Greta Thunberg Warns The Heat Wave Is 'Just Getting Started' As Canada Breaks Temp Records

Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg has made her opinion on Canada's record-breaking high temperatures pretty clear!

© Provided by Narcity

In a tweet on June 28 — one day after Canada broke its own all-time heat record — the 18-year-old warned that "This heat-wave is just getting started."

"Highest temperature ever recorded in the planet north of 50N latitude also shattered (44.4C from July 1941)," Thunberg wrote, responding to the news that Canada recorded sweltering temperatures of 46.6 C.

She went on to say that heat records are usually broken by decimal points "like a tenth of a degree," and particularly not in months like June.

"This heat-wave is just getting started," the activist said, before adding the hashtag "#FaceTheClimateEmergency."

On June 27, in the middle of a "heat dome" across western Canada, a village in B.C. reached a sizzling 46.6 C (116 F).


Video: Greta Thunberg Warns The Heat Wave Is 'Just Getting Started' As Canada Breaks Temp Records (Narcity)

This broke Canada's all-time heat record of 45.0 C (113 F), which was set in Saskatchewan in 1937.

Sunrise Movement calls for key climate inclusions in Biden infrastructure plan


Members of the Sunrise Movement called on President Joe Biden Monday to push for an infrastructure bill including key climate change provisions. Photo by Bonnie Cash/UPI | License Photo

June 28 (UPI) -- Members of the Sunrise Movement protested outside of the White House on Monday calling for President Joe Biden to prioritize the fight against climate change in his infrastructure bill.

Protesters from the climate change action group chanted "no climate, no deal" and "Biden, you coward, fight for us" as Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., joined the crowd.

The protest comes after Biden last week announced a $1.2 trillion infrastructure agreement with a group of bipartisan lawmakers that includes $579 billion in new spending but did not include an increase on gas tax or fees on electric vehicles and wouldn't require an increase on taxes from people earning less than $400,000.

One of the provisions protesters demanded was the creation of a Civilian Climate Corps, a federal entity to focus on job creation in renewable energy and other green industries.

Sunrise Movement organizer Nikayla Jefferson said Biden should negotiate with those who helped to elect him.

"We elected you -- the youth vote carried the election. If you are going to negotiate on our lives and livability of our planet, negotiate with us," Jefferson said. "So we will sit here until you commit to the side of climate justice, commit to an American Jobs Plan written with bold ambition against the climate crisis including a Civilian Climate Corps, and pass it through with reconciliation immediately -- or you will not pass a bill at all."

Ocasio-Cortez pledged that lawmakers would fight to get such a provision into the infrastructure bill.

"They want you to think, 'Oh, this is a new idea, this is too ambitious, this is too crazy.' How about this? The last time we introduced the Civilian Climate Corps in this country, we hired and mobilized a quarter-million people in three months," she said.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki on Monday said she disagreed with the notion that the bipartisan agreement "doesn't do anything for climate," stating it includes investments addressing legacy pollution, clean energy transmission and electric vehicle buses.

"Whether or not everyone is aware of all those specifics, that's incumbent on us to keep conveying that, communicating it, listening and making sure people understand that this is a down payment and the president will continue to advocate for, press for, work for,even more on climate as he will in the reconciliation bill in the process moving forward," she said.

Trees may be key to cooler temps during the summer, study says
By HealthDay News

Could trees be the key to a cool summer in the city?

Yes, claims new research that calculated just how much greenery can bring temperatures down.

"We've long known that the shade of trees and buildings can provide cooling," said study co-author Jean-Michel Guldmann. He is a professor emeritus of city and regional planning at Ohio State University, in Columbus.

"But now we can more precisely measure exactly what that effect will be in specific instances, which can help us make better design choices and greening strategies to mitigate the urban heat island effect," Guldmann said in a university news release.

RELATED Commercial forests could produce long-term climate benefit



For the study, his team created a 3D digital model of a nearly 14-square-mile area of northern Columbus to assess the effect that shade from trees and buildings had on land surface temperatures over one hour on a summer day.

The researchers found that the amount of tree canopy had a significant impact on what's known as the urban heat island effect.

For example, on a day when the temperature was 93.33 degrees Fahrenheit in one neighborhood, the temperature would have been 3.48 degrees lower -- 89.85 degrees -- if all the current trees had been fully grown.

RELATED New urban planning software may inspire more sustainable cities


And if the neighborhood had 20 more full-grown trees, the temperature would be another 1.39 degrees lower.

The researchers also found that both shaded and sun-exposed grassy areas had significant heat-reducing effects, but shaded grass provided more cooling than sun-exposed grass.

As expected, buildings increased the temperature, but shadows cast by them could significantly cool temperatures, particularly if they shaded the rooftops of adjacent buildings, the study authors said.

RELATED Most low-income blocks in U.S. cities are hotter, have fewer trees

For example, a 1% increase in the area of a building led to average surface temperature increases of between 2.6% and 3%. But an increase of 1% in the area of a shaded rooftop led to average temperature decreases of between 0.13% and 0.31%, the researchers found.

Shade on roadways and parking lots also significantly decreased temperatures, according to the study published online recently in the journal Computers, Environment and Urban Systems.

"We learned that greater heat-mitigation effects can be obtained by maximizing the shade on building rooftops and roadways," Guldmann explained.

The type of information provided by the model can be used to "formulate guidelines for community greening and tree planting efforts, and even where to locate buildings to maximize shading on other buildings and roadways," Guldmann said. "This could have significant effects on temperatures at the street and neighborhood level."More information

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has more on how trees and vegetation reduce heat islands.




Copyright © 2021 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

INFRASTRUCTURE TOO

Study: Pandemic daycare closures linked to 600K lost jobs among U.S. moms

By Amy Norton, HealthDay News

JUNE 30, 2021 / 1:05 AM



A woman helps a child with adjusting a face mask in New York City on September 2020. File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI | License Photo

When child care centers were forced to close in the pandemic's early months, hundreds of thousands of American working mothers lost their jobs, new research shows.

The study is just the latest illustration of the toll the pandemic has taken on working women in the United States.

Over the first 10 months of the U.S. pandemic, more than 2.3 million women left the labor force, according to the National Women's Law Center. That compared with just under 1.8 million men.

That was, in part, because many job losses were in industries where women make up much of the workforce. On top of that, working mothers -- more than fathers -- faced the difficulty of having kids home from school or day care.

RELATED

Poll: 72% of U.S. parents fear COVID-19 danger at schools, daycare

The new study looked specifically at the impact of pandemic child care closures.

It found that in states that had closures in spring 2020, women's job losses were particularly acute. In contrast, the employment decline among men was similar to that of men in other states.

Nationwide, the gap amounted to about 611,000 lost jobs among working mothers

.
RELATED Survey: 1 in 4 parents won't vaccinate their kids against COVID-19

"The effect was concentrated among women with young children," said lead researcher Yevgeniy Feyman of the Boston University School of Public Health.

That, he said, suggests that child care closures, themselves, fueled many of the excess job losses.

That is likely the case, agreed Rasheed Malik, who studies child care policy at the Center for American Progress, a nonpartisan policy institute in Washington, D.C.

RELATED COVID-19 anxieties still high in U.S. one year into pandemic, poll shows

"Prior to the pandemic," he said, "there was already a strong relationship between local availability of child care and women's participation in the workforce."

The pandemic only worsened the longstanding problem of child care "deserts," Malik said. Those are areas across the country -- typically low-income -- where working parents lack affordable, quality child care options.

Child care centers did reopen in closure states by June 2020, according to Feyman's team. But while many women and men did go back to work, women still lagged behind as of December 2020, the study found.

They were less likely than men to be employed, and their employment rate remained below its pre-pandemic level.

Simply allowing child care centers to reopen didn't necessarily solve families' problems.

For one, Malik said, an estimated 10% of programs closed for good. And at those that did survive, staff reductions meant fewer families could be served.

"Getting back into the system wasn't just a matter of going back to the program you'd been in," Malik said.

The findings are based on data from a monthly labor force survey. It included nearly 49,000 U.S. adults, including more than 13,000 from states where child care centers shut down by April 2020.

Employment among men and women in all states dropped sharply in April 2020, but women in states with child care closures saw the steepest drop-off. The likelihood of women being employed during the closure period was 2.6 percentage points lower, compared to men.

That translated to 611,000 job losses among 23.5 million working mothers, the researchers estimated.

To Feyman, one implication is that American workers need better paid family leave, and a "cultural shift" where not only women, but men, take it.

Malik pointed to some fundamental issues that make finding reliable child care so difficult, pandemic or not.

Unlike public education, he said, the child care system is "market-based" -- with programs concentrated in more affluent areas where families can afford the cost.

"We think of it as a market failure," Malik said. "We don't have public school deserts, but we do have them in child care."

To make quality care accessible to more families there must be some level of government subsidy as well as assistance to low-income families, he said.


That "investment in families" would be repaid in parents' increased productivity and the educational and social benefits young children gain from being in high-quality programs, Malik said.

Another problem is the field's generally low pay and high turnover.

"These are difficult jobs," he added. "The work is rewarding, but definitely not financially rewarding."

Malik said that low pay is rooted in "historical bias" that undervalues the work of women, who make up the vast majority of the child care workforce.

"It's about time we honor the decades of hard work they've given us," Malik said.

The findings were published online recently in JAMA Health Forum.More information

The nonprofit Zero to Three has resources on child care.


Copyright © 2021 HealthDay. All rights reserved.  

Report showed 'major' damage before Florida condo collapse

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) — The ground-floor pool deck of the oceanfront condominium building that collapsed near Miami was resting on a concrete slab that had “major structural damage” and needed to be extensively repaired, according to a 2018 engineering report that also uncovered “abundant cracking and spalling” of concrete columns, beams and walls in the parking garage.

Provided by The Canadian Press

The report was among a series of documents released by the city of Surfside as rescuers continued to dig Saturday through rubble in an effort to find any of the 156 people who remain unaccounted for after the collapse. At least five people were killed.

While the engineering report from the firm of Morabito Consultants did not warn of imminent danger from the damage — and it is unclear if any of the damage observed was responsible for the collapse — it did note the need for extensive and costly repairs to fix the systemic issues with Champlain Towers South.

The report said the waterproofing under the pool deck had failed and had been improperly laid flat instead of sloped, preventing water from draining off.

“The failed waterproofing is causing major structural damage to the concrete structural slab below these areas. Failure to replaced the waterproofing in the near future will cause the extent of the concrete deterioration to expand exponentially,” the report said.

The firm recommended that the damaged slabs be replaced in what would be a major repair.

Some of the damage to the concrete in the parking garage was minor, while other columns had exposed and deteriorating rebar. It also noted that many of the building’s previous attempts to fix the columns and other damage with epoxy were marred by poor workmanship and were failing.

Beneath the pool deck “where the slab had been epoxy-injected, new cracks were radiating from the originally repaired cracks,” the report said.

These were all problems that should have been dealt with quickly, said Gregg Schlesinger, an attorney specializing in construction defects and a former construction project engineer.

“The building speaks to us. It is telling us we have a serious problem,” Schlesinger said in a telephone interview Saturday about the new documents. “They (building managers) kicked the can down the road. The maintenance was improper. These were all red flags that needed to be addressed. They weren’t.”

In a statement Saturday, Morabito Consultants confirmed its report “detailed significant cracks and breaks in the concrete, which required repairs to ensure the safety of the residents and the public.”

The firm said it was hired again in June 2020 by Champlain Towers South to begin the 40-year recertification process that would detail what work needed to be done.

“At the time of the building collapse, roof repairs were under way, but concrete restoration had not yet begun,” the statement said.

Abi Aghayere, a Drexel University engineering researcher, said the extent of the damage shown in the engineering report was notable. In addition to possible problems under the pool, he said several areas above the entrance drive showing signs of deterioration were worrisome and should have been repaired immediately.

“Were the supporting members deteriorated to the extent that a critical structural element or their connections failed leading to progressive collapse?” he wrote in an email to the AP after reviewing the report. “Were there other areas in the structure that were badly deteriorated and unnoticed?”

The building was in the midst of its 40-year recertification process, which requires detailed structural and electrical inspections. In an interview Friday, Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett said he wasn’t sure if the inspection had been completed, but he said it may contain vital clues.

“It should have been a very straightforward thing,” Burkett said. “Buildings in America do not just fall down like this. There is a reason. We need to find out what that reason is.”

The 12-story tower’s collapse Thursday morning has also raised questions over whether other similar buildings are in danger.

“This is a wake-up call for folks on the beach,” Schlesinger said. “The scary portion is the other buildings. You think this is unique? No.”

Details of the building's 40-year recertification inspection will be made public once they are completed, Surfside Town Clerk Sandra McCready said in an email.

Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said at a news conference Friday that she has seen no evidence of a sinkhole — much more common in other parts of Florida — or of something criminal, such as a bomb.

“I can tell you that at this time, they haven’t found any evidence of foul play,” she said.

Beyond that, much focus is on ocean water, which is rising in South Florida and elsewhere because of climate change. Last year, Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis signed into law a measure that would require developers to complete sea-level rise studies before beginning publicly funded projects.

One theory is that the saltwater ubiquitous in the area, which is subject to flooding during so-called King Tide events, intruded into concrete supports, corroding the steel-reinforcing rebar inside and weakening the concrete.

Meanwhile, the land on which Champlain Towers sat has been gradually sinking, according to a study published last year by an environmental professor at Florida International University.

But the professor, Shimon Wdowinski, cautioned against blaming the collapse on the caving ground.

“In most cases, these buildings just move,” he said in a video interview released by the university. “There’s no catastrophic collapse like in the case in Surfside, which was very unfortunate.”

Surfside officials say roof work was ongoing at the now-collapsed tower but have downplayed the possibility that work was a cause. Barry Cohen, a lawyer who escaped the crippled building with his wife, said the roof work could be part of a “perfect storm” of causes that combined to bring down the structure.

“They were doing a new roof. And I think, all day long, the building was pounding and pounding and pounding. They’ve been doing it for over a month,” Cohen said.

Another issue is whether nearby construction might have caused vibrations that weakened Champlain Towers. Cohen said he raised concerns previously that the work was possibly causing cracked pavers on the pool deck.

The collapse is already drawing lawsuits, including one filed hours after the collapse by attorney Brad Sohn against the condo’s homeowners association seeking damages for negligence and other reasons for all of the tower’s residents.

The association, the lawsuit contends, “could have prevented the collapse of Champlain Towers South through the exercise of ordinary care, safety measures and oversight.”

An attorney for the association, Ken Direktor, did not respond Friday to an email requesting comment.

_____

Condon reported from New York. Associated Press writers Freida Frisaro in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and Bobby Caina Calvan in Tallahassee, Florida, contributed to this story.

Curt Anderson And Bernard Condon, The Associated Press

SEE

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2021/06/third-world-usa-construction-corruption.html

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2021/06/experts-get-1st-clues-on-what-may-have.html

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2021/06/engineer-reportedly-warned-in-2018-of.html

THIS HAPPENED THREE DAY'S EARLIER

USS Gerald Ford shock trials register as 3.9 magnitude ...

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/uss-gerald-ford-shock-trials-earthquake-florida

2:07

2021-06-21 · The blast registered as a 3.9 magnitude earthquake. June 21, 2021 / 2:26 PM / CBS/AFP. The U.S. Navy has started a series of tests on its newest and most advanced aircraft carrier

US Navy detonates huge 40,000lb bomb next to its own aircraft carrier triggering earthquake 100 miles away in Florida

THE US Navy detonated a mammoth 40,000lb bomb next to its OWN aircraft carrier – triggering an …

The Sun · 3d

NORTH AMERICA
Classrooms grapple with racial slurs in classic American novels

Issued on: 27/06/2021 - 

The dismissal of a white New York professor for reading aloud the "N-word" from a Mark Twain novel has renewed debate about how books from some of the United States' most famous authors should be taught in an age of reckoning with racial injustice

Jason Redmond AFP/File

New York (AFP)

The recent dismissal of a white New York professor for reading aloud the "N-word" from a Mark Twain novel has shone a spotlight on the use of racial slurs in American classrooms.

It has renewed a long-standing debate about how books from some of the United States' most famous authors should be taught during an age of reckoning with racial injustice.

After years of hearing the term read from the texts of writers such as Twain and William Faulkner, students are increasingly taking a stand.

"There was no reason that I should have to go to my class and hear that slur," said Dylan Gilbert recalling the time in 2019 when her white English teacher at the University of Michigan uttered the term while reciting a passage from Faulkner.

Gilbert, who is Black, walked out of class.

"It felt like a reminder that even though I had gotten into Michigan I would still not be afforded the same opportunity for a safe learning environment as my white peers," she told AFP.

The issue came into sharp focus again last month when Hannah Berliner Fischthal, who is white, departed St. John's University in Queens, NYC.

She apologized after upsetting several students by pronouncing the racial slur out loud while reading an extract from Twain's 1894 book "Pudd'nhead Wilson" -- having first explained the context for the word in Twain's text and saying she hoped it would not cause offense.#photo1

The incident came after another professor, also white, this time at Duquesne University in Pennsylvania, was dismissed for using the slur during a course.

"The word has such a history and such a psychological emotional impact that just hearing the word, for some people, can be disruptive," said Arizona State University English professor Neal Lester, who is Black.

Derived from a Latin word, it became widely used in 18th Century America, partly to dehumanize African Americans and cast them as an inferior race.

Lester says he never says the word in his classroom.

Vershawn Young, a Black communications professor, takes a different view.

When, in June 2020, his employer, the University of Waterloo, announced that the word was banned on campus, Young refused to adhere to the new rule.

"When reading from a text, I say the word," he told AFP. "When students quote the text, they too are free to speak what they read. However, they also may replace the word with its euphemism. What they can't do is ignore it."

Young says he always prepares his students that it is coming so they aren't shocked.

"Outside of quotes, I do not use the word because I recognize my authority in relation to the multiple sensitivities that my students embody," he added.

- Censorship -

In an article in The Conversation last year, Young wrote that the ban on his campus censored Black professors like himself.

"I belong to multiple Black communities, where we use the N-word in six or seven culturally rich ways," he wrote, adding that banning it "serves the purposes of white supremacy."

In recent decades it has been culturally acceptable for Black people to use the word. It is regularly heard in discussions, movies or music, hip-hop songs being the most obvious example.

"Hearing a non-black person say the N-word is always offensive and harmful to me," said Gilbert, the student who objected to her white teacher using it.

"(But) I have no problem with Black people saying (it). In my personal opinion the word is never violent or threatening to me when it comes out of Black person's mouth," she added.

Wendy Kaminer, a lawyer and writer who used to be an American Civil Liberties Union board member, said "the distinction between quoting a racial slur and using a racial slur has been completely erased."

"I think that's quite problematic," she told AFP.

Kaminer says the disappearance of the word from university campuses is part of a wider trend that started in the 1990s of banning other terms, including relating to sexuality and minorities.

She thinks the United States, where freedom of speech is enshrined in the constitution, is moving towards a more western European approach to the regulation of what people can and can't say.

For Lester, the Arizona State University professor, the answer is to talk about the word and its complex history without uttering it.

"I've had many conversations in class around the word without actually saying it," she said.

"That in and of itself is not a huge intellectual gymnastics routine."

California's famed Venice Beach grapples with homeless problem

Issued on: 27/06/2021

Los Angeles police inspect an encampment at Venice Beach on June 16, 2021 where Rodrick Mims, 50, (R) who has been homeless off and on over the last 15 years, is living by the Pacific Ocean Patrick T. FALLON AFP

Venice (United States) (AFP)

Ah yes, Venice Beach in California: synonymous with sun, surf, palm trees and, now, homeless people.

As many as 200 tents line the oceanfront in this Los Angeles-area town that for decades has been a lure for surfers and tourists.

The area is a chaotic jumble of any material that can create shelter, and of waste and detritus, amid appalling hygiene conditions. The smell of urine competes with that of suntan lotion.


"I didn't expect to see so many homeless people here in Venice. Already in Hollywood a few days ago, I was a bit surprised, but here, all these tents touching each other, these shacks, these tarpaulins, it's almost like a village," said John Jackson, who was visiting from the southern US state of Alabama.

Before the coronavirus pandemic, authorities made homeless people living on the beach take down their tents during the day. But city hall suspended that rule to limit the risk of contagion among people who are already vulnerable to illness.

Homeless people in the Venice area, many of whom lost places in shelters and free meals because of the pandemic, have used the health crisis to converge on the city's beach.

"The homeless have been part of Venice folklore since the 60s or 70s, but now their numbers have exploded. And they've changed too," said an assistant in a souvenir shop who did not want to be named.

"Before a lot of them were hippies, beach bums who had more or less chosen this way of life. Now they are really poor guys. Almost everyone out there is very bad physically and mentally," said this man in his 60s.

"I see pain, mental illnesses, drugs ... And it's been rough for me this past month," said Denise Diangelo, a homeless woman who spoke to AFP near the beachfront encampment.

"Probably the main problem that I've had personally is sleeping. I usually like to sleep alone by the water, the Pacific Ocean, to keep away from problems," said Diangelo. Her only shelter, she says, is a beach umbrella.

Right before the pandemic nearly 2,000 people were recorded as being homeless in the streets of Venice. The numbers have grown steadily.

But now that life is returning to normal and tourists are coming back, the beachfront homeless camp is beginning to bother some and even take on a political bent.

Mike Bonin, a city councilor who advocates relocating the homeless population, has found himself locking horns with the Los Angeles County sheriff's office and neighborhood associations that want a much more forceful evacuation the homeless.

- A chronic problem in California -

Like many people who visit Los Angeles, Jackson, the Alabama tourist, said he cannot understand "why all these people are homeless when California has the reputation of being so rich."

Indeed, California boasts the world's fifth-largest economy in terms of GDP. But it is also one of the US states with the most poor people.

It holds the sad title of being home to the largest homeless population in America: more than 66,000 in Los Angeles County alone before Covid-19, up nearly 13 percent from the previous year.

One of the main reasons for this, according to the Los Angeles city agency that tries to address homelessness, is the lack of affordable housing in a city where rent is very expensive.

Rent shot up 65 percent from 2010 to 2020, nearly twice the average rate of increase for the country as a whole. In the same period, median Los Angeles household income rose only 36 percent.

Some groups are working to provide aid and housing for the homeless people of Venice, but this is a tough job because some of them having been living in the streets for years.

Take the case of Rodrick Sims, who is 50 and has been homeless for 15 years. He said his descent started when he got divorced.

"I don't know what to do. I'm hoping that they give me, you know, a place where I can start learning how to live inside again," he told AFP while eating grapes outside his tent on the beach.

"I'll tell you, when once you're outside, you get feral, like a wild wild man," Sims said.

© 2021 AFP

PROMOTED

NAFTA TOO

Friction emerges in North America one year into trade deal

Issued on: 27/06/2021

The United States and Canada are close allies but have a number of trade disputes, including over their dairy industries JIM WATSON AFP/File


Washington (AFP)

One year after it took effect in the midst of a record economic downturn, the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) has yet to end trading friction between the North American allies.

The three countries said the new treaty would benefit their economies and workers but, as the anniversary nears on Thursday, the neighbors have already entered into a range of disputes -- many of which have seen the United States object to Mexican or Canadian practices.

"Most of the focus on USMCA over the next several years is going to be on the disputes," said Edward Alden, an expert at the Council on Foreign Relations.

USMCA replaced the North American Free Trade Agreement, which had been in force since 1994, and which Alden said had envisioned the continent's three economies at one point becoming a single market, like the European Union.

That vision appears to be dead, at least for now.

"USMCA is very much the rules for three separate North American economies to cooperate, where they can, and rules for fighting where they can't cooperate," Alden said.

While the disputes between the countries have made headlines, Jeffrey Schott, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, credited the deal with "removing the cloud of uncertainty" over continental commerce.

"That creates a better atmosphere for trade and investment than we've had in some time," he said.

Former president Donald Trump, who was known for his bellicose rhetoric even towards American allies, negotiated the USMCA, but his successor President Joe Biden could change policies.

But there are also signs that even under the new government, the squabbling will continue.

- Ready to fight -

Canada is perhaps Washington's closest ally, but when it comes to trade, the neighbors have several differences.

The United States has long-running disputes over the Canadian dairy and softwood lumber industries, and has also taken issue with Ottawa's solar panel exports and with the taxation of American tech firms.

US Trade Representative Katherine Tai has said she will defend American interests, starting with dairy farmers.

Her office has set up a dispute settlement panel under the USMCA to examine the issue of milk quotas imposed by Canada, much to its dismay.

Francois Dumontier, a spokesman for a group representing Quebec milk producers, said USMCA provides "no advantage."

He also called some provisions an "attack on Canadian sovereignty," because they restrict Canadian exports while allowing more imports from the United States.

- After the pandemic -

On the other side of the border, David Salmonsen, senior director of congressional relations with the American Farm Bureau Federation, pointed to a long list of trade disputes, but said he is overall optimistic.#photo2

"I think we'll get a better picture once everybody's economies are recovering from the pandemic," he said. "We supported the agreement, and we think it'll work to keep agricultural trade moving and growing between all three nations."

Ottawa however has called for its own dispute settlement panel over Washington's 18 percent tariffs on solar panels made in Canada.

Despite the skirmishes, Valeria Moy, general director of the Mexican Institute for Competitiveness, said that over the past year, there has been "no radical change compared to NAFTA."

However, she expects that USMCA could have an agreement on labor legislation in Mexico in the future.

Washington has already invoked USMCA twice to ask Mexico City to investigate violations of union rights in the automotive sector, notably at a General Motors plant.

"Will this have a beneficial effect on Mexican workers? It seems to me that it will," she said. "It will force Mexican companies to make changes."

But Moy warned that the United States could end up using the labor issue "as a pretext to apply protectionist measures."

© 2021 AFP

Bargaining over global tax enters key stage

Issued on: 27/06/2021 - 

Global tax reforms would allow countries to tax a share of profits of the 100 most profitable companies in the world JUSTIN TALLIS AFP/File



Paris (AFP)

Nearly 140 countries will haggle over key details of a global corporate tax plan this week, with some concerned about giving up too much and others eager to ensure tech giants pay their fair share.

The Group of Seven (G7) wealthy democracies approved a proposal to impose a minimum corporate tax rate of at least 15 percent earlier this month, hoping to stop a "race to the bottom" as nations compete to offer the lowest rates.

It is one of two pillars of reforms that would also allow countries to tax a share of profits of the 100 most profitable companies in the world -- such as Google, Facebook and Apple -- regardless of where they are based.


The deal now goes to the Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), which is overseeing two days of talks starting Wednesday to find a consensus among 139 countries.

The proposal will then be taken up by the G20 club of wealthy and emerging countries at a meeting of finance ministers in Italy on July 9 and 10.

"I don't think we have ever been so close to an agreement," said Pascal Saint-Amans, director of the OECD tax policy centre.

"I think that everybody has realised that a deal is better than no deal," Saint-Amans told France's BFM Business radio earlier this month, adding that failing to agree would lead to unilateral taxes and US reprisals.

US President Joe Biden has galvanised the issue by backing the global minimum corporate tax, and Europeans want a deal, he said.

Negotiations have gained new urgency as governments seek new sources of revenue after spending huge sums on stimulus measures to prevent their economies from collapsing during the coronavirus pandemic.

- Irish concerns -

While the G7 -- the United States, Canada, Japan, France, Britain, Italy and Germany -- approved the plan, it still faces hurdles as the negotiations expand to other nations.

European Union members Ireland and Hungary are not thrilled about it, as their corporate taxes are less than 15 percent.

Ireland has become the EU home to tech giants Facebook, Google and Apple thanks to its 12.5-percent rate.

But another EU country that has benefited from a low rate, Poland, voiced support for the proposal last week.

US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said China also has concerns about the proposal.

Two sources involved in the negotiations told AFP that China, which has a reduced rate for companies in key sectors, would not want a rate that exceeds 15 percent.

Biden also has some convincing to do at home, as key Republicans in Congress have already criticised the deal as a "speculative agreement" and an "economic blunder".

- Amazon escape? -

The next round of talks will also have to settle on a tax base and the number of companies whose profits could be taxed.

While Britain backed the G7 plan, it wants to ensure that its financial sector is exempt from the reform's "Pillar One" on taxing a share of profits of overseas-headquartered companies.

Others like France are concerned that US e-commerce behemoth Amazon could escape the levies because its profit margin does not exceed a 10-percent threshold.

The world's 100 biggest multinationals would be targeted by Pillar One, but countries in the G24 -- an intergovernmental group that includes countries such as Argentina, Brazil and India -- say more firms should be added to the list.

© 2021 AFP

World's smallest hog released into wild in India by conservationists

Issued on: 27/06/2021 

A dozen of the world's smallest pigs have been released into the wild in northeastern India as part of a conservation programme to boost their population Biju BORO AFP

Manas (India) (AFP)

A dozen of the world's smallest pigs have been released into the wild in northeastern India as part of a conservation programme to boost the population of a species once thought to have become extinct.

The pygmy hog, which has the scientific name porcula salvania, lives in tall, wet grasslands and was once found along plains on the Himalayan foothills in India, Nepal and Bhutan.

Its population declined in the 1960s, leading to fears it had become extinct until it was rediscovered in India's northeastern state of Assam in 1971, conservationists say.

By 1993, it was only found in a few pockets of Assam's Manas National Park, which borders Bhutan. The Pygmy Hog Conservation Programme, involving several organisations including from state and national governments, established a captive breeding scheme with six hogs in 1996 to try and revive their population.

"This time we are releasing 12 pygmy hogs including seven male and five female," the programme's field scientist Dhritiman Das told AFP at the release site in Manas National Park on Saturday.#photo1

Eight of the hogs were released in Manas on Tuesday and four more on Saturday. Some 14 were released last year.

The programme looks after around 70 captive hogs and is breeding more to be released.

The past week's releases take the number of pigs reintroduced into the wild by the programme to 142.

The wild population is estimated to be less than 250, conservationists say.

"In next four years, we target to release 60 hogs... so that they can build their own population in the wild," Das added.

The programme has also sought to rehabilitate the grasslands home to the tiny creatures, which measure about 25 centimetres (9.8 inches) in height and 65 centimetres in length and weigh around 8-9 kilogrammes (17.6-19.8 pounds).

The species' survival has been threatened by the loss and degradation of its habitats due to human activity such as settlement and agriculture, and the improper management of such areas, experts say.

© 2021 AFP

Germany: Cannabis legalization becomes election campaign issue

Millions of people regularly use illegal drugs. After Germany's upcoming parliamentary election, drugs legalization looks set to be a new issue on the political agenda.


In Germany, one in three adults have smoked cannabis at least once

With watershed elections looming in Germany, some politicians are talking about a new approach to drug control.

The opposition Free Democrats (FDP), for whom civil liberties are a major issue, have called for the limited and legal sale to adults of "cannabis for leisure consumption." In view of growing global sales of cannabis for medical purposes and private pleasure, the business-friendly FDP is even looking to turn "Cannabis Made in Germany" into a lucrative export product.

Watch video04:36 The race to legalize marijuana

Things are really beginning to happen in the debate over illegal drugs — and, above all, cannabis. Half a century of restrictive drug policies across Europe has not helped to significantly stifle demand or slash supply. Even the coronavirus pandemic has had no real effect on the flourishing black market.

Despite lockdowns and border checks, "at the beginning of 2020, the European drug market was characterized by the widespread availability of a diverse range of drugs of increasingly high purity or potency," said a report published in mid-June by the European Monitoring Center for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA).

Cannabis: Drug of choice

Sales of illegal drugs in Europe are now reported to be worth some €30 billion ($15.5 billion). And, just like in other countries around the world, cannabis is also by far the most popular prohibited drug in Europe. Despite all the bans and crackdowns, EMCDDA figures suggest that nearly 30% of all adult Europeans will try smoking cannabis as a joint or with a pipe at least once in their lives. In Germany, too, every third adult has smoked cannabis at least once in their lives, indicating there is a high level of acceptance for the drug in many sectors of society.

This explains why a growing number of lawyers and prosecutors, criminologists, police officers, and social workers are questioning the reasoning behind prohibitionist policies. Politicians are also beginning to ask whether the police and state prosecutors are the right instruments for protecting people's health. The discussion has been fueled by one key trend: In more than a quarter of all US states, adults are now permitted to buy quantities of their favorite narcotic — legally.

Four of the six parties currently represented in the Bundestag, the German parliament, are committed to backing an end to the prohibition policy.


Finding the right strategy

Of course, there are differences between the various political parties. But the Green party and the FDP, the Left Party, and the Social Democrats (SPD) all agree that present drug strategies based on prohibition are a failure. They are all calling for new approaches to pave a path between strategies like legalization, decriminalization, and regulation.

Wieland Schinnenburg, the FDP's parliamentary group spokesman on drug and addiction policy, told DW that there are an estimated 4 million regular cannabis users in Germany. And their fates are being left to the ruthless forces of the black market, where there are no quality standards.

What's more, says Schinnenburg, the state is losing out on sizeable revenue. "If the market were to get official approval, the state would of course take in tax income that could, in turn, be spent on prevention and therapy."

So just how much money are we talking about here? Well, in 2018, that was precisely what Justus Haucap, professor of economics at Düsseldorf University, decided to find out.

He calculated the combined sum that could be saved in police and legal services plus income through tax revenue totaled around €2.6 billion.


The Greens are the only party to so far come forward with comprehensive draft legislation designed to tackle the problem. Their "Cannabis Control Bill" is mainly based on the controlled distribution of cannabis to adults at designated sales points. The idea is to dry out the black market, provide better protection for youngsters, remove some of the burdens from the shoulders of police and the legal system, and bring in tax revenue that could be used for prevention and treatment. But, last October, the Bundestag rejected the bill.

Criminalized consumers

Heino Stöver says new initiatives in drug control policies are "long overdue." The Frankfurt-based social scientist is a familiar face for members of the Bundestag's Health Committee, where he regularly provides expert reports and testimony.

Speaking to DW, Stöver pointed to the high number of criminal cases on police records. "We have registered an all-time high with over 358,000 so-called narcotics offenses." Nearly four-fifths of that total, he continued, involve actual consumption. In other words: a user has been caught in possession of just a few grams of marijuana and a heroin addict with his daily shot. What happens is: harmless consumers are criminalized — often with devastating consequences for their workplace, a training position, or in their circle of friends and relatives.

Watch video06:46Growing cannabis under police surveillance

Police and the criminal justice services find themselves buried beneath an avalanche of ultimately petty cases.

Not to forget the perils of the black market and the uncontrolled products that are sold there. The European Drug Report includes plenty of examples for the resultant horrors: Gangsters, for instance, who mixed inferior quality marijuana with lethal synthetic cannabinoids, leaving over 20 people dead in Hungary in the summer of 2020.

Heino Stöver dismisses any prospect of a drug-free, abstinent society as mere fiction: "And the majority of people in society don't share in that vision in the first place," says Stöver, pointing to the pleasure principle that is central to drug consumption. There are, he adds, very few societies in human history that have not actually resorted to drugs.


Daniela Ludwig, the German government's drug commissioner, only recently spoke out against an initiative to legalize cannabis — referring to the primary obligation to protect children.

But Ludwig, a conservative from the Bavarian CSU party, "did concede that deploying the full force of the law against somebody caught for the first time in possession of cannabis is counterproductive." She pointed to Portugal's policy of

"decriminalization, that is moving away from the application of criminal law and towards understanding that what we are seeing are petty offenses. A real alternative if coupled with binding counseling options."

But Germany's conservatives are far from united on such a strategy. In their 140-page manifesto for the upcoming election, there is not a single mention of the word cannabis.

However, when the dust finally settles on the autumn election and negotiations to form a new government coalition get underway, it will simply not be possible to sweep the many pressing questions surrounding drug policies under the carpet.

This article has been translated from German.