Canada and the United States showed scant sign on Thursday of closing a deal to revamp NAFTA, and Canadian officials made clear Washington needed to withdraw a threat of possible autos tariffs, sources said. The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump wants to be able to agree on a text of the three-nation North American Free Trade Agreement by the end of September, but major differences remain. “We discussed some tough issues today,” Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland told reporters after meeting with U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer. Freeland, who has visited Washington four weeks in a row to discuss NAFTA, gave no further details. Market fears over the future of the 1994 pact, which underscores $1.2 trillion in trade, have been regularly hitting stocks in all three nations, whose economies are now highly integrated. While multiple deadlines have passed during the more than year-long negotiations to renew NAFTA, pressure on Canada to agree to a deal is growing, partly to push it through the U.S. Congress before Mexico’s new government takes office on Dec. 1. Canada says it does not feel bound by the latest deadline. Asked whether time was running out, Freeland said her focus was getting a deal that was good for Canadians. Trump came to power last year vowing to tear up NAFTA unless major changes were made to a pact he blames for the loss of U.S. manufacturing jobs. Trump struck a side-deal on NAFTA with Mexico last month and has threatened to exclude Canada …
Analysts: Poor Economy, Unemployment Lure Tunisians to Extremism
Seven years after the Arab Spring, little has been done to address youth unemployment in Tunisia, a key factor in extremist groups’ ability to recruit marginalized youth, rights groups and experts warn. “Someone who is marginalized with nothing to lose, no stability in life, no vision of the future, no hope for change, can become a very easy target for terrorist groups,” Amna Guellali, director of Human Rights Watch’s Tunisia office, told VOA. The Arab Spring was ignited in Tunisia, in part because of deteriorating economic conditions. A frustrated street vendor set himself on fire outside a local municipal office in Sidi Bouzid to protest repeated harassment from authorities, who often confiscated his goods or fined him for selling without a permit. Although economic conditions that force people to eke out a living on society’s margins play a big role in the unrest, Guellali said that unemployment is the central issue in Tunisia. “Unemployment stands at 15 percent, rising to 36 percent for Tunisians under 24 years old. Unemployed youths with diplomas are 25 percent, according to the last statistic of 2017,” Guellali added. The World Bank, which has been helping Tunisia in its development, has also warned that unemployment among young people is a serious issue that needs to be addressed. Economic growth The World Bank says Tunisia has made progress in its transition to democracy and good governance practices, compared with other countries in the Middle East, but still grapples with growing its economy and providing economic opportunities. Tunisia’s economic …
Bye Bye Bugs? Scientists Fear Non-Pest Insects Are Declining
A staple of summer — swarms of bugs — seems to be a thing of the past. And that’s got scientists worried. Pesky mosquitoes, disease-carrying ticks, crop-munching aphids and cockroaches are doing just fine. But the more beneficial flying insects of summer — native bees, moths, butterflies, ladybugs, lovebugs, mayflies and fireflies — appear to be less abundant. Scientists think something is amiss, but they can’t be certain: In the past, they didn’t systematically count the population of flying insects, so they can’t make a proper comparison to today. Nevertheless, they’re pretty sure across the globe there are fewer insects that are crucial to as much as 80 percent of what we eat. Yes, some insects are pests. But they also pollinate plants, are a key link in the food chain and help decompose life. “You have total ecosystem collapse if you lose your insects. How much worse can it get than that?” said University of Delaware entomologist Doug Tallamy. If they disappeared, “the world would start to rot.” He noted Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson once called bugs: “The little things that run the world.” The 89-year-old Wilson recalled that he once frolicked in a “Washington alive with insects, especially butterflies.” Now, “the flying insects are virtually gone.” It hit home last year when he drove from suburban Boston to Vermont and decided to count how many bugs hit his windshield. The result: A single moth. Windshield test The un-scientific experiment is called the windshield test. Wilson recommends everyday people …
Scrounge for Workers Sees US Jobless Claims Hit 48-Year Low
New U.S. claims for jobless benefits fell for the third week in a row, hitting their lowest level in nearly 49 years for the third straight week, the Labor Department reported Thursday. The new figures suggest the U.S. economy’s vigorous job creation continued unabated this month as the data were collected during the survey week for the department’s more closely watched monthly jobs report, due out next week. Amid a widely reported labor shortage, employers are reluctant to lay off workers who are difficult to replace. For the week ended September 12, new claims for unemployment insurance fell to 201,000, down 3,000 from the prior week. Economists had instead been expecting a result of 209,000. The result was the lowest level since November of 1969, whereas the prior week’s level had been the lowest since December 1969. However, economists say that in reality the levels are likely the lowest ever, given demographic changes in the United States in the past half century. Claims have now held below the symbolic level of 300,000 for more than 3.5 years, the longest such streak ever recorded. Though they can see big swings from week to week, jobless claims are an indication of the prevalence of layoffs and the health of jobs markets. In a decade of economic recovery, the United States has seen uninterrupted job creation, driving the unemployment rate to historical lows. In light of these trends, the Federal Reserve is widely expected to raise interest rates next week to prevent inflation …
Removing ‘Zombie’ Cells Deters Alzheimer’s in Mice
Eliminating dead-but-toxic cells occurring naturally in the brains of mice designed to mimic Alzheimer’s slowed neuron damage and memory loss associated with the disease, according to a study published Wednesday that could open a new front in the fight against dementia. The accumulation in the body of “zombie cells” that can no longer divide but still cause harm to other healthy cells, a process called senescence, is common to all mammals. Scientists have long known that these dead-beat cells gather in regions of the brain linked to old age diseases ranging from osteoarthritis and atherosclerosis to Parkinson’s and dementia. Prior research had also shown that the elimination of senescent cells in ageing mice extended their healthy lifespan. But the new results, published in Nature, are the first to demonstrate a cause-and-effect link with a specific disease, Alzheimer’s, the scientists said. But any treatments that might emerge from the research are many years down the road, they cautioned. In experiments, a team led by Tyler Bussian of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota used mice genetically modified to produce the destructive, cobweb-like tangles of tau protein that form in the neurons of Alzheimer’s patients. The mice were also programmed to allow for the elimination of “zombie” cells in the same region. “When senescent cells were removed, we found that the diseased animals retained the ability to form memories, and eliminated signs of inflammation,” said senior author Darren Baker, also from the Mayo Clinic. The mice likewise failed to develop Alzheimer’s signature …
Report: Extreme Poverty Declining Worldwide
The world is making progress in its efforts to lift people out of extreme poverty, but the global aspiration of eliminating such poverty by 2030 is unattainable, a new report found. A World Bank report released Wednesday says the number of people living on less than $1.90 per day fell to a record low of 736 million, or 10 percent of the world’s population, in 2015, the latest year for which data is available. The figure was less than the 11 percent recorded in 2013, showing slow but steady progress. “Over the last 25 years, more than a billion people have lifted themselves out of extreme poverty, and the global poverty rate is now lower than it has ever been in recorded history. This is one of the greatest human achievements of our time,” World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim said. “But if we are going to end poverty by 2030, we need much more investment, particularly in building human capital, to help promote the inclusive growth it will take to reach the remaining poor,” he warned. “For their sake, we cannot fail.” Poverty levels dropped across the world, except in the Middle East and North Africa, where civil wars spiked the extreme poverty rate from 9.5 million people in 2013 to 18.6 million in 2015. The highest concentration of extreme poverty remained in sub-Saharan Africa, with 41.1 percent, down from 42.5 percent. South Asia showed the greatest progress with poverty levels dropping to 12.4 percent from 16.2 percent …
China’s Alibaba Scraps Plan to Create 1M US Jobs
Alibaba Chairman Jack Ma said Wednesday that the Chinese e-commerce giant had canceled plans to create 1 million jobs in the U.S., blaming the ongoing trade war for the decision, according to Chinese news agency Xinhua. “This commitment is based on friendly China-U.S. cooperation and the rational and objective premise of bilateral trade,” Ma told Xinhua. “The current situation has already destroyed the original premise. There is no way to deliver the promise.” Ma originally pledged to spur job growth by letting American small businesses and farmers sell their goods on Alibaba, which is one of the world’s largest online retailers, when he visited then-President-elect Donald Trump early 2017. Trump imposed 10 percent tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports on Monday, threatening to place taxes on an additional $267 billion worth of Chinese imports if China attempts to retaliate. China placed tariffs on about $60 billion worth of U.S. products the next day as previously planned, though it reduced the size of the tariffs. At an Alibaba investor conference Tuesday, Ma described the state of economic relations between the two countries as a “mess” with consequences that could last for decades. Some experts said Ma’s plan to bring 1 million jobs to the U.S. might have been overly ambitious in the first place. …
Chinese Entrepreneur Rescinds Offer to Create 1 Million US Jobs
Chinese technology billionaire Jack Ma has rescinded his offer to create 1 million new jobs in the United States, saying it is no longer possible with the escalation of trade disputes between the world’s two biggest economies. The Alibaba chief made the U.S. jobs pledge to then-President-elect Donald Trump in January 2017 at Trump Tower in New York, just before Trump assumed power. The prospective U.S. leader declared, “Jack and I are going to do some great things.” But in an interview published late Wednesday by Xinhua, China’s official news agency, Ma said tit-for-tat tariffs imposed by Washington and Beijing, including new levies this week on billions of dollars of trade between China and the U.S., have scuttled his investment plans in the U.S.. “This promise was on the basis of friendly China-U.S. cooperation and reasonable bilateral trade relations, but the current situation has already destroyed that basis,” Ma said. “This promise can’t be completed.” Trump this week said he was imposing a 10 percent tariff on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports, with Beijing immediately responding by targeting $60 billion worth of U.S. imports with 5 to 10 percent taxes. As part of its 1 million jobs pledge, Alibaba, a massive online shopping site, had not planned to build factories or customer product fulfillment centers in the U.S. Rather, it had hoped to boost trade by helping small U.S. businesses sell their products in China and elsewhere in Asia. Alibaba held a conference in the Midwest city of Detroit …
Zimbabwe Government Pledges Funds to Fight Cholera Outbreak in Harare
Zimbabwe’s president, Emmerson Mnangagwa, says his government will assist municipalities struggling to fight a cholera outbreak that has killed 32 people and affected more than 3,000 during the past three weeks. After visiting the epicenter of the cholera outbreak in Harare, President Emmerson Mnangagwa vowed to help the Harare City Council with financial assistance and called on the corporate world to donate toward fighting the epidemic. “We are raising money, which has been coming in daily, so that we fix the burst pipes at Morton Jeffery Waterworks and the Central Business District, as well as the suburbs… we have been told that most of these pipes are old and are bursting at any given time, so we have found some well-wishers who are helping us. We will continue to support the Harare City Council In its programs meant to sanitize Harare, because the council does not have enough powers to be doing all the work alone,” he said. Nearby, David Shonhiwa, a vendor in Glen View, the suburban epicenter of Harare’s cholera epidemic, says there have been improvements in the area’s hygiene since cholera was detected, but more are needed. “The situation is better now. We have been receiving clean water and we got buckets, but it has not been possible for everyone to get something because there are difficulties which others have been encountering,” he said. Tuesday, a U.N. spokesperson in Zimbabwe, Sirak Gebrehiwot, said a U.N. emergency response fund may be activated as the cholera outbreak spreads to other …
DNA Tests Identify Ivory Smuggling Cartels
Researchers are using genetic analysis to connect the dots in the illegal ivory trade, linking multiple seizures of the valuable tusks to a common set of traffickers. Targeting these ivory-smuggling cartels could have a major impact on the elephant poaching that is driving the animals to extinction, according to the authors of a new study. The findings mean some suspects already facing charges from single arrests could face additional charges and stiffer penalties if convicted. Ivory trafficking is a multibillion dollar transnational criminal enterprise with links to other illegal activities, including drug trafficking. Poaching claims an estimated 40,000 elephants each year. Missing tusks University of Washington biologist Samuel Wasser and colleagues have been analyzing tusks seized in ivory busts to track where poached elephants came from. They previously identified hotspots in Tanzania and Mozambique from where nearly all the ivory seized between 2006 and 2014 came. The new findings emerged from the case of the missing tusks. Wasser and colleagues noticed that when ivory shipments were confiscated, they often only contained one of an elephant’s pair of tusks. When they searched through genetic data taken from large-scale ivory busts between 2006 and 2015, they found 26 cases in which a tusk from one seizure matched one from a separate shipment. In each case, the two shipments passed through the same port within a few months of each other. Wasser said that “suggest[s] that the same major trafficking cartel was actually responsible for shipping both.” The study, published in the journal …
Taking Back Carbon ‘Imperative’ to Stop Planet Overheating, Backers Say
With climate-changing emissions still inching higher — and resulting threats from extreme weather surging — sucking greenhouse gases out of the atmosphere must become an urgent priority, backers of “carbon removal” efforts say. “The math is quite simple,” Manish Bapna, executive vice president of the Washington-based World Resources Institute, told a panel discussion on the fledgling approach this week. If the world overshoots the temperature goals set in the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change, as looks increasingly likely, “carbon removal gets us back on track,” he said. “The first imperative is to reduce emissions as quickly and deeply as possible,” Bapna said. “But there is now a second imperative… to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere at a large scale.” Proposals to suck carbon out of the atmosphere range from planting many more trees, which absorb carbon dioxide to grow, to installing devices that capture carbon directly from the air. Changing farming practices to store more carbon in soils, or producing energy by growing trees or crops, burning them and pumping underground the carbon released also could play a role, scientists say. Interest in carbon removal technologies is growing, not least because countries from Britain to the United States have included some of them in their plans to curb climate change. They also feature in a report, due out next month, by the world’s leading climate scientists, who say governments may have to find ways to extract vast amounts of carbon from the air if warming overshoots the lower Paris pact …
Canada Wants to See Flexibility in NAFTA Talks With US
Canada said on Wednesday that it would need to see movement from the United States if the two sides are to reach a deal on renewing NAFTA, which Washington insists must be finished by the end of the month. Although the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump and its allies are increasing pressure on Canada to make the concessions they say are needed for the North American Free Trade Agreement, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made clear he also wanted to see flexibility. “We’re interested in what could be a good deal for Canada but we’re going to need to see a certain amount of movement in order to get there and that’s certainly what we’re hoping for,” he told reporters in Ottawa. Shortly afterwards, Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland met U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer for their fourth set of talks in four weeks with the two sides still disagreeing on major issues. Trump has already wrapped up a side deal with Mexico and is threatening to exclude Canada if necessary. Canadian officials say they do not believe the U.S. Congress would agree to turn NAFTA into a bilateral treaty. U.S. Chamber of Commerce President Thomas Donohue said it would be extremely complicated, if not impossible, for the administration to pull off a Mexico-only agreement. “If Canada doesn’t come into the deal there is no deal,” Donohue told a media breakfast in Washington. Donohue said he believed that if the administration wanted to end the current NAFTA, such a …
Kenya’s Finance Minister Cuts Spending, Money Transfer Taxes to Rise
Kenya’s Finance Minister Henry Rotich has cut the government’s spending budget by 55.1 billion shillings ($546.90 million), or 1.8 percent, for the fiscal year from July this year, a Treasury document showed on Wednesday. The government is facing a tough balancing act after a public outcry over a new 16 percent value added tax on all petroleum products forced President Uhuru Kenyatta to suggest to parliament to keep the VAT and cut if by half. In the document detailing the new spending estimates, Rotich said the budget had to be adjusted because of the amendments to tax measures brought by lawmakers when they first debated it and passed it last month. The proposed halving of the VAT rate on fuel has left the government with a funding shortfall, hence the cuts in spending. Parliament will vote on a raft of proposals, including the 1.8 percent cut on spending, in a special sitting on Thursday. Kenya’s economy is expected to grow by 6 percent this year, recovering from a drought, slowdown in lending and election-related worries that cut growth in 2017, but investors and the IMF have expressed concerns over growing public debt. While the next election is still four years away, the government’s economic policies are chafing with citizens angered by increasing costs of living. Fuel dealers protested when the VAT on fuel kicked in this month and citizen groups have gone to court to try to block new or higher taxes. Separate documents sent by Kenyatta to parliament ahead …
Vietnamese Fighting Back on Plastic Pollution
For many Vietnamese people, it is a ritual as circadian as the sunrise: On the way to work, they pull over their motorbikes to grab an iced coffee from a street vendor, complete with a plastic cup, plastic lid, plastic straw, and plastic case to hang from the bikes as they drive. The coffee, with four separate pieces of plastic for a single drink, exemplifies how this packaging has became such a common and wasteful scourge on Vietnam’s environment. But some citizens have become alarmed by the trend and begun fighting back against the pollution. More Vietnamese than ever are looking for alternatives to plastic, from metal bottles to cloth tote bags, just as many communities around the world are starting to believe they have relied for too long on cheap and versatile — but ecologically disastrous — plastic. Rwanda was remarkably efficient at banning plastic bags, while Durham, North Carolina has a volunteer program to distribute reusable takeout containers, and an Amsterdam grocer introduced an aisle of products with no plastic. What makes Vietnam special, to the chagrin of environmentalists, is that it ranks among the top five countries in the world that send plastic trash into the ocean, according to the Ocean Conservancy. To have become a top polluter is staggering for the Southeast Asian nation, especially when there are dozens of countries with much larger economies but far less plastic waste. “Everyone, every country should be responsible, it doesn’t matter the size,” said Tran An, a volunteer …
Report: Cryptocurrency Exchanges at Risk of Manipulation
Several cryptocurrency exchanges are plagued by poor market surveillance, pervasive conflicts of interest and lack sufficient customer protections, the New York Attorney General’s office said in a report published on Tuesday. The study found that online platforms where virtual currencies such as bitcoin can be bought and sold by individuals operate with lower safeguards than traditional financial markets, are vulnerable to market manipulation and put customer funds at risk. “As our report details, many virtual currency platforms lack the necessary policies and procedures to ensure the fairness, integrity, and security of their exchanges,” Attorney General Barbara Underwood said in a statement. As a result of the findings, the attorney general asked New York’s Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) to review whether three exchanges might be operating unlawfully in the state. The attorney general’s office launched its Virtual Markets Integrity Initiative in April 2018, asking 13 platforms to voluntarily share information about their practices. Four platforms did not participate, claiming they did not allow trades from within New York State. The Attorney General’s office investigated whether the platforms did operate in the state, and has referred three – Binance, Kraken and Gate.io – to NYDFS. The three platforms could not immediately be reached for comment. U.S. and international regulators have begun clamping down on malpractices in the cryptocurrency market over the past year as trading in the nascent asset class boomed. Two Wall Street regulators last week announced a series of actions, including levying fines, against companies involved with cryptocurrencies, while …
Фонд держмайна завчасно виконав річний план надходжень від оренди – Трубаров
Фонд державного майна станом на вересень отримав обсяг доходів від оренди майна, який планували отримати протягом року. Про це повідомив виконувач обов’язків голови Фонду Віталій Трубаров. За його словами, ФДМ вже отримав один мільярд гривень від оренди підзвітних йому об’єктів державної власності. Трубаров прогнозує, що до кінця року загальна сума сягне майже 1,5 мільярди гривень. Втім, голова Фонду звернув увагу на те, що чимало державних об’єктів досі не задіяні для оренди. Читайте також: «Перший лот малої приватизації виставили на продаж – Трубаров» «На сьогодні ще існує величезна кількість об’єктів, які перебувають на балансі різних міністерств і відомств, котрі не використовуються, пустують, а могли би приносити гроші до бюджету. І Фонд державного майна вкотре закликає балансоутримувачів більш активно передавати такі об’єкти для оренди», – заявив чиновник. Сума надходжень від оренди державного майна, закладена в проект бюджету 2018 року, становила один мільярд гривень. Надходження від приватизації мають сягнути 21,3 мільярди гривень. …
Мін’юст США розслідує заяви Маска щодо Tesla – Bloomberg
Компанія з виробництва електромобілів Tesla стала об’єктом уваги Міністерства юстиції Сполучених Штатів через публічні заяви свого засновника та директора Ілона Маска, повідомляє американське видання Bloomberg. Федеральні прокурори почали розслідування про ймовірне шахрайство після того, як Ілон Маск минулого місяця заявив, що думає, чи не викупити компанію Tesla в акціонерів. «Міркую над тим, щоб зробити Tesla приватною за ціною 420 доларів (за акцію – ред). Гроші є», – написав він тоді». Після цієї заяви акції компанії стрімко зросли. В Tesla підтвердили, що Мін’юст зв’язувався з нею. «Минулого місяця, після заяви Ілона, що він думає над купівлею компанії, Tesla отримала запит від Міністерства юстиції на добровільне надання документів, і у своїй відповіді ми пішли на співпрацю. Нам не надсилали судових повісток, запитів на дачу свідчень чи будь-яких інших формальних документів. Ми поважаємо бажання Міністерства юстиції отримати інформацію про справу і віримо, що вона буде швидко вирішена, коли вони ознайомляться з отриманими даними», – заявили в компанії. Читайте також: «Фейкові новини та «Pravda» мільярдера Ілона Маска: за і проти» Однак розслідування прокуратури в Північному судовому окрузі штату Каліфорнія все ж вилилося в повістку, яку Комісія з цінних паперів і бірж надіслала компанії щодо планів Маска її викупити, від яких він згодом відмовився. Акції Tesla 18 вересня впали на 3,4%. Загальне падіння протягом 2018 року – 8,5%. …
Kenya Taxi Drivers Create New Ride Hailing App
In Kenya, a new taxi hailing app developed by local taxi drivers is in its fourth month of operation in Nairobi. Dubbed BebaBeba by the Drivers and Partners Association of Kenya (DPAK), it was created to compete with Uber and other ride hailing apps. Rael Ombuor reports from Nairobi. …
Critics Skewer Venezuelan President Over Feast as Country Starves
Videos of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro feasting on steaks at an upscale restaurant have sparked worldwide outrage on behalf of the poverty-stricken people of his country. One video show celebrity chef Nusret Gokce, also known as “Salt Bae,” carving meat for the president and his wife, Cilia Flores, at the Nusr-Et restaurant in Istanbul, where each cut of meat can cost hundreds of dollars. Florida Senator Marco Rubio slammed the chef who was filmed with the “dictator,” who was shown eating “a five-star gourmet meal, smoking fine cigars while the people of Venezuela are literally starving.” “It’s an outrage, disgusting … this is a man starving human beings and [Salt Bae] is celebrating him as some sort of hero – I got pissed,” Rubio told the Miami Herald on Tuesday. “I don’t know who this weirdo #Saltbae is, but the guy he is so proud to host is not the President of #Venezuela. He is actually the overweight dictator of a nation where 30% of the people eat only once a day & infants are suffering from malnutrition,” Rubio tweeted Tuesday. The senator also tweeted the address and phone number of the chef’s restaurant in Miami, which is home to scores of Venzeulan-Americans and Cuban-Americans who despise the socialist leader. Opposition leader Julio Borges, who lives in exile in Colombia, tweeted: “While Venezuelans suffer and die of hunger, Nicolas Maduro and Cilia Flores have a good time in one of the most expensive restaurants in the world, all with money …
Mexico’s Next Anti-money Laundering Czar Vows Action After ‘Shameful’ Odebrecht
Mexico’s incoming financial intelligence chief said it was “shameful” how little had been done about bribes that Brazilian construction firm Odebrecht executives said were paid to secure Mexican public works contracts, and vowed to reexamine the case once in office. Santiago Nieto will head the finance ministry’s Financial Intelligence Unit, which analyzes suspicious financial records, once the new leftist government takes office on Dec. 1. He said in an interview last week that the unit had been misused for political ends, without elaborating. “It’s shameful that Mexico and Venezuela are the only countries in Latin America that haven’t sanctioned anyone,” he said of the Odebrecht case, which is at the heart of Brazil’s Lava Jato, or Car Wash, corruption investigation that has reverberated across the region in recent years. “In the case of Odebrecht, and in any other case, the first thing we would have to do is review what there is in the Financial Intelligence Unit related to the case,” he said. Nieto does not yet have access to files and records kept by the unit. In Brazil, Odebrecht executives admitted to paying bribes within Mexico. Prosecutors in Mexico have said they are probing business between the Brazilian conglomerate and state oil company Pemex. Pemex has declined to comment on issues related to Odebrecht, citing the ongoing investigation. The office of Mexico’s attorney general, the finance ministry and the Financial Intelligence Unit all declined to comment for this story. Odebrecht acknowledged receipt of an emailed request for comment, but …
When the Music’s Over: Cities Suffer as Venues Fall to Developers
When Pearl Jam led 50,000 people in a chant of “Save the Showbox” in a Seattle stadium last month, the rockers confronted a question facing many cities: When do the cultural costs of a property boom become too high? The Showbox is an 1,100-person venue across the street from Pike Place Market, Seattle’s top tourist attraction. It opened in 1939 and has hosted acts from Duke Ellington to Prince, as well as the hometown grunge pioneers Pearl Jam. The venue now risks becoming the latest casualty of the Pacific Northwest city’s real estate rush – and many in the community are saying enough is enough. “Today one of our great cathedrals is at risk of being leveled,” said Ben Gibbard, lead singer of indie rock band Death Cab for Cutie, at a Seattle City Council hearing in August. “It’s not just a music venue, but a cornerstone of our cultural heritage. We cannot allow this vital piece of our rapidly changing city to be snuffed out.” Historic venues are being crushed by real estate development in cities across Britain and the United States. London has lost 35 percent of its independent music venues since 2007, according to the mayor’s office. In 2014, The New York Observer documented eight significant music venues the city lost over the previous decade, beginning with punk icon venue CBGB and ending with the Roseland Ballroom, another pre-World War II concert hall. Experts say that the trend affects more than just music fans, bands, and others …
Winning Design for Phnom Penh Factory Worker Homes, a Model for Other Cities
An award-winning design for factory worker housing in Cambodia’s capital will serve as a model for homes in other cities in the rapidly-urbanizing country, according to the charity that will build 3,000 units based on the blueprint next year. The contest was hosted by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) as part of its strategy to encourage investment in sustainable development worldwide. The competition required designs for housing for workers and their families at a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in the capital of Phnom Penh, which would “improve the quality of life of the intended residents.” In the SEZ, “options for high quality, affordable, safe housing are limited”, said David Cole, director of Britain-based Building Trust International, which will construct the homes based on the winning entry by India’s atArchitecture. “When construction of the winning design is complete, it should provide a precedent for similar affordable housing projects, which are needed to meet the growing demand in Phnom Penh and other cities in Cambodia,” he said. There are more than 17,000 workers in the Phnom Penh SEZ, with the number set to rise steadily as more people migrate from the countryside for jobs, according to the UNDP. The competition, backed by the UNDP’s SDG Impact Finance, tapped into the U.N.’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals that aim to tackle the world’s most challenging problems, from halting deforestation to reducing child mortality. The U.N. estimates that achieving these targets by 2030 will require $5 trillion to $7 trillion. The gap in developing …
In Hong Kong, Disposable Fashion Gets a Recycled Makeover
In Hong Kong, more than 340 tons of textile waste is dumped each day into the city’s overflowing landfills, according to the city’s Environmental Protection Department. But a new textile spinning mill, the first to open in this former textile manufacturing powerhouse in half a century, aims to reuse that waste, harnessing pioneering recycling technology to try to make the fashion industry more sustainable. “These technologies may be the gateway to a fashion industry decoupled from the use of virgin natural resources,” said Erik Bang, who heads innovation efforts for the H&M Foundation, a nonprofit funded by the family, founders and main owners of H&M Group. The clothing retailer has already placed a first order at the mill, as part of its bid to become “fully circular and renewable,” according to Cecilia Brännsten, the group’s environmental sustainability manager. The Novetex Upcycling Factory in Tai Po Industrial Estate, when it opens this month, will use new technology to separate fabric blends in waste garments and produce yarn. It comes as clothing companies around the world doubled the amount of garments they made from 2000 to 2014, according to a 2016 report by management consultancy McKinsey & Co. Over the same period, the number of garments bought each year, per person, jumped 60 percent, the report said. That has led to a stream of clothing — purchased and thrown away, left unsold, or tossed as textile plant waste — going into landfills. Curbing ‘take-make-dispose’ The government of Hong Kong wants to encourage its 7.3 …
Uncontacted Tribes at Risk Amid ‘Worrying’ Surge in Amazon Deforestation
Illegal loggers and militias cleared an area three times the size of Gibraltar in Brazil’s Amazon this year, threatening an “uncontacted” indigenous tribe, activists said on Tuesday. Satellite imagery collected by Instituto Socioambiental (ISA), a Brazilian advocacy group, detected about 4,600 acres (1,863 hectares) of deforestation this year in the Ituna Itata indigenous land in northern Para state. “This situation is very worrying,” Juan Doblas, senior geo-processing analyst at ISA, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. “There is a series of risks, not only to indigenous territories of uncontacted tribes, but also to other indigenous territories in the area.” The indigenous affairs agency Funai and the federal police were not immediately available to comment. The environmental protection agency Ibama said in a statement that official data on Amazon deforestation will be released in November. Brazil’s uncontacted tribes, some of the last on earth, depend on large areas of unspoiled forest land to hunt animals and gather the food they need to survive. They are particularly vulnerable when their land rights are threatened because they lack the natural immunity to diseases that are carried by outsiders, rights groups say. Forest loss in Ituna Itata — from which outsiders were banned in 2011 to protect the uncontacted tribe — spiked to about 2,000 acres in August from 7 acres in May, said ISA, which has monitored the area through satellites since January. South America’s largest country is grappling with scores of deadly land conflicts, illustrating the tensions between preserving indigenous culture and economic …