MEXICO CITY, Aug 4 2021 (IPS)* – In southeast Mexico, work on the Yucatan Solar Park, owned by the Chinese company Jinko Solar, has been halted since 2020 for lack of proper consultation with indigenous communities, after affected local residents filed an injunction against the project.
.
For the construction of the suspended Yucatán Solar Park on the Yucatán peninsula in southeastern Mexico, the site was only partially cleared. Like most infrastructure projects involving Chinese companies and banks in Latin America, the plant lacks socio-environmental standards. CREDIT: Courtesy of Asamblea Múuch’ Xíinbal
(UN News)* — Capping years of deliberations, the UN General Assembly on 2 August 2021 established a new platform to improve the lives of Afro-descendants, who have for centuries suffered the ills of racism, racial discrimination and the legacy of enslavement around the globe.
.
UN Photo/Logan Abassi | Children living in a displaced persons camp in Haiti. (file)
Manama, 02 August 2021 (UNEP)* – Improved awareness, appropriate policies and a strong regulatory framework are needed to reduce food waste in West Asia, according to a new report, The State of Food Waste in West Asia, released by the UN Environment Programme’s Regional Office for West Asia.
The report, conducted in 12 countries in the region, sets out a comprehensive view of the current situation across the region, in which around 34% of the food served is wasted, with an estimation ranging from 100 to 150kg/cap of food waste occurring at the household stage, similar to levels in Western Europe and North America.
The Pre-Summit of the United Nations Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) taking place in Rome, as a preparative stage to the New York September Summit, is, as expected, going in the wrong direction.
As many civil society members, as well as past and current Rapporteurs on the Right to Food, have denounced, this summit is yet another instrument to reinforce corporate control over food and agriculture, while attempting to restrain civil society’s role in global food governance.
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 2 2021 (IPS)* – Ed Koch, a sharp-tongued Mayor of New York city (1978-89), once stopped short of using a four-letter word to denounce the United Nations.
Credit: UN Photo/Evan Schneider
Instead, he opted for a five-letter word dismissing the UN as a “sewer” relegating it to the lower depths of degradation.
Washington: There is History in the UN 29 Nov 2012 vote: 138 YES to giving Palestine the UN status as “nonmember observer state”, only 9 NO, and 41 abstentions.
Johan Galtung
Beyond Middle East politics the vote also mirrors the limits to the US global, and the Israeli regional empires: 138 defy their grip and favor change, 41+9=50 NOT–for various reasons. A crucial vote on a crucial issue is a crucial test. Who want what?
First: the OIC, Muslim, Arab: none yielding to USA-Israel in spite of the efforts against the Arab awakening. Israel is alone in the region: Greece-Turkey-Cyprus were all YES.
Next: Saraoui (Sahrawi or Saharawi), Western Sahara building on Spain-Morocco YES, and Kashmir on India-Pakistan YES.
(WHO)* — The theme of World Breastfeeding Week 2020 is “Support breastfeeding for a healthier planet”. In line with this theme, WHO and UNICEF are calling on governments to protect and promote women’s access to skilled breastfeeding counselling, a critical component of breastfeeding support.
Breastfeeding provides every child with the best possible start in life. It delivers health, nutritional and emotional benefits to both children and mothers. And it forms part of a sustainable food system.
But while breastfeeding is a natural process, it is not always easy. Mothers need support – both to get started and to sustain breastfeeding.
Skilled counselling services can ensure that mothers and families receive this support, along with the information, the advice, and the reassurance they need to nourish their babies optimally.
2 August 2021 (UN News)* — Two senior UN officials are urging Governments to make breastfeeding-friendly environments a priority, in line with commitments made earlier this year to accelerate global progress on malnutrition.
Henrietta Fore, Executive Director of the UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, and Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), issued the reminder in a joint statement for World Breastfeeding Week, which runs through 7 August.
The World Food Programme launched its school meals programme in Venezuela, carrying out the first distributions of take-home rations in the state of Falcon.
Kim wants to become a ballet dancer. Photo: WFP/Alexis Masciarelli
Sitting in the kitchen, Kim watches attentively as her mother empties the large blue bag they just went to collect at her school. “One, two, three, four. That’s lentils. One, two, three, four, five, six… That’s rice!”, counts the 5-year-old girl pointing at the food piling up on the table.
Coral reefs are one of the most striking maritime populations. Large underwater forums or structures consisting in principle of skeletal structures of colonial marine invertebrates.
But certain types of corals are flexible organisms that create some of the world’s most diversified ecosystems.
Intelligently resemble or mimic plants and trees and include species such as sea fans and the sea, but are vulnerable to environmental changes.
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 