Water scarcity in the Middle East is impacting on lives and causing diplomatic tensions in between countries. The Turkish dam project, which includes the large Ataturk and Ilisu dams, has reduced water flow to the Tigris River’s natural channel impacting Syria and Iraq. Pictured here is Koctepe – a village covered by water in the Ilisu dam project. Credit: Mustafa Bilge Satk?n/Climate Visuals Countdown
by Hisham Allam (sharm el sheikh)
Inter Press Service
Sharm El Sheikh, Nov 17 (IPS) – The Middle East and North Africa are the world’s most water-scarce regions – with 11 of the 17 water-stressed countries on the globe.
According to UNICEF, nine out of 10 children live in areas with high or very high-water stress, resulting in significant consequences for their health, cognitive development, and future livelihoods.
Now climate change is resulting in less rain for agriculture and a decline in the quality of freshwater reserves due to saltwater transfer to fresh aquifers and increased pollution concentrations.
Maha Rashid, Middle East managing committee member for Blue Peace, which works for water cooperation among borders, sectors, and generations to foster peace, stability, and sustainable development, says the situation in the region is dire.
“More than 60% of this region’s population lives in areas of high or very high-water stress, compared to the global average of about 35%. While the Middle East and North Africa have continued to experience water scarcity for thousands of years, several interconnected challenges today threaten environmental sustainability and security for the region’s water supply.”
Water scarcity is expected to impact development in the Middle East. Credit: Hisham Allam/IPS
As COP27 negotiations continue at Sharm El Sheikh in Egypt, people in the Middle East are dealing with the impacts of climate change. Rashid explained that Iraq relies on water from Turkey and Iran, as well as rain and snow, to feed its rivers, especially in the spring. Water revenues to Iraq’s rivers, Tigris and Euphrates, dropped for the third season in succession. The current season has experienced a more severe and unprecedented fall not seen for several years, and water levels in the Euphrates and Tigris rivers declined, and drought conditions are experienced in the rivers and lakes in Diyala Governorate.
The Turkish dam system, which includes the large Ataturk and Ilisu dams, has reduced water flow to the Tigris River’s natural channel. It will result in a 10 billion cubic metre annual reduction in water flow for downstream countries – like Syria and Iraq.
Despite having large amounts of arable land, Iraq will not be able to achieve food and water security. Instead, over the long term, water will confine development, plans, and programs and not bring food or water security, says Rashid, who is also a professor at Tigris University, told IPS.
Water insecurity in the region had also impacted international relations, with tensions arising over Ethiopia’s building of the Renaissance Dam for irrigation and electricity generation without considering the significant effects on Egypt and Sudan. Now the threat of water scarcity is growing for the two countries, followed by food security and potential future natural disasters.
The Middle East is now experiencing rising temperatures, which is one of the effects of climate change. As a result, North Africa is now experiencing drought in some regions and torrential downpours in others.
According to Rashid, since 2010, which set new temperature records in 19 countries, many of which were Arab nations, countries are experiencing summertime temperatures of up to 54 degrees Celsius, including in Iraq and Morocco, where two-thirds of the oases have vanished as a result of decreased precipitation and increased evaporation. Saudi Arabia and Sudan are also experiencing fierce sandstorms.
These climatic changes are predicted to get worse unless the inhabitants and governments of the area deal with them properly and urgently over the course of the next fifty years.
Rashid contended that doing this calls for more prudent resource management as well as adjustments to sectoral and economic models, mindsets, and behaviours. While she is optimistic about the outcome of the climate negotiations, most countries have not committed to implementing the recommendations and reducing carbon emissions since the COP 26 climate summit in Scotland.
“I believe that COP27 will address climate change issues and, in the end, will insist on finding a method that works to save poor communities.”
Opinion by Jomo Kwame Sundaram, Hezri A Adnan (kuala lumpur, malaysia)
Inter Press Service
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Nov 15 (IPS) – The latest annual climate conference has begun in the face of a worsening climate crisis and further retreats by rich nations following the energy crisis induced by NATO sanctions after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Copping out again
The 27th Conference of the Parties (COP 27) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is now meeting in Sharm-el-Sheikh, Egypt, from 6 to 18 November 2022.
Hezri A Adnan
COP27 takes place amidst worsening poverty, hunger and war, and higher prices, exacerbating many interlinked climate, environmental and socio-economic crises.
The looming world economic recession is likely to be deeper than in 2008. The likely spiral into stagflation will make addressing the climate crisis even more difficult.
Invoking the Ukraine war as pretext, governments and corporations are rushing to increase fossil fuel production to offset the deepening energy crisis.
Resources which should be deployed for climate adaptation and mitigation have been diverted for war, fossil fuel extraction and use, including resumption of shale gas ‘fracking’ as well as coal mining and burning.
War causes huge social and economic damage to people, society and the environment. The wars in Ukraine, Yemen and elsewhere impose high costs on all, disrupting energy and food supplies, and raising prices sharply.
Russia’s Ukraine incursion has provided a convenient smokescreen for a hasty return to fossil fuels, as military-industrial processes alone account for 6% of all greenhouse gases.
The future is already here
All these have worsened crises facing the world’s environment and economy. The most optimistic Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) scenario expects the 1.5°C rise above pre-industrial levels threshold for climate catastrophe to be breached by 2040.
Jomo Kwame Sundaram
Crossing it, the world faces risks of far more severe climate change effects on people and ecosystems, especially in the tropics and sub-tropical zone.
But the future is already upon us. Accelerating warming is already causing worse extreme weather events, ravaging economies, communities and ecosystems.
Recent floods in Pakistan displaced 33 million people. Wildfires, extreme heat, ice melt, drought, and extreme weather phenomena are already evident on many continents, causing disasters worldwide.
In 2021, the sea level rose to a record high, and is expected to continue rising. UN reports estimate women and children are 14 times more likely than adult men to die during climate disasters.
Popular sentiment is shifting, even in the US, where ‘climate scepticism’ is strongest. Devastation threatened by Hurricane Ida in 2021 not only revived painful memories of Katrina in 2005, but also heightened awareness of warming-related extreme weather events.
Stronger climate action needed
In international negotiations, rich nations have evaded historical responsibility for ‘climate debt’ by only focusing on current emissions. Hence, there is no recognition of a duty to compensate those most adversely impacted in the global South.
Last year’s COP26 Glasgow Climate Pact was hailed for its call to ‘phase-out’ coal. This has now been quickly abandoned by Europe with the war. And for developing countries, Glasgow failed to deliver any significant progress on climate finance.
At COP27, the Egyptian presidency has proposed an additional ‘loss and damage’ finance facility to compensate for irreparable damage due to climate impacts.
After failing to even meet its modest climate finance promises of 2009, the rich North is dithering, pleading for further talks until 2024 to work out financing details.
Meanwhile, the G7 has muddied the waters by counter-offering its Global Shield Against Climate Risks – a disaster insurance scheme.
Get priorities right
What the world needs, instead, are rapidly promoted and implemented measures as part of a more rapid, just, internationally funded transition for the global South. This should:
replace fossil fuels with renewable energy, including by subsidizing renewable energy generation for energy-deficient poor populations.
promote energy-saving and efficiency measures to reduce its use and greenhouse gas emissions by at least 70% (from 1990) by 2030.
implement a massive global public works programme, creating ‘green jobs’ to replace employment in ‘unsustainable’ industries.
develop needed sustainable technologies, e.g., to replace corporate agricultural practices with ‘agroecological’ farming methods, investment and technology.
Another world is possible
Another world is possible. A massive social and political transformation is needed. But the relentless pursuit of private profit has always been at the expense of people and nature.
Greed cannot be expected to become the basis for a just solution to climate change, let alone environmental degradation, world poverty, hunger and gross inequalities.
The COP27 conference is now taking place in Sharm-al-Sheikh, an isolated, heavily policed tourist resort. Only one major road goes in and out, as if designed to keep out civil society and drown out voices from the global South.
The luxury hotels there are charging rates that have put COP27 beyond the means of many, especially climate justice activists from poorer countries. The rich and powerful arrived in over 400 private jets, making a mockery of decarbonization rhetoric.
Thus, the COP process is increasingly seen as exclusive. Without making real progress on the most important issues, it is increasingly seen as slow, irrelevant and ineffective.
Generating inadequate agreements at best, the illusion of progress thus created is dangerously misleading at worst.
By generating great expectations and false hopes, but actually delivering little, it is failing the world, even when it painstakingly achieves difficult compromises which fall short of what is needed.
Multilateralism at risk
Multilateral platforms, such as the UNFCCC, have long been expected to engage governments to cooperate in developing, implementing and enforcing solutions. With the erosion of multilateralism since the end of the Cold War, these are increasingly being bypassed.
Instead, self-appointed private interests, with means, pretend to speak for world civil society. Strapped for resources, multilateral platforms and other organizations are under pressure to forge partnerships and other forms of collaboration with them.
Thus, inadequate ostensible private solutions increasingly dominate policy discourses. Widespread fiscal deficits have generated interest in them due to the illusory prospect of private funding.
Private interests have thus gained considerable influence. Thus, the new spinmeisters of Davos and others have gained influence, offering seductively attractive, but ultimately false, often misleading and typically biased solutions.
Meanwhile, global warming has gone from bad to worse. UN Member States must stiffen the backs of multilateral organizations to do what is right and urgently needed, rather than simply going with the flow, typically of cash.
Hezri A Adnan is an environmental policy analyst and Fellow of the Academy of Sciences, Malaysia. He is author of The Sustainability Shift: Reshaping Malaysia’s Future.
In each of the three global food crises studied, financial speculation has caused steep increases in prices, making food inaccessible to hundreds of millions of people. Credit: Bigstock
by Baher Kamal (madrid)
Inter Press Service
MADRID, Nov 11 (IPS) – While grain exports continue to regularly flow to world’s markets since the July 2022 Turkey-brokered agreement between Russia and Ukraine to resume cereals and fertilisers shipments from both countries, food prices are still skyrocketing everywhere. How come?
The handiest answer by establishment politicians and media is that it’s all about the Russian invasion of Ukraine last February.
Another argument they use is that it is Russia who interrupted its gas and oil exports, omitting the fact that it is West US-led sanctions that have drastically cut this flow to mostly European markets, causing a steady rise in energy costs, food transportation, etcetera.
Nonetheless, such answers clearly ignore other structural causes: the dominant markets’ shocking speculations.
In his report to the United Nations Security Council, the Special Rapporteur stated that hunger and famine, like conflicts, are always the result of “political failures.”
Specifically, explains Michael Fakhri, “Markets are amplifying shocks and not absorbing them… food prices are soaring not because of a problem with supply and demand as such; it is because of price speculation in commodity futures markets.”
Blocking the solutions
The current food crisis is caused by “international failures,” he said, while providing two points in conclusion:
– For over two years, people and civil society organisations around the world have been raising the alarm about the food crisis. For over two years, they have been calling for an international coordinated response to the food crisis.
– And yet Member States have refused to mobilise the Rome-based agencies and other UN organisations to respond to the food crisis in a coordinated way.
According to Michael Fakhri, some Member States and civil society organisations tried to get the CFS to pass a resolution last October in order for it to be the place to enable global policy coordination around the food crisis.
“And yet some powerful countries – some members of the P5 – actively blocked that initiative. This undermined the world’s ability to respond to the food crisis.”
Food “nationalism”
Meanwhile, in a 7 November 2022 dossier by Focus on the Global South, Shalmali Guttal warned that a perfect storm is brewing in the global food system, pushing food prices to record high levels, and expanding hunger.
“As international institutions struggle to respond, some governments have resorted to knee-jerk ‘food nationalism’ by placing export bans to preserve their own food supplies and stabilise prices….”
In its dossier, researchers from Focus on the Global South write about various aspects of the current crisis, its causes, and how it is impacting countries in Asia.
Corporations fuelling the crisis
These include regional analysis, case studies from Sri Lanka, Philippines and India, “the role of corporations in fuelling the crisis and the flawed responses of international institutions such as the World Trade Organisation (WTO), the Bretton Woods Institutions and United Nations agencies.”
The recently released State of Food Insecurity and Nutrition in the World 2022 (SOFI 2022) report presents a sobering picture of the failure of global efforts to end hunger, malnutrition and food insecurity. According to SOFI 21, “even before the Covid-19 pandemic struck in 2020, world hunger levels were abysmally high.”
Governments, and multilateral and international agencies are by and large apportioning the lion’s share of the blame for the current world food crisis to global supply shortages arising from the war on Ukraine, ignoring the persisting impacts in low- and middle-income countries of “the market forces of concentration and speculation, of globally determined macroeconomic processes, and the collapse of livelihood opportunities affecting these countries in the post-Covid world.”
World food system dominated by markets
Central to recurring food price volatility, food crises and the entrenchment of hunger and food insecurity are “market structures, regulations, and trade and finance arrangements that bolster a global corporate-dominated industrial food system, and enable market concentration and financial speculation in commodity markets.”
“Multilevel market concentration and financial speculation on commodity markets have played pivotal roles in past and the present food crises and present grave threats to the realisation of the Right to Food.”
In addition, a historical examination of food crises over the past 50 years by professor Jennifer Clapp shows that the global industrial food system has been rendered more prone to price volatility and more susceptible to crises because of three interrelated manifestations of corporate concentration:
– First, the global industrial food system relies on a small number of staple grains produced using highly industrialised farming methods, making the system susceptible to events that affect just a handful of crops and to rising costs of industrial farm inputs.
– Second, a small number of countries specialise in the production of staple grains for export, on which many other countries depend, including many of the poorest and most food-insecure countries.
– And third, the global grain trade is dominated by a small number of firms in highly financialized commodity markets that are prone to volatility (IPES-Food 2022; FAO 2022; OECD and FAO 2020).”
Mega corporations
On this, Jennifer Clapp, professor and Canada Research Chair, School of Environment, Resources and Sustainability, explains that “a small number of corporations exercise a high degree of influence over the global industrial food system, powered by mergers and acquisitions of one another to form giant mega-corporations, which enable further concentration horizontally and vertically, as well as influence over policy-making and governance nationally and globally.”
According to Clapp, “four grain trading corporations– Archer-Daniels Midland, Bunge, Cargill and Dreyfus, called the ‘ABCD’– control 70-90 % of the grain trade.”
As “cross-sectoral value chain managers” these grain trading giants are able to compile large amounts of market data, but are under no obligation to disclose this information and can hold stocks until prices have peaked, explains the expert.
“And in each of the three global food crises studied, financial speculation has caused steep increases in prices, making food inaccessible to hundreds of millions of people.”
Urgent immediate actions must be taken now, both to address the crisis in the short-term and long-term. Credit: James Jeffrey/IPS
Opinion by Esther Ngumbi (urbana, illinois, usa)
Inter Press Service
URBANA, Illinois, USA, Nov 02 (IPS) – The statistics are stark. The crisis is unprecedented. Yet again, according to the United Nations, famine looms in Somalia, with hundreds of thousands already facing starvation. In addition, droughts, and catastrophic hunger levels have left over 500,000 children malnourished and at risk of dying. This is already nearly 200,000 more than the 2011 famine. Urgent immediate actions must be taken now, both to address the crisis in the short-term and long-term.
Circumstances have been building up for the last four years to create this current crisis. Rainy seasons have failed for the last four years which has left many farmers without livestock or crops. Further, compounding the impact is the fact that the drought has coincided with a global rise in food, fuel, and fertilizer prices, the Ukrainian war, and the COVID-19 global pandemic.
The future isn’t promising either. According to the World Meteorological Organization, the forecasts reveal high chances of drier-than-average conditions in the horn of Africa. Other issues that are likely to persist in the future include food crises, civil war, and political instability.
Not only can the famine lead to untimely deaths, but hunger can affect people in other ways, particularly children. A recent systematic review and meta-analysis demonstrated that malnutrition was linked with cognitive development. In Ethiopia, a recent systematic review and meta-analysis demonstrated that malnutrition affected the academic performance of elementary school children. Another review also linked malnutrition with impaired brain development.
In a study that compared children of average nutrition with their malnourished peers, it was shown that malnourished children had lower IQs, lower school performance and less cognitive functioning. Left unchecked, malnutrition can be far-reaching and have a devastating and incalculable impact on children’s future potential.
What can be done differently now and in the coming years?
Immediately, there is need for humanitarian aid. Thankfully, organizations including the UN World Food Programme (UN-WFP), UNICEF and other NGOs are doing everything they can to provide food to the people that are suffering the most. UN-WFP, for example is delivering life-saving food and cash assistance. UNICEF is delivering ready-to-use therapeutic foods to treat children with severe acute malnutrition. It has also deployed mobile teams to find and treat children with severe malnutrition.
But, as we have repeatedly seen, providing aid is like putting on a band-aid. It is a temporary fix. Often, the international community and stakeholders react to crises in this way. After many years- it should be clear that short fixes in the form of humanitarian aid, including bursts of cash and food assistance to those most affected, are unsustainable.
Clearly, given how often drought and famine are issues, fixing the hunger crisis at the horn of Africa will require much more than emergency aid. Stakeholders must also roll out long-term solutions. For each dollar spent on humanitarian aid, 50 cents should go to long term solutions. For example, the UNICEF appeals for US$222.3 million dollars to provide humanitarian services to 2.5 million people in Somalia. Out of the entire amount, half of that should go to long-term projects that solve the root causes of hunger.
Undoubtedly, droughts are recurrent because of failed rainy seasons. There is need to roll out water projects to meet the water needs of growing crops for food for the impacted communities and their livestock. It is a no brainer. Just like the gas stations in America and other developed nations are present in every corner, there should be water stations every 10 or 20 miles.
This would be water sourced from aquifers and underground sources. Half of the funds received by the UN agencies, for example, could go towards actualizing this bold effort of drilling these water stations across Somalia. For example, out of the $222.3 million UNICEF is asking for, $111, should go to drilling water in Somalia.
With water, Somalia and other African countries that consistently are impacted by recurrent droughts, can diversify the crops they produce. More importantly, they can be able to implement climate smart practices and other local solutions.
Simultaneously, as water projects are rolled out, African countries including Somalia need to have clear, systematic, and holistic plans of how to solve climate linked extremes including drought, extreme temperatures, frequent insect outbreaks that are inextricably linked.
Planning should go hand in hand with strong documentation of what was done, how it was done, and how successful or unsuccessful it was in solving the crisis. At the moment, Somalia and other African countries lack accountability and transparency about what initiatives and strategies are implemented following early warnings. We will never make headways into solving these recurring crises, if we are not documenting what has been done, what worked and what failed.
Importantly, like any other crises, there is need to keep thinking of new solutions to roll out. As such, think tanks – that draw from in-country experts, diaspora, public, private, NGO and other stakeholder coalitions – need to research concrete strategies that can be implemented, tracked, and scaled.
We must invest in long-term solutions if we are to solve once and for all the recurrent drought, hunger and famines in Somalia and other African countries. Investing in long-term initiatives will not only solve hunger, but it will also reignite sustainable development and bring prosperity to communities. It is a win for all.
Dr. Esther Ngumbi is an Assistant Professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, and a Senior Food Security Fellow with the Aspen Institute, New Voices.
Dr Alice Karanja is a post-doctoral research fellow at the World Agroforestry Center (ICRAF) in Nairobi, Kenya, where her research focuses on restoration of agricultural landscapes based on regenerative agriculture for biodiverse, inclusive, safe, and resilient food systems. Credit: Paul Virgo/IPS
by Paul Virgo (rome)
Inter Press Service
ROME, Oct 31 (IPS) – Dr Alice Karanja knows from personal experience the tough choices the climate crisis is putting people before in the Global South. Choices such as whether to have a healthy diet or give your children an education. Choices such as whether to go hungry or allow your children to have any schooling at all.
Having grown up on a small farm in Kenya, Karanja’s family made those tough calls and the huge sacrifices necessary to enable her to go all the way in education, obtaining a PhD in Sustainability Science from the University of Tokyo, Japan.
“I grew up on the slopes of Mount Kenya to a smallholder farming family,” Karanja told IPS at the recent World Food Forum at the Rome headquarters of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
“Both my parents are small-scale farmers. My motivation for my work is inspired by what I saw when I was growing up.
“I observed my parents and how they were affected, and still are affected, by climate change in terms of extreme weather patterns, prolonged droughts, inconsistent rainfall patterns.
“The income that they got from their farms sometimes was mostly used to support us with education or health, while the expectation was that we could diversify our diets at home.
“In Africa one of the issues that is affecting us regards the limited set of crops that are grown, mostly maize, wheat and rice. So when people grow maize, they expect then to get some income to get some vegetables or fruit to include in their diets. But often, because of climate change, that money can only be channeled to other needs of the household.”
Karanja is now using her skills to help people just like her parents.
She is a post-doctoral research fellow at the World Agroforestry Center (ICRAF) in Nairobi, Kenya, where her research focuses on restoration of agricultural landscapes based on regenerative agriculture for biodiverse, inclusive, safe, and resilient food systems.
She also plans to pilot food-tree portfolios in Zambia to help smallholder families obtain year-round access to nutritious foods, diversify their incomes, and boost their resilience to increased food prices and climate change.
“Most of my work is at the intersection of resilience to climate change in terms of livelihoods, food security and conservation and the use of agro-biodiversity for improved diets,” Karanja said.
“For the past two years in my work at ICRAF, I have been looking at the role of agricultural biodiversity and the interplay it has with dietary diversification, also looking at how this interplay affects nutritional status, especially for women and children”.
Many other experts selected to take part in the Young Scientists Cohort (YSG) at the World Food Forum had similar stories.
Ram Neupane decided to study agriculture after being born on a small family farm in Gorkha, Nepal, and seeing the economic and psychological implications of devastating plant diseases.
Ram Neupane. Credit: Paul Virgo/IPS
“Climate change is a tentacular threat to all aspects (of life) and plant health is affected too,” Neupane, who is pursuing a dual-title doctorate in plant pathology at Penn State University in the United States thanks to a scholarship, told IPS.
“Novel pathogens and viruses are emerging right now because of climate change. I am from one of the more rural parts of Nepal. I was raised in a farming family, so I have first-hand experience of the impact on the farming community there. For example, in my village, the main crop is rice and most of the rice is rain fed.”
“When there is rainfall, farmers plant their rice. Due to climate change there has been irregularities in the timing and frequency of rainfall and this is affecting planting times.
“This, in turn, affects the whole cropping system.
“This has led to flows of people going from more rural areas to urban areas because farming is no longer profitable”.
Dr. Peter Asare-Nuamah, a lecturer at the University of Environment and Sustainable Development, Ghana, employs his quantitative and qualitative research skills and experience to offer solution-oriented contributions to issues of climate change, food security, adaptation and environmental management, particularly in smallholder agriculture systems in developing economies.
“I chose this (career path) because of what I saw about climate change,” Asare-Nuamah told IPS.
“I work within the context of climate change and smallholder agriculture systems.
“I was born in a rural farming community where we engage in cocoa, cassava and other food crops, and you could see the impact of climate change.
“At the time the conversation about the impact of climate change was not so high, it had to do with high political level discussions, and I thought there was a need to engage individuals in the conversation on how to address climate change.
“People from my community are suffering. They plant (crops) and because of the absence of rainfall, the plants do not ripen. Even if they ripen, they give very low yields.
“There are pests and disease all over the world and in Ghana we are currently suffering with fall armyworm, which has arrived because of climate change and is having devastating consequences.
“Smallerholder farmers feed a lot of the population of the African continent but they have not been able to push themselves out of poverty and they continue to struggle.
Dr. Peter Asare-Nuamah, lecturer at the University of Environment and Sustainable Development, Ghana. Credit: Paul Virgo/IPS
Education is an issue. Basic necessities are also an issue.
“So all this combines to put them in a position where they are highly vulnerable.
“Even though African economies contribute less than 3% to global carbon emissions, the impact is so high in this part of the continent.
“This calls for the need to address climate change, how developed economies, which have contributed so much to climate change, can come together and help smallholder farmers and developing economies to mitigate some of the challenges caused by the actions and inactions of some of the developed economies.
“So these are the issues that drove me personally to go into the climate change arena, so I can contribute to making sure that we have solutions for smallholder farmers, we have conversations, we have financing, and we are able to build the capacities of smallholder farmers”.
Workmen at a Dar es Salaam harbour loading bags of wheat destined for Central Africa. Credit: FAO/Giuseppe Bizzarri
by Thalif Deen (united nations)
Inter Press Service
UNITED NATIONS, Oct 31 (IPS) – A war of words between Russia on the one hand, and the US, Britain, France and Germany on the other—specifically on the deployment of drones in Ukraine—has triggered an unintended consequence: a new world food crisis.
The Western powers last week asked the UN to verify whether Iranian drones were being used “illegally” in violation of the 2015 Security Council resolution 2231 which endorsed the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) on Iran’s disputed nuclear programme.
But Iran has denied it had supplied Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs)—or drones—to Russia. So have the Russians.
Russia’s First Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN, Ambassador Dmitry Polyanskiy, insisted last week that drones used in Ukraine were Russian-made, not Iranian.
He also warned UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and his staff not to engage in any “illegitimate investigation” of drones used in Ukraine.
And Russia pushed back further and said it will re-consider its cooperation with the UN on the Black Sea Grain Initiative, thereby barring Ukraine grain exports.
As expected, Russia pulled out of the deal threatening food security worldwide.
The world is facing a global hunger crisis of unprecedented proportions – we are at a critical crossroads. Up to 50 million people in 45 countries are on the brink of famine, says WFP. Credit: WFP/Eulalia Berlanga in South Sudan.
As of October 30, the total tonnage of grain and food stuffs moved from Ukrainian ports. under the Initiative, was 9.6 million tons.
UN Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said October 30 that the Secretary-General “is deeply concerned about the ongoing situation regarding the Black Sea Grain Initiative”.
“The Secretary-General continues to engage in intense contacts aiming at the end of the Russian suspension of its participation in the Black Sea Grain Initiative”, he added.
The same engagement, Dujarric pointed out, also aims at the renewal and full implementation of the initiative to facilitate exports of food and fertilizer from Ukraine, as well as removing the remaining obstacles to the exports of Russian food and fertilize
Danielle Nierenberg, President Food Tank, told IPS Russia’s decision to halt grain shipments is using food as a weapon.
As a result, she pointed out, food prices across the world will increase and people, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, will suffer the most.
“There will likely be food riots and increased malnutrition,” she predicted.
The Russian war against Ukraine, she argued, demonstrates that our global food systems are fragile.
“What we need are more local and regional food and input production to ensure food security”, said Nierenberg, whose non-profit organization aims at reforming the food system with the goal of highlighting environmentally, socially, and economically sustainable ways of alleviating hunger, obesity, and poverty. www.foodtank.com
The President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky is quoted as saying that Russia has been “deliberately aggravating” the world’s food crisis.
“Russia is doing everything to ensure that millions of Africans, millions of residents of the Middle East and South Asia, will find themselves in conditions of artificial famine or at least a severe food crisis”.
The world has the power to protect people against this, he declared.
Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, beginning February 2022, exports of grain from Ukraine, as well as food and fertilizers from Russia, have been significantly hit, according to the United Nations.
“The disruption in supplies pushed soaring prices even higher and contributed to a global food crisis. The Black Sea Grain Initiative, brokered by the United Nations and Türkiye, was set up to reintroduce vital food and fertilizer exports from Ukraine to the rest of the world.”
Ukraine, one of the world’s largest grain exporters, normally supplies around 45 million tonnes of grain to the global market every year but, following Russia’s invasion of the country, mountains of grains built up in silos, with ships unable to secure safe passage to and from Ukrainian ports, and land routes unable to compensate, the UN said.
“This contributed to a jump in the price of staple foods around the world. Combined with increases in the cost of energy, developing countries were pushed to the brink of debt default and increasing numbers of people found themselves on the brink of famine.”
On 22 July, the UN, the Russian Federation, Türkiye and Ukraine agreed the Black Sea Grain Initiative, at a signing ceremony in Türkiye’s largest city, Istanbul.
The deal allowed exports from Ukraine of grain, other foodstuffs, and fertilizer, including ammonia, to resume through a safe maritime humanitarian corridor from three key Ukrainian ports: Chornomorsk, Odesa, and Yuzhny/Pivdennyi, to the rest of the world.
To implement the deal, a Joint Coordination Centre (JCC) was established in Istanbul, comprising senior representatives from the Russian Federation, Türkiye, Ukraine, and the United Nations.
According to procedures issued by the JCC, vessels wishing to participate in the Initiative will undergo inspection off Istanbul to ensure they are empty of cargo, then sail through the maritime humanitarian corridor to Ukrainian ports to load.
The corridor was established by the JCC and monitored 24/7 to ensure the safe passage of vessels. Vessels on the return journey will also be inspected at the inspection area off Istanbul.
Meanwhile, a statement released on October 30 says the UN Secretariat convened all delegations earlier Sunday at the Joint Coordination Centre in a plenary format.
During the session, the delegation of the Russian Federation informed that while it suspends its participation in the implementation of the activities of the Initiative, including in inspections for an indefinite time, it will continue the dialogue with the United Nations and the Turkish delegation on pressing issues.
The Russian Federation also expressed its readiness to cooperate remotely on issues that require immediate decision by the JCC.
The Secretariat, in close cooperation with the Turkish delegation at the JCC, continues to engage all representatives to offer options on next steps regarding the JCC operations in accordance with the goals and provisions stated in the Initiative.
In order to continue fulfilling the Initiative, it was proposed that the Turkish and United Nations delegations provide by October 31 ten inspection teams aimed at inspecting 40 outbound vessels. This inspection plan has been accepted by the delegation of Ukraine. The Russian Federation delegation has been informed.
Currently, there are 97 loaded vessels and 15 inbound vessels registered for JCC inspection around Istanbul. There are an additional 89 that have applied to join the Initiative.
In addition, the Ukrainian, Turkish and United Nations delegations agreed on a movement plan for the maritime humanitarian corridor of 14 vessels, 12 outbound and four inbound.
The UN delegation, in its capacity as JCC Secretariat, has informed the delegation of the Russian Federation on the movements in accordance with the JCC established procedures.
As per JCC procedures, all participants coordinate with their respective military and other relevant authorities to ensure the safe passage of commercial vessels under the Black Sea Grain Initiative.
There was no movement of vessels in the corridor on 30 October. There are currently 21 vessels engaged in the Initiative that are in or near the three Ukrainian ports with a capacity of over 700,000 metric tons, including IKARIA ANGEL, a vessel chartered by the World Food Programme loaded with 30,000 metric tons of wheat for the emergency response in the Horn of Africa, the UN said.
In just two years, the number of people facing, or at risk of, acute food insecurity increased from 135 million in 53 countries pre-pandemic, to 345 million in 82 countries today.
Fuelled by conflict, climate shocks and COVID-19, the crisis is escalating as the war in Ukraine drives up the costs of food, fuel and fertilizers. Millions of people are struggling to put food on the table and are being driven closer to starvation in a storm of staggering proportions.
“We are at a critical crossroads. We need to rise to the challenge of meeting people’s immediate food needs, while at the same time supporting programmes that build long-term resilience”.
“The alternative is hunger on a catastrophic scale,” the WFP warned, long before the current grain crisis.
In 2010-2011, a devastating drought led to more than 260,000 deaths beyond normal levels of expected mortality in Somalia. Yet almost no one died in Ethiopia after a severe drought in 2015. Credit: Abdurrahman Warsameh/IPS
Opinion
Inter Press Service
Oct 28 (IPS) – The Horn of Africa is facing its worst drought in 40 years. Scientists suspect that a multi-year La Niña cycle has been amplified by climate change to prolong dry and hot conditions.
After multiple failed harvests and amid high global food prices, the Horn is confronted with a severe food security crisis. Some 37 million people face acute hunger in the region, which includes Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan and Uganda.
In Somalia alone, 40% of the population is facing food insecurity: about 6.7 million people. In neighbouring Ethiopia, the proportion is lower – 20% – but the absolute numbers are higher at 20.4 million.
It was not too long ago that drought led to highly divergent impacts between Somalia and Ethiopia. In 2010-2011, a devastating drought led to more than 260,000 deaths beyond normal levels of expected mortality in Somalia. Yet almost no one died in Ethiopia after a severe drought in 2015.
Using the cases of the two countries, among others, the book shows why Somalia had a famine in the early 2010s while Ethiopia did not, despite both being exposed to severe droughts.
The biggest differences were that, compared with Somalia, Ethiopia enjoyed a state with more capacity and more political inclusion, and made good use of foreign aid. These are factors that I identify in the book as contributing to how climate change is affecting the security of states. I include famine as a form of insecurity.
Better outcomes are expected in states with high capacity to deliver services, high political inclusion where all social groups are represented in government, and where international assistance is welcomed and shared broadly.
Two sets of conditions, two different outcomes
So how did Somalia and Ethiopia stack up on the three factors that contribute to a bad situation being made worse?
In the lead-up to Somalia’s famine in 2011, the country faced persistent problems of a weak national government that was being challenged by Al-Shabaab, a violent Islamist militia that controlled significant territory in the south of the country. The Somali government had limited ability to deliver services in the areas it controlled, let alone areas under Al-Shabaab.
For its part, the Ethiopian government invested in social safety net programmes to feed people in the midst of the drought through cash transfers, employment programmes and food assistance.
The issue of sections of the society being excluded was also in greater evidence in Somalia than in Ethiopia. A number of marginalised groups, notably the Bantu Somalis and the Rahanweyn clan, were among the most affected by the drought. Better connected groups diverted aid that otherwise would have benefited these communities.
Finally, Somalia was in much worse shape when it came to aid. Al-Shabaab militants were blocking aid into the country, which led to a number of humanitarian groups withdrawing from Somalia. In addition, the US, through the Patriot Act, discouraged NGOs from providing aid for fear it would end up in Al-Shabaab’s hands. Together, this meant that little humanitarian assistance came into Somalia precisely at the time when the country needed it most. Hundreds of thousands died.
Ethiopia was a favourite of the international community for foreign assistance. It received funds that supported its social safety net programmes, which helped it prepare for the drought and administer emergency aid supplies.
The current food security crisis in the Horn of Africa, however, reveals persistent vulnerability in both countries.
As Ethiopia’s case shows, progress can be undone. Rising political exclusion is leading to huge food security risks, particularly in the Tigray region where aid is currently largely blocked amid the ongoing violent conflict.
Equally worrisome is Somalia’s situation, where both local and external actors have struggled to build state capacity or inclusion in the face of a long-running violent insurgency.
What can work
My book provides some hopeful insights, as well as caution. It shows that for countries like Ethiopia and Bangladesh, international assistance can help address weak state capacity. Donors worked with local officials to address specific climate hazards, like drought and cyclones.
Such international assistance helped compensate for weak state capacity through discrete investments in early warning systems, targeted social services, such as food assistance or cash transfers, and hazard-specific protective infrastructure, such as cyclone shelters.
Those examples suggest that climate adaptation can save lives and contribute to economic prosperity.
However, as the unfolding dynamic in Ethiopia shows, progress can be reversed. Moreover, it’s far more challenging for external actors to build inclusive political institutions if local actors are not so inclined.
With climate change intensifying extreme weather events around the world, it is incumbent upon policymakers to enhance the practice of environmental peacebuilding, both to resolve ongoing conflicts through better natural resource management and to prevent future emergencies.
One third of all plastic waste ends up in soils or freshwater. Most of this plastic disintegrates into particles smaller than five millimetres, known as microplastics, and these break down further into nanoparticles. Credit: UN Environment
by Baher Kamal (madrid)
Inter Press Service
MADRID, Oct 27 (IPS) – No. No lettuce, no matter how British it may be, could outlast such a steady depletion of the very foundation of life.
Now, new facts about such depletion come to add to the already reported ones regarding the unstopped, man-made dangers threatening the present and future of indispensable natural resources.
These are some of the biggest reasons explaining how the web of life is unrelentlessly agonising:
1.- Poison
A recent scientific study by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) reveals the following:
– The millions of tons of plastic swirling around the world’s oceans have garnered a lot of media attention recently. But plastic pollution poses a bigger threat to the plants and animals – including humans – who are based on land.
— Very little of the plastic we discard every day is recycled or incinerated in waste-to-energy facilities. Much of it ends up in landfills, where it may take up to 1,000 years to decompose, leaching potentially toxic substances into the soil and water.
– Researchers in Germany are warning that the impact of microplastics in soils, sediments and freshwater could have a long-term negative effect on such ecosystems. They say terrestrial microplastic pollution is much higher than marine microplastic pollution – estimated at four to 23 times higher, depending on the environment.
– Fragments of plastic are present practically all over the world and can trigger many kinds of adverse effects.
– One third of all plastic waste ends up in soils or freshwater. Most of this plastic disintegrates into particles smaller than five millimetres, known as microplastics, and these break down further into nanoparticles (less than 0.1 micrometre in size). The problem is that these particles are entering the food chain.
2. Sewage is an important factor in the distribution of microplastics. In fact, between 80% and 90% of the plastic particles contained in sewage, such as from garment fibres, persist in the sludge, says the study.
– Sewage sludge is often applied to fields as fertiliser, meaning that several thousand tons of microplastics end up in our soils each year. Microplastics can even be found in tap water.
– Moreover, the surfaces of tiny fragments of plastic may carry disease-causing organisms and act as a vector for diseases in the environment.
— Microplastics can also interact with soil fauna, affecting their health and soil functions. “Earthworms, for example, make their burrows differently when microplastics are present in the soil, affecting the earthworm’s fitness and the soil condition,” says an article in Science Daily about the research.
3.- Toxic
In 2020, the first-ever field study to explore how the presence of microplastics can affect soil fauna was published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society. The paper notes that terrestrial microplastic pollution has led to the decrease of species that live below the surface, such as mites, larvae and other tiny creatures that maintain the fertility of the land.
– Chlorinated plastic can release harmful chemicals into the surrounding soil, which can then seep into groundwater or other surrounding water sources, and also the ecosystem. This can cause a range of potentially harmful effects on the species that drink the water.
– When plastic particles break down, they gain new physical and chemical properties, increasing the risk that they will have a toxic effect on organisms. And the larger the number of potentially affected species and ecological functions, the more likely it is that toxic effects will occur.
– Chemical effects are especially problematic at the decomposition stage. Additives such as phthalates and Bisphenol leach out of plastic particles. These additives are known for their hormonal effects and can disrupt the hormone system of vertebrates and invertebrates alike.
– In addition, nano-sized particles may cause inflammation, traverse cellular barriers, and even cross highly selective membranes such as the blood-brain barrier or the placenta. Within the cell, they can trigger changes in gene expression and biochemical reactions, among other things.
4.- Pests
Should all this not be enough, please be reminded that:
– Up to 40% of food crops are lost due to plant pests and diseases every single year, according to the world’s top food and agriculture organisation.
This is affecting both food security and agriculture, the main source of income for vulnerable rural communities, FAO warned on the occasion of the International Day of Plant Health on 12 May 2022.
– Two main factors, among several others, appear behind the increasing expansion of plant pests and diseases. One is that climate change and human activities are altering ecosystems and damaging biodiversity while creating new niches for pests to thrive.
– The other one is that international travel and trade, which has tripled in volume in the last decade, is also spreading pests and diseases.
– Such pests and diseases cause massive crop losses and leave millions without enough food.
All the above shocking facts should pose several tough questions.
For instance: if food production –and food health– are so endangered, why discard as much as 20% of all of it just because they are not “nice” enough for selling them in the supermarket?
Why are all these special deals offering two or even three products while paying the price of just one? Aren’t such marketing techniques the major cause why up to one third of all food is lost and wasted?
By the way: all grown-in-soil food should by nature be taken as biological and ecological. In addition to sunshine, all food needs soil, water, and air to grow, right?
But being the soil, the water, and the air so highly contaminated, why sell them at double price just because the market lords brand them as biological and ecological?
At Jhargram in India’s West Bengal state, farmers have returned to indigenous and organic farming with promising results. Here women farmers prepare seed beds. Credit: Umar Manzoor Shah/IPS
by Umar Manzoor Shah (jhargram, india)
Inter Press Service
Jhargram, India, Oct 24 (IPS) – At Jhargram, a far-flung village in India’s West Bengal state, a group of farmers sit together in one of the open fields. They debate, deliberate, and confabulate about the marketing strategy they should use when selling their harvest on the open market.
Two years ago, the scenario in the village was completely different. The farmers were perturbed by sudden market inflation—a price hike on seeds, fertilisers, and saplings. On top of that, they were worried about climate change and the damage that occurs with the changes in weather patterns—late monsoons, unseasonal rains, and extreme heat waves.
The state of West Bengal is located in the eastern region of India along the Bay of Bengal. It was in this Indian state that Britain’s East India Company started doing business before it went on to rule almost the entire South Asia.
West Bengal is primarily an agricultural state. Despite covering only 2.7% of India’s geographical territory, it is home to approximately 8% of its 1.3 billion population. There are 7,1 million farming families, with 96% being small and marginal farmers in West Bengal. The average land holding is only 0.77 hectares. The state has a broad set of natural resources and agro-climatic conditions that allow for the production of a wide range of crops.
However, over the past few years, farmers here have been reeling in distress. According to recent research conducted to determine the intensity of the agrarian crisis in the region, agricultural produce returns for farmers were meagre.
The main reasons for low agricultural returns were a flawed marketing system; low agricultural product prices; price fluctuations of farm products; and crop loss due to disease, flooding, and heavy rains.
Jayanta Sahu, a farmer from Jhargram village, recalls how the drastic price rise of seeds and saplings put farmers like him in dire straits.
“We belong to the village, which is far away from the city. It takes hours of bus rides to reach the markets. Hardly a bus drones through this place. This was why we used to rely mostly on the middleman to supply seeds, fertilisers, and related entities required for farming. They used to take their commission from the supplies, and we were left with extremely high-priced material,” Sahu told IPS.
He adds that several issues have afflicted the farming sector in the past, including loss of agricultural land, a shortage of local seeds and seedlings, irrigation, and a lack of agricultural infrastructure, manures, fertiliser, and biocides.
But above all, said Sahu, the plummeting income from farming left them feeling “wretched” in more ways than one.
“We couldn’t even cover the basic expenses of our family through the meagre income from agriculture. Our finances were strained by inflation and climate change. We were really helpless before such a tumultuous situation,” Sahu said.
Another farmer, namely Mongal Dash, recalls how he was about to bid adieu to farming forever and instead do menial jobs like working as a daily wage labourer in the main town. “We were fighting a battle on multiple fronts—the low yields of our crops, the high cost of fertilisers and seeds, and climate change. The middlemen who used to supply us with the seeds raised the basic cost four to five times. We had no option left but to buy from them. The degraded quality of these seeds would result in low yields and, ultimately, low incomes,” Dash told IPS.
Witnessing insurmountable predicaments coming from all sides, the farmers last year sat together to decide a future course of action. It was like either they would perish or prosper. After hours of deliberations, they identified the key issues concerning them and how they should address them as a priority. One of the major hurdles was the involvement of middlemen or commission agents in procuring seeds. Another hurdle was the long distance to the city, which made it difficult to procure seeds and fertilisers for themselves.
At this time, they deliberated over a strategy to produce their own seeds and saplings that they could grow and make profitable yields.
The village, with more than 250 households, identified six veteran and experienced farmers who were tasked with producing their indigenous seeds and saplings. These farmers were trained in seed preservation, seed bed making, organic manure preparation, and pest control.
About an acre of land was identified. Seedbeds for Tamara, cabbage, cauliflower, and chilli, with an estimated 9000 saplings, were prepared there. The farmers resolved that no chemical fertilisers or pesticides would be used on seedlings or seed beds—everything was grown organically.
The saplings were distributed at a low cost to the farmers in the village based on their needs.
Now, when more than a year has passed, the endeavour these otherwise crisis-stricken farmers have made is beginning to yield the desired results.
“We are no longer dependent on the outside market for seed procurement. We do not use chemical fertilisers, nor are we importing any degraded saplings from outside. Our village is becoming self-reliant in this regard, and we are very proud of this,” says a local farmer Shyam Bisui.
The farmers, who otherwise had to invest about one-third of their yearly earnings on purchasing inorganic seeds and chemical fertilisers, now save most of their money because organic manures are used. Seeds are prepared in the village.
“The yields are subtly growing, and so are our hopes of good living. We are sure our earnest efforts will bring us prosperity, and we will never perish,” the farmer said.
Travelers await the Laos-China Railway. Credit: Bridget Dooley/IPS
by Bridget Dooley (vientiane, laos)
Inter Press Service
VIENTIANE, Laos, Oct 18 (IPS) – Mountainous terrain in northern Laos has until now restricted chances for farmers and producers in much of the nation to export their goods, limiting them primarily to subsistence farming and also curbing development, education and poverty reduction in their communities.
But as infrastructure and transportation in the “land of a million elephants” grows, the southeast Asian nation is moving from landlocked to land-linked. The Laos-China Railway is the most notable of these transformations, creating a high-speed means of bringing people and products through some of the most remote provinces, particularly in the north, and giving farmers access to new markets to sell their goods.
It’s still too soon to gauge the economic impact of the railway, which opened in December 2021, on nearby communities. Through the Hand in Hand Initiative (HiH), the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) aims to harness the potential of this blank slate to benefit Laotian farmers by attracting investors who will support the development of a green economic corridor along the track to sustainably empower the local communities that act as stewards of the land.
HiH is an evidence-based, country-owned and led initiative of the FAO to accelerate agricultural transformation, with the goal of eradicating poverty, ending hunger and malnutrition, and reducing inequalities. The initiative was supporting 52 countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East as of May 2022.
Small markets limit production
Investment in Laos via the HIH has the power to expand market options for producers and also improve their collective bargaining power and earning potential. Currently many of these farmers yield small harvests not because of natural circumstances but because of the lack of buyers, processers and exporters of their crops and livestock.
Living in a fertile and relatively large country with a small population, Laotian farmers are primed to move “beyond feeding themselves, from subsistence farming to enterprise farming,” says FAO Country Representative Nasar Hayat. Because farmers tend to plough their profits into their families and communities, supporting their earning potential directly benefits communities, he added in an interview with IPS.
“When a farmer earns, they put that money into homes, into their children’s nutrition and education, into local businesses. They don’t take a trip to Europe and drain the funds from their communities.”
In order to tap into this earning potential, Hayat says that Laotian farmers must work collectively and be supported through market accessibility, scientific training, and research and development, all of which can be supported by investors. These advances can pave the way for positive long-term development, he added.
While the fertile southern and central plains of Laos have historically been seen as the country’s breadbasket, the initiative aims to increase the capacity of the mountainous north. As a result, tea (which grows in the mountain forests) cassava (which can be cultivated on slopes) and livestock (which can be raised in any terrain) are the commodities included in the HiH.
The owner of Nam Phu Vieng farm, Mrs. Vanheung Duanglasy, poses with her cattle outside of Vientiane, Laos. Credit: FAO
Only one tea factory
In the misty, mountainous northern province of Oudomxay, in the village of Ban Phouhong (population 270), members of the Khmu ethnic group have been earning their livelihoods by picking tea in traditional ways for the last eight years. Plucking the leaves takes skill and dexterity and the leaves are potentially highly valuable, but pickers in Ban Phouhong have unfortunately seen their profits limited by a meagre market: only one factory is accessible, giving its owner a de facto monopoly over the area’s tea.
As a result, the factory owner has kept the prices he pays growers low, not at all in step with inflation rates and the rising cost of living. Picked tea earns just 15,000-20,000 Lao Kip per kilo (US$1.20), a rate which has stayed steady while food and gasoline prices have soared.
The limited market also means that only two-thirds of the trees’ valuable leaves are being picked, because these older leaves are the only ones purchased and processed by the nearby factory. Meanwhile, the tea buds, which can be the most valuable part of the plant, are left unpicked. Investment in Ban Phouhong could give pickers access to their own means of processing these valuable buds.
Also, while the workers have been trained in picking, they lack the knowledge necessary to grow their own enterprises: “We want to plant more seedlings, but we don’t know how. Only one family knows how to plant seedlings, and they have not been here for years,” said one picker. With investment, the villagers hope to get the scientific training they need to take control of their own growing potential.
Outside of the capital Vientiane, in May Park Ngum, a group of cassava farmers has been wasting up to 15 metric tonnes of cassava per day of harvest, amounting to about 100 metric tonnes of wasted cassava each year, because of the limits of their local cassava market.
The story of these farmers highlights how the potential benefits of Laos’ new connectivity are not limited to rural, remote provinces. After one export middleman failed to pay the May Park Ngum growers for their cassava – a debt amounting to about $1,200 per family – the farmers have been reticent to accept anything but cash for their crops. As a result, they have reduced their growing area by half and have also been stockpiling unsold cassava, much of which they have had to throw away because it has gone bad.
Livestock workers on Nam Phou Vieng farm. Credit: Bridget Dooley/IPS
Growers turn to pesticides
As a result of this loss, the farmers have unfortunately begun looking for less environmentally-friendly ways of boosting their profits, even as they are unsure of who would buy those crops. “We’ve been experimenting with pesticides on a small portion of our land. We found this could increase our yield from three metric tonnes of cassava per hectare per year to five metric tonnes of cassava per hectare per year,” said one grower.
However, with more reliable buyers, the farmers could maintain their current organic growing methods while doubling their growing potential, in turn doubling the earnings of their 50 hourly workers and, most importantly, ensuring their crops are not wasted.
Taking full advantage of the railway’s market-expanding power depends on following strict export regulations. For livestock, export requires vaccination to prevent the spread of transboundary diseases. While initial vaccination is costly, it pays for itself several times over through profits.
The owner and operator of Nam Phu Vieng farm in Vientiane Province, Vanheung Duanglasy, says that the high cost of vaccinating against lumpy skin disease prevents her from selling more of her animals, despite the fact that she has the capacity to raise far more. While she has contacts with reliable buyers in Vietnam, vaccination costs about $45 per cow every three months, significantly limiting how many cows she is able to raise for sale.
Like the cassava farmers, the owner of Nam Phu Vieng says that with investment and more buyers her farm could produce far more, expanding her profits and allowing her to hire more workers from her local community.
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