Month: April 2019

The U.N. labor agency says existing methods of protecting workers from accidents and disease are not good enough to deal with new occupational hazards arising from changes in the nature of work.  The International Labor Organization (ILO) is calling for revisions to address physical and psychological problems stemming from the changing job world. In a new report, ILO estimates find 2.78 million workers die from occupational accidents and work-related diseases each year. It says more than 374 million people are injured or fall ill every year through work-related accidents.  The cost to the world economy from work days lost is nearly four percent of global Gross Domestic Product. The ILO’s report warns the changes and dangers posed by an increase in technology could result in a worsening of that situation.  It says new measures must be implemented to deal with the psycho-social risks, work-related stress and non-communicable diseases resulting from new forms of work. It says digitization, artificial intelligence, robotics and automatization require new monitoring methods to protect workers.   Manal Azzi, an ILO Technical Specialist on Occupational Safety and Health, says that  on the one hand, new technology is freeing workers from many dirty, dangerous jobs.  On the other, she says, the jobs can raise ethical concerns. She told VOA surveillance of workers has become more intrusive, leading them to work longer hours, a situation that may not be ethical. “Also, different monitoring systems that workers wear.  Before, you would punch in, punch out.  Now, you could wear bands …

Pakistan Finance Minister Asad Umar has resigned days after returning home from crucial talks with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on a financial bailout package to avert a national balance of payments crisis. While formally announcing his decision to leave Thursday at a hurriedly arranged news conference in Islamabad, Umar explained that he was asked to take the energy minister position instead of finance as part of a Cabinet reorganization. Umar acknowledged his successor would have to make “some difficult decisions” to deal with economic challenges facing Pakistan. Prime Minister Imran Khan’s eight-month-old administration has faced sustained criticism from political opponents, independent commentators and the business community over the government’s handling of the economic crisis facing the country. Much of that criticism was leveled against Umar. Umar returned this week from Washington, where his delegation fleshed out details of Pakistan’s next IMF bailout package that he said could be up to $8 billion. Critics blamed the outgoing minister for taking months to finalize the IMF deal, saying the delay shattered investor confidence in Pakistan’s economy. But speaking Thursday, Umar defended his performance. “We have finalized the IMF agreement on much better terms than before.I have made these decisions.I refused to take the decisions that would have crushed the nation,” Umar said without elaborating. He said that an IMF mission is expected to visit Islamabad later this month to work out more details “since all major issues had been settled and documented,” he said. 13th bailout The long-delayed package would be …

The U.S. trade deficit fell to an eight-month low in February as imports from China plunged, temporarily providing a boost to President Donald Trump’s “America First” agenda and economic growth in the first quarter. The surprise second straight monthly narrowing in the trade gap reported by the Commerce Department on Wednesday was also driven by soaring aircraft exports, which are likely to reverse after Boeing halted deliveries of its troubled 737 MAX aircraft. MAX planes have been grounded indefinitely following two deadly crashes. Economists warned the trade deficit would remain elevated regardless of whether the United States and China struck a trade deal that was to the White House’s liking because of Americans’ insatiable appetite for cheaper imports. Talks between Washington and China to resolve the bitter trade war have been dragging. The United States is also embroiled in conflicts with other trading partners, including the European Union, contributing to big swings in exports and imports data in recent months. “Even if trade negotiations are resolved in such a way as to reduce the bilateral trade deficit with China, one of the Trump administration’s stated goals, this would likely divert trade flows to other countries and have little impact on the top-line U.S. trade deficit,” said Emily Mandel, an economist at Moody’s Analytics in West Chester, Pennsylvania. The trade deficit tumbled 3.4% to $49.4 billion in February, the lowest level since June 2018. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast the trade shortfall widening to $53.5 billion in February. The politically …

A long-hidden trove of unpublished works by Franz Kafka could soon be revealed following a decade-long battle over his literary estate that has drawn comparisons to some of his surreal tales. A district court in Zurich upheld Israeli verdicts in the case last week, ruling that several safe deposit boxes in the Swiss city could be opened and their contents shipped to Israel’s National Library. At stake are untouched papers that could shed new light on one of literature’s darkest figures, a German-speaking Bohemian Jew from Prague whose cultural legacy has been hotly contested between Israel and Germany. What’s in the vaults? Though the exact content of the vaults remains unknown, experts have speculated the cache could include endings to some of Kafka’s major works, many of which were unfinished when they were published after his death. Israel’s Supreme Court has stripped an Israeli family of its collection of Kafka’s manuscripts, which were hidden in Israeli bank vaults and in a squalid, cat-filled Tel Aviv apartment. But the Swiss ruling would complete the acquisition of nearly all his known works, after years of lengthy legal battles over their rightful owners. Kafkaesque saga The saga could have been penned by Kafka himself, whose name has become known as an adjective to describe absurd situations involving inscrutable legal processes. Kafka was known for his tales of everyman protagonists crushed by mysterious authorities or twisted by unknown shames. In “The Trial,” for example, a bank clerk is put through excruciating court proceedings without …

China’s economic growth held steady in the latest quarter despite a tariff war with Washington, in a reassuring sign that Beijing’s efforts to reverse a slowdown might be gaining traction. The world’s second-largest economy expanded by 6.4% over a year earlier in the three months ending in March, the government reported Wednesday. That matched the previous quarter for the weakest growth since 2009. “This confirms that China’s economic growth is bottoming out and this momentum is likely to continue,” said Tai Hui of JP Morgan Asset Management in a report. Government intervention Communist leaders stepped up government spending last year and told banks to lend more after economic activity weakened, raising the risk of politically dangerous job losses. Beijing’s decision to ease credit controls aimed at reining in rising debt “is starting to yield results,” Hui said. Consumer spending, factory activity and investment all accelerated in March from the month before, the National Bureau of Statistics reported. The economy showed “growing positive factors,” a bureau statement said. ​Recovery later this year Forecasters expect Chinese growth to bottom out and start to recover later this year. They expected a recovery last year but pushed back that time line after President Donald Trump hiked tariffs on Chinese imports over complaints about Beijing’s technology ambitions. The fight between the two biggest global economies has disrupted trade in goods from soybeans medical equipment, battering exporters on both sides and rattling financial markets. The two governments say settlement talks are making progress, but penalties on …

Argentine presidential hopeful Sergio Massa would renegotiate the country’s unpopular financing deal with the International Monetary Fund if he wins office later this year, the former congressman told reporters on Tuesday. The $56 billion IMF standby financing agreement includes fiscal cuts that have enraged wide segments of the public, denting the popularity of President Mauricio Macri. “We need to find a longer-term mechanism to ensure that Argentina meets its debt obligations, ” the 46-year-old Massa said in a briefing with international correspondents. Macri was forced to negotiate the IMF deal last year amid a sell-off in the peso that raised questions about Argentina’s ability to pay dollar-denominated bond obligations. Many Argentines blame the IMF for policies that set the stage for the country’s 2002 sovereign debt default and economic meltdown. Popular protests supported by Massa’s Peronist party have gained momentum in recent weeks as the Macri administration pursues IMF-backed public utility subsidy cuts and other austerity measures aimed at erasing the primary fiscal deficit this year, a goal included in the IMF pact. Massa, who wants to unseat Macri in the October election, spoke just hours after Macri’s government announced that consumer prices shot 4.7 percent higher in March alone, bringing 12-month inflation to 54.7 percent. More than three years into his first term, Macri’s re-election is less than certain as his government strains to jumpstart a shrinking economy while cutting the fiscal deficit and trying to tame one of the world’s highest inflation rates. Previous Argentine leader and possible …

Surrounded by vultures perched on trees awaiting their turn, Venezuelan migrants scrape out a living scavenging for metal, plastic, cardboard and food in a Brazilian border town’s rubbish dump. Trapped in a wasteland limbo, they barely make enough to feed their families and cannot afford a bus ticket to get away and find regular work in Brazilian cities to the south. They blame leftist President Nicolas Maduro for mismanaging their oil-producing nation’s economy and causing the deep crisis that has driven several million Venezuelans to emigrate across Latin America. “I left because I was dying of hunger. We are trying to get ahead looking through this rubbish. Every night I pray to God to take me out of here,” said Rosemary Tovar, a 23-year-old mother from Caracas. Tens of thousands of Venezuelans have fled the political and economic upheaval in their country through Pacaraima, the only road crossing to Brazil, overloading social services and causing tension in the northern border state of Roraima. More than 40,000 Venezuelans have swollen the population of state capital Boa Vista by 11 percent, Mayor Tereza Surita told Reuters. The influx has also been a headache for Brazil’s new, far-right government of President Jair Bolsonaro, who has so far resisted U.S. pressure to take a more forceful attitude against Maduro. About 3.7 million people have left Venezuela in recent years, mostly via its western neighbor Colombia, according to the World Bank. A dozen Venezuelans scramble to grab bags of rubbish that tumble from the Pacaraima …

Argentina’s inflation rate accelerated for the third straight month in March, the government statistics agency said on Tuesday, prompting the central bank to unveil fresh measures to temper raging inflation and protect the embattled peso currency. The recession-hit country’s consumer prices rose 4.7% for the month, taking the year-to-date increase to 11.8%. Rolling 12-month inflation is running at 54.7%, the National Institute of Statistics and Censuses (INDEC) said. “That’s a very bad number,” said Alberto Bernal, chief emerging markets strategist at XP Investments in New York, adding it would force the country’s central bank to keep already-sky-high rates elevated to help protect the peso currency. Argentina has been taking measures to fight inflation since last year, when prices rose 47.6%, battering consumers’ spending power and dampening President Mauricio Macri’s popularity ahead of make-or-break national elections later this year. Latin America’s No. 3 economy has also been hit by broader financial turmoil that has left a third of the population in poverty, forced interest rates upward and sent the beleaguered peso currency tumbling against the dollar. Argentine central bank chief Guido Sandleris said in a press conference after the data that the bank believed the pace of inflation would start to ease from April. He added the central bank would reinforce the “contractionary bias” of monetary policy, which includes freezing a non-intervention peso trading range until year-end and holding off from buying dollars to rein in the currency if it strengthens outside the range until the end of June. The bank …

In Zimbabwe, white farmers whose land was taken by the government are cautiously hopeful about a promise from President Emmerson Mnangagwa to give them at least partial repayment. The promise came a few days before Zimbabwe celebrates 39 years of independence. On Sunday, state media quoted President Mnangagwa promising partial compensation for white commercial farmers whose land was seized under former president Robert Mugabe and redistributed to blacks. He said the government would pay for improvements to the land, such as buildings or dams. Ex-farmers are now submitting requests for compensation at the offices of the Zimbabwe Commercial Farmers Union. One of them is Glen Johnston, whose mother, Agnes, was displaced from her farm about 17 years ago. Since then, she has been living in Harare with her son. Johnston says he is taking the president’s promise with caution.   WATCH: Zimbabwe Makes Promise to White Farmers “Basically, it looks like we’ve been promised that we have steps to be taken. So now, taking the steps, will we get the money at the end of the day? Obviously time will tell,” he said. The land seizures began in 2000 with the backing of Mugabe, who said they would correct colonial imbalances. Farm production plunged, and critics blamed the seizures for the collapse of Zimbabwe’s economy. Others blamed the collapse on targeted Western sanctions imposed in 2002, in response to alleged election rigging and human rights abuses. Douglas Mahiya of the ruling ZANU-PF party does not think Zimbabwe should compensate white …