Clean Coal

Humour aside, NewScientist reports today that the World Bank's Clean Technology Fund (CTF)is coming under increasing criticism because of its funding of coal power stations in developing countries. The new US administration has withdrawn funding from the CTF.

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The Plot Thickens: Greens Buy Land at Heathrow

Environmental activists, including some members of the Green Party, have completed the purchase of a plot of land adjacent to London's Heathrow Airport as a way of hindering attempts by the British Airport Authority to extend the airport through the construction of an additional runway.

Purchasers, who completed the transaction on Monday, include impressionist Alastair McGowen and actor Emma Thompson.

The move seems to caught the imagination of many green sympathisers, with the UK Green Party reporting over 5,000 individuals signing up online to support the initiative by Wednesday morning.


View Larger Map

The plot is located just to the south of the proposed runway and within the proposed area that the airport would expand into if a third runway were to be constructed and is represented on the map by a spanner (get it??)

The new land owners have announced their plans to use every legal means to oppose the airport expansion, including giving evidence at the planning inquiry, resisting the compulsory purchase of the land and "if necessary, we will stand with the community of Sipson and stop the bulldozers." The village of Sipson consists of 700 houses plus schools and businesses that would be demolished if the expansion were to go ahead.

The move follows a "Climate Rush" event at Heathrow's Terminal One on Monday when up to 1,000 activists entered the terminal and staged a 96-minute protest, highlighting the view that there are only that many months left before climate change becomes irreversible and cataclysmic.

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DR Congo - A Civilian's Perspective on War

This incredible video was shot at the Virunga National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo inside a park ranger station located in Rumangabo.

The video speaks for itself.

Credit to Global Voices Online for their brilliant work of bringing together blogs from DR Congo at this critical time.

Donations to Oxfam's emergency appeal for DR Congo can be made here, where other videos and up-to-date eye-witness reports can be accessed.

The conflict in DRC is one example of the way that the availability of arms can make a bad situation worse. Oxfam, IANSA and Amnesty International are currently campaigning for an International Arms Treaty that would, for the first time, set internationally binding agreements on the way that small arms can be manufactured and traded around the world. Details of the Control Arms Campaign can be found here.

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Brazil Becomes Middle Class

The Economist reports today that Brazil, with a population of 170,000,000 (an under counting of 3.3% according to the US Census Bureau's projections) has officially become a middle class country.

A person is, apparently, officially defined as middle class if they have:

1. a job in the formal economy
2. access to credit
3. ownership of a car or motorbike
   

According to Brazilian non-profit group FGV, more than half of the Brazilian population now meet these criteria.

Notable features of this move to middle-classdom include:

• 52% of the population now earn between £350 and £1,337 per month; in 2002 the figure was 44%
• Poverty (defined as living on the minimum wage) has declined from covering 52% of the population 15 years ago to 38% today
• Extreme poverty (defined as surviving on less than 50 pence per day) has also declined over the same period from 8.8 % to 4.2 % of the population
  
• The reduction in extreme poverty in Brazil has met one of the Millennium Development goals set out by the UN in 2000

Increases in rates of education (Brazilians now spend three years more in school than they did in the early 1990's) and in jobs in the formal employment sector are cited as the main factors contributing to the country's economic progress in recent years, a trend which has been evident over several decades.

It was as recently as 1985 that Brazil, Latin America's most populous country, finally left behind its reliance on military-backed governments and began its current uninterrupted journey towards democratic government.

In some ways, the transformation of Brazil is embodied in the life of its current president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. Born into an illiterate peasant family in the poor north-east of Brazil, he moved with his family to Sao Paolo when he was seven, working as a shoe shine boy and learning to read at the age of 10. Becoming a metal worker, he lost a finger in an industrial accident and emerged as a leading trades unionist in the 1970s. His early radical politics have developed into a social democratic platform of reform which in recent years has seen an increase in the minimum wage, the courting of local and international business leaders and significant reductions in inflation and levels of foreign debt.


Selected Brazil Links:

• Jose Sarmago is the only Portugeuse language writer to win the Nobel prize for literature. At age 85, he's also started blogging. It's in Portuguese and Spanish, but I'm sure Babel Fish will help you if you ask nicely.

• Daniel Duende Carvalho shares some thoughts on the state of the blogosphere in Brazil at Global Voices Online.

• The CIA factbook entry on Brazil contains all the basic stats and figures.
  

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G8 Summit Japan - a Time to Account for Millennium Development Goals

The G8 Summit in Hokkaido, Japan, on 7-9 July is a huge opportunity for millions around the world to call on the G8 to fulfill their commitments for better health for children as part of the Millennium Development Goals. Click here to visit the petition, which will be presented to the G8 leaders ahead of their meeting next month.

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Ole Gunnar Solskjær Visits Schools in Angola

Former Manchester United striker and UNICEF Norway Goodwill Ambassador Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has this week been visiting Angola to witness and lend his support to the educational reconstruction work being undertaken in the southern African country. His trip took him to Bengo province in the north of the country to a couple of schools hoping to install sanitation and water systems for the first time.

The next day the footballer visited schools in the capital, Luanda where he saw the practical benefits that simple sanitation can make to improve health and save lives by preventing waterborne diseases.

The UN General Assembly has designated 2008 the Year of Sanitation in an attempt to increase the pace towards the UN Millennium Goal of halving the number of people worldwide who do not have access to a clean and safe toilet. At present, the total number is 2.6 billion - nearly half of the world's population.

Awkwardness and a reluctance to talk about sanitation is one factor contributing to low funding for this area of development. As the film Liquid Gold shows, however, changes made in this area can result in dramatic improvements in local communities.

Photo copyright UNICEF 2008.








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