By: Ian Mason, Reporter from the Street

The fast began at five, breakfast had been taken at four. This did not spare men or women and they knew that after the first meal and until half past six there was a period of time to be filled. For some it was occupied by free study, for others by menial tasks; for all prayer was the cornerstone of each day during the period of Ramadan.

The day before he had experienced Muslim kindness and discipline. Fast was broken strictly at that hour in the evening. Men and women ate at tables laid out minutes before. Cakes and savory rice cakes, figs and watermelon, sweet tea was the fare for the first part of this meal. They went away to prayer ten minutes later and returned to “feast” on rice and chicken. He had seen food parcels delivered to the Mosque one hour before supper. They prepared the foods carefully and quickly. He had not yet broken fast at five with them. He could see that they were also hungry.

A young, attractive Muslim woman asked if he wanted milk and brought a cup of milky tea. A Muslim man arrived later than most, scolded a young boy and left the refectory to cool down. It looked like a business venture or meeting had got the better of his calm and the kid behaved as kids do at that age with cheek and he blew a red hot chili. The teenagers on one table broke fast and drank sugary carbonated drinks, ate the figs, watermelon and rice cakes with famished eyes. The green clad Muslim woman he had spoken to brought more melon and figs.

He found out that rice, the staple diet of millions of Asian men and women, is the perfect food. It is usually eaten cold in Indonesia, some told him. He thought “they’re just saving on gas and electricity”. He had commitments that same evening, excused himself, was offered a choice of rice based meal, took one plate and left the mosque. He continued his supper. Both meat and rice were still warm and he ate hungrily.

On his return, a man running uphill at a brisk pace, made him reach for his right thigh. He had not twisted an ankle and wanted to be running fit the following morning. His right big toe bled the following day and he purged.

He had experienced his second time at a Mosque, that active community of men and women who offered him love and charity. He chuckled as he walked by a training centre for social welfare and thought there was a movement of those two cardinal qualities and virtues in that working community. The Nepalese man, who was drunk when he said that the mosque offered care, had still not shown his face and he concluded he had returned to Nepal.

The library was closed and the leader of the refectory told him it was the librarian’s day off. He had done what all the librarians do here and shown him where the books of non-Asian content were to be found. It was quiet. He was homeless; he made good use of his time.

This is the first of a three part articles series that originally appeared on the SOMESSO blog. It is re-published here on the 21st C/N blog with kind permission by its author.

By: Anne McCrossan, @Annemcx, founder of Visceral Business

The social dynamic and the transformation of business

With something of a perfect storm of food, energy and water shortages being forecast by 2030 and the combined forces of social technology, economic recession and environmental change making their mark, the possibility of a new social ethic is emerging with the potential to transform the way we do business. Whilst ensuring we bring the intangible assets and existing equity of established businesses with us into this new commercial domain, new business models are required that involve a recalibration of organizations and businesses as we know them. And this means that marketing and organizational development needs to be reinvented.

This new social dynamic calls us to shift our approach from pushing a message to galvanizing people around an idea. Marketing strategies that do no more than prime the pump to achieve sales have become a tax paid for being unremarkable; if your ideas are big enough you don’t need that spend. Organizations now need to be propelled by ideas big enough and inspiring enough to bring communities together - employees and consumers alike - based on a common belief in the value of their activities.

The idea of forming a strong group around a purpose has been central to brand identity for a while. And when this idea is placed within a social ecosystem - and the social tools and practices loosely called web2.0 - the implications for traditional organizations are huge. The social dynamic challenges most of the marketing and organizational development fundamentals of conventional business.

Dysfunction is an operational cost

Needing a large media spend to promote business opportunity is only one symptom of operational dysfunction. When what an organization says and what it does are not aligned, when they aren’t compelling or credible as a brand and when they lack a strong sense of communal purpose, huge - and hidden - operational costs are incurred.

We know how it makes us feel when promises aren’t kept. When we feel let down, when people or organizations cannot be trusted, we’re inclined to give them less attention. This is a fundamental aspect of any social contract.

In brand identity and organizational terms, trusted networks have value both commercially and socially. But in bricks and mortar organizations, tacit knowledge and networks of trust exist invisibly, in parallel to official channels and hierarchies. When things go awry, corrective strategies that are insensitive to trust networks create opportunity and operational cost by making cuts based on abstract efficiency, thus remaining blind to - or often destroying - locations where commitment and affinity networks mean proven delivery as well as innovation could continue to flourish.

In the absence of affinity, commitment and shared values, companies over-engineer their management structures, building in the risk of system failure. Organizations built on industrial production principles - command and control - have heavy infrastructure, capital cost and tangible asset overheads that are expensive and hard to maintain. Time, money and energy is spent on management plans based on outmoded ideas of how things should work, rather than on understanding how they actually do work. This does not constitute streamlining, improving fitness for purpose or generating stakeholder value.

More broadly, our current model for how business should work assumes infinite needs and resources, but the reality is that we don’t have an infinite number of needs, and ecologically we don’t have an infinite amount of resources. This, combined with the current global recession - driven by creative accounting itself inspired by the drive for constant growth at any cost - sounds a death knell for the single-minded capitalist focus on corporate value as judged by investor return and based on financial value alone.

Investors in organizations have expected annual returns of 15%-20% p.a or more. But there is a growing appreciation for the welfare and the fragility of our ecosystem and a realization that there are limits as to how far we can use consumption as an engine for corporate growth.

A new social dynamic

We have to learn to live with the meaning of ‘enough’ and refocus on new kinds of corporate opportunities, opportunities that move from making ‘more’ to making what we have work ‘better’, and businesses that are socially driven by the power of big ideals. What’s emerging now takes the place of consumption at all costs: businesses that focus on what we really need, and have an inherent permission to operate within the ecosystem because the work they do makes them valuable, as opposed to the old organizational notion that interruption via marketing creates sales.

The organizations that will be most successful moving on from here are likely to be those that make it their mission to meet these needs well, that are additive and supportive, fun to be around, inclusive, that people care about, that connect people and inspire them, that solve problems and are on a social mission.

Re-evaluating value

We need to re-examine how we measure worth and how, in this context, worth is linked to achievement. Are we going to value organizations that take from the system only to benefit themselves, or are we going to value organizations that replenish the ecosystem and the people who are creating value for and with the system? It’s a stark choice. I think social networks are encouraging us to think in terms of systems, to address how we can create achievement for the ecosystem, to reassess how we place a value on that and how we invest in that. The paradigm shifts from ‘profit from’ to ‘profit with’. That’s our future.

It’s only a matter of time before CEOs start having to ask themselves: ‘What is our strategic goal within a socially-led ecosystem?’ How do we redefine and view our marketplace? How can we sustain ourselves within an ecosystem, and how can we recalibrate what we have in order to do that?

The second of this three parts article series will be published in early March 2010.

Anne McCrossan, Twitter: @Annemcx, is the founder of Visceral Business, a social business consultancy that specializes in helping organizations create social leverage through strategic change initiatives, brand management, leadership training, and social marketing capabilities.

London is often cited as the most ethnically diverse city in the world, priding itself as a place where every ethnic community is encouraged to retain their own identity. But for some ethnic diversity can also be a source of tensions leading to a social breakdown. As this meetup asked, can we all be different and all live together?

By: Ingrid Ots, 21st C/N Reporter

“The scale of migration changed the way we perceive our identity”, says Michael Keith, a former councilor in Tower Hamlets, the most ethnically diverse area in London. “We do increasingly think globally and act locally. If there is a bond between citizenship and identity, it plays out on many levels and we tend to have multiple layers of self”.

Michael, whose current work develops projects on the dynamics of urbanism, the study of cultural difference and the impact of migration on structures and processes of governance, is keen that we should adopt “the ethics of hospitality” recognising the importance of belonging to a particular place but also understanding the difficulties that new arrivals face in their adopted communities.

“To me, the debate about multiculturalism is a debate about civilising globalisation. People are moving around in great numbers and they have to think differently about their identities and communities”, said Afua Hirsch, the Guardian newspaper’s legal affairs correspondent.

The journalist, who has mixed Ghanaian and German heritage, points out that the loss of identity is often a “sinister” aspect of globalisation and an issue that Western governments fail to address. But equally, the acute sense of otherness can become more important in a multicultural society. Afua cites the example of a young Kurdish woman who grew up in Australia where she felt like “kind of Australian, kind of other”. It is only when she moved to Iraq she felt “profound sense of national empathy” and “a magical bond” with fellow Kurds. “It is the matter often overlooked but indigenous white communities also have different sense of cultural identity”, said the journalist.

Afua said that nowadays there was a wider debate in the media about multiculturalism than before. In 1993 there was only one story in The Guardian that mentioned it - it was about pagan metal, a Celtic Viking-inspired type of death metal.
According to the newspaper website, in the last five years there were around 200 stories discussing the issue, adds Afua, including inflammatory comments by a former Today editor Rod Liddle who argued that the black community has given Britain “rap music, goat curry and a far more vibrant and diverse understanding of cultures which were once alien to us” in return for the higher rates of crime.

Zubaida Haque, a government official who undertook extensive research of community cohesion in the UK said, that the key issue is how to manage the host communities’ treatment of and reactions to new migrants. “I think it is where this country really failed, we haven’t dealt with the reactions of existing communities, we haven’t thought how we can help them to manage new migrants coming in. A lot of anxieties are based on mis-perceptions, with housing being the perfect example”, said Zubaida. “In my research I’ve actually asked the question – what works for facilitating social integration? Having looked at all the evidence, I came across four factors. One was language support classes, another was facilitating exchange about and among new arrivals, third was changing attitudes of the public and media and the forth was making use of mentoring and volunteering”.

The meetup was sponsored by Runnymede, a research organisation that focuses on equality and justice and promotes the idea of multi-ethnic society.

The highly anticipated UN Climate Change conference in Copenhagen ended with a fraudulent last minute agreement, engineered by the United States, using China, backed by Brazil, India and African Nations as cover-up. What exactly contains the five pages accord? What does it mean? What are the social movements asking for? And what will happen next?

By: Sandra De Andrade, Activist

The UN Climate Change conference had for its main objective the formulation of a worldwide agreement on the reduction of greenhouse emissions which would constitute the prolongation of the Kyoto protocols.

What is in that five pages accord? What does it contain?

=> Read the original 5 pages Copenhagen agreement.

Although most nations agreed that the global temperature rise must be kept under 2C° to prevent climate run-away effects, they nevertheless did not set any binding reduction targets to stop that from happening. According to experts, industrialised countries should reduce their CO2 emissions between 25% to 40% by 2020, and between 80% to 95% by 2050.

The Kyoto protocol that requires industrial nations to reduce their emissions by 5,2% below the 1990 baseline over the 2008 to 2012 period was preserved but undermined. The Cop15 accord challenged the wider United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) process used in the Kyoto Protocol. It moved from a top-down framework aim at setting global greenhouse gas reduction targets for the 39 countries of the Annex I (Industrialised countries) to a bottom-up approach. This latter requires each country to set its own greenhouse gas reduction targets which might not be sufficient to keep the global rise in temperature under 2C recommended by the science.

Although the accord was recognised by the conference as whole, it was not endorsed by the 193 parties/nations present at the Cop15 in Copenhagen. For most nations this all Cop15 conference was a masquerade! According to Michael von Bülow, the outcome was decided 3 weeks earlier at the APEC (Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation) forum in Singapore. Backed by the US and other leaders, among them most probably China, the Danish Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen proposed a two-step strategy that would yield to a political agreement only.

In monetary terms, rich nations promised to establish a Copenhagen Green Fund to finance adaptation measures to climate change for developing countries starting with US$ 30bn a year to reach US$100bn by 2020. This amount is by far lower than what was requested by the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) and African countries, which were demanding US$200bn by 2020 in order to take effective mitigation measure.

Also, experience has shown that without binding agreements and penalties, the promises are hardly kept at all. According to the BBC World Service investigation, when signing the Bonn Declaration in 2001, 20 industrialised nations (the 15 EU countries, Canada, Iceland, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland), pledged to pay $410 million a year until 2008 into the UN fund, in order to tackle climate change. The date the payments were meant to start is unclear, but the total should be between $1.6bn and $2.87bn. But only $260m has ever been paid into two UN funds earmarked for the purpose.

The Copenhagen accord mentions technological development and knowledge transfer mechanisms in support of developing countries. The shift to a low-carbon economy in developed countries requires a massive investment. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), the shift will require $1100bn – the equivalent of 1,5% of the 2030 global GDP.

The worst outcome of Copenhagen is the REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation) scheme under the carbon market offsetting mechanism’s Clean Development Mechanisms (CDM).

According to Dag Hammarskjold Foundation this concept assumes that deforestation happens because too little economic value is placed on intact forests, and that providing money for conservation to forested countries in the South will help to protect these. This idea is challenged however by many Indigenous People and forest communities, who warn that putting a price on forests will only encourage further land grabs by large companies and governments. Indigenous People stress that the real drivers of deforestation are the major construction, mining, logging and plantation developments whose owners stand to be rewarded by REDD Funds.

In short, where and how did the Copenhagen conference fall short?

The biggest failure is the renewal of the Kyoto protocol with higher, binding, time limited CO2 reduction targets. Binding targets are essential for a properly functioning international regulated ‘Cap and Share’ carbon market.

José Manuel Barroso, the European Union president commented: “This deal is better than any deal. It’s a step forward, but, of course, below our ambition. I won’t hide my disappointment for it not being binding”.

The EU was hoping that a binding agreement would set a legal ground that would have allowed smaller carbon markets to link-up with its EU Emission Trading System (EU ETS). The final goal is to become the central hub for carbon trading in the world. This said, the EU ETS has generously rewarded polluting companies while failing to reduce emissions. The downside of not having international binding targets is that our governments will not feel pressured to act and set the regulation that will lead us to a low-carbon economy in order to reduce our GHG at home.

What NGOs and Southern nations were pushing for

The increasingly frustrated NGOs and Southern nations, struggling to have their demands heard, attempted to meet to discuss the real solutions outside the Bella Centre on December 16h, under the banner of The Reclaim Power March, lead by the Climate Justice now! coalition. They were confronted with violence from the Danish police preventing them to join the movement.

Climate Justice now! is made up of a huge coalition of organisations such as Climate Camp, Via Campesina and joined by numerous other activists groups. Their demands are summarised in their call ’system change, no climate change’. Read the People’s Declaration from Klimaforum09. They ask that industrialised countries recognise their climate debt, which needs to be repaid, toward the Southern Developing Countries. They further call for Greenhouse gas emission targets to be based on Greenhouse Gas emission reductions achievements at home, and not through cheap offsetting projects in developing countries, which threaten the livelihood of indigenous people. Climate Justice Now! also demands that natural resources such water, land, sky, forest…. stay under public control, giving equal access to essential resources, and insuring fairer repartition of wealth to all this that produce it. Watch how trees are turned into a commodity.

What’s next:

In the coming month, the practicalities of the Cop15 accord will be proposed by each nation and presented at the Bonn UN Climate body’s meeting in May until the next Cop conference in Mexico (Cop16).

The accord requires each country to register their planned emissions cuts by end of January 2010. We want Gordon Brown to remember the promises he made at the London Climate Change protest in December 2009, namely that of a 10% CO2 reduction by end of 2010. Unfortunately, the reality is however, that the UK government has been extraordinarily quiet about their plans of how to go about this promise since their return from Copenhagen.

Between 31 May and 11 Jun 2010, the 32nd session of the UNCCC convention will take place in Bonn. There, the Subsidiary Bodies will examine the targets put forward by each individual country.

Mexico will host the Sixteenth United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP 16) in December 2010. There is already a lot of hope on that UNCCC conference to achieve a achieve a binding treaty.

On April 22nd, Evo Morales, Bolivia’s president, is organising a counter-summit to welcome the social movement that grew in Copenhagen and to discuss the “real solutions” in preparation of these next major talks.

Conclusion:

Copenhagen has been a disaster for a just and equitable climate solutions demanded by NGOs and some Southern Developing countries. The major harm was the annexation of forests into the Clean Development Mechanisms (CDM) threatening millions of indigenous people of evictions of their homes. The good news is that the accord did not set further ground for an international Cap & Share carbon market which would have accelerated the damages caused to our ecosystems and the livelihood of the most vulnerable, mainly indigenous populations, women and peasants. The Cop15 is finished but the practicalities are still being negotiated, so keep your eyes open. In the meantime, NGOs have been gathering to organise an action plan strategy for the months to come.

Cop15 will, from a social movement perspective, be remembered as a united, inspiring moment where the voices of the oppressed joined call to ask for ’system change, not climate change’.

Mark Barrett originally trained as a lawyer. An eye-opening stint in the City triggered the decision to travel the world, and after years of cultural research across the globe, and a decade’s work as a European tour guide, he finally returned to London in 2005. He has since campaigned on issues of civil liberties, human rights, ecology and democracy. He presently works in education as a Cover Supervisor at a school in Enfield.

In 1997, while living in Vancouver, Mark was inspired by taking part in the anti-APEC and anti-MAI (Multilateral Agreement on Investments) nascent global protest movement. His first foray into radical politics was to organise the ‘People in Common’ picnic campaign, a direct action response to the clampdown on peaceful protest in Westminster (under §132 of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act, or SOCPA 2005). As part of this campaign, Mark helped organise a number of demonstrations, as well as a series of forays for grassroots groups to consider the future of the Constitution. This resulted in the 2006 C421 (or Campaign for a 21st Century Constitution) Interim Campaign Statement. In his work as a campaigner for freedom of protest, expression and assembly, as well as organiser and press officer for the G20 Meltdown’s Bank of England demonstrations in April 2009, Mark has made a number of appearances on national television and the mainstream press.

In late 2008/ early 2009, following a conference on Human Rights to commemorate the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), Mark and colleagues formed a new network: Project 2012 is dedicated to building a rights based coalition for a new society in the UK and elsewhere. At the same time, as part of his work for the 21st Century Network, the Campaign for Real Democracy (CRD) was set up, aiming at developing a new political economy, and social action based on ‘real’ (as in ‘decentralised’, ‘bottom up’) democracy - what CRD members are calling The Real Third Way. The idea is that an independent civil society is the third superpower, which must now stand up as an equal alongside, and ultimately as the master of both state and capital; and that need a new political economy, based on a radical localism, is needed in order to make that a reality.

As part of the Campaign for a 21st Century Constitution, Mark set up a local organising ‘community anchor’ or ‘People’s Assembly’ project in Southgate, North London. This work has resulted in a novel campaign for a community owned street market in the area through which it is hoped the local community will begin to create its own revenue, and to provide its own public services. A CRD Manifesto is now being developed by CRD. In 2010, with the support of the 21 C/N organisers Francis Sealey and Christina Wiltshire, as well as that of Southgate College with their offer of venue space, Mark is hoping to extend the success of the 21st Century Network’s public engagement program and grounding it in a local community, which is an educational public service in itself.

“Cradle to Cradle – re-making the way we make things”
by M. Braungart and W. McDonough
ISBN: 0099535475

Review by: Pamela Ravasio, Editor

“When you do something wrong, don’t try improve upon it.” Instead, the ‘cradle to cradle’ approach suggests, you go back to the beginning (to the design of a product, and hence the drawing board that is), and fix the problem right where it went wrong in first place.

The fundamental underlying idea is, based on the cycles of nature, that there should principally not be any ‘waste’ at all. Waste, in nature, is nothing but the fuel to other – natural – processes. ‘Waste’ is always of further use, and certainly never a looming source of danger and pollution.

The authors purposely take the focus away from the human being, and instead broaden it to look at Earth, the globe, as a systemic whole. With chiefly examples taken from the world of consumer goods producers (from buildings and cars to sneakers and kids’ toys), each of the chapters adds a piece to the puzzle answering questions such as:
- how did we get where we are now (i.e. close to succeeding in destroying the species’ habitat through mismanagement of finite resources)?
- why are current mainstream efforts by far not good enough to change the course of the ship we’re on?
- why should we be ‘fundamentally good’ rather then just ‘less bad’? and
- why does doing ‘the right thing’ not mean to loose out on business opportunities?

The authors introduce us to the important distinction between eco-effectiveness and eco-efficiency:
Eco-efficiency is what the currently on-going“green the production” wave across all industrial sectors is all about – the famous 3Rs: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. The whole underlying idea is to“be less bad”, and therefore, make the currently existing resources last longer. Essentially, this means going on doing the same [dangerous, wasteful, polluting, depleting] activities for longer than previously estimated, but on a reduced level of intensity in order to be able to stretch the period during which the limited resources will be available. Eco-efficiency, cannot be the ultimate stage in – humanity, Earth - overcoming serious challenges such as Climate Change, depletion of fossil fuel reserves, extinction of marine live and mountains of toxic waste.
In contrast, eco-effectiveness would mean to“fit in” with nature. All that is left over at the end of one production process (’waste’, product, by-products etc.) is either a clean natural resource such as water, or entirely organically decomposable such as untreated wool, or itself a source of potentially infinitely recyclable (rather then down-cyclable as is current practise) non-degradable material such as pure copper or gold.

The authors suggest 5 indicative, practical steps (read ‘hurdles’) as pathway to create goods that follow the logic of nature. Each step is concrete enough to apply it to a specific product design, yet sufficiently generic to not exclude any single industry. The steps and the examples given from their own experience proof that it is often only the lack of commitment as well as man’s inertia that hinders Cradle-to-Cradle becoming the new state-of-the-art.

The ClimaTex story:

In the early 1990s, the authors collaborate with the Swiss upholstery textile company Rohner in an assignment to design “an aesthetically unique fabric that was also environmentally intelligent”. The textile company’s preferred idea was a fabric made of a cotton/recycled-PET combination. Now, PET is plastic – treated with a multitude of chemicals and dyes. In its use, upholstery fabric is exposed to heavily abrasive processes – setting free highly toxic nano-particles into the air we breath. Also, the by- and waste products of such a fabric would, under Swiss law, need to be exported as highly toxic waste, as they cannot be buried, or even incinerated in the country. In short, in the overall image a range of substantial challenges, both ethically as well as environmentally, surfaced.

Instead, a short period of research into natural fibres and non-toxic dyes began, which lead to the development of a novel fabric. With the help of sun, rain and micro-organisms, the trimmings – or fabric scraps – now provide mulch for the farmers in the surrounding community. The effluent water was as clean as, or even cleaner than, the influent water – to the degree that the Health & Safety inspectors first thought their equipment was broken. The lack of toxic materials in the production process meant that workers did not need any protective equipment such as goggles or gloves any more – which not only resulted in steep monetary savings, but also in a more agreeable, “human-kind” work place.

The fabric was such a huge success that the producers faces a different type of problem: over-demand. It is for example being used for the seating of Airbus’ current A380 model.

“Cradle to Cradle – re-making the way we make things” is an inspirational read. The authors clearly get their point across that man is just one of the creatures living on this planet, and that the human being needs again to become a “native” within the system called Earth. The examples presented are clear and generally well understandable, albeit more detailed descriptions, specifically on how the design process exactly works in practice, would be very much appreciated. The beauty of the concept stretches beyond what is written in the book – if the authors’ motto (“love the children of all species for all time”) is taken at heart, phenomena such as human rights breaches and poverty would no doubt have a much harder time to continue to exist.

Beyond the book however, it is very unfortunate that the authors have chosen to exclude the vast majority of businesses from their efforts. They have done so by creating yet another, highly valued and equally expensive, certification process based on the 5 steps model mentioned above. This said, this only leads to enforce the conclusion that the word about the Cradle-to-Cradle concept should be spread with even more commitment. Many more committed managers, designers, workers, are needed to take the idea off the hands of a selected few out into the mainstream and our everyday lives.

By: Steven Brewer, Member

On January 13th, Haiti was hit by a 7.3 magnitude earthquake. This is one of the places in the world where, instead of thinking things couldn’t get any worse, perhaps we should welcome this disaster as a catalyst for change. It could well be a blessing for the children of Haiti. While I do hope nobody perished, some broken buildings and temporary chaos is a small price to pay to bring the spotlight over Haiti. Ironically, the first nation to abolish colonial slavery in the 19th century, now runs a slave trade among its own people today, except they’re using children.

“They get beaten up and there’s nobody to speak up for them. One child we helped had his head cut open with a machete, another had her back slashed with a razor blade, another was burned with hot oil and another had his arm broken.”

“Many are beaten with stiff cowhide whips, known as rigoises, which are designed for use on children and are widely available in shops. More than 70 per cent of child domestics are girls and sexual abuse is so common that restaveks are said to be “la pou sa” – “there for that”.”

Marline Mondesir, director of a local organisation, which supports child domestics.

The nuclear family, so common here in the West, is rare in Haiti; families often send their children to live with relatives. But parents from the countryside, where education is almost non-existent, are willingly sending their children to the Dominican Republic to ‘stay with’, or ‘rest avec’, very distant relatives, sometimes of no relation at all. They hope their children will receive an education and the chance of a better future, but these host families have their own concerns, and they don’t involve caring for these children. When they arrive, detached from their families and unsure if they’ll see their parents again, they’re immediately expected to pay their way in servitude, and education never materialise as it only makes them ‘less obedient’.

“Because economic conditions are better there, some Haitian parents think they are helping their children get on if they are handed over to agents who ferry them across the border, but those kids have no rights at all in the Dominican Republic, and they are often abused.”

“We are deceiving ourselves if we say this is some kind of national tradition. This is child slavery pure and simple.”

Margarett Lubin, from the International Organization for Migration, Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

These children have given up what it feels to be loved and cared for at the time they need it most. They give up their freedom, playing with friends, being safe, secure and relaxed. They will never know why their parents did this to them, and their parents will never know what they’ve done to them. They soon forget how life came to be like this, and the memories of loving parents become indistinguishable from a dream.

“[Unpaid labour] deprives children of their family environment and violates their most basic rights, such as the rights to education, health, and food as well as subjecting them to multiple forms of abuse including economic exploitation, sexual violence and corporal punishment, violating their fundamental right to protection from all forms of violence.”

Gulnara Shahinian, Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Slavery.

If these children were provided with free education and could remain in a stable family environment with people that care about them, there would be no supply of child slaves. The government delivers a mere 10% of the education in Haiti, and only 20% of eligible age children actually reach as far as secondary school. Basic education for children is simply unaffordable for most Haitians at around $80 per year, in a country where the GDP is just $1300 per year (2008).

“We need to show the poorest families that they have a duty to look after their children – and we need to build schools in the countryside, so that they have something to stay for.”

Margarett Lubin.

When we help rebuild Haiti after this natural disaster, let’s fill the devastating hole in its poverty stricken society that turns vulnerable children into a commodity.

Osama Bin Javaid is a Pakistani Journalist and Senior Duty Editor at DawnNews TV and has agreed to provide us, GlobalNet21, with articles for our Blog. We are grateful for that as Pakistan is in the centre of the storm of world affairs and often we know little about what is going on. Here is the first of his articles that we are posting. It is entitled - “Is Obama reading the Soviet guidebook?” It begins with a
Question…

By: Osama Bin Javaid, Journalist, Pakistan

What is your view on what should happen in Afghanistan?

I believe that acountry should be ruled by the democratic principles of the early Chartists and Tom Paine etc..they are my moral compasses over here not knowing yours aside from Muhammed Jinnah of course. Self determination. However is there the will there to protect the way of life that allows women and girls to be educated? What should be done internally and how can people in these western countries involved help?

I was asked this question by a friend and here’s what I think:

Afghanistan is a mess and a by product of the cold war. It has reached this state due to plundering both intentional and unintentional by vested interests of internal and external powers. The CIA funded extremist literature and brain washing created monstrous killing machines, not in numbers but in generations. The Pakistani intelligence knowingly remained a tool because it could salvage 2 cents from the dollars being pumped in. The foreign fighters aren’t acceptable to Pakistan or Afghanistan and their home countries sure as hell dont want them back. Not all the foreign fighters became Jihadi machines, some were doctors, some engineers, some preachers who settled down and had families. Bear in mind we are talking about a period of over 30 years. The geography of the area has tribal customs dating back to centuries. The tribals are hospitable people with traditions such as Pakhtoon Wali and doing everything to protect who they deem as guests.

I need to bore you with the background because the future is closely linked to learning from the past. After 9/11 they changed their minds and with a snap of their fingers wanted to mow down on beliefs and ideologies they had sown for decades.

Its a myriad of muddles which each successor with no foresight has complicated even more, both on the home and the international front and now there is no easy fix. The easiest solution which would’ve had lasting impact was education. Call me an optimist but I only see prosperity clubbed with knowledge giving people a sense of belonging and responsibility, as the solution.

War brings destruction and creates divides which run deeper with each battle. You’d become a suicide bomber if all of your family was hit by a ‘friendly’ mortar and charred everyone you loved alive in front of your eyes. Believe me I have come across people with such harrowing tales. Give them something to lose and then let them guard it. Take away everything and you have an unpredictable weapon which can explode in your face.

The only way the west can help is empowering democracy. Not the Karzai style, Washington/London approved version but the actual will of the people. Let the Taliban get the vote, let them come to power then set ground rules. You cannot wish them away as they are a mighty force the west created and if it took three decades to build it, it will take at least double the time to dismantle it. Build schools, build hospitals, build power stations, build roads - when they destroy them - build them again. That is the only solution.

Obama administration maybe on the right track but they have to do more to gain trust. The CIA’s counter plans of securing Pakistan’s nukes, just in case, of taking over Kabul, just in case, of securing Islamabad, just in case; are the white man’s burden Washington needs to put to rest. Until the double game is being played, there is no solution to Afghanistan or to Pakistan’s tribal areas no matter how many troops you send in.

Accept yesterday’s mistakes and facilitate a prosperous tomorrow.

You can read this and other articles on the author’s Blog.

Manila. Price-wise, tilapia is the cheapest fish in the market. However, if you factor in the environmental and social costs of the aquaculture business, the cost of tilapia should be much higher.

By: Sherilyn Siy

Take the case of Taal Lake, the third largest lake in the Philippines, which supplies 60% of the tilapia demand in the entire Southern Luzon including the National Capital Region (NCR). Within the Taal Lake stands the 300-meter high Taal Volcano, which enjoys the distinction of being the smallest active volcano in the world. Taal Volcano in turn contains a small crater and a sulfur-rich lake called Crater Lake. Taal Lake itself is hypothesized to have been the base of a much bigger volcano that collapsed in one of the major eruptions. Often dubbed as “a lake within a volcano within a lake within a volcano,” Taal Lake and Taal Volcano have been declared a Protected Area in 1996 and are major tourist attractions.

Aside from its aesthetic value, Taal Lake derives ecological importance from being home to the endemic tawils (Lat: Sardinella tawilis). Endemicity means that this species is found in the Taal Lake and nowhere else in the world, making it a good indicator of the ecological status of the lake. The tawilis is the only species of Sardinella found solely in freshwater in the whole world. To local people, it is important as a delicious food fish very much sought after for its tender meat and scrumptiously fat belly. The tawilis faces serious threats due to overfishing, fishing using illegal methods, introduction of invasive and predator species into the lake, fish cage aquaculture, and severe eutrophication. In the past ten years, the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) reported a decline in tawilis catch by almost 80%. Unfortunately, the tawilis cannot be bred in captivity. Aside from the tawilis, the mysterious Taal sea snake (Lat: Hydrophis semperi) also exclusively inhabits the fresh waters of Taal Lake.

The Taal Lake holds economic importance for the populated fishing towns surrounding it. There are over 4,000 small-scale fishermen who catch commercially valuable free-swimming fishes in the lake. Tilapia fish cage aquaculture was introduced in the Taal Lake in the 1970s. At present there are approximately 8,000-10,000 tilapia fish cages in the Taal Lake, mostly financed by wealthier city residents and foreigners. The proliferation of fish cages has been raising pollution levels and posing a great hazard to the lake ecosystem. Aquaculture has various negative impacts on the lake environment including physical (e.g., visually unattractive, causes friction and slows down the water current that brings in clean water), chemical (e.g., oxygen depletion, eutrophication), and biological (e.g., species competing for limited resources). All stakeholders concretely feel the effects of deteriorating water quality and are forced to raise the question of the lake’s carrying capacity for tilapia fish cages: How many fish cages can the lake hold before it fails to support life (and result in fish kills)? Scientific estimation pegs the lake’s carrying capacity at 27,000 tons of tilapia. However, the standing stock of the lake is at 35,000 tons making the lake over capacity by 30%.

Regulations limiting the number of fish cages have been largely violated as fish cage financiers are allegedly backed by big businessmen, active and retired military men and incumbent politicians, making the lake highly politicized.

The biodiversity loss that accompanies habitat destruction and natural resources depletion is often justified by developing nations as necessary costs of progress. From this perspective, the extinction of species is not as economically threatening as the many other huge problems a country like the Philippines faces such as population explosion, a sizeable percentage of which are illiterate and destitute, insurmountable foreign debts, and a weak industrial sector.

Above everything else, the tawilis derives its economic value as a food item, a fish that nourishes and provides income for the community living around the lake. However, the tawilis does not lend itself easily to market forces or commoditization. It fails to meet increases in demand due to its elusiveness and inability to be subjected to cultivation or control. The shift from small-scale tawilis fishing to tilapia fish cage farming in the lake can be likened to the widespread shift in agriculture from subsistence farming to cash crop cultivation. The cash-centered, profit-oriented economy coupled with the lifestyle peddled by media put pressure on local community members to move towards more lucrative forms of livelihood to acquire cash to purchase consumer items. Unfortunately, this trend leaves the local community members with less food security as they become more vulnerable to unstable market prices.

The alarming consequences of this trend on the biodiversity and the ecosystem of the lake have become more and more difficult to ignore. Market prices that fail to reflect the true value of resources are partly culpable (Winter, 1996). To illustrate, tilapia is cheap enough to be a regular fare of the masses. Tilapia prices merely adjust to the immediate supply and demand situation. They do not factor in the method of production, a process that results in the deterioration of the water quality of the lake. Consider how the lake is simultaneously a recreation venue, a source of fresh water for some communities, and home of the endemic tawilis, all of which translate into peso amounts. If these were all taken into account, the tilapia would not be so cheap.

Another socio-economic reason for the continued loss of biodiversity is the state of poor governance and its susceptibility to corruption and bribes. Administrative policies are also short-sighted in that they encourage resource exploitation in exchange for quick revenue. For instance, the official transaction cost (i.e. license or permit) of setting up a fish cage business in the Taal Lake is pegged at a cheap Php500 (7£; 11$) a year per cage. Local governments consider the influx of investors (regardless of where they come from) as favorable since more permits issued means more income. Perverse incentive systems practically institutionalize profit-centeredness and perpetuate inefficient use of resources.

Poverty and limited economic mobility probably tops the list of socio-economic hindrances to biodiversity conservation. The constraint of having to fulfill basic short-term needs for food and other daily provisions precludes concerns about the long-term effects of securing resources in a manner that depletes biodiversity and deteriorates ecosystems. Poverty also prevents people from acting against environmental injustices as they cannot afford the costs of making grievances heard. Given this situation, alternative livelihood must be prepared for local community members who will be displaced when conservation initiatives take effect. One promising innovative alternative is the cultivation of plants (e.g. flowers, vegetables, and rice) on top of nutrient rich fish cages using hydroponics (this concept as a whole is called aquaponics). Plants extract nutrients from the water, thereby increasing the carrying capacity of the lake.

The economics of biodiversity is multifaceted and far too complex to be elucidated using simplistic causal factors. Many of the variables involved in biodiversity loss are multiply determined. Economic factors exert a significant influence to the valuing and protecting of a threatened species and its habitat. Economists must team up with ecologists in identifying the micro and macro economic forces driving biodiversity loss, and developing feasible solutions.

What do you do to fight for justice and equality? “Most of us can read the writing on the wall; we just assume it’s addressed to someone else”, said American writer Ivern Ball. But some act differently. Among them is David Barker, a social entrepreneur and a co-founder of White Box Digital, an IT company that helps small charities.

By: Ingrid Ots, 21st C/N Reporter

A Mancuanian who sold his house to do research on poverty, he now manages a growing business that has a commitment to positive change in its core agenda. Founded in 2005, White Box Digital serves a mixture of private corporations and small charities developing their websites and marketing. It also undertakes a number of social projects such as creating 14 work places for “unemployable” this year.

With social enterprises currently contributing over £27bn to the UK economy, David talks about how business can be done in another, more responsible way.

David, where does your dedication to social causes come from?

I came from poverty myself. At 16 I had to leave school feeling like I was predestined to nothing. I knocked on the doors asking for a job and it was a small local business that gave me a chance and helped me and my family to rise out of hardship.

My school friends were less fortunate. After leaving education, they didn’t have anything to build their productive life on, they couldn’t get any employment. I found out after many years that one of them became addicted to heroin, another serves a sentence for murder and another one committed suicide. I’ve read the findings of the research done in the North of England that one in seven 16-24 year old  “NEETs” - those not in education, employment or training – died within ten years of falling out of the system. We were all good kids and it’s getting employed that saved me from similar path.

How did your experience of working in private sector strengthen your belief that businesses should be more accountable to the society?

In 1994 I co-founded one of the first Internet companies in the UK. We worked with Microsoft and other business corporations and part of my job was to go around the world and sell their products. I went to Middle East, Europe and Africa and I saw that globalisation leads to more poverty, more financial divide between people. Every time I came back I saw more people on a street, more social unrest.

My objective became to end global poverty but I didn’t know whether I should work for the government or something like Oxfam. I came to the conclusion that at first I have to think how to eliminate homelessness, which is the worst type of poverty, in London. I thought, what right do we have to preach to developing countries if we can’t end poverty on our doorstep?

You did a year-long research on poverty in the UK. Where did you start it?

I went to Shelter and spent nine months volunteering there. After a while I got the trust of some of the homeless I worked with and they started opening up to me.  Very soon I’ve discovered that every one of them had a critical point in their life from when their lives went downwards and when social services had failed to save them.

For example, one of the men I met was sexually abused in his childhood. He had had a stable life, family and work but when he reached his mid-thirties suddenly the memories triggered in him and he gradually lost control over his life. Another guy was an ex-offender who found that there were no opportunities for him after he came back from prison. With a basic training given to him after his release he applied for more and more jobs but everybody kept turning him down until he finally despaired and re-offended.

I then sought out 5 other charities such as Survivors UK who work with victims of sex abuse and Start Up for ex-offenders and did further 3 months volunteering with them. I saw that they were incredibly good in what they were doing. They had a small staff of 3-15 employees and understood the communities they were closely linked to. But operationally they were inefficient, mainly to do with multiple issues with their underdeveloped IT. I found, for instance, that all of the sensitive data on sex abuse sufferers was stored on one laptop! They also needed urgent improvements in their marketing and advertising, website design and working on increasing traffic to their online resources.

I’ve found where my expertise could come handy but after all the research and a break from work I ran out of money. I’ve already sold my house to raise £100,000 in order to support my volunteering. Debt collectors were ringing me, I was one week from ending up on the street myself. Then I had a eureka moment to go back to the commercial IT sector again, where I worked for 17-18 hours a day for two years. The money I earned through that became start-up capital for our company.

This is how White Box Digital started taking shape…?

That’s right. We launched it in 2005. Our first clients were Survivors UK. We redesigned their website and improved their visibility to search engines and within weeks they had five times more traffic.The proposition of White Box Digital is to become an IT department for all small charities that will increase their ability to reach out to more people. Small charities can outsource their IT to our company reducing their energy demand.

But it doesn’t stop here. Our core principles are similar to those formulated for sustainable businesses by Caux Round Table in Switzerland. We use our business to create jobs and apprenticeships for people who otherwise will be left out. We recruit people from different backgrounds linking people to jobs according to their aspirations, skills and qualifications. We want our business to grow horizontally, through a network of small offices around the country, not exclusive to people based around Canary Wharf. This February we are opening our office in Newcastle, employing 35 young people. By September 2010 we are planning to open our departments in Manchester, Oxford, Leeds and Birmingham.

Where do you think the funding for social enterprise projects should come from?

Social enterprises should fully sustain themselves delivering the best services and products while the government should support social programmes. We are better equipped to give training than middleman agencies. There are 2.4 million small businesses in the UK and 2.2 million unemployed, so why not to match them together?

What are the obstacles that you face promoting responsible business?

Unfortunately, the ideology in most of the business circles is still about making profit. Executives don’t believe that social business can work. The best we can do is to prove them wrong with our own example of success.

We want to show that social enterprise is business as it should be. We are also setting up White Box Digital Education  with an aim to promote responsible business in universities and schools. You have to understand that social enterprise is a state of mind.