Bill Gates recently submitted a report on how to finance the development of poor countries in the 21st century to the G20 leaders at the Summit in Cannes. Cannes, as you may know is usually associated with movie premieres and paparazzi trailed celebs like this one.
- Paris Hilton in Cannes
I’m not trying to knock the billionaire’s efforts. I know he doesn’t control the summit’s scheduling, but it still amuses me that world leaders had converged on a town gilded with champagne and truffles when one of their goals was to get down to the business of discussing the poor of the world.
Now, on to heart of the matter. According to the report, Gates believes “the first key priority is for poor countries to raise more revenues…developing countries’ domestic resources will be the largest source of funds for development.” So that seems pretty legit. Developing countries need to fund their own development utilizing their own resources. That’s the intended end goal of all development work anyway, right? Ok, well, just what do these poorest of poor countries have available for the global economy? Let me think-gold, copper, diamonds, oil, unskilled human labor… and did I mention OIL!
Nigeria has tons of oil, how are they doing? After 33 years of military rule funded by oil revenues that also allowed democratic processes and institutions to atrophy (no taxation, no representation), there is finally a new democratic president, Goodluck Jonathon. The Niger Delta is still an area of violent conflict over issues of oil revenue, lack of development for locals and a horrendous environmental record (the Niger Delta is one of the single largest contributors of CO2 due to the practice of gas flaring).
I don’t have a problem with the logic, but Gates main thesis seems a bit naïve. I do agree with his suggestion that private companies and international bodies should press for transparency regulations for extractive industries, but I feel this is a much harder battle and more complex than Gate’s tone suggests. If exploiting resources without proper investment in the people and democratic governance then more revenue is just fanning the flames of any fires that have been smoldering within the society lying in wait for fuel.
Gates notes the potential boon that improved seed could have on production capacities in developing countries and then states the obvious in that, “innovation take(s) hold in rich countries quickly, but take(s) decades to trickle down to poor countries.” He suggests “triangular partnerships” between developed, developing and least developed countries to speed technology transfer and create economically beneficial ties. It’s a nice idea, though a little nebulous, and sounds a bit like a veiled ploy for the more developed countries to access farming land in the least developed countries. He seems to blatantly ignore the simple free market fact of why these kinds of innovations are slow to trickle down. They are slow because the poor can’t afford them. Technological advances will always occur in the richer countries that have the funds to spend on research and design. The newest technological advances in any field will also initially be more expensive than the previous and until the opportunity costs are lowered, those with the least amount of finances will not be able to implement the new technology until costs decrease or they receive some form of subsidy. This “trickle down effect” is inherent in the structure of the global economy and will not change and the poor countries will increasingly adopt newer technologies once they start to become wealthy, i.e. India and Brazil.
Farmers aren’t afraid or too backwards to use improved seed, they just can’t afford it. Imagine you are a farmer and Mr. Salesman from the Seed Company comes to your farm. He tells you, “why don’t you throw out all that old seed you saved from last year to plant your crops and instead buy this special seed I have, and by the way, once you start using my seed you have to buy it every year because this seed is very unique and we own the patents.” I will ignore the fact that Gates mentioned the improved seed as “bred” since I do not know the particulars of the seed in question, but I would venture that it is genetically modified seed the likes of Monsanto sells and they have donated to projects in developing countries.
The ideas he promotes in the Innovation with Impact paper are worth further exploring. I do not mean to wholly condemn his efforts even though I have been very critical. Bill Gates is obviously a smart and capable human being whose foray into international development I am greatly interested. I’m sure he thrives on this sort of criticism and I welcome any rebuttal he may have.
I would be remiss if I didn’t touch on the ongoing struggle in Egypt. Egyptians have been in the streets for days now demanding the departure of Hosni Mubarak, reasserting their rights to be free men and women and for their interests to be represented in government. My favorite part of the coverage is hearing the protesters themselves speak. Unlike a career politician’s focus group tested and speech writer polished statements, they imbue the rhetoric of democracy with a passion it has not felt for many years in the U.S. They embody the pursuit of happiness in a way that should make those who use this tenet of democracy to justify self-serving behavior feel sorrowful. Egyptians, true lovers of freedom, we support you!
It does seem that the Obama administration is beginning to break the right way on this one. They hesitated in the beginning, but now are at least supporting an “orderly transition”. The change will happen and it can occur entirely peaceful. It can be done, and if given room and support, it will become lasting change. Never mind the naysayers like Jordan and Saudia Arabia (both ranked as “Not Free” by the Freedom House 2010 survey of political and civil rights) who merely fear for themselves if Egypt becomes a success story of democracy. I feel this is our real opportunity for spreading freedom and peace in Northern Africa and the Middle East. This is finally a revolution of the people, for the people: a sentiment that has been forged into a founding principle of the United States. It would be unethical not to support the Egyptian people who are espousing the very values we claim as our own. A friend sent me the below picture that has been floating around the internet.
Interesting, even if it is just Photoshop propaganda. It does represent a relative truth. Iraqi’s freedom was imposed and it seems the world will watch them struggle with democracy for a long time. Egypt’s is developing internally and will seemingly succeed faster and with greater capacity to resolve conflict because it is THEIR revolution with much less foreign support and resources. This is the foreign policy dream the U.S. has been waiting for and if we let it pass because we fear the Muslim Brotherhood will have representation, I do not live in the country of my forefathers. I’ve stated this before, we cannot allow ourselves to be ruled by fear of a few marginal people. There are myriad radical political and religious groups in our own country. Why do I not fear them? Because I know the majority of humans are sane, rational, and do not wish death upon others. Those sane rational people make up the majority of our electorate and are the ones who lead these great United States, even though we have our differences, and it is the same kind of group demanding freedom in Egypt. The majority of populations in all countries are not blood-thirsty radicals and if true representative democracies were the norm these people would rule, not the marginal ideologues that call for Jihad or Christian War! A true liberal democracy is antithetical to a theocratic state and once this is understood there is no longer anything to fear from a religious group that wants to join.
It’s been a busy week and I’m finding it hard to make time to write. I just became involved in a local development project that could become another huge time commitment if I allow it. There’s a group of people in my neighborhood trying to start a food cooperative in order to bring in a wider variety of food choices and organic and locally produced products into Bushwick, Brooklyn. I think it is a worthwhile project and one that could be very successful. If you visit Access To Action again soon to find no new post, well, rest assured I’m working on the Bushwick Food Coop business plan and trying to help make it a reality. Check out their blog and if you have any resources; mental, physical or monetary, feel free to get involved!
Now the reason I am compelled to write this morning is because a friend of mine, a onetime copy editor, has taken to reading my blog and getting a good laugh at the misuse of certain punctuation. Who am I to deny anyone their happiness? So, here it goes. Last night I had dinner with an executive who works for a global positioning company based in the U.S that has a large presence in the agriculture and construction sectors globally. His particular charge is to help develop GPS solutions using his company’s technologies to aid large scale development projects in developing countries. He works mostly in Africa. Eventually, he began to talk about the other big players who bid on the same jobs and it was not surprising to find out many were Chinese. He characterized their projects as often “messy”, for example, they are done without proper environmental impact assessments or post construction clean-up. Now if a project is funded by the World Bank or other multi-lateral organization, there are stipulations that these assessments have to be done as a condition of the loan for the project. Then I read this article when I woke up today about development loans from China surpassing those of the World Bank! So, just imagine now that you have a bank that is merely an enabler of the Chinese government’s desire, which is currently natural resources, funding development projects abroad and paying Chinese companies to do the work. An unapologetically self-centered regime is not best suited to act as the catalyst for long-term sustainable development in Africa. This is just maintenance of the status quo. Countries with money come in to Africa, leverage their power to take African resources and reap the majority of trade benefits while leaving the African people no better off and with increased environmental degradation. I commend the gentleman I dined with as well as all other Western companies that see Africa as a future market and believe in doing business there the same way they would in the U.S. or Europe. Not that all Chinese endeavors are evil and Western projects benevolent, but in general we should support those who see Africa as a long-term investment rather than merely a market lax on regulation and enforcement while rich in resources. I just got an idea for the next post: green funds!
It seems the first reports coming in from Sudan are promising, at least in regards to a peaceful process that seems likely to lead to a separate southern Sudan. Honestly, it is hard not to get caught up in all personal stories of people spending their lives striving and fighting in Sudan for independence. After Losing sons and daughters for decades the people of southern Sudan finally see freedom on the horizon. It is a powerful sentiment, but it is hard to get past the fact that Africa seems to be on the verge of gaining a new sovereign nation that will be one of the poorest and least developed upon its birth. Actually, I guess I should hold my comments for a later date. I think even the Sudanese are well aware what lies beyond the golden horizon of liberty. Lets hope the process remains peaceful and at the end we can take a moment to celebrate and give thanks for all their hard work. After all what is it worth if we can never enjoy these triumphs and continually look for the next problem? Amazingly our issues are always there waiting for us as soon as we are ready pick them up so lets not worry if we ignore them for a day. I wish the best for the Sudanese this week; North and South!
I think the popular narrative of the greatest conflict currently facing Americans is framed as a battle of East vs. West, of Christians vs. Muslims, at least if looking for the one conflict that instills fear due to the possibility of an attack on American citizens. If you would ask someone in the Middle East, let’s say Iraq for the sake of this exercise, it would probably be spoken of in terms of Shiite vs. Sunni. Yes, of course there is the whole business concerning Israel in the Middle East, but your greatest day to day threat of physical violence is coming from other Muslims. These Inter and Intra-religious battles have come to define the conflicts of our recent past and present, but I think the major battle of the future is on the horizon. This battle is between the religious and the secular, and I have to admit, the first person who brought this to my attention was my friend Elijah three or four years ago. It came to mind again after I watched this TimesCast clip showing pictures of revelers celebrating the assassination of liberal politician Salmaan Taseer. Then I came across this article in the Washington Post detailing Iranian plans to overhaul their educational system. It seems they want to use their schools to instill religious values and protect their students from any conflicting scientific thinking derived from the West. Don’t tell them, but their real friends on this front are fundamentalist Christians. Admittedly, I am oversimplifing. It’s not really about the religious versus religious today and won’t necessarily be about the secular versus the religious in the future, it is about the extremes in all of these camps. I don’t want to deny a middle ground where the secular and religious can coexist. The moderates on all sides of these conflicts wish all the violence and wars surrounding them would stop. I do and so do my religious and friends. It is the firebrands and extremists we need to be wary of. Those who will stir up passions, unite through belief in order to lead a charge against some concocted “other”. Long live the moderates!R
When discussing the aim of his new Satellite Sentinel project George Clooney told Time that:
“We want them (Sudanese troops) to enjoy the level of celebrity attention that I usually get. If you know your actions are going to be covered, you tend to behave much differently than when you operate in a vacuum.”
Though I think the project will be beneficial, I doubt that it will deter any violence in Sudan surrounding the secession vote. The flaw is found in his very assumption that leaders of Sudan, like President Al-Bashir, would act in a similar manner as an image conscience Hollywood star and activist such as Clooney. I think Al-Bashir knows he has already been demonized in the media in the U.S. and other countries and feels it is of little consequence. He is not looking for his next leading role. He is looking to keep control over as much of the country and its resources as possible. He has made encouraging statements about no violent response if the vote in South Sudan turns out to be for secession, but I will believe it when I see it. After all this is the same man accused of war crimes in Darfur and denied any state supported genocide.
I think Satellite Sentinel’s greatest contribution will be to connect us, eventually, in real time to any conflict beginning worldwide. This may not deter actors in their violent acts but it will allow quicker dissemination of the facts and hopefully quicker action by states and non-state actors to intervene. It could become a torrent of information exposing atrocities that we will not be able to turn away from. It is a great tool and I hope it proves successful in the fight to end genocide.
I have to admit, recently I had been heartened with the progress made by the United States Congress and President Obama during the lame duck session. The repeal of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell”, the compromise on taxes and New START are a cumulative positive according to my tally. It was giving me reason to believe that the Republican gains in the November elections might have been exactly what American politics needed: a move to the center. And this is not something I can admit without pause and some accompanying psychic pain from “sucking it up”. Still, it must be recognized once Democrats were in a position where compromise was their only choice, bipartisanship finally became an apt term to describe new legislation rather than hopeful rhetoric during the health care reform process.
Then I read something like this entry in the Opinion section of the Wall Street Journal and fear reaches up like a drowning man’s hand to pull my heart back into the abyss. Compromise between two rational positions is one thing, but compromise between a rational position and one supported mostly by conspiracy theorists and nihilists is another. Congressman Fred Upton is about to take the reins of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and does not believe there is any danger from global warming. He plans on putting his money where his mouth is by taking it directly from the EPA and trying to stop any efforts by the U.S. government to impose regulation on polluters to curtail their output of green house gases. His stated reason: the loss of millions of jobs.
Let’s start there. He unequivocally tells his readers that millions of jobs will be lost when the EPA begins its regulations, but then three paragraphs later condemns the agency for not completing the requisite jobs loss/gain analysis that is required by law. So what is the basis of his large rounded off number as to the amount of job losses this legislation will create? I would guess fear. The EPA is beginning their regulation on a graduated time line in order to curtail any sudden disruptions to the energy and manufacturing industries and will only begin with a small number of the largest polluters and new large scale construction projects. Also, it is perfectly logical that a positive long-term change in direction for an industry will actually create more jobs in the long run, Including high paying and highly influential jobs in research and design. And industry hasn’t been blindsided with this. These changes have been in the works for a long time (The Clean Air Act was passed in 1990) and some in the energy industry are ready and support the EPA’s new measures. They even think it will spur job creation! Instead of making the EPA toothless why don’t we empower it and let it thin the herd to make our energy sector stronger?
The second assertion of Mr. Upton’s that I would like to take to task is that the EPA was wrong when:
“In December 2009 the agency (EPA) determined they (greenhouse gases) were a danger—and gave itself the green light to issue rules cutting CO2 emissions on a wide range of enterprises from coal plants to paper mills to foundries.”
All procedural matters aside, Fred Upton is claiming that greenhouse gases are not dangerous, that the global warming issue is a non-issue. As I write this it is December 31, 2010. You have to be kidding me. Let’s break this down into three simple statements of scientific fact. For over fifty years Co2 has been recorded as increasing in the earth’s atmosphere at an extremely high rate: Check. Increased Co2 increases the Earth’s temperature: Check. Ecological systems are interdependent and change in temperature will affect global weather patterns and thus plant and animal life: Check. Yes, all these are basic science facts and you can deny them at your own peril. People believed the Earth was flat long after it was proven to be round. Let’s choose the legacy that doesn’t leave us looking like Neanderthals, dragging our knuckles on the ground, and trust what has made us a super power in the first place: science!
I came across Green America’s National Green Pages while trying to come up with some nice socially and environmentally friendly gifts this year. I know it is a little late now, unless you have an after Christmas gift exchange, but it is well worth bookmarking as it goes far beyond seasonal gifts and offers the kinds of household goods people need all year round. And the award for “Greenest Product of the Year” or maybe in this case “Brownest”: Mr Ellie Pooh’s paper.
Case in point of the Democratic Party’s ineptitude to shape national discourse and persuade the public that Republicans do not have their best interests in mind is found in this Daily Kos post. Republicans can say they support the American troops and give a McCarthian glare to anyone who questions U.S. foreign policy, but their words ring hollow when we see how these mostly non-upper class Americans soldiers were treated upon returning home under the Bush era. Today the same party blocked legislation that would fund veterans and 9-11 victims because then they would have to concede that gays have equal rights in the armed services. The Republicans are just being obstructionists until agreements serve their special interests. Their success and the fact the Democrats are beating one catch phrase, “the millionaire tax cut”, to death is not a good sign for their party in 2012.
For a nice discussion on this theme of the Democratic message please check out episode 417 , act 2 of the radio show This American Life.
I meant to share this a couple months ago, but it got lost in the shuffle and just resurfaced when I was looking for something else. It’s an article about a motorcycle maintenance program that has been very successful in creating a low cost, job producing, high impact project in the health sector. Not an obvious correlation for most Americans or other Western people living in developed countries, but to those living in rural areas far from any clinic the connection is clear. Without transportation, that actually runs, you can’t get to resources or bring them to you. I think this story is representative of the larger problem with most aid projects: their autonomy and long term management are not properly addressed. Gaining skills and business management training are the keys to the local level aspect of larger national development plans.