SUSTAINABILITY

Photo: Brass and Stainless Steel Metal Tool. Credit: Pixabay

3D Printing Ushers in A New Era With Industry 4.0

By J W Jackie

RENO, Nevada, USA (IDN) – 3D printing is a mode for construction that is continuing to break out and pervade through numerous industries. Forbes reported that in 2019 80 percent of enterprises claim 3D printing is allowing them to innovate faster, reducing costs for production and allowing for greater flexibility of their products’ design.

On the one hand, this developing technology permits the freedom to formulate complex geometric figures free from the restraint of machine or injection moulding. On the other, it is faced with limits in the form of small build chambers lofts and restricted resource compatibility.

: Admin; SUSTAINABILITY; Sustainable Industrialisation; 29 June 2019

Photo: Trawler arrested in 2016 by the Norwegian Coast Guard for illegal fishing. Source: Wikimedia

ACP Urges G20 to End Menacing Illegal Unreported and Unregulated Fishing

By Reinhard Jacobsen

BRUSSELS (IDN) – Ahead of the G20 Summit in Japan’s Osaka on June 28-29, the Brussels-based organisation of 79 developing countries, the ACP Group of States, called upon Heads of Government to take strong measures to end Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing – an issue at the core of marine ecosytems and ensuring food security.

This has a pride of place in Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in their entirety and SDG14 in particular, the international community pledged in September 2015 to achieve by 2030.

: Reinhard Jacobsen; GLOBAL GOVERNANCE; ACP Group of States; 28 June 2019

Photo: Egyptian professor Dr Mohamed El-Guindy addressing the conference. Credit: David Robie.

Ethics Essential to Developing Global Smart Tech, Say Experts

By David Robie*

This feature is moved in association with the Pacific Media Centre in New Zealand.

BANGKOK (IDN) – Addressing the annual conference of Asian communication scholars, a leading cyber security expert has called on universities to play a more active role in implementing ethics and legal frameworks for communications smart technology to save society from an Orwellian future.

Dr Mohamed El-Guindy, an Egyptian consultant to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC-ROMENA), says communication research programmes should promote “ethically aligned” design.

: Kalinga Seneviratne; THE WORLD; Asia-Pacific; 27 June 2019

Photo: The Bangladeshi migrants were part of a 75-strong group stuck onboard a tugboat for weeks before being taken to Tunisia. Photograph: Courtesy of Forum Tunisien pour les Droits Economiques et Sociaux. Source: The Guardian.

Tunisia Forces Bangladeshi Migrants to Return Home

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

New York (IDN) – A shipload of desperate Bangladeshi migrants was told to turn the boat around and go home by Tunisian officials or be deprived of food, water and medicines. The migrants, trapped on a merchant ship off Tunisia for three weeks, were sent back to their home country against their will, according to relatives.

The International Organization for Migration (IOM), an intergovernmental organization linked to the United Nations, said the Bangladeshis “wished to return home”.

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Asia-Pacific; 26 June 2019

Photo: Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed with Presidfent Guelleh of Djibouti on 18 November 2018.

Ethiopian Old Guard Rejects Prime Minister’s Sweeping Reforms

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK | ASMARA (IDN) – Since becoming prime minister of Ethiopia in April 2018, Abiy Ahmed has launched a wide-ranging programme of political and economic reforms, not all of which have met with favour by supporters of the federalism-based constitution and system of the land-locked country on the Horn of Africa.

In a challenge to his sweeping reform, rebel gunmen launched a coordinated assault on June 22-23 in the Amhara region. Several senior government officials died in the assault including the army chief and the governor of Amhara state.

: Global Information Network; THE WORLD; Africa; 26 June 2019

BIOPAMA Launches the 1st Call for Proposals for Medium Grants

By Reinhard Jacobsen

BRUSSELS (IDN) – The Biodiversity and Protected Areas Management (BIOPAMA) has launched on June 24 the first call for proposals for medium grants (up to € 400,000) in the frame of its "Action component". The Programme assists the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries to address their priorities for improved management and governance of biodiversity and natural resources.

BIOPAMA provides a variety of tools, services and funding to conservation actors in ACP countries. It is an initiative of the ACP Group of States financed by the joint ACP-European Union (EU) 11th European Development Fund (EDF).

: Reinhard Jacobsen; GLOBAL GOVERNANCE; ACP Group of States; 25 June 2019

Photo: Palestinian boys raise their hands during one of the first classes of the new academic year, at a school in Gaza supported by UNRWA. UN Photo/Shareef Sarhan

UN Calls for Bridging Palestinian Refugee Agency's Funding Shortfall

By Jaya Ramachandan

NEW YORK (IDN) – UNRWA, officially the Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, faces a "serious funding shortfall", the General Assembly President María Fernanda Espinosa Garcés has warned. The agency is $211 million short of the $1.2 billion needed to deliver its aid programmes.

She was speaking at the opening of the 2019 pledging conference for UNRWA on June 25, alongside Secretary-General António Guterres, and the agency’s Commissioner-General, Pierre Krähenbühl.

: Jaya Ramachandran; UN INSIDER; 25 June 2019

Families in a Changing World Call for Reality Check

Viewpoint by Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka

The writer is UN Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director, of UN Women.

NEW YORK (IDN) – What’s a family? Classically, we think of a mother, a father and the children. The father goes out to work, the mother takes care of the children, maybe she works part time, at home or close to home so she can be there when the children get back from school. It’s a common formula in advertising, movies and the media. It’s the pattern of romance plots, the story of song lyrics, the image for illustrations in schoolbooks. It’s comforting, stable, predictable. And it’s wrong, for the majority of families in the world.

: UN Bureau; OPINION; 25 June 2019

Photo: Qu Dongyu of China was elected Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) on June 23. Credit: FAO

China Bags Yet Another Trophy with Qu Dongyu as FAO Chief

By Ramesh Jaura

BERLIN | ROME (IDN) – With the election of Qu Dongyu as Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), China has made yet another stride in its unrelenting efforts to take over a signature role in strategic UN organisations and foster its massive 'Belt and Road' infrastructure initiative spanning the globe.

Qu takes over from Brazil's José Graziano da Silva August 1. He was first elected in 2011 and has served two consecutive terms. The new FAO chief is expected to find in LI Yong, the UN Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) Director-General since 2013, an example of how a UN organisation can be deployed to proselytise the advantages of the Belt and Road initiative.

: Ramesh Jaura; UN INSIDER; 25 June 2019

Photo: Pamir mountains. Credit: Alijon Boynazarov

Climate Change Finds Its Way to the 'Rooftop' in Tajikistan

By Alisher Kukanbekov*

PAMIR, Tajikistan (IDN) – The great mountains of Pamir that have been known as the ‘Roof of the World’ over the centuries is now falling victim to climatic change. One of the largest glaciers here, Garmo glacier, has retreated by a staggering 7 kilometers in the past few decades with the annual mean temperatures recording an upwards trend over the past decade.

Pamir is situated at an altitude of over 2000 meters in the heart of Central Asia. Throughout centuries it has been the hub for many great empires such as the Persian Empire and the Greek Empire led by the boundless Alexander the Great. However, in the recent years, climate change has had its toll on the great mountains here and the whole of Tajikistan.