretches across western Alberta into northeast British Columbia. The area is expected to hold 450 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 14.5 billion barrels of natural gas liquids and 1.12 billion barrels of oil.

One particular area in the Montney that is beginning to attract significant attention is Elmworth, located just outside of Grande Prairie, Alberta. Companies are stepping up their capital expenditures in the area as it is showing signs of being very productive. Encana (NYSE: ECA) is the biggest player in this region, and has drilled in excess of 47 wells, all targeting the Montney resource and each coming back with positive results. Encana drilled 7 wells in the second quarter of 2014, with initial production rates of about 12 to 14 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d), and higher than expected liquids production. They have six rigs active in the Montney and had drilled 50 net wells by the middle of the year.

In a sign of the company’s confidence in its future production, it constructed a compressor station capable of handling 100 MMcf/d at its Pipestone project, located in the Elmworth area. Encana estimates that there is 25 years’ worth of drilling on its acreage alone, with a potential of 2 billion cubic feet per day (bcf/d) and more than 50,000 barrels of oil per day (bpd).

One smaller company, NuVista (TSE: NVA), is also posting exceptional results. In its latest corporate presentation stated that it will have 32 wells on production in the Montney by the end of 2014, double the number that it started with at the beginning of the year. The results that have been released to date show wells with initial production rates ranging from 916 to 1,770 boe/d – which are further showcasing the exceptional nature of the Montney in this particular area. The company is now averaging about 18,030 barrels of oil equivalent (boe/d) in production per day.

In fact, NuVista has done so well thus far that it is actually running into infrastructure constraints, which is why the company is working to expand processing facilities. Near its Bilbo field, a new pipeline came online in October that will allow NuVista to ramp up production. NuVista also contracted with SemCAMS, a pipeline owner, to take another 30 MMcf/d from NuVista’s holdings in the Elmworth region.

And it is in the Elmworth area where more companies are turning their attention. NuVista just completed a major purchase of acreage in the Elmworth in August 2014, acquiring 12.5 more sections for $2.91 million per section (640 acres). As companies like NuVista and Encana drill the Elmworth, they are finding that it is rich in natural gas liquids and oil. For 2015, NuVista plans on building another compressor station at its Elmworth block.

An even smaller company is making a move to graduate from its small cap positioning to that of a junior producer. Blackbird Energy (TSX Venture: BBI) also completed a major land acquisition, and the intriguing part about this acquisition was the close proximity of the acquired land to NuVista’s newly purchased acreage and the price it appeared to pay for the land (approximately $300,000 per section). Both companies appear to believe that the Elmworth is going to be a hot play, and are not waiting for bigger players to move in. Blackbird is drilling back to back wells in its Elmworth acreage, one targeting the Upper Montney which has been exploited by Encana and another targeting the Middle Montney, which Nuvista and other producers in the area have been targeting.

Blackbird is also focused on establishing infrastructure to tie in its wells for production. At the end of September, the company signed a memorandum of understanding with Mistral Energy that could see the construction of gas gathering systems. If and when it is completed, the system will take 20 MMcf/d of natural gas from Blackbird’s fields, which could eventually be expanded to handle 35 MMcf/d. Mistral’s system will have a total capacity of 50 MMcf/d – with potential to expand to 70 MMcf/d – and will allow other companies to tie into the system. Then there will be an 8 inch pipeline that will run south to connect to yet more proposed processing infrastructure.

All of the companies mentioned above are poised for value creation due to the promise of the Montney. But intermediate players like NuVista – and especially emerging producers like Blackbird – could see the biggest boost to their share price as they report impressive initial production rates from their wells. NuVista is predicting that its overall production for 2015 will climb to 23,500-25,000 boe/d, up from an expected average of 17,750-18,500 boe/d for 2014.

The smaller Blackbird hopes to transform its prime land block at Elmworth into a productive acreage. It expects to complete its two wells by January 2015, which will be a huge moment for the company. Blackbird could see its share price jump to a new level if its two wells come back with positive results effectively proving up its acreage.

What are we to make of all of this? It would be one thing if a few companies were just drilling some test wells or doing some geological assessments to figure out how much oil and gas sat beneath them. But, when a multitude of companies start pouring millions of dollars into gas gathering and processing infrastructure, you have to figure that they know they are sitting on a bounty. And it isn’t just one company. They are all doing it, and all at the same time. The Montney is getting hot.

Source: http://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/As-Excitement-Builds-in-the-Montney-Companies-Seek-More-Infrastructure.html

The post Canada: As Excitement Builds In Montney, Companies Seek More Infrastructure – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Eurozone inflation has been persistently declining for almost a year, and constantly undershooting forecasts. Building on existing research, this column explores the conjecture that low inflation in the Eurozone results from an excess demand for safe assets. If true, this conjecture would have definite policy implications. Getting out of such a ‘safety trap’ would necessitate fiscal or non-conventional monetary policies tailored to temporarily take risk away from private balance sheets.

By Jean-Pierre Landau

Inflation in the Eurozone stood at 0.4% (year on year) in November. It has been persistently declining for almost a year, and constantly undershooting forecasts. The Eurozone is now clearly diverging from many advanced economies, where inflation is either on the rise – albeit at moderate levels – as in the US, or, when falling, still remaining close to target, as the UK.

Inflation has kept falling even in ‘core’ economies, where employment remains strong and the output gap has been reduced, such as Germany. Recent data show little prospect for improvement. According to the October World Economic Outlook (IMF 2014b), under current policies, the Eurozone inflation rate “is expected to remain substantially below the ECB’s price stability objective through at least 2019”.

This column explores one specific conjecture, that underpinning those evolutions, including the lack of growth, is one single and common factor – an excess demand for ‘safe assets’. Essentially, economic agents develop a strong inclination for holding money and government bonds, in preference to any other financial or real assets; and, doing do, are induced to cut down on their expenditures. This is both a sign and a consequence of extreme risk aversion. As a result, Europe may be caught into a ‘safety trap’ from which there is no escape other than a temporary transfer of risk from private to public balance sheets.

If true, this conjecture would have definite policy implications. The column brings no new insights. Rather, it builds on existing research (Caballero and Fahri 2013), to analyse the situation in the Eurozone.

The current situation

Disinflation in the Eurozone has been accompanied by symptoms commonly associated with a lack of aggregate demand: stagnant or negative growth, and increasing unemployment, especially in peripheral economies. The causation from demand to inflation may seem obvious, as the output gap has simultaneously increased in 2013 (from 2.5% to 3%).

However, it seems difficult to relate the recent downward shift in inflation to pure demand factors. Nominal wage growth is still robust, with compensation per employee rising by 1.1% in annual terms for 2014Q2. While fiscal policy has been a sizeable drag on the economy in 2012–2013, it is not the case anymore, and the Eurozone structural fiscal balance is stabilising. Finally, according to the IMF, the Eurozone output gap (at approximately 3%) is smaller than in the US (3.5%).

On the supply side, the appreciation of the euro could account for the decline in inflation in 2013. But that pass-through is now over and the effective exchange rate has depreciated by 5% in the last seven months. Import prices have been stable over the last six months, and may be expected to increase following the recent depreciation.

In sum, demand and supply factors could explain the low inflation prevailing up to the first quarter of 2014. They cannot account for the constant, and unexpected, fall in inflation that has occurred since.

Something deeper may be at work. Inflation is a process – while impacted by temporary shocks, it is fundamentally driven by endogenous dynamics and expectations. There are many signs of such deteriorating dynamics in the Eurozone. Core inflation (excluding food and energy), is now at 0.7%. Most significantly, inflation expectations are dropping fast. At a short horizon, they now stand below 0.7% for 2016. Longer-term expectations, broadly stable until June, are now falling too. For the first time in 15 years, the ‘5 years in 5 years’ swap stands below 2%, at 1.84%, down from 2.4% at the beginning of the year, prompting the ECB President to note this in his speech at Jackson Hole in August 2014. This is dangerous – as Japan’s experience has shown, long run inflation expectations are very rigid and, once destabilised, may move irreversibly down.

Safe assets shortage: How does it work?

The intuition is straightforward. In a safety trap, there is a strong demand for precautionary balances that cannot be satisfied under prevailing economic and financial conditions. In order to accumulate more safe assets, economic agents have to reduce their consumption or investment, thus depressing aggregate demand for goods. There is a close analogy with a basic monetarist model in which an excess demand for money translates, for given income and wealth, into an excess supply of goods. There is also some analogy with a liquidity trap, where the demand for money (one specific safe asset) becomes infinite.

In developed contemporary models (e.g. Caballero and Fahri 2013), the safe asset shortage works through the interest rate. An excess demand for safe assets drives down the risk-free natural interest rate, possibly to negative levels in real terms. When inflation is already low and the economy hits the zero lower bound, it becomes impossible to reach the necessary (negative) real interest rate. The economy falls into a ‘trap’ with cumulative disinflation and the possibility of an ever-deeper recession. Just like a liquidity trap, there is there is a self-perpetuating aspect in the safety trap because lower inflation increases real interest rates which, in turn, leads to lower inflation. In a sense, however, a safety trap is more serious. Increasing preferences for safety can constantly push the equilibrium interest rate further down, thus widening the gap between effective and equilibrium interest rates. An increased demand for safe assets therefore acts as an endogenous tightening of monetary conditions (Fisher 2013).

One important insight is that in a safe asset trap, the lack of demand is not the ultimate cause of disinflation. Rather, both low demand and low inflation are joint manifestations of an underlying disequilibrium in asset markets. This disequilibrium may persist for a long time, as real interest rates cannot adjust.

The safe asset hypothesis therefore explains the persistence of low inflation and no growth despite extremely easy financial conditions. It also helps to clarify some of the puzzles currently affecting advanced – and more specifically, European – economies.

Three puzzles

Take, first, the financial behaviour of corporate firms. Considered in aggregate, they have been simultaneously issuing debt (most often with high yields and light covenants), hoarding cash (in the order of 18% of GDP in France and Germany) and buying back their shares. Admittedly, this is not purely a European characteristic, and such behaviours may result from tax arbitrages. The phenomenon, however, shows that low inflation and low demand cannot fully be explained by a ‘balance sheet recession’ (Koo 2009) triggered by the deleveraging occurring in the private sector. Actually, outside the banking sector, little deleveraging is taking place in aggregate. In the Eurozone, corporate debt is up by 7% of GDP as compared to 2007 (Hannoun 2014). There is strong issuance of new debt, but proceeds are used to finance precautionary cash hoarding. Policy debates may be excessively focusing on debt. For the Eurozone, at least, the main economic problem lies on the asset – not the liability – side of corporate balance sheets.

Indeed, a second puzzle relates to physical investment, which remains well below pre-crisis levels (by an order of 2% of GDP) despite extremely easy financial conditions. The safe asset hypothesis brings some elements of clarification. In a safe asset trap, risk-free assets are abnormally attractive since they offer an excess return (as compared to equilibrium). This creates a disincentive to invest – high risk-free rates compress the spreads with other assets to levels insufficient to compensate for perceived economic risk.

Still, while reluctant to take ‘economic’ risk, investors show a great appetite for ‘financial’ risk. This is a third puzzle, recently illustrated by the IMF in its latest Global Financial Stability Report (IMF 2014a).

Here, it is useful to identify the two main characteristics of a safe asset. First they are ‘information insensitive’ – they keep the same value (and therefore protect their owner’s wealth) in all possible states of the world (this is the definition of safety). And, second, they are liquid and can be exchanged for money without loss of value at any single moment in time. It has been shown (Dang et al. 2012) that those two properties are closely related. But they are not identical. They provide a matrix through which one can look at the investment universe.

Physical investments are the exact opposite of safe assets. They are both illiquid and fully exposed to economic risk (and, therefore, sensitive to uncertainty). Risky financial instruments – such as high yield debt or equity – are in an intermediary situation. Their value is information sensitive. But, under the assumption of market liquidity, they can be transformed into a safe asset (and money). Therefore they do not suffer from the irreversibility attached to physical assets. Easy monetary policies strengthen the perception of liquidity and increase substitutability between safe and risky financial assets. They do not affect, however, the illiquidity of physical assets. Hence the currently observed disconnect between economic and financial risk.

Why could there be an excess demand for safe assets?

Many causes can explain a shortage of safe assets – some global, some more specific to the Eurozone.

In the Eurozone, like in the rest of the world, the demand for safe assets is mechanically bound to increase, as they are needed to meet new regulatory and market requirements. Banks will hold more Government debt and other ‘high quality’ assets to meet the liquidity standards set up by the Basel Committee. Market transactions, whether or not intermediated by central clearing counterparties, will increasingly depend on the provision of high quality collateral.

At the same time, and more specific to the Eurozone, the supply is shrinking. The Eurozone crisis has resulted in a large chunk of government debt losing its ‘safe asset’ status, as markets have become increasingly sensitive to credit and liquidity risks. This annihilation of previously safe government debt amounts to several trillions of euros. It is conceivable that it will produce macroeconomic effects on a large scale and for a long time while investors adjust their behaviour to a new, and unforeseen, environment.

Finally, and more relevant to recent evolutions, economic uncertainty and expectations of deflation generate their own preference for safety. An excess demand for safe assets is just one consequence and manifestation of strong aversion to risk.

Policy implications

If the conjecture proves correct, any policy response must necessarily increase the net supply of safe assets. Measures that would simply substitute one safe asset for another would not work. It turns out that some monetary policy actions, including non-conventional one, fall into that last category. This requirement – increasing the net supply of safe assets – therefore provides a useful criterion through which to assess various policy initiatives.

In the Eurozone, the excess demand for safe assets has been, until recently, satisfied by an expansion of central bank liabilities – notably through the ECB’s long-term refinancing operations (LTROs). This is a useful but imperfect solution. Access to the central bank’s balance sheet, while much broader in the Eurozone than in the US, is still limited to financial institutions. If households and firms need to hold additional safe assets, they depend on banks to ‘transform’ that central bank liquidity into other safe assets, i.e. to issue money through credit. As is well known, this process is currently severely impaired in the Eurozone. Broad money aggregates are growing at an annual pace of 2.5%, but external counterparties play a major role and domestic credit is shrinking (-1.5% year on year in October).

Would quantitative easing (QE) – i.e. purchase of government bonds by the central bank – work? In a first step, it would simply substitute one safe asset (money) with another (government debt), leaving the total net amount unchanged. What follows will depend on the degree of preference for safe assets. It is usually assumed that, with less government debt in their hands, investors will ‘rebalance’ their portfolios by purchasing additional risky assets, thereby pushing their price up and driving their yields down. This portfolio rebalancing is essential for QE to have an impact on the real economy, through a reduction in spreads and an increase in financial wealth.

Crucially, however, the process relies upon some (imperfect) substitutability between safe and risky financial assets. Investors must be willing to swap money and government debt for riskier corporate debt, real estate, or equity in order to get a higher return. A strong preference for safe assets would inhibit that arbitrage and significantly impair or paralyse portfolio rebalancing.

Things are very different when the central bank engages in direct and massive purchases of private (risky) assets. In that case, the net amount of safe assets does increase. This is exactly what the ECB is currently doing through its programme of asset-backed securities (ABS) and covered bond purchases. This action will potentially bring huge benefits to the Eurozone economy.

In the short run, it will increase the net volume of safe assets, although by limited amounts and mainly in the hands of the banking sector. Should, however, the demand be ‘satiated’, some portfolio rebalancing towards risky assets could occur, credit would increase again, and one could expect some resumption of consumption and growth, together with an increase in inflation.

In the longer run, the ECB can help to create a new class of safe assets in the Eurozone and significantly increase their supply. Plain vanilla (not structured) ABS are very safe (with an average default rate of 2%), and will remain so if strict rules are implemented and liquidity is guaranteed. ABS have no ‘nationality’ as they can be made of assets originated in different countries and be traded across borders. A vibrant ABS market will further delink sovereign, banking, and credit risk, offering investors a truly ‘European’ asset class. It will help to overcome the geographical segmentation of European capital markets and improve the transmission of monetary policy in different countries.

At present, however, the European ABS market is only one-fifth of the size of the US market. The ECB is now creating the conditions for it to grow. As the ultimate buyer, it can impose the conditions that ABS would have to meet and quickly standardise the market, thus bypassing the complicated and burdensome process of EU regulation. (see Bank of England and ECB 2014). Ideally, the ECB should set itself as a ‘market maker of last resort’, committing to sell and buy ABS and guaranteeing market liquidity for some period of time.

Admittedly, this is no ordinary job for a central bank. And it involves taking some risks. This may be unavoidable in a safe asset trap when the only remedy is for the public sector to temporarily take additional risk by itself, on its consolidated balance sheet. If the strategy is successful, such action will be costless as aggregate risk in the economy will diminish and so will the excess demand for safe assets.

While this remains extremely controversial inside the Eurosystem, the necessity to take risk away from private balance sheets now seems well internalised by policymakers. Through its recent communication, the ECB is signalling its willingness to significantly increase the size of its balance sheet. It implicitly aims at a certain level of leverage, and, therefore, seems to accept some additional and temporary risk-taking.

Finally, of course, issuing new government debt and spending the proceeds could increase the amount of safe assets. The private sector would then hold both money and newly issued bonds. The power to tax gives governments a comparative advantage in creating safe assets. This advantage, however, is fragile and heavily dependent on fiscal and debt sustainability. Preserving ‘fiscal capacity’ (Caballero and Fahri 2013, 2014) is essential. It raises difficult issues of fiscal policy governance and moral hazard. Fiscal rules increase the fiscal space to the extent that they credibly ensure debt sustainability in the long run. Disagreements on how they should be implemented in current circumstances have the opposite effect. Setting up an appropriate, robust, and commonly agreed fiscal governance becomes crucial at a moment when the Eurozone is just regaining some fiscal credibility.

About the author:
Jean-Pierre Landau
Economics Department, Sciences Po

References:
Bank of England and European Central Bank (2014), “The case for a better functioning securitisation market in the European Union – A Discussion Paper”, May.

Caballero, R and E Farhi (2013), “A Model of the Safe Asset mechanism (SAM): Safety Trap and Economic Policy”, NBER Working Paper 18737.

Caballero, R and E Farhi (2014), “On the Role of Safe Asset Shortages in Secular Stagnation”, in C Teulings and R Baldwin (eds.) Secular Stagnation: Facts, Causes and Cures, VoxEU.org eBook.

Dang, T V, G Gorton, and B Holmström (2012), “Ignorance, Debt and Financial Crises”, mimeo.

De Paoli, B and P Zabcszyk (2014), “Risk Aversion and the Natural Interest Rate”, Liberty Street Economics, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, 16 July.

Fisher, P F (2013), “Reflections on the meaning of ‘risk free’”, BIS Paper 72.

Kocherlakota, N (2014), “Low Real Interest Rates”, Speech, 5 June.

Koo, R (2009), The Holy Grail of Macroeconomics, John Wiley & Sons.

Hannoun, Hervé (2014), “Central Banks and the Global Debt Overhang”, Speech, 20 November.

International Monetary Fund (2014a), “Improving the Balance Between Financial and economic Risk Taking”, Global Financial Stability Report, Chapter 1, October.

International Monetary Fund (2014b), World Economic Outlook, Chapter 1, October.

Landau, J-P (2013), “Macroprudential rebalancing”, VoxEU.org, 18 April.

The post Why Is Euro Inflation So Low? – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Scientists may have solved a long-standing enigma known as the African Humid Period – an intense increase in cumulative rainfall in parts of Africa that began after a long dry spell following the end of the last ice age and lasting nearly 10,000 years.

In a new study published this week in Science, an international research team linked the increase in rainfall in two regions of Africa thousands of years ago to an increase in greenhouse gas concentrations. The study was funded by the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy.

The findings are critical, researchers say, because they provide new evidence that increases in carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases could have a significant impact on the future climate of Africa.

“This study is important not only because it explains a long-standing puzzle, but it helps to validate model predictions of how rising greenhouse gas concentrations might change rainfall patterns in a highly populated and vulnerable part of the world,” said Peter Clark, an Oregon State University paleoclimatologist and co-author on the study.

The study was led by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). It used computer simulations and analysis of geologic records of past climate.

The researchers focused on the era following the last ice age. When ice sheets covering North America and northern Europe began retreating after the last glacial maximum some 21,000 years ago, there was a long dry spell in central Africa that lasted until about 14,700 years ago, when rainfall increased abruptly. Scientists have long been puzzled by the regime shift, which turned deserts into grasslands and earned the African Humid Period moniker.

Rainfall actually increased in two separate regions of Africa – one north of the equator, the other south. Some previous studies had suggested that the shift may have been triggered by changes in the Earth’s orbit, but lead author Bette Otto-Bliesner said orbital patterns alone could not explain increased rainfall of that extent in both regions.

As the Earth emerged from the ice age, atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide and methane increased significantly – almost to pre-industrial levels – by 11,000 years ago. As the planet continued warming, ice sheets melted and the influx of fresh water from North America and northern Europe began weakening the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, which brings warm water up from the tropics and keeps Europe temperate.

This weakening of the Atlantic ocean current simultaneously moved precipitation southward toward the southernmost part of Africa, and suppressed rainfall in east Africa and northern equatorial Africa during the long dry spell, the researchers say.

When the ice sheets stopped melting, the circulation strengthened and brought precipitation back to the north. This change, coupled with the orbital shift and warming of both the atmosphere and oceans by greenhouse gases, triggered the African Humid Period.

“This study provides yet another demonstration of the sensitivity of the Earth’s climate to small changes in atmospheric greenhouse gases,” said Clark, a professor in OSU’s College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences.

The science team recreated records of past moisture conditions by examining fossils, former lake levels and other geologic data, and simulated past climate with a power climate model developed by NCAR.

”The future impact of greenhouse gases on rainfall in Africa is a critical socioeconomic issue,” Otto-Bliesner said. “Africa’s climate seems destined to change, with far-reaching implications for water resources and agriculture in ways that may generate new conflicts.”

The study focused on the Sahel region of Africa to the north, including Niger, Chad and northern Nigeria; and the southeastern equatorial region of Africa, including the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania and Kenya.

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While Ebola has attracted much of the world’s attention recently, a severe HIV epidemic rages on around the world and in sub-Saharan Africa in particular. Globally, more than 34 million people are infected with HIV; in sub-Saharan Africa alone, 3 million new infections occur annually.

In an attempt to stop the spread of HIV, governments in the region are considering providing antiretroviral drugs to people who do not have the virus but are at risk for becoming infected. Such drugs are known as pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP.

Although the conventional strategy — attempting to attempt to distribute the drugs to people in every city and village — might seem logical and equitable, researchers at UCLA have devised a plan they say would be much more effective in reducing HIV transmission.

The strategy, developed using a complex mathematical model, focuses on targeting “hot zones,” areas where the risk of HIV infection is much higher than the national average. In South Africa, where 17 percent of the population is infected with HIV, the model predicted that targeting hot zones would prevent 40 percent more HIV infections than using the conventional strategy — and would therefore be 40 percent more cost-effective.

“Stopping the HIV pandemic is one of the greatest challenges facing the global community,” said Sally Blower, the paper’s senior author and the director of the Center for Biomedical Modeling at the UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior.

The report appears in the current online edition of Nature Communications.

“Since results from clinical trials have shown that antiretroviral drugs are effective in protecting individuals against HIV, the big question now is how best to use them,” said David Gerberry, the study’s first author and a former UCLA postdoctoral fellow who now is an assistant professor in mathematics at Xavier University.

To develop the strategy, UCLA researchers designed a computer model that calculated and mapped the incidence of HIV in South Africa and identified hot zones. The model featured three important components: the geographic dispersion of the population, the geographic variation in the severity of the HIV epidemic and the geographic variation in the level of risk behavior. The model revealed that two of South Africa’s nine provinces are hot zones.

The researchers then used the model to predict where, and how many, new HIV infections would occur based on using either the conventional strategy or a strategy targeting hot zones for distributing the drugs.

“Our results are quite striking,” Blower said. “Both strategies would provide PrEP to the same number of people, but using the hot zones plan would prevent 40 percent more HIV infections than using the conventional plan.”

Gerberry said the team’s strategy could be applied to other nations as well. “The methods we developed can be used to find hot zones in any other sub-Saharan countries that have geographic variation in the severity of their HIV epidemic, such as Lesotho, Botswana, Nigeria and Uganda,” he said. “Once the hot zones have been found in these countries, our spatial optimization algorithm can be used to identify the geographic targeting strategy that would be the most cost-effective.”

Blower said the study holds great significance for global health policy. “The findings show that, when interventions are rolled out, governments in sub-Saharan Africa will have to choose between maximizing equity in access to the drugs and minimizing transmission of HIV.”

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