I expect that you, like most Americans, are beginning to ponder who you’re going to vote for in the upcoming presidential election. If this is the case, then you might also be causally conversing about or considering the factors most important to your decision. Let me draw your attention to one of the most significant aspects of the presidency, foreign policy.
For a President to be successful in foreign policy it is fairly likely that they will need to have foreign policy experience. When you hear the words foreign policy your mind might initially jump to the conflict in Ukraine and the threats from ISIS. The less considered aspect of foreign policy is foreign aid. If a president does not have a good deal of foreign policy experience, as we saw with President Barrack Obama, it is likely that this president may neglect foreign aid and focus only on military conflicts. This is a problem because foreign aid is integral to the United States’ economics and national security.
Foreign aid has been neglected in foreign policy and viewed as “charity” rather than as a strategy for a long time. During the Obama administration, this neglect grew. According to ForeignPolicy.com USAID, the United States’ aid organization, has had about a 16 percent drop in funding since 2009.
Before Obama was elected many concerns were raised, as described by an article in Time magazine, about Obama’s lack of experience in the foreign policy arena. The article stated that perhaps his international experience would prove to be enough.
It appears that this was not the case.
“Obama’s critics see a president adrift, lacking firm convictions or a strategy for dealing with the world,” says an article by Elias Groll on ForeignPolicy.com. Others such as Dr. Colluci on U.S. News and World Report even go as far as to describe Obama’s administration as a “foreign policy vacuum.” While perhaps this is a little extreme, it is fair to say that Obama did in fact have little experience in foreign policy and that is reflected in his actions abroad as a president.
Obama has focused too much on military conflicts and strategy and has allowed aid funding to decline significantly. Perhaps if he had had more experience he would have learned an important lesson before becoming president: that the global security that he has been working toward could be better sought through stabilizing countries economically and through building infrastructure.
Foreign aid can both spread democracy, as has been the United States’ goal since the Cold War, and fight terrorism. Perhaps Washington should return to foreign aid as a strategy, rather than continuing to use the military to maintain its sphere of influence.
The Marshall Plan could arguably be listed as one of the United States’ greatest foreign policy successes. This move gave the United States the influence it sought, stabilized countries after World War II, and spread democracy.
In addition, while poverty does not necessarily cause terrorism, reducing global poverty will reduce the human resources of terrorist organizations. Not only that, but reducing global poverty will also prevent at-risk populations from being recruited by these organizations in the future.
The next President should be someone who has had enough experience to realize the importance of foreign aid for these reasons. The president should have had enough military and aid experience to know the value of each, and enough foreign policy experience to know that the military is not the most vital part of our national security.
Even if this president does not know the importance of aid to United States’ foreign policy, I hope that at the very least they will realize that increasing U.S. foreign aid will provide a new job market for United States citizens.
– Clare Holtzman
Sources: The Borgen Project, Clingendael, Foreign Policy 1, Foreign Policy 2, Time, U.S. News & World Report
US State Department Country Reports on Human Rights Practices
On June 24, the US State Department released the Country Reports on Human Rights. The Country Reports on Human Rights are mandated by Congress in the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 and the Trade Act of 1974. These acts describe the performance of governments that receive U.S. foreign assistance and of all United Nations member states. The performance of a government is determined by how much a country conforms to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that outline civil, political, individual and worker rights.
The Department of State prepares these reports using information from U.S. embassies, foreign government officials, nongovernmental organizations and published reports. U.S. diplomatic missions prepare the initial drafts of the individual country reports. The Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (DRL) and other Department of State offices work to document, evaluate and edit the reports.
In 2014, there were a few trends in regard to human rights abuses. While many governments repressed and harmed citizens, many non-state actors also committed horrible human rights atrocities. As observed before, there is a correlation between corruption, human rights abuses and repressive governance.
Many countries had many human rights abuses. The President of Syria, Bashar Asad, continues to attack innocent civilians in an ongoing civil war between the government and citizens who oppose the government’s leadership. ISIL emerged partly because of a non-inclusive government in Iraq. In the Middle East and Africa, ISIL has both killed people and sold girls into slavery. In Nigeria, Boko Haram attacked school children and captured young girls. Countries such as China, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Iran, Russia and Saudi Arabia do not allow open media markets and imprison journalists.
Even though many countries still do not recognize certain human rights, or disregard human rights altogether, many countries have given more rights to citizens than ever. In Afghanistan, millions elected a new President. Similarly, India had one of the largest parliamentary elections in history in 2014. Indonesia elected a leader who challenged traditional centers of power. In addition, Tunisia held its first democratic election in 2014.
These reports, along with other reports on human rights from other countries, will help educate the public about international human rights. These reports will allow citizens to learn more about human rights abuses, but they can also help people learn about human rights successes. Education is a vital step to help foster human rights internationally.
– Ella Cady
Sources: Council on Foreign Relations, U.S. Department of State
Photo: Flickr
40% of African American Children Living in Poverty
For the first time since the United States began keeping Census records, the number of African American children in poverty has surpassed that of white children. As of 2013, there were reportedly 4.2 million African American children living below the poverty line versus 4.1 million white children. What makes this statistic even more alarming is the fact that white children outnumber African American children under the age of 18 by three to one.
According to an article by USA Today published on July 16 of this year, “The poverty rates for Hispanic, white and Asian children improved as the United States emerged from an economic recession, but for African-American children, little changed. Poverty is defined as living in a household with an annual income below $23,624 for a family of four.” African American children have suffered more than any other demographic in the United States over the past few decades.
Location is largely to blame for the disparity among African American children. Poor black neighborhoods have remained in poverty for decades without any real sign of improvement. The poverty numbers are highly concentrated in these primarily urban, black areas. Detroit has emerged as a hot-spot for African American children.
In the Michigan city, roughly 60 percent of these children are in poverty, significantly higher than anywhere else in the area. An excerpt from CBS reporting on the matter says, “In Detroit, the jobs have left, the good schools have left, there is poor transportation, high insurance rates, and difficulty getting reasonably good paying jobs.” African American children in poverty suffer as a direct result of their environment.
This trend will continue to increase and spread rapidly across the country if real change does not come soon. More African American children are continually falling behind because of a lack of proper education and social reform. The numbers will continue to grow until the government begins to take this situation seriously.
– Diego Catala
Sources: USA Today, CBS Global
Photo: Flickr
Why You Should Vote for a Candidate With Foreign Policy Experience
I expect that you, like most Americans, are beginning to ponder who you’re going to vote for in the upcoming presidential election. If this is the case, then you might also be causally conversing about or considering the factors most important to your decision. Let me draw your attention to one of the most significant aspects of the presidency, foreign policy.
For a President to be successful in foreign policy it is fairly likely that they will need to have foreign policy experience. When you hear the words foreign policy your mind might initially jump to the conflict in Ukraine and the threats from ISIS. The less considered aspect of foreign policy is foreign aid. If a president does not have a good deal of foreign policy experience, as we saw with President Barrack Obama, it is likely that this president may neglect foreign aid and focus only on military conflicts. This is a problem because foreign aid is integral to the United States’ economics and national security.
Foreign aid has been neglected in foreign policy and viewed as “charity” rather than as a strategy for a long time. During the Obama administration, this neglect grew. According to ForeignPolicy.com USAID, the United States’ aid organization, has had about a 16 percent drop in funding since 2009.
Before Obama was elected many concerns were raised, as described by an article in Time magazine, about Obama’s lack of experience in the foreign policy arena. The article stated that perhaps his international experience would prove to be enough.
It appears that this was not the case.
“Obama’s critics see a president adrift, lacking firm convictions or a strategy for dealing with the world,” says an article by Elias Groll on ForeignPolicy.com. Others such as Dr. Colluci on U.S. News and World Report even go as far as to describe Obama’s administration as a “foreign policy vacuum.” While perhaps this is a little extreme, it is fair to say that Obama did in fact have little experience in foreign policy and that is reflected in his actions abroad as a president.
Obama has focused too much on military conflicts and strategy and has allowed aid funding to decline significantly. Perhaps if he had had more experience he would have learned an important lesson before becoming president: that the global security that he has been working toward could be better sought through stabilizing countries economically and through building infrastructure.
Foreign aid can both spread democracy, as has been the United States’ goal since the Cold War, and fight terrorism. Perhaps Washington should return to foreign aid as a strategy, rather than continuing to use the military to maintain its sphere of influence.
The Marshall Plan could arguably be listed as one of the United States’ greatest foreign policy successes. This move gave the United States the influence it sought, stabilized countries after World War II, and spread democracy.
In addition, while poverty does not necessarily cause terrorism, reducing global poverty will reduce the human resources of terrorist organizations. Not only that, but reducing global poverty will also prevent at-risk populations from being recruited by these organizations in the future.
The next President should be someone who has had enough experience to realize the importance of foreign aid for these reasons. The president should have had enough military and aid experience to know the value of each, and enough foreign policy experience to know that the military is not the most vital part of our national security.
Even if this president does not know the importance of aid to United States’ foreign policy, I hope that at the very least they will realize that increasing U.S. foreign aid will provide a new job market for United States citizens.
– Clare Holtzman
Sources: The Borgen Project, Clingendael, Foreign Policy 1, Foreign Policy 2, Time, U.S. News & World Report
Why This Year’s Flu Epidemic May Be the Worst One Yet
Every winter, the elderly line up at their local drug store and people start walking around cities with face masks—all hoping to avoid getting this year’s strain of the flu. But much like many other diseases, the flu hits people in undeveloped countries, who have minimal access to quality healthcare, harder than it hits those in the United States. This summer, poultry farmers in West Africa are hit particularly bad as the flu epidemic spreads between their livestock.
“[Poultry farming] was our main activity for revenue,” said Naba Guigma, a poultry farmer from Burkina Faso’s Boulkiemde province, a region hit particularly hard by this strain, told IRIN. “Now I have no more poultry. The henhouse is empty.”
Millions of other farmers find themselves in the same situation as Guigma, as the sector has been steadily growing in West Africa since 2005. In Cote d’Ivoire alone, jobs in poultry farming have increased by 70% between 2006 and 2015, according to the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). This kind of job growth means that this epidemic does not only affect individual farmers but damages the entire regional economy.
The strain was confirmed to be H5N1, a particularly deadly strain of the bird flu or H1N1 that circled Africa, America and beyond in 2008 and 2009. First identified in January in Nigeria, this poultry flu has since shown up in Cote d’Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Ghana and Niger. Before January, what is commonly known as “bird flu” had not been seen in the region since the epidemic in 2008.
This strain of the disease is particularly dangerous because it can kill the chickens before it is recognized. Guigma initially thought his chickens and guinea fowl were sick with the Newcastle virus, a routine poultry disease. Just two weeks after Guigma first noticed the signs of disease, all of his 120 birds—worth up to $515—died, leaving Guigma without any source of income and with higher prices for poultry in his region.
“At this point, we don’t know very much about these viruses,” said CDC officer Alicia Fry at a press conference with the International Business Times in April. However, given that the virus kills animals in a radius of a contaminated copse and the main way of dealing with exposed animals is killing them on compensating their owners, the future does not look bright for these poultry farmers.
“Nothing about influenza is predictable—including where the next pandemic might emerge and which virus might be responsible,” the United Nations health agency told International Business Times in March. According to the World Health Organization, if this flu is not well-monitored, it could be worse than the 2009 swine flu outbreak that killed over 284,000.
– Eva Lilienfeld
Sources: IB Times 1, IB Times 2, Irin News
Photo: Newshunt
Ryan’s Well Foundation Brings Clean Water to Communities in Uganda
Every day, over 9,000 people living in the Mitoomi-Bushangi districts of Uganda walk many miles to retrieve water that is contaminated with harmful bacteria.
The Ryan’s Well Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to increasing clean water supply in underdeveloped communities, is working on their project, Protected Springs/Latrines and Handwashing, which will complete a series of projects that are providing clean water, latrines and education to people living in western Uganda. The project is set to establish 25 protected springs, 16 of them for primary schools, build four latrines at a local primary school accompanied with six hand washing stations, and create water committees that will provide training on how to properly wash hands and practice good sanitation. When complete, 8,100 students and teachers will have access to clean water.
In 2014, Ryan’s Well Foundation completed their Uganda: Water and Sanitation project. This project supplied 37 protected springs, prevented diseases by enhancing protection for women and youth through workshops, and increased awareness in schools about washing and hygiene. The project also provided a 25,000 liter rainwater harvesting tank, four latrines and a girls washroom, and training on maintenance and repair for the springs and tank.
With over 500 completed and ongoing projects, Ryan’s Well Foundation has successfully provided over 750,000 people in 16 developing nations. Their projects focus on raising funds to build water and sanitation systems and educating youths about the importance of water conservation and sanitation.
The foundation’s core programs include the Youth in Action Program, Getting Involved Program, and the School Challenge Program, with all three of them narrowing down on educating students in elementary and secondary level schools to practice safe and smart water habits. The organization, located in Kemptville, Ontario, Canada, was started by Ryan Hreljac in 2001.
In 1997, seven-year-old Hreljac recognized the need to provide clean water to children in Africa. With the help of his friends and family, Hreljac fundraised enough money to build a well at the Angolo Primary School in northern Uganda. Since its incarnation, Ryan’s Well Foundation has helped build more than 740 wells and 990 latrines, providing clean water to families who would normally be without.
The Ryan’s Well Foundation has open and completed projects in West Africa, East Africa and Haiti. Their primary targets comprise of Uganda, Kenya, Ghana and Tanzania. Right now they have nine active projects in Northern Togo, Ghana, Western Uganda and Burkina Faso. These projects currently revolve around providing access to clean water in primary and secondary schools.
– Julia N. Hettiger
Sources: Ryan’s Well, Gaiam, My Hero
Photo: Ryan’s Well Foundation
Global Education Emergency Fund Proposed
Education is a fundamental step in bringing people out of poverty. It gives boys and girls the opportunity to seek a higher paying job. It also gives them the chance to become better informed citizens that can make an impact on their country later in life.
The United Nations and other organizations have set about tackling the education issue in the developing world with programs that provide the resources for successful schools. While the programs have been very successful, there are still children without access to education; 58 million, to be exact. That is why on July 6-7 an education summit was held in Oslo, Norway to look at some of the problems that still exist with global education.
One major issue that came up in talks was education amid disasters. The recent earthquake in Nepal and the conflicts in Syria and Yemen demonstrate that wars and natural disasters hinder children going to school. Roughly 65 million children are not in school because of these events. Their absences range from a few months to years. Another issue these recent events highlighted was that education was not included as part of the emergency relief aid, while health, food, and shelter are.
As part of the summit, leaders looked at ways to solve this issue and increase support for educational humanitarian aid. What was proposed was a multimillion Global Education Emergency Fund. The idea behind the plan is to have reserve funds available for building/rebuilding schools, buying books, paying teachers and more in the event that a disaster destroys a school or children become refugees with no access to school.
For the case of medicine, food and shelter, there are already emergency funds set up. In order to fix education issues after disasters, money has to be raised first. This delays the time that reforms can be made and means that children spend more time away from school. The Global Education Emergency Fund would solve this issue. With the fund, education would be addressed as a natural human right. Children would be able to have access to schooling even during strenuous times in their lives. They would be able to continue learning and their development. It would enable them to better themselves and pass through difficult times.
– Katherine Hewitt
Sources: BBC, Gordon And Sarah Brown, Oslo Education Summit
Photo: Oslo Education Summit
Poverty in Russia Has Reached a Breaking Point
Poverty in Russia has been a prevailing issue for years now, but a host of causes has finally brought it to its worst point yet.
According to a recent report by Rosstat, a Russian state statistics service, the amount of people living below the poverty line in Russia hit 22.9 million earlier this year. Russia’s population was roughly 144 million at the end of 2014.
Russia’s poverty crisis has worsened steadily over the past few years due primarily to embargos and resulting inflation. As a result of Russia’s involvement in the Ukraine crisis, many countries embargoed food imports to Moscow. This caused inflation in the country to rise to 16.9%, its highest point in 13 years.
“Unfortunately, predictions are coming true: According to official statistics, the number of poor people has reached 22 million,” Deputy Prime Minister Olga Golodets told a Russian television station.
Additional Western sanctions have caused a steep decline in the price of oil, Russia’s largest export, further damaging the country’s economy and job market. In 2014, the amount of social service agency employees in Russia was cut by 6.5%. Experts are predicting that far more job cuts will follow, affecting 33 different regions of the country over the next few years.
Poverty in Russia is also proving to be immensely damaging to education. According to the Accounts Chamber report, 9,500 towns with populations between 300 and 1,500 had no preschool facilities, and one-third of these towns had no public transportation.
Between this year and 2018, 5.6% of Russia’s preschools are expected to close, as well as 6% of primary and secondary schools, 14.7% of orphanages and 16.1% of vocational schools.
As conditions in Russia continue to worsen, work must continue to be done to improve the quality of life within the country.
– Alexander Jones
Sources: World Socialist Web Site, International Business Times, Moscow Times
Photo: Business Insider
Power to Victims: Human Trafficking
Human trafficking is a major concern especially for young people in underdeveloped and developing nations. However, there have been major efforts to save those taken into modern-day slavery, and victims of such atrocities are now fighting back.
Victims are fighting back with two different approaches: through advocacy programs, and through direct involvement in ending human trafficking and returning others who have fallen victim. These victims range in age, gender and nationalities, whether poor countries in Africa or citizens of the United States. Human trafficking a global issue that affects every nation directly.
The United Nations has founded that 70% of those taken into human trafficking are young women and children. When victims, especially women and children, are able to escape their traffickers, they often find themselves in need of help. For this reason, many shelters and organizations have begun to appear around the world—in order to shelter and protect these traumatized victims, as well as bring their violators to justice.
The Philippines have had several young people taken into human trafficking against their will, and, as the issue is given more attention, victims of the practice are now finding the strength to oppose their captors. Many of these victims are women and children, stolen from shelters—as many of them were already fleeing unsafe living circumstances.
There are shelters throughout the Philippines that are specifically established to house people who have fled their human trafficking captors, assist them in reintegrating into society and also give the legal assistance needed to take down their traffickers.
Human trafficking is also being combated by nonprofit organizations that are emerging all over the globe. A number of organizations have been created to spread awareness of the issue in an effort to end the terrible practice.
One group that was created for such a purpose is Polaris, a nonprofit organization that works with survivors of human trafficking and governments of different countries to apprehend human traffickers and bring back captives who have been taken against their will. One of the biggest efforts in ending the phenomena is through advocacy and spreading awareness of the issue, as is the case for many security concerns throughout the world.
– Alexandrea Jacinto
Sources: CNN, The Polaris Project, The United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime
Photo: FBI
Empact Northwest: Rapid Ready Response When Disaster Strikes
On April 25, a massive earthquake of magnitude 7.8 rocked the tiny country of Nepal. Widespread devastation resulted and the aftermath left hundreds of people entombed in concrete graves. As the international relief effort mobilized, smaller teams of volunteers responded from all over the world using money from their own pockets. One of these teams was Empact Northwest.
Empact Northwest, a nonprofit volunteer organization, hails from Kitsap County, Washington. They specialize in dispatching technical rescue operations locally, regionally, nationally and internationally to communities in need. The group’s motto is “Empathy in action” and on April 27, empathy turned into action when they deployed as Disaster Team 1 to Nepal.
The epicenter of the earthquake that struck Nepal was located in the Lamjung District northwest of Katmandu, a part of Gandaki Zone and one of the seventy-five districts of Nepal, a landlocked country in South Asia. The district, with Besisahar as its headquarters, covers an area of 1,692 squared kilometeres and has a population of 167,724, as of 2011. Lamjung mainly consists of agricultural villages.
After establishing an operation base in Katmandu, Disaster Team 1 became USA-11 by the United Nations Disaster Assistance Center (UNDAC) and were then assigned to the village of Lanmang. The team drove and hiked over rough terrain and demolished roads before they reached the village, where they provided rescue operations and conveyed vital assessment information to the UNDAC. Later, USA-11 partnered with a rescue group from Burnaby, British Columbia in the town of Barabise, conducting K-9 search and rescue tactics.
Empact Northwest is certainly not a newcomer to the international aid scene. The organization is only about five years old, but since its formation, inspired by work done after an earthquake in Haiti, it has been involved in numerous life-saving missions around the world. Empact Northwest offers technical rope and urban search and rescue as well as emergency medical services to disaster-stricken communities. Not only providing rescue, they also offer preventative education to at-risk populations.
In addition to the recent Nepal disaster, since 2010 Empact Northwest has responded to situations in Haiti, Pakistan, Japan, Sierra Leone and the Philippines, providing relief and rescue in catastrophes ranging from earthquakes to tsunamis. It also provides medical relief, logistics and educational mission projects.
Between catastrophes, Empact Northwest is not sitting around idly. The organization is working to provide emergency medical technician training to hundreds of people in Haiti in an attempt to help Haitians sustain a skilled medical work force.
There seems to be no shortage of tragedies in the world, but it is thanks to organizations like Empact Northwest that people are able to cope with these hardships as best they can. In just five short years, Empact Northwest has made an incredible contribution to the globe’s developing countries by saving lives in communities where poverty and hardship are made painfully worse by natural disasters.
– Jason Zimmerman
Sources: Empact Northwest, UNOCHA, CBS
Photo: Empact Northwest
US and Brazil Work Together for Food Security in Mozambique
Obama recently announced that $2 million would be dedicated to an expansion of the partnership between USAID, through Feed the Future, and the Brazilian Cooperation Agency. The money will be used to help Mozambique increase food security with creative agricultural production strategies.
Around 54.7% of Mozambique’s population lives below the national poverty line. The country also struggles with high rates of chronic malnutrition.
With these additional American and Brazilian funds and support systems, Mozambique is in a position to reduce poverty. It has one of the highest rates of economic growth in Africa and exports a large amount of food in the region.
Feed the Future and the Brazilian Cooperation Agency have started initiatives to connect school food programs with local agricultural production. Agricultural research and technology to support local farmers can help address the malnutrition in the region and the broader prevalence of poverty by supporting local farmers.
In the fiscal year of 2013, 47,700 hectares of land were sustained with improved technologies, 575,000 people were trained in child health and nutrition, and 63,800 producers have used new agricultural skills developed by Feed the Future projects
There are several key strategies to increase Mozambique’s food security. One is to increase farmers’ access to agricultural inputs, finance services and unique partnerships. In Mozambique, the central focus is support of critical value chains. For example, sesame, soybean and banana are important crops for nutritional and economic reasons.
Moving forward, there is a push to increase equitable growth in agriculture, support the government’s investment plan and promote local agriculture and nutrition efforts.
– Iliana Lang
Sources: Feed the Future, USAID 1, USAID 2
Photo: Feed The Future