This is the century of new state forms

China’s outreach will popularise state-capitalism

by Kumar David=June 10, 2017

A Chinese Puzzle: A one-party state economic superpower with global ambitions

The New Silk Road(Maritime routes are broad-brush and incomplete)

The convolution of state forms is likely to change more during this century than in any previous 100 year period of human history. The ancient civilisations Mesopotamia, Egypt and Indus Valley survived unchanged for several thousand years; so did the hydraulic society of ancient China. Lanka’s later dry-zone system continued for a millennium. Military power cum slave-production dependent societies such as Greece, Rome, the Mayas and the Aztecs flourished for hundreds of years; Rome, close upon a millennium. The reign of capitalism has been 370 years if we count from 1648; nearly 230 years from 1789. Stabilisation of a new state ‘genotype’ in China, the collapse of the Soviet order, the chronic disorders of late capitalism and the prospect of guaranteed minimum income societies, taken together with leaps in a technology broadly and IT specifically, are quickening the pace of change.

This essay is about two factors in this metamorphosis; the prevailing state form in China and the future global impact of this super-state. By super-state I mean a nation state that is projecting economic power, political influence, security concerns and territorial ambitions, globally. I will take it in two steps; first the nature of the state in China (is it capitalist, socialist or something else?) and second, perspectives on future impact of this super-state. Donald Trump handed Beijing a walkover in their bilateral rivalry by refuting globalisation and asinine withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accord; but these are ephemeral to my big picture and merit no further mention.

Characterisation of the

Chinese State

Whether the state in China is capitalist or not is not abstract disputation among idle scholars. It matters to countries which are destinations of Chinese investment or lie along the proposed land and sea corridors. In former days whether a small country was allied to the US or USSR mattered in economics, politics and social relations. (The nature of their state matters even more to citizens and classes within China but that dimension is absent from my discourse today). I have been researching the nature of the Chinese state from the mid-1980s and my first definitive paper was in December 1999 at the Hector Abhayavardhana Felicitation Symposium at the Ecumenical Institute (ESIDA).

The proceedings, edited by Rajan Philips, were published in 2001 as ‘Sri Lanka: Global Challenges and National Crisis’.

If I may brag a bit, when I reread the paper I was elated how well its 50 pages ("China’s Socialist Market Economy: Viable Concept or Oxymoron") had held up for two decades. The three paragraph Conclusion could well have been written yesterday, or tomorrow! I concluded (a) China was not capitalist, nor definitively on a road to capitalism; (b) the viability of an alliance of non-capitalist (sate and collective) sectors with private capital was being established; and (c) I offered the prognosis that the character of this state would eventually be decided by international developments. If I were asked now, 20 years on, how I would like to update this I would go further than the caution that held me back then. I would confidently assert the state in China is state-capitalist; a term I held back in the 1990s.

On the second point it is apparent that China is state-capitalist with the feature that the party-state is the leading partner and private capital plays an auxiliary role. On the third point, global influence, reality has gone beyond my anticipation. I was then ruminating that the class nature of the Chinese state would be decided by the strength and evolution of global capitalism in the twenty-first century. It has gone much further; the global system is being set by China as much as the other way round. In the remainder of this sub-section I will argue that state-capitalism in China is led by the party-state with capitalism and the market playing auxiliary roles.

The monopoly of power in the hands of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) defines the nature of the state. The CCP and its leaders retain control over state, economy, army, media-culture-web and many aspects of everyday life. There is a temptation to trace a Mao-Deng-Xi Jinping lineage but this is exaggerating the individual dimension. The economy and economic decision making is integrated into polity. The growth and prosperity of the private sector and the global reach of the Chinese economy (mostly through ‘private’ companies) has hardly altered this hierarchy. At root the state controls politico-economic power relations; no Chinese company, no "filthy" billionaire dare defy the state. And the Party holds reserve power over the state. This is the mechanism, much admired by some, which endows decision making in China with such authority. In the domestic market and the panoply of international projects, many led by purportedly private companies, authority lies with the state. Washington cannot bring Microsoft, GE, Blackrock or Bank of America to heel with the muscle that Beijing’s writ has over Chinese enterprises.

About 50% of China’s output in the modern (non-peasant, non-informal) sector is created by private capital. But . . . but! All land is state owned only usufruct is conceded to farmers, provinces and private enterprises. A property bubble may produce billionaire property developers but their edifices stand on state owned land; ditto for private industrial plant. China’s four giant banks are state owned; private and foreign ones are comparatively tiny. The economy is credit intensive, not equity intensive since domestic savers do not have deep pockets, so the banks who pay the piper call the tune. The state intervenes directly and indirectly in enterprise decision making; the Party reigns through trade unions and cells. Apart from this there are 120 giant state-owned conglomerates which dominate energy, petroleum, telecoms, defence, coal, aviation, chemicals, steel and base metals.

It is not that Chinese capitalism is effete; of course not. It is robust and powers on. Hundreds of millionaires and billionaires have surfaced. The Gini Coefficients which measure wealth and income inequality are worse in China than America. But these giants stand on quicksand and clay. Yes, Chinese capitalism is solid; its entrepreneurs thrive better than their Western counterparts. The use of market forces is real; an exploding economy cannot function without market rationalism in price determination and resource allocation. Indeed, Chinese capitalism flourishes, but at the end of a short leash.

China goes global

It is not possible to cover the whole gamut of Global China Inc. within the confines of this essay. One star item, land and maritime expansion known by the ugly moniker One Belt One Road, OBOR, will have to suffice. OBOR is economic (lubricating China’s gigantic export and import market), it is political (China hopes to replace America as the world’s premier power, within, maybe 25 years; leadership in Asia is already secure), and it is strategic, supplementing its expanding military spending. Analysts argue whether the impetus behind OBOR is more economic or political. In perspective, the two cannot be separated. In the short-term it is also driven by infrastructure overcapacity and the need to deploy China’s huge foreign savings and construction capacity.

OBOR is structured along two land corridors, two spurs and an ambitious maritime expansion.

* A railway corridor from central China and another from northern China to Europe through Russia

* A non-rail corridor from western China through Central Asia to Iran, the Levant and Turkey. (This mimics the famous Silk Road of yore from Xian to Rome)

* A spur to the port of Gwadar in Pakistan through Afghanistan and Kashmir

* A spur from south-west China through Burma to the port of Sitwe

* Port developments in Burma, Lanka (Colombo and Hambantota), Pakistan, West Africa, and even Greece (Prius) until it was blocked by a nervous European Union.

Financing calls for massive deployment of capital; China says it will invest $4 trillion and analysts estimate other countries en route will chip in $1.6 trillion till 2030. These estimates are wildly exaggerated; actual expenditure will be much less in view of China’s huge domestic debt*. Lanka has run up a sovereign debt of $60 billion; 10% is owed to China and to resolve this, our government will convert debt into equity. The $15 billion China-Uzbekistan deal is a quarter of Uzbekistan’s GDP; the $37 billion China-Kazakhstan deal, the $46 billion China-Pakistan agreement and the $24 billion China-Bangladesh pact each represent about a fifth of GDP of the partner countries. 

[*Though China has large foreign reserves, domestic debt has risen to $17 trillion due to massive credit expansion to state corporations and private enterprises to boost activity and create jobs following the post-2008 downturn in exports].

OBOR is Chinese government driven but construction is in the hands of private companies at market rates; a classic state-capitalist arrangement. For some countries, the impact will be overwhelming; for some like Lanka very large. The greatest impact will not be political subservience or financial imbalance per se, but rather copycat ideas of how to organise the nation state. It is impossible not to be influenced by how they do things in China. If not governments, then some political movements will be impressed. Whether Beijing intends it or not - most likely it is indifferent - imitating features of state-capitalism ("With national characteristics!") by small countries is unavoidable.

Therefore, the global landscape of the next half-century will consist of a plurality of interwoven state forms; common or garden capitalism in some countries mainly in the West, re-emergence of social-democracy as the futility of neo-populism strikes home, and thirdly the state-capitalist model. You have the advantage over me in that you will know the UK election results when you read these lines. If Labour does well, the polls say victory is impossible, it will signal the return of social-democracy to European centre-stage. Copycat state-capitalism will not lag far behind in small nations along the New Silk Road.

Re-Connect with Nature Now… Before It Is Too Late!

World Environment Day 2017

By Baher Kamal--Tuesday, June 13, 2017

ROME, Jun 5 2017 (IPS) - Now that president Donald Trump has announced the withdrawal of the world’s largest polluter in history—the United States, from the Paris Accord, perhaps one of the most specific warnings is what a United Nations independent expert on rights and the environment has just said: “We should be fully aware that we cannot enjoy our basic human rights without a healthy environment.”

Speaking in Geneva ahead of the World Environment Day on Monday 5 June, the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and the Environment, John H. Knox, said “We should all be alarmed at the accelerating loss of biodiversity on which healthy ecosystems depend.”

We depend on healthy natural ecosystems for so much – nutrition, shelter, clothing, the very water we drink and the air we breathe, Knox reminded. “And yet, natural forest area continues to decline, marine ecosystems are increasingly under siege, and estimated populations of vertebrate animals have declined by more than half since 1970.”

Many scientists fear that we are at the outset of the sixth global extinction of species around the world, the first in over 60 million years, noted this professor of international law at Wake Forest University in the United State.

“States have reached agreements to combat the causes of biodiversity loss, which include habitat destruction, over-exploitation, poaching, pollution and climate change, Knox recalled, “But the same States are woefully failing to meet their commitments to reverse these disturbing trends.”.

Illegal Poaching, Logging and Fishing

He also reminded that nearly one third of natural and mixed World Heritage sites reportedly suffer from illegal poaching, logging and fishing, which have driven endangered species to the brink of extinction and threatened the livelihoods and well-being of communities who depend on them.

“The extinction of species and the loss of microbial diversity undermines our rights to life and health by destroying potential sources for new medicines and weakening human immunity. Reduced variety, yield and security of fisheries and agriculture endangers our right to food. Nature’s weakened ability to filter, regulate and store water threatens the right of access to clean and safe water.”

The UN independent expert strongly emphasised that biodiversity and human rights are “interlinked and interdependent,” and States have obligations to protect both.

World must urgently up action to cut a further 25 [er cent from predicted 2030 emissions—UNEP. Cerdit: UNEP

No Biodiversity, No Food Security, No Nutrition

For its part, the UN leading agency in the fields of food and agriculture underlines that biodiversity is “essential” for food security and nutrition.

Thousands of interconnected species make up a vital web of biodiversity within the ecosystems upon which global food production depends, says the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

With the erosion of biodiversity, it warns, humankind loses the potential to adapt ecosystems to new challenges such as population growth and climate change. Achieving food security for all is intrinsically linked to the maintenance of biodiversity.

On this, the UN agency provides some key facts.

For instance, that of the 8 800 animal breeds known, 7 per cent are extinct and 17 per cent are at risk of extinction. And that of the over 80 000 tree species, less than 1 per cent have been studied for potential use.

Also that fish provide 20 per vent of animal protein to about 3 billion people. Only ten species provide about 30 per cent of marine capture fisheries and ten species provide about 50 per vent of aquaculture production.

Meantime, over 80 per cent of the human diet is provided by plants. And only five cereal crops provide 60 per cent of energy intake

Land Is Finite

In parallel, a major UN convention has been focusing on land, “which is finite in quantity.” Competing demands for its goods and services are increasing pressures on land resources in virtually every country, warns the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD).

A changing climate, population growth, and economic globalisation are driving land use change and poor land management practices at all scales, it explains, adding that for the most part, these changes and practices will continue to degrade the “real” current and future value of our land resources, including soil, water and biodiversity.

“Now is the time to recognise the biophysical limits to land productivity and the need to restore multi-functionality in both our natural and production landscapes. Evidence strongly suggests the need to act in the short term to avoid potentially irreversible negative outcomes in the medium to long term.”

On this, the Bonn-based Convention secretariat informs that its Global Land Outlook (GLO) presents a strategic vision to transform the way we think about, value, use and manage our land resources while planning for a more resilient and sustainable future.

The GLO first edition is the new flagship publication of the UNCCD, akin to the CBD’s Global Biodiversity Outlook (GBO) and the United Nations Environment Programme- UNEP’s Global Environmental Outlook (GEO).

“It is a strategic communications platform and publication that demonstrates the central importance of land quality to human well-being, assesses current trends in land conversion, degradation and loss, identifies the driving factors and analyses the impacts, provides scenarios for future challenges and opportunities.”

Bringing together a diverse group of international experts and partners, UNCCD informs that GLO addresses the future challenges for the management and restoration of land resources in the context of sustainable development, including: food, water and energy security; climate change and biodiversity conservation; urban, peri-urban and infrastructure development; Land tenure, governance and gender; and migration, conflict and human security.

Connecting with nature makes us guardians of our planet. For Erik Solheim, Head of UN Environment, closeness to nature helps us see the need to protect it. Credit: UNEP

“The loss in both the quality and quantity of healthy and productive land resources is an immediate global concern, especially in developing countries and those with a high proportion of fragile and vulnerable dry lands.”

These are some of the key reasons why ‘Connecting People to Nature’ –the theme of World Environment Day 2017– highlights the vast benefits, from food security and improved health to water supply and climatic stability, that natural systems and clean environments provide to humanity.

But there are more reasons.

Mental Health, Stress, Depression

Many studies show that time spent in green spaces counters mental health problems such as stress and depression. Affecting 350 million people, depression is the leading cause of disability worldwide, the United Nations informs.

For instance, in Japan, the health benefits of forests have prompted some local governments to promote ‘forest therapy.’ Research shows time in the woods can boost the immune system, including against cancer, according to the UN.

“Urban green space is a key weapon in the fight against obesity: an estimated 3.2 million premature deaths in 2012 can be attributed to lack of physical activity.”

More and more cities are planting trees to mitigate air pollution, the world’s largest single environmental health risk: 6.5 million people die each year due to everyday exposure to poor air quality.

Otherwise, the world body reminds that the use of plants in traditional medicine dates back to the beginning of human civilisation and that herbal medicine has clearly recognisable therapeutic effects and plays an important role in primary health care in many developing countries. Common painkillers and anti-malarial treatments as well as drugs used to treat cancer; heart conditions and high blood pressure are derived from plants.

Still need more reasons to connect –or rather re-connect—with Nature?

'Seductive names' make vegetables more appealing

By Michelle Roberts-13 June 2017

How do you get more people to eat their greens? Give vegetables seductive names, say US researchers.

A team at Stanford tried it out on students in the university cafeteria and found veggie sales went up by 25% when indulgent labels were used.

"Sizzlin' beans", "dynamite beets" and "twisted citrus-glazed carrots" tempted diners to fill their plates.

Healthy labels, such as "wholesome", were a turn-off, even though the dishes were identical in every other way.

Seductive carrot...

The experiment took place over the whole of the autumn academic term. Each day, a vegetable dish was labelled up in one of four ways:

• basic - where the description was simply "carrots", for example
• healthy restrictive - "carrots with sugar-free citrus dressing"
• health positive - "smart-choice vitamin C citrus carrots"
• indulgent - "twisted citrus-glazed carrots"

The choice of vegetable - beetroot, butternut squash, carrot, corn, courgette, green beans, sweet potato - was also rotated to make sure there was enough variety throughout the week.

Each day, the scientists counted how many of the 600 or so diners selected the vegetable dish and, at the end of the meal time, weighed how much of the food had been taken from the serving bowl.

The indulgent labels came out top and included "twisted garlic-ginger butternut squash wedges" and "dynamite chilli and tangy lime-seasoned beets".

Seductive names resulted in 25% more people selecting the vegetable compared with basic labelling, 41% more people than the healthy restrictive labelling and 35% more people than the healthy positive labelling.

Could this trick make you like your vegetables more?

Make vegetables taste amazing

Pulling power

The researchers, Brad Turnwald and colleagues, say the findings, published in JAMA Internal Medicine, make sense when you consider the psychology behind food choices.

"When most people are making a dining decision, they are motivated by taste.

"And studies show that people tend to think of healthier options as less tasty for some reason.

Image copyrightBOWIE15/GETTY

"Labels really can influence our sensory experience, affecting how tasty and filling we think food will be.

"So we wanted to reframe how people view vegetables, using indulgent labels."

Although most of us know that we should eat plenty of veg, too few of us do it.

People are advised to eat at least five portions of fruit and vegetables per day. Roughly a quarter of UK adults actually achieve this, however.

Prof Heather Hartwell from Bournemouth University in the UK has been leading a European project, VeggieEAT, designed to get people eating more veg.

She says no one strategy works for all, but there are lots of ways to boost intake.

Veg by stealth

For some, selecting healthy food is a considered and conscious choice.

But Prof Hartwell is also an advocate of "health by stealth" - nudging people in the right direction.

"Nudges can work. We have looked at using choice architecture, which is product placement, subliminal cues and descriptive tags, to nudge people."

For example, putting a picture of tasty looking fruit on supermarket trolleys could help "nudge" consumers to select more produce from the fruit aisle, she said.

Some consumers might buy something "gourmet and healthy" - such as spiralised courgette noodles - simply to impress their friends, she said.

"Choice is a really complex thing. But this study suggests that giving vegetables an indulgent tag can help raise their hierarchy."

---

Simple ways to meet your five a day

• Have a side salad with your main meal
• Add grated carrot or courgette to your pasta sauces, stews and curries
• Add extra vegetables or fruit to pizza
• Snack on carrots, cucumber or celery
• Instead of a sweet pudding, try low-fat natural yogurt, topped with chopped banana and strawberries

Black sheep in Army should be dealt with: Mangala-[Parliament– (07-06-2017)]

Wednesday, June 7, 2017

There could be black sheep even in an excellent Army. They should be dealt with in accordance with law to protect the dignity of the Army, Finance and Media Minister Mangala Samaraweera said.

He said if there are suspects in the Army who assaulted or abducted media personnel, abducted children in Wellawatta and killed them to take ransom, they should be dealt with according to law even if they had done them on instructions of the superiors, irrespective of the suspects’ uniforms or the robes, to protect the dignity of the Army.

Minister Samaraweera made theses observations yesterday in response to the adjournment motion moved by Joint Opposition Parliamentary Group Leader Dinesh Gunawardena.

The minister said there are attempts by various groups to create racial conflicts. He said a Muslim business institution had been damaged in Maharagama recently. The minister said the Police would not allow to continue these acts.

“The government has not entered into any agreement as the Joint Opposition complained, said Minister Samaraweera said.

“By co-sponsoring the UN resolution, we have restored the sovereignty of Sri Lanka. I beg the opposition members not to lie. Anybody can read the resolution,” he said.

He said 48 countries stood with Sri Lanka on March 23 in Geneva.

“We have to be proud that it was a quarter of the globe, including UK, USA, China, Russia and Australia,” Minister Samaraweera said.

“Those countries appreciated the country’s constructive path. Opposition members thought with the election of Donald Trump as USA President, the government in Sri Lanka would collapse. But even his representative to Geneva

spoke with me and appreciated the move of Sri Lanka as an important step which would restore the country’s sovereignty and dignity,” he said.

He said if the previous government continued on its path, the international community might have imposed economic sanctions, preventing the leaders going abroad and also resulting in closure of many factories in the country.

“It was me who went to Geneva in 2015 February and submitted that we did not accept its move and emphasised that the new government had been offered mandate to find solutions within the country,” Minister Samaraweera said.

The minister said there is no more international action against Sri Lanka.

“Joint Opposition members have no understanding of the new global trends. We can’t treat certain groups differently,” he said.

Minister Samaraweera said Sinhalese, Tamils, Muslims, Malays and Burghers should get together to go forward as a nation.

House to take up adjournment debate on floods on Friday

Parliament will take up an adjournment debate on the recent flood situation of the country on Friday.
The adjournment motion will be moved by the JVP. The Committee on Parliamentary Business headed by Speaker Karu Jayasuriya, which met on Monday has decided to take up a full day adjournment debate on the flood havoc caused by heavy rains.

Over 200 lives were lost and thousands of people were displaced due to recent floods and landslides in the country.

The debate will be held from 11.30am to 6.30pm. Disaster Management Minister Anura Priyadarshana Yapa, making the reply speech on the adjournment motion, will brief the House on the current situation and future measures.

Meanwhile, Minister Yapa replying to a question by UPFA MP Douglas Devananda yesterday in Parliament said the National Insurance Trust Fund (NITF) paid Rs 3.3billion last year as disaster relief, adding that some more claims are to be settled raising the amount to Rs 4 billion.

“This insurance is a good mechanism. Only Sri Lanka has such a system in Asia. Last year, we paid Rs. 300 million as insurance premium. This year, we will pay Rs. 500 million,” he said.

Asked by NFF Leader MP Wimal Weerawansa whether the international insurance companies involved with the NITF have refused to pay as insurance premium has not been paid, the minister said there was no such an issue.

Speaker expresses condolences on landslide and flood victims

Speaker Karu Jayasuriya at the outset of Parliamentary sessions yesterday expressed the condolences of the House on the lives lost in recent landslide and flood disasters.

Making a special announcement, the Speaker drew the attention of the House to the need of a well-organised disaster management mechanism in the country to minimise the loss of lives and property damages in any future natural calamity.

The Speaker recalled with respect the sacrifice made by the Air Force officer who died during a lifesaving mission. “On behalf of Parliament, I extend thanks to tri-forces personnel, public servants, local and international organisations, voluntary groups and the media for their support to help the people at the time of the tragedy.

“We should come up with a disaster management mechanism to face natural calamities. Such an effort may cost a large sum of money, but given the international recognition, the country has received, we will be able to find foreign funds for the purpose.

“I request Parliamentarians to join hands in this effort irrespective of party divisions,” he said.

Plans to protect Pahiyangala cave from landslide threat

A multidisciplinary evaluation report has been sought on the historical Pahiyangala cave to decide on steps to protect the site from landslide threat, Education Minister Akila Viraj Kariyawasam said.
The minister made this observation in reply to a question by JVP MP Dr. Nalinda Jayatissa in Parliament yesterday. The MP inquired about measures the ministry has taken to conserve the site in the face of recent landslide threats.

Kariyawasam, observing that the ministry’s special attention has been drawn to this matter, said that he inspected the site along with the Heads of the Archaeological Department and Central Cultural Fund.

He said Buddhist monks in the site have been asked to evacuate, adding that an alternative place will be provided for them to stay.

He said once the report is submitted, the ministry would decide the future measures, adding that foreign expertise would be sought if necessary.

Sri Lanka fell short of its promise: Mahinda Samarasinghe

Sri Lanka did not deliver what it undertook to implement in 2009. The foreign policy was implemented in a way that sent wrong signals to the international community, Ports and Shipping Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe said.

He made these observations yesterday joining the adjournment debate moved by Joint Opposition Parliamentary Group Leader Dinesh Gunawardena.

He said to make matters worse, then President Mahinda Rajapaksa went to see Gadafi and Sadam Husein and took photos with them. They appeared in newspapers. It sent wrong signals to the countries that helped us, he said.

The minister said the Human Rights Council of the United Nations accepts the unity government’s policies since its foreign policy is non-aligned.

He said when the US joined and took the power of the Human Rights Council, they did not look for those who violated human rights much. If they did so, there were other countries that had violated human rights more than us, Minister Samarasinghe said.

“If they were impartial, there were other countries to be aimed at before Sri Lanka. They thought of us as we were out of their group. Our then leader had been to Iraq and Libya,” he said.

He said it sent signals that were standing with dictators and with the leaders of countries where democracy was not practised well.

“We did not implement a foreign policy that we practise today. Foreign countries expected that there would be reconciliation after the war. They did not speak of an international inquiry in 2012. The forces conducted a disciplined war. They could save 300,000 Tamil people. We took 29 votes in 2009. It dropped to 12 in 2014,” Minister Samarasinghe said.

He said the government changed its foreign policy. The UN has welcome the move. The Judiciary is independent, he said.

“We have more to execute. The leadership is ready to guarantee equal rights to all communities,” the minister said.

OHCHR report on Sri Lanka harmful to nation: Dinesh

Joint Opposition Parliamentary Group Leader Dinesh Gunawardana yesterday said that the report of the Office of the United Nations Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) on Sri Lanka was a deceitful report and its recommendations were harmful to the nation.

MP Gunawardena made these observations yesterday moving an adjournment motion on the United Nations (UN) Resolution on Sri Lanka.

He said the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) report on Sri Lanka on February 10, 2017 stating that Sri Lanka had formulated a draft of the new Constitution in December 2016 was untrue.

He said according to the report, a draft Constitution was formulated by Sri Lanka last December. “This is false. No such draft has been formulated,” MP Gunawardena said.

“The report is full of lies to mislead the international community,” he said.

He said the UN resolution co-sponsored by Sri Lanka would harm the country. Gunawardena said the resolution calls for international judges in judicial matters of the country. He said this is a breach of the country’s sovereignty. “The Constitution does not provide for hybrid courts or a local judicial system consisting of international judges or lawyers. As a result of the resolution, a witch-hunt was carried out against armed forces’ members. They were arrested and detained without bail. They have been arrested in a vengeful manner,” he said.

He said incidents in Manchester and London show that terrorism is a threat to the world. Sri Lanka must be vigilant. The armed forces must have the support of the government to carry out their duties, he said.

MP Gunawardana said India too was in support of Sri Lanka to defeat the LTTE because of the way it was carried out.

He said the government must avoid foreign intervention in judicial matters and carry out post-war investigations in a transparent and independent manner through the local judicial system. 

Desertification of Jaffna and Jojoba

Featured image courtesy Athavan News

DEVANESAN NESIAH on 06/10/2017

This is in reference to Dr.Rohan Wickramasinghe’s valuable and interesting article of Tuesday 6th June. The desertification process in Jaffna has been detected and analysed for over half a century and the main solution also worked out. This is a ‘River for Jaffna’ that involves sealing the Elephant Pass lagoon at the crossing and the Eastern end and let Kanagarayan Aaru gradually convert it into a fresh water lagoon. This will increase the quantity of fresh water in the lagoon and reduce the proportion of salt water. In turn, the water bodies within the peninsula, which are connected to the Elephant Pass lagoon will improve in quantity and quality. These periodically dry up during the dry season and could be manually leaked of salt during those seasons. All these, in turn will lead to improving the quality and quantity of the wells in the Peninsula. This improvement will continue indefinitely unless there is over extraction of water from the wells for farming and other uses.

To avoid this, some of us have suggested two remedies, namely to avoid the over population of the peninsula and, secondly, gradually change farming practices in Jaffna. Pre-war, Jaffna had a population of close to one million, which is much too many. The present population of about half a million seems to be optimal. To avoid an influx of population post-war, farmers in particular should be encouraged to migrate to the Vanni where there is ample scope for productive cultivation. Regarding farming practices, traditional Jaffna cultivation, with focus on subsidiary food crops is heavily dependent on large inputs of water and agro-chemicals, both of which are particularly harmful to the ecology of the peninsula. These cultivations could be replaced by tree crops such as mango, jak and plantains which have proved to be very successful in Jaffna, if less remunerative than onions, chillies and tobacco. The expansion of the production of fruit crops need to be supplemented by fruit preservation industries and appropriate marketing strategies.

The resort to Jojoba cultivation recommended by Rohan is a further option. There is yet time to avoid desertification of the whole of Jaffna and to retain its greenery, but even now there are arid patches (there always have been) within the peninsula and in some of the off shore islands. The Jaffna farmers could experiment with Jojoba on these lands. With their traditional enterprise and expertise, there is no doubt that they will make a success of it. Hopefully the export of fruits, both fresh and in preserved form, and of Jojoba will soon become a feature of Jaffna.

Readers who found this article enlightening might enjoy, “Dealing with caste prejudice and inequalities in Sri Lanka” and “Paradise Lost: The hidden costs of tourism development in Sri Lanka“

Gods in government 

by Sanjana Hattotuwa-June 10, 2017, 5:59 pm 

Last Sunday, I wrote about how Sri Lanka’s Minister of Disaster Management never returned hurriedly to Sri Lanka to deal with the catastrophic flooding which hit the country last month, and instead, on his way back to the country from an international conference - ironically on disaster management - had an extended stopover in Dubai for indeterminable reasons. Last week, in coordination with colleagues at work, an RTI request was lodged in order to ascertain just what the Minister was doing outside the country, using public funds, when he should have been on the ground leading relief efforts. To date, there has been no statement whatsoever, leave aside any degree of contrition in public from the Minister, his Ministry or other public officials from the Meteorological Department or the Disaster Management Centre (DMC) around failures in early warning, response and relief coordination.

We should be angry. We should demand the resignation of the Minister and all public officials who fail in what we expect them to do. The lack of accountability and near total impunity around governance arises from elected representatives and appointed officials who know that once in office, the public no matter what will rarely seek their removal. This needs to change, but not just because of last month’s flooding.

An article by journalist Amantha Perera, who has perhaps the most experience around disaster reporting in the country, published by IRIN, quotes Lalith Chandrapala, Director General of the Meteorological Department who says the department doesn’t have Doppler radar capability in 2017 and that with Japanese funding, two stations will be set up in the next two years. Four years ago, in 2013, a storm killed at least fifty fishermen at sea. At the time, an article published by Amantha, also on IRIN, quotes DMC’s Assistant Director Sarath Lal Kumara saying that a new Doppler Radar system would be operational by August, that year. One year prior to this, in 2012, the then Disaster Management Minister Mahinda Amaraweera was quoted in the mainstream print media, after devastating flooding that year, saying that a Doppler radar system had been installed at Gongala Kanda in Deniyaya and that it would be operational by the end of that year. Two years ago, in 2015, mainstream print media reported that the Doppler radar system was dysfunctional, even though it was shipped to Sri Lanka as far back as 2011. The same media report notes that the Meteorological Department was in discussions with Japanese parties to secure two more Doppler radar systems.

We have then multiple officials and Ministers, over successive governments, for at least six years, misinforming and misdirecting the public around life-saving adverse weather detection equipment financed by bi-lateral and multi-lateral agreements, as well as public coffers. Over this period of time, due to rains alone and because of little to no warning coupled with abysmal planning, we have had hundreds of thousands displaced, tens of thousands of homes and buildings completely or partially destroyed and the catastrophic loss of human life including children, women and men – a cost to family, community and country that is really incalculable. The responsibility for all this lies with those heading relevant line ministries and government institutions. And yet, they continue in their employment, no questions asked.

Last Sunday, as well as at a meeting at the United Nations in Colombo convened last week to discuss how social media played a role in the flood relief operations, I called this lack of accountability criminal. I also said that institutions like the World Bank, UN and other bilateral and multilateral donors who support Sri Lanka’s disaster risk reduction and prevention programmes are now part of the problem, instead of supporting the development of solutions and proper planning. As part of the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI), the UN Development Group maintains a transparency portal on the web which, for purposes of public accountability, publishes the sum of money going into development in each UN member state, divided by sector. In 2016, Sri Lanka got US$ 100,417,924 towards disaster prevention and preparedness.

That’s 25% of the total sum of money towards developmental assistance as calculated on the portal. It is unclear whether the UN country office in Sri Lanka will hold accountable the institutions and ministries it funded, for this considerable amount over 2016 alone, around their inability to plan for, provide early warning around, or create comprehensive collaboration, coordination and communication platforms after a disaster. Without strict controls, key performance indicators or naming and shaming, foreign funding and technical support will just go to waste. Donors and foreign governments need to peg future funding to key deliverables, ask for comprehensive reasons around systemic failures or stop funding the government of Sri Lanka with immediate effect. It is either this, or becoming partners in fostering a culture of impunity that leads to the loss of life.

Much more can be done with data from the private sector that can around emergencies be leveraged by government and other mandated authorities, like the Red Cross in Sri Lanka. Facebook last week, in collaboration with WFP, UNICEF and the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies launched a way through which near real-time maps of population displacement and movements after disasters can be drawn. This is based on the millions of Facebook users alone, and amongst other sources, data they generate through their actions and the geo-location features of Facebook’s apps on smart phones.

Sri Lankan telecommunications companies like to endlessly promote their selflessness and largesse after a disaster. Tellingly however, there is no reported case around how billions of call data records, generated daily, is made available to and used by relevant ministries, departments and agencies for disaster risk reduction, as well as post-disaster search and rescue, or relief operations. This data, pseudonymised to protect individual privacy, is already available for think-tanks dealing with development. Telcos and government haven’t, even in 2017, thought about how beyond the telegenics of a disaster, this data can help with disaster planning and response, in near real time data, based around customer location. This information can help direct relief and supplies to where people are gathered most, moving towards, or those marooned in areas most affected by a disaster, complementing aerial reconnaissance and other means. Another suggestion made at the UN meeting last week was to encourage government to open up their datasets around disasters, and to stop publishing daily updates in proprietary, closed formats like PDFs, which cannot be indexed or ingested by systems tailored for disaster response, or the reporting of urgent needs.

But really useful solutions can also be relatively low-tech. Take the DMC’s Twitter feed, an important source of information especially during and immediately after a disaster. Last year, critical warnings around severe weather conditions were uploaded against a green or blue background. This year, it was red and brown, at various times. In sum, the severity of the alert bears no relation to the choice of colour. This flies in the face of logic, and established protocols around early warning by for example the Philippines Government, which has an alerting system basic on green, yellow and red (mirroring traffic lights) around disasters. The Philippines government even has officially recognised hashtags for use around disasters by those on Twitter reporting on needs, alerts and situation updates.

Even in Bangladesh, things are more developed than they are in Sri Lanka. When at the height of flooding, Twitter reached out in order to help them compile a list of the most useful, active and reliable sources on the platform reporting on the floods, they refused to believe me when I said there was not a single line ministry, Minister, department, agency or public official on Twitter, save for DMC, that was active around the disaster. We are so backward in our adoption of basic technology that it beggars disbelief around leading social media companies that want to help save lives.

Just the simple implementation of a colour coded public warning framework can help reduce anxiety, help with planning, coordinated evacuations and public information dissemination. Yet, this eludes government, along with common-sense, accountability, innovation, collaboration, coordination and communication. In every imaginable way official entities can prepare for and respond to a disaster, systems and frameworks are found lacking. There is no doubt that citizens will in the future, independent of government, help others in need. However, the spontaneity, sophistication and success of these citizen led post-disaster initiatives may ironically make government more complacent, allowing them to take credit for things that they have had no role engineering or even supporting.

We must not allow the impunity to continue. The loss of life is not the result of severe weather alone. It is the result of openly lying, the misallocation of public money and foreign funding, a lack of accountability and a culture of impunity. Our anger should be directed at our public representatives, who have names, designations and faces.

We may not be able to influence the weather gods, but those who think they are gods in government must be reminded, unequivocally, they are not.