The failure of wages to keep pace with rising food prices is putting a strain on families and communities worldwide, according to a report titled ‘Squeezed’ by OxFam and the International Development Studies. The food price spike of 2011 alone increased the numbers of people living in poverty by an estimated 44 million. The study focused on rural and urban consumers in 10 developing countries: Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Kenya, Bangladesh, Guatemala, Zambia, Bolivia, Indonesia, Pakistan and Vietnam.
Leaders continue to disregard the specific impacts the food system has on low income households. The authors of the report write, “Many people are earning more, but this is often illusory: wage rises rarely match rises in the cost of living. People have to cope in time-honoured ways by cutting back, substituting, shopping around, and growing and gathering more. The impacts are felt in homes, relationships, communities and work places, changing the way people think about themselves and others.” More often households are being forced to resort to riskier ways of getting income, for example, gold mining in Burkina Faso; sex work in Kenya; and jungle fishing in Bangladesh, despite the risks posed by tigers and pirates. The numbers of migrants has also increased as people must travel to find work. And the stress to food insecurity often leads to increased levels of domestic violence, and alcohol and drug abuse.
The types of food that people consume represent the single best indicator of their well-being. The research from this report uncovered a familiar hierarchy of hardship whereby the poorest people eat too little and lose out on vital nutrients. Even some better-off urban communities are struggling to afford basics, and have begun eating less diverse diets and substituting foods. Latest estimates suggest one in eight of the world’s population suffer from undernourishment and that nearly one in five face food “inadequacy”.
The rising costs of fuel, rent, and agricultural inputs make it more difficult for people to become farmers, despite the need to produce cheaper food. Without relatively large land assets, capital and the capacity to store produce and hedge their cultivation decisions, contemporary farming in the 10 developing countries surveyed will remain very difficult. Furthermore, agriculture is less appealing for young people to enter into due to of unpredictable returns, high input costs, and high costs of living. Education is perceived as a ticket off the farm, and agricultural aspirations are rare.
Societies, too, are changing in response to the food price crisis. Customary cooperative labor arrangements are being replaced with wage labor. The urgent need for cash takes priority over collective social life and values. The high price of essentials translates into a decline in public social life, with families becoming more inwardly focused and people less willing or able to socialize or help each other.
The report recommends that national social protection policies aim to provide routine protection for the poorest and most vulnerable communities, with the understanding that it is too late to start developing schemes when a price spike occurs. Policymakers should design social assistance policies aimed at protecting against spikes in the form of temporary cash or food transfers, or by providing subsidies that are automatically triggered by price rises. And economic leaders should adjust to real changes in needs by linking social protection to inflation.
– Maria Caluag
Sources: Guardian, OxFam-IDS
Photo: Politico
Focusing on the Living, Not the Dying
So much of the emphasis in judging the quality of life of a country, or its progress, focuses on death. The numbers tell how many people die; how many of the dead were mothers, how many were children, the most fatal diseases, the most deaths by violence, etc. Christopher Murray, a Harvard researcher, took issue with this standard of measurement. While he agreed that death was a powerful indicator of a country’s welfare, he also saw a major oversight in using it as a yardstick. To Murray, it was important not solely to focus on the dead, who we can do nothing for, but also examine the quality of life of the living. Not only to think of how to keep people alive but also to ensure they are living well. Murray’s viewpoint was to revolutionize metrics. He spearheaded the shift from measuring mortality to the implementation of the DALY measure – Disability-Adjusted Life Year.
In simplest terms, the DALY measures the number of years a population lives with a disability, adjusting its productivity accordingly (as a major psychological or health problem will undoubtedly decrease a worker’s effectiveness), as well as measuring the impact of shorter life expectancy (often which is related to the disabilities in the DALY). ‘Disability’ in the term covers a wide arrange of conditions, among them pain, arthritis, mental illness such as depression and PTSD, disfigurement and major diseases. A highly sophisticated system, the DALY is weighted to measure the impact of conditions on younger members of a population more than older members to give a more accurate measure of impact on the economic potential of a given population (as the young are seen to have more potential than the aged because of longevity, energy, new skills, etc.).
Measuring the global burden of disease this way has yielded surprising – and often controversial – results. Yet this data is promising and exciting in that it shakes our current system and demands attention to issues that have so far been neglected. For example, depression and suicide are found to be more damaging than tuberculosis or cirrhosis, and one of the fastest-growing diseases is glaucoma. The DALY’s results have not been welcomed by all, however. When first introduced after measuring international statistics, many countries were graded much lower than on an objective mortality scale and hotly contested the results.
The importance of metric systems in foreign aid is steadily increasing: in a world where every dollar could be used in many different ways, expenditure on aid and social programs needs to be well justified, with potential for results from investment. When asked about the use of DALYs to give an accurate picture of the state of global health, Murray stated, “People walk around with a mental map that’s different for every one of us. A real map has got to be a better guide.”
– Farahnaz Mohammed
Source: Discover Magazine
Photo: Change
What is Sequestration?
Se·ques·tra·tion (n) /ˌsēkwiˈstrāSHən/: a four-syllable word that hasn’t been part of average American vocabulary for long. Now the term is ubiquitous, even blamed for a vast number of completely unrelated problems. High gas prices? Must be sequestration. Long wait time on a business license? Probably the sequester. Got a flat tire? That darned sequester is to blame.
So what is sequestration? Etymologically speaking, the verb “sequester” itself derives from the Latin sequester which meant “trustee” or “mediator.” It has links to the root sequi (“to follow”), but by the early 16th century the word “sequester” meant “to seize by authority, confiscate.” Today “sequester” also carries a similar meaning to “isolate” or “withdraw.” In budget contexts, sequestration implies withholding funds normally disbursed.
For the United States government, the Sequester was a massive set of budget cuts enacted by The Budget Control Act of 2011. This Act contained provisions that if the United States Congress could not formulate and pass a federal budget by a certain date, these massive budget cuts would occur across most departments and agencies (about 50/50 between defense and domestic spending). Other countries have proposed and enacted similarly drastic spending cuts to balance their budgets, but have typically called those measures “austerity policies.”
Congress’s threat of sequestration was supposed to incentivize compromise on reducing the deficit in the federal budget. After all, those who support a large defense budget would hopefully work harder to come up with a budget to keep this funding intact; those who support high amounts of domestic spending would fight tooth and nail to pass a budget to avoid those cuts.
Multiple attempts to compromise were made on both sides of the aisle, but in the end, Congress was unable to agree, and the government plunged over what many called “the fiscal cliff.” Many saw this as the point of no return for Congressional compromise — or, rather, the lack thereof; others winced at the blunt nature of the cuts but expressed support for the step towards a balanced federal budget. For invaluable foreign aid programs, however, the sudden budget cuts threaten to hurt many more people than just Americans.
– Naomi Doraisamy
Source: CNN,Online Etymology Dictionary,USA.gov
Photo: Esibytes
The History of the World Food Programme
During international crises, the media often publishes striking images of planes unloading bags and bags of food to distribute to those in need, or air-dropping supplies. Often, these are from the World Food Programme, a branch of the United Nations that focuses entirely on providing food and easing malnutrition in at-risk and needy communities worldwide.
Formed in 1963, the WFP was initially started as a three-year experiment after the director of the U.S. Food for Peace Program spoke of the need for a larger, multilateral food assistance organization. Its success was such that after two years, it was expanded into the branch it is today. In 1994, it adopted a mission statement, a first for any U.N. organization, which established its focus as the following:
The WFP’s programs are not limited to the direct distribution of food. It has expanded to provide food vouchers, implement food for work programs for the poorest members of society, buying food directly from developing countries to support local farmers, and providing food specifically to sufferers of HIV and TB (for whom proper nutrition is especially important.)
Like UNICEF, WFP has attracted significant attention, also in the celebrity sphere. Actress Drew Barrymore, an ambassador for the program, donated $1 million towards its efforts. Football stars Ronaldinho and Kaka, alongside names like Penelope Cruz, Rachel Weisz, and Sean Connery have also supported the WFP’s efforts.
The WFP’s impact is indisputable: in 2011, it provided close to 4 million tons of food to nearly 99 million people, alongside their other growing programs. They have one of the best track records for aid agencies in terms of cost-effectiveness, with their administration costs reported to be only around 7%. And they are funded entirely by donors and governments who provided an impressive 3.73 billion dollars in 2011.
– Farahnaz Mohammed
Source: World Food Programme
Photo: Wikipedia:World Food Programme
Macklemore & Lewis Address Global Poverty
Macklemore & Ryan Lewis are a fairly new artist/producer group that has quickly risen to fame through their popular song, “Thrift Shop.” Criticizing mainstream media, consumerism, and popular culture, this hip-hop group has a lot in common with the work being done at The Borgen Project. Raising these questions is essential to understanding not only the condition of the United States but also the state of the world.
Gaining considerable exposure within the music industry in the past year, Macklemore & Ryan Lewis have released their full-length album The Heist, hitting the number one spot on iTunes.
Macklemore & Ryan Lewis are proud to be from humble beginnings and proud to support the “alternative” lifestyle of anti-consumerism. Deciding not to sign with any record label, the group is completely independent and produces their own music with their own flare.
Thinking under the lens of global poverty, “Thrift Shop” raises a number of ethical concerns. On one hand, Macklemore & Ryan Lewis are criticizing the United States culture of consumerism. A lyric from the song explains:
“They be like “Oh that Gucci, that’s hella tight”
I’m like “Yo, that’s fifty dollars for a t-shirt”
Limited edition, let’s do some simple addition
…I call that getting tricked by business”
Here, the group brings attention to the arbitrary nature of clothing, calling out branding as a mere print on some cloth, and propose, throughout the rest of the song, that spending 99 cents on an otherwise expensive jacket is a much better option.
Alternatively, we look that the main hook of the song with a somewhat critical eye in relation to global (rather than only domestic) poverty:
“I’m gonna pop some tags
only got 20 dollars in my pocket
I’m, I’m I’m runnin’, looking for a come up”
All humor aside, the group is bringing attention to the fact that $20 for clothes is considered insanely cheap in the United States. However, while American consumers think that they are being frugal, $20 is far more than most people in the world make in one year. That much money, in much of the world, could be used much more effectively to feed a family. However, while the monetary value is relative—what may be cheaper in the U.S. is expensive elsewhere—Macklemore & Ryan Lewis advocate for frugal living no matter what the exchange rate, leaving the quality of their beats far from impoverished.
– Kali Faulwetter
Sources: Rap Genius
Photo: MTV
Effective Public-Private Partnership
A significant challenge to the work of nonprofits and NGOs is finding funds and negotiating with private companies to provide goods and services. The GAVI Alliance, however, does just that. Founded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the GAVI Alliance (formerly the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunizations) has taken public-private partnerships to a new level in the years since 2000.
The GAVI Alliance focuses on negotiating prices for vaccines against such diseases as yellow fever, measles, Human Papillomavirus (HPV), and diphtheria. The vaccine industry often provides these life-saving vaccines at prices far too high for anyone in the developing world to afford, but with the help of the GAVI Alliance, vaccines can be provided at a significantly lower cost.
This practice of public-private partnership allows monoliths in the vaccine industry to provide large amounts of vaccines at manufacturing cost. The high volume of demand can also minimize production costs that contribute to the significantly higher normal costs in the developed world. And while vaccine prices remain high in the developed world, “in a sense,” journalist Gary Stern writes, “wealthier people [in industrialized countries] are subsidizing the lowered prices for poorer people.”
Lower costs can mean life or death for those in the developing world. For example, a recent agreement between GAVI and two HPV-vaccine providers Merck and Glaxo-Smith-Kline brought the price of a $130-dose vaccine to $4.50 a dose for developing countries. These vaccines against HPV — a major risk factor for cervical cancer — are expected to be administered to over 30 million girls by 2020.
The GAVI Alliance also focuses on strengthening health systems in the host country. Instead of GAVI immunization programs operating independently in the midst of poorly developed healthcare systems, the Alliance also provides funding for health system strengthening (HSS) for health service delivery and the establishment of permanent health centers.
With these two focuses, the GAVI Alliance not only contributes where the need is greatest — providing vaccinations for high-risk populations — but strengthens host-countries’ capacity to help themselves in the future, maximizing its effectiveness through a public-private partnership.
– Naomi Doraisamy
Source: GAVI Alliance
Photo: GAVI Alliance
Berhane Hewan: Ethiopia Gives Girls a Future
In 2004 the Berhane Hewan project was established in one community in Ethiopia to empower adolescent girls. The program is now considered award-winning by the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA) and has expanded into 36 communities in Northern Ethiopia. Child marriage is a major issue in the Amhara Region of Northern Ethiopia and the Berhane Hewan project seeks to educate girls about the dangers associated with early marriage and their rights as women. Almost half of the female population of this region is married before they are 15 years old and many girls are also deprived of the chance of attending school because their families cannot afford to send them.
Child marriage can lead to girls being forced to have sex at too young an age, which causes health issues including premature pregnancy, high infant mortality, and difficult or even dangerous births. It also has many psychological ramifications as girls are forced into marriages with older men whom they do not know and have the traumatic experience of being forced into sex as adolescents.
The Berhane Hewan program addresses the issues associate with child marriage at multiple levels. Community-wide talks are held that encourage everyone to participate and learn about the ramifications of early marriage and health issues associated with young pregnancies and STDs. The program also provides financial assistance for girls to encourage them to stay in school and avoid early marriage. Informal educational groups have also been established so that girls unable to attend school can still receive schooling.
Girls are becoming aware of their rights and leaving isolated lives to join an empowered community of women. Zufan Fentahun’s marriage was annulled and with the help of Berhane Hewan, she was able to begin attending school and supporting herself with the sale of several animals and keeping a garden. Almost 12,000 girls have become involved with the project in some capacity and there is the potential to reach many more as it continues to expand. UNFPA has passed the program over to the U.K.’s Department for International Development who has increased funding and has ambitious plans to increase the number of communities involved.
– Zoë Meroney
Source: UNFPA
Photo: Take Part
Polio 101
Poliomyelitis, commonly referred to as polio, is a highly contagious viral disease that, despite being deemed as a problem of the past by the Western world, remains a very current problem in other parts of the world. Though its remnants are seen in the stunted limbs of the survivors, polio’s worst effect is no disfigurement.
Polio is a potentially fatal disease of the nervous system that causes paralysis. After infection, the organs can stop functioning within a matter of hours. Fatalities normally occur if the virus affects the respiratory system, preventing the victim from breathing. In some cases, polio leaves an individual with permanent paralysis, typically in the lower body.
In the majority of cases, polio shows no symptoms. Although anyone can contract the disease when they come in contact with it, the disease mainly affects children under five. Currently, there is no cure for polio once it has been contracted. Programs to eradicate polio work solely through prevention by vaccinating children at a young age.
As a result of a huge global effort to eradicate the disease, it has largely disappeared and has become one of the global health’s success stories. Only 223 cases were reported in 2012 (down from an estimated 350,000 in 1988). According to the World Health Organization, only three countries in the world still report polio as a problem: Afghanistan, Nigeria, and Pakistan.
At the Global Vaccine Summit in the United Arab Emirates in April 2013, a five-year plan was presented to ensure the eradication of all forms of polio, backed by contributions of 75% of the 5.5 billion necessaries for implementation.
– Farahnaz Mohammed
Source: WHO
Photo: Cyrusdurant
Big Business: Promoting Unhealthy Lifestyles
As our world works towards the eradication of all infectious diseases we have seen a rise in non-communicable diseases such as obesity, cancer, and COPD. These unhealthy lifestyles are promoted by big businesses that sell items such as unhealthy foods and tobacco. Margaret Chan, the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) said, “Economic growth, modernization, and urbanization have opened wide the entry point for the spread of unhealthy lifestyles.” The efforts to regulate unhealthy lifestyles are not in the interest of most big businesses.
Big businesses are able to lobby for favorable policies in the government. They use tactics such as front groups, promises of self-regulation, and lawsuits to shift the focus away from the unhealthy lifestyles they are promoting. These businesses also gift and give grants to worthy causes to look admirable in the public eye. The main tactic these businesses use is the argument that an individual is responsible for their own health, and that the government has no right to interfere with a person’s free choice.
“This is formidable opposition. Market power readily translates into political power, few governments prioritize health over big business. As we learned from experience with the tobacco industry, a powerful corporation can sell the public just about anything,” stated Dr. Chan.
Dr. Chan is most concerned about two recent trends that have emerged. The first is governments being taken to court over measures to protect the health of their citizens. We saw this happen recently in New York City where the law regulating soda size was deemed illegal by the court. The second trend is industries having influence in shaping “public health policies and strategies that affect their products.” Dr. Chan argues, “When industry is involved in policy-making, rest assured that the most effective control measures will be downplayed or left out entirely. This, too, is well documented, and dangerous.” Dr. Chan urges governments to keep big businesses out of health policy formation because it only distorts the real issues. Dr. Chan and the WHO are working diligently on identifying and pursuing processes that limit big businesses in public health decision-making.
– Catherine Ulrich
Source: UN News
Photo: Los Angeles
The Social Costs of High Food Prices
The failure of wages to keep pace with rising food prices is putting a strain on families and communities worldwide, according to a report titled ‘Squeezed’ by OxFam and the International Development Studies. The food price spike of 2011 alone increased the numbers of people living in poverty by an estimated 44 million. The study focused on rural and urban consumers in 10 developing countries: Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Kenya, Bangladesh, Guatemala, Zambia, Bolivia, Indonesia, Pakistan and Vietnam.
Leaders continue to disregard the specific impacts the food system has on low income households. The authors of the report write, “Many people are earning more, but this is often illusory: wage rises rarely match rises in the cost of living. People have to cope in time-honoured ways by cutting back, substituting, shopping around, and growing and gathering more. The impacts are felt in homes, relationships, communities and work places, changing the way people think about themselves and others.” More often households are being forced to resort to riskier ways of getting income, for example, gold mining in Burkina Faso; sex work in Kenya; and jungle fishing in Bangladesh, despite the risks posed by tigers and pirates. The numbers of migrants has also increased as people must travel to find work. And the stress to food insecurity often leads to increased levels of domestic violence, and alcohol and drug abuse.
The types of food that people consume represent the single best indicator of their well-being. The research from this report uncovered a familiar hierarchy of hardship whereby the poorest people eat too little and lose out on vital nutrients. Even some better-off urban communities are struggling to afford basics, and have begun eating less diverse diets and substituting foods. Latest estimates suggest one in eight of the world’s population suffer from undernourishment and that nearly one in five face food “inadequacy”.
The rising costs of fuel, rent, and agricultural inputs make it more difficult for people to become farmers, despite the need to produce cheaper food. Without relatively large land assets, capital and the capacity to store produce and hedge their cultivation decisions, contemporary farming in the 10 developing countries surveyed will remain very difficult. Furthermore, agriculture is less appealing for young people to enter into due to of unpredictable returns, high input costs, and high costs of living. Education is perceived as a ticket off the farm, and agricultural aspirations are rare.
Societies, too, are changing in response to the food price crisis. Customary cooperative labor arrangements are being replaced with wage labor. The urgent need for cash takes priority over collective social life and values. The high price of essentials translates into a decline in public social life, with families becoming more inwardly focused and people less willing or able to socialize or help each other.
The report recommends that national social protection policies aim to provide routine protection for the poorest and most vulnerable communities, with the understanding that it is too late to start developing schemes when a price spike occurs. Policymakers should design social assistance policies aimed at protecting against spikes in the form of temporary cash or food transfers, or by providing subsidies that are automatically triggered by price rises. And economic leaders should adjust to real changes in needs by linking social protection to inflation.
– Maria Caluag
Sources: Guardian, OxFam-IDS
Photo: Politico
3 Ways the G8 is Fighting Superbugs
What do we do when our own medicine becomes our greatest threat? For the world today, this question is becoming more and more significant. G8 leaders met in London on Wednesday, June 12 to discuss the global threat of antibiotic-resistant microbes, or superbugs.
In a statement published on Thursday, the G8 science ministry said that they consider antimicrobial drug resistance as one of the major health security challenges of the twenty-first century. “Across the G8 we should regard the spread of antibiotic resistance as a global challenge that is up there with climate change, water stress and environmental damage, and there are genuine policy consequences that follow from that,” said science minister Mr. Willetts.
As usual, those living in extreme poverty are most at-risk. As bacteria develop resistance to widespread antibiotics in humans, animals, the soil, and water sources, they become more dangerous to humans—and especially the most vulnerable sectors of the world’s population.
To combat the development of superbugs and protect those most vulnerable to them, G8 leaders decided to make sweeping changes in the medical and pharmaceutical community. These included:
1. Limiting the use of antibiotics in humans, animals, and plants.
2. Investing in more research about the evolution of resistance and in developing better diagnostics for precise prescription.
3. Improving international collaboration on surveillance of bacterial strains.
The need for steps like these is urgent, and the G8’s decision was hailed with applause from the humanitarian community. If the world continues support these decisions, health security will continue to improve.
– John Mahon
Source: The Independent, Agripulse
Photo: The Independent