Colombian influencer puts the pizzazz into recycling


By AFP
March 18, 2025


Sara Samanieg has become an unofficial spokeswoman for the 74,000 people who rummage through the garbage of Latin America's fourth-biggest economy every day - Copyright AFP Raul ARBOLEDA

Sarah KRAKOVITCH

Colombian influencer Sara Samaniego braids her long straight hair, checks her make-up in a mirror, places her phone in the center of a ring light and flashes a big smile for the camera.

“Hola mis recicla-amores! (Hello my recycling loves),” the 32-year-old, who is on a mission to teach Colombians how to sort their waste, says to greet her half-a-million Instagram followers.

Samaniego, who wears blue overalls and a baseball cap on backwards as part of her “Marce, la recicladora” (Marce, the recycler) social media alter ego, has also become an unofficial spokeswoman for the 74,000 people who rummage through the garbage of Latin America’s fourth-biggest economy every day.

Colombian cities have no public recycling systems.

Instead, they rely on informal waste pickers to go through bins and garbage left out for collection to salvage cardboard, glass, plastic and other reusable materials.

Across the world, between 20 and 34 million people play a crucial role in environmental protection by collecting and sorting waste recyclables — dirty, dangerous work for which most are paid a pittance.

– Making ends meet –

Throughout the developing world, waste pickers can be seen pulling carts laden high with bric-a-brac through dense traffic.

Samaniego tries to boost their visibility by profiling waste pickers on her YouTube and Instagram accounts.

She “encourages people to understand the work of recyclers from the inside,” Zoraya Avendano, the manager of a warehouse where the recyclers sell their wares for a few pesos, told AFP.

Bogota, a city of eight million people, produces 9,000 tons of waste each day, according to a 2023 Greenpeace report, of which 17 percent is recycled — the same proportion as New York, according to the GrowNYC recycling group.

Recycler Mary Luz Torres, 50, spends two hours travelling by bus from her home in the working-class south of Bogota to the wealthier north, where she plies her trade.

A fluorescent vest is her only form of protection from the cars and trucks zooming past, as she lugs a cart spray-painted with her name through the street.

“You have to go out and find a way to make ends meet,” she said.

Pedro Talero, 55, spends his days collecting trash, which he sorts by night under a bridge.

On a good day he earns around $20, double the minimum wage.

“Some people look down on us,” he said, but added that growing environmental awareness is leading to greater recognition of “our services to the planet.”

– Growing recognition –

Colombia’s leftist President Gustavo Petro last year rewarded the work of waste pickers by giving them a monopoly on recycling for 15 years.

“If traditional informal recyclers are compensated, we lift many people out of poverty. We lift many children out of child labor. We lift many women out of indignity,” Petro said, crediting them with “improving the balance between humankind and nature.”

Samaniego’s contribution has been an attempt to glamorize the trade, with how-to posts set to tracks by Colombian stars such as Shakira and Karol G.

Born in Bogota, she developed a passion for nature on childhood holidays in the countryside.

Making a documentary about recycling while studying communications put her on the path to environmental influencer.

When she launched her YouTube channel six years ago, she said, there were “a lot of videos about music, dance, cooking, sports but the environment was rarely discussed.”

Samaniego’s winning formula is to inject levity into a subject characterized by earnestness.

The response has been thousands of questions and comments on her posts each day, and growing renown.

She gets stopped on the street for selfies, was recently a special guest on a TV reality show and is regularly invited to give talks at schools and businesses.

She owes much of her knowledge to informal recyclers, whom she calls her teachers.

To repay them, she fundraises on social media to buy them equipment, such as safety gloves and face masks, or to send them on a well-deserved holiday to the sea.

“I am fulfilling my goal of being an agent of change in the country,” she says.

Bulgaria ski resort, once buzzing, creaks under crumbling infrastructure


By AFP
March 18, 2025


Praised for its proximity to the capital, Vitosha once featured more than a dozen cable cars and chair lifts - Copyright AFP BONNIE CASH

Rossen BOSSEV

Bulgarian slalom star Albert Popov, who recently claimed his first World Cup win, learned how to ski at Vitosha, the mountain towering over his native capital Sofia.

But the once-modern resort is now a far cry from its former glory — and with its crumbling infrastructure is unlikely to again produce talented ski champions like Popov, said local ski club founder Ivaylo Rangelov.

“Bulgaria’s first chair lift was built here,” said Rangelov, pointing to the now rusted poles and cables from the decaying lifts in the European Union’s poorest country.

“My father learned to ski here, then it was my turn, and after that three generations of children in Sofia, including Abi,” said the 57-year-old former special forces officer, referring to Popov’s nickname.

The walls of Vitosha’s main mountain hut are adorned with Popov’s race jerseys displaying his starting numbers.



– Sole chair lift –



Prized for its proximity to the capital, Vitosha, located in the oldest nature park in the Balkans, once featured more than a dozen cable cars and chair lifts.

The resort applied during the 1980s to host the 1992 Winter Olympics, but lost out to Albertville in France.

After the fall of communism in 1989, the resort’s infrastructure was gradually privatised.

Over the years, one lift after another closed, even as Bulgaria’s biggest ski station, Bansko in the southwest, kept growing.

The Vitosha resort, whose highest peak is 2,290 metres (7,510 feet), is also burdened by the costly production of artificial snow necessitated by global warming.

These days, it has just one operating chair lift with two sections, while most of the chalets and other accommodations on the mountain have been transformed into luxurious private residences owned by oligarchs.

Still, on a sunny day in March, around a hundred children from Sofia were learning how to ski on the slopes of the mountain.

But “once children learn to stand on skis and make their first swings, there is nowhere they can continue to learn,” said Rangelov, whose 25-year-old club has produced several winter sports champions.



– ‘Priceless mountain’ –



Popov, who claimed his first World Cup win in the slalom at Italy’s Madonna di Campiglio in January, said he hoped that children, enthusiasts and athletes alike “can all do sports on Vitosha again”.

“We deserve to have this priceless mountain returned to us in all its splendour,” the 27-year-old told Bulgarian media in 2023.

Neither he nor the resort operator returned an AFP interview request.

Sofia’s Mayor Vassil Terziev has made improving access to Vitosha mountain a “top priority”, expressing his “anguish” about the lost opportunities to train future champions there.

“We want to give (the mountain) back to the people,” he said after he was elected in 2023, though he has admitted it is a “difficult task”.

After a cable car line that ran straight from a Sofia neighbourhood to the ski resort stopped operating in May 2024, Terziev increased bus services.

Parking space on the mountain is limited with cars and buses jostling for space.

Amid those waiting patiently for the bus at Vitosha, a French couple said they came to the resort to “share the habits” of Sofia inhabitants.

“For the people of Sofia, Vitosha is a bit like the sea is for the people of Marseille,” retiree Francois Trebosc told AFP.

SOCIALLY RESPONSIBLE AI

In Nigeria, tech workers and farmers bring AI to the fields


By AFP
March 18, 2025


Atsuku Msenhemba Mercy feeds chickens at her Jos farm which benefits from Anatsor local start-up technology 

- Copyright AFP Raul ARBOLEDA

Leslie FAUVEL

With a few taps on his phone, Dandam Nangor knows exactly what temperature his greenhouse is at, when to water his crops and even the pH of the soil.

Backed by artificial intelligence, it’s all designed to make growing his peppers easier — and perhaps usher in a sort of agriculture 2.0 in Nigeria, where millions work in the sector, from subsistence farmers to, increasingly, young tech workers.

With probes in the soil collecting data, processed by local agri-tech local company Green Eden and sent to his phone, “my production has increased (by) about 400 kilograms,” or 20 percent, 34-year-old Nangor, who is also an IT analyst, told AFP during a visit to his greenhouse in Jos.

Farms around the Plateau state capital, sitting at 1,200 metres (4,000 feet) above sea level and known for its mild climate, have long fed the nation, with their fruits and vegetables ending up in markets across Nigeria.

But they haven’t been spared from climate change, as increasingly erratic rainfall threatens farmers across west Africa, the majority of whom are smallholders who operate without irrigation.

The stakes are high for the whole country: some 20 percent of Nigeria’s GDP comes from agriculture.

“That was the simple problem, the weather. Climate change,” said Stephanie Meltus, founder of Green Eden, whose tech has been deployed on more than 70 farms.

“That’s what we are trying to solve.”

The start-up first found financing from friends and family, before more business and foundations started getting involved — providing an opportunity to “bridge the gap” between Nigeria’s bustling tech scene and its rural hinterlands, said Meltus, a 21-year-old pharmacy student.



– Field to henhouse –



The central city of Jos itself is becoming something of an agri-tech hub.

Mercy Atsuku, who raises chickens, told AFP that after adopting a monitoring system from another local start-up, “we barely even record any mortality cases”.

The tech, from Anatsor, keeps tabs on temperature, humidity and air and water quality on poultry farms.

Due to climate change, “the weather pattern is uncertain”, Anatsor’s 24-year-old founder Miriam Agbo said.

“When the temperature is too high, the chickens don’t eat,” she told AFP.

When its too humid, “the environment becomes damp, they tend to stay together to heat up. And that results in suffocating”.

Now, minute shifts in conditions are now sent directly to Atsuku’s phone.

“Let’s say when the water is contaminated, it’s no longer too good for the chickens. I get a notification,” she said. “I no longer wake up in the middle of the night just to check on the chickens.”

Though the $150 she paid for the system — three times the monthly minimum wage — might be out of reach for some, “it has reduced a lot of stress for me”.

The new tech is coming online at a key time, said Nuhu Adamu Gworgwor, an agronomy professor at the University of Jos, as climate change and urbanisation drive more and more Nigerians away from agriculture and into cities.

Poor harvests from drought and erratic rains have “driven away people from their fields” — and many are unlikely to return.

“They could not be able to go to agriculture again,” he told AFP.



– Eyes in the sky –



Critics of the broader agri-tech sector worry that innovation is being directed at increasing output, rather than at mitigating farming’s own negative effects on the environment.

And artificial intelligence will do little to help growers bogged down by land degradation, a lack of access to financing and poor infrastructure.

Only 40 percent of people in Nigeria have an internet connection — a rate that plunges in rural areas.

But Gambo Wadams Zakka, an English literature student, still has dreams of putting tech in the fields, as he pursues a start-up that would combine satellite imagery and AI to warn farmers of pest infestations, delivered via text message.

He also wants to monitor market prices, to give farmers more information about when to sell their crops.

“We could give them an SMS alert, like prices of heavy beans is selling at 15,000 naira ($10) per bag… but prices are expected to rise by next week,” Zakka said.

For Michael Inyam Itsegok, who has grown potatoes, bananas and cucumbers for 25 years, it’s the “perfect” technology, which would help take some of the chance and guesswork out of farming.

“If you don’t have an insight of what is coming,” he said, “you are left at the mercy of that very thing that has come.”

BARBARISM

US to execute four Death Row inmates this week

By AFP
March 18, 2025

Chris Lefkow

A 46-year-old man convicted of rape and murder is to be put to death by nitrogen gas in the southern state of Louisiana on Tuesday, the first of four executions scheduled this week in the United States.

Jessie Hoffman, who was sentenced to death for the 1996 murder of Molly Elliott, a 28-year-old advertising executive, will be the first person executed in Louisiana in 15 years.

A district court judge last week stayed Hoffman’s execution on the grounds that the use of nitrogen gas may amount to cruel and unusual punishment, which is banned under the US Constitution.

But the stay was lifted by the conservative-dominated US Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, allowing the execution to proceed.

Only one other US state, Alabama, has carried out executions by nitrogen hypoxia, which involves pumping nitrogen gas into a facemask, causing the prisoner to suffocate.

The method has been denounced by UN experts as cruel and inhumane.



– ‘Plenty of execution methods’ –



The vast majority of US executions since the Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976 have been performed using lethal injection, although South Carolina executed a man by firing squad on March 7.

Hoffman, a parking lot attendant, was convicted in 1998 of abducting Elliott in New Orleans as she went to retrieve her car and join her husband for dinner.

Hoffman forced Elliott to withdraw $200 from an ATM machine, before raping and killing her with a single shot to the head.

He was 18 years old at the time.

Elliott’s nude body was found by a duck hunter the next day on a makeshift dock by the Middle Pearl River.

Hoffman’s lawyers have appealed to the Supreme Court to halt the execution on the grounds that the nitrogen gas would “interfere with Jessie’s ability to practice his Buddhist meditative breathing.”

“The Supreme Court has repeatedly held that prisoners must be allowed to practice their religion as their lives are being taken by execution,” said Cecelia Kappel, one of Hoffman’s attorneys.

“There are plenty of execution methods Louisiana could adopt that would not interfere with Jessie’s ability to practice his Buddhist meditative breathing, and only one, nitrogen gas, that makes it impossible for him to do so,” Kappel said.



– Arizona, Florida, Oklahoma executions –



Three other executions are scheduled in the United States this week — in Arizona, Florida and Oklahoma.

Aaron Gunches, 53, is to be executed by lethal injection in Arizona on Wednesday for the 2002 murder of Ted Price, his girlfriend’s ex-husband.

Gunches has dropped legal efforts to halt his execution, which would be the first in the southwestern state since November 2022.

Wendell Grissom, 56, is to be executed by lethal injection in Oklahoma on Thursday for shooting and killing Amber Matthews, 23, in 2005 during a home robbery.

Edward James, 63, is to be executed by lethal injection in Florida on Thursday.

James was sentenced to death for the 1993 rape and murder of an eight-year-old girl, Toni Neuner, and the murder of Betty Dick, her 58-year-old grandmother.

There have been six executions in the United States this year, following 25 last year.

The death penalty has been abolished in 23 of the 50 US states, while three others — California, Oregon and Pennsylvania — have moratoriums in place.

President Donald Trump is a proponent of capital punishment and on his first day in office called for an expansion of its use “for the vilest crimes.”

OECD lowers global growth projections over tariffs, uncertainty


By AFP
March 17, 2025


New tariffs imposed by the United States, like on steel, are creating uncertainty in the global economy - Copyright AFP HECTOR RETAMAL
Hugo RUAUD

Trade tensions and geopolitical uncertainties are weighing on economic perspectives, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development said on Monday as it lowered its projections for global growth in 2025.

“We are navigating troubled waters,” said the OECD’s chief economist Alvaro Santos Pereira as he summed up the world’s economic situation in the coming months, with inflation set to rise.

US President Donald Trump’s return to the White House is in part responsible for the coming turbulence, the OECD said in its report, with his protectionist policies sparking trade wars and driving up inflation.

While global economic activity remained “resilient” in 2024 with a 3.2 percent increase in GDP, the OECD trimmed back its 2025 projection from 3.3 percent growth to 3.1 percent.

That was due to “higher trade barriers in several G20 economies and increased geopolitical and policy uncertainty weighing on investment and household spending”.

The Paris-based OECD’s projections were based primarily on weaker expected growth in the United States and the eurozone.

US growth is expected to be 2.2 percent in 2025, down from the OECD’s 2.4 percent projection in December, before falling to 1.6 percent in 2026 — a drop of 0.5 percentage points on the OECD’s previous forecast.

Likewise, the eurozone growth projection is down from 1.3 percent three months ago to just 1.0 percent, but will continue its upward trajectory from 0.7 percent in 2024, reaching 1.2 percent in 2026.

China, meanwhile, is expected to maintain healthy growth at 4.8 percent in 2025 and 4.4 percent the following year.

– ‘Higher than expected’ inflation –

But trade wars sparked by Trump’s protectionist policies are due to drive inflation “to be higher than previously expected” levels.

“Core inflation is now projected to remain above central bank targets in many countries in 2026, including the United States,” added the OECD, which advises industrialised nations on policy matters, issues regular forecasts on the global economy and identifies factors that could impact growth.

US inflation is now expected to accelerate to 2.8 percent in 2025, up 0.7 percentage points from the previous projection and above the 2.5 percent figure from 2024.

The OECD said its projections took into account new tariffs between the United States and its neighbours Canada and Mexico, both of whom are likely to be heavily affected by Trump’s policies.

The OECD slashed its projection of Canada’s growth from 2.0 percent to just 0.7 percent, while it now forecasts a 1.3 percent contraction in Mexico’s economy having previously predicted 1.2 percent growth for 2025.

The OECD also took into account new tariffs on trade between the United States and China and those imposed on steel and aluminium, but not any threatened reciprocal levies nor any concerning the European Union.

“European economies will experience fewer direct economic effects from the tariff measures” than Canada and Mexico, the OECD said, “but heightened geopolitical and policy uncertainty is still likely to restrain growth”.

For the second report in succession, the OECD has lowered its growth expectations for both France and Germany — down to 0.8 and 0.4 percent respectively.

Britain’s forecast is also down to just 1.4 percent, with only Spain amongst major European nations bucking the trend and set to maintain its recent strong performance with 2.6 percent growth predicted in 2025.

The OECD said that “significant risks remain” as further tit-for-tat tariffs between major global economies “would hit growth around the world and add to inflation”.

However, one element that could ease the short-term pressure on the global economy is European nations’ vows to boost defence spending in the face of the threat from Vladimir Putin’s Russia and reluctance from Trump to continue Washington’s bankrolling of NATO.

An increase in defence spending could “support growth in the near-term, but potentially add to longer-term fiscal pressures”, the OECD said.

‘Anti-American’? US questions UN agencies, international aid groups

By AFP
March 17, 2025

Nina LARSON

Washington has questioned UN agencies, nonprofits and charities that received US funds on whether they have “communist” links or support “gender ideology,” and other topics targeted by US President Donald Trump, a dozen groups told AFP.

A list of 36 questions was sent to small and large organisations alike as part of Washington’s ongoing review of its vast foreign aid spending.

“I don’t think we have ever received anything like this,” said a staff member at a large humanitarian organisation, speaking on condition of anonymity.

While the questionnaire, obtained by AFP, included typical donor queries about things like “cost-effectiveness” strategies, others seemed crafted to determine if grantees conform with the politics of President Donald Trump’s administration.

One question asked if organisations had “received ANY funding from (China), Russia, Cuba or Iran”, and for confirmation that there are no “DEI elements of the project”, referring to diversity, equity and inclusion, Trump’s bogeyman.

They were also asked to confirm that “this is not a climate or ‘environmental justice’ project”, and that it takes “appropriate measures to protect women and to defend against gender ideology”.

And organisations were asked if they worked “with entities associated with communist, socialist, or totalitarian parties, or any party that espouses anti-American beliefs”.

– ‘Authoritarian’ –

“Authoritarian or anti-American regimes… ironically is a pretty accurate description of the Trump Administration,” Phil Lynch, head of the International Service for Human Rights (ISHR), told AFP.

He said his organisation had “declined to respond” to the questionnaire, adding: “Our grants from the US government have been terminated.”

ISHR was among a long line of organisations, ranging from NGOs to UN agencies, the Red Cross and other large international humanitarian actors, that told AFP they had received the questionnaire.

Many voiced shock at the tone of the queries, sent out following Trump’s decision immediately upon his return to power in January to freeze virtually all US foreign aid pending the review.

The sudden about-face by the country that traditionally has given most has sent the entire humanitarian community into a tailspin.

“It is fair to send out a questionnaire to people you give money to,… but (this questionnaire) doesn’t seem to be adapted to the humanitarian sector,” said a high-level official within a large international aid organisation, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“What we find very problematic is that there are a lot of questions around certain political objectives.”

Lucica Ditiu, head of STOP TB which also received the questionnaire, stressed that donor country had the prerogative to “look at the way their funding is being used”.

She said her organisation, which has traditionally received around half of its funding from the United States, had responded, confirming among other things that no US funds would go to “work related to DEI”.

She meanwhile voiced hope that funds from other donors would allow such work to continue.

– ‘Unclear’ –

Other organisations said they had debated whether or not to respond, as they felt drawn between the threat of losing vital funding and fear they could be construed as sacrificing their principles.

“Whatever the financial implications, ISHR will not resile from its principled commitment to human rights and the rule of law, as well as to values such as diversity, equality and justice,” Lynch said.

A large international aid organisation said it had opted to respond but not without reservations.

“If we are seen as a tool for American foreign policy, it will further jeopardise our work,” the high-level official there said.

“It can create security risks for our staff, it can create a lack of acceptance in communities… (The) potential negative repercussions are quite far-reaching.”

UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters that “a number of UN entities have received questionnaires from the US government”, and would “respond in accordance with their respective rules”.

A spokesperson with UNAIDS, which has counted on the US for half of its budget, confirmed it had received “several different questionnaires from the United States since the new administration arrived”.

“We answer each time.”

The deadlines for responding appear to differ.

One large aid organisation said its deadline fell on the same day as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the completion of the US review.

“If the review is already done, it is unclear to us how they will actually use this information,” an aid agency official said.

The staff member at another large aid organisation agreed.

“Unclear is the keyword of 2025.”

EU warns Trump’s freeze of US-funded media risks aiding enemies


By AFP
March 17, 2025


President Donald Trump has ordered a funding freeze on US-funded outlets such as Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty - Copyright DVIDS/AFP -

The EU on Monday warned that President Donald Trump’s freeze on US-funded media outlets, including Radio Free Europe, risked “benefitting our common adversaries.”

Trump’s administration at the weekend started laying off staff at Voice of America and other broadcasters including Prague-based Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFERL) after freezing their funding.

“We see these media outlets really as beacons of truth, of democracy, and of hope for millions of people around the world,” said European Commission spokeswoman Paula Pinho.

“Freedom of the press… is critical for democracy. And this decision risks benefitting our common adversaries,” she said, without naming countries, groups or individuals.

Pinho added that the freeze would be discussed during a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels on Monday.

Founded by the United States during the Cold War to counter Soviet propaganda, RFE/RL was banned across the communist bloc including former Czechoslovakia, where regimes regularly jammed its signal.

The US-funded media have since focused on countries like Russia, China and Iran.

Asked whether the European Union would “fill the void” left by the United States, Pinho said it would not always be possible for the bloc to do so.

“We are reiterating our support,” she told reporters, adding: “We cannot always step in for the US and for whatever the US stops doing.”

Trump has already eviscerated the United States’ aid agency and its education department.

The media funding freeze affects many other US outlets besides Voice of America and RFERL, including Radio Farda, a Persian-language broadcaster blocked by Iran’s government, and Alhurra, an Arabic-language network established after the Iraq invasion in the face of highly critical coverage by Qatar-based Al-Jazeera.

Iran, China and Russia have all invested heavily in state media outlets created to compete with Western narratives and to push out government lines to foreign audiences.

China calls media outlets facing Trump funding axe ‘notorious’


By AFP
March 18, 2025


Trump signed an order last week freezing Voice of America, Radio Free Asia, Radio Free Europe and other outlets as part of his sweeping cuts to federal government spending - Copyright AFP BONNIE CASH

Beijing on Tuesday said media outlets facing the axe by US President Donald Trump had a “notorious” history of reporting on China, as Cambodia’s autocratic former leader hailed the move for “combating fake news”.

Trump signed an order last week freezing Voice of America (VOA), Radio Free Asia (RFA), Radio Free Europe and other outlets as part of his sweeping cuts to federal government spending.

RFA was created to provide reporting to China, North Korea and other countries in the region with heavily restricted press.

It has reported extensively in recent years on issues highly sensitive to Beijing authorities and other autocratic leaders in Asia.

Asked about Trump’s decision during a daily news briefing, China’s foreign ministry said it did not comment on domestic policies of the US government.

But, said spokeswoman Mao Ning: “I think it is no secret that some of the US media you mentioned have a notorious track record in reporting on China.”

In an editorial, state-backed nationalist tabloid Global Times went further — describing Voice of America as a “lie factory”.

“The so-called beacon of freedom, VOA, has now been discarded by its own government like a dirty rag,” it said.

“The demonising narratives propagated by VOA will ultimately become a laughingstock of the times,” it added.

China has frequently criticised Western media reporting on the country as “biased” and it heavily restricts the operations of domestic news outlets.

Thorny topics covered by RFA and its fellow outlets included China’s alleged large-scale human rights abuses against ethnic minorities in the regions of Xinjiang and Tibet, as well as the crackdown on democratic activists in Hong Kong.

Notably, Radio Free Asia’s reporting is published in a wide range of languages spoken in China, including Tibetan and Uyghur as well as Mandarin and Cantonese.

Related news stories are heavily censored in China’s domestic media environment — and foreign reports on the subjects are blocked online.

The outlets had also long been critical of the influential former leader of Cambodia Hun Sen.

He welcomed the move to cut their funding, praising Trump for “his courage to lead the world in combating fake news, starting with news outlets funded by the US government”.

Hun Sen, who ruled Cambodia with an iron fist for nearly four decades and shut down multiple independent media outlets, has been the subject of critical reporting by VOA and Radio Free Asia.

In 2020, Beijing ordered several US media outlets — including VOA — to declare in writing their staff, finances, operations and real estate in China.

The decree was part of a media row between Washington and Beijing that saw more than a dozen journalists working for US media expelled from China.

Op-Ed: ‘Rotting superpower kills own future’ — Summary of two months of failure


By Paul Wallis
March 17, 2025

DIGITAL JOURNAL


The Canadian and US flags fly near the countries' border in Blackpool, Quebec, Canada - Copyright AFP ANDREJ IVANOV

The world and at least half of America have had a massive allergic reaction to the anything-but-new Trump administration. The administration has perfected a simple routine where whatever it does or says on any subject inevitably blows up in its face.

Tantrums abound—they are the news. The disasters are simply waiting to get a word in edgewise, and that’s not happening yet. Absolutely nothing useful has been achieved.

The rot is deep and getting deeper. This is a corpse saying it feels great and it is great and the gangrene is just a coincidence.

The “achievements” so far include:

Totally antagonizing and infuriating Canada and the European Union in two sentences.

Driving allies away in sheer disgust to the extent of excluding America from major policy initiatives.

Destroying US trade worldwide.

Making the US government administration totally dysfunctional.

Compromising US revenue and increasing Federal debt.

Compromising the Federal budget, which is by now more likely to win a Pulitzer for fiction than any level of credibility.

Ignoring and worsening previously extremely serious domestic economic issues hurting the domestic economy.

Criminality is completely out of control. Agencies are being gutted.

It’s textbook mismanagement. You’d fail first-year economics, unless your teachers lynched you.

Let’s try warily to put an accurate perspective on this mess:

America’s highly insulated bottom-line private capital is usually safe and well out of the danger zone. This time it’s directly in the firing line thanks to property market jitters and capital market spasms. These market volatility moves reflect unstoppable knee jerks, and they’re lethally costly.

The US national sport of fraud is now a large spreading expensive stench and nobody’s winning. People are getting trashed every second. This applies in spades to the capital markets as well. The “living dead of 2008” are still around and so are the people who caused 2008.

Main Street is not remotely in anything like good shape. People are living paycheck to paycheck, plus credit. US retail recorded a coy 0.2% rise in spending in comparison with the official 2.8% inflation rate. That’s less than 1%. Those pockets are hurting, badly.

The future is already buried under decades of neglect.

This almost total negativity in every sector obviously can’t end well. That’s not the problem. The problem is an ongoing legacy of total failure, wrecked lives and multigenerational bankruptcy.

Millennials, Zoomers, and Alphas were already broke and unable to access a viable future. In comparison with the 1950s, they’ve got no way of achieving anything like that standard of living. They already work multiple jobs just to cover daily costs. they can’t buy homes or even have lives to live.

Beware of idiots bearing future disasters.

__________________________________________________
Disclaimer
The opinions expressed in this Op-Ed are those of the author. They do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of the Digital Journal or its members.

 

Some nicotine pouch flavors much more addictive than others

Oxford University Press USA

Facebook

XLinkedInWeChatBlueskyMessageWhatsAppEmail

A new paper in Nicotine & Tobacco Research, published by Oxford University Press, indicates that different nicotine pouches, which have become very popular in recent years, particularly among young people, may influence user preferences very differently. An investigation using rats finds some flavors lead to much more nicotine consumption than others.

According to the World Health Organization, tobacco use remains a major global health threat, with 1.3 billion tobacco users, and 8 million tobacco-related deaths annually. While cigarette smoking is the most prevalent form of tobacco use worldwide, people also use other tobacco products including e-cigarettes, smokeless tobacco, and oral nicotine products.

The rise of oral nicotine products, including gums, pouches, and other novel formats, represents a significant shift in nicotine consumption pattern. For example, there is noted interest in and use of nicotine pouches among adult smokers planning to quit. Young people may perceive nicotine pouches as less addictive, due to their noncombustible form and due to the influence of youth-oriented advertising. US sales of nicotine pouches increased more than 600% between 2019 and 2022.

As the market for oral nicotine products expands, with an increasing diversity in flavors, nicotine concentration, and sources, many observers believe it’s important to investigate the implications of these products on consumer behavior and public health. A recent American national online survey revealed that flavored nicotine use is preferred among youth. Although flavors do not significantly impact nicotine absorption, they significantly influence user satisfaction and increase the likelihood that people will continue using nicotine products.

Researchers from the Yale School of Medicine here investigated the effects of the sweeteners sucrose and saccharin, as well as the commonly used flavor additive cinnamaldehyde (cinnamaldehyde is the principal chemical of cinnamon) on nicotine preference and oral choice behavior in female and male adult Sprague Dawley rats supplied with various nicotine and flavor-enhanced water solutions.

The investigation found that both male and female rats significantly preferred sucrose and saccharin, but not the cinnamon flavor. Moreover, when rats were given a choice of different solutions, rats differentiated between sweet and bitter solutions, with the highest preference for saccharin.

Between different solutions, females showed the highest nicotine preference when combined with sucrose, while males preferred nicotine combined with cinnamon. When rats were given multiple options with saccharin and cinnamaldehyde, saccharin increased nicotine preference in females, but not in males. These findings suggest that sweeteners may play a greater role in nicotine preference for females, while flavors are more influential for males. Consistent with this potential differential extent of flavor effects in females and males, menthol flavoring increases oral nicotine intake and preference in male rats but not in female rats.

“The study examined the choice behaviors between sweetened and flavored solutions, said the paper’s lead author,” Deniz Bagdas. “Females rats showed the highest preference for nicotine when combined with sweeteners, while males showed highest nicotine preference when combined with cinnamon. Understanding the role of sweeteners and flavorants in oral nicotine product appeal can inform regulatory policies and harm reduction strategies.”

The paper, “Effects of Sweeteners and Cinnamon Flavor on Oral Nicotine Choice Behaviors,” is available (at midnight on March 18th) at https://doi.org/10.1093/ntr/ntaf037.

---

Journal

Nicotine & Tobacco Research

DOI

10.1093/ntr/ntaf037 

Method of Research

Experimental study

Subject of Research

Animals

Article Title

Effects of Sweeteners and Cinnamon Flavor on Oral Nicotine Choice Behaviors

Article Publication Date

18-Mar-2025

 

Social media pressures could make friendship a full-time job

Perception of social media features and norms, especially highly visual content and availability expectations, could lead to teens experiencing digital stress that might give rise to fights with friends

Frontier

Facebook

XLinkedInWeChatBlueskyMessageWhatsAppEmail

Friendships are critical parts of our lives. Staying in touch with friends online is crucially important, especially for teenagers. Fostering friendships online, however, takes time and might require near constant availability, which can cause digital stress that can arise when expectations on social media are not met. This in turn, can lead to conflicts among friends.

New research published in Frontiers in Digital Health by scientists in Italy highlights how social media expectations within friend groups and digital stress shape adolescent friendships and conflicts over time.

“We show that adolescents’ perceptions of social media norms and perceptions of unique features of social media contribute to digital stress, which in turn increases friendship conflicts,” said Federica Angelini, a researcher at the University of Padua and first author of the study. “Disappointment from unmet expectations on social media—such as when friends do not respond or engage as expected—is a stronger predictor of friendship conflict than the pressure to be constantly available.”

Left on read

More than 1,100 young people aged between 13 and 18 participated in the study collecting friendship and social media use data at two time points six months apart. In particular, the researchers focused on how teens’ perceived need to be constantly available (entrapment) and feelings of sadness, anger, or frustration that may arise when teens find friends aren’t available to them on social media (disappointment) might lead to digital stress and friendship conflict. 

Disappointment emerged as the behavior that is most likely to lead to squabbles six months after the initial data collection. “Individuals feel let down by their friends’ availability or responsiveness online. This disappointment arises from unmet expectations and leads to negative emotions which can spill over into friendship conflicts,” Angelini said. Entrapment, on the other hand, had less impact on how often conflicts arise, which might be due to constant availability being a normalized aspect of peer relationships.

Images and videos posted to social platforms may play a particularly important role in how social media use can cause friendship conflicts, the researchers found further. “Visual content makes it easier for teens to see what their friends are doing at any given time. If teens notice that their friends are active online or spend time with others while ignoring their messages, they may feel excluded, jealous, or rejected,” Angelini explained. “This heightened awareness can intensify negative emotions and contribute to friendship tension.”

Add friend: Building healthy friendships

The research highlights how social media expectations and digital stress shape adolescent friendships. “Identifying key stressors, for example visual content and availability expectations, and understanding dynamics of online interactions among friends can help educators, parents, and teens develop healthier online habits,” Angelini said. One such habit for teenagers could be setting boundaries, for example scheduling ‘offline’ times or managing notifications. When done in discussion with friends this can also help reduce misunderstandings. “Learning to accept that not every message requires an immediate reply can ease digital stress while maintaining healthy friendships.”

The study provides valuable insights into the inner workings of teenage friendships but has some limitations, the researchers noted. For example, it relies on self-reported assessment of teens’ social media use, which may not fully reflect the reality of social media behaviors. In addition, the six-month time span doesn’t allow for the examination of even longer-term effects. “Future research could use objective measures of social media activity and extend the timeline to better understand how digital stress and friendship conflicts evolve over time,” Angelini recommended.

---

Journal

Frontiers in Digital Health

DOI

10.3389/fdgth.2025.1497222 

Method of Research

Data/statistical analysis

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Digital Stress and Friendship Conflict in Adolescence: The role of Perceived Norms and Features of Social Media

Article Publication Date

18-Mar-2025