By Rita Joshi BERLIN (IDN) – Global environmental threats, the opportunities brought by new sciences, and the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic call for the transition to the bioeconomy, says the communiqué emerging from the Global Bioeconomy Summit 2020 organised by the International Advisory Council on Global Bioeconomy (IACGB) composed of about forty high-level policy […]
Egypt Bashed for Arrest of Prominent Rights Defenders
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) – “Meeting with foreign diplomats is not a crime. Nor is peacefully advocating for human rights.” Those were the first words of Antony Blinken as he steps up to the plate and assumes the position of foreign policy adviser to President-elect Joe Biden. Blinken joins prominent […]
Sports and Art Suggested as Means to Promote Teens’ Mental Health
By J W Jackie RENO, Nevada, USA (IDN) – Art, music and sports have all been proven to boost mental health across a wide range of age groups, but one new study by researchers at the University of British Columbia indicates that these extracurricular activities are a powerful way to boost teen mental health. The […]
New Report Sparks Anxiety About COVID-19 Wrecking UN’s 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda
By Ramesh Jaura BERLIN | GENEVA (IDN) – UNCTAD Secretary-General Mukhisa Kituyi has stressed the need to address the frailties of globalization that led to the rapid spread of the COVID-19 pandemic and its uneven economic impacts, gravely wounding the world economy with serious consequences for everyone. He hopes that the situation would prove to […]
Australia: Environmentalists’ Market 40 Years on Going Strong
By Kalinga Seneviratne CHANNON (IDN) – At the peak of the hippie movement in the West, in 1976, the traditional farming village here in this scenic setting was a battleground between loggers and environmentalists who had travelled from across Australia, to stop the clear-felling of the rainforest at Terania Creek close by. This was the […]
Why Cybersecurity for Small Businesses is More Necessary Now Than Ever Before
By J W Jackie RENO, Nevada, USA (IDN) – Nearly one-fifth of small businesses experienced either a hack, virus or data breach in 2019, according to data from B2B site The Manifest. While this proves that small businesses are indeed vulnerable to cyber attacks, it also serves as a warning to others that makes proper […]
COVID-19: Europeans Can Learn from Developing Countries
Developed Countries Should Change Their Mindset Viewpoint by Maru Mormina and Ifeanyi M. Nsofor* OXFORD | WASHINGTON (IDN) – Nine months into the pandemic, Europe remains one of the regions worst affected by COVID-19. Ten of the 20 countries with the highest death count per million people are European. The other ten are in the […]
Agribusiness Interests Hijack 2021 UN Food Systems Summit
Viewpoint by Anuradha Mittal * OAKLAND, USA (IDN) – This World Food Day (October 16) amidst the ongoing pandemic and the devastating impact of the climate crisis, a Food Systems Summit is being planned a year from now by the United Nations, to fulfil the realization of the Sustainable Development Goals. As the Summit takes […]
UN Agency Points to Linkages Between Human Trafficking and Forced Marriage
By Richard Jacobsen VIENNA (IDN) – A new UN report has documented the interlinkages between trafficking in persons and marriage, and specified steps for governments and other authorities to strike back. Published by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the report points out that across the world, girls as young as 12 are […]
COVID-19 Highlights the Global Structural Dependence on Exploitable Labour
Viewpoint by Randall Hansen* TORONTO (IDN) – In November 2019, a federal government official visited the University of Toronto’s Munk School and asked its faculty to delineate coming global threats. We spoke of inequality, hunger, climate change, sanitation, and plastic pollution, among others. No one mentioned a microbe; a discussion of the threat of immunity […]