Wildfires that are blackening the American West in one of the nation’s worst fire seasons have ignited calls, including from Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, to thin forests that have become so choked with trees that they are at “powder keg levels.” The destruction has exposed old frictions between environmentalists and those who want to see logging accelerated, and it’s triggered a push to reassess how lands should be managed to prevent severe wildfires. Zinke’s directive Tuesday for department managers and superintendents to aggressively prevent wildfires was welcomed by Ed Waldron, fire management officer at Crater Lake National Park in Oregon. Waldron was exhausted after fighting two fires that have been burning since late July in or near the park, whose centerpiece is a lake that fills the remains of an erupted volcano and is the deepest in the United States. But he wondered where the additional resources would come from to hire contractors to thin the fuel. For now, Waldron and other firefighters have been too busy fighting blazes that forced the closure of a road into the park to thin vegetation elsewhere. “We’ve been working hard,” he said Tuesday. “It’s day 50.” For decades, logging was king in the West, notably in Oregon, which is famed for its majestic ponderosas and towering Douglas firs. But restrictions on harvesting timber from federal lands to protect endangered species and lower demand led to a freefall in the industry starting around 1990. Meanwhile, wildfires — nature’s way of thinning and regenerating forests …
Pittsburgh to Be Site of America’s Largest Urban Farm
Pittsburgh, once a dynamo of heavy industry, will soon become home to the United States’ largest urban farm, part of what advocates say is a trend to transform former manufacturing cities into green gardens. The Hilltop Urban Farm will open in 2019, consisting of 23 acres (9 hectares) of farmland where low-income housing once stood, two miles (three kilometers) from the city center, designers say. On top of farmland where winter peas and other fresh produce will be grown by local residents and sold in the community, the farm will feature a fruit orchard, a youth farm and skills-building program. Hillside land will eventually have trails. The farm is believed to be by far the largest nationwide to be located in an urban area, said Aaron Sukenik, who heads the Hilltop Alliance that is coordinating the initiative. “The land was just kind of sitting there, fenced and looking very post-apocalyptic,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. After Pittsburgh boomed during the late 19th and early 20th centuries as a center of coal production, steel and manufacturing, it was hit by industrial decline in the 1950s, its population cut by half over the next half century. Reinventing itself, the metropolis has since regained much of its economic vigor with the health care industry replacing manufacturing as the city’s powerhouse. But while “all the areas that you can see from downtown really have turned around,” several neighborhoods on the city’s outer ring have yet to see a similar resurgence, said Sukenik. “It’s …
Cameroon Forest People: Land Rights Abuses Threaten Survival
Leaders of Cameroon’s indigenous forest peoples say their survival is at risk if they are further deprived of access to the lands that are the source of their livelihoods. Speaking in Cameroon’s capital, Yaoundé, indigenous representatives said they had experienced increasingly serious violations of their land rights by palm oil and other agro-industries, mining firms and timber concessions, as well as the process of creating protected areas on their ancestral lands. “This disturbing situation foreshadows a future where we, as indigenous peoples, will no longer have land,” said Hélène Aye Mondo, president of Gbabandi, an organization of more than 50 indigenous Baka and Bagyeli communities. “If we continue to lose our lands and forests, the very survival of our cultures and peoples is at risk.” At the meeting on Tuesday, forest community leaders signed a joint declaration calling for recognition and respect of their customary land rights, timed to coincide with the 10-year anniversary of the 2007 United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, of which Cameroon is a signatory. Denied access to forest The U.N. declaration says governments must consult indigenous peoples to gain their consent before approving any decisions that affect how their land and resources are used, and they are entitled to redress for any such activities. Suzanne Ndjele, a member of the Baka ethnic group from the village of Assoumindelé in south Cameroon, said in a written testimony handed out to journalists that her community no longer has access to the forest they depend …
Представник МВФ закликав Україну використати економічні можливості
Перший заступник директора-розпорядника Міжнародного валютного фонду Дейвід Ліптон у перебігу візиту до Києва закликав Україну скористатися з можливостей нинішнього зростання світової економіки, повідомила пресова служба Кабінету міністрів України. Як сказав він під час зустрічі з прем’єр-міністром України Володимиром Гройсманом, Україна, на його думку, демонструє чудові результати у вирішенні першочергових економічних та соціальних питань, і те, що її урядові вдалось забезпечити впродовж останнього року стабілізацію ситуації, створює добрі передумови для того, щоб перейти до більш динамічного економічного зростання. «Світова економіка зараз зростає. І зараз це момент можливостей для України, які можна й треба використати», – сказав Ліптон. «Прогрес України в економічних реформах був чудовим, стабілізація економіки своєчасна і збігається за часом із періодом зростання світової економіки. Це можливість для України перейти від періоду стабілізації до періоду швидкого зростання. Сподіваюся, що підтримка МВФ у попередні періоди була корисною, і ми проведемо дискусію про те, як просувати реформи в подальшому. Реформи дозволять забезпечити Україні світле майбутнє», – наводить також слова Ліптона агентство «УНІАН». У березні 2015 року між МВФ і Україною була затверджена чотирирічна програма розширеного фінансування на суму близько 17,5 мільярдів доларів США. Наразі МВФ надав Україні за цією програмою близько 8 мільярдів 380 мільйонів доларів. Метою програми є відновлення економіки України, відновлення її незалежності від зовнішніх джерел, зміцнення державних фінансів, утримання фінансової стабільності і підтримка економічного зростання шляхом структурних і управлінських реформ за одночасного захисту найменш вразливих верств. …
Gambia Turns to Private Maritime Policing
Gambia is negotiating deals with three private companies to crack down on rampant illegal fishing in its territorial waters, a senior official with the fisheries ministry told Reuters. Made possible by poor monitoring capacity and, in some cases, corrupt local officials, illegal fishing costs West Africa’s coastal nations about $2.3 billion a year, according to a recent study. Regional coast guards regularly seize Chinese fishing boats for fishing illegally. An investigation published by marine conservation group Oceana this week found that European vessels had also broken European Union law in West Africa. “Fighting illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing requires continuous monitoring and surveillance of our waters, and we don’t have the resources to do that,” Bamba Banja, permanent secretary at the Ministry of Fisheries and Water Resources, said late Tuesday. A former ruler of Gambia, Yahya Jammeh, fled the country earlier this year amid accusations of widespread corruption. President Adama Barrow is now seeking to bring order to a sector neglected by the old regime. Despite its narrow coastline, Gambia possesses particularly rich waters, caused by the merging of fresh water from the Gambia River with the Atlantic Ocean. Banja said the government was in talks with Dutch shipbuilding group Damen and two other companies, from the United States and South Africa, to provide monitoring and surveillance of Gambia’s exclusive economic zone. “The South African and Dutch companies will provide patrol boats while the American company is for aerial surveillance to complement the patrol boats,” he said. A spokesman for …
У ЄС підписали додаткові торговельні преференції для України – дипломат
У Європейському союзі підписали документ про запровадження додаткових тимчасових торговельних преференцій для України на три роки, повідомив голова представництва України при ЄС Микола Точицький. «Підписання завершує майже рік наполегливих зусиль наших європейських партнерів щодо надання Україні додаткових преференцій для низки важливих товарів українського аграрного та промислового експорту», – написав він у фейсбуці. «Очікується, що цей законодавчий акт ЄС розпочне діяти з 1 жовтня цього року, окремі додаткові преференції для аграрних товарів стануть доступними для наших виробників із 1 січня 2018 року», – додав Точицький. Рада Євросоюзу затвердила рішення про ці преференції 17 липня. Як заявили тоді в Раді ЄС, «пропозиція спрямована на покращення доступу українських експортерів до ринку ЄС, з огляду на складну економічну ситуацію й зусилля економічних реформ, що здійснюються Україною». Тимчасові автономні торговельні заходи впроваджуються додатково до положень про торгівлю, які вже були запроваджені в рамках Угоди про асоціацію між Україною і ЄС – спершу на основі їх тимчасового застосування з 1 січня 2016 року, а нині після офіційного набуття чинності угодою 1 вересня 2017 року. Торговельні преференції складаються з додаткових квот на деякі різновиди сільськогосподарської продукції з нульовими митними ставками, а також часткового або повного скасування мит на деякі різновиди промислової продукції. Документ визначає, що додаткові торговельні преференції для України включають впровадження нульових митних тарифів для деяких різновидів сільськогосподарської продукції, зокрема, на 625 тисяч тонн кукурудзи, 325 тисяч тонн ячменю, 65 тисяч тонн пшениці, 2,5 тисяч тонн меду, а також на 23 різновиди промислових товарів, серед яких добрива, взуття, деякі метали, електронне обладнання, фарби. У вересні 2016 …
Чехія висловила готовність допомогти Україні стати енергетично безпечною країною – віце-прем’єр
Чехія готова допомогти Україні стати енергетично безпечною країною, повідомив Радіо Свобода віце-прем’єр-міністр Чехії Павел Белобрадек після зустрічі у Празі з міністром енергетики України Ігорем Насаликом. За його словами, це найголовніший підсумок переговорів, що стосувались енергетичної безпеки України і перспектив співпраці двох країн в енергетичній галузі. «Інструменти, які використовує Росія для впливу на політичну ситуацію, є саме питанням енергетики. Водночас ми б хотіли, щоб енергетика України модернізувалась, ми ж можемо запропонувати кібербезпеку, можемо надати свій дуже добрий досвід у галузі безпеки ядерної енергетики, а також зробити можливим, щоб Україна змогла приєднатись до європейської енергетичної системи і сама експортувала електроенергію до цієї мережі». Чеський віце-прем’єр також наголосив, що Чехія як член Європейського союзу володіє для цього відповідними фондами і має відповідний досвід їхнього використання. Зокрема, Павел Белобрадек зазначив, що «зараз у США і в ЄС є кошти, виділені для того, щоб допомогти Україні зміцнити її енергетичну незалежність. «І в цьому ми хочемо брати участь як із правового боку, так і з допомогою нашого досвіду, і завдяки нашим фірмам, які вже нині, наприклад, у галузі атомної енергетики дуже активні», – додав чеський віце-прем’єр. Як повідомляють чеські ЗМІ, в переговорах із українським міністром Ігорем Насаликом взяла також участь низка керівників відомих енергетичних, технологічних і промислових фірм і підприємств, які зацікавлені у тісній співпраці з Україною. …
China Plans Nationwide Ethanol Use by 2020
China plans to expand use of ethanol in gasoline nationwide by 2020 to curb smog and fossil fuel demand, the government said Wednesday, joining United States, Brazil and other nations that use blended fuel. The announcement adds to a series of initiatives to clean up smog-choked Chinese cities and control surging demand for imported oil. The government is spending heavily to develop an electric car industry and has raised sales taxes on vehicles with larger engines. Plans call for China to develop a demonstration facility by 2020 that can make 50,000 tons of ethanol a year from cellulose, according to the Cabinet’s National Energy Administration. It said that would expand to commercial scale by 2025. “It is an ideal alternative to fossil fuel,” said an unidentified NEA official quoted by the official Xinhua News Agency. China is the world’s biggest energy consumer and auto market. It started producing ethanol from corn in 2004 but banned use of food crops in 2007, prompting suppliers to switch to straw stalks and other materials. About one-fifth of gasoline produced in China has added ethanol, according to Xinhua. Regulators later eased the ban on use of food crops in some areas. Xinhua said the latest plan is intended in part to use up aging stockpiles of corn. Other governments including Brazil and the United States require gasoline to contain from 10 percent to as much as 85 percent ethanol to curb emissions and reduce petroleum demand. The …
Study Prompts Call to Examine Flu Vaccine and Miscarriage
A puzzling study of U.S. pregnancies found that women who had miscarriages between 2010 and 2012 were more likely to have had back-to-back annual flu shots that included protection against swine flu. Vaccine experts think the results may reflect the older age and other miscarriage risks for the women, and not the flu shots. Health officials say there is no reason to change the government recommendation that all pregnant women be vaccinated against the flu. They say the flu itself is a much greater danger to women and their fetuses. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has reached out to a doctor’s group, the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, to warn them the study is coming out and help them prepare for a potential wave of worry from expectant moms, CDC officials said. “I want the CDC and researchers to continue to investigate this,” said Dr. Laura Riley, a Boston-based obstetrician who leads a committee on maternal immunization. “But as an advocate for pregnant women, what I hope doesn’t happen is that people panic and stop getting vaccinated.” Past studies have found flu vaccines are safe during pregnancy, though there’s been little research on impact of flu vaccinations given in the first three months of pregnancy. Flu and its complications kill thousands of Americans every year. The elderly, young children and pregnant women are especially at risk. When a new “swine flu” strain emerged in 2009, it killed 56 U.S. pregnant women that year, according to the CDC. …
Microsoft, Disney Among Companies Calculating Carbon Footprints
Microsoft, Walt Disney Co. and General Motors are among hundreds of companies calculating how much they spend on carbon emissions to show investors they are concerned about global warming, a study said on Tuesday. More than 700 other businesses around the world plan by 2018 to introduce so-called carbon pricing, said the report by the U.S.-based Center for Climate and Energy Solutions (C2ES). The findings come amid efforts by U.S. President Donald Trump to scale back climate change-related regulations on grounds they are burdensome to the economy. Putting a monetary value on carbon dioxide emissions helps limit the burning of fossil fuel, which contributes to global warming, and signals to investors that companies are aware of the financial risks posed by global warming, the study said. Some 500 companies, including 80 in the United States, reported using carbon pricing, it said, drawing on an array of previous research. Many oil and gas companies such as British energy company BP use an internal, or “shadow,” accounting method to track their carbon emissions, it said. “It just stands to reason that investors, in looking at enterprises, of course are looking at ‘Are they resilient to all kinds of changes in the future?’” Bob Stout, vice president for BP America, said during a telephone briefing with reporters and others. “Climate change and carbon pricing as a policy obviously are key factors that businesses need to look at,” he said. Other companies charge carbon fees to internal business units. Microsoft, which charges its business …
Urban Designers Look to Nature as Solution for Flood-Prone Cities
From Houston and Miami, to cities in South Asia, 2017 has been a year of intense weather and devastating floods. A combination of climate change and urban development has created a perfect storm for catastrophe. “We are living in a warmer world. We are living in a world where potentially, hurricanes could be more damaging,” said Bill Patzert, climatologist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “Sea levels are rising. They have risen almost nine inches (22 centimeters) in the last century,” he said. Rising sea levels, however, make up only a small fraction of the problem, he said. “It has the appearance that flooding due to great storms or during the monsoon season over Asia is becoming more severe. So what is really happening is that the population of the planet, especially along the great river valleys of Asia and along the coast, for instance, of the United States, we tend to migrate toward the coasts.” Patzert added, “so there is just more infrastructure. There are more people. There is more damage.” An example is the recent flooding in neighborhoods near dams and levees in the Houston, Texas from Hurricane Harvey. “It is a symptom of the way that we have not been able to control development and to control where and how developers build,” said Kian Goh, assistant professor of urban planning at the University of California, Los Angeles. Architects and urban planners said many cities in potentially flood-prone areas should rethink how they are built and their relationship with water. “Many urban …
Перша партія антрациту зі США прибула в Україну
Вночі 13 вересня у морський торговельний порт «Южний» прибула перша партія антрациту зі США, повідомляє підприємство на своєму сайті. «О 2:15 до перевантажувального комплексу ДП «Морський торговельний порт «Южний» пришвартувалось судно Ocean Ambitious. На борту балкера 62 тисячі тонн енергетичного вугілля із США для ТЕС ПАТ «Центренерго». Стивідори планують розвантажити імпортний вантаж за 3 доби», – йдеться в повідомленні. Згідно з повідомленням, у найближчі декілька днів підприємство планує прийняти одразу чотири судна з вугіллям, загальним об’ємом понад 295 тисяч тонн. «Графік прийому та відправки (підприємствам теплогенерації – ред.) ми виконаємо», – заявив в.о. директора порту «Южний» Віталій Жуковський. На своїй сторінці у Twitter президент України Петро Порошенко заявив, поставка американського вугілля в Україну означає «безповоротну втрату для Росії ще одного інструменту енергетичного шантажу». «Вітаю перше американське вугілля в Україні, поставлене відповідно до моїх домовленостей з президентом Трампом», – написав Порошенко. Українські приватні й державні компанії вивчали можливість постачання вугілля зі США із 2014 року, від початку російської збройної агресії на сході України. Однак перша угода про постачання американського енергетичного вугілля з’явилася лише у 2017 року, після початку президентства Дональда Трампа у США та після початку урядової транспортної блокади окупованих територій Донбасу, звідки донедавна українська енергетика отримувала більшість вугілля антрацитової групи. Цього року Україною законтрактовані 700 тисяч тонн вугілля зі США. Упродовж 2018 року Україна планує закупити близько 2 мільйонів тонн американського вугілля, заявили в Мінерего. Із травня цього року в порту «Южний» було також розвантажено понад 220 тисяч тонн енергетичного вугілля з ПАР. …
World’s Nations Make Progress on Some, But Not All, Health Goals
More than 60 percent of the world’s nations are expected to meet some of their health targets in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. The targets include reducing child and maternal deaths and deaths from malaria. However, fewer than five percent are projected to meet their targets on reducing the number of overweight children, tuberculosis infections and traffic deaths. The news comes in a report published Wednesday by the British journal The Lancet that analyzed health-related Sustainable Development Goals in 188 countries. The 17 wide-ranging goals spearheaded by the U.N. focus on improving health and education, ending poverty, combating climate change, making cities more sustainable and protecting oceans and forests. They were adopted at a U.N. summit in 2015. Singapore, Iceland and Sweden were the highest performing countries in the health-related goals. Somalia, Central African Republic and Afghanistan ranked the lowest. Nordic and other European countries plus Australia, Canada, Antigua and Barbuda rank in the top 20. The U.S. ranks 24th. The report, which was funded by the U.S. Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, said the findings should help shape policies in order to address long-standing and emerging health challenges. Dr. Christopher Murray, director of the Institute of Health Metrics Evaluation and a professor of global health at the University of Washington, was the lead author. Murray said in The Lancet, “China, Cambodia and many other middle and low-income nations deserve recognition for improving their citizens’ lives, as evidenced by impressive improvements in under-five mortality, neonatal mortality, vaccine …
From Refugee Camp to Runway, Hijab-wearing Model Breaks Barriers
Roughly one year ago, Denise Wallace, executive co-director of the Miss Minnesota USA pageant, received a phone call from 19-year-old Halima Aden asking if she could compete in the contest wearing her hijab. “Her photo popped up and I remember distinctly going, ‘Wow, she is beautiful,’” Wallace said. The Somali-American teen made headlines as the first hijab-and burkini-sporting contestant in the history of the pageant. The bold move catapulted her career to new heights involving many “firsts,” including being the first hijabi signed by a major modeling agency. “I wear the hijab everyday,” Aden, who was in New York for Fashion Week, told Reuters. The hijab – one of the most visible signs of Islamic culture – is going mainstream, with advertisers, media giants and fashion firms promoting images of the traditional headscarf in ever more ways. Nike announced it is using its prowess in the sports and leisure market to launch a breathable mesh hijab in spring 2018, becoming the first major sports apparel maker to offer a traditional Islamic head scarf designed for competition. Teen apparel maker American Eagle Outfitters created a denim hijab with Aden as its main model. The youthful headscarf sold out in less than a week online. Allure magazine’s editor-in-chief, Michelle Lee, is also in the mix, describing Aden as a “normal American teenage girl” on the front cover of the magazine’s July issue. “She is someone who is so amazingly representative of who we are as America, as a melting pot it totally …
Violent Street Protests Break Out in Haiti Over Tax Hikes
Protesters in Haiti damaged commercial buildings in the capital city and set cars on fire Tuesday, angered by government tax hikes that come at a time when foreign aid is declining. The Port-au-Prince protest, called by former presidential candidate Jean-Charles Moise, took many by surprise and represents the biggest outcry against the administration of President Jovenel Moise since he took office earlier this year. “The revolution has just started. Jovenel Moise will have to retract his taxes or he will have to leave immediately,” said Jacques Menard, a 31-year-old protester. “And this is a warning because the next phase can be very violent.” Protesters took to the streets in separate groups in several districts in the metropolitan area of Port-au-Prince, erecting flaming barricades, blocking traffic, and confronting riot police, who fired tear gas and warning shots in the air. Several people were arrested, the police said, but there were no reports of deaths or serious injuries. Lawmakers last weekend approved an unpopular budget that raises taxes on products including cigarettes, alcohol and passports. At the same time, foreign aid to Haiti is slowing. The country is one of the poorest in the Americas and suffered a devastating earthquake in 2010 and the worst of Hurricane Matthew last year. “If Jovenel Moise is intelligent, he should refrain from publishing the budget, otherwise he will have to face a series of street demonstrations that will further complicate the situation,” Jean-Charles Moise said on local radio. Government officials were not immediately available for …
Corporate Tax Goal in Doubt as Trump Kicks Off Push on Reform
U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Tuesday cast doubt on President Donald Trump’s goal of cutting the corporate tax rate to 15 percent, even as the president moved to inject new urgency into a sluggish effort in Congress to lower taxes. “Ideally, he’d like to get it down to 15 percent. I don’t know if we’ll be able to achieve that given the budget issues, but we’re going to get this down to a very competitive level,” Mnuchin told a conference in New York hosted by CNBC. The administration is cranking up a publicity campaign to build public support for the Republican president’s tax goals, and Trump was due to meet with three Democratic senators Tuesday to discuss taxes. But neither the administration nor the Republicans who control Congress have agreed on a detailed plan for overhauling the tax code, which was one of Trump’s main campaign promises in 2016, despite months of discussions. A major concern is not adding to the federal budget deficit. It would balloon if tax rates were cut too deeply without providing offsetting federal spending reductions and closure of tax loopholes, both politically difficult tasks. Mnuchin declined to say what business tax rate is achievable. He said he was “incredibly hopeful” a tax plan can be enacted this year, adding it could be retroactive to January. Asked whether Trump would hold out for a 15 percent corporate tax rate, compared to the current 35 percent, White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said, “The president is …
US, Russian Crew Blasts Off for Space Station
Two U.S. astronauts and a Russian cosmonaut blasted off from Kazakhstan on Wednesday for a six-hour trip to the International Space Station, a NASA TV broadcast showed. Commander Alexander Misurkin of Roscosmos and flight engineers Mark Vande Hei and Joe Acaba of NASA lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome at 3:17 a.m. local time on Wednesday (2117 GMT/1717 EDT on Tuesday). The crew is set for a fast-track transit to the station, which orbits about 250 miles (400 km) above Earth, to begin a five-month mission. They are due to arrive at the Space Station by mid-morning on Wednesday but should the fast-track approach fails, the Soyuz will take two days to reach the ISS. Misurkin, Vande Hei and Acaba will join NASA astronaut Randy Bresnik, Russia’s Sergey Ryazanskiy and Paolo Nespoli of the European Space agency who have been aboard the orbital outpost since July. To commemorate the upcoming 60th anniversary on Oct.4 of the launch of the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, the Soyuz crew are using its small model as a zero gravity indicator. …
GOP Lawmakers Push Balanced Budget Mandate in Constitution
Lawmakers from 19 states are trying to develop a plan in Arizona this week for carrying out a growing, but unlikely, national effort to amend the Constitution to require a balanced U.S. budget, a long-held goal of conservatives who believe out-of-control spending is harming the nation. The plan is to add an amendment to the Constitution through a convention — a longshot effort that has never been successfully done. All 27 amendments that have been adopted were proposed by Congress. A balanced budget amendment is a core goal of conservative Republicans who have gained control of an increasing number of state Legislatures in recent years, now holding both chambers in 32 states. Backers include groups like the American Legislative Exchange Council and the Koch brothers-backed Americans for Prosperity. The effort also comes against the backdrop of deep turmoil in Washington over debt spending. Top congressional Democrats last week cut a deal with President Donald Trump to increase the federal debt limit, avoiding for now a fight that commonly causes divisions and threats of a government shutdown. The goal of amendment backers is to eliminate the federal deficit and drive down the national debt, which is approaching $20 trillion. The current federal budget includes spending of about $4 trillion and has a shortfall of nearly $700 billion, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Congress debated a balanced budget amendment in the early and mid-1990s, but it did not pass. The lawmakers meeting this week are discussing a process that requires several …
Former US CDC Director Takes Aim at Outbreaks, Heart Disease
Former U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director Dr. Tom Frieden on Tuesday announced the start of a new public health initiative funded by private philanthropies to fight heart disease and stroke and shore up infectious disease capabilities around the world. The new initiative, called Resolve, will be funded by $225 million in backing from Bloomberg Philanthropies, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. “There are proven strategies every country can use to prevent deaths from heart disease, stroke and epidemics — but progress has been painfully slow,” said Frieden, president and chief executive of Resolve, which will be housed at Vital Strategies, a New York-based global health organization that works in more than 60 countries. For Frieden, the initiative allows him to take on some unfinished business. As part of the $5.4 billion in Ebola emergency funding for fiscal 2015, the CDC got $1.2 billion for international efforts to bolster countries’ capabilities to identify and fight infectious disease outbreaks. “Those dollars will expire within the next year or so,” Frieden said in a telephone briefing. To fight heart disease, the group will invest in efforts to reduce the amount of artery-clogging transfats from their menus, a reprise of Frieden’s efforts in 2006 as New York City health commissioner to ban transfats from restaurants. They also aim to support countries’ efforts to reduce sodium and increase treatment of high blood pressure, which kills 10 million people every year, more than from all infectious diseases combined. …
UN: More Than a Billion People Live on Degraded Land, At Risk of Hunger
More than 1.3 billion people live on agricultural land that is deteriorating, putting them at risk of worsening hunger, water shortages and poverty, the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) said Tuesday. People’s use of the earth’s natural reserves has doubled in the last 30 years. Now a third of the planet’s land is severely degraded, and every year 15 billion trees and 24 billion tons of fertile soil are lost, UNCCD said. “The land we live on is being strained to breaking point. Restoration and conservation are key to its survival,” UNCCD said in a report launched in Ordos, China. UNCCD promotes good land stewardship, and is the only legally binding international agreement on land issues. As land becomes less productive — which can happen through deforestation, overgrazing, flash floods and drought — people are forced to migrate to cities or abroad, there is greater likelihood of conflict over dwindling resources, and countries’ economies are hit, said UNCCD deputy executive secretary Pradeep Monga. “If you don’t fix land degradation, we get into a cycle where people are losing their livelihoods, their homes, their fields,” he said. And if the amount of productive land shrinks, less will be available to feed the world’s population, which is predicted to increase to more than 9 billion people by 2050, up from 7 billion today. “If we can stop land degradation and green our deserts, we can easily become food secure,” Monga told Reuters. Small choices, like families cutting back on food …
Syria Signs Aleppo Power Plant Contract With Iran
Syria’s government signed a contract with an Iranian company on Tuesday to import five gas-fired power plants to the war-battered city of Aleppo, in an early sign of the major role Tehran is expected to play in Syria’s reconstruction. The deal, reported by Syria’s state news agency SANA, is part of a broader understanding reached by Damascus and Tehran promising Iranian companies contracts to restore electrical infrastructure in Syria, Electricity Minister Zuhair Kharboutli said during a visit to Tehran. The Aleppo contract was awarded to the Iranian firm Mabna and is valued at around 130 million euros, according to a Kharboutli statement carried Sunday by SANA. Kharboutli also signed memorandums with Iranian Energy Minister Sattar Mahmoudi promising to import five plants to provide 540 megawatts of electricity to the coastal Latakia province, as well as to build wind and solar plants, and to restore plants in Deir el-Zour and Homs. Iran has been an indispensable ally to President Bashar Assad, organizing militias from Lebanon to Afghanistan to fight for alongside his forces and sending its own Revolutionary Guard Corps to Syria to manage battles. Assad has been battling an uprising against his family’s 47-year dynasty since 2011. Electricity generation plunges The fighting has come at a tremendous cost to the nation’s infrastructure. Electricity generation dropped by more than half from 2010 to 2014, according to the latest figures available from the OECD’s International Energy Agency monitoring group. Syrian troops retook eastern Aleppo at the end of last year with the …
Child Heart Patients Treated for Rare Surgical Infection
At least a dozen children who had heart surgery at Children’s Hospital New Orleans between late May and July have infected incisions, apparently from contaminated equipment. The hospital’s chief medical officer says the infections were linked to a machine that regulates a patient’s temperature during heart surgery. Dr. John Heaton says the machine was replaced and patients are responding to intravenous antibiotics. He says a handful who haven’t shown symptoms will see doctors this week, to make sure. Heaton says the hospital’s paying for treatment and related costs, such as parents’ hotel rooms and meals. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention describes the bacteria in question as common in water, soil and dust. It says contaminated medical devices can infect the skin and soft tissues under the skin. …
АП: Порошенко висловився проти приватизації державних об’єктів інвесторами з країни-агресора
Президент України Петро Порошенко виступає за приватизацію державних об’єктів українськими та іноземними інвесторами, за винятком інвесторів з країни-агресора. Про це повідомляє прес-служба президента за підсумками проведення Порошенком у вівторок засідання Національної ради реформ. «У влади є бажання і політична воля забезпечити приватизацію об’єктів державної власності ефективно, відкрито, конкурентно і за новими законодавчими нормами, які забезпечать доступ до цього процесу вітчизняних і іноземних інвесторів, за винятком країни-агресора», – повідомляє слова президента його прес-служба. Згідно з повідомленням, на засіданні ради реформ учасники розглянули законопроект щодо приватизації об’єктів держвласності. Петро Порошенко заявив про необхідність обговорити і в найкоротші терміни запропонувати парламентові оптимальний варіант приватизаційних правил, додали у президентській канцелярії. Як повідомив перший віце-прем’єр Степан Кубів, 1231 підприємство в Україні наразі заборонене до приватизації. За його словами, в державній власності має залишитись лише 378 державних підприємств та об’єктів, які виконують функції держави. «Починаючи з 2015 року, ми приватизували 48 підприємств на загальну суму 3,6 мільярда гривень, при тому, що план надходжень від приватизації на рік – 17 мільярдів», – сказав Кубів. Кабінет міністрів пропонує віддати на приватизацію близько 900 об’єктів власності, що більше ніж вдвічі більше у порівнянні з планом минулого року. Під державним контролем мають залишитися лише стратегічні та важливі підприємства. Законопроект «Про приватизацію державного майна» був поданий до Верховної Ради 4 вересня 2017 року. Як повідомляє Мінекономрозвитку, учасники засідання Національної ради реформ сьогодні висловили підтримку цьому законопроектові. …
Macron’s Big Test: France-Wide Protests Over Labor Overhaul
Eiffel Tower employees planned a walkout, angry carnival workers snarled traffic around Paris’ Arc de Triomphe, and Paris police girded for potential violence as unions and others hold nationwide protests Tuesday against changes to labor laws they fear corrode job security. The protests are the first big public display of discontent with President Emmanuel Macron’s presidency, which kicked off in May amid enthusiasm over his promises of reviving up the French economy but is now foundering amid anger over the labor decrees and other domestic troubles. The prominent CGT union is leading Tuesday’s protests, calling for strikes and organizing some 180 demonstrations against last labor decrees unveiled last month by Macron’s government. At the Eiffel Tower, CGT union representative Denis Vavassori told The Associated Press that workers plan a walkout Tuesday afternoon, but it is unclear so far whether the monument will be forced to close or will stay partially open for tourists. Horn-tooting funfair workers held a separate protest movement Tuesday against legal changes they say favor big corporations and could wipe out their centuries-old industry. Dozens of big rigs drove at a snail’s pace around the Arc de Triomphe, causing rush-hour traffic snarls as protesters danced and waved flags on a flat-bed truck with a severed plastic head from a funfair ride. The workers said they timed their protest to coincide with Tuesday’s broader labor demonstrations, since both movements are about workers fearing their jobs are at threat. Bumper car worker …