Israel just finished a mass deportation of over 150 Sudanese nationals. From this Associated press story that we found at the Athens Banner Herald, Daniel Estrin says Israel conducted the deportation because they claim the migrants were overwhelming the state.
Another link from the Middle East, this time for the Gaza Strip. The From Poverty to Power blog has this story about de-Development in Gaza. The post was written by Kristy Hughes of Oxfam.
The US Census Bureau say that half of the children in Alabama's Dallas County lives in relative poverty. The Montgomery Advertiser made mention of the Associated Press story.
From IRIN, a story on the role that small urban gardens play in fighting poverty.
Mame Penda Diouf talks above car horns and city bus engines as she shows potted lettuce, mint and potato plants at a traffic circle in the Senegal capital Dakar. A trader and horticulture trainer, she said micro-gardening – which can create jobs and allows people to better feed their families – is an answer to poverty.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and many other international and local institutions are pushing just that message – that micro-gardening and other forms of urban horticulture can go a long way to boosting city dwellers’ food security and improving living conditions.
Two hundred people from 39 countries met from 6 to 9 December to talk about building an international network to promote and implement urban horticulture, incorporating the practice into urban planning, and developing alternatives to pesticides.
Urban and peri-urban horticulture is the cultivation of a wide range of crops – including fruits, vegetables, roots, tubers and ornamental plants – in cities and towns and the surrounding areas. FAO says an estimated 130 million urban residents in Africa and 230 million in Latin America engage in agriculture, mainly horticulture, to provide food for their families and/or earn an income.
“While the urban poor, particularly those arriving from rural areas, have long practised horticulture as a livelihood and survival strategy, in many countries the sector is still largely informal, usually precarious, and sometimes illegal,” according to FAO.
People often farm idle urban land, but with no legal standing they can be kicked off when the land is wanted for development. FAO says urban policies should acknowledge the role of urban and peri-urban agriculture in development.
About half the world population lives in urban areas, according to the UN Population Fund; the number is expected to reach some five billion by 2030.
Neveen Metwally, a researcher at the Central Laboratory for Agriculture Climate in Cairo, Egypt, said city dwellers must be convinced of the benefits of urban horticulture, and scientific data translated into messages that speak to the needs of ordinary people so as to broaden the practice.
In Egypt the numerous benefits of rooftop gardens are well-documented, she told IRIN – they can decrease air pollution; absorb heat and act as insulators, reducing the energy needed for cooling or heating; and provide low-cost food and often also a source of revenue.
“But I can say to someone, ‘A rooftop garden will help the environment’, and they’ll say, ‘No, thank you – I just want to feed my family’. So I must identify and communicate benefits that are of interest to that person.”
Health
Jacky Ganry, of the French agricultural research organization CIRAD, said health should be the entry point for promoting urban and peri-urban horticulture.
“We know that non-communicable disease is a more alarming problem in urban areas than rural ones. An unbalanced diet is much more common in urban areas because of the price of fruits and vegetables, and the consumption of imported and processed products,” he told IRIN.
Participants said urban farming should be advocated as a strategy to combat malnutrition, disease and poverty, and urban infrastructure should favour the development of horticulture, for example, through land-use planning and better irrigation and drainage systems.
Muhammad Yunus has weighed in on the microcredit crisis in India. The suicides of 17 borrowers has led to a government investigation of microcredit bank practices. Some new laws have been implemented and some accuse the banks of charging outrageous interest rates.
From this AFP article that is hosted at Google News, we read more comments from the man who started microcredit.
India's biggest lender to the poor, SKS Microfinance, has been in the spotlight following a series of suicides among debt-laden villagers in Andhra Pradesh state, where authorities have reacted by ordering a crackdown on microfinanciers.
"A lot of people are misusing and abusing the concept and use it as vehicle to make money. And SKS is a big example in this regard," Yunus told reporters in Dhaka, the Bangladeshi capital.
He said SKS boss Vikram Akula had set up a non-governmental organisation and transformed it into a profit-making company which he then launched on the Mumbai stock exchange.
"It's a complete detour and nothing but a quitting of the (microfinance) mission," said Yunus, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for his Grameen Bank's microfinance work.
"The original micro-credit concept cannot be blamed for their faults," he added.
The microfinance industry in India, once seen as a saviour of the poor, is in crisis after criticism of the alleged abusive practices by debt collectors and high interest rates.
A new debate is forming in how to treat the cholera epidemic in Haiti. People are beginning to call on the World Health Organization to begin distributing cholera vaccines in Haiti. Up until now, treatment of those already infected with re-hydration has been the action taken.
There’s reason to fear that this outbreak is, in the words of a colleague who’s an expert on the disease, “not your grandmother’s cholera.” The strain described by epidemiologists as “an El Tor biotype of Vibrio cholerae serogroup 01” seems especially virulent and hard to slow down. In fact, if the long history of a similar El Tor strain in Bangladesh is any indication, the disease could become endemic in Haiti. That threat makes it all the more urgent for the world to renew its relief efforts in Haiti—and to resist the temptation to write off the country’s 10 million people as beyond hope.
The No. 1 priority is to deliver quality care to the sick. Although cholera’s profuse diarrhea can shrivel and kill a healthy adult in hours, early detection and expert care can save virtually anyone who contracts the disease. And in our opinion, proper care includes aggressive use of antibiotics. Some authorities recommend that treatment consist only of oral rehydration or, failing that, intravenous resuscitation. Antibiotic therapy is currently recommended only for the most severe cases, because of cost and for fear of encouraging the growth of drug-resistant microbes. In the case of Haiti’s present outbreak, we think this is a mistake. Antibiotics can shorten the course of illness, decrease the volume of diarrhea, and reduce the time that patients shed contagious organisms—all of which helps prevent deaths and limit transmission.
Oral cholera vaccines are another powerful tool against the disease, protecting as many as 90 percent of people who have been fully vaccinated. Some say this can’t work in Haiti, since at least two doses are recommended; others argue the vaccine is too expensive or in short supply. But we’ve already accomplished an even tougher feat by completing a three-course dose of the cervical cancer vaccine in Haiti for 76 percent of the girls we enrolled—about twice the rate for similar programs in the United States—and the earthquake struck between the first and second doses. Vaccines were not recommended during last year’s cholera outbreak in Zimbabwe, and 4,000 people died in a single year. With half that number of deaths in just one month, Haiti can’t afford not to consider vaccination. And the rest of the world can’t afford not to have a global vaccine stockpile.
From IRIN, a look at how anti-human trafficking NGOs work a border city of India to stop people being trafficked in from Nepal.
The daily flow of Nepalis over the border to India is relentless, as they come by car, motorcycle, rickshaw and horse-drawn carriage, but mostly on foot, through the main gate at the border city of Nepalganj.
Not all the migrants are legitimate, however, and there are lookouts to prevent traffickers’ false promises from being realized. Waiting by the side of the road, Puspa Rana and Bimala Shrestha blend in with the rickshaw drivers, food vendors and resting travellers.
The two women with Saathi, a local anti-trafficking NGO, notice a young woman walking briskly with a young man, and pull the two aside for questioning.
But the couple's story checks out; they are going to India to work as potato farmers.
Just a few minutes later, two workers with the NGO International Nepal Fellowship (INF) hand over to Saathi a young couple whose behaviour, they say, is suspicious.
“When we asked them where they are going, the girl started weeping and the man tried to run away,” said Hem Bahadur Thapa of INF.
The girl said she was 14 and that she had married the man, who appeared at least several years older, a month previously.
Twice she changed her explanation for the trip: first it was for work, then for a medical check-up, and lastly, to visit her sister.
“We think he could be a broker, but we have don’t have any clear evidence yet,” said Puspa Rana of Saathi, referring to the man.
The NGO workers then escorted the couple to local police, who are supposed to open an investigation.
Looking for a better life
Nepal’s per capita GDP is just US$467 and often substantially lower in rural areas.
Such poverty compels some 1.5 million Nepalis every year to work abroad, mostly in neighbouring India but, increasingly, in other countries in Asia and in the Gulf, according to the government's Central Bureau of Statistics.
Many find work across the border on their own; others are enticed. Traffickers offer poorly educated rural Nepali women jobs as domestic workers or factory staff that promise steady pay.
However, the deals can be a ruse, say anti-trafficking NGOs.
Once out of their country, some trafficked Nepali females are sold into bonded labour as domestic or sex workers with no pay and no way out unless their families pay for their return, or the women are rescued or flee, say rights groups.
According to researchers from the UK-based University of Southampton in the most recent and comprehensive study on this topic, released in 2005, most trafficked females are between the ages of 13 and 18, unmarried, illiterate and born into the Mongoloid or Dalit “untouchable” castes - which while no longer legal are still widely observed.
The report, based on interviews with victims of trafficking at NGO shelters, estimated some 7,000 Nepali women and girls are trafficked annually, through deception or abduction, into India for forced sex work.
NGOs say the report’s findings remain true today.
On the lookout
Saathi and fellow anti-trafficking NGO Maiti Nepal say that in the first 10 months of 2010 at the Nepalganj checkpoint, they counselled more than 16,000 border crossers, sent back 106 and were contacted by the families of 99 missing persons.
“First, we look at their behaviour. Do they look concerned?” said Bharat Singh Rathaur, the police officer in charge of the border outpost.
“Second, we see who they are with. Are they on their own – which makes us concerned – or with friends and family?”
Since police and NGOs have stepped up their surveillance at major transit points in recent years, traffickers are using more isolated routes along the open 1,880km border between Nepal and India, said Rathaur.
Nepali women were banned by their government from working in the Gulf in 1998 because of safety concerns, leading traffickers increasingly to circumvent the ban by transiting to third countries through India, said Navaraj Joshi, head of Saathi in Nepalganj.
A study conducted in New York City to track the fortunes of those about to become homeless is being called cruel by advocates. New York Times writer Cara Buckley describes the study that withholds housing assistance from the "control" group.
A health-care non-profit in Uganda learned a lesson from Avon in how to conduct their business. From Fast Company writer Lisa Katayama talks about how Living Goods gets health-care products out to the people.
The divide between rich and poor in China is growing, and the gap is showing up in other abusive forms. From the Inter Press Service writer Mitch Moxley describes the new abuse of privilege.
Next up in our continuing series of guest posts from Concern Worldwide, is this look at recovery efforts in Pakistan. Press Officer Joop Koopman says that relationships with other NGOs and community members have helped to look to speed recovery efforts from the summer flooding.
Susan Finucane, program officer at Concern Worldwide US, and I have come to Pakistan to report on the progress of Concern’s large-scale emergency program in response to the megadisaster caused by summer’s unprecedented heavy rains and massive flooding that left an area the size of Italy underwater.
Upon our arrival, Dorothy Blane, Concern Worldwide Country Director in Pakistan, briefs us on Concern’s immediate priorities and our approach to this particular disaster, which is informed by a long track record in both long-term development and emergencies in Pakistan.
LONG-TERM RELATIONSHIPS SECURE VITAL REACH
What gives Concern vital reach and flexibility, says Dorothy, is our network of local partners and our long-term relationships with community members in the poorest parts of Pakistan. Dorothy tells us that working with local organizations is “a powerful way to build up civil society.” Concern offers capacity building and technical expertise that benefits and strengthens local NGOs so that work can be sustained in the long term without Concern. The local NGOs Concern partners with in Pakistan closely involve the communities they serve through Community-Based Organizations, an approach strongly encouraged by Concern in its programs throughout the world.
The purpose of Susan’s and my field visit is to see firsthand the impact of the disaster on communities in Pakistan and document the ongoing humanitarian needs, as well as to document the emergency response programs that Concern is overseeing in Sindh and Punjab provinces. Compared to KPK, where the recovery and reconstruction process has begun in earnest, people in Sindh and Punjab still face enormous needs and challenges.
In Sindh, only 30 percent of people displaced by the flooding have been able to return to their homes, with significant parts of the province still underwater, and silted soil has ruined the first post-flood harvest. Many of those who have returned to their villages are still living in makeshift dwellings pending the construction of more permanent dwellings. In Punjab, where most of the water has receded, the big challenge is to make the destroyed crop lands productive again. In KPK, in the north, the advent of winter and cold weather are making the construction of solid housing an urgent matter.
For example, Concern gave 900 farming families from the village of Basti Noon Wada, in District Muzaffargah in South Punjab, 50kg bags of wheat and basic farming tools just before wheat planting season ended in early December. The orderly distribution process managed to serve 500 people a day.
SAFEGUARDING COMMUNITIES AGAINST DISEASE
In the spontaneous settlement of Sonda Eid Gab, in District Thatta in Sindh, 128 families are living in tents and make-shift shelters just up a hillside from where their community once stood at the river’s edge. The remains of a wall are among the few reminders of the existence of a once thriving village, the majority of whose men made their living fishing. Concern built latrines in this settlement to reduce health threats from poor sanitation, and has also been providing clean drinking water to meet the population’s daily needs, along with hygiene education programs. All of these are safeguarding an extremely vulnerable community against waterborne diseases and other health risks.
For the nearly 200 families in the village of Abora Jakhro, a few hours’ drive from the camp, Concern is also building new latrines—complete with permanent plumbing—and the new hand pumps are the pride of the community. “Before we simply never thought about hygiene,” said Nooran Merbahar, a mother of five children. “We were plagued by mosquitoes, and we had to rely on dirty water. All of us got sick.” Those days are now behind her.
Nearly 20 million people have been affected by this disaster, with 7 million in urgent need of shelter, food, water, seeds and tools, livelihood opportunities and repairs to infrastructure such as roads, bridges and, especially, permanent housing.
Through its commitment to local partners, Concern empowers local groups that would otherwise not have the capacity to jump into action or be eligible for significant funding. And once projects get underway, Concern’s monitoring mechanism also ensures ongoing support and training for such local organizations.
BUILDING PAKISTAN BACK BETTER THROUGH LOCAL PARTNERSHIPS
“It often makes no sense for us or other international NGOs to set up and staff local offices when so many committed and capable civil society organizations are already in place,” Blane insists. Local and community organizations have a wisdom and experience that INGOs need in order to ensure local sensitivity, appropriate solutions, and sustainability.
In fact, though Concern began working in Paksitan in 2001, the history of INGOs in Pakistan is a relatively short one, explains Mubashir Ahmed, Concern’s Assistant Country Director. It wasn’t until the 2005 earthquake that INGOs built up a significant and lasting presence in Pakistan, as the crisis highlighted Pakistan’s widespread poverty.
Similarly, the long-term needs of Sindh and Punjab—both suffering from extreme poverty—were not really on the radar until the devastating floods. There was momentum after the 2005 Pakistan earthquake to help build the affected areas back better. That call to action applies even more powerfully today, as Concern is helping lay the groundwork for long-term recovery for millions whose assets and homes were literally washed away by the floodwaters.
The World Health Organization is now looking into vaccinating people in Haiti to ward off cholera. If they begin the WHO will have to solve the problems of buying more vaccines as well as transportation and distribution issues.
From the New York Times, writer Donald G. McNeil Jr. examines the possible switch in strategy.
So far, the cholera vaccine has seen little use in Haiti, where the disease has killed more than 2,000 people and is still spreading. However, major obstacles remain, including supply shortages, transportation problems and the need to administer the vaccine several times for it to be effective.
But the Pan American Health Organization, which represents the W.H.O. in the Western Hemisphere, recently learned that there might be one million to two million doses of vaccine in the world, not just the 200,000 it originally thought, Dr. Jon K. Andrus, the Pan American organization’s deputy director, said Friday. “We recognize that it’s time to rethink our position,” he said. “We don’t want to miss an opportunity.”
His organization will hold a meeting of experts in Washington next Friday to consider whether to buy those doses and move them to Haiti.
Even if the group agrees to move forward, there would be no quick fix. Most of the doses are in bulk form, and it could take up to two months to have them ready, Dr. Andrus said. Also, the vaccines have not been tested by the W.H.O.
Also on Friday, Dr. Paul Farmer, who is well known for fighting AIDS in Haiti, endorsed broader use of the vaccine there, and called for creating emergency stockpiles of millions of doses to keep cholera from spreading to other countries.
He endorsed measures like searching Haiti’s central mountains for people too sick to reach clinics, using antibiotics even in moderate cases and rebuilding the water and sanitation networks shattered by January’s earthquake.
1.5 million Zimbabweans are living South Africa but many are expected to return soon. South Africa is expected to resume deportations of Zimbabwean migrants at the end of the month. South Africa did allow Zimbabwean people in during the country's recent political and economic collapse.
From Reuters Alert Net, writer Katy Migiro describes how the country is bracing for the mass return of people.
The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) says thousands of migrants are expected to pass through a reception and support centre it's been running since 2006 for Zimbabwean migrants at Beitbridge on the Zimbabwe-South Africa border.
IOM officials say services on offer include medical care, counselling for rape victims, temporary shelter and family tracing for unaccompanied children, and free transport home to Zimbabwe. IOM also has a project to help people to set up their own small businesses, such as hairdressing or carpentry.
Poverty is likely to be the greatest challenge for returnees with unemployment a staggering 80 percent in Zimbabwe. Many will not even have money to travel from the border back to their communities or buy basic household items, aid workers say.
UNHCR will help returnees get vital documentation. National identity cards are necessary “for pretty much everything” in Zimbabwe, including sitting school exams and accessing health care services, according to Tina Ghelli, a UNHCR Southern Africa official.
In April 2009, South Africa halted the repatriation of Zimbabweans in recognition of the political violence and economic collapse in their home country.
South Africa now wants to resume deportations following the introduction of a power-sharing government between President Robert Mugabe and rival Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai after disputed elections in 2008.
From IRIN, a story about a survey taken with Afghanistan people about their desires to leave the country for Europe.
The financial costs and serious risks faced by Afghan asylum-seekers in making the long and arduous journey to Europe are no real deterrent when the alternatives are seen as poverty and political uncertainty at home, young Afghans told IRIN.
The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) says 26,800 Afghans requested refugee status in 2009 - a 45 percent increase on the year before when 18,500 claims were made.
“Afghans currently constitute 7 percent of all asylum applications lodged in the 44 industrialized countries,” Adrian Edwards, a UNHCR spokesman, told IRIN. In 2001 they topped the chart when 54,000 Afghans sought asylum.
UNHCR’s data is only about asylum-seekers and does not include economic migrants who mostly use the same routes and means to reach to their destination, but in far larger numbers.
Many of these “irregular migrants” cross borders without valid travel documents, and risk tough treatment from the authorities if caught. Some countries, such as Iran, treat irregular migrants as illegal intruders into their territory and eligible for immediate expulsion.
“Irregular migrants generally have no legal protection, often don’t speak the language and don’t know where to go for help,” Christopher Lowenstein-Lom, a spokesman for the International Organization for Migration (IOM), told IRIN.
There are also the physical perils of the journey. “We know that a number of people have lost their lives trying to reach Europe on flimsy vessels by sea and via the River Evros border between Turkey and Greece. Others have lost their lives trying to enter European countries on trucks and smuggled in containers,” said UNHCR’s Edwards.
And even if they do make it, there is a strong chance their refugee application will be turned down. More than half of all Afghan migrants who applied for asylum in European countries were rejected in 2007-2009, according to EU statistics.
Search for better a life
Afghanistan, ranked among the least developed countries in the world and suffering an intensifying conflict, has few incentives to offer its young generation. IRIN spoke to five young men in Kabul on whether they would prefer to remain in Afghanistan, or despite the risks, try their luck abroad.
• “In Europe and America at least I will breathe clean air,” said Ahmad Naseer, a university student, adding that he would try to leave after graduating. “I will be able to earn enough and support my family and dependents in Afghanistan. What would I do in Afghanistan? I will not find a decent job because corruption is pervasive and no one can find a job without knowing officials.”
• “The future looks very grim and dark in Afghanistan so everyone tries to go abroad for a better life,” said Ahmad Masoud, 25. “Everyone is poor here except warlords, criminals and ministers so it is impossible to make a good life here. Even if Afghanistan were to have peace and progress, 50 years later we will only reach the level of where Bangladesh and other poor countries are today, so why should I stay in a country where there is only poverty and problems?”
• “We don’t want to die in the war or suffer under the Taliban’s brutal regime again,” said Sardar Mohammad, 27. “Americans and all foreign forces are leaving and this weak [Hamid] Karzai government will collapse. Who will care about what brutalities the Taliban will do to us? The Taliban were killing and torturing all of us while they were in power [1995-2001] but the world was saying ‘It’s an Afghan issue and we won’t interfere’. The same thing will happen again when foreign forces leave. ”
• “I know life is not easy in Europe, but at least there is hope for improvement which there is not in Afghanistan. If you work hard in Europe there are no commanders or criminals to rob you and kill you while here [in Afghanistan] there is no rule of law and no order,” said Ahmad Zameer, 22.
• “I want to migrate to Europe because I want to live in peace, have a good income and get a foreign passport but I will return to Afghanistan. A foreign passport is a kind of guarantee that in case of emergency I would be able to leave the country. All senior government officials have foreign passports,” said Faraidoon Atif, 27.
There are some in the west that are against using genetically modified seeds for under-developed world farming. They say that there is no proof that these technologies can improve yields, and that forced use of technology takes control away from the farmer. This side of the argument has taken the aim of their views squarely at the Gates Foundation for investing so much in GM seed technology.
From the great Business of Giving blog at the Seattle Times, writer Kristi Heim interviews a critic the work of GM crops and the Gates Foundation. Phil Bereano of AGRA Watch explains why they would rather have the farmer control yields instead of bio-tech.
Q: One of the projects the Gates Foundation is working on with Monsanto, Water Efficient Maize for Africa (WEMA), is being billed as a way to deal with worsening drought due to climate change, a serious problem for farmers.
A: It may use water more efficiently, but it's not drought tolerant. Drought tolerance is a complicated interplay between several dozen different genes.
There are thousands of varieties of maize, including drought tolerant varieties. The problem is they can't be patented and sold because they are in the public domain. Multinational corporations like Monsanto are attempting to gain control over food by patenting GMO seeds and presenting them as a savior to peoples' needs.
Q: Do you believe any genetic modification (GM) of food has merit?
A: It's very hard to say the existing GM products satisfy any criteria I would find socially useful. A UN and World Bank study said there is no necessary role for GM in the future in order to deal with issues of hunger and increasing production. Agroecological methods are able to do it.
None of the technologies which have been presented respond to the genuine needs of people. Herbicide resistance has not increased food production or reduced food costs for farmers.
But no one really knows because there are no adequate scientific assessments of the risk with the potential benefits. We actually don't know whether it's worth it.
The great website Wikileaks has gathered some evidence that China's aid to Africa does come with conditions. Jonathan Glennie of the Guardian examines the leaked US embassy cables.
USAID has suspended a contractor from receiving any new government contracts. The contractor is the Washington DC based non profit Academy for Educational Development. A. E. D. is being investigated by USAID for evidence of collusion that inflated the price of goods the non-profit bought. USAID contracted with A. E. D. to provide educational services in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
From the Washington Post, writer Dana Hedgpeth and Josh Boak tell us more about the investigation.
USAID's Office of Inspector General is investigating the Academy for Educational Development (AED), which is based in the District. The 49-year-old nonprofit group contracts with U.S. government agencies and others to run health, education, social and economic development programs in about 150 countries.
AED is also one of USAID's key contractors in Afghanistan, overseeing the government agency's higher-education program in the war-torn country. In the past three years, it has received $109 million in contracts from USAID for work in Afghanistan.
Initial findings by the inspector general's office "reveal evidence of serious corporate misconduct, mismanagement, and a lack of internal controls, and raise serious concerns of corporate integrity," according to a statement from USAID.
AED has 65 contract awards from USAID worth roughly $640 million, according to a USAID official.
The agency said it plans to conduct "an immediate internal review" of "every program associated with AED."
...
USAID recently ended a five-year, $150 million cooperative agreement with AED after its inspector general found evidence of fraud related to a program in Pakistan that was designed to provide disaster relief, infrastructure development, education and agricultural services, according to a recent report to Congress that did not identify the company by name. A source close to the investigation confirmed that the company in the report was AED.
In that Pakistan program, the inspector general's investigation found "evidence of collusion between vendors and staff . . . resulting in overpayment for certain goods," according to the agency's report.
Transparency International has released their annual Corruption Barometer. The Barometer is a public opinion survey that asks people their perception on corruption and even if they have specifically payed any bribes. Most people who answered the survey said that they believed that corruption has increased. The perception especially increased in North America and that is most likely in response to the global financial crisis.
From the BBC, we receive this overview of the survey's results. You can look into more details of the survey by going to the Transparency International website.
The organisation put Afghanistan, Nigeria, Iraq and India in the most corrupt category, followed by China, Russia and much of the Middle East.
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In the Transparency International survey, political parties were regarded as the most corrupt institutions, and 50% of people believed their government was ineffective at tackling the problem.
One in four of those polled said they had paid a bribe in the past year - the police being the most common recipient.
Some 29% of bribes went to the police, 20% to registry and permit officials, and 14% to members of the judiciary.
Political parties have long been regarded as the most corrupt institutions - they topped the list in Transparency's 2004 barometer with 71%. In this year's report, 80% regarded them as corrupt.
Religious bodies experienced a sharp rise in people regarding them as corrupt - 28% in 2004 increased to 53% by 2010.
Corruption has increased over the last three years, say six out of 10 people around the world, and one in four people report paying bribes in the last year. These are the findings of the 2010 Global Corruption Barometer, a worldwide public opinion survey on corruption, released today, International Anti-Corruption Day, by Transparency International (TI).
Views on corruption trends are most negative in Europe and North America, where 73 per cent and 67 per cent of people respectively think corruption has increased over the last three years.
Despite these results, the survey also found that seven out of 10 people would be willing to report an incident of corruption.
“The fall-out of the financial crises continues to affect people’s opinions of corruption, particular in Europe and North America. Institutions everywhere must be resolute in their efforts to restore good governance and trust,” said Huguette Labelle, Chair of Transparency International. “It is heartening that so many people are ready to take a stand against corruption. This willingness must be mobilised.”
The 2010 Global Corruption Barometer surveys more than 91,000 people in 86 countries and territories. It focuses on petty bribery, perceptions of public institutions and views of whom people trust to combat corruption.
Petty bribery: regional differences matter
The survey showed that in the past 12 months one in four people paid a bribe to one of nine institutions and services, from health to education to tax authorities. The police are named the most frequent recipient of bribes, according to those surveyed, with 29 per cent of those who had contact with the police reporting that they paid a bribe.
Sub-Saharan Africans report paying the most bribes: more than one in two people report paying a bribe in the past 12 months. This compares to 36 per cent of people surveyed in the Middle East and North Africa, 32 per cent in the Newly Independent states, 23 per cent in Latin America, 19 per cent in the Western Balkans and Turkey, 11 per cent in Asia Pacific and just 5 per cent in European Union countries and North America.
More than 20 countries report significantly more petty bribery than in 2006, when the same question was asked in the Barometer. The biggest number of reported bribery payments in 2010 is in Afghanistan, Cambodia, Cameroon, India, Iraq, Liberia, Nigeria, Palestine, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Uganda where more than 50 per cent of people surveyed paid a bribe in the past 12 months.
Almost half of all respondents say they paid bribes to avoid problems with the authorities and a quarter say it was to speed up processes.
Most worrying is the fact that bribes to the police have almost doubled since 2006, and more people report paying bribes to the judiciary and for registry and permit services than did so five years ago.
Bribery and the poor
The demographics of bribery continue to disadvantage the poor and the young. As in past surveys, lower income earners report paying more bribes than higher income earners. Poorer people are twice as likely to pay bribes for basic services, such as utilities, medical services and education, than wealthier people.
“Corruption is a regressive tax. This injustice must be addressed. The marginalised and poor remain the most vulnerable to extortion. Governments should do more to identify corruption risks in basic services and to protect their citizens,” said Labelle.
A third of all people under the age of 30 report paying a bribe in the past 12 months, compared to less than one in five people over 51 years of age.
Lack of trust in public officials
Sadly, few people trust their governments or politicians. Eight out of 10 say political parties are corrupt or extremely corrupt. The civil service and parliament are considered the next most corrupt institutions.
Half the people questioned say their government’s action to stop corruption is ineffective. This reflects little change over time; however, opinions have worsened slightly since 2007 in Asia Pacific, Latin America and Sub-Saharan Africa – while they have improved in the Newly Independent States and North America.
And although a large majority of people – seven out of 10 – say they would report a corrupt act if they saw one, if they are victims of corruption, this drops to about half.
“The message from the 2010 Barometer is that corruption is insidious. It makes people lose faith. The good news is that people are ready to act,” said Labelle. “Better whistleblower protection and greater access to information are crucial. Public engagement in the fight against corruption will force those in authority to act; and will give people further courage to speak out and stand up for a cleaner, more transparent world,” she added.
A new round of violent protests have erupted in Haiti, not about the earthquake or cholera but over the latest election. The people are crying fraud over last weeks election and are burning tires and blocking roads in protest. The ruling party declared that they came in second place while most international observers believe they came in third. The next step is a runoff election between the top two places that will take place early next year.
From this Time Magazine article, writer Jessica Desvarieux describes the unrest and how the election caused it.
The longstanding credibility issues of Haiti's Provisional Electoral Council (CEP) continued on Tuesday, when it announced preliminary election results that gave second place — and a place on a runoff ballot on January 16 — to President Rene Preval's hand-picked candidate, Jude Celestin. International observer groups maintain that Celestin had, in fact, finished third behind opposition candidate Michel "Sweet Micky" Martelly. After an election marred by widespread reports of fraud, many Haitians took to the streets to make it clear whom they were believing, and it wasn't the CEP.
The resulting wrath, especially among Martelly supporters, led to gunfire and left the streets of Port-au-Prince choked by' roadblocks and burning tires on Wednesday, while the headquarters of the ruling INITE (Unity) Party was set on fire. Preval, widely criticized for his aloof response to January's massive earthquake that killed 230,000 people, called for calm; but the unrest shut down the capital's airport. With more than a million Haitians still homeless after the quake, and with a cholera epidemic so far claiming 2,100 more lives, the nation is in no mood to tolerate what many suspect is government-engineered fraud. "All the money Celestin spent on his campaign, he could have [bought us new homes]," says protester Dadil Jean-Pierre, 21. "INITE has been in power for too long, and they haven't done anything for us with their power."
According to the CEP, opposition candidate Mirlande Manigat, a 70-year-old constitutional law professor and former First Lady, finished first with 31% of the vote, followed by engineer Celestin, 48, with 22.5% and Martelly, 49, with 21.8%. That razor-thin margin, representing fewer than 7,000 votes, has provoked widespread skepticism, since independent organizations such as the European Union-financed National Election Observation Council (CNO), which placed more than 5,500 monitors at 15% of Haiti's polling stations, estimated that Martelly won closer to 25% and Celestin about 20%.
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Jean Francois Vezina, a police spokesman for the U.N. Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), acknowledges that protests are erupting all over the country and are growing in scale. But he says most demonstrators have been relatively benign. "The protests are not really violent," Vezina told TIME. "Some protesters throw stones or block the roads with cars or burning tires. But the security situation can change rapidly here." There were unconfirmed reports of two protest-related deaths in the southwestern city of Les Cayes, where government buildings had been attacked and set ablaze. Businesses and schools in Port-au-Prince, meanwhile, remained closed.
Even though the flooding in Pakistan took place some time ago, there are still over a million people displaced from it. There is a large area in southern Pakistan where the waters have still not receded, so people who used to live in this area still can not return. In the meantime, there are over a million people who still need food, shelter and water from the international community while they wait.
From Reuters, writer Nita Bhalla talks to the U.N. about the latest conditions in Pakistan.
“We have a protracted humanitarian crisis in the south where we still have one million people displaced because of flooding in the province of Sindh,” Manuel Bessler, head of the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Pakistan, told AlertNet in an interview.
“The basic survival items of food, water and sanitation, shelter and healthcare are urgently required."
The floods, sparked by unusually heavy monsoon rains, caused Pakistan's mighty Indus river to burst its banks, inundating one-fifth of the country and forcing millions to flee.
Hundreds of thousands of acres of crops have been destroyed and infrastructure such as roads, schools and bridges have been damaged in the provinces of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Baluchistan in the north, and Punjab and Sindh in the south.
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The United Nations says it needs $1.9 billion to provide displaced populations with basic relief items as well as help those returning to repair their homes and generate some income.
But Bessler said donors have only contributed about 49 percent of the funds required and more is urgently needed -- especially for shelter and health services for the 500,000 people who are living in makeshift settlements.
First up, a new survey finds that Saskatchewan residents think poverty as the biggest world concern. Writer Tim Switzer filed this story that we found at the Saskatoon Star Phoenix.
Jacqueline Novogratz of the Acumen fund has penned another op-ed piece for the Huffington Post. Novogratz presents a new video from the fund that describes how "patient capital" works.
Finally, The Free Press from Mankato, Minnesota takes a look at the latest poverty statistics for their local area.
Norway has cleared Muhammad Yunus' Grameen Bank of any wrong-doing from a misuse of funds accusation. The claims that Yunus' Grameen Bank diverted money away from its intended use was made by a recent Norwegian documentary. A loan Norway gave to the Grameen Bank was transferred to another company within the Grameen family for tax purposes. Norway stated on Tuesday that Grameen was innocent and that the funds were used for housing loans as intended.
From the Economic Times, we read more about the statement from Norway and another statement from Bangladesh that will continue to beat a dead horse.
The claims were based on series of letters dating from 1996 to 1998 -- a decade before Yunus and Grameen were awarded the Nobel Prize in 2006 -- showing a conflict between the Norwegians and Grameen over the aid transfer.
After a review, Norway's minister of international development Erik Solheim said in a statement Tuesday that there was "no indication that Norwegian funds have been used for unintended purposes, or that Grameen Bank has engaged in corrupt practices or embezzled funds."
Grameen maintained the transfer of aid to Grameen Kalyan, another part of the group, was legitimate and done to minimise tax on the money.
"We are very happy that actual proof (of Grameen's innocence) has come to light and we hope this will end all debate about Grameen," Grameen spokesman Mohammad Shahjhan said.
Yunus and microfinance have come under fierce attack from Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina , who called Sunday for a full investigation of a sector she said "does not lift people from poverty."
"Is there any other business that forces people to pay 30 to 40 per cent interest on loans?" Hasina asked, describing Grameen's transfer of Norwegian and other European aid money in 1996 to avoid tax as a financial "trick".
Another step in the process of independence for Southern Sudan was completed today. Registration for voting was completed for the January 9th vote. 3 million people are registered to vote in the referendum that will likely split Sudan into two halves. As Southern Sudan steps closer to the vote, the fears increase of possible delays, voting fraud or even civil war.
However, aided by a renewed international engagement over the past two months, the registration process has passed peacefully and smoothly in the semi-autonomous south.
Despite the registration window being extended for a week until today, hopes are high that the vote will still go ahead on schedule.
"Logistical challenges remain but things look to be on track," said John Ashworth, an analyst who works with Sudan's churches. "The momentum is there, and 99% of the international community now say it should happen on time."
South Sudan's right to choose secession stems from the 2005 comprehensive peace agreement, which ended a 20-year civil war between the non-Arab south and the Arab-led north that claimed more than 2 million lives.
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Though the peace has held for the past six years, the mistrust between the ruling Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) in the south and the president Omar al-Bashir's National Congress party (NCP) in the north has not disappeared.
About three-quarters of Sudan's 500,000 daily barrels of oil come from the south, and while this revenue is currently shared between the two sides, the north will lose out if the country splits. Many southerners believe Bashir will try to postpone their bid for freedom to avoid giving up much of the country's petrodollar income.
These suspicions led to many of the southerners living outside south Sudan refusing to register for the referendum, fearing that the Khartoum government will tamper with their votes.
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Regardless of what the NCP can negotiate, a divided Sudan will weaken its hand in the north.
Opposition politicians are likely to blame Bashir for the country breaking up, and the loss of a large chunk of oil revenue will also hurt.
This uncertainty has led to some Sudan-watchers to suggest that Bashir would consider using force to prevent secession.
Zan Rice mentioned the revenue sharing agreement for the oil in Southern Sudan. Despite this major settlement there are other issues that would want the north to keep the south from breaking away. Al Jazeera analyzed these issues in the news magazine show "Inside Story'. The video is a half -hour long.
Finally, the organization Operation Rescue has links to the entire NBC Dateline episode that focused on the possibility of civil war, an issue that actor George Clooney has put his stardom into.
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