UK

Welfare not warfare! Budget is a chance to set out a vision for a better world

5th March 2024Leave a Commenton Welfare not warfare! Budget is a chance to set out a vision for a better world

“Arms races fuel insecurity and increase the risk of war. We need to put the brakes on. Instead, we need to redirect spending to tackling the roots of insecurity.”

Colin Archer

By Colin Archer

When the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt stands up in Parliament tomorrow he will deliver what could be the last set-piece financial announcement before the General Election. These events are not only great parliamentary theatre but also give a chance for politicians on all sides to show the voters what kind of society we want to build for the future. In the face of the many challenges our country faces, bold thinking is needed.

We don’t have to look far to see these challenges: public services are suffering after 14 years of chronic under-investment; schools are crumbling; hospital waiting lists are at an all-time high; food bank use is shockingly common; and the climate crisis is worsening by the year. Taken alongside pressures on public finances after 14 years of austerity and government economic mismanagement, something surely has to give.

Last year’s Autumn Statement showed an increase in the UK core military spending which reached £53.1 billion in 2022-23, an increase of more than 15% on the previous year, well above inflation. This means that the UK was spending £100,000 on the military every minute of every day. This figure doesn’t even cover all spending associated with the military, including the military aid to Ukraine, which has been increased to £2.5bn for the coming year.

Politicians often talk about ‘difficult decisions’ when they are talking about cutting public spending in the context of public services or welfare provisions. But with the Ministry of Defence struggling to fund its own equipment plans, now is the time to start talking about reducing the amount of money we are spending on military.

The target of spending 0.7% of our national income on overseas development was dropped because some labelled this UN aim as ‘arbitrary’ and ‘unaffordable’. Yet the UK remains committed to the NATO target of 2% of GDP spending on its military – which has been criticised even by some security analysts as arbitrary.

Figures from the MoD indicate a shortfall of £16.9 billion in funding for the latest 10-year equipment spending plans, with the ever-expensive nuclear-weapons programme continuing to prove to be a money pit. Do we really need to spend around £200 billion on a new generation of nuclear weapons, when the deterrence doctrine this system is based upon is so flawed? Do we need to retain such a heavily armed military with ‘global reach’ for the foreseeable future? Can we afford to keep spending so much on our armed forces when tackling poverty, ill-health and the climate crisis are so urgent? These are the difficult questions it is time to ask as a country.

Nearly ten years ago, the nations of the world set 17 targets – the UN Sustainable Development Goals – including the elimination of poverty and hunger, and urgent action on climate change. Progress on these targets is faltering – and in some cases being reversed – due to a lack of resources. Meanwhile, global military spending is spiraling and is now comparable with that during the worst periods of the Cold War. Arms races fuel insecurity and increase the risk of war. We need to put the brakes on. Instead, we need to redirect spending to tackling the roots of insecurity – like poverty and ecological damage. We need to defuse international tensions, by focusing more on diplomacy, arms control, and disarmament. Britain can play a leading role in bringing about a positive future – or it can continue down the road of militarism and war. It’s time to choose.

---

• Colin Archer is a retired Secretary-General, International Peace Bureau and now sits on the Steering Group of the Global Campaign on Military Spending UK.

UK

School energy bills rise by nearly half in Devon – as inefficient school buildings shown to be wasting energy

School energy costs have risen by nearly half in Devon over the past academic year, new figures show.

By Will Grimond
Tuesday 5th March 2024 


School energy costs have risen by nearly half in Devon over the past academic year, new figures show.

Amid last year's soaring gas and electricity prices, separate analysis suggests a significant proportion of school buildings across the country are suffering from poor energy efficiency, despite some improvement in recent years.

Figures from the Department for Education show £4.53 million was spent on energy for local authority-run schools in Devon in the 2022-23 academic year – up 50% from the £3.02 million spent the year before.

This was the highest figure since at least 2015-16, when records are first available.

Across England, expenditure on energy for local authority-maintained schools hit £485 million in 2022-23 – a 61% increase on the year before, when £302 million was spent.

Almost every local authority saw a rise, with 74% recording their highest spending on record. One local authority, Bolton, saw expenditure nearly triple compared to the year before.


The Local Government Association – a membership body for local authorities – said many schools have been voicing concerns about their financial stability.


Louise Gittins, chair of the LGA’s Children and Young People’s Board, said schools are facing higher costs from "fuel, energy and food for school meals, alongside the need to fund agreed staff pay rises, and support for a growing number of pupils experiencing disadvantage."

Schools in Devon spent £120 per pupil on energy in 2022-23, up from £79 the year before.

The LGA urged further Government support for schools in the upcoming Spring Budget.

Separate analysis of energy efficiency ratings suggests many English school buildings are underperforming.

Across England, a fifth of all school buildings receiving display energy certificates last year were in the lowest, most polluting categories (E to G) – meaning they are not up to standard. However, this does represent an improvement – in 2018, around a third of ratings were in these categories.

DECs are designed to show the energy performance of public buildings, using a scale from ‘A’ to ‘G’ - ‘A’ being the most efficient and ‘G’ being the least.

Of the 16,700 buildings receiving a certificate, just 55 were rated A, and 831 received a B.

Across the South West, 12% of the 1,474 school buildings rated last year were in the worst categories – emitting the most carbon dioxide and wasting more energy.

An estimated 43% of schools in the region had a building evaluated last year.

These figures include academies and independent schools. Larger buildings require energy certificates more regularly, so bigger schools may be overrepresented in the figures.

Daniel Kebede, general secretary of the National Education Union said schools have been left to their own devices to deal with "leaky, draughty, energy inefficient buildings" and higher bills.

He said: "In the medium term we need a massive retrofit programme to make school buildings fit for the future – safe, energy efficient and able to play their part in creating a safe climate future for children.

"For many schools, however, the problems are such that rebuilding is the only answer, but the Government's record on this is woeful."

A Department for Education spokesperson said: "We know that schools have faced increased energy bills. We took account of this and made additional investment in total school funding to cover costs – a £4 billion increase in 2022-23, and a further £3.9 billion this year.

"School funding is rising to more than £59.6 billion next year – the highest ever level in real terms per pupil."

UK

Tesco latest supermarket to increase staff pay

Bloomberg

Tesco has become the latest supermarket to increase pay as retailers face up to the rising minimum wage and try to retain staff.

The hourly pay rate for store workers will rise from £11.02 to £12.02 in April, while pay for workers in London will rise to £13.15 an hour.

More than 200,000 staff will benefit from the increase, Tesco said.

All staff will get the voluntary Real Living Wage, which is higher than the compulsory National Living Wage.

The National Living Wage, often referred to as the minimum wage, is set to rise to £11.44 an hour in April 2024 - and for the first time will include 21 and 22-year-olds.

As a result, many of the major supermarkets have been announcing pay deals over the past few weeks.

How much is the minimum wage going up?

M&S raises pay in battle for supermarket staff

Tesco now joins Sainsbury's, Asda, Aldi, Lidl and M&S in increasing its minimum pay for staff outside of London to £12 per hour.

Aldi's higher pay has been in place since the start of February, while Lidl and Sainsbury's increased wage began in March. M&S's pay rise will begin in April, while Asda will bring in an interim increase on 1 April to £11.44 an hour before raising the rate to £12.04 an hour from 1 July.

As well as raising pay, Tesco also said it would be increasing paternity leave to six weeks fully paid.

In addition, Tesco said it would increase maximum company sick pay entitlement to 18 weeks for eligible colleagues.

The supermarket has dropped separate pay rates for inner London and outer London employees to create one London Allowance, and it said the £13.15 per hour rate for this area meant it kept in line with the voluntary London Real Living Wage.

Daniel Adams, national officer at the shopworkers' union Usdaw, said: "This deal not only delivers an inflation-busting increase for Tesco employees, but it also demonstrates the value of progressive employers engaging constructively with trade unions at a time when the cost-of-living pressures continue to be keenly felt by our members."

 Tesco to increase pay for shop workers by 9.1%

Tesco is to increase basic pay for shop workers ahead of a rise in the national minimum wage (Ben Stevens/Parsons Media/PA)

By Henry Saker-Clark, PA Deputy Business Editor

Today at 08:55

Tesco is to increase store workers’ pay by 9.1% in a roughly £300 million investment.

It is the latest supermarket group to lift pay levels for workers ahead of the rise in the national minimum wage in April.

The national minimum wage will increase from its current rate of £10.42 per hour to £11.44 on April 1.

The grocery giant, which employs more than 330,000 people across the UK, will raise the basic hourly rate for store workers from £11.02 per hour to £12.02.

Tesco employs more than 330,000 people across the UK (Danny Lawson/PA)

It will also increase the pay of workers within the M25 to £13.15 per hour, from a current rate of £11.95 for those in inner London and £11.75 for those in outer London.

The pay deal announcement, which came after an agreement with the Usdaw trade union, will also see the business increase its paternity level to six weeks fully paid and raise maximum sick pay entitlement to 18 weeks.

Tesco UK chief executive Matthew Barnes said: “This represents another significant investment in our colleagues, building on the last two years of investment.

“We recognise the amazing work our colleagues do every day in serving our customers and we’re really proud to offer such competitive rates of pay alongside a great range of exclusive colleague benefits.”

Tesco will also increase its annual Colleague Clubcard discount allowance to £2,000, up from £1,500.

Usdaw national officer Daniel Adams said: “This deal not only delivers an inflation-busting increase for Tesco employees, but it also demonstrates the value of progressive employers engaging constructively with trade unions at a time when the cost-of-living pressures continue to be keenly felt by our members.

“We welcome the company’s positive response through our negotiations, which have resulted in the largest investment in pay in a single year, with the highest entry rate for store employees of any major supermarket.”

It comes days after rival Asda said it will increase its basic rate of staff pay to £12.04 per hour later this year.

Dartmouth men's basketball team votes 13-2 in favor of first labor union for college athletes

The vote could present a huge shakeup to the National Collegiate Athletics Association’s model, which currently only allows college athletes to financially benefit from their role on teams through name, image and likeness.

March 5, 2024
By Natalie Kainz


The Dartmouth Men's Basketball team voted 13-2 in favor of becoming the first-ever labor union for college athletes on Tuesday afternoon.

The vote could present a huge shakeup to the National Collegiate Athletics Association's (NCAA) model, which currently only allows college athletes to financially benefit from their role on teams through name, image and likeness.


The National Labor Relations Board paved the way for the union vote on Feb. 5, after Regional Director Laura Sacks ordered an election for the team.

“Because Dartmouth has the right to control the work performed by the Dartmouth men’s basketball team, and the players perform that work in exchange for compensation, I find that the petitioned-for basketball players are employees within the meaning of the [National Labor Relations] Act,” Sacks said in a statement.

Dartmouth has pushed back against the ruling, filing an appeal to postpone the election or impound the ballots. In the motion, which is pending with the NLRB, the university argued that the athletes are "students first and athletes second," and participate in college basketball to further their educational aims, like all students who participate in any recognized extracurricular activity.

Cornell Sports Law Professor Michael L. Huyghue called the classification of college athletes as regular students a “mockery,” because it neglects the millions of dollars that colleges are paid for television contracts, marketing rights and ticketing sales.

“We’ve just reached a point where the anti-trust laws are suggesting universities don’t have a right to capitalize on all that revenue,” said Huyghue.

Dartmouth still has five days to file an objection to the union election, and the decision by the NLRB can be appealed all the way up to the Supreme Court.

“Unionization is not appropriate in this instance,” Dartmouth wrote in a statement to NBC News. “The costs of Dartmouth’s athletics program far exceed any revenue for the program.”

But Huyghue said the mere fact that an employer has not been successful in generating revenue does not mean its employees don't have a right to unionize.

Dartmouth Big Green players huddle during a game on February 16, 2024, in New York City.

Adam Gray / Getty Images

The push for the team to be recognized as a union was started by Dartmouth men's basketball players Cade Haskins and Romeo Myrthil, who told NBC News Now they had to take on jobs to sustain their finances while also being student-athletes.

“We don’t get a stipend or any type of benefit for being athletes even though we are working like full time jobs basically by being on the team,” Haskins said.

This isn't the first time a college athletics team has made a bid to be recognized as employees. In 2014, Northwestern University's football team sought union status from the NLRB.

Although a union election was held, the ballots were destroyed because the NLRB ruled the following year that the prospect of union and nonunion teams in college sports could create competitive imbalances on the field.

Dartmouth men’s basketball team votes to unionize, though steps remain before forming labor union


College sports has grown into a multibillion-dollar industry that richly rewards coaches and schools while the players remained unpaid amateurs.

ASSOCIATED PRESS / March 5, 2024

Dartmouth's Robert McRae III (23) takes a pass from Jackson Munro (33) as Duke's Jaylen Blakes (2) defends during the second half of an NCAA college basketball game in Durham, N.C., Nov. 6, 2023. (AP Photo/Ben McKeown, File)

HANOVER, N.H. (AP) — The Dartmouth men's basketball team voted to unionize Tuesday in an unprecedented step toward forming the first labor union for college athletes and another attack on the NCAA's deteriorating amateur business model.

In an election supervised by the National Labor Relations Board in the school's Human Resources offices, the players voted 13-2 to join Service Employees International Union Local 560, which already represents some Dartmouth workers. Every player on the roster participated.

"Today is a big day for our team," players Cade Haskins and Romeo Myrthil said in a statement. “We stuck together all season and won this election. It is self-evident that we, as students, can also be both campus workers and union members. Dartmouth seems to be stuck in the past. It’s time for the age of amateurism to end.”"

The school has five business days to file an objection to the NLRB and could also take the matter to federal court. That could delay negotiations over a collective bargaining agreement until long after the current members of the basketball team have graduated.

Dartmouth pushed back on the decision — again — in a statement, saying it was supportive of the five unions it negotiates with on campus, including SEIU Local 560.

“In this isolated circumstance, however, the students on the men’s basketball team are not in any way employed by Dartmouth,” the school said. “For Ivy League students who are varsity athletes, academics are of primary importance, and athletic pursuit is part of the educational experience. Classifying these students as employees simply because they play basketball is as unprecedented as it is inaccurate. We, therefore, do not believe unionization is appropriate.”

Although the NCAA has long maintained that its players are “student-athletes” who were in school primarily to study, college sports has grown into a multibillion-dollar industry that richly rewards coaches and schools while the players remained unpaid amateurs.

Recent court decisions have chipped away at that framework, with players now allowed to profit off their name, image and likeness and earn a still-limited stipend for living expenses beyond the cost of attendance. Last month’s decision by an NLRB that the Big Green players are employees of the school, with the right to form a union, threatens to upend the amateur model.

"We will continue to talk to other athletes at Dartmouth and throughout the Ivy League about forming unions and working together to advocate for athletes’ rights and well-being,” Haskins and Myrthil said.

A college athletes union would be unprecedented in American sports. A previous attempt to unionize the Northwestern football team failed because the teams Wildcats play in the Big Ten, which includes public schools that aren’t under the jurisdiction of the NLRB.

That’s why one of the NCAA’s biggest threats isn’t coming in one of the big-money football programs like Alabama or Michigan, which are largely indistinguishable from professional sports teams. Instead, it is the academically oriented Ivy League, where players don’t receive athletic scholarships, teams play in sparsely filled gymnasiums and the games are streamed online instead of broadcast on network TV.

Myrthil and Haskins have said they would like to form an Ivy League Players Association that would include athletes from other sports on campus and other schools in the conference. They said they understood that change could come too late to benefit them and their current teammates.

The team includes four seniors, five juniors, three sophomores and three freshman.

“We have teammates here that we all love and support,” Myrthil said after playing at Harvard last month in the Big Green’s first game after the NLRB official’s ruling. “And whoever comes into the Dartmouth family is part of our family. So, we’ll support them as much as we can.”

Mary Kay Henry, the international president of the SEIU, said the players “will go down as one of the greatest basketball teams in all of history.”

“The Ivy League is where the whole scandalous model of nearly free labor in college sports was born and that is where it is going to die,” she said.

__

By JIMMY GOLEN AP Sports Writer

Jimmy Golen covers sports and the law for The Associated Press.

NHS Scotland strikes: BMA warns Scottish Government it would consider strike action in consultant pay dispute

The British Medical Association has warned “it is increasingly clear” the Scottish Government will only negotiate once a formal dispute is opened and strike action is threatened

By Joseph Anderson
Published 5th Mar 2024


A union representing Scotland’s doctors has warned the Scottish Government it will consider strike action, after ministers were accused of ignoring “pleas for positive engagement” during negotiations over consultant pay.
The British Medical Association (BMA) has secured an improved pay offer from the UK government for consultants in England after a previous offer was narrowly rejected at the end of January

This has led to the BMA in Scotland calling for a similar pay offer from the Scottish Government, taking into account the extra funding that will arise from Barnett consequentials and the higher rate of top tax in Scotland for individuals earning more than £125,140.

The BMA in Scotland has threatened to "undertake the kind of industrial action seen elsewhere in the UK", such as the junior doctors' strike pictured above in England.

Dr Alan Robertson, chair of BMA Scotland’s consultant committee, said: “When you add in the new top rates of tax introduced in Scotland, the competitive disadvantage our consultants face is becoming increasingly clear

“We cannot possibly hope to make any difference on reducing the number of gaps in our workforce if it continues to become substantially less attractive to work in Scotland than other places in the UK.

“While we will need to analyse the English offer in relation to Scotland, in particular any impact on Barnett consequentials, we urge the Scottish Government to commit to at least matching what is on offer in England and ensuring no consultant in Scotland is missing out. Indeed, there is an opportunity to go further if we really want to deliver the consultant workforce our NHS in Scotland needs.”

Dr Robertson added: “Sadly, given the way that ministers have recently ignored our pleas for positive engagement, I fear that this may be unlikely unless there is an urgent change in direction.

“It sadly and frustratingly seems increasingly clear that the only way we will get the attention, action and improvements necessary for the hugely valuable resource that is our consultant workforce, is to pursue a course of threatening to enter dispute and then undertake the kind of industrial action seen elsewhere in the UK.

“I very much hope that we hear from the new Cabinet secretary soon and he proves my fears unfounded.”

The consultant workforce in Scotland’s NHS is “beyond crisis point”, the doctors’ union said.

BMA Scotland’s consultant committee responded to the latest quarterly figures for the NHS medical and dentistry consultancy workforce, which were released on Tuesday.

In the quarter ending December 2023, there were 6,006 whole-time equivalent consultants, with 436 vacancies.

Dr Robertson said: “New statistics show that consultant vacancies remain far too high, standing at some 436 gaps in the workforce – and up by 5.8 per cent on this time last year. Worryingly, posts sitting vacant for six months or more are up to 238 – a 12.2 per cent increase over the past 12 months – showing just how hard it is to recruit senior doctors.

“Audit Scotland has warned our NHS and its workforce is simply unable to meet the growing demand for health services of our population. The stubbornly high level of gaps in our consultant workforce just back up that claim further – and it is patients who are suffering as waiting lists grow and care becomes harder and harder to access.”

Scottish Conservative shadow health secretary, Dr Sandesh Gulhane, said: “As BMA Scotland points out the chronic shortage of NHS consultants is the product of twin SNP failures – their mismanagement of both our health service and the economy.

“Years of dire workforce planning by successive SNP health secretaries has left us with a huge and growing shortfall of frontline medics.

“That problem is now being exacerbated by them making Scotland the highest taxed part of the UK, in an attempt to fill the gaping hole they’ve created in the nation’s finances.

“It is little wonder Scotland’s NHS is finding it increasingly difficult to recruit and retain consultants when they are being taxed thousands more per year than they would be elsewhere in the UK.

“Sadly, it’s Scottish NHS patients who suffer as a result of this disastrous SNP double whammy.”

The Scottish Government has been contacted for comment.

Robert Reich: The Most Troubling Aspect Of Monday’s Supreme Court Decision – OpEd

 March 5, 2024 

By Robert Reich

Even though Trump clearly engaged in an insurrection and even though the Constitution clearly bars insurrectionists from holding elected office, the Supreme Court Monday ruled that Trump will remain on the ballot anyway

With the Super Tuesday primaries now underway, all nine justices agreed that states (in this case, Colorado) cannot decide to keep Trump off the ballot under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment — which bars anyone who has sworn an oath to the Constitution and yet participated in an insurrection against the United States from holding office. They agreed that allowing states to make such decisions would lead to a patchwork of ballots, undercutting federal authority.

But this may not be the most troubling aspect of their decision over the long term. The five justices in the majority went further, ruling that Section 3 could only be enforced by Congress. They rested their argument on Section 5 of the 14th Amendment, which provides that Congress shall pass “appropriate legislation” to enforce the Amendment — such as, for example, procedures to identify which individuals should be disqualified under Section 3. And Congress has not done so. 

But requiring that Congress first pass such legislation would prevent the federal government’s own Justice Department from bringing a suit alleging that someone should not be allowed on a ballot because they participated in an insurrection. 

It would in effect shield any future insurrectionist candidate whose party controls at least one chamber of Congress and therefore would not enact such legislation.

Justices Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson were also rightfully concerned that the majority’s decision could be used to prevent the Justice Department or any aggrieved plaintiff from enforcing other provisions of the 14th Amendment — such as Section 1, which prohibits states from making or enforcing laws that “abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States” or deprive “any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law” or deny them “equal protection of the laws.”

Recall that these 14th Amendment provisions have been bulwarks against states that have discriminated against Black people, against LGBTQ+ people, and against women. The due process clause of the 14th Amendment was the foundation for Roe v. Wade. 

But under the majority’s view of how the 14th Amendment should be enforced, Section 5 might first require Congress to pass “appropriate legislation” to identify which defendants should be prosecuted under Section 1, before the Justice Department or any plaintiff could act against a state that’s abridging people’s rights. 

States charged with violating the privileges and immunities clause, or denying people due process of law, or denying their citizens the equal protection of the law will almost certainly use today’s ruling in attempts to shield themselves from federal prosecution.

By the way, Clarence Thomas should never have participated in the case, given his obvious conflicts of interest. His participation makes the Supreme Court’s recently adopted “ethics” guidelines look like the sham they are.

This article was published at Robert Reich’s Substack

Robert B. Reich is Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley and Senior Fellow at the Blum Center for Developing Economies, and writes at robertreich.substack.com. Reich served as Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration, for which Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries of the twentieth century. He has written fifteen books, including the best sellers "Aftershock", "The Work of Nations," and"Beyond Outrage," and, his most recent, "The Common Good," which is available in bookstores now. He is also a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine, chairman of Common Cause, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and co-creator of the award-winning documentary, "Inequality For All." He's co-creator of the Netflix original documentary "Saving Capitalism," which is streaming now.

Explosive fire at site in US used by vape suppliers sends debris a mile away

Firefighters battled an industrial blaze in a Detroit suburb

 (Courtesy of WXYZ via AP)

TUE, 05 MAR, 2024 - 

A fire that destroyed a building which housed suppliers for the vaping industry caused multiple explosions that killed one person and injured a firefighter as the blasts rocked the US city of Detroit, sending gas canisters and debris shooting into the air, authorities said.

The debris fell as far as a mile away, the Clinton Township Police Department said on Facebook.

As the fire and explosions raged, authorities urged people in the area to stay inside after the explosions began at about 8.50pm on Monday. Officials said the fire was contained by late Monday.

Clinton Township fire chief Tim Duncan said that the building housed two businesses, one of them a distributor for the vaping industry called Goo which had more than 100,000 vape pens stored at the site.

Debris fell as far as a mile away (Robin Buckson/Detroit News via AP)

He said a truckload of butane canisters had arrived within the past week at the building and more than half of that stock was still on site when the fire began.

A 19-year-old man died after being struck a quarter of a mile away by one of the canisters, he said, calling his death “very unfortunate”. Mr Duncan said it is believed the man was “just observing” the fire when he was struck.

“The person was essentially about a quarter of a mile down the road here and did suffer injury from one of these flying canisters,” Mr Duncan said at a news briefing.

He said the building also housed a business called Select Distributors that he said he believed supplied gas canisters for the local vaping industry for vape pens, along with other products. He said those canisters are believed to have accounted for the explosions that littered a large area with debris.

Authorities urged people in the area to stay inside (Courtesy of WXYZ via AP)

A firefighter was also injured when one of the canisters struck the windshield of a fire vehicle. The firefighter was believed to have been struck by glass and was treated and released from a hospital, Mr Duncan said.

Mr Duncan said that as he was driving to the fire scene his car was shaken repeatedly by the distant explosions of the gas canisters.

Mr Duncan said the cause of the fire was not yet known and firefighters had not yet been able to inspect the ruined building because it was unsafe as debris was still smoking.

White smoke and an orange glow could still be seen above the remnants of the building on Tuesday morning. Earlier, news helicopter videos showed a massive, bright orange area of fire with bursts of flames within the blaze that looked like explosions.

Rural women in poor countries hit harder by climate shocks: FAO study

Gender gap translates into wide income losses, poor work conditions for women farmers, female-run households

Giada Zampano |05.03.2024 -



ROME

Women farmers and female-headed households in low- and middle-income countries suffer larger losses due to climatic shocks, such as heat and flooding, than those by male-headed households, according to a new study Tuesday by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

The Unjust Climate noted that female-headed rural households on average have lost 8% more of their income during heat waves and 3% more during floods, compared to male-headed households.

The gender gap translates into a per capita reduction of $83 due to heat stress and $35 due to floods -- reaching an annual total of $37 billion and $16 billion, respectively, it said.

The report used data from 24 low- and middle-income countries across five regions and spans 70 years of daily climate data, matched with the incomes of more than 100,000 households.

Climate change is also increasing the number of hours women are required to work and since women already have a higher burden of care in almost all countries, it exacerbates the situation.

On top of all of this, there are also persistent discriminatory social norms that women and girls face in agri-food systems, which may constrain how much they can work outside the home or how far they can travel for work.

The FAO estimated that closing labor and productivity gaps between women and men could significantly affect GDP, increasing it by 1% globally and reducing food insecurity for 45 million people.

The report found that projects and policies focusing on empowerment can significantly improve resilience to climatic and other shocks. It was estimated that empowering projects could lead to an additional 235 million families having higher resilience to climate shocks.

Addressing the gaps and promoting empowerment are crucial to helping families and women become more resilient to climate change.

The UN agency then urged specific strategies to address the particular vulnerabilities of rural households headed by women.