197 ARES Scholarships in Belgium for Developing Countries 2016-2017

Scholarship Name: ARES – Academy of Research and Higher Education – Scholarships Program for Developing Countries Belgium

Brief description: 2016-2017 Masters and Training Scholarships for 197 Students from Developing Countries by University Commission for Development (CUD) Scholarship Program, Belgium

Accepted Subject Areas

Master complementary Aquaculture,
Master complementary Transport Management,
Master in Public Health – Health and Development,
Master of Science and supplemental, Environmental Management in Developing Countries
Master complementary Managing animal and plant resources in tropical,
Master complementary Managing Natural Hazards,
Master complementary Food Science and Technology,
Master in Transfusion Medicine, European Microfinance Programme,
Master complementary Crop Protection tropical and subtropical,
Advanced Master in International and Development Economics,
Master in Development, Environment and Society,
Master in Public Health Methodology complementary

About Scholarship

Within the framework of the Belgian policy for development cooperation, the Minister for Development Cooperation and the Directorate-General for Development Cooperation entrust the Belgian Higher Education Institutions with the preparation of Postgraduate Programmes (Advanced Masters) and Training Programmes that are specifically oriented towards young professionals from developing countries.

International Courses and Training Programmes are part of the global study programmes of the Higher Education Institutions. They are open to all students who satisfy the conditions of qualification, but aim at proposing training units that distinguish themselves by their openness towards specific development issues.

Within the programme for International Courses and Training Programmes 2016-2017, ARES grants 130 scholarships for participation into the masters and 67 scholarships for participation into the training programmes.

Scholarship Offered Since: Not specified

Scholarship Type: Master’s and training scholarship programmes

Selection Criteria

The following criteria will apply for the selection of holders of scholarships:

1. Only applicants originating in developing countries, qualify for selection. To be eligible, candidates must reside and work in their country at the time of the introduction of the file.
2. Only the nationals of the following countries are authorized to postulate with the scholarships: Benin, Bolivia, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cambodia, Cameroon, Cuba, Ecuador, Haïti, Indonesia, Madagascar, Mali, Morocco, Niger, Peru, Philippines, Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Senegal, Vietnam.
   
3. At the beginning of the programme, candidates must be less than 40 years old for courses, and less than 45 years old for training programmes.
4. Candidates must be holders of a degree that is comparable to a Belgian University graduate degree (“licence”). However, for certain programmes different rules of admissibility may be defined, and these are specified hereafter, where appropriate.
5. Candidates must show professional experience of at least two years upon termination of their studies. Where candidates are holders of a postgraduate degree delivered by an university of an industrial country, they must show professional experience of at least three years upon termination of their studies.
6. Candidates must have a good knowledge of written and spoken French; for programmes organised in another language, good knowledge, in writing and speaking, of this language, is required. Moreover, the candidate will be asked to commit himself to study French in order to be able to participate in daily life in Belgium.
7. Candidates are not allowed to apply for more than one programme.

Applicants must not first obtain admission to one of the French-speaking universities of Belgium in order to apply for grants from ARES.

Number of Scholarships: ARES grants 130 scholarships for participation into the masters and 67 scholarships for participation into the training programmes.

Duration of Scholarship:  For the duration of the program

Eligible Countries: Students from African and  developing countries

To be taken in: Belgium

Application Deadline: starting from 5 October 2015 to 10 February 2016

Offered annually? Yes

How to Apply

The application form can be downloaded from our website here.

It will be carefully completed and returned, only by Post Mail or Express Mail, to ARES (rue Royale 180, 1000 Brussels, Belgium), that must be in their possession at the latest by 10 February 2016

Visit the Scholarship Webpage to for details

Sponsors: The University Commission for Development

Important: Applying for a ARES scholarship is absolutely free of charge. ARES does not charge any fee at any stage of the application or selection process. You may raise any question or concern about persons or companies claiming to be acting on behalf of ARES and requesting the payment of a fee by emailing us at maryvonne.aubry[at]ares-ac.be.
Any application containing cash will be automatically rejected.

ESED Scholarship for Developing Countries 2016 (US$ 23,000/year)

Scholarship Name: Education for Sustainable Energy Development [ESED] scholarship

Brief description: 2016 Masters Scholarship in Sustainable Energy Development for Students from Developing Countries by the Education for Sustainable Energy Development [ESED] to be taken in any University around the world

Accepted Subject Areas: Programs eligible for this scholarship must show a 75% focus on renewable energy and/or the power sector in general.

About Scholarship

The purpose of the Education for Sustainable Energy Development [ESED] scholarship is to support outstanding students from developing countries pursuing advanced studies in sustainable energy development and to encourage meaningful contributions to the collective body of knowledge about this subject. These scholarships are available to up to 10 outstanding students from developing countries and economies in transition, for a period of up to two years for Masters Degree, awarded annually.

Scholarship Offered Since:  2001

Selection Criteria

The Global Sustainable Electricity Partnership considers an outstanding student to be one who:

• graduates with excellent grades in the top 20% of her/his class
• is determined to advance her/his knowledge and understanding
• has a history of community involvement
• is committed to sustainable energy
• is committed to return and contribute to her/his home country

Who is qualified to apply?

To be eligible to apply for this scholarship, students must

• plan to undertake studies at the Masters level in areas directly related to sustainable energy development
• be citizens of the developing countries and territories identified for OECD official development aid in the DAC List of ODA Recipients

Number of scholarships: Up to ten (10) Masters scholarships will be awarded annually.

Value of Scholarship: Scholarships of US$ 23,000 per year.

Duration: Scholarship will last for a period of up to two years for Masters Degree

Eligible African/Other Countries

Developing countries and territories identified for OECD official development aid in the DAC List of ODA Recipients are eligible to apply. Download list for details.

To be taken at (country): All universities are eligible for the ESED scholarship. It is preferable that the candidate pursues her/his studies in a university outside his home country.

Application Deadline: The ESED Masters Scholarship deadline is March 4, 2016. The online application system and application forms will be available in early January 2016.

Offered annually? Yes

How to Apply

Applications should be submitted using the Online ESED Scholarship Application Submission and uploading the requested documents. As the volume of incoming applications is extremely heavy around the deadline, we strongly urge you to submit your file as early as possible.

Visit Scholarship webpage for details

Sponsors: Education for Sustainable Energy Development [ESED]

Apply for 150,000 China Government Scholarships for Developing Countries 2016

Do you want to study in China for undergraduate, Masters or Doctoral degree?

China’s goal to Attract 500,000 foreign students by 2020 is causing the government to offer enormous scholarships to students around the world. At the September UN Sustainable Development Summit, Chinese President Xi Jinping announced that China will provide 150,000 scholarships for citizens of developing countries including Africa. And also help nurture 500,000 professional technicians in these countries with the next 5 years. The essence of the two programmes was to ensure that beneficiaries fast-tracked development of their countries.

China, the third Most Popular Study Destination for International Students

Over the last couple of years China surpassed other leading countries, such as France, Germany, and Australia, to become the third most-popular study destinations for higher education studies, behind UK and US.

In addition, as of July 2013, international students are now permitted to take part-time jobs during their studies, or to pursue paid internships off campus, so long as they have permission both from their host institution and Chinese immigration authorities.

Language of study in China

Some Chinese universities provide international bachelor, master and doctoral programs conducted in English which have no requirements of Chinese language proficiency.

150,000 China Scholarships for Developing Countries

China Scholarship Council (CSC), entrusted by the Ministry of Education (MOE) of People’s Republic of China, is responsible for the enrollment and administration of Chinese Government Scholarship programs. 279 designated Chinese universities offer a wide variety of academic programs in Science, Engineering, Agriculture, Medicine, Law, Economics, Management, Education, Liberal Arts, Philosophy, History, and Fine Arts for scholarship winners at undergraduate, masters and PhD levels.

Chinese Government Scholarships for developing countries includes the following programs.

Chinese Government Scholarship Bilateral Program

This includes full or partial scholarships in accordance with educational exchange agreements or MOUs between the Chinese government and governments of other countries, institutions, universities or international organizations. It supports undergraduate students, graduate students, general scholars and senior scholars. Applicants shall apply to the dispatching authorities for overseas study in their home countries.

Where to send the application: dispatching authorities in applicant’s home country

Eligible Field of Study: Undergraduate, Master’s and Doctoral students, General and Senior Scholars

Learn more about the Bilateral Program

Chinese University Scholarship Program

This is a full scholarship for designated universities in China and certain provincial education offices to enroll outstanding international students to pursue graduate degrees in China. It only supports graduate students. Applicants shall apply to the designated Chinese universities undertaking this program. At present, a total of 271 Chinese universities are designated to undertake this program.

Where to send the application: designated Chinese universities

Eligible Field of Study: Master’s and Doctoral students

Learn more about the Chinese University Program

Great Wall Program for Developing Countries

This is a full scholarship for the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to sponsor students and scholars in developing countries to study and conduct research in China. Applicants shall apply to the National Commissions for UNESCO in their home countries.

This program only supports, in general, one-year English-taught programs. Scholarship recipients of Chinese-taught programs without adequate Chinese proficiency are required to get approval from both CSC and UNESCO for one-year Chinese language study.

Where to send the application: National Commissions for UNESCO in applicant’s home country

Eligible Field of Study: General and Senior scholars

Learn more about the Great Wall Program

Applications Deadline

You can apply to the dispatching authorities for overseas study in your home country or the designated Chinese universities undertaking the program between January and early April.

Number of Scholarships: Up to 150,000

Full Scholarship covers: tuition waiver, accommodation, stipend, medical insurance

Offered annually? Yes

How to Apply

CSC only accepts recommended applications from the dispatching authorities in your home country. The Agency Number, which can only be got from the dispatching authorities upon recommendation, is a must for online application.

The illustration below will help you understand the general application steps. There might be minor differences between programs. Please read the introductions to each program for detailed guidance.

You can register and submit your online application at www.csc.edu.cn/laihua/ and click“Application Online for International Students”.

What is “Agency Number” and where can I get it?

Agency Number is the first required item that must be filled when applying online at CSC Online Application System for International Students. Each Agency Number stands for a specific application receiving agency and will be given to the recommended candidates only. You will only get your Agency Number from your application receiving agency (e.g. Chinese embassy, AUN Secretariat, etc.) when you are recommended as a candidate.

Apply for Total Startupper Challenge 2016 for African Entrepreneurs – Up to $30,000

Brief description: Do you aspire to start your own business and build a brighter future? Startupper of the year by Total is a unique opportunity for Start-Ups and entrepreneurs in Africa to get coaching and financial support (Up to $30,000) to grow their ideas and business.

Eligible Projects: All projects are eligible regardless of the type of business or activity, as long as they share the characteristics common to creative start-ups: innovation, competitiveness, growth boosting and job creation.

About The Challenge

In Africa as elsewhere, many young people aspire to start their own business and build a brighter future, which is why Total created the Startupper of the year challenge. If you’re currently preparing a business plan or are in the early stages of creating your own business, you’re eligible to enter this challenge!

What challenges need to be tackled where you live? How will your innovative project address them? After you show how, Total will support those of you who will inspire, create, invest, hire and produce, all to transform “your” world

Offered Since: 2016

Contest Type: Challenge for African Entrepreneurs

Eligibility

• Are you under 35 years old?
• Do you want to create a business or develop one that is less than two years old?
• Are you a citizen of one of these 34 African countries: Algeria, Angola, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Côte d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Republic of Guinea, Republic of the Congo, Reunion, Senegal, South Africa, Tanzania, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia or Zimbabwe?

If so, this challenge is for you!

Only one application by contestant is admitted.

Selection Criteria

Be clear, concise and efficient. Demonstrate your thoroughness, precision, knowledge and desire to be an entrepreneur. In each of the 34 countries, “Startupper of the year by Total” jury will evaluate the innovativeness, boldness and originality of your project, along with its social and economic impact, feasibility, sustainability and potential in terms of growth, development and employment.

To boost your score, don’t overlook anything.

Number of Winners: up to 3 winners per country

Value of Award: Each winner will receive a customized coaching to help him/her to create and/or develop its business.  Its content and duration will be defined by the jury in accordance with the needs of the winner that it will have identified during the selection process. Total will provide financial support up to $30,000 (in winners local currency)

Duration of Program: will be defined by the jury based on the needs of the winner

Eligible Countries: see list above

To be taken at (country): The contestant must be a citizen of the country where its application is submitted in order to create or develop its project there.

Application Deadline: is 31 January 2016

Challenge schedule

• 28 February 2016 – Notification of preselected finalists
• 15 March 2016 – Finalists oral presentations before the jury
• 1 May 2016 – Announcement of the winners

Offered annually? Not specified

How to Enter

To enter, create your profile and provide the required information online. To support, justify and illustrate your project, you can attach as many documents as you wish to your application, including:

• your résumé,
• your business plan,
• your financing plan,
• your partnership strategy,
• an executive summary,
• a marketing brochure,
• your logo,
• your graphic standards,
• and/or a photo or video presentation, etc.

Each country has specific rules for the application process. Go to startuppers.total.com/en/challenges/ and download the rules for your country (PDF).

On completion of the pre-selection stage, the jury in each of the 34 countries will select up to 10 finalists of the best projects submitted. The finalists will then be invited to present their project orally to the jury, which will select up to three winners.

Take advantage of this opportunity. Enter for challenge

Sponsors: Total

Romanian Government Scholarships for International Students 2016

The Romanian Government through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs offers Scholarships  to foreign citizens to study for Undergraduate, Masters and Doctoral Degrees for the 2016- 2017 academic year

Eligible Field of Study: priority will be given to the candidates applying for: political and administrative sciences, education studies, Romanian culture and civilization, journalism, technical studies, oil and gas, agricultural studies, veterinary medicine, architecture, music, arts.

About Scholarship

The scholarships are granted for three levels of study:

1.  for the first cycle (licenta): This scheme is dedicated to graduates of high schools or of equivalent pre-university systems, as well as to candidates who require the equivalent of partial studies and the continuation of their studies in Romania. The complete cycle of university studies lasts for 3 to 6 years, according to the specific requirements of the chosen faculty, and ends with a final examination (licenta);
2.  for the 2nd cycle (master): This scheme is dedicated to graduates of university/post graduate studies; it lasts for 1,5 to 2 years and ends with a dissertation;
3.  for the 3rd cycle (doctorate) this scheme is dedicated to the graduates of university/postgraduate studies (i.e. master); it lasts for 3-4 years, in keeping with the specific requirements of the chosen faculty, and ends with a doctor’s thesis.

Scholarship Offered Since: Not specified

Scholarship Type: Undergraduate, Masters and Doctoral degrees

Eligibility

Citizens of non EU countries (irrespective of their country of residence) are eligible to apply. Priority is given to citizens from non EU states with which Romania does not have cultural and education cooperation agreements.

Number of Scholarships: 85 scholarships for undergraduate and postgraduate studies in Romania

Value of Scholarship:

• Free-of-charge tuition
• Free-of-charge accommodation (depending on availability, accommodation will be offered free-of-charge in students hostels, in keeping with the higher education regulations and within the limits of the sums available for this purpose),
• Financial support – a monthly amount representing :
  •  the equivalent in Romanian currency of 65 EURO per month, for the under-graduate students (1st cycle),
  • the equivalent in Romanian currency of 75 EURO per month, for post-graduate students (master degrees and specialization) 2nd cycle,
  • RI737126839CN the equivalent in Romanian currency of 85 EURO per month, for post graduate students (doctor’s degree) 3rd cycle.

These scholarships do not cover food, international and local transport. The candidates must be prepared to support personally any other additional expenses.

Duration of Scholarship: For the period of study, subject to academic performance

Eligible Countries: Any non-EU country

To be taken at (country): Romanian Universities

Application Deadline: The deadline for submitting the application files is established by each diplomatic mission. The candidate should enquire at the diplomatic mission about the enrolment calendar, starting with 2 December 2015. Foreign diplomatic missions accredited to Bucharest must send the application files with a Verbal Note to Ministry of Foreign Affairs – Public, Cultural and Scientific Diplomacy Directorate (MFA – PCSDD) by 15 March 2016, at the latest.

Offered annually? Not specified

How to Apply

To get all the necessary information about the scholarships (conditions, necessary documents, enrolment calendar) and to submit their application files, the candidates should apply directly to:

• the Romanian diplomatic missions accredited to the candidate’s country of origin or of residence or to
• the diplomatic mission of candidate’s state of origin accredited to Bucharest

Visit scholarship webpage for application details

Sponsors: Romanian Government

Important Notes

Language of Study: In order to promote Romanian language and culture, the Ministry of National Education has decided that the beneficiaries of the scholarships should study only in the Romanian language. The candidates who do not know Romanian are offered one supplementary preparatory year to study the language. Students who declare that they know Romanian language will have to pass a language test organized by the competent higher education institutions.

The significance of the elevation of the Chinese renminbi

Nick Beams

The elevation the Chinese renminbi (also known as the yuan) to the basket of global currencies making up the International Monetary Fund’s special drawing rights (SDRs), in effect making it an international reserve currency, is unlikely to have any major immediate effects. But it does underscore the vast transformation in the foundations of the world economy over the past three decades resulting from the long-term economic decline of the US.

As the Stratfor web site noted in its comment on the decision, it is the first time that the basket of reserve currencies, which had previously comprised the dollar, the British pound, the Japanese yen and the euro, will include the currency of a country not allied with the US.

The post-World War II monetary order, of which the IMF was a part, was grounded on the overwhelming economic dominance of the US. In 1945, Stratfor pointed out, US gross domestic product was estimated to be as high at 50 percent of the world total. This year it will be 22 percent.

While it supported the decision to include the renminbi in the SDR basket, the US did so very much with gritted teeth. The principal reason for its acquiescence was fear that its continued resistance—it played the leading role in having China’s 2010 push to be included in the SDR basket turned down—would provoke opposition from other powers. There is already criticism of the US from within the IMF because Congress has refused to ratify a 2010 decision to give China increased voting rights. At present, it has the same vote within the organisation’s bodies as Belgium.

This incongruity is a measure of the transformation in the world economy over the past quarter century. Two decades ago, China comprised just 2 percent of global GDP. Since then, its share has increased six-fold and this year will reach 12 percent, as the world’s second largest economy. This is one of the most significant transformations in world economic history.

However, its implications and impact on geopolitics cannot be determined by simply extrapolating from what has already taken place and drawing the conclusion that China is set eventually to become the world’s economic hegemon, or that it is on the way to becoming an imperialist power, if it is not already.

The rise of China can be understood only if it is placed in its historical and international context. This is completely ignored both by those who maintain that China is going to provide a new base of stability for world capitalism and by various pseudo-left tendencies that claim it is an imperialist power.

The overriding tendency in the historical integration of China into the framework of world capitalism has been the drive by the imperialist powers to dominate and subjugate it.

This started with the Opium Wars initiated by Britain in the mid-19th century. By the end of the 19th century, there was not only a scramble for Africa, but also the carve-up of China, as all the imperialist powers, including the emerging ones—the US, Japan and Germany in particular—sought to establish their own economic zones and spheres of influence. The US announced its emergence on the world scene with the declaration that it sought an “open door” policy in China—in other words, it was not to be excluded from exercising its burgeoning interests.

When that perspective was challenged by Japan in the 1930s, first with the invasion of Manchuria in 1931 and then the attempted conquest of the whole country in 1937, the US set itself on a path of war against its Asian rival, which erupted with the attack on Pearl Harbour in 1941 and concluded with the dropping of two atomic bombs on Japan in August 1945.

However, US plans for domination of the Chinese landmass were thwarted by the Chinese Revolution of 1949, which threw off the yoke of imperialism. But the nationalist policies and program of the Maoist regime, based on the Stalinist dogma of “socialism in one country,” meant that the country’s economic problems could not be resolved, erupting in a series of crises such as the “Great Leap Forward” of the 1950s and the “Cultural Revolution” in the 1960s.

Fearing an eruption of the working class from below, the Maoist regime moved back towards imperialism, beginning with the Nixon-Mao rapprochement at the start the 1970s and leading to the turn to market forces at the end of the decade under Deng Xiaoping. With the bloody suppression of the working class in the events of June 1989 and the subsequent economic opening up of China, the Maoist-Stalinist bureaucracy carried through the restoration of capitalism, making its economy ever more dependent on the shifts and flows of global capital.

The spectacular growth of the Chinese economy over the past quarter century, however, does not mean that China is on the path taken by the existing imperialist powers in an earlier historical period. In the first place, its economic expansion has taken place very differently: it has been a product not of some organic national development, but has flowed above all from its role as the cheap-labour manufacturing platform of the transnational corporations of the major powers.

Consequently, the physiognomy of the Chinese ruling elite—notwithstanding the great wealth of its upper echelons—is very much that of the comprador bourgeoisie that emerged in the earlier period of colonial subjugation, seeking to manoeuvre its way through the powerful currents of the global economy while enhancing its wealth, often by political means and outright corruption.

The concerted push by the regime to have the renminbi recognised as part of the SDR basket displays these characteristics. It is aimed at trying to enhance China’s economic status and give it greater room for manoeuvre by lessening, at least to some extent, the power of the US dollar in determining its connections to the world market.

In that way, the hope of the regime is that it will contribute to what it calls China’s “peaceful rise.”

Such calculations, however, completely leave out of account the implications of the very changes in the structure of the global economy and geo-political relations that have led to the renminbi’s rise.

One hundred years ago, in analysing the significance of World War I as the opening of the imperialist epoch of wars and revolutions, Lenin explained that there could be no permanent peace under capitalism because any equilibrium between the major powers would, by the very nature and dynamic of the capitalist economy, be only temporary.

This was because the capitalist economy developed unevenly. Consequently, the economic conditions that prevailed at one point and formed the basis for stability would immediately start to be disrupted, leading inevitably to the eruption of new wars.

Lenin specifically pointed to the transformation that had led to the emergence of Germany from a “miserable” collection of states and principalities to a major economic power in the space of barely 50 years.

The situation a century ago is not exactly analogous to that of today. China, unlike Germany in the first decade of the last century, is not an imperialist power. But Lenin’s analysis has contemporary relevance nonetheless. The economic rise of China has completely disrupted the post-war economic order and the equilibrium established between the major imperialist powers following the 30 years of conflagration—two world wars and many smaller conflicts—from 1914 to 1945.

The elevation of the Chinese currency must be seen within this context. Rather than providing a new foundation for stability and order, it is an expression of the deepening instability and disorder that increasingly characterise the global economy, flowing from the erosion of the foundations on which it was based—unchallenged US economic hegemony.

Faced with this situation, the US is not planning to fade away peacefully into the background, but is seeking to counter its economic decline by military means. This is the meaning of its ever-increasing bellicosity towards Russia and its pivot to Asia, aimed at the subjugation of China. However, this drive brings it into conflict with its old imperialist rivals, which likewise see their future as bound up with the exploitation of the resources and labour of the Eurasian landmass, and whose interests do not necessarily coincide with those of the US.

From this perspective, the elevation of the renminbi is an expression of shifts in the tectonic plates of the world economy that are fueling geopolitical tensions and creating the conditions for the eruption of a third world war—a catastrophe that can be prevented only by the unification of the working class on the program of world socialist revolution.

Mass job losses loom in Scotland

Stephen Alexander

On the back of thousands of job cuts in the UK steel industry, winding up 150 years of steel production in Scotland, mass job losses have been announced by major employers.

Workers in the North Sea oil and gas industry and across local government and HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) tax offices will be among the worst hit.

The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics recorded an 11,000 hike in unemployed between July and September. Scotland’s unemployment rate now stands at 6 percent—double its pre-recession low—compared to 5.3 percent for the UK as a whole. Economic growth has also begun to lag behind the UK rate, which also slowed dramatically.

Higher unemployment and slower growth in Scotland are being driven by the crisis of the UK offshore oil and gas industry, which accounts for a much greater portion of the economy than any other UK region. With some of the highest exploratory costs of any offshore site in the world, British fields, based predominantly off the coast of Scotland, have been hit severely as crude values have tumbled by 60 percent in the past year.

As energy firms have moved to shore up profits by slashing investment and operational costs, employment in the sector has fallen by 65,000 to 375,000. Prior to the oil slump, some 225,000 of these posts were based in Scotland, equivalent to one in 12 jobs north of the border. The Aberdeen Press and Journal reports “up to 20,000 more positions are expected to go before 2020.”

Recently, Chevron, which axed 225 jobs in Aberdeen last July, announced another 140 posts are at risk in Aberdeen, London, Norway, Denmark and the United States. Danish giant Maersk Oil has initiated 220 redundancies as part of the retirement of its Janice oil installation. Royal Dutch Shell is to withdraw from the majority of its operations in the North Sea. According to Swift Worldwide resources, some 233,000 oil jobs have been stripped globally since 2014 and this figure is projected to top 250,000 by the end of 2015.

Hundreds of redundancies are filtering through the oil and gas supply chain, which supports around 2,000 companies across Scotland. To name but a few: US electronics manufacturer Plexus is downsizing production in Bathgate at the expense of 50 posts. Howco, a supplier of specialist alloys, is shedding a similar number from its 167-strong workforce in Irvine. And around 260 jobs are imperilled in the Shetlands, where the Wood Group PSN and Bilfinger are reducing the workforce refurbishing the Sullom Voe oil terminal.

The City of Aberdeen in the northeast of Scotland, the UK oil capital, is in deep crisis. The numbers claiming out-of-work benefits increased by 39 percent in October, compared to the same month last year. Shockwaves have been felt across the wider region where house prices and businesses have begun to stagnate. A 66 percent spike in claimants was recorded across Aberdeenshire and 25 percent in the neighbouring Highlands.

The oil slump has exposed the fraudulent nature of the Scottish National Party’s (SNP) referendum campaign last year, which hinged on the promise that an independent Scottish state would utilise oil revenues to eliminate austerity. This was always a cynical fraud aimed at marketing its right-wing separatist agenda to the working class. Demonstrating the party’s true constituency, the devolved SNP administration worked with the Conservative government of Prime Minister David Cameron to arrange £1.7 billion of additional tax breaks for energy conglomerates. The industry now contributes less to government revenues than it receives.

A similar pro-corporate alliance between the nationalists and the Conservatives is on display over the crisis in the British steel industry, where 4,000 jobs have gone since the summer. Both are united in a strategy of securing the profit interests of the industry by offering up tax breaks and subsidised energy costs. Both have sought, alongside the Labour Party and the trade unions, to stifle the resistance of the working class by promoting anti-Chinese chauvinism, blaming China for the “devastating impact that steel dumping has on the Scottish industry.”

So much for the SNP’s “civic” brand of nationalism.

The move by Tata Steel to close the last remaining steel plants in Scotland, at Dalzell in Motherwell and Clydebridge in neighbouring Cambuslang, will erase 400 relatively high paid jobs and further impoverish working class communities devastated by decades of deindustrialisation. Motherwell and the surrounding area never recovered from the shutter of the sprawling integrated steel factory at Ravenscraig in 1992, which cost 10,000 jobs. Today, North Lanarkshire accounts for 23 of the most deprived regions in Scotland, second only to the Glasgow City Region.

Many more workers will be pitched into destitution after North Lanarkshire council, based in Motherwell, unveiled plans to slash 1,095 full-time posts, approximately 10 percent of its workforce. Similar measures are being carried out with the backing of all the major parties across Scotland’s 32 local authorities: 8,000 redundancies have been initiated, including 3,000 at Glasgow City Council and 2,000 at Edinburgh.

Approximately 40,000 public sector jobs, primarily at local authorities, were cut in Scotland in recent years. This figure could rapidly double as councils face a combined financial shortfall of £1 billion despite repeated rounds of brutal budget cuts.

This is before the impact of the unprecedented austerity cuts tabled by Chancellor George Osborne in his Autumn Statement is factored into the Scottish budget. According to the Institute of Public Policy Research (IPPR), non-protected Scottish government departments, including local government, will see budgets fall by between 9.5 and 13.5 percent

Cuts to departments directly managed by Westminster will also result in mass job losses. The HMRC has outlined more than 2,000 redundancies in Scotland, as part of plans to close 137 offices across the UK over the next decade.

The official employment statistics conceal the full scale of the assault on the social position of working class at the hands of the SNP and successive UK governments. While Scotland’s unemployment rate has recovered somewhat from its 9 percent peak following the 2008 financial collapse, most employment is in generally low paid and insecure jobs. Last month, Bank of England Chief Economist Andy Haldane characterised the years since 2008 as “one of the largest and longest squeezes on wages since at least 1850.”

A recent study commissioned by global financial services company KPMG found that 450,000 workers, one in five, earn less than the miserly Scottish Living Wage of £8.25. This is an increase of 27,000 people over the last year. The figures include 72 percent of young people aged 18-21 years, who are the most poorly paid group, alongside women (29 percent) and part-time workers. With a median hourly wage of just £11.76, low pay is the norm for the majority of Scottish workers.

At the opposite pole of society, Scotland’s four richest families are now worth £1 billion more than the combined wealth of the poorest 20 percent of society—one million people. Annual figures published by the High Pay Centre indicate that the median pay of executives of Scotland’s largest businesses stands at £1.1 million or 77 times the earnings of a minimum wage worker.

India: Hundreds die in Tamil Nadu floods

Deepal Jayasekera

Massive flooding across southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu has taken the lives of 280 people since early November and effectively cut off Chennai, the state capital and the country’s fourth largest city. Over 50 people have been killed in the neighbouring state of Andhra Pradesh and two in Puducherry.

More than a million people have been affected by the heaviest rainfall in the state in over a century with the Indian Meteorological Department on Thursday predicting three more days of torrential rains. Damage is estimated so far at over $US3 billion.

Currently more than 164,000 people are homeless and sheltering in 460 camps in Chennai, Cuddalore, Thiruvallur and Kanchipuram. Emergency assistance has yet to reach some parts of the state. In many areas, only the roofs of houses are visible and where the water has subsided there is thick black mud and garbage.

Much of Chennai and its suburbs remain submerged for the fourth consecutive day under up to two-and-half metres of water. Schools, hospitals, factories and other facilities in and around the flat coastal city have been shut down. This includes the Ford, Renault, Daimler, Hyundai and Nissan auto plants, the Royal Enfield motorcycle company, the Indian Oil Corporation and three commercial television networks.

Yesterday the media reported that at least 18 patients in intensive care at MIOT International, a Chennai private hospital, have died since December 2 after floods flooded the power generators that maintain critical life-support systems.

All highways to the city are closed with most mobile telephone networks in Chennai down. The city’s central railway station was shut on Wednesday and on Thursday Chennai airport was closed. Over 1,500 stranded passengers had to be rescued from the international airport on Wednesday. The Airport Authority of India has announced that the facility may be able to start partial operations today.

The majority of those affected are working-class families and the poor. The cost of basic items—milk, vegetables and drinking water—has skyrocketed. A two-litre bottle of mineral water, normally available for 30 rupees, now costs 150 rupees while a one-litre packet of milk, usually 20 rupees, is being sold in some places for 100 rupees.

D.K. Sharma, medical superintendent at All India Institute of Medical Sciences, told the Indo-Asian News Service on Friday: “The situation will become critical now and there are possibilities that diseases like cholera, diarrhea would spread and various types of infections would increase. The intake of safe and clean water at this time is very important to avoid any disease.” He also warned that stagnant water contaminated by bacteria could result in several types of severe skin and throat infections.

In some areas Chennai authorities gave no warning to local residents before opening flood gates on some of the city’s 30 waterways. One South Chennai resident told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation that he was not given adequate information about water being released from a nearby lake. The Tamil Nadu public works department claimed that it had issued warnings but there had been a breakdown in media and phone communications. In North Chennai, residents held protests denouncing the state government for its lack of any rescue response in their locality.

An Indian home ministry official said that the central government would be sending “technical experts and engineers who will find a solution to flush out all the flood water. It has to be drained out soon, but we don’t know how.”

Addressing the Indian parliament on Thursday, Home Minister Rajnath Singh described the situation in Tamil Nadu as “alarming” and said that Chennai had been “turned into an island.”

On Thursday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the release of 10 billion rupees ($US154 million) for flood relief in Tamil Nadu. Indian government officials claimed that this was on top of 9.4 billion rupees ($145 million) previously announced. These amounts are a pittance compared to the magnitude of the devastation, not just in Chennai but across the state. Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa Jayaram has called on the Indian government to provide 80 billion rupees in floor relief assistance.

Contrary to government claims that authorities are providing “all possible help” for flood victims, the official relief operations are very limited. While over 4,000 military personnel have been deployed, on Thursday only four helicopters were involved in dropping food, water and medicines. In Chengalpattu, near Chennai, residents have told the media that they have not received any government relief and that food parcels are only being distributed by NGOs and local organisations.

Indian authorities have attempted to blame climate change for the flooding but according to weather experts, the seasonal north-east monsoon, worsened by the El Nino effect in the eastern Pacific Ocean, was mainly responsible for the unprecedented rainfall.

The flooding is an indictment of all levels of government—central, state and city—that have been promoting Chennai as a “developed” metropolis in order to attract investors and allowed uncontrolled and unsafe development throughout the city.

In fact, one of the principal reasons for the devastation in Chennai is government endorsement of major building projects without proper planning and lack of serious flood-precaution measures. The construction of high-rise buildings on wetlands and marshes that previously absorbed heavy rain has led major to flooding even during normal monsoon periods. The absence of effective storm-water drainage systems means that the water has nowhere to go and quickly inundates low-lying areas and roads throughout the city.

Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) director Sunita Narain told the Hindu on December 3 said that the Chennai floods were the direct result of unregulated urbanisation. “Urban sprawls such as Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai, Chennai, Srinagar, have not paid adequate attention to the natural water bodies that exist in them. In Chennai, each of its lakes has a natural flood discharge channel which drains the spillover. But we have built over many of these water bodies, blocking the smooth flow of water.”

According to CSE research, Chennai had over 600 lakes in the 1980s but by 2008 only a fraction were in healthy condition. State records also indicated that the total area of 19 major lakes, which provide storage, shrank from 1,130 hectares in the 1980s to around 645 hectares in the early 2000s. The CSE said that drains carrying surplus water from lakes to other wetlands area had also been reduced and hundreds of city storm-water drains required immediate de-silting.

Number of US investable wealth millionaires grew by 8.6 percent in 2014

Andre Damon

The number of “high net worth individuals” in the United States increased by 8.6 percent in 2014, according to a report released Wednesday by consulting firm Capgemini.

The firm’s 2015 US Wealth Report showed that the number of such “high net worth individuals” (HWNI), or those with $1 million or more in investable assets, grew to 4.4 million, and that their overall wealth grew by 9.4 percent to $15.2 trillion.

Significantly, the enrichment and expansion of this social layer, which makes up slightly more than 1 percent of the population, took place even as the earnings of a typical household continued to decline. The Census Bureau noted earlier this year that the median household income in the US fell from $54,462 in 2013 to $53,657 in 2014, and that this figure is down by 6.5 percent since 2007, the year before the official start of the 2008 recession.

Despite six years of what the Federal Reserve and the White House have termed an economic “recovery,” in which the official unemployment rate has returned to the “normal” level of 5 percent, the incomes of a typical household have fallen year after year during the Obama presidency.

The Capgemini report noted that the US continues to create more wealthy, rich, and super-rich people than any other country. The US accounted for 28.6 percent of all wealth created for HWNI since 2007, despite having only 5 percent of the world’s population.

But even the US’s sharp increase in millionaires was dwarfed in percentage terms by China, whose population of HWNI grew at a rate of 17.5 percent as a result of the country’s speculative run-up in stock prices.

Both the US and China created millionaires more quickly than the rest of the world, whose population of HWNI increased by 6.7 percent, while their wealth increased by 7.2 percent last year, according to the firm.

The rise in the numbers of investable wealth millionaires paralleled the continued growth in stock values, which rose 11 percent last year. This process had in turn been fueled by seven years of bank bailouts, zero interest rates and quantitative easing carried out by global central banks, with the leading role played by the US Federal Reserve.

Despite the Federal Reserve’s intention to begin raising rates slowly, these policies continue to expand and intensify worldwide. On Thursday, Mario Draghi, the president of the European Central Bank, announced a further reduction of one of the bank’s benchmark interest rates. Global financial firms, who expected that Draghi would announce another expansion of “quantitative easing” asset purchases, responded with a stock selloff.

Draghi, whipped into line by the response of financial markets, clarified Friday that the ECB stands ready to carry out further quantitative easing in the future, prompting global stocks to rally in response.

The Capgemini report only hinted at the sharp disparity between the relative social weight of “millionaires next door” and so-called ultra-high net worth individuals, or those with $30 million or more in investable wealth.

But another report, published this week by the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS), pointed to the vast amount of US and global wealth dominated by a handful of super-rich oligarchs.

“America’s 20 wealthiest people—a group that could fit comfortably in one single Gulfstream G650 luxury jet—now own more wealth than the bottom half of the American population combined, a total of 152 million people in 57 million households,” noted the report.

The IPS report is an analysis of figures published by Forbes magazine in October that showed that the 400 richest people in the US had their wealth grow to a record $2.34 trillion.

The IPS added, “The Forbes 400 own more wealth than the bottom 61 percent of the country combined, a staggering 194 million people,” a figure larger than the combined populations of Canada and Mexico.

But even the Forbes figures are likely to underestimate the true scale of social inequality in the US. Researcher Gabriel Zucman has computed that some 8 percent of personal wealth is held in offshore tax havens, and hence untaxed.

This enormous concentration of wealth has been significantly accelerated under the Obama administration, whose policies have been aimed at protecting and expanding the wealth of the financial oligarchy that dominates American society, at the expense of the working population.

After making its first order of business upon assuming office the extension and expansion of the Bush administration’s taxpayer-funded bailout of Wall Street, the Obama administration made the proliferation of poverty-wage jobs the precondition for its restructuring of the US auto industry. It worked with congressional Republicans to impose sweeping cuts to social programs benefiting poor and low-income households.

As a result of these policies, the social legacy of the Obama administration has been a vast increase in the wealth of the financial oligarchy on one pole of society, and the impoverishment of the great majority of working people on the other.