News headlines in July 2019, page 8

UNITED NATIONS, Jul 09 (IPS) - Luis Felipe López-Calva is UN Assistant Secretary-General and UNDP Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Transparency is a critical element of making governance more effective. By making information available, it creates a foundation for greater accountability to citizens.

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Jul 09 (IPS) - For decades, the two Bretton Woods institutions have rejected the contribution of industrial policy (IP), or government investment and technology promotion efforts, in accelerating and sustaining growth, industrialization and structural transformation.

Finally, two International Monetary Fund (IMF) staff members, Reda Cherif and Fuad Hasanov, have broken the taboo. They embrace industrial policy, arguing against the current conventional wisdom that East Asian industrial policies cannot be successfully emulated by other developing countries.

STOCKHOLM / ROME, Jul 09 (IPS) -

And I've seen it before,
and I'll see it again.
Yes I've seen it before,
just little bits of history repeating.

-- Propeller Heads: History repeating

The Libyan catastrophe and the suffering of "illegal" migrants are generally depicted as fairly recent events, though they are actually the results of a long history of greed, contempt for others and fatal shortsightedness. Like former Yugoslavia, Libya was created from a mosaic of tribal entities, subdued by colonial powers and then ruled by an iron-fisted dictator. Now, Libya is a quagmire where local and international stakeholders battle to control its natural resources. The country holds the largest oil reserves in Africa, oil and gas account for 60 percent of GDP and more than 90 percent of exports.¹ This is one reason why Egypt, France, Russia, Saudi Arabia, the U.S., and many other nations are enmeshed in Libya. Furthermore, European nations try to stop mainly sub-Saharan refugees and migrants from reaching their coasts from Libya. An attempt to understand Italy´s essential role in the struggle over Libya´s oil and attempts to control unwanted immigration may help to clarify some issues related to the current situation.

UNITED NATIONS, Jul 09 (IPS) - Finbarr Toesland, Africa RenewalMegacities, cities with a population of at least 10 million, are sprouting everywhere in Africa. Cairo in Egypt, Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Lagos in Nigeria are already megacities, while Luanda in Angola, Dar es Salaam in Tanzania and Johannesburg in South Africa will attain the status by 2030, according the United Nations.

UNITED NATIONS, Jul 09 (IPS) - The United Nations has condemned an internet shutdown and the blocking of social media channels during Sudan's political crisis, as fears persisted over a crackdown on media freedoms in the turbulent African country.

BRASILIA, Jul 09 (IPS) - When cases of Hansen's disease, better known as leprosy, increase in Brazil, it is not due to a lack of medical assistance but to the growing efficacy of the health system in detecting infections, contrary to the situation in other countries.

COTONOU, Benin, Jul 08 (IPS) - Richard Dossevi parks his motorcycle taxi on one of the busiest street corners in Cotonou, Benin's commercial capital, to wait for commuters amid the summer heat.

LONDON, Jul 08 (IPS) - Professor Joshua Castellino is Executive Director of the UK-based Minority Rights Group International.

Contemporary politics generates a lot of noise and smoke, with little attention devoted to understanding, analysing and fixing the causes of the noise and smoke. The global public discourse is dominated by statements made by politicians and aspirants to power, designed to shock, awe and draw support.

AMSTERDAM, Jul 08 (IPS) - Eco Matser is Hivos global Climate Change / Energy and Development Coordinator.

Whoever still thinks climate change is purely an environmental issue, threatening only nature, needs to think again. Climate change is also essentially a human issue because of its devastating effect on human life – and rights. It exacerbates existing inequalities, undermines democracy and threatens development at large. Likewise, by far the greatest burden will fall on those already in poverty, while the rich will be able to buy their way out of rising heat and hunger.

BONN, Jul 08 (IPS) - Jens Martens is executive director of Global Policy Forum (New York/Bonn) and has been the director of Global Policy Forum Europe since its foundation in 2004. Since 2011 he has also coordinated the international Civil Society Reflection Group on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

When UN Member States adopted the 2030 Agenda and its SDGs in September 2015, they signalled with the title Transforming our World that ‘business as usual’ is no longer an option and fundamental changes in politics and society are necessary.