In another Op-Ed piece on Syria, Friedman profiles the significance of the drought – and its mismanagement of the government – on the civil war that has persisted there for over 2 years. He quotes a Syrian economist: “State and government was invented in this part of the world, in ancient Mesopotamia, precisely to manage irrigation and crop growing, and Assad failed in that basic task.” Although the drought did not cause the civil war in Syria, it has greatly exacerbated the misery there, and has succeeded in politicizing and agitating Syrians against the Assad government. Help the refugees.

Op-Ed contributor Ma Jian, author of the new novel “The Dark Road” that is based on the same topic, examines, and ultimately condemns, China’s brutal one-child policy. The policy, implemented in 1979 after the death of Mao, was intended to be temporary, and at the time seemed reasonable in the wake of China’s disastrous Cultural Revolution. Not only is the policy extremely inhumane – forced abortions on women in the last month of pregnancy, the discarding of non-male newborns – but furthermore, it has brought China to the verge of a demographic nightmare. The birthrate is close to 1.2, well below the 2.1 replacement level. If this rate continues, China will find it impossible to support its rapidly aging population. One shudders at the thought of the solutions that China may consider to address that problem.

In the lead-up to Myanmar President Thein Sein’s visit to the White House, Op-Ed contributors José Ramos-Horta, Muhammad Yunus and Benedict Rogers have a few words of advice for Obama. Although Myanmar has made considerable progress towards democracy, it is still on the path of reform. Obama must be explicitly clear on what the West demands in exchange for full diplomatic and economic trust: a solution to the decades of civil war between the country’s ethnic minorities, less military involvement in the government and an end to the persecution of the Kachin people and the Muslim Rohingyas. These three bullet points are just a start.

Op-Ed contributor Sujatha Fernandes has used the recent music ban by Islamic militants in the north of Mali to remind readers of music’s power to communicate and inspire. Although the music ban is in line with orthodox Islam, in which in anything that distracts for one’s devotion to Allah should be avoided, those who levied the ban most certainly recognized its cultural significance in Mali, especially as a critical tool for Griots. As the banning of anything is always suspect, and ultimately a sign of desperation, the music ban in Mali is no exception.

This common knowledge is now supported by scientific evidence. A new study carried out over 18 years, and involving over 10,000 participants in the UK, has found that living near parks and other urban green spaces can be beneficial for mental wellbeing. In short, it can make people happier.

Researchers from the University of Exeter gathered survey data about the life satisfaction and mental distress of participants, and matched the results to a map showing where parks and other green areas were. The study found that people living near parks and green areas, and those who moved to such areas, were on the whole more satisfied with life and experienced less mental distress than those who didn’t.

 “Our analyses suggest that people are happier when living in urban areas with greater amounts of green space” writes the lead researcher Mathew White. “Compared to instances when they live in areas with less green space they show significantly lower mental distress and significantly higher wellbeing ”.

These findings, along with those from similar studies, may be something for city planners to seriously consider. Global urbanization will bring 70% of the world’s growing population to live in cities by 2050. It makes a lot of sense to help these people to be happier by providing decent amounts of urban green space in every city.

The researchers conclude: “The analysis also made it possible to compare the beneficial effects of green space with other factors which influence wellbeing. In comparative terms, living in an area with higher levels of green space was associated with improvements in our wellbeing indicators roughly equal to a third of that gained from being married or a tenth as large as being employed vs. unemployed”.

See Dr. Mathew White speak about the results here…

Image: Tiergarten (Manfred Brückels, 2005). Licensed under Wiki Commons

UNICEF: as many as 100,000 children forced to work in Philippines illegal sex trade. [CNN]

After just fifteen minutes of talks about strengthening an Afghan women’s rights law, traditionalists stop the debate and ask for the law to be eliminated. [BBC]

India limits foreign funding of NGOs that campaign against nuclear energy and genetically modified food. [Washington Post]

Making a move towards ethical shopping by rating high street brands. [The Guardian]

“People are dying from curable diseases in South Central Los Angeles.”

Obesity rates in South Central LA are among the highest in the US. According to a report of the LA County Public Health Department, every third adult in the area is obese – and numbers are trending upwards.

When Ron Finley had to drive for forty-five minutes to pick up a freshly grown apple untreated by pesticides, he realized he had to make a change. And so he founded the group L.A. Green Grounds and started to plant vegetables in one of the various vacant lots owned by the city: the empty, barren median in front of his own house.

A few months later, neighbours were gazing at the tall sunflowers, kale, corn and peppers. The city itself, however, was less enthusiastic. Finley was cited for gardening without permission on a piece of land that wasn’t his own – one piece of the twenty-six square miles of vacant lots owned by South Central LA.

With the aid of his group and 900 signatures on change.org Finley was permitted to continue gardening. By now he has turned parts of the “food desert” into a “food forest”. Pumpkins and tomatoes are growing, not artificially lined up but freely seeded all over the place just like in nature.

Finely considers himself an artist. He beautifies the land like a graffiti gangster beautifies the walls.

“I want us all to become ecolutionary renegades. Gangsters. Gangster-gardeners. If you ain’t a gardener, you ain’t gangster!”

Read the report of LA County Public Health Department here…

To read more about Ron Finely, click here… and here…

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Mamadou, a 47-year-old man from rural Senegal, has advanced prostate cancer that has spread throughout his body. He can no longer be cured, but with morphine, a strong painkiller, he could live his last months in dignity. However, morphine is hard to get in Senegal, as it is in much of Africa, and supplies are unreliable. During the interview, Mamadou struggled even to speak. “I cannot have a real life without my medication”, he said.

Still in pain

Mamadou is not alone in his suffering. Millions of patients in Africa with advanced cancer, HIV or other illnesses live and die in extreme pain every year. And their numbers grow year by year. In 2007, there were over 700,000 new cancer cases and nearly 600,000 cancer-related deaths in Africa, though those figures do not include the many people who are misdiagnosed or never diagnosed at all. Non-communicable diseases are expected to become Africa’s biggest killer by 2030, surpassing maternal, child and infectious diseases.

But much of the suffering Mamadou and so many others face could be addressed. Palliative care, a health service that focuses on improving the quality of life of patients with incurable illnesses, is highly effective in treating debilitating symptoms, including severe cancer pain. Moreover, it can be provided at relatively low cost, making it realistic to provide this health service even when resources are tight. The World Health Organization has encouraged all countries to ensure that palliative care is integrated into public healthcare systems.

Yet, palliative care services do not exist in almost half of Africa’s countries. In most others, they are accessible to only a small percentage of patients who need them. As a result, many patients die in their homes, in agony and without proper support. For example, in Senegal, palliative care is only available in the capital Dakar – and even there it is very limited. According to theInternational Narcotics Control Board, in many African countries, morphine is simply not available, even though it is inexpensive and essential for treating severe cancer pain.

Hope on the horizon

But there are positive signs that African leaders have heard the cries of those who suffer. At a meeting in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa last month, African Union health ministers recommended that member-states integrate palliative care into national strategies to combat non-communicable diseases. They also adopted a progressive common position on improving access to strong pain medications that calls for efforts to drastically increase their availability for patients. These initiatives have the potential of leading to vastly improved care for patients with incurable illnesses and their families.

It is also encouraging that Africa already has several excellent palliative care models that other countries can use or adapt. In Uganda, for example, the government has worked closely with palliative care advocates and the healthcare system to develop home-based palliative care services and provide free access to oral morphine. The government and Hospice Africa Uganda are training palliative care specialists, and legal changes have been made to allow appropriately trained nurses to prescribe oral morphine to patients in pain.

In Kenya meanwhile, the government has worked with the Kenyan Hospice and Palliative Care Association to integrate palliative care into 44 public hospitals and to train healthcare providers. Last month, the Health Ministry announced that it was going to supply morphine through the Kenya Medical Supply Agency (KEMSA) to all public hospitals that are providing palliative care.

Progress has also been made in countries as diverse as Zimbabwe, Rwanda, Swaziland, Mozambique and Nigeria, often in cooperation with the African Palliative Care Association. But much remains to be done. As African leaders celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Organization of African Unity/African Union, they have an opportunity to take action to ensure that people like Mamadou do not have to suffer unnecessarily.

African leaders at the summit should set the ball rolling by adopting the recommendations of health ministers. Considering the fact that populations in Africa are aging and that the prevalence of chronic diseases is increasingly rapidly, African leaders would also be addressing a great need that the African Union will face in its next 50 years.

This article was originally published by Think Africa Press.

The geopolitics behind the Syrian conflict and the instability in the Arab world. [The Guardian]

After severe conflict in northern Mali, half the population of Timbuktu has fallen by half, making daily life difficult for those left behind. [Washington Post]

The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization endorses eating insects as a potential weapon against hunger. [Huffington Post]

The European Space Agency approves a satellite that can weigh the Earth’s forests with sensors and help collect information about climate change. [BBC]

Nora Schenkel has made a one-of-a-kind Op-Ed piece. Schenkel spent 15 months working in Haiti for an international NGO, the name of which she does not reveal. As only a skilled writer could do, Schenkel confesses the inadequacy of her mindset as a development worker and her weakness for the sorts of comforts one usually must forego in such a line of work, problematizes the idea of a “career” development worker, and all the while underscores the importance of such work, yet only when done by the right people in the right frame of mind. And in the process, she draws much-needed attention to the still-desperate situation in Haiti. Brilliant.

In the lead-up to Pakistan’s first peaceful change of government in its history, Op-Ed contributor Manan Ahmed Asif is asking whether this upcoming election is indeed a sign of progress. Despite grand pronouncements of equal minority rights at the country’s founding in 1947, institutional racism has been an integral part of Pakistani society since its earliest days. A chief target of the racism, and a group that particularly suffers from disenfranchisement, are the Ahmadis, who are reviled by Sunni Muslims for believing that the most recent prophet was not Mohammed, but rather Mirza Ghulam Ahmad. Not only are Ahmadis not allowed to vote, they, along with Shiite Muslims, are regular targets of violence that most often goes overlooked by the state. Even in this would-be optimistic year of free elections, the leading candidates are continuing to marginalize minorities to capture a greater share of the mainstream vote. Petition to end the persecution of Ahmadi Muslims.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki seems to be doing as little as possible to prevent his country from falling back into civil war. Indeed, he seems to be provoking it. An attack on a protest camp, in which at least 44 were killed and over 100 wounded, along with the suspension of licenses for 9 satellite stations that were considered to be pro-Sunni are two of the more recent signs of provocation. And in taking a page from the manual on “how to become totalitarian state”, despite the horrendous state of infrastructure within Iraq, Maliki has just completed a state-of-the-art media monitoring facility, which no doubt contributed to the recent censorship of the 9 satellite stations. With such moves, it’s only time before Iraq once again become the most problematic country in the region, a mantle currently held by its neighbor Syria.

Op-Ed contributor Irene Khan, director general of the International Development Law Organization and a citizen of Bangladesh, has written about a few of the stark ironies that have come to international attention of late. Most of the world knows of the horrific collapse of the garment factory building just outside Dhaka killing at least 1127 workers, most of them women. In the wake of this tragedy there have been protests in Dhaka, by Islamic extremists demanding an Islamic state where women would be segregated from men and not be allowed to work in such factories like the one that collapsed. This is not exactly the response the world expected to see from Bangladesh, especially considering that the garment industry, which is dominated by women, is the country’s greatest source of income. As these same protesters are also demanding death for “atheist bloggers”, it seems sadly that the security of civil rights in Bangladesh has a long way to go.

Capture – Accelerate – Concentrate. These three words express the essence of SheerWind’s approach to wind power. The name INVELOX comes from a dedication to INcreasing the VELOcity of wind. What the technology produces—energy that is affordable, abundant, safe, and clean—is nothing short of revolutionary. Conventional wind turbines use massive turbine generator systems mounted on top of a tower. INVELOX, by contrast, funnels wind energy to ground-based generators.

Instead of snatching bits of energy from the wind as it passes through the blades of a rotor, wind is captured with a funnel and directed through a tapering passageway that naturally accelerates its flow. This stream of kinetic energy then drives a generator that is installed safely and economically at ground level.

Bringing the airflow from the top of the tower to ground level allows for greater power generation from units that are 50% shorter than traditional wind towers, and whose turbine blades are up to 84% smaller. It also allows for networking, allowing multiple towers to direct energy to the same generator. Fewer generators are required, so equipment and maintenance costs are lower. Most importantly, energy output is greater.

This means that the new turbine produces electricity that costs less than 1 cent per KWH, making it competitive with natural gas and hydroelectric powered generation. It is also able to operate at wind speeds as low as 1 mile per hour and in low wind regimes. This makes it suitable for areas around the world which were not considered optimal for wind energy before. The company says that in contrast to the systems of today, its system ROI (return on investment) is a merely five years. If all the data released by the company is correct, and field tests have shown that it is, than the market is heading for a revolution with the potential to affect the lives and future of us all.

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Rios Montt is found guilty of genocide in Guatemala and sentenced to 80 years in prison. [Huffington Post]

Over 5,000 refugees displaced by violence in Myanmar have been evacuated to higher ground in preparation for Cyclone Mahasen. [Washington Post]

NGO Global Witness presents evidence of illegal land grabs by corporations in Vietnam that equal over 280,000 hectares of land. [BBC]

The journal Nature Climate Change reports that a rise of 2C in global temperatures could threaten the habitats of half the  common plant species and one third for animals. [The Guardian]

This may come as a surprise for those who thought that anger over austerity plans was a sentiment confined to Europe. However, in Israel public frustration over rising living costs has been growing for some time. Never before had so many demonstrators taken part in street protests like in 2011; with the stats hitting a record high towards the end of the year, when half a million Israelis from all sorts of background voiced their anger.

2,000 people took to the streets in Tel Aviv on Saturday to contest the government’s planned austerity measures. On Monday, the cabinet is due to debate an income tax and VAT increase, as well as further spending cuts. A significant part of the disapproval is directed towards Yair Lapid, whose Yesh Atid party was came second in January’s election. For many protestors, the new finance minister has a lot to answer for, seeing as he ran on the promise to eleviate the burden of Israel’s middle class, who are said to be most affected by the proposed austerity budget.

Mounting Tensions between Syria and Turkey

Fears over a spread of the conflict in Syria are heightened once again, as Turkey accuses the world of inaction. During a visit to the German capital, Turkey’s foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu has blamed the occurrence of deadly bombings near Turkey’s border with Syria on the international community’s inaction to intervene. Saturday’s blasts killed 46 and injured 100 people, thereby making it one of the deadliest attacks on Turkish soil in recent years.

Meanwhile, the Syrian government has rejected any links to the attacks. Speaking with a Turkish TV station, Davutoglu said that he belived it had “everything to do with the Syrian regime”. While in Berlin, he further explained:

“The latest attack shows how a spark transforms into a fire when the international community remains silent and the UN Security Council fails to act. [...] It’s unacceptable for the Syrian and Turkish people to pay the price for this”, as Al Jazeera reports.

Egypt’s Latest Controversy

After a controversy concerning the host of the Egyptian version of the US satire news show, The Daily Show, President Morsi’s government has become the recipient of international disapproval once again. Ahmed Maher, leader of one of Egypt’s 2011 uprising youth groups, has been detained by security officials at Cairo airport after returning from Washington DC. In the States, Maher attended a conference on Egypt’s transitional state, where he was one of the speakers. According to reports, the activist faces the accusation of inducing Egyptians to demonstrate outside Interior Minister Mohammed Ibrahim’s home.

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