Native Notes

The Food Chain

World’s Poor Pay Price as Crop Research Is Cut

By KEITH BRADSHER and ANDREW MARTIN

Published: May 18, 2008

Cuts in agricultural research continue even as the growth of the global food supply slows and the population increases.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/18/business/worldbusiness/18focus.html?ex=1368849600&en=dc1e610689a4c0d4&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink

Lately I’ve been reading several United Nations Conference on Trade and Development reports. Here are some excerpts from The Least Developed Countries Report 2007: Knowledge, Technological Learning and Innovation for Development that are relevant to the discussions on transitioning to a knowledge economy at the recent Third Annual Tribal Energy Policy Roundtable organized by the International Institute for Indigenous Resource Management:

·    The dominance of the mineral industry’s Foreign Direct Investment, (FDI) inflows into Least Developed Countries (LDCs) since the 1990s has consequences for the impacts that they can have on domestic technological capability accumulation. Typically, Transnational Corporations’ (TNCs’) mineral extraction activities in those countries are capital-intensive, have little impact on employment, are highly concentrated geographically, have high import content and result in exports of their output as unprocessed raw materials. Most of those operations are totally owned by foreign investors (rather than joint ventures) and a large share of their foreign exchange earnings is retained abroad. Those operations are strongly integrated internationally, but weakly embedded into domestic economies, as they have few forward and backward linkages in host economies (UNCTAD, 2005). In other words, they tend to operate as enclaves.

·    The potential of those FDI inflows to contribute to domestic technological capability-building in host countries is, therefore, very limited. In fact, there is little evidence that the entry of TNCs into mining in those countries is leading to the technological upgrading of domestic firms in the same industry. Where some intermediate technology potentially useful for small- and medium-scale miners has been developed for secondary processing purposes, its distribution and assimilation within the mining community have been limited.

·     Enhancing the contribution of the mining industry and its TNCs to knowledge accumulation in host countries has not been among the objectives of host countries, owing to the narrow sectoral focus adopted (as opposed to a broader developmental perspective). The goal of generating technology spillovers has generally not been actively pursued, nor has it been an unintended consequence of increased TNC activity. There are few indications that increasing FDI inflows into the oil and hard rock mining industry of African LDCs have been accompanied by greater knowledge flows to those countries beyond the activities of the TNCs themselves.

The Report can be accessed at: http://www.unctad.org/en/docs/ldc2007_en.pdf.

We do quite a bit of work with think tanks and other “wonkish” groups. Here I’m with Ed Moreno of the Keystone Center at a February 2008 meeting to address the questions: “What are the major challenges to biodiversity conservation over the next 5 to 10 years and beyond and what might be the most significant opportunities for philanthropic impact?”.

Under a grant from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, The Keystone Center is conducting a national survey to help identify future opportunities for philanthropic investments in habitat and biodiversity conservation. Click here to learn more about this project and to participate in an online survey and a discussion forum on habitat and biodiversity conservation.

We received this note a week ago from our colleagues at the Desert Knowledge Cooperative Research Centre. We think it’s worth a read.

As climate change menaces the world with spreading drought, Australia – a continent that is almost three quarters desert – is pioneering a new kind of global science: the science of desert living.

“Living in deserts is about much more than just managing the natural resources,” say four of the pioneers of the new science. It is also about desert livelihoods, sustainable settlements, social empowerment, novel technologies and how these things interplay.

In an article introducing a special issue of The Rangeland Journal, Dr. Mark Stafford Smith, Craig James, Murray McGregor and Jan Ferguson of the Desert Knowledge Cooperative Research Centre (DKCRC) argue that people living in Australia’s and the world’s dry places obey the same basic rules for survival as the animals and plants of the desert.

Understanding these rules, and adapting them to human needs, will be critical in the dry times that face the world under climate change – but also in developing sustainably and wisely using the vast arid lands of Australia.

“Deserts are different. They are highly unpredictable places – things which live there must adapt to this variability if they are to survive and thrive,” says Dr. Mark Stafford Smith.

“That’s one reason why populations of both humans and animals are small and widely scattered, so as not to over-use scarce resources. But this also creates isolation – and desert communities are often physically far from the main society, remote from markets and the places where the big decisions are made.”

The challenges that face desert communities in areas such as healthcare, education, law and order, access to jobs, technology, markets or opportunities reflect this isolation – and the difficulty experienced by desert people in getting their views heard and understood by policymakers.

“It has been clear for some time that policies developed for large, settled populations living in stable conditions along the coast, close to markets and government often don’t to work so well when translated to regions which have the opposite characteristics,” says DKCRC Managing Director Jan Ferguson.

“This has practical implications for the livelihoods and jobs of desert people, the sustainability of their settlements, how they get their services, how the region is governed and how its economics function.

“To give just one example, many government policies are delivered via the internet, and assume everyone has access to it – but many desert communities have only a single public phone and often not even that, certainly no community accessible internet,” she says.

“For many policymakers, despite its size and the contribution it makes to our national wealth, desert Australia simply doesn’t seem to be on their radar. They don’t see it. They don’t attribute a value to the Bush, but operate off a deficit model where ‘it has to be fixed because it’s broke’.”

“Australia needs to see the desert differently. The desert is very rich and it is also very beautiful and diverse. It is clean and healthy – more so than the cities. It is a place of opportunity, ideas and creativity. We need a positive model of our deserts – not a deficit model,” Jan says.

Desert science is demonstrating with increasing clarity that the desert contributes far beyond the scale of its population to national wellbeing – and it is time that policies were designed to reflect this for the sake of both, the team argues.

Desert populations, both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal are highly mobile – responding to one of the most basic imperatives of desert life: to follow the resources. Yet most policies are geared for a static lifestyle, a permanent house located close to services, with easy communication and transport. In fact so mobile are desert people that many escape the four-yearly census altogether, and their needs are therefore overlooked – as Australians, they remain uncounted.

Desert science is bringing fresh perspectives to the greater part of Australia, the team says. And it is also trailblazing a new understanding of how the dry areas of the world contribute directly to global society, its economy and its sustainability even though they seem remote and far away.

The Biosafety Unit of the International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology has launched its new Biosafety Website. The site has been completely overhauled to provide a more “user friendly” interface, as well as updated links to the latest relevant developments and documents while maintaining those providing a valuable historical perspective.

The website provides access to a broad range of information specifically relevant to biosafety and biotechnology via links to the webpages of the principal international organizations, national competent authorities, publishing houses and scientists, etc. involved in or associated with  these activities.

American Electric Power Service Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of American Electric Power, is seeking proposals for long-term supply of renewable energy from new renewable energy projects with an aggregate name-plate rating totaling up to 200 MW on behalf of its utility operating company, Public Service Company of Oklahoma (PSO), for projects capable of being on-line by 12/31/10. The RFP and other details can be found at:
http://www.psoklahoma.com/news/renewrfp/.

The UNDP’s Human Development Report 2007/2008, Fighting climate change: Human solidarity in a divided world can be downloaded at: http://hdr.undp.org/en/reports/global/hdr2007-2008/.

If you’ve already plowed through the IPCC reports and 20 year’s worth of other climate change literature, you’re not going to find much that’s new in the HDR 2007/2008 narrative and because it’s a UN work the recommendations, some may say sermonizing, are directed toward the nation states. 

But there’s sound advice for Indian tribes and other indigenous peoples that can be gleaned from the report.  I especially like the suggestion that nations, but for us, tribes and indigenous peoples, should be taking action now to conduct assessments of the risks posed by climate change to public health, economies, political and cultural integrity “to be followed by the mobilization of resources to create an enabling environment for risk management.”  I suggest that an even more daunting challenge is for Indian tribes to identify the risks that climate change poses.

We’re involved in a couple of related activities with long-time colleagues that we hope will trigger responses suggested by HDR 2007/2008.  The first is the August 19-20, 2008 Workshop on Adaptive Governance and Climate Change sponsored by the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation and the International Institute for Indigenous Resource Management.  The workshop is subtitled, “Climate Change is Real: Leadership and Planning are Optional” and incorporates themes such as governance and planning for continuity of services.  We’re working with Stuart Harris and Dr. Barbara Harper of the CTUIR Department of Science and Engineering on this effort.  They’ve been at the forefront in incorporating cultural factors in risk assessment methodologies.

The other activity is the symposium on risk assessment, risk management and indigenous peoples: legal, scientific, social, and cultural contexts which will take place at Second World Congress on Risk in Guadalajara in June.  The symposium organizer, Dr. Elaine M. Faustman directs the University of Washington’s Institute for Risk Analysis and Risk Communication which aims to enhance risk assessment methods and their scientific underpinnings.

Being an old pinko, anarcho-communist type of bloke I tend to think there is a sameness about Australian politics that reminds me of beige upon beige.

There is a lot of icing sugar in Rudd’s pronouncements at this time but no real substance.

The unfortunate thing is that Rudd is still rolling out the intervention in the Northern Territory despite calls from people wanting it to stop or at least be changed.

At this time the Chair of the Central Health Service, an Aboriginal medical service that oversees approx. $100 million in funds is still caught up in that mess. She still has a part of her pension taken from her each fortnight and is given vouchers which can only be spent at certain food stores. She has no choice and the intervention and most of the worst aspects are still being undertaken in a racist manner. The very fact that Howard waived the racial discrimination act just to get the intervention going and Rudd has not thought fit to rectify that indicates where he might be going in the future.

Howard was disastrous for Aboriginal Australia and, as we are now seeing for all Australia in many ways. Rudd, at least, does have a few members of his cabinet who are dedicated to Aboriginal issues and equity.

However, a report released today indicates that from 1971 to 2006, although there has been some improvement in death rates, employment, education, etc. for Aboriginal people, in many respects we have gone backwards. To the point that this research indicates that, for some issues, it might take as much as 100 (yes, 100) years for Aboriginal Australia to achieve equity.

We are a very lucky country in so many ways. It is unfortunate that so many of us have a conservative bent that, to me, is due to the fact that we have never had any kind of revolution - not necessarily the bloody kind, but a revolution of minds and thoughts.

Babana, for instance, though new is one of the most successful men’s groups in NSW at least. However, it is still trying to scratch funds to pay for an office, perhaps a men’s shed and definitely a paid manager to keep things going. They keep trying to make the organization play to their tune, when it is shown so often to be not working. It, and its members will survive but it will not necessarily be thanks to the bureaucracy.

The Babana website will soon be putting up some of the things that the organization has been doing lately, just to let people know its members are alive and well.

The Canadian Electricity Association (CEA) released its annual North American policy paper today in Washington. Entitled  “Providing Reliable Energy in a Time of Constraints: A North American Concern”, the paper presents the Canadian industry’s views on opportunities for cooperation between Canada and the United States on challenges facing the electricity sector.

·        Constraints in Supply Generation

·        Transmission Constraints

·        Labor Constraints

The last item, Labor Constraints, was discussed in some detail at the International Institute for Indigenous Resource Management’s March 2008 Third Annual Tribal Energy Policy Roundtable.

The CEA policy paper cites the challenges an aging workforce and pending retirements could have on an industry already challenged by increasing demand and technology change, but what was most intriguing, from an indigenous peoples perspective, was some of the actions the Canadians have taken to address the labor constraints.

The policy paper suggests increasing participation of under-represented groups and expanding and improving skills training and apprenticeship funding as steps that could be taken to develop a skilled, educated and adaptable workforce and cites as examples, the Hydro Northern Training and Employment initiative that was launched as a result of two proposed Manitoba Hydro hydroelectric projects in Northern Manitoba. This initiative is training and preparing over 1,000 Aboriginal residents for 800 Manitoba Hydro construction and related employment opportunities. Another example of a pro-active industry-Aboriginal partnership is BC Hydro’s Aboriginal Employment and Education Strategy, established as a long term approach to building internal awareness and conducting recruitment outreach with Aboriginal communities in British Columbia.

Methinks a site visit by tribal workforce development planners to Manitoba and British Columbia may be in order.

What You Need to Know About Energy …
Read this FREE online! Full Book

The National Academies Press has published a very nice, very readable introduction to energy issues, What You Need to Know About Energy.  Targeted at the non-specialist or non-wonk, the well-illustrated, graphically rich work should serve very nicely as a text for middle and high school science and civics (do they still call it civics?) classes.  I’d like to have seen some discussion on ocean-based technologies but that’s a niggling criticism. I like the book’s strong message to the ideologically, monomaniacally inclined: “One thing is certain: There will be no single “silver bullet” solution to our energy needs. Tomorrow’s energy, like today’s, will come from a robust variety of sources.

And it’s free!