Millions displaced and hundreds killed by monsoonal floods in South Asia

Rohantha De Silva

Heavy monsoonal rains that began in early July have battered the lives of millions of people in Nepal, India, Bangladesh and Pakistan. Though the weather situation has improved, social conditions will worsen in the coming period, with livelihoods and dwellings devastated and increased risks of disease outbreaks.

While current reports indicate that around 600 people have been killed across these countries, the real figure may well be higher because many casualties go unreported. UN estimates show that over 25 million people have been displaced, with the majority being poor people living a hand-to-mouth daily existence.

India is the worst affected. According to an NDTV report on Monday, 170 people were killed and nearly 11 million impacted by flooding in the Indian states of Assam and Bihar. More than 100 of these deaths occurred in Bihar, India’s poorest state.

In the north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, 32 people were killed by lightning strikes on Sunday, while 2,283 villages in 18 of the 33 flood-hit districts of the state remain under water. Food production has been shattered and thousands of villagers rendered homeless.

Last Thursday an express train near Mumbai, the capital of Maharashtra state, was stranded for more than 12 hours when a river burst its banks and submerged rail lines. Indian navy helicopters and emergency boats rescued around 1,000 passengers.

In Assam, over 180 animals, including 16 rhinos, died in Assam’s Kaziranga National Park.

At least 113 deaths have been reported in Nepal, with 38 people still missing due to serious flooding and landslides in the mountainous state.

Massive destruction has occurred in the eastern parts of the country. Many bridges and roads have collapsed or been washed away. The repair bill is estimated to be more than 300 million Nepal rupees ($US2.7 million).

In Bangladesh, over 75 people were killed and more than six million displaced in 28 districts, but with many still reported missing, the death toll will be higher. The Jamuna River embankment was breached on July 17, flooding at least 40 villages and inundating the dwellings of over 200,000 people.

Rohingya refugees from Burma or Myanmar have been badly affected because most of their settlements are located in the flood-prone areas, such as the Cox’s Bazar area near Dhaka. At least 6,000 refugees are now homeless following the destruction of their makeshift huts.

Parts of Pakistan are also flooded, with 23 reported dead, and in Sri Lanka, nine people have been killed and over 540 badly impacted.

South Asian governments have responded with a combination of apathy and indifference toward the millions of poverty-stricken people affected by the floods and now desperately attempting to survive the aftermath. In some areas there has been no government aid or assistance whatsoever.

According to the Indian media, Prime Minister Narendra Modi telephoned the chief ministers of Assam and Bihar states and instructed them to initiate relief measures. Likewise in Bangladesh, Prime Minister Sheik Hasina issued ritual instructions.

On Monday, Reuters reported that Foyez Ahmed, the deputy commissioner of Bogra district in Bangladesh, declared that although the district had relief supplies, “we don’t have adequate transport facilities to move to the areas that are deep underwater.”

Some media reports indicate that anger is mounting among flood victims over ongoing government failures to prepare for the annual flooding.

In the northern Indian state of Bihar, residents chased away a circuit officer on July 19 for failing to distribute relief material. Residents in the state’s Motihari district, near the Nepal border, told journalists that no health officer had visited the area, no community kitchen had been organised, and children had been suffering from hunger for five to six days.

The BBC reported that protesting villagers chanted slogans denouncing the government and said they were “abandoned every monsoon season.”

Heavy monsoonal rains, which trigger devastating floods and landslides, are an annual occurrence in South Asia. In 2017, 1,300 people were killed and 45 million people impacted by floods in South Asia. According to UNICEF, 16 million children were among the victims.

Though the monsoons are a natural phenomenon, responsibility for the social devastation lies with the regional ruling classes and their governments. Climate change, driven by global warming, deforestation and unplanned mining, worsens the situation.

Enriching themselves at the expense of the masses, no section of South Asia’s capitalist elites has taken any serious flood mitigation measures, let alone provided safe dwellings and adequate disaster relief. The International Disaster Database in Belgium noted in 2017 that around 2,000 people die every year in South Asian floods.

Two weeks ago, Xavier Castellanos, the Asia Pacific regional director of the International Federation of Red Cross and Crescent Societies, warned: “We are seeing growing numbers of displaced and increasing loss of life with each day of rain. Entire communities have been cut off by rising waters, increasing the risk of people going hungry and getting sick.”

While that international charity has mobilised over 1,000 volunteers in Bangladesh, Nepal and India to provide emergency supplies, including food, temporary shelters and hygiene kits, these efforts are grossly inadequate.

On July 18, a Hindustan Times editorial called on the Indian government to develop “a long-term strategy on floods.” Similar perfunctory calls have been issued after every major flood in the past ten years—in 2008, 2011, 2013, 2015 and 2017—but nothing has been done.

A “long-term strategy on floods” is impossible within the framework of the capitalist nation-state system. All the major rivers originate in the Himalayas, and pass through Nepal and India to Bangladesh and Pakistan. The 1,800-kilometre border between India and Nepal has over 6,000 rivers and rivulets, which provide 70 percent of the river water during the dry season.

This year’s monsoonal floods occur as wide areas of India face drought. The Asia Times recently reported that water levels in 85 of India’s 91 reservoirs are below 40 percent and 65 are below 20 percent. Chennai, the Tamil Nadu state capital and the country’s fourth-largest metro area, faces severe water shortages, with the working class and the poor hardest hit.

Monsoonal flood mitigation measures must be developed as part of a sub-continent plan that cuts across national boundaries and the conflicting profit interests and ambitions of the competing corporate elites. This perspective is rejected by all South Asian governments, underscoring the reactionary character of the 1947 division of the sub-continent into competing capitalist nation-states by British imperialism, India's Congress Party and the Hindu and Muslim elites.

UK: Penniless father of three commits suicide while waiting for welfare payment

Margot Miller

Phillip Herron, a single parent from Durham, England, is another victim of the UK’s punitive benefits system and the decades-long onslaught against the working class.

The 34-year-old father of three children was driven to suicide while waiting a month for his Universal Credit (UC) welfare payment to come through. At the time of his death he had just £4.61 in the bank. One can only imagine his desperation.

On March 18, he drove to a quiet country lane where he took his own life, after posting a photo of himself in tears on social media with a suicide note. Phillip left his job at a factory shortly before becoming the full-time care giver for his children.

His grieving mother, Sheena Derbyshire, 54, told the Daily Mirror, Phillip wrote that “his family would be better off if he wasn’t there anymore.” His family had been unaware of his financial difficulties, and his death came as “a complete shock.”

Sheena later discovered that Phillip owed £20,000 to the banks, utility firms and the modern-day loan-sharks, pay day lenders who were charging him 1,000 percent interest. Phillip was in danger of losing his home. Among his paperwork, Sheena found an eviction notice received from his social landlord, the Bernicia housing association.

Phillip Herron

Sheena was able to form a picture of the last six months of her son’s life by trawling through his computer and mobile phone. It revealed Phillip’s life unravelling through no fault of his own. Listening to the last few months of voice messages revealing the deterioration of Phillip’s mental health was “the most heart-wrenching thing I’ve ever done,” said Sheena.

Phillip’s death has had a devastating effect on the family. Sheena explained that his youngest daughter “is totally lost. She misses her dad so much. She had a dream the other night that he came to her. She said, ‘I asked him not to leave again. But when I woke up, he wasn’t there.’ [The children] haven’t even been offered counselling.”

Sheena will present the evidence she uncovered among Phillip’s belongings at the upcoming inquest into his death to be held in Sacriston, County Durham—to expose how he was failed by the UC system.

UC was introduced in 2010 and rolled out nationally between 2013 and 2018. It is a single benefit payment replacing six existing previous entitlements for the unemployed and those with low incomes. Advanced by the Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition as simplifying the benefits system, it is designed to drive people into low paid jobs and cut benefits as part of slashing £12 billion from the welfare budget.

As UC is paid a month in arrears, an initial claim is followed by at least five weeks before the first payment. This causes untold hardship. “When people turn to the government for help, they’re already desperate,” Sheena explained to the Daily Mirror. “To make them wait so long for payments is dangerous. There is no reason it should take so long. Phillip already had problems, but I think this was the final straw.”

Phillip’s death triggered an outpouring of sadness, outrage and anger on social media. Among the 260 comments on the Manchester Evening News Facebook page reporting the story are “This is barbaric,” “those poor kids,” and for “[t]he poorest debts should be written off like the banks were.”

Singling out Amber Rudd, Secretary for the Department for Work and Pensions [DWP] who has been retained in Tory Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s new class war cabinet, another tweeted: “You should hang your head in shame.”

A DWP spokesperson had stated in relation to the tragedy, “Suicide is a very complex issue, so it would be wrong to link it to someone’s benefit claim.” In response one person stated on social media, “[N]ow another death on their blood-soaked hands.”

Someone from Leeds posted, “So [former Tory Prime Minister] Theresa May cried when she lost her job. She didn’t get upset for the working-class people who died in the Grenfell Tower. She never cried for the people who suffered due to cuts in Universal Credit and even committed suicide when all hope had gone.”

Phillip joins a growing list of victims, whose deaths have been hastened by sadistic government cuts to benefit entitlement for hundreds of thousands of people.

Joy Worrall, an 81-year-old pensioner, threw herself into a quarry in North Wales in May after the DWP froze her pension benefits, leaving her destitute with just £5 to her name.

Martin John Counter, a 60-year-old from Bromley, took an overdose in September after being wrongly accused of benefit fraud. He suffered from myriad health problems making him unfit for work. He had forgotten to inform the DWP of some bank savings when he lodged a claim for Employment Support Allowance (ESA)—an essential benefit to assist people with disabilities.

On April 15, Stephen Smith, 64, died in Liverpool weighing just six stone after terrible suffering. The DWP had cut off his ESA and declared a chronically ill man “fit for work.”

Stephen Smith’s advice worker, Terry Craven, told the WSWS he found the news of Herron’s suicide “extremely upsetting. I cried when I saw Phillip’s case.

Stephen Smith in hospital shortly before his death__Credit_Liverpool Echo

“He died needlessly. Phillip is the product of this evil government’s aims and objectives. [Former Tory leader and DWP minister] Iain Duncan Smith is back in government and will be wringing his hands in glee.

“Anyone reading about Phillip’s suicide will think, ‘Is that what it does to you, applying for Universal Credit?’ and will end up taking poorly paid work.”

Last year, the food bank Trussell Trust distributed 1.6 million food parcels to destitute households. A fifth of recipients needed help because of social security delays, half of which were UC claimants.

Terry Craven (left) with Stephen Smith (centre) and Terry Nelson (right) who manages CASA

Because of the delay in the initial payment, renters can easily slip into rent arrears and face eviction. An Inside Housing investigation found that people on UC were twice as likely to present as homeless to their local councils as households under the previous benefits system.

Phillip’s death came just months after an academic study commissioned by Gateshead council found that claimants in the UC system had considered suicide over a number of issues. Alice Wiseman, the director of public health at Gateshead council, said of the study’s findings, “I consider Universal Credit, in the context of wider austerity, as a threat to the public’s health.”

An All-Party Parliamentary Group on Universal Credit report published July 18, “What needs to change about Universal Credit?” confirms the intention behind the UC welfare reforms is to intensify the impoverishment of the working class. It notes that under UC, tenants are left with a rent shortfall of between £100 and £300 a month. Families with three children lose an average £2,600 a year, while larger families an average £7,800.

Families cannot qualify for free school meals above an income of £7,400 a year, leaving many households caught in a poverty trap. More than 100,000 families with disabled children will be worse off by £1,750 plus per year.

Parents under the age of 25 lose £66.05 a month under UC compared to the previous tax credit system. Parents who are students cannot claim childcare support. People with additional care needs stand to lose about £64 a week, while the most disabled adults in the support group for ESA will lose £42 a week.

Under UC far more people suffer welfare sanctions (with the first sanction being deprived of benefits for 91 days). Eleven percent of claimants have been sanctioned, around a fifth of them more than once.

Labour Party leaders routinely denounce the UC system. Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary Margaret Greenwood said, “The Coalition Government claimed Universal Credit would lift people out of poverty… [B]ut instead it is ruining lives.” This demagogy conceals the fact that Labour refuses to even call for UC’s abolition. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn only calls for it to be “redesigned. ” A party spokesman declared recently, “Universal Credit isn’t working and cannot continue in its current form.”

Preparing for great-power war, France creates space command

Will Morrow

French President Emmanuel Macron’s administration announced this month the creation of a military space command and detailed plans to place anti-satellite weapons systems in orbit. The announcement is the latest step in a military build-up by France and the EU imperialist powers, and part of preparations to wage “great power” wars, including between nuclear-armed states.

The new military branch, whose creation was signaled by Macron on July 13, will be merged into the Air Force, which will henceforth be called the Air and Space Force. Defense Minister Florence Parly outlined the details of the new division in a speech to over 100 air force military brass at the Air Base 942 in Lyon on July 25.

“Space is a new front to defend, and we must be ready,” Parly declared. “Seeking to one day become a space general will no longer be a fantasy, it will be a credible ambition.”

Florence Parly at the Air Base 942 in Lyon on July 25 [credit Florence Parly]

This first stage of the command’s operations will involve the deployment of a new generation of Syracuse satellites equipped with visual cameras to identify other nearby satellites. In the second stage, so-called nano-satellites that are more difficult to shoot down, and satellites equipped with submachine guns and lasers capable of destroying or incapacitating rival satellites, will be deployed.

The obvious implication of these announcements, ignored and covered up by the media, is that the ruling class is preparing to wage wars not only against impoverished and former colonial countries in the Middle East and Africa, targeted under the fraudulent banner of the “War on Terror”—which have no capacity to launch attacks using satellite technology or destroy French satellites—but against militarily-advanced nuclear-armed powers, like Russia, China and the United States, which rely heavily on satellite technology for their operations.

This insane perspective is being worked out with no public discussion and entirely behind the backs of the working class. Summing up the discussions in the French state, Le Point quoted an unnamed official from Parly’s cabinet stating that “we do not want to launch into a space arms race,” but were engaged in “reasoned arsenalization.”

In fact, the French announcement will accelerate a growing turn by the major powers to the development of outer-space weapons. Every area of the world, from the Arctic, to cyberspace and outer space, is being transformed into an arena of battle amidst a historic breakdown of the capitalist nation-state system that is driving the ruling elite towards war and accelerated attacks on the social and democratic rights of the working class at home.

In June 2018, US President Donald Trump announced the creation of a new “Space Force,” to oversee and expand the more than 20,000 personnel already under the direction of the Air Force’s Space Command. Last March, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi delivered a blood-curdling address to the nation to announce that India had become the third nation after the US and China to shoot down a satellite, and proclaim that “We are now a space power.” China and Russia, the two principal targets of US military aggression to offset its relative economic decline through military force, are building up their own anti-satellite missile systems as well.

The feverish and Dr. Strangelove-esque militarism gripping the French ruling class was indicated by an announcement earlier this month that Macron’s newly created Defense Innovation Agency has just created a “Red Team” of five to six science fiction authors, whose task is to imagine and advise the military on futuristic weapons systems.

The development of a French space force is part of Macron’s bid to take the leadership of a European army being spearheaded by Paris and Berlin. Their aim is to transform the European Union into a military power capable of waging war, including independently of and in opposition to the United States. Germany, in addition to having no nuclear weapons, does not have an active space program of its own, while the exit of Britain from the EU leaves France as the only EU nuclear power, in addition to possessing—for now—Europe’s largest blue-water navy.

The EU’s “Strategic Agenda for 2019–2024,” adopted at its Brussels summit last month, asserts that Europe must “reinforce its global influence,” “influence the course of world events,” and “move forward towards a genuine European Defence Union.”

Last month, a week after the US Defense Department reached the biggest ever trade deal for the purchase of nearly 500 fighter jets, France, Spain and Germany responded in kind with the signing of agreements for the creation of an integrated European air combat system. The cost of the project—which will include not only a new fighter plane, but an integrated network of fighter jets and unmanned drones linked to naval and land forces—will exceed €100 billion. Some estimate it at over €500 billion by 2050.

Speaking last Thursday, Parly made clear that France expects other European powers to contribute to the program. “France has its independence,” but would “not be isolated in this new space of conflict,” she said. “We will thus build, with our European partners, a future common capacity of knowledge in the spatial context.” Germany and Italy would contribute to radar technology for detecting and identifying satellites, she said, and €700 million is to be reallocated to the Air and Space Command to give a total budget of €4.3 billion.

The Macron administration has boosted military spending and announced a series of major arms projects since coming to office. Last September, France raised total military spending by 5 percent to €35.9 billion, excluding pensions, as part of the EU target of 2 percent of GDP.

Last month, Macron unveiled the first of six Suffren-class nuclear-powered submarines, each of which is to cost approximately €9 billion. As opposed to its predecessors, the Suffren will be able to remain underwater for 70 instead of 45 days and carry 50 percent more arms. It will be tasked with escorting France’s nuclear-armed ballistic-missile submarines and aircraft carriers, as well as conducting espionage operations.

The feverish rearmament of the French and European ruling class for war exposes the fraud of all claims that European capitalism stands in relation to its US counterpart as a kinder and more benevolent version. Under conditions of the deepest economic crisis of the capitalist system since the 1930s, all the imperialist powers are once again preparing for war. The billions of euros necessary to fund these destructive weapons systems are to be extracted from the exploitation of the working class and the relentless imposition of social austerity.

The fascist attack in Gilroy and the US epidemic of mass shootings

Patrick Martin

The killing of three people at the Garlic Festival in Gilroy, California captured headlines across America, but the corporate media has sought to suppress or downplay its most important aspect: its politically motivated character.

Nineteen-year-old Santino William Legan opened fire with an AK-47 assault rifle inside the festival late Sunday afternoon. He killed three people—a six-year-old boy, a 13-year-old girl, and a 25-year-old man—and wounded at least 15 others before being shot to death by local police.

The three people he killed were Hispanic or African-American. This was apparently not an accident. Legan’s internet postings indicate he was motivated by racist and white-supremacist views. The most important indication was a piece of text urging, “Read Might is Right by Ragnar Redbeard,” followed by a complaint about “hordes of mestizos” (mixed-race people) allegedly crowding into towns in the Gilroy area.

The book Legan praises is Might is Right or The Survival of the Fittest, a social Darwinist, white supremacist screed first published in 1890, inspired by, among others, the reactionary German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. One passage in the book denounces the Declaration of Independence for the “degrading, self-evident lie” that “all men are created equal.” This is followed by imprecations against blacks, Asians, Jews and the poor, as well as those who live in “noxious” urban centers like London, Liverpool, New York, Chicago and New Orleans—language whose modern equivalent is Donald Trump’s denunciations of “rat-infested,” crime-plagued Baltimore.

Despite this clear evidence of Legan’s political sympathies, local police and the national media claimed that the motive for his attack was a mystery, and that it was just one more “senseless killing” of the type which has become commonplace in the United States over the past three decades.

Not a single prominent media pundit or newspaper columnist made the obvious connection between Legan’s mentality and the fascistic hatred of immigrants and minorities promoted by the president of the United States, using mass rallies, comments to the media and tweets directed to a Twitter audience of more than 50 million.

The media cover-up only gained a certain plausibility because the Gilroy attack was one of ten instances of mass shooting across the United States over the past weekend. The casualty toll showed 15 deaths and 52 wounded.

The slaughter continued after the beginning of the work week. Tuesday morning at a Walmart in Southaven, Mississippi, a suburb of Memphis, Tennessee, a gunman shot two Walmart workers to death and wounded a policeman before he was himself shot and arrested.

The media response to these tragedies has been twofold: using them to disguise the specifically political aspects of the Gilroy, California attacks; and holding them up as proof of the need for stepped up repressive measures, including not only the usual liberal calls to restrict gun ownership, but stepped-up police powers as well.

Particularly noteworthy was an editorial in the Washington Post, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, the richest man in the world, which made no mention of the fascistic beliefs of the gunman and declared that the Gilroy shootings were “an indictment of our gun laws.” The editorial went on to note the heavy security presence of police during the Gilroy attack, and their quick response, shooting Legan to death one minute after he opened fire. The implication was clear: quicker and more massive police repression was in order.

In the two decades since the Columbine massacre made “mass shootings” a recognized category of events in the United States, the World Socialist Web Site has sought to develop a critical understanding of what is typically dismissed as “senseless violence” in America.

As we noted in a recent commentary, the two decades since Columbine coincide with the decomposition of American society under the impact of mounting social inequality and endless imperialist war:

It has also been two decades, more or less, since the declaration of the “war on terror” and the invasions of Afghanistan and later Iraq, two decades since the hijacking of a national election and the repudiation of any concern by the American bourgeoisie for democratic norms, two decades of mounting social inequality and two decades of unrelenting attacks on workers’ conditions of life…

American capitalist society is disintegrating. Mad, individual anti-social acts such as the one that occurred at Columbine will not be halted by the pious wishes, much less the indifference, of the powers that be.

There has been a change in the general category of “mass shootings,” which have increasingly acquired a political character.

Of course, the event that to a certain extent triggered the wave of mass killings, the Columbine murders, had an element of this. It was planned for Hitler’s birthday and the anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombings. Now, however, such politically-motivated massacres happen with regularity, including the attack by a fascist gunman against a synagogue in Poway, California in April of this year and the Tree of Life synagogue massacre in Pittsburgh in October 2018.

And as the example of the Gilroy, California attack demonstrates, far from “pious wishes” about an end to such violence, the current American government is deliberately inciting such atrocities. President Trump is pursuing a definite political strategy, politically facilitated by the Democrats, of stoking violence and creating the conditions for ever more authoritarian measures.

The capitalist system as a whole is responsible. The bitter disappointment in Obama, the fascist incitement of Trump, in combination with the economic hardships and endless war, have encouraged or produced a new phenomenon, the openly right-wing mass shooter.

Johnson & Johnson Nurses Innovate Quickfire Challenge (Up to $100,000 in funding + Mentoring) 2019

Application Deadline: 26th July 2019 Midnight PST

Eligible Countries: All

About the Award: For more than 120 years, Johnson & Johnson has supported nurses, through employment, platforms, partnerships, training and millions in scholarships, helping to educate, empower and inspire those in the field.
We also recognize that nurses are the backbone of our healthcare system, and through extensive patient experience have ideas that may profoundly improve human health. Johnson & Johnson firmly believes that nurses are our critical partners on the frontlines of health care.
We believe that by working together, we can spark the next great idea that can potentially change the trajectory of human health.
Areas of Interest:

• New Treatment Protocols
• New Health Technologies
• New medical device
• New preventive approach
• New consumer product
• New community health approach
• New screening tools

Type: Entrepreneurship

Selection Criteria: We are looking for ideas from nurses around the world to potentially improve human health through the pre, intra, and post-operative care.
Solutions will be evaluated by a panel of reviewers and judges on their ability to meet the following criteria:

• Uniqueness of the idea
• Potential impact on human health
• Feasibility of the idea
• Thoroughness of approach
• Identification of key resources and plan to further idea

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: The nurse innovators with the best idea(s) will receive up to $100,000 in grant funding and access to mentoring and coaching from experts across the Johnson & Johnson Family of Companies to help bring their ideas to life.

How to Apply:

• It is important to go through all application requirements in the Award Webpage (see Link below) before applying.

Visit Award Webpage for Details

World Economic Forum on Africa 2019 – Start-ups Application

Application Deadline: 5th August 2019

Eligible Countries: African countries

To be Taken at (Country): Cape Town International Convention Centre (CTICC2), Cape Town, South Africa

About the Award: The programme in Cape Town, South Africa, aims to tackle these issues by focusing on how to scale up the transformation of regional architecture related to innovation, cooperation, growth and stability. Under the theme, Shaping Inclusive Growth and Shared Futures in the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the 28th World Economic Forum on Africa will convene more than 1,000 regional and global leaders from politics, business, civil society and academia to shape regional and industry agendas in the year ahead.

Type: Entrepreneurship

Eligibility:

• Be less than 10 years old 
• Have received more than $1 million in funding
• Be headquartered in Africa and/or with a primary market focus on Africa
• Be developing a product or service that makes a substantial long-term positive impact on business and society
• Be considered a high-potential company in their field with a disruptive business model or significant product or service innovation
• Not be a subsidiary or a joint venture
• The chief executive officer / founder must represent the start‑up at the World Economic Forum on Africa 2019  

Number of Awards: Not specified

Duration of Award: 4 to 6 September 2019.

How to Apply: Apply in Link below

Visit Award Webpage for Details

SCIENCE BY WOMEN Visiting Senior Research Fellowships 2019 for African Women (Fully-funded to Spain)

Application Deadline: 30th September 2019

Eligible Countries: African Countries

To Be Taken At (Country/university): Spain

In this 5th edition our associated research centres are:
Institute of Photonic Sciences (ICFO)
Vall d´Hebron Institut de Recerca (VHIR)
Institute for Neuroscience (IN)
Kronikgune Research Center
Biocruces Bizkaia
DeustoTech
Spanish National Cancer Research Centre (CNIO)
Institute of Health Carlos III (ISCIII)
Donostia International Physics Center
Material Physics Center – (MPC-CFM)
Principe Felipe Research Center (CIPF)
Spanish National Center of Biotechnology (CNB)
Institute for Sustainable Agriculture (IAS)
Institute of Mathematical Sciences (ICMAT)
Campus of International Excellence in Agrifood

About the Award: Each of these centres will host 1 senior woman researcher with at least 3 years of post-doctoral experience for a six-month fellowship. Applications will be subjected to a rigorous selection process, evaluating the academic merits and leadership of the applicants as well as the scientific quality and expected impact of their research projects. Selected candidates will receive training and integration in a dynamic, multidisciplinary and highly competitive working team, where they will be able to develop their research projects and acquire complementary skills, empowering them to transfer their research results into tangible economic and social benefits.
The main goal is to enable African women researchers and scientists to tackle the great challenges faced by Africa through research in Health and biomedicine, agriculture and food security, water, energy and climate change,  mathematics, Information and Communication Technologies as well as Economic Sciences.

Eligible Fields of Study: The preferred areas of research include:

1. Health and Bio-medicine
2. Energy, Water and Climate Change
3. Agriculture and Food Safety
4. Mathematics, Information and Communication Technologies
5. Economic Science

Type: Fellowship

Eligibility: 

• Being a woman
• Nationality of an African country.
• PhD with at least 3 years of post-doctoral professional experience
• Contractual relationship with a university or a public or private non-profit organization based in Africa dedicated to significant scientific research in the areas indicated
• Excellent academic record and proven track of relevant research experience
• Solid working knowledge of English
• Proven experience leading a research group

Beneficiaries of first and second edition are not eligible. Candidates must have already contacted and identified research groups in the host centres to confirm that their proposed research can be carried out in collaboration with those research groups and, when needed, in their laboratories.

Selection Criteria: Applications will be subjected to a highly competitive selection process by the Women for Africa Foundation’s Scientific Committee. The jury will evaluate the following criteria:

• The candidate’s research career, curriculum vitae and experience as independent research group leader.
• The project’s scientific -technical quality and innovative potential.
• The expected and measurable economic or social impact of the research project.
• The candidate’s plan to communicate and disseminate the project’s results.
• The proper consideration of ethical issues where appropriate.

Successful applicants will present innovative research projects that respond to the needs of African populations and that are likely to be transferred into products or patents for commercial exploitation, or services and public policies which have a social impact in terms of people’s welfare and quality of life, as well as an economic impact in terms of companies’ productivity and competitiveness.

Number of Awards: 10

Value of Award: Successful candidates will have access to the following benefits:

• Flight from their centre of origin to the host institution and back
• Living allowance of 2.400 Euros gross per month to cover accommodation, personal expense and health and occupational accident insurance coverage.

Duration of Program: 6 months

How to Apply: Only applications submitted in English via the Science by Women microsite at www.mujeresporafrica.es will be accepted. They must include the following documents:

• Letter of Interest (max. 1 page)
• Full curriculum vitae • Fully filled form
• Brief but concise description of the project to be developed in the Spanish
• host centre (max. 2 pages)
• A letter of the prospective host group’s stating its interest to support the project proposed by the candidate.

APPLICATION FORM


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European Investment Bank/Global Development Network (GDN) Special Recruitment Drive in International Finance 2019/2020 for Developing Countries

Application Deadline: 2nd August 2019

Eligible Countries: The Fellowship is open only to nationals of African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries (see link below).

To be Taken at (Country): While EIB will make every effort to match location with project assignment, Candidate Fellows may be required to travel to countries outside of their home countries.

About the Award: The Global Development Network (GDN) and the European Investment Bank (EIB) have partnered to create the EIB-GDN Program in Applied Development Finance to study the impact of projects in African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries financed under EIB’s Impact Financing Envelope.
The purpose of the program is to provide a select group of highly qualified and motivated young researchers a practical opportunity to hone their impact assessment skills, by working on real-world projects in private sector development funded by one of the world’s leading financial institutions, under the mentorship of top international experts.
The researchers will be inducted into the Program as Candidate Fellows at an inception workshop at EIB Headquarters in Luxembourg City on 21-30 September 2019. At the end of the 12-month program cycle and on satisfying all program requirements, the Candidate Fellows will receive joint certification from EIB and GDN as EIB-GDN Fellows in Applied Development Finance. 

Type: Job, Fellowship

Eligibility: The ideal candidates should be first-rate, early career researchers or research professionals at universities, think tanks, government, development institutions, economic consultancy, or in professional transition. The typical profile of an inductee should be as follows:

1. Academic credentials: Candidates should ideally hold or be close to holding a PhD in Economics, Finance or Business with specialization in International Finance or Open Economy Macroeconomics.
2. Subject matter knowledge: Candidates should be able to demonstrate through coursework, publications or professional experience advanced knowledge about at least a few of the following: international development finance, exchange rate determination, credit markets, risk management in financial markets, currency exchanges and solutions, volatility, risk and hedging instruments and derivates, with applicability in micro- and SME finance, infrastructure, or other developmental sectors. Candidates should also be familiar, through academic knowledge and/or professional experience, with impact investing, development finance or impact evaluation or assessment.
3. Ability and willingness to think and work creatively, flexibly and proactively, in cooperation with other partners: candidates should have the ability to work independently and proactively and should be able to demonstrate that, for example through experience in research consultancy or through independent and self-driven collection of field data. Preference will be given to candidates who, in addition to academic credentials, have employment or other substantive experience with the private sector.
4. Language Skills: Demonstrated professional written and oral communication skills in English. Some of the projects may be in Francophone Africa or the Caribbean, for which fluency in French or Spanish may be required.
5. Age: The program targets early-career researchers, typically inducting in the 35-40 age-range. However, slightly older, but otherwise qualified, candidates will also be considered.
6. Gender: Applications from qualified female candidates are particularly encouraged.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: The program aims to fast track the professional development of promising young researchers and research professionals in the field of Development Finance. Qualified young researchers interested in evaluation will get a practical opportunity to hone their impact assessment skills by working on real-world projects under the mentorship of top international experts and to work with the EIB, GDN, and with young, innovative private sector companies. There is also the opportunity, in some cases, to work together with other research partners. The program is designed to provide career growth and learning opportunities along multiple dimensions, including soft-skills, modeling consumer preferences and business problems, formulating theory-of-change, econometric and methodological issues, and writing skills.
For successful candidates, the program offers the following benefits:

1. Firsthand experience in the rapidly developing fields of Impact Investing and Development Finance;
2. The opportunity to apply academic knowledge and training to real world private sector development projects;
3.  Deepening of subject matter expertise in evaluation methodologies, with mentoring from some of the world’s leading evaluation experts;
4. Working with two leading international institutions;
5. Professional certification;
6. Inclusion in a knowledge network which can work locally in ACP countries for national and regional development; and
7. Part-time commitment with excellent financial support.

Financial and Non-financial Support
Each researcher inducted into the program will receive a stipend of €15,000 (to cover time costs), along with a grant of up to €10,000 to cover all direct and indirect expenses of conducting the research (including field trips, data collection and analysis). These will be disbursed in installments through the length of the 12-month program cycle and will be tied to deliverables and contingent upon satisfaction of all program requirements. GDN will provide administrative, management and logistical support.

Duration of Award: 12 months

How to Apply: Candidates are encouraged to apply at the earliest. Applications submitted after 02 August 2019 will be considered only on a contingency basis. Candidates shortlisted for the program will be informed by mid-August.

• It is important to go through all application requirements in the Award Webpage (see Link below) before applying.

Visit Award Webpage for Details

Mastercard Start Path Global Accelerator Program 2020 for Innovative Startups

Application Timeline:

• Application deadline: Ongoing
• Global Pitch Day: In Sept (tbc) Virtual
• Immersion Day: Btw Nov – Dec (tbc)

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: Global

To be taken at (country): Dublin, Ireland

About the Programme: Mastercard works with an ever growing portfolio of later stage startups with unique solutions across fintech and commerce. Start Path Global is based on what has worked best for our portfolio of startups: more flexibility, more customization, and no distractions from your current business.

Offered Since: 2014

Type: Entrepreneurship

Eligibility: Start Path Global is designed for later stage startups:
* That have raised investment
* That are looking for support to scale
* That are targeting the fintech and broader commerce space
* That can benefit from partnering with MasterCard and accessing our ecosystem

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Programme: 
* Six month virtual programme tailored to the individual needs of your company
* No need to move from your home location
* No equity taken up front (but an option to participate in your next round)
* Immediate access to 60+ MasterCard experts
* Connections to potential customers – global corporate brands spanning banking, retail, tech and telecoms
* Funds provided so that you have no out of pocket expenses

How to Apply: Apply here

Visit Programme Webpage for details

Award Provider: Mastercard Foundation

Thomson Reuters Foundation Reporting Workshops on Illicit Finance in Africa 2019 for African Journalists – Cape Town, South Africa

Application Deadline: 13th August 2019.

Eligible Countries: African countries

To Be Taken At (Country): Cape Town, South Africa

About the Award: Wealth of Nations is a long-term engagement, and journalists who take part must commit to all elements of the scheme, signing an agreement to this effect. These elements include:

• The production of stories on illicit financial flows
• A mentoring support scheme that will help produce these stories
• Intensive training on reporting illicit finance with a workshop from 22 – 23 October 2019
• Attendance of a two-day conference related to illicit financial flows in Cape Town as part of the workshop

Journalists will not be considered to have completed the scheme until they have completed all the elements, which include producing at least one story or investigation on illicit financial flows and will not receive their certificates until this point.

Type: Workshops

Eligibility: 

• Journalists with at least two years of professional experience and fluent English
• It is an advantage if you are familiar with investigative journalism, reporting on finances and/or dealing with numbers more generally, but if you have a strong motivation to learn about and understand these issues then we will consider your application. Early career journalists are invited to apply.
• You must be able to spend significant time working on illicit finance stories.
• Both freelancers and staff journalists may apply. Journalists working for a news organisation will need consent from their editor to take part. Freelancers should provide evidence that one or more media organisations will be willing to take their work.
• Journalists working in any medium or multiple media are welcome to apply (print, online, radio or television).
• Journalists should be based in Africa and working for one or more African media organisations.
• Journalists applying must have fluent English.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: 

• If selected, you will take part in one intensive workshop (5 days) covering illicit finance, reporting on companies, accounts and budgets, and investigative techniques. The Workshop will take place in Cape Town, South Africa.
• During the workshop you will also attend a two-day conference related to illicit financial flows. Being at the conference will allow you access to leading experts on illicit financial flows.
• You will propose one or more story ideas that you wish to work on within the scheme – we will provide experienced journalists to help you pursue your stories right up to publication/broadcast.
• You will have exclusive access to expertise through our network of illicit finance experts.
• You will also have access to story ideas and editorial advice, and will be invited to share your own expertise with participants from other regions.

Successful applicants will receive a full bursary that will cover air travel expenses (economy class), accommodation, local transfers and meals. Please note that you need to check visa requirements and ensure you have the necessary documentation required. The cost of your visa and any other related costs will be the responsibility of the participant.

Duration of Program: 21 October – 25 October 2019

How to Apply: 

• Two work samples
• A letter from your editor consenting to your participation and confirming that they will publish any story produced through the programme. For example, the letter should say “I confirm that we will publish any story produced through the programme”.

Please have these ready before you begin the form.

Click here to begin the application form.


Visit Program Webpage for Details

World Bank Group IFC Investment Analyst Program 2019 for sub-Saharan African and MENA Professionals

Application Deadline: 14th August 2019 at 11:59pm UTC

Eligible Countries: Sub-Saharan African and Caribbean countries

To be Taken at: Nairobi, Kenya; Johannesburg, South Africa;  Lagos, Nigeria; Amman, Jordan; Cairo, Egypt; Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; Dakar, Senegal; Accra, Ghana

About the Award: The Financial Institution Group (FIG) of IFC is recruiting Investment Analysts to join the Investment and Portfolio Team, which originates, manages and monitors IFC’s financial sector investments in Africa and the Middle-East.
IFC recruits investment analysts globally on two-year term contracts extendable to a maximum of four years. Upon completion of their contracts, investment analysts typically leave to pursue a graduate degree or additional work experience.

Type: Job/Internship

Eligibility: 

• Bachelor’s or equivalent degree;
• Up to 3 years work experience in a financial institution, particularly in investment projects;
• Ability to develop complex financial models;
• Keen interest in development finance and multicultural environments;
• Highly motivated, committed to highest ethical standard, ability to work successfully in multicultural teams and across boundaries;
• Strong knowledge of financial markets;
• Strong analytical and conceptual skills including corporate/project finance;
• Ability to communicate clearly and concisely both orally and in writing;
• Fluency in English required, proficiency in additional languages is preferred.

The World Bank Group values diversity and encourages all qualified candidates who are nationals of World Bank Group member countries to apply, regardless of gender, gender identity, religion, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or disability.  Sub-Saharan African nationals, Caribbean nationals, and female candidates are strongly encouraged to apply.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Duration of Award: IFC recruits investment analysts globally on two-year term contracts extendable to a maximum of four years. Upon completion of their contracts, investment analysts typically leave to pursue a graduate degree or additional work experience.

How to Apply: Apply for the job in the Link below. 

Visit Programme Webpage for Details

Domestic Violence is Widespread in the Middle East

Cesar Chelala

Gender violence, manifested essentially as violence against women, is one of the most significant epidemics in the Middle East today. This kind of violence occurs in practically all countries in the region and affects families of all backgrounds, religions, and social spheres. It affects not only families but societies as a whole.

It is estimated that 37 percent of women in Arab countries have experienced domestic violence. According to a United Nations report, approximately 200,000 women were victims of domestic violence in Israel between 2014 and 2015.

Various cultural, economic, and social factors, including shame and fear of retaliation from their partners, contribute to women’s reluctance to denounce these acts. The women who speak up mostly turn to their families and friends rather than the police. The lack of effective judicial response to their accusations contributes to their discouragement. North Africa and the Middle East have the fewest legal protections against domestic violence.

Consequences of domestic violence

“Violence against women has multiple consequences, at the individual level, within the family, community and wider society. It can lead to fatal outcomes and have a significant burden on the economy,” said Manal Benkirane, regional program specialist at the UN Women’s Regional Office for Arab States.

Worldwide, violence is as common a cause of death and disability as cancer is among women of reproductive age. It is also a greater cause of ill-health than traffic accidents and malaria put together. Public health experts increasingly consider violence against women a public health issue, one requiring a public health approach.

The experience of violence makes women more susceptible to a variety of mental health problems such as depression, suicide, and alcohol and drug abuse. Sexual violence also increases women’s risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV/AIDS (through forced sexual relations or because of the difficulty in persuading men to use condoms). It may also lead to serious gynecological problems.

The World Organization against Torture has expressed its concern regarding the high levels of violence against women worldwide. Although provisions related to domestic violence are included in several national policies and laws, there are difficulties in implementing them. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), “nearly half of women who die due to homicide are killed by their current or former husbands or boyfriends.”

Public health experts increasingly consider violence against women a public health issue. Studies carried out in the Arab world show that 70 percent of violence occurs in big cities, and that in almost 80 percent of cases those responsible are the heads of families, such as fathers or eldest brothers. In most cases, they assert their right to punish their wives and children in any way they see appropriate.

Of the 22 United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) member states, only Jordan, Lebanon, Tunisia, Morocco, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia are considered to have laws to protect women against domestic abuse.

There has been some progress, however, regarding this problem. Tunisia, for example, continues to raise the bar for Arab women’s rights in the 21st century. In 2014, The Ministry of Women and Family Affairs wrote a draft bill condemning and criminalizing domestic violence. The draft law was approved in 2016.

In Lebanon, there are no reliable statistics about domestic violence, a subject that to a large extent still remains a taboo in Lebanese society. In 2009, the second Arab Regional Conference for Family Protection took place in Jordan. It was held under the patronage of Her Majesty Queen Rania, chairperson of the National Council for Family Affairs (NCFA). The conference formulated a unified strategy for safeguarding families from domestic violence, with the attendance of family experts and sociologists from the Arab world.

In Morocco, the Union of Women’s Action (UAF) has organized forums to raise public awareness of violence against women, and lobby local groups to protect victimized women. At the same time, counseling centers have been set up to allow women to talk about their problems and receive help. In Egypt, where the phenomenon is pervasive in society, Beit Hawa (The House of Eve) was founded as the first comprehensive women’s shelter in Egypt and the Arab world.

In December of 2018, protesters across Israel criticized the government’s failure to address violence against women. Chanting to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “wake up, our blood is not cheap,” the protest was a reaction to the killings of 24 women last year at the hands of a partner, family member or an acquaintance. After the protests, the Welfare Ministry reported a 150 percent increase in complaints about domestic violence cases in the country.

Addressing domestic violence

However, more work has to be done if this epidemic of violence is going to be controlled. Government and community leaders should spearhead efforts to create a culture of openness and support to eliminate the stigma associated with this problem.

Furthermore, it is necessary not only to enact but also to enforce legislation that criminalizes all forms of violence against women, including marital rape. Laws should be followed up with plans for specific national action.

The 2009 report by the U.N. Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) stated that women’s lack of social participation “is primarily attributable to the existence of discriminatory laws, failure to implement the nondiscriminatory legislation that does exist, and a lack of awareness by women of their rights in such matters.”

There cannot be true development in the Middle East without women’s progress and the recognition of their rights. As a Human Development Report stated, “The rise of Arab women is in fact a prerequisite for an Arab renaissance and is causally linked to the fate of the Arab world and its achievement of human development.”

Feeding 7.7 billion

James Haught

When I was born in 1932, the world had 2 billion people. Today, the global population has swelled to 7.7 billion – soon to quadruple in a single lifetime.

How can the planet feed the mushrooming manswarm? Here are some thoughts:

I grew up in a meager farming region of West Virginia. We had no electricity. Small-town families had gaslights, and everyone else used kerosene lamps.

Our valley was mostly a string of dirt farms, horse-operated like in medieval times. My boyhood was during World War II, when most men had gone to combat. My aging uncle ran his farm with two mismatched horses and a crew of granddaughters, plus a scrawny pubescent nephew, me.

We milked cows by hand, plowed and mowed by team, found Indian arrowheads in corn rows, cut creekbank weeds to feed pigs, killed copperhead snakes, straightened bent nails to save money – long days of manual work. It seemed like slavery. Other family farms along the valley were little different.

As soon as I graduated from a little country high school (13 in my senior class), I fled to urban life and a newspaper job. In decades after the war, when I returned home, I found most of those old farms abandoned, overgrown in thickets. I guess parents died and children went to city jobs, as I did.

(When back-to-the-land urbanites came to rural West Virginia farms in the 1960s, I told them they were rushing toward the life I had spurned. Many of them didn’t last long at hoeing and shoveling.)

Most food production shifted away from skimpy family farms to big commercial plantations capable of much greater output. But even those huge farms couldn’t keep pace with the soaring human population.

In the 1960s, alarm spread that the manswarm was exceeding the food supply, and famines were likely. Stanford professor Paul Erlich wrote a 1968 book, The Population Bomb, warning that mass starvation seemed certain in the 1970s. Church groups held public discussions of the impending crisis. Erlich wrote:

“The battle to feed all of humanity is over…. In the 1970s and 1980s, hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now.”

But, out of the spotlight, Norman Bourlag had unleashed the Green Revolution in Mexico, Pakistan and India, using high-yield crops and heavy fertilization. Massive food increases resulted. His technique spread around the world. Bourlag got the 1970 Nobel Peace Prize. He was credited with saving a billion lives.

Yet the population upsurge didn’t stop. Before he died in 2009, Bourlag said his Green Revolution had peaked and couldn’t keep up with the worsening need.

So, what’s the future regarding hunger? I’m an ardent believer in science. I hope that genetic engineering will make breakthrough after breakthrough, producing ever-better plants and animals to feed humans.

A technique called CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) snips a plant’s own DNA as needed – rather than inserting bits of foreign DNA as in past gene-splicing. The revised genome duplicates itself endlessly as new generations of improved crops ensue. National Geographic says it has potential to “help feed the world.”

Here’s hoping that gene science spawns a second Green Revolution and keeps humanity thriving.