Tuesday, May 23, 2017

Water Security. Event. Monday, June 5, 2017. Sharing Water. Water World Forum


Dear Global Water Challenge Colleagues:

This note is to encourage your participation in Sharing Water — an event convening influential voices from government, civil society and business to explore issues and solutions to the world’s water challenges. The event, scheduled for June 5, 2017 starting at 8:30 am, is co-hosted by World Wildlife Fund and The Coca-Cola Company and will also serve as part of the regional planning process of the 8th World Water Forum.

The event will host a strong list of speakers, including a Q&A session and reflections from Dayne Walling, former Mayor of Flint. More details on the sessions and speakers can be found below and attached.

Please
RSVP as soon as possible to secure your spot as space is limited at the venue. The event is free to attend.
Click here to download agenda

Monday, May 22, 2017

EPA requires BNSF Railway Company to begin work at abandoned uranium mines

For Immediate Release:  May 22, 2017

 EPA requires BNSF Railway Company to begin work at abandoned uranium mines
SAN FRANCISCO – Today, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced an agreement with BNSF Railway Company to begin cleanup at the Haystack Mines Site, a group of three abandoned uranium mines near Prewitt, New Mexico and the Baca/Prewitt chapter, on Navajo Nation. 
The mines site operated from 1952 to 1981 and produced 400,000 tons of uranium ore.  Today, the 174-acre area is being used for livestock grazing and includes one residence with some additional homes nearby. The work is expected to begin in July and last for four months.
Under the agreement, BNSF Railway Company will conduct the following actions:
  • Through biological and cultural assessments of the property, ensure cultural resources and sensitive species are not impacted
  • Fence the property and post warning signs
  • Outreach to the local community
  • Provide temporary alternative housing to impacted residents if necessary
  • Construct access roads
  • Excavate contaminated soil
During the Cold War, 30 million tons of uranium ore were mined on or adjacent to the Navajo Nation, leaving more than 500 abandoned mines.  EPA has entered into settlement agreements valued at $1.7 billion to reduce the highest risks to the Navajo people.  Since 2008, EPA has conducted preliminary investigations at all the mines, remediated 48 contaminated structures, provided safe drinking water to 3,013 families in partnership with the Indian Health Service, and performed cleanup or stabilization work at nine mines.  In total, funds are available to begin the cleanup process at over 200 abandoned uranium mines, representing 40% of the abandoned uranium mines on the Navajo Nation. This work is a closely coordinated effort between federal agencies and the Navajo Nation to address the legacy of uranium contamination. 
For more information about EPA activities in the Southwest, please visit: www.epa.gov/region9 or www.epa.gov/region6

Media Contact:   Margot Perez-Sullivan, perezsullivan.margot@epa.gov

Sunday, May 21, 2017

May 2017. U.S. Virgin Islands. Least talked about Afro-Caribbean community and Part of the Diaspora.

To our new community members on the U.S. Virgin Islands. 

Thank you for your membership in BEMA International, and invitation to your community.  Now on our radar, and full assistance available to your community.

CDS CEO BEMA International


Situational Awareness:
            Disaster\Emergency Management Agency\Office:
Virgin Islands Territorial Emergency Management Agency  (VITEMA)

VITEMA Headquarters
8221 Estate Nisky
St. Thomas, VI 00803
phone: (340) 774-2244
fax: (304) 715-6847

St. Croix Office
102 Hermon Hill
St. Croix, VI 00820
phone: (340) 773-2244
fax: (304) 778-8980

St. John Office
6 Susannaberg
St. John, VI 00830
phone: (340) 776-6444
fax: (304) 714-4470


                                       
Population:  (2015)  103,574    (comparison:  District of Columbia Pop: 672,228)
                        Breakdown:       74   % Black (African Descent)
                                                                                15.6% White
                                                                                2.1 %  Mixed
1.4 %  Asian
4.9 %  Other (Hispanic, etc.)
            Capital City:   Charlotte Amalia

The USVI consist of 4 larger islands: St. Croix, St. Thomas, St. John and Water Island, and some 50 smaller islets and cays. The total area of the USVI is 133 square miles.

Who owns St Croix Island?
St. Croix was home to HOVENSA, one of the world's largest oil refineries. HOVENSA is a limited liability company owned and operated by Hess Oil Virgin Islands Corp. (HOVIC), a division of U.S.-based Hess Corporation, and Petroleos de Venezuela, SA (PDVSA), the national oil company of Venezuela.

What islands are part of the United States?
The United States currently administers 16 territories as insular areas:
·        American Samoa.
·        Guam.
·        Northern Mariana Islands.
·        Puerto Rico.
·        U.S. Virgin Islands.


Additional information to follow on CERT, community organization involvement, and other disaster risk management issues planning before, and after a disaster.



Black Emergency Managers Association
           International
1231  Good Hope Road  S.E.
Washington, D.C.  20020
Office:   202-618-9097 
bEMA International 
GC_Endorser_BLUE_RGB_GRADIE     








“Our lives are not our own. We are bound to others, past and present, and by each crime and every kindness, we birth our future.” ¯ David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas
Cooperation, Collaboration, Communication, Coordination, Community engagement, and  Partnering (C5&P)             A 501 (c) 3 organization.


Friday, May 19, 2017

May 2017. Situational Awareness. International ReliefWeb Crisis App. Smartphone

I use to keep abreast of Situation Awareness issues internationally.

Charles D. Sharp
CEO
BEMA International



ReliefWeb


Four Reasons Why You Should Use the ReliefWeb Crises App


Read the article on ReliefWeb:
http://reliefweb.int/blogpost/four-reasons-why-you-should-use-reliefweb-crises-app



We have released a new version of the RW Crises app, which has seen more than 3,500 downloads since its launch in October 2016. The Crises app features key figures, access to latest updates, real-time funding status, as well as an overview for each humanitarian crisis.
The powered-up version is faster and offers four significant improvements from the previous version:
Features:
  1. Comprehensive coverage
    The new version has been enhanced with features, including links to third party datasets and in-country contacts and country overviews. Crisis key figures, such as the number of people affected by health emergencies within a crisis situation, have been scaled up in their coverage. These numbers are hand-curated by the ReliefWeb editorial team from the most trusted sources in the respective sector/cluster. The app currently covers over 20 countries and new countries will be added when major emergencies strike.
  2. Offline access
    Going to the field with limited internet access and still want your data? You can now save Crises content for offline use in areas with limited connectivity - an invaluable feature for aid workers in the field. You can access all key figures as well as five reports in each category (Headlines, Sitreps, Visuals, etc.) while offline.
  3. Smooth and easy navigation
    Seamlessly switch between countries and choose the type of content you want to see. Interested in situation reports only? Simply go to the Sitreps tab and swipe through the latest reports.
  4. Speed and Size
    RW Crises has been optimized for both Android and iOS devices. Switch countries and access the latest reports in seconds. You no longer need to worry about storage space as the app is 20 times lighter than before!
The new RW Crises app features comprehensive country coverage, offline use, and more!
Download the new Crises app by clicking on the links below:

May 18, 2017. Pambazuka News. Learning to trust the poor.

May 18, 2017
Is it wrong to simply give money to the poor? Will giving money turn us into enablers and make the poor entitled? We don’t trust the poor to make the right choices with our money, so we do it for them. This is why it is common for aid to come with rules depending on the giver’s beliefs. But there  is evidence that giving money to the poor empowers them to make the right choices and uplift their lives.
We always empathize with the poor. However, it is a paradoxical type of empathy; the sort that places us above them. We think to ourselves: the woman at the bus stage should know better than to have five kids with another clearly on the way. The man drunkenly passed out on the sidewalk should use that money to fix himself up. And those children that bombard us with requests that start out pitifully and end up violent have no excuse. After all, don’t we have free primary education? We may never say it out loud but somewhere along such lines of thought we unanimously decided that the poor cannot be trusted.
We then take it upon ourselves to arrange their needs and priorities for them. We start organizations, sign up to them and together we send food, clothes and everything in between. Everything but money. Once this is done and our conscience is at rest - at least for the next few months - we go back to our lives. The poor we now meet on the streets are met with the phrase ‘Sina leo’, the Kenyan connotative way of politely saying no. After all we have done our part.
Is it wrong to simply give money to the poor? Why is it that according to humanitarian reports 94 per cent of aid is non-cash? Will giving money turn us into enablers and make the poor entitled? Then again, is it really about the money or what it symbolizes: Choice? We don’t trust the poor to make the right choices with our money so we do it for them. This is why it is common for aid to come with rules depending on the giver’s morals and beliefs. Are we seeing any changes through this or might we need to rethink this and start trusting the poor?
In a change of narrative, 6000 Kenyans in impoverished rural areas are set to receive Ksh 2,280 monthly for the next 12 years. This money comes with no strings attached; all that is needed is an M-Pesa [mobile money transfer] account. For 12 years GiveDirectly, the organization behind this unorthodox project will observe the recipients to see if this basic income will improve their living standards in the long run or if it will make them dependent and complacent. Since the aid will be similar to the universal basic income system, the payments will have to be regular, individual, unconditional and in cash.
When some of the recipients of the money were interviewed by a Vox reporter Dylan Mathews, everyone had their own priorities. A mother was using the money for school fees, a couple wanted to start a greenhouse, whereas a young man was using the money to rent a motorbike for business. Choice. As for the fear of people misusing the money on things like alcohol, a report by the World Bank shows that these cash transfers neither increase nor reduce the alcohol consumption of the recipients. What it does is promote the mental wellbeing of the recipients by reducing their financial stress, therefore preventing them from turning to alcohol as a form of escape.
However, this project is not like the past GiveDirectly projects. GiveDirectly as an organization is known for conducting evidence driven projects but this project is one of a kind and may have to rely more on theory rather than facts. This may explain why some aspects of this project clash with their past research. According to their research, large cash transfers have a bigger impact compared to monthly cash transfers since they bring more development in the long run. While others are content with the current situation this issue has been raised by some of the Kenyan cash recipients.
When talking to the Vox reporter some recipients said they would have preferred to receive lump sum amounts of money rather than monthly since this would have enabled them to easily work on bigger projects. In order to deal with this issue, these recipients have resorted to forming ‘chamas’, which are informal Kenyan saving group systems where members put all their cash transfers together and each month one of the members takes all the money. This system rotates until every member has gotten a chance to receive the lump sum of money, before the rotation starts again.
GiveDirectly is very open about its projects and they too acknowledge this problem in the project. However, there is not enough research on the subject of a universal basic income and those that are there did not run as long as the Kenyan project which is set run for over a decade. Also, it helps to note the unorthodox nature of the project may disadvantage it because many people may not be willing to donate to an organization that simply gives money to the poor and lets them decide what to do with it. Most of the donors to the project are from the Silicon Valley since they are interested in the possibility of universal basic income as technology slowly replaces human resource. The project not only requires an open mind but also patience and trust in the poor.
This method of simply giving cash to those in need is quickly gaining traction and has proved to be efficient especially in times of crisis. This year Uhuru Kenyatta, Kenya’s president, declared a national crisis with the drought that saw up to 2.7 million Kenyans food insecure. The president then asked for help from both local and international bodies. The government has been accused of complacency and lack of proper long term planning and they in turn blamed their slow response on logistics such as transportation and contracts.
 In such a time, cash transfers proved to be efficient. The Kilifi County government teamed up with the Red Cross Society and launched its first cash transfer system that would see families in hard hit areas getting Ksh. 6,000 monthly.
According to Mr Hassan Musa, regional manager of the Kenya Red Cross Society, "A lot of money that is supposed to help fight hunger is usually wasted on logistics and the process of looking for service providers and tendering is usually long and tiring. But this move will see that we cut away these costs and see up to 98 percent of the money aimed to be given to the people is transferred to the most vulnerable."
For us to help those in need we need to understand only those in need understand what they need and the Red Cross Society has proved it understands this. While it may baffle us as we watch starving Kenyans lying helplessly on dry cracked grounds next to their herds of livestock, the Red Cross saw it for what it was. What we see as food is seen by the pastoralists as a means of livelihood. As a solution, the Red Cross now buys these animals from the pastoralists before they lose value and then sells the same meat to the same sellers. To us it’s absurd; for them it works.
The next time conscience comes knocking in your sheltered life reminding you that it is time to play your part, you may need to rethink your way of helping. Do you really get to choose what the poor need and what they don’t? Then again you hold the money, the choice, you decide.
References:
Lowrey, A. (2017, February 23). The Future of Not Working. The New York Times. Retrieved from: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/23/magazine/universal-income-global-inequality.html?_r=0
Mathews, D. (2017, March7). This Kenyan village is a laboratory for the biggest basic income    experiment ever. Vox. Retrieved from: https://www.vox.com/2016/4/14/11410904/givedirectly-basic-income
Mwakio, P. (2017, November11). Kilifi County to give Sh6,000 each to starving families. Standard Digital. Retrieved from: https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2000223061/kilifi-county-to-give-sh6-000-each-to-starving-families
Thornhill, J. (2017, May 3) Elite’s fears over tech backlash drive Universal Basic Income Debate. Financial times. Retrieved from: https://www.ft.com/content/56d5f7f8-0fea-11e7-a88c-50ba212dce4d
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