Bioeconomy and the Sustainability Problem

“High levels of consumption in industrialised countries have far-reaching impacts on ecosystems, food security and human rights both within and beyond their borders. Low- and middle-income countries are directly affected by the policies and practices of the global North, and ordinary citizens have limited influence. Demand in the United States and the United Kingdom for beef directly drives deforestation in the Amazon; while the number of everyday products that contain unsustainable palm oil continues to increase.

…The ‘bioeconomy’ is a sophisticated sounding term, but essentially it means the things we make, use and sell that have their origins in nature; and the aim is to transition the economy from fossil resources towards renewable ones. Farming and forestry are part of the bioeconomy, as is energy produced from biomass, and services like tourism that are rooted in nature and outdoor experiences. The bioeconomy is central to what we do every day, and is an essential part of the global economy. In Europe alone the bioeconomy has an annual value of €2.4 trillion. It holds the key to a greener, more sustainable and healthy future for all — if the right practices, regulations and incentives are in place.

At the same time, the bioeconomy has the potential to drive further environmental destruction and degradation. Irresponsible pursuit of profit and unsustainable exploitation of natural resources are making climate change, biodiversity loss, infectious diseases, hunger and inequality much worse. A recent report from the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) found that unless we dramatically reduce our impact on the natural world, future pandemics will become more frequent, spread more quickly and kill more people.

An unsustainable bioeconomy also threatens the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) — a global sustainability framework adopted by the United Nations in 2015. A recent report by the German Federal Environment Agency found that in order for the bioeconomy to work for, rather than against, the SDGs, the global agenda and national strategies need to focus much more on restoration of ecosystems, sustainable land-use, climate protection and food sovereignty.”
 
Read More – by Patrick Schröder – a senior research fellow in Chatham House’s energy, environment and resources programme>>>

Covid: African Experience

Wired Article: ” Two months after it opened, Khayelitsha Field Hospital abruptly closed. The facility, constructed in a sports hall in early July on the outskirts of the South African city of Cape Town, had been constructed in anticipation of a wave of Covid-19 deaths. But the infections and deaths that have overwhelmed healthcare systems across the world never came. Almost a year into the pandemic Africa has mostly been spared from a crisis that has brought much of the world to its knees.

It wasn’t meant to be this way. In April, as Covid-19 shut down country after country, the United Nations issued a stark warning: Africa might be next. Officials said Covid-19 could directly kill at least 300,000 people in Africa and possibly as many as 3.3 million. In May, with infections and deaths still surprisingly low, the World Health Organisation revised that prediction down to between 83,000 and 190,000 deaths. To date, just over 40,000 Africans have lost their lives to Covid-19. “Very few cases were identified,” says Gilles Van Cutsem, a senior HIV and tuberculosis adviser for Médecins Sans Frontières at the Southern African Medical Unit in Cape Town.

There is no single reason for Africa’s seemingly remarkable escape. For one, Africa isn’t a homogenous lump of land. Its 54 countries are ethnically and socially diverse. Yet, across the continent, there are some trends that hint at why deaths from Covid-19 remain so low. The median age in Africa, where more than 60 per cent of people are under the age of 25, is about half of that in Europe. This has played a significant role, says Denis Chopera, a public healthcare expert at the Africa Research Institute in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. He also points to Africa’s warm climate and the potential of pre-existing immunity in some communities. “Africa has a high burden of infectious diseases, including coronaviruses, and it is possible that there is some cross-immunity which protects Africans from severe Covid-19,” Chopera says. The WHO has made similar suggestions.

Across the continent, high rates of tuberculosis, HIV, polio and Ebola, have also ensured a wealth of well-trained medical professionals and, crucially, the infrastructure and expertise to handle a pandemic. “The experience has come in handy, especially in countries such as South Africa where contact tracing already existed for tuberculosis,” says Chopera. “These were repurposed to combat Covid-19.”

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One in six children living in extreme poverty rising during pandemic

“Global Estimate of Children in Monetary Poverty: An Update, notes that sub-Saharan Africa, with its limited social safety nets, accounts for two-thirds of children living in households that struggle to survive on an average of $1.90 a day or less per person – the international measure for extreme poverty, while South Asia accounts for nearly a fifth of these children. 

The analysis shows that the number living in extreme poverty decreased moderately, by 29 million, between 2013 and 2017. However, UNICEF and the World Bank Group warn that any progress made in recent years, has been “slow-paced, unequally distributed, and at risk” due to the economic impact of the pandemic.  

Struggling for survival 

“One in six children living in extreme poverty is one in six children struggling to survive”, said Sanjay Wijesekera, UNICEF Director of Programmes. 

“These numbers alone should shock anyone. And the scale and depth of what we know about the financial hardships brought on by the pandemic, are only set to make matters far worse. Governments urgently need a children’s recovery plan to prevent countless more children and their families from reaching levels of poverty unseen for many, many years.” 

Although children make up around a third of the global population, around half of the extreme poor are children. Furthermore, they are more than twice as likely to be extremely poor as adults. 

The youngest children are the worst off – nearly 20 per cent of all of them below the age of 5 in the developing world, live in extremely poor households, the report highlights.  

“The fact that one in six children were living in extreme poverty and that 50 per cent of the global extreme poor were children, even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, is of grave concern to us all,” said Carolina Sánchez-Páramo, Global Director of Poverty and Equity for the World Bank. “

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COVID-19 is Decimating Health Workers

BMJ Global Health Article: “Health workers are essential for improved global health—but the COVID-19 pandemic is decimating them. Worse still, we don’t know the true toll the virus is taking on healthcare workers. In Africa, where the healthcare workforce of many countries was already desperately thin, the WHO counted nearly 42 000 sickened clinicians as of 9 September 2020, but the total number of infected surely outstrips that. And the pandemic is still unfolding: ongoing community transmission of the virus in many countries in Africa means far more casualties yet to come.

When health workers are at risk, so are their patients. In recent epidemics, health workers have unwittingly infected patients and colleagues. Of even greater concern, when the population perceives health facilities as unsafe, they delay or forgo needed care, leading to preventable deaths from other causes. Disruptions caused by the pandemic could result in millions of preventable deaths.

It doesn’t have to be this way. Health workers are endangered when they do not receive training on infection prevention and control, and when the places they work run short of PPE and testing kits, run delays in returning test results or lack basic necessities such as running water.

WHO and its partners have worked hard to improve procurement mechanisms for much-needed medical supplies. Further, WHO is advocating for the mobilisation of resources to secure PPE supplies for countries and is conducting training of healthcare workers in infection prevention and control.

Many African countries have struggled to secure PPE for their health workers, partly because there are shortages of PPE on the international market. However, we have also become aware of instances of corruption and misuse of funds including for contracts for the procurement of PPE. Corruption, particularly in procurement of supplies that are required to protect life, is unacceptable.

This isn’t the first epidemic to strike the healthcare workforce, and it won’t be the last; but we must learn from our past failures and ensure a safer future. COVID-19 presents yet another opportunity—and urgent requirement—to strengthen protection of health workforce.”

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Eradicating Polio

At the World Health Assembly in 2012, 194 member states declared that the eradication of polio is a “programmatic emergency for global public health.” At the 2013 Global Vaccine Summit in Abu Dhabi, donors pledged $4 billion to fund GPEI’s new six-year plan to eradicate polio and eliminate the disease. Experts estimate that in the two decades following eradication, countries will receive between US$40 billion and US$50 billion in net benefits, approximately 85 percent of which will go to low-income countries. This figure does not include additional health improvements resulting from other GPEI efforts, such as vitamin A supplementation or the much larger net benefits of eradication for countries that eliminated polio before the GPEI started.

India—long considered the most difficult place to end polio due to its population density, high migration rates, poor sanitation, high birth rates, and low rates of routine immunization—is a prime example of how a fully funded program with dedicated leaders and workers can achieve success.

Polio vaccination teams pick up supplies at a railway station in the state of Bihar in northern India.

A number of factors contributed to India’s success: highly targeted, data-driven planning; well-trained and motivated staff; rigorous monitoring; effective communications; mobilization of trusted community and religious leaders; political will at all levels; and adequate funding. India has served as a model for other regions and has shared technical assistance and best practices with countries including Nigeria, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.

Global collaboration and innovation have produced new tools and approaches that can help improve logistical planning for polio eradication. In addition, refinements to the polio vaccine have improved the immune response to the remaining types of the disease. (Wild type 2 poliovirus was eliminated in 1999, and wild type 3 has not been reported anywhere since 2012.) New diagnostic, monitoring, and modeling tools are allowing faster and more accurate tracking of polio cases and transmission patterns.

To slow the spread of polio in their countries, Nigeria, Pakistan and Afghanistan have implemented national emergency plans overseen by their heads of state. These programs increase accountability and improve the quality of polio vaccination campaigns from the national to the local level. WHO is providing unprecedented levels of technical assistance to these countries, and improved vaccination campaigns are helping reach more children.

The GPEI six-year plan serves as the basis for all activities required to stop polio, including the use of data and analysis to set country-level vaccination targets, as well as the use of new tools and approaches to implement programs. According to a 2015 midterm review, the GPEI program is largely on track but will need an additional US$1.5 billion to fund the program through 2019.

Eradicating polio is an important milestone for the Decade of Vaccines, a shared commitment by nearly 200 countries to extend the benefits of vaccines to every person by 2020. It also would establish a model we could use to deliver vaccines for other preventable diseases and protect children in the poorest, least accessible areas.

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Tuberculosis: 25% of the World Infected

About one-quarter of the world’s population is infected with tuberculosis (TB) bacteria. Only a small proportion of those infected will become sick with TB.

People with weakened immune systems have a much greater risk of falling ill from TB. A person living with HIV is about 20 times more likely to develop active TB.

Over 1.4 million people died from TB in 2019. Worldwide, TB is one of the top 10 causes of death and the leading cause from a single infectious agent (above HIV/AIDS).

Read more at WHO Website

Covid experts: There is another way

Three eminent epidemiologists – Prof. Sunetra Gupta, Prof. Jay Bhattacharya and Prof. Martin Kulldorff met in Massachusetts to plan a better response to the pandemic.

They have now issued a joint declaration proposing the way forward is to focus on protecting the vulnerable and allow the rest of the community to develop ‘herd immunity’ based on science and common sense – ‘Focused Protection’.

“As infectious disease epidemiologists and public health scientists, we have grave concerns about the damaging physical, and mental health impacts of the prevailing COVID-19 policies and recommend an approach we call Focused Protection. 

Coming from both the left and right, and around the world, we have devoted our careers to protecting people. Current lockdown policies are producing devastating effects on short and long-term public health. The results (to name a few) include lower childhood vaccination rates, worsening cardiovascular disease outcomes, fewer cancer screenings and deteriorating mental health – leading to greater excess mortality in years to come, with the working class and younger members of society carrying the heaviest burden. Keeping students out of school is a grave injustice. 

Keeping these measures in place until a vaccine is available will cause irreparable damage, with the underprivileged disproportionately harmed.

Fortunately, our understanding of the virus is growing. We know that vulnerability to death from COVID-19 is more than a thousand-fold higher in the old and infirm than the young. Indeed, for children, COVID-19 is less dangerous than many other harms, including influenza. 

As immunity builds in the population, the risk of infection to all – including the vulnerable – falls. We know that all populations will eventually reach herd immunity – i.e.  the point at which the rate of new infections is stable – and that this can be assisted by (but is not dependent upon) a vaccine. Our goal should therefore be to minimize mortality and social harm until we reach herd immunity. 

The most compassionate approach that balances the risks and benefits of reaching herd immunity, is to allow those who are at minimal risk of death to live their lives normally to build up immunity to the virus through natural infection, while better protecting those who are at highest risk. We call this Focused Protection. 

Adopting measures to protect the vulnerable should be the central aim of public health responses to COVID-19. By way of example, nursing homes should use staff with acquired immunity and perform frequent PCR testing of other staff and all visitors. Staff rotation should be minimized. Retired people living at home should have groceries and other essentials delivered to their home. When possible, they should meet family members outside rather than inside. A comprehensive and detailed list of measures, including approaches to multi-generational households, can be implemented, and is well within the scope and capability of public health professionals. 

Those who are not vulnerable should immediately be allowed to resume life as normal. Simple hygiene measures, such as hand washing and staying home when sick should be practiced by everyone to reduce the herd immunity threshold. Schools and universities should be open for in-person teaching. Extracurricular activities, such as sports, should be resumed. Young low-risk adults should work normally, rather than from home. Restaurants and other businesses should open. Arts, music, sport and other cultural activities should resume. People who are more at risk may participate if they wish, while society as a whole enjoys the protection conferred upon the vulnerable by those who have built up herd immunity.

Great Barrington, Massachusetts, 4th October 2020

Read More and See who has also signed the Declaration

SMEs feeding Africa and Asia

The Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) reports:

“In low-income countries, poor dietary diversity is driven in large part by the low availability and affordability of nutritious foods like fresh fruits and vegetables, dairy products and other animal sourced foods. In a recent assessment, GAIN determined that small-and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), or small and mighty enterprises as GAIN likes to call them, produce, process or sell up to 70% of nutritious food sold in low-income markets in Africa.

SMEs face various constraints in their ability to produce safe, nutritious foods. Specialised knowledge on food production, labelling, packaging, and marketing is often difficult to find in low-income countries. Where such knowledge is available, it is often prohibitively expensive for SMEs. Further, there are few networking opportunities or information-sharing platforms available to SMEs involved in the production of safe, nutritious foods.

By providing SMEs with technical and financial assistance, we can enhance companies’ operational performance and improve the quality and desirability of the foods they produce. Support to SMEs results in increased profitability of businesses, and increased availability of safe, nutritious foods in the market. With funding from the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs, UK Department for International Development (DFID), United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Rockefeller Foundation, GAIN has provided targeted technical assistance to over 134 SMEs and has convened and trained over 2,000 businesses in 7 countries between 2013–2019. By working with investible businesses to build capacity, foster networks, and support innovations all along nutritious food supply chains, GAIN is making a sustainable contribution to agriculture, enterprise development and nutrition”

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