CLIMATE CHANGE, CARBON TRADING and ASIA: first futures trading for Asia in Mumbai

India's Multi Commodity Exchange opens Asia's first-ever commodity exchange to offer trades in carbon credits - among the select few including Chicago Climate Exchange and the European Climate Exchange. Carbon credits are generated by enterprises in the developing world by using cleaner technologies and saving on energy consumption. This consequently reduces their greenhouse gas emissions. For each reduced tonne of carbon dioxide emission, an organisation receives a carbon emission certificate, which it can sell, either immediately or through a futures market, just like any other commodity. Only time can tell if we are witnessing a "race to the top" or "tunnelling to the bottom", national gains and sub-national poverty or win-wins??

Source: Business Standard Reporter

Multi Commodity Exchange (MCX), the country’s largest commodity exchange, today launched futures trading in carbon credits - one of the fastest emerging intangible commodities in developing countries including India.The trading unit of carbon credits is fixed at 200 tonne. Today, five annual contracts are available on the platform with respective expiries on 15 December 2008, Dec 2009, Dec 2010, Dec 2011 and Dec 2012.The tick size has been fixed at Re 0.50 per tonne while the exchange has decided to facilitate delivery on the expiry of the respective contracts.The initiative makes it Asia's first-ever commodity exchange and among the select few along with the Chicago Climate Exchange and the European Climate Exchange to offer trades in carbon credits."The launch of carbon credits is significant as more and more countries are adhering to global carbon emission norms," said Joseph Massey, deputy managing director, MCX.Carbon credits are generated by enterprises in the developing world by using cleaner technologies and saving on energy consumption. This consequently reduces their greenhouse gas emissions. For each reduced tonne of carbon dioxide emission, an organisation receives a carbon emission certificate, which it can sell, either immediately or through a futures market, just like any other commodity. Carbon trading is carried out under an UN-mandated international convention on climate change.Under the Kyoto Protocol, carbon credits, or carbon emission reduction certificates, are issued by the executive board of Clean Development Mechanism - the highest international body to register projects and issue credits.

Cameroon: Climate Change Will Have Dreadful Consequences - Experts

Journalists are being trained to keep a keen eye on the potential shocks and trends that climate change will put in motion that can scupper economic growth options for Cameroon.
Source: The Post (Buea) by Kini Nsom & Ernest Sumelong

Climate change may soon have a toll on Cameroon's agriculture, economy and health, experts have revealed.
They raised the concern on Monday, January 14, during a training course on reporting climate change, organised by the British High Commission in Yaounde."Our activities - felling trees, burning bushes and emitting gases into the atmosphere - have direct consequences on our environment. We must regulate them to prevent impending consequences of climate change," Dr. Gabriel Tchatat, one of the facilitators told The Post.
Tchatat said global warming, which is an indicator of climate change, will cause the disappearance of watersheds, savannah and lakes like the Lake Chad watershed and so on.
According to him, demography, agriculture, industries, urbanisation, deforestation etc., cause climate change.
Other facilitators - Drs. Joseph Amougou, Jacob Tche and Ernest Moloua - corroborated Tchatat; adding that there can hardly be economic development in Cameroon without considering climate change.
"Everybody is concerned about this; there would be loss of biodiversity, fertile lands and increase in pests. "Agriculture contributes 40 percent of the Gross Domestic Product, GDP, and that is really important for our economy," Dr. Moloua posited.
"Without integrating climate change in every project, there can be no development," Amougou argued.The researchers cited residents of Douala and the northern provinces of Cameroon who are already suffering from excessive heat and diseases.
Climate change became a major concern when President Paul Biya addressed the UN General Assembly in Geneva in November 2007. He announced the creation of the Climate Change Observatory, even though it is yet to go operational.
However, the researchers faulted government for failing to make concrete efforts in spite of its pledge to fight climate change. They also said government has failed to communicate and get the population involved. Administrative authorities at the training admitted that communication is important if the population must understand and participate in the fight.
Thus, the facilitators maintained that journalists must, through environmental reports, educate the population on what role they can and should play in fighting climate change.
Meanwhile, the course instructor Janet Barrie, former BBC news presenter, urged reporters to write stories that will cause people to act.

CLIMATE CHANGE and The Famous SHORT ECONOMIST: Stern resources online

Rabett Run has a long list of resources online about Stern Review including from the CC Economist himself, supplementary material, critiques from Nordhaus, Varian, Stiglitz, etc. Well worth a browse ... well that's my weekend reading taken care of! [btw, couldnt find a picture online of Stern standing next to anyone for perspective ... so u will have to take my word for it!]

CLIMATE CHANGE, BUSINESS AND EQUITY: Its all about the money ...

Source: ClimateCorp.com - “Bali Special Report – was it good for business?” By Zara Maung

The logistical challenge of tackling climate change was displayed perfectly at the UN climate conference in Bali, Indonesia, by the constant stream of taxis queuing up to ferry conference attendees from one five star hotel in Nusa Dua to another. A modest free bike hire service did exist for the event but unfortunately bike lanes didn’t.
The Bali bicycle analogy also sums up the businesses’ approach at the post-Kyoto political negotiations: “We can run the low carbon economy” was the message to governments, “but you need to build the infrastructure to make it work”.

The balance sheet
Although businesses were not included in the negotiations at Bali, business and investors organisations such as the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) and International Emissions Trading Association (IETA) had a strong presence at the conference side events. The general attitude from companies towards the political process at Bali was a mixture of idealist hope for a global plan on combating climate change, along with increasing frustration that the politicisation of climate change was in fact holding back meaningful progress.
The main factors holding businesses back from investing in low carbon solutions are price, price and more price. The price of developing new technologies is too high, the price of carbon is too unstable, the prices consumers are willing to pay for low carbon goods is not high enough – all were recurring comments from businesses throughout the conference.
So what did they get in return for their pleas for better market conditions? Well, Yvo de Boer, general secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), came to the press on week one of the conference with a very clear view of what needed to be done to drive private low carbon investment. Quoting figures from the UNFCCC report on investment and financial flows, which was published shortly before the talks, he noted how much global investment and financial flows relied on private sector involvement - 86 per cent of it to be precise.
He acknowledged that businesses would need policy certainty, incentives to invest in new technologies and that international and public capital would need to be channelled towards climate friendly and climate proof investments. “The problem is that governments don’t want to pay for all of this” he told the press frankly.
The frustration of knowing what needed to be done set against all the political stalling that occurred (alongside serious sleep deprivation) would have driven any sane man to tears by the end of the talks. Many of the developing countries, who could only afford to send two or three delegates to the conference compared to the large team from the US, simply had to drop out of the talks at times due to sheer exhaustion, which might in part explain the raw deal they ended up with on adaptation funding. The meagre fund is to contain money collected from a 2 per cent adaptation levy on Kyoto Clean Development Mechanism projects, the emissions abatement projects in the developing world that fuel the carbon markets with tradable credits.
Being an outsider, following the last few days of negotiations was a little like waiting at the hospital bed of a comatosed patient. There was nothing much going on but you still hung on day and night waiting for some signs of life. Luckily Al Gore’s refreshing speech provided welcome respite and the waiting paid off. At the end of the talks we were proudly presented with a somewhat patchy but promising Post-2012 road map. The road map was so called because of its express purpose to lead countries towards a post-2012 agreement in Copenhagen at the end of 2009.

Policy certainty
After 13 consecutive years of UNFCCC conferences and 10 years of Kyoto, it’s becoming increasingly clear that the best these global powwows on climate change can give us is an indication of what might happen policy wise on the national scale. Even the Kyoto Protocol, as low as its 5 per cent emissions reductions targets for 2012 were, could not prevent Japan, Canada and a host of European countries from emitting over their limits.
Accordig to media reports at the end of 2007, Japan, Italy and Spain face payments of as much as $33 billion in carbon credits combined for failing to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions as promised under the Kyoto treaty. Other analogies at the national level include the bi-lateral deals on technology transfer being brokered between the US and Asia.
Nevertheless, some measures agreed under the Bali road map had good prospects. Promises by developing countries to measure and cut their emissions suggested that we can expect a stronger focus on renewables and energy efficiency policies in the big emitter nations such as China and India.
The much anticipated REDD policy, a handy acronym for “Reducing emissions from deforestation in developing countries” also came into swing. Deemed of high importance because deforestation is estimated to account for 20 per cent of global emissions, countries agreed to work on methods to preserve tropical forests, the type of forest best suited to absorbing carbon.
Providing disputes over indigenous peoples’ rights are peaceably settled, it seems the post 2012 future for forests may be based on selling avoided deforestation credits, with governments being issued the credits by a UN authoritative body for preserving their trees. Some impoverished forested states, such as Indonesia’s West Papua and Aceh are taking the hint and trying to get in on the act early. They plan to seize on the new confidence in forestry credits to sell them on the voluntary markets as soon as possible.
Developing countries lost out at the talks. Promises by developed countries to transfer technology to developing nations (which have lingered unfulfilled since the start of Kyoto) continue to be vague. China did however manage to bully the European Union and US on the last day of the talks into agreeing to measure and report on their contributions to technology transfer.
Downright negative was the agreement to set up an inadequate adaptation fund for developing countries. The fund will also be unpredictable, with the amount raised from the CDM levy estimated at somewhere between $80-300 million by 2012. This is hardly a drop in the ocean for places like Bangladesh, which already needs emergency flood prevention and management measures costing billions of dollars.
Calls from the finance world and development NGOs, before the talks, to simplify the Clean Development Mechanism’s overly bureaucratic registration process seemed to go unheeded. The problem of finding buyers for existing CDM carbon credits was tackled via the launch of a (somewhat bizarre) website called www.cdmbazaar.com, the CDM’s own matchmaking website, where buyers and sellers of carbon credits are able to make contact.

Technology hurdles
Vague promises from rich countries to transfer clean tech to poor ones tend to fall down on two counts: firstly private companies, not countries, own much of the technology in the first place; secondly developed countries are not putting enough money into clean tech investment in their own countries, let alone being in a position to transfer the technology. Sun Guoshun, a Chinese delegate at the Bali conference explained that China desperately needed clean coal technology from America. Cedric Philibert from the International Energy Agency pointed out, however, that these technologies, including Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) technology and carbon capture and storage were yet to reach the commercial stage.
The Bali talks brought countries one step closer to accepting carbon capture and storage in geological formations for use in CDM projects. More is to be decided on this front at the 2008 conference in Poznan, Poland. The notion that fossil fuels could continue to be used “in a clean way” was a strong concept at Bali but the challenge remains to prove that the technology works and that high costs of CO2 storage can be drastically reduced.
The riddle of bringing clean technologies to the commercial stage is one that governments and companies alike are failing to solve. Clean tech solutions already exist in many cases but commercial take up is low. Examples include the revolutionising low cost, low carbon French invention, the MDI air car, which runs on compressed air. The car has been ready for years but big manufacturers have not yet taken the bait (save India’s Tata Motors, which had promised to produce 8000 air cars this year). Not surprisingly, the rapidly developing markets in India and China are finding opportunities in the area of clean tech. Ten years on, they might have turned the issue of technology transfer completely on its head.

Nasty leakage
It would be impossible to sum up the global political process on climate change without mentioning “leakage”. It doesn’t sound very pleasant and indeed to most Kyoto signatories it is not. From the time developed countries started to address their responsibilities to tackle climate change at Kyoto in 1997, factories that have been leaving developed countries in droves, looking for cheaper manufacturing processes in developing countries.
Leakage refers to the emissions that have leaked out of one country into another when a factory has relocated. A paper released by Chinese academics in 2007 relating 25 per cent of China’s greenhouse gas emissions directly to US and European supply chains. China, for example, provides the leading global supply of steel, which requires a dirty, high carbon manufacturing process part of which was transferred from Europe in the 1990s.
Unfortunately the term used by developed countries for leakage until now has been “emissions reductions” - emissions reductions that count towards Kyoto targets.
“Kyoto signatories have to be responsible for the emissions of factories that have moved to other countries since the Kyoto agreement”, argued Kevin Conrad, one of the more outspoken delegates for Papua New Guinea at Bali (who famously told the US to “get out of the way”).
The leakage debate is picking up steam as developing countries are being pressured into making their own emissions reductions, and is sure to be tackled in more depth in coming talks, though the outcome is entirely uncertain. Companies hoping to ‘offshore’ their emissions in response to the introduction of cap and trade schemes may want to take note however.
Already a form of environmental protectionism is being hinted at in the EU, with suggestions of a carbon tariff on dirty imports. These measures are popular with the diminishing German steel industry, whose production processes are three times less carbon intensive than China’s.

Going it alone

Despite numerous complications in the move towards the elusive low carbon economy, forward thinking companies were keen to point out at Bali that they had made the most of the opportunities so far. Most moves were made in the carbon markets, which are set to take off globally.
The long term price of carbon was subject to much speculation at Bali. Whilst some banks have taken pains to predict accurate price for carbon on the European Union’s Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS), other investors, such as Fortis bank predict the price of carbon could be anywhere between zero and 100 Euros over the coming phases of the scheme.
Karen Degouve from the European Carbon Fund, a CDM project investor, concurred with Fortis at an IETA event, saying, “Prices could go anywhere from zero to the roof”.
Cmpanies seemed to agree that we would soon see a global roll out of mandatory carbon markets. “We’re going to see multiple markets although a unique carbon price might not happen for another 10 years” said Degouve.
This could include Japan, Canada, Australia, US – all of which have started voluntary carbon markets.
Mile Bess from Camco International, a big CDM project developer, predicted that within two to three years “the biggest game in town” would no longer be the EU ETS. Bess said the EU scheme was “a valuable model”, although he expected a mandatory US market to start to take over, acting as a driver for carbon markets globally.
“What we need to see is what happens post-tightening”, he said, referring to the reduction in emissions allowances given to EU nations under each four-year phase of the ETS. Phase I of the ETS collapsed after emissions allowances were too generous, and the price of carbon dropped to around 1 cent, so all eyes are now on phase II, which started in January 2008, and the time of writing stood at €22 per tonne of CO2.
Fabian Gaioli, from Morgan Stanley’s MGM International, another CDM project developer, warned that carbon credits under the CDM may become more expensive, as the highly profitable ‘low hanging fruit’ HFCs reduction projects start to dry up. HFCs are very potent greenhouse gases - around 1300 times more potent than CO2. Projects may move towards renewable energy and energy efficiency, he said, but will require more capital to set up and offer less returns.

Fate of the CDM
The Australian renewables company Pacific Hydro has been making the most out of the Kyoto Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), having directed much of its new investment $ 0.5 billion so far, into developing countries, such as Chile, where the company’s wind and hydro projects have earned money from carbon credits. However, the future of the CDM is left hanging in the balance from 2012 onwards, when the first phase of Kyoto ends. According to JP Morgan’s Odin Knudson, who spoke at an Asian Development Bank side event, companies were being dissuaded from getting involved in setting up CDM projects every year the uncertainty continued.
Pacific Hydro chief executive Andrew Richards expressed the same sentiments, complaining at a WBCSD event about the lack long term planning on the international level. “Nothing exists beyond 2012 except fairly long term targets” he explained, referring to the faraway target of a 50 per cent cut in the global emissions of 2000 by 2050, which was set by scientists at the IPCC.

Business technology
Technology transfer was a hot debated topic amongst businesses at Bali. David Hone, climate change manager at the energy company Shell, stood up at the WBCSD event to explain all the difficulties of getting clean coal technology to the market. He compared our relatively primitive coal technology to the fast moving electronics industry pointing out the fundamental difference between them. Without consumers willing to pay the extra for their energy, as they would for the latest electrical gadget, the development of the product could not be funded.
Richards meanwhile bashed the “politicisation of technology”, arguing that clean coal was “not a cure all” solution.
Jonathon Lash, head of the World Resources Institute attempted to convince us that the world would see an “explosion of low carbon technologies” over the next ten years, driven by a price on carbon, which he believed would be a steady $25 a ton in the US within five years. Once a green technology booms in one country, said Lash, it will spill over national boundaries regardless of politics, driven by consumer demand. He used the example of GE’s Ecoimagination energy efficient products, which he said cost $100 million to market but in the long run added to GE’s value by 10 cents a share. Proving his point that technology has no boundaries, 65 per cent of ecoimagination sales were outside of the US.

Domestic solutions
Although it has its faults, the strength of international meetings such as Bali is that they allow fresh ideas and sometimes painful truths to be unearthed about how countries deal with climate change. Despite the political charades, it is the ripple effect of positive agreements on the international level within nations, businesses and consumers that matters. The global talks will continue, but meanwhile the real action on climate change will happen at home

Climate Change and Poverty Top Google's Giving Priorities

Good to see Google.org is listening to someone - maybe even Tall Economist [!]. Google will be focusing on Climate change and poverty - let's hope it will marry these two rather than discretely focus and report on each ...

Source: The Chronicle of Philanthropy
Tackling climate change, emerging health threats, and poverty in developing countries will top Google.org’s philanthropic agenda
After more than a year of research and planning, the charitable arm of the Mountain View, Calif., search-engine company announced today the focus for its efforts over the next five to 10 years:
To support efforts that make plug-in hybrid electric vehicles commercially available. Such cars are essentially hybrids with larger batteries that can be recharged from a standard outlet, which further reduces the amount of gas needed to run them.
To support the development of renewable energy sources that can be produced on a large scale and at a lower cost than conventional energy sources, such as coal.
To support efforts to make it easier for small and medium-size businesses in developing countries to gain access to the capital and expertise they need to grow and create more jobs.
To support projects that improve the flow of information related to public services, such as education, health, water, and sanitation, in developing countries. This program, known as the Inform and Empower Initiative, will focus on India and East Africa at the start.
To support efforts to identify emerging health and environmental threats, such as infectious diseases or drought, and take steps to mitigate their impact and prevent them from becoming local, regional, or global crises.
‘Best Solutions’
Google’s decision to operate its philanthropic arm largely as a for-profit entity gives it the ability to make both grants to nonprofit organizations and investments in for-profit companies involved in solving social problems. To date, Google.org’s giving and investments total $75.4-million.
In the program to promote plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, for example, Google.org has awarded $1-million in grants to nonprofit organizations, such as CalCars and Plug-In America, that raise public awareness about the cars. But it also has issued a call for proposals for $10-million in investments.
“We want to be open if the best solution is in the private sector or if the best solution to a given problem is to invest in a for-profit company,” says Jacquelline Fuller, head of advocacy and communications at Google.org.
Google.org has already made investments of $10-million each in eSolar, a company in Pasadena, Calif., that builds solar power plants, and Makani Power, an Alameda, Calif., wind-energy company.
Operating as part of the company, rather than as a corporate foundation, also gives Google.org greater latitude in lobbying and advocacy, something Ms. Fuller expects the organization will take greater advantage of now that it has decided its top priorities.
“Advocacy really is a tool that can be used to advance an agenda, but you first have to get very clear about what you’re trying to do,” she says.
Early ‘Flag’
Google didn’t always plan to take a hybrid approach to its philanthropy. Early on, the company set up the Google Foundation, which still exists today, with an endowment of $90-million.
One of the first grants that the foundation wanted to make was to the One Laptop Per Child Foundation, in Cambridge, Mass. The organization’s mission was close enough to Google’s business that foundation officials worried the grant could be construed as aiding the company.
“That was a flag early on” for the Google executives leading the company’s philanthropic efforts, says Ms. Fuller.
“They began asking questions like, ‘What really are the pros and cons of doing this so separate as a 501c(3)?’ and realized that it was preferable for Google — not for everyone, but for Google — to hold the majority of its resources outside of a foundation structure,” she says.
In 2004, before Google went public, the company’s founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, wrote a letter that said they wanted to use 1 percent of the company’s equity and 1 percent of profits to support philanthropic work, a total that Ms. Fuller says currently comes to almost $2-billion.
But while Google.org relishes the freedom its largely for-profit status affords, the organization does also make grants to charities. In fact, one of its first projects was to create a new nonprofit organization: Innovative Support to Emergencies, Diseases and Disasters, or Instedd.
The new organization will seek to improve the early detection of global health threats and humanitarian crises, as well as the process of preparing for and responding to them, by working with governments, health and relief organizations, and scientists to develop software and other technology tools to improve the sharing of information and collaboration. In addition to a $5-million grant from Google.org, the organization has also received financial support from the Rockefeller Foundation and contributions from several philanthropists.
Instedd’s first project will be to work with 20 partners on efforts to identify emerging infectious diseases and improve the ability to respond to them in Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam, and Yunnan Province in southern China.
“We are so connected as a global population now with travel and trade,” says Eric Rasmussen, the new organization’s chief executive officer. Before joining Instedd in October, Dr. Rasmussen served as chairman of the department of medicine at the Naval Hospital Bremerton, near Seattle. “If we do not spot [health] events transpiring early enough, it doesn’t take much for them to escape.”
Instedd’s software engineers will first look at existing technologies to see how they can be adapted for disease tracking and humanitarian response, only developing new software when other options can’t be found. Engineers have already built several tools using technologies from Microsoft, Google, Facebook, and Twitter.
Other large grants include a $3-million award to TechnoServe for its efforts to support businesses, spur job creation, and strengthen antipoverty programs in Africa; $2.5-million to the Global Health and Security Initiative, which tracks international biological threats; and $2-million to Prath am, in Mumbai, to study India’s educational system.
Staff of 40
Google.org currently has 40 employees, and plans to add a few more staff members now that its giving and investment priorities have been established.
Employees have come from various backgrounds, and include an epidemiologist, a former vice president at Goldman Sachs, and a former assistant secretary of energy.
Google.org has already seen the value of building a team comprising people with different training and backgrounds, says Ms. Fuller.
“There was a lot of tears and angst to go from a white sheet of paper down to five initiatives,” she says. “It was really good as we were in the room trying to narrow it down to have people with these different perspectives talking about how they thought we could best contribute.”
Google.org hopes that it will be able to encourage other corporations to both increase their giving and to think about it more creatively.
But Ms. Fuller says that the organization is uncomfortable with the excitement Google’s entry into philanthropy has caused.
“We don’t feel like we are sprinting on the scene with the answers,” she says. “We’ve got a lot to learn from others. So we really disagree with the slant that some people are trying to take, that this is new or different or better. It’s just that this is Google’s way of doing things.”

CLIIMATE CHANGE AND GLOBAL ECONOMIC EQUITY: Zoellick/ World Bank's take; CC is a core development and economic challenge

Developing nations hit hardest, least able to adapt. Zoellick report the World Bank will help by integrating climate change adaptation and mitigation into core development work, providing innovative and below-market rate financing, markets, technology and research. The TallEconomist salutes this approach, but asks if simply assuming climate change as a development risk is enough? I am keen to see the WB find innovative ways of leveraging the carbon credit that developing countires have - making their ecological space work for them. Can the WB give voice to these concerns at an international level? Can the WB be the developing nations' champion and not just its donor? Skeptically, I see nothing here that diverges from core World Bank work - I hope the reality of operationalising this programme in developing countries will yield the success the WB so sorely needs and doesnt backtrack on the promise the countries so heartily need.

Source: NYT Blogs, map: Distribution of Climate Change Risks, World Bank, October 2007, IDA and Climate Change: Making Climate Action Work for Development, mimeo.





Q. Citizens in developing countries are most vulnerable to the impacts of climate changes now in progress on a global scale. The changes in the weather patterns, from droughts to flooding, will affect the poorest in those countries. How is the World Bank dealing with the phenomenon of unprecedented climate change in its poverty reduction strategy, if at all?
Rita ChangHong Kong


A. Rita, you are correct. As you can see in the attached map, poor countries are much more likely to be affected by droughts, poor crop yields, floods, hurricanes and wind storms – likely consequences of climate change. Since 2000, poor countries have experienced three times more floods and twice as many wind storms than they did 20 years ago. And the poor people in these countries – people who live on less than $2 a day –are the most affected and least able to adjust. Climate change is not only an immense environmental threat; it is a core development and economic challenge.
This is why at the recent Bali conference on climate change, I outlined how the World Bank Group can support developing countries as they combine growth and development with protection of the environment.
How can the World Bank Group help?
• First, by integrating climate change adaptation and mitigation into core development work. Climate change policies cannot be the frosting on the cake of development. They must be baked into the recipe of growth and social development. We can help countries incorporate climate change and low-carbon plans into agriculture and land use policies, urban development strategies, water policies, transport plans and so forth.
• Second, we can help by providing innovative and below-market rate financing to promote investments both in low-carbon and adaptation projects. We already do this through the Global Environment Facility and Carbon Finance. We will do more thanks to donor governments contributing record sums to the latest replenishment of the International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank’s fund for the poorest countries. We will also work with donors to develop new funding innovations.
• Third, we will pioneer and advance new market and trading mechanisms, such as for carbon trading.
• Fourth, recognizing the vital importance of new technologies that can generate energy while limiting the impact on climate, we are working with partners on new financing and incentives schemes to facilitate technology deployment and transfer to developing countries. Some will involve alternative energy. But given the high use of coal in developing countries, it would help enormously if we could help develop and disseminate, for example, carbon sequestration technologies.
• Fifth, the sums involved are too large to handle with public funds, so we need to encourage policy changes to help create an enabling environment to tap resources from the private sector. IFC, the private sector arm of the World Bank Group, can help spur these investments.
• Sixth, we will work with developing countries to support policy research on climate change and development to help share information and tools for analyzing the impacts and developing cost-effective strategies. We are now working with six large countries on customized assessments of pathways to low-carbon growth.
• Finally, if we are able to advance these six activities, we should have the experience and knowledge to play a supportive role to the UN and the negotiating partners as they develop a new climate change agreement.
Let me give you a concrete example of how we are helping negotiators develop a post-Kyoto Protocol.
Deforestation and change in land use accounts for about 20 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, and over a third of emissions from developing countries. In many developing countries, deforestation and forest degradation account for a majority of the carbon emissions. However, the Kyoto Protocol does not include a mechanism for rewarding reduced emissions from deforestation and degradation in developing countries: It rewards countries for planting trees, but does not encourage them to keep trees standing. So with the support of 10 donors, the World Bank has launched a Carbon Forest Partnership Facility. It will pilot incentives to communities for reducing emissions from deforestation while improving their livelihoods and safeguarding indigenous peoples. By highlighting this concept and showing a way to address it financially, the World Bank helped advance its inclusion in the framework that was agreed among negotiators at the Bali Conference.
I cannot end this entry without mentioning that the World Bank Group is carbon-neutral!

KENYA's poor farmers hard hit by political unrest

Mounting evidence that Kenyan political situation is harming the country's exports and that this isplacing costs squarely on the small-scale farmers involved with the export horticulture trade. Most of these farmers are GLOBALGAP certified - but the realy question is - will this certification count for anything in the market after political storms have stilled?

Source: The Nation (Nairobi)
Horticultural farmers in Murang'a North and South Districts have lost millions of shillings since the post-election unrest begun.
Most affected are French beans growers who have depended on the crop as the sole source of income for years.
Thousands of tonnes have gone to waste due to lack of markets, while middle men take advantage of the situation to give the farmers a raw deal.
Farmers have to contend with the situation and watch helplessly as their produce goes to waste, due to lack of storage facilities and lack of access to markets.
The area has about 23 French beans buying centres.
Before the skirmishes, each of the centres was handling an average of 1,200 kilogrammes of the produce daily.
"We invested heavily, hoping to catch good markets in January and February that would help us raise school fees for our children and meet other requirements," said Ms Agnes Wanjira.
Like many other farmers in the upper side of Murang'a North District, she diversified from coffee to French beans' farming, due to better and faster returns.
Farmers say major buyers have not bought the produce since the day of elections. Though the farmers would have wished to sell the beans to brokers at throw away prices, the middlemen traders could not cope with the high supplies and only bought a little.
"Most of these traders sell in the normal local markets and could not buy in bulky. They offered as little as Sh10 per kilogram compared to major buyers like Frigoken Company that paid Sh30 per kilo of the beans," said Ms Wanjira from Mugoiri.
The beans require frequent picking to maximise production and turn into waste if not harvested in time. After picking, they need to be stored in a freezer, something the farmers do not have.
"Buyers tell us they would be taking a risk in buying the beans since they are not guaranteed of delivering the purchases to their stores and other destinations," Mr Irungu said

CLIMATE CHANGE and WHALES: Greenpeace hypocrisy? or a globally sustainable trade-off?

Greenpeace are claiming success after chasing Japanese whalers from the seas around Antarctica. That is, they have successfully chased away internationally sanctioned activities of one of the least efficient fishery nations in the world. And made it even less efficient. What is the carbon cost of stopping the whale hunt? Why does Greenpeace feel it is fine to expend tonnes of carbon stopping legal whale hunts but also lambast developing world farmers for flying their produce to supermarkets? Dont forget the fleet they are chasing is becoming more inefficient by the day and will be going at high speeds, burning more and more fossil fuel. AND dont forget the value of the whale meat is increasing as the story is splashed across the press.

Maybe they are Economists and have done a calculation that shows each whale saved/ life extended is worth XX tonnes of carbon. My question is "Dear Mrs Greenpeace, is one whale life worth more or less than one African farmer?". What do you think the answer will be? Comments in civil tongue this time please ...

Source: www.chinaview.cn -- "Greenpeace: Japanese whalers chased from Antacrtica"
BEIJING, Jan. 14 (Xinhuanet) -- Greenpeace activists claimed Sunday they had chased Japanese whaling ships Nisshin Maru and Yushin Maru through dense fog and over hundreds of miles, driving them out of the whaling grounds off Antarctica.
"We came here to stop the fleet from whaling and we have done that. Now they are out of the hunting grounds they should stay out," said Greenpeace Japan campaigner Sakyo Noda.
But Greenpeace added that it expects the ships to refuel and offload whale meat onto a tanker outside the whale grounds, raising the possibility that the ships might try to return.
Greenpeace's ship Esperanza confronted the Japanese whalers in the Antarctic Ocean early Saturday after a 10-day search, and the hunting ships immediately steamed off with the activists in pursuit, the environmentalists said in a statement.
They warned they would take non-violent action to try to stop the ships from killing whales — a promise that in the past has led to activists in speed boats trying to put themselves between whales and Japanese harpoons, and once to a collision of ships.
A spokesman for Japan's whale hunt called Greenpeace's actions illegal and demanded it stop its disruptive actions.
"Greenpeace actions are illegal under international law (and) it's time the public stopped treating Greenpeace as heroes," Glenn Inwood, spokesman for the Institute of Cetacean Research, in Tokyo, Japan, said Monday. "It's time the public saw this fringe group for what they really are: environmental imperialists who are trying to dictate their morals to the world."
Japan dispatched its whaling fleet to the icy water of Antarctica in November to kill about 1,000 whales under a program that Tokyo says is for scientific purposes, but which anti-whaling nations and activists scoff at as a front for commercial whaling.

CLIMATE CHANGE AND EQUITY: Can Crops Be Climate-Proofed?

Source: SciDev.Net (London) and AllAfrica
Climate change threatens food crops across the world. Now scientists are re-focusing their efforts on crop resilience, rather than yields.
Among the most worrying aspects of climate change is its effects on the world's food supply. The worst-case scenario is stark: Africa's Sahel region will produce fewer cereals, rice cultivation in Asia will be under threat, there will be fewer vegetables -- with potatoes and beans potentially wiped out -- and livestock and fisheries will be severely stressed.
Climate change is making crop scientists review their research agenda. Until now, their main focus was on improving yields. But with successive International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports warning that increased droughts and floods will shift crop systems, 'climate-proofing' of crops has become crucial. The Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) institutes are now investigating how to make crops' more resilient to environment stresses.
Working blind
But efforts are hampered because few climate models predict changes for individual regions, making it difficult to predict how climate change will affect growth and yields of specific crops in each region.
"A partnership between climatologists and crop scientists will be valuable in developing regional analogues," says Martin Parry, IPCC co-chair and a scientist at the UK-based Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research.
And the need is urgent. At a meeting of CGIAR institutes in Hyderabad, India, in November 2007, Parry said that the estimated window for implementing mitigation and adaptation programmes has shrunk from 30-40 years to 15.
He advised CGIAR scientists to put climate change at the heart of research programmes.
Others agree. As Kwesi Atta-Krah, deputy director-general of the Italy-based research organisation Biodiversity International says, "Plant breeders now need to focus on the future as well as the present, and use the vast genetic resources in gene banks and in the wild that hold potential for adaptation of major crops to a changing climate."
Rice crops most vulnerable
Rice crops are most vulnerable to global warming. Studies worldwide show that rising carbon dioxide levels may initially increase growth, but the benefit is temporary. Rising temperatures make rice spikelets -- the slender branches containing rice flowers -- sterile, and grain yields will fall.
Asia and sub-Saharan Africa will be amongst the most severely affected by climate change. About 90 per cent of the world's rice is grown and consumed in Asia (where 70 per cent of the world's poor live), and sub-Saharan Africa is the world's fastest growing rice consumer. The most vulnerable agricultural systems are the rain-fed uplands and lowlands that form almost 80 per cent of total rice land in Africa.
Reiner Wassman, coordinator of the Rice and Climate Change Consortium at the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in the Philippines, says IRRI strategies should include breeding rice that can survive climate change. He wants to see plants that can tolerate higher temperatures and/or flooding, that flower in the mornings before temperatures rise, and that transpire (lose water through evaporation from leaves) more efficiently to cool the air around them.
His hopes are buoyed by IRRI's latest research into the rice line 'sub1', which survived submersion for 17 days (see Scientists create flood-resistant rice). The line could provide genes for flood tolerance.
In Africa, the Africa Rice Centre (WARDA) is focusing on its NERICA (New Rice for Africa) varieties. These combine traits of Africa's Oryza glaberrima -- such as drought and local disease tolerance -- with the high yields of Asia's Oryza sativa.
Looming disaster for wheat?
Drought is also a big concern for the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre (CIMMYT) in El Batan, Mexico. The IPCC's predictions of increasing droughts spell disaster for half of the developing world's wheat growing areas.
The problem is particularly acute in central and west Africa, where the poor depend on wheat but get an annual rainfall of less than 350 mm, says CIMMYT scientist Rodomiro Ortiz.
CIMMYT has launched a hunt for drought tolerance in wild wheats and 'landraces' -- traditional crops that have adapted to local conditions over centuries. The centre is also teaming up with the Japan International Research Centre for Agricultural Sciences to map drought-tolerant genes in wheat and maize.
CIMMYT is using its findings in both traditional breeding and genetic engineering programmes. For example, researchers are working on genetically engineered wheat containing the DREB gene of Arabidopsis thaliana -- a relative of mustard plants -- that may confer tolerance to drought, saline soils and low temperatures. CIMMYT is testing yields of genetically engineered plants with the DREB gene under varying water stress.
However, Ortiz cautions that the plant is still experimental. Most published studies simulated drought conditions in greenhouses more rapidly than would occur naturally. Ortiz wants more experiments under natural water stress conditions.
Shrinking diversity
Scientists look for useful genes in plants grown only locally, and CIMMYT already has maize breeding programmes that work with local communities. But researchers fear many useful wild species could disappear.
"Climate change is leading to significant losses of genetic resources in several regions of the world," says Atta-Krah. He says diversity among crop species must be effectively conserved, managed, and used to improve crops and adapt to climate change.
One striking example of shrinking diversity is Latin America's beans. Peter Jones, a scientist at the International Centre for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) in Columbia, says that of the 17 wild species of the Arachis genus -- the pea family that includes the peanut -- 12 will be extinct by 2055 due to climate change.
We must systematically map important bean species and ensure important collections have more than five live specimens, adds Jones.
The world's livestock are also in the danger zone. A 2006 assessment of global animal genetic resources by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization estimated that 70 per cent of the world's unique livestock are in developing countries. Many breeds already risk extinction. On average, one livestock breed is lost every month, mainly due to globalisation of livestock markets.
Climate change will strike further blows. According to the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) in Kenya, climate change will affect livestock by changing the yield and nutritional quality of their fodder, increasing disease and disease-spreading pests, reducing water availability, and making it difficult to survive in extreme environments.
"Climate change will have impacts at the ecosystem level that are poorly understood," says ILRI's deputy director-general for research, John McDermott. Effects will vary between the rain-fed highlands in the Great Lakes region of eastern Africa, the coastal regions of south, east and west Africa, and the forests of central Africa. The exact consequences for each ecosystem need to be analysed in detail.
Water holds the key
The common theme in all these changes is water availability. Already, one-third of the world's people live in river basins where they face water scarcity. But climate change will have other effects on agricultural irrigation.
The timing and size of river flows will change, affecting river water schemes, says Colin Chartres, director-general of the Sri-Lanka-based International Water Management Institute. He adds that receding glaciers mean less water will be available in spring, which could affect some 17 per cent of the world's population, including those irrigating the Indus basin. Changes in groundwater recharge could also affect irrigation in China, India, Mexico and the United States.
Chartes says scientists need to go beyond coarse global models, and develop specific river-basin and farm-scale models of how climate change will affect river water availability and lake levels. He also calls for more precise models of how climate change may affect fish productivity in oceans, seas and inland fisheries.
A tentative start
As the problems become apparent, CGIAR centres are working on better understanding their implications.
The India-based International Centre for Research in Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) research strategy for 2007-2012 targets climate change issues in the short- and medium-to-longer term.
ICRISAT director-general, William Dar, says ICRISAT is working to make millets, sorghum, pigeon pea and groundnut better adapted to major climate stresses. The organisation has already developed varieties tolerant to heat, high soil temperatures, low and variable rainfall, and diseases.
What is needed now, says Dar, is a better knowledge of the physiology behind stress tolerance, wider gene pools, and more effective screening methods for useful genes.
CIAT is developing computer software to analyse future climate scenarios. Examples include 'MarkSim' to simulate daily weather for up to 100 years anywhere in the tropics, and 'Homologue' to compare climate and soil throughout the tropics.
The International Centre for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA) has studied how areas in and around Egypt, Morocco and Sudan are coping with water scarcity in rainfed and irrigated grasslands, as well as traditional watershed management systems.
But the task ahead is tough. As Jones points out, historically the average time between scientists beginning to hunt for useful traits and a new stable variety growing in farmers' fields has been 46 years. "So that is how far ahead we should be looking at the start of every project," he says.
And as one participant at the Hyderabad conference commented, "You may put all those traits for tolerance to drought, salt and pests in a plant -- and then find it has no yield!"

CLIMATE CHANGE AND ECONOMIC EQUITY: Biofuel incentives still forgetting about deforestation

In the face of mounting evidence that jatropha and other biofuel options are environmentally damaging to produce - monoculture issues, pollution, deforestation, short-term fertile cycles on land, land grabbing, loss of community benefits, elite capture, etc - some car firms are more interested in having something to report on their greencredentials in 2008's Annual Report ... HOWEVER, it will be beneficial in some locations - as Damlier state: "Since jatropha can be cultivated on barren land, it does not compete for land that is being used for food production, and thus provides farmers with an additional source of income". Let's hope its not just rich plantation farms only that benefit, and that the degraded land is re-invigorated through this production.

Source: African Agriculture: "Car maker Daimler, partners explore jatropha as a biodiesel source"
German carmaker Daimler AG has teamed up with Archer Daniels Midland and Bayer CropScience to explore tropical plant jatropha as a biodiesel fuel, Daimler said.
"Biodiesel derived from jatropha nut kernels has properties similar to those of biofuels obtained from oilseed rapes. It is also characterised by a positive CO2 balance and can thus contribute to protecting the climate," the companies said in a statement.
The partners aim to develop production and quality standards for jatropha-based biofuel. ADM runs several biodiesel refineries worldwide, while Bayer plans to develop herbicides, insecticides and fungicides for Jatropha plants.
Daimler has already completed a five-year project which demonstrated that jatropha can be used to make biodiesel. It will continue to explore the interactions between the fuel and engines.
Jatropha, a wild plant, has never been professionally cultivated, the statement said, suggesting the plant could be grown on 30 million hectares of land, especially in South America, Africa and Asia.
"Since jatropha can be cultivated on barren land, it does not compete for land that is being used for food production, and thus provides farmers with an additional source of income," it added.

CLIMATE CHANGE and HEALTH: Malaria buzz

Climate Change Fueling Malaria in Kenya, Experts Say
Eliza Barclay in Tumutumu, Kenya
for National Geographic News
Esther Njoki lay on a slender cot in the women's ward of Tumutumu Hospital, lucid for the first time in days after being ambushed by fever and delirium. The emaciated 80-year-old had survived a bout of malaria, but her doctor said it nearly killed her.
Malaria has long been endemic to Kenya's humid coast and swampy lowland regions, but it has only rarely reached Njoki's village on the slopes of Mount Kenya (see Kenya map).
In recent decades, however, scientists have noted an increase in epidemics in the region, as well as in sporadic cases like Njoki's.
Many medical and environmental experts attribute the spike in malaria to climate change, in the form of warmer temperatures and variations in rainfall patterns. (See a map of global warming's effects.)
"We are now finding malaria in places that we did not expect to find it, particularly the highland regions that used to be too cool for malaria," said Dorothy Memusi, deputy director of the Malaria Division in Kenya's Ministry of Health.
Parasites, Mosquitoes Affected by Climate
Malaria is an infectious disease caused by parasites in the blood system. Symptoms include fever, severe joint pain, and in extreme cases, anemia—a deficiency in red blood cells—because the parasites use red blood cells to reproduce.
Changes in temperature can affect the development and survival of malaria parasites and the mosquitoes that carry them, according to a joint 2004 study by the State University of New York, Buffalo, and the Kenya Medical Research Institute.
Rainfall also influences the availability of mosquito habitats and the size of mosquito populations, the research found.
Shem Wandiga is a professor of chemistry at University of Nairobi who has studied the relationship between climate and malaria.
He said malaria epidemics first appeared in Kenya's highlands in the 1920s, but during the last 20 years, the frequency of outbreaks in the region has been more pronounced.
"The best climate conditions for malaria are a long rainy season that is warm and wet, followed by a dry season that is not too hot, followed by a hot and wet short rainy season," Wandiga said.

CLIMATE CHANGE and ECONOMIC EQUITY: The People's Car arrives in India

Climate change evangelists are in uproar over the launch of Tata's latest locally-relevant innovation, the 'People's car'. With sales of cars going up, emissions worries are compounded by incomplete information and a lack of thinking about the equity [economic and social] that India's population deserves. First, the People's Car will replace inefficient emitting motos -- basically lawnmower engines working overtime. Second, these will be efficient petrol users and emitters -- assuming higher passenger loads. Third, safer [hopefully]. Fourth, benchmarking efficiency, price and quality in the Indian automotive sector for all other manufacturers, designers and planners to follow. Fifth, locally built enhancing multipliers. And finally, from an "ecological space" viewpoint, Indian consumers have a lot of carbon spare to burn in economically enriching ways. The People's Car is not perfect, but it is way better than consuming imported cars.

Tata says: "Indian car sales are predicted to more than quadruple to $145bn by 2016. Company chairman Ratan Tata said the launch of the Nano was a landmark in the history of transportation. Further, the car was "a safe, affordable and all weather transport - a people's car, designed to meet all safety standards and emissions laws and accessible to all".
Environmental critics have said that the car will lead to mounting air and pollution problems on India's already clogged roads. The car had passed emission standards and would average about 50 miles to the gallon, or five litres per hundred kilometres.

DOMINO EFFECT? Regional economic cost of KENYAN problems becoming apparent

Kenya's position as a hub for transport and trade in East and Southern Africa is aptly demonstrated by the current problems and subsequent disruption. Fisheries companies in neighbouring Uganda cannot access packaging boxes let alone export through the usual channels into SOuth Africa. Compounding this are price rises as oil costs increase owing to distribution problems. The spectre of snowballing poverty is emerging. From an economic perspective, it is during times of shocks that an economy relies on its key export sectors to continue and to help drip-feed the rest of the economy through the mire. Yet, it seems a mixture of the hub business model and the reliance of many of the companies at the vanguards of fragile economies on Kenya's throughput might produce a catastrophic domino effect starting with the richer and more reliable internationally-trading companies. What this means for the majority of poorer, locally trading and subsistence farmers and workers remains unclear but is not for continued unfettered growth. Let's hope this forecast is wrong.

Source: "Uganda: Three Fish Exporters Suspend Operations", New Vision (Kampala)
Macrines Nyapendi
THREE fish exporting companies have suspended operations due to high production costs caused by the post-election violence in Kenya. The plants are Oakwood based at Kansensero landing site, Wild Catches in Butiaba, Lake Albert and Marine and Agro.
"Skyrocketing fuel prices and lack of packaging materials has forced us to temporarily close down. If the violence in Kenya continues, all processors will halt operations," a source said.
Solid packaging boxes imported from South Africa, which come into the country by road through Kenya, have not arrived.
Dick Nyeko, the commissioner for fisheries, said the processors who suspended operations use generators because they are not connected to the main power grid.
He added: "But even those who are connected to the main power grid may be affected by the surging prices of the Nile Perch at the landing sites and the depreciating dollar."
"The fuel crisis has severely affected fish exports because boats fishing Nile Perch use petrol engines. Nile Perch prices at the landing sites have been rising by 10% daily," Nyeko said.
A kilogramme of Nile Perch at the landing sites was at sh3500 before the crisis.
Hundreds of fishermen in Butiaba and Kasensero landing sites are stuck with fish.
"The situation is getting worse by the day. Our main buyers have stopped us from supplying them, yet the other processors are in Kampala. We cannot take fish to Kampala plants because we don't have contracts with them," a fisherman in Butiaba said.
Fish export earnings stand at over $150m (sh255b) annually with fish being the second largest forex earner after coffee.
Nyeko said the violence in Kenya is a blessing to the lake's ecosystem.
"The pressure mounted on the Nile Perch species has reduced. This will help regeneration of stocks," he explained.
Last week, the processors and the fisheries department officials had a meeting to plan how they could avert the crisis.

CLIMATE CHANGE AND EQUITY: Kenya Hit By Food Shortage After Poor Rains

Poorer rains in the Greater Horn of Africa region are forecast to spell bleak futures for pastoralists and all those who rely on their production system for cheap protein [nyama choma]. Climate change is expected to exacerbate these trends, spelling potential disaster for the pastoral communities and for the macroeconomy as imports of protein will need to rise and the management of rangeland is reduced. Fortunately, we can expect a rise in price/value of such meat, increasing incentives to be involved.

Source: BuaNews (Tshwane)
Judith Akolo
The long-term implications of last year's poor rain seasons in the Greater Horn of Africa region, affecting mostly Kenya, will be bleak.
Kenya, as well as Uganda, Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Sudan, Tanzania, Rwanda and Burundi, are experiencing a shortage of pasture for animals, poor crop harvests and reduced drinking water availability due to insufficient rainfall during the short-rains period last year.
This is according to Famine Early Warning Systems (FEWSNET), which is funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
The worst hit area is to be central Kenya, with impacts being felt in southern Kenya and parts of Somalia and Ethiopia.
Poor rainfall during the 2007 short-rains season has left southern portions of Kenya with insufficient pasture, drinking water and crop yields.
The northern pastoral areas of Kenya have also experienced a below normal short-rains season, the FEWSNET report says.
While control operations are ongoing following a locust invasion in parts of northern Kenya, the current situation is threatening livelihoods, because of a shortage of pasture and browse for livestock.
Some locations in the area have also experienced two consecutive seasons of failed rainfall.
Kenya is also currently experiencing political unrest following the announcement of President Mwai Kibaki, as winner of the 27 December presidential election.
Opposition leader Raila Odinga disputes the election result which gave victory to President Kibaki by a very narrow margin and he accused the president of rigging the election to stay in power.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown earlier this week appealed to Kenya's political leaders to urgently hold talks to end the riots in which more than 300 people are reported to have died.
All local radio and television stations in Kenya on Sunday evening aired a special joint prayer session for peace.
The one-hour programme dubbed "Prayer for peace, Kenyans unite", involved leaders from the Catholic, Baptist and Pentecostal churches, as well as from the Muslim and Hindu faiths, who converged to pray for peace, unity, truth and justice.

Do Beanz meanz [we forgive democracy] hijackerz? UK hopes Kenyan exports not disrupted!

The UK middle/ chattering classes are really hoping the Kenyan public's reaction to its hijacked election does not mean interrupted fresh green beans and roses on Valentine's Day. Although, maybe this is the sort of international pressure and exposure that is needed to resolve the current troubles -- how else to keep the developed world engaged in the emerging problems in another of Africa's success stories.
It is the Tall Economist's opinion that a greater understanding of the African nature of a number of everyday household products will be well demonstrated by such interruptions. I just hope the situation resolves and trade can begin again with gusto and great quality we have come to expect from Kenya and its feeder countries that rely on its transport hubs [Uganda, Rwanda, Tanzania, Ethiopia]. As Philip Ngunjiri notes, "Economists credit Kibaki's government with allowing private enterprise the freedom to flourish. But they say growth could have been even better if the government had tackled corruption, speeded infrastructure improvements and fought crime." If only ...

Sources: Kenyan Broadcasting Corporation "UK companies move to protect 2008"; "Uganda: Kenya Stumbles, And Uganda Loses Its Step" The Monitor (Kampala) by Charles M. Mpagi ; "East Africa: Neighbours Also Suffer As Kenya Burns" The East African (Nairobi) by Philip Ngunjiri

Kenyan Broadcasting Corporation "UK companies move to protect 2008"

British companies moved to protect hundreds of thousands of staff in Kenya following post election violence that had threatened the country's economy.
More than 60 British companies - including Barclays, Unilever and GlaxoSmithKline - have operations in Kenya, a former British colony where the UK is the country's largest foreign investor, with investments worth an estimated £1.5bn.
The supply of roses, a major Kenyan export, has been disrupted by the violence
Unilever, which owns two tea plantations and employs several thousand Kenyans, said it was "taking all necessary steps to safeguard all our employees" following violence that is feared to have claimed at least 300 lives.
"Employee welfare is obviously paramount," said a Unilever spokesman.
Both Barclays and Standard Chartered, which employ 4,000 staff combined, closed a number of branches in areas where tensions were high "until further notice". GlaxoSmithKline said it had stepped up security at its manufacturing site on the outskirts of Nairobi.
Following the violence, sparked by disputed presidential elections, the world's biggest tea auction in the Kenyan port city of Mombasa and the Nairobi Coffee Exchange suspended trading because of concerns about security.
Most east African producers sell tea at the Mombasa auctions.
Kenya is the world's third largest exporter of tea, which, together with coffee and horticultural products, contributes to about 55pc of exports.
An estimated 135,000 Kenyans are employed in the production of flowers and fresh vegetables for the UK market.
Leading UK supermarkets - which import more than £100m of produce and flowers from Kenya every year - said that imports of green beans, mange tout, sugar snap peas, aubergines and chillies had not been affected. Kenya's total exports to the UK are worth £255m.
However there were reports that the supply of flowers, a major Kenyan export, had been disrupted.
The coming weeks are a key trading period for exporters of flowers, which supply Valentine's Day roses to the UK.
An Asda spokesman said: "Asda has a long and positive relationship with our suppliers in Kenya. Many families depend on the revenue generated from supplying products to Asda and it would be inappropriate to cease trading. We will continue to monitor the situation on an ongoing basis and will review if there is further deterioration."
There have been fears that Kenya's £450m-a-year tourist industry - the largest single contributor to the country's GDP - could be affected by the violence.
Lonrho, the London Stock Exchange listed conglomerate, said its Kenya-based budget airline had suspended flights following the violence.
The majority of flights, however, resumed on Wednesday.





Uganda: Kenya Stumbles, And Uganda Loses Its Step
The Monitor (Kampala) by Charles M. Mpagi



WITHIN hours of the violent protests following Kenya's disputed elections held Thursday last week, Uganda was on the brink of its own crisis.
Landlocked to the west of Kenya, Uganda suffered the biggest shock of countries that rely on the Mombasa sea route for imports and exports.
Long queues at fuel stations and prices that shot right through the roof immediately brought the Kenyan election, long seen as a minor distraction by most of Uganda's politically unconscious "middle class" (who are generally defined by the cheap second hand Japanese car they drive and the fact that they buy their groceries from supermarkets).
But the daunting prospect of having to pay between Shs80, 000 to Shs10,000 for a litre of petrol soon shook up their indifference and made them understand that politics matters after all. The fact that there was no fuel even if one could afford to pay for it at any price helped drive the point home.
Traders in Kampala's trading hub of Kikuubo told this news paper that, "We are suffering, business is not good, we do not have fuel." One trader who preferred not to be named also posed the tricky question: "they are talking about fuel coming, but will our goods come?"
This was in reaction to reports that the Uganda government has negotiated with the Kenyans to provide armed escort to fuel tankers through the volatile western Kenya so as to replenish stocks in Uganda.
Because of the significance of Kenya as a transit route for Ugandan imports, the crisis has seen local news media lead their bulletins with the Kenyan crisis. This concentration of attention may also be partly explained by the fact that the violence and mayhem have in a way provided answers to Uganda's own crisis and therefore the newspaper reports in part helped provide the population some form of reflection of their own fears back home.
To the ruling political class, it was the fear of a domino effect where the defeat of an incumbent government by the opposition in a neighbouring country could galvanise the domestic Opposition, which has already been gaining popularity in recent by-elections even where the President has personally been chief campaigner.
This, pundits say, could have in one way contributed to the government's hurried message of congratulation to Mr Mwai Kibaki despite the many questions that still hang around the manner of his victory.
As it turned out, only Uganda, in the entire world has sent a message of support and congratulation to Kenya. This embarrassing state of affairs has since given Uganda the unflattering distinction of being the lead news item on all major international networks.
Mr Kibaki was sworn-in in dramatic fashion within minutes of the declaration by the Electoral Commision of Kenya that he had pulled off a last minute overhaul of Mr Raila Odinga. There was no live media coverage of this event instead what was conspicuous was the presence of heavily police.
To some extent the Kenyan crisis also helped focus attention on Uganda's lack of preparedness for disasters just months after the government had again been paralysed in the face of unusually heavy unseasonal rains that led to unprecedented flooding in northern and eastern Uganda between September and early November.
As noted earlier, Uganda has not only suffered the biggest effects of the Kenya electoral crisis that has so far seen the death of at least 300 people (unofficial figures put the figure much higher) but also remains the lone voice of support to Kibaki's troubled government.
The endorsement of Mr Kibaki by President Museveni has drawn sharp criticism from the Ugandan Opposition but the man who was the conduit of the statement of congratulation, Senior Presidential Advisor on Media and Public Relations Mr John Nagenda remains unrepentant and unfazed.
Mr Nagenda told Sunday Monitor that even his boss has no regrets for remaining the sole leader to endorse Kibaki.
"He did what he thought was the right thing to do," said Nagenda on Friday.
Asked to comment on whether the message wasn't premature, he retorted, "Of course he doesn't feel it was hasty, as it is the point of the matter is that on Sunday the Electoral Commission of Kenya announced that Kibaki had won and even gave the tallies. Having done that he was sworn, Museveni has two roles to play, as President of Uganda and chairman of the East African Community (EAC). What is he supposed to do other than congratulate the person who has been declared a winner?" Nagenda said.
He then observed that in spite of the violence, as chairman of the EAC, President Museveni had asked the Kenyan government if it needed any help from its neigbours and expressed readiness to help

"East Africa: Neighbours Also Suffer As Kenya Burns" The East African (Nairobi) by Philip Ngunjiri
The ripple effects of the current political stalemate are being felt in the region, with the country's immediate neighbours that rely on the Kenyan port of Mombasa suffering the most.
According to Arun Devani, chairman of the East Africa Business Community, the five countries of Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Southern Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo are suffering more than Kenya.
"In a span of four days, fuel pump prices shot up from $1.2 to $5 per litre in Kampala. The situation is equally grave in the other major cities in the region."
Mr Devani was in a Kenya business community delegation that included the Kenya Association of Manufacturers, Federation of Kenya Employers, Kenya Private Sector Alliance and the Kenya National Federation of Agricultural Producers who told a media briefing that the country was losing Ksh2 billion ($31.45 million) worth of taxes daily due to unrest caused by the disputed presidential election results.
Most business premises in Nairobi have remained closed after the announcement that declared the incumbent Mwai Kibaki the president. Since then Nairobi and its environs has been rocked by widespread riots and looting.
The results announced by the Electoral Commission of Kenya have caused tension and violence in the country and a breakdown in security because they were not considered credible and the process appeared to have been compromised, said FKE chairman Patrick Obath.
"We are concerned about the country and are keen to protect it from further violence and loss of lives.
Our hearts bleed for Kenyans who have died needlessly and we extend our condolences. In the national interest, it is important for the truth to be established about the electoral outcome," he said.
In this regard, the business community appealed to all the main political protagonists to facilitate a process of establishing the truth with regard to the disputed elections.
The numbers presented by the commission are in dispute, they said in a statement. Both parties must facilitate an independent process that establishes the truth about the verdict of Kenyans in the elections. Such results will provide a basis for negotiations between the political leaders on a settlement acceptable to both of them.
Economists credit Kibaki's government with allowing private enterprise the freedom to flourish. But they say growth could have been even better if the government had tackled corruption, speeded infrastructure improvements and fought crime.

CLIMATE CHANGE and FEAR: how the climate is changing in ways we are not being told about!

An excellent article in NYT by John Tierney "In 2008, a 100 Percent Chance of Alarm" deserves to be read by everyone. As does Bjorn Lomborg's Cool It. It covers the media ignorance on climate change and some of the key misinformations. Including the non-disappearing polar bears, the growing glaciers on Antarctica, the falling sea levels, etc. It is no wonder that the business world, both culpable for the actual climate change happening and the hope for stopping future change, finds doing nothing preferable!

WILDLIFE and ECONOMIC EQUITY: biltong being produced from elephant meat

Source: "Zimbabwe: Parks Authority to Produce Biltong From Elephant Meat" The Herald (Harare)
The Parks and Wildlife Management Authority of Zimbabwe says it plans to produce biltong from elephant meat for sale in retail outlets throughout the country as part of sustainable utilisation of the animals.
Parks director-general Dr Morris Mtsambiwa said the project begun last year after the Ministry of Environment and Tourism permitted the authority to experiment with the said resource. "It is in our plans. We plan to start this year. We tried it last year and we found that we did not have the proper infrastructure for the purpose," he said. Dr Mtsambiwa said the authority would apply to the Ministry of Environment and Tourism for a quota of elephants to slaughter every year, after which it would build some abattoirs. He said slaughtering the animals for biltong would, however, not contribute in reducing the size of the elephant herd in the country, which has far surpassed the carrying capacity of the National Parks.
The country would need to slaughter at least 6 000 animals every year to have an impact on the population of the elephants. It is estimated that there are more than 100 000 elephants in Zimbabwe, a figure three times more than the carrying capacity of the protected areas. Currently, the country slaughters at least 500 elephants every year with the meat distributed to communities living adjacent to the game parks. The size of the elephant herd is posing serious environmental challenges in Zimbabwe and other Southern African countries including Botswana, Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, South Africa and Zambia.
It is estimated that the regional elephant population has now surpassed 400 000 and is growing at between 4 to 7 percent every year. The affected countries have since formulated an African Elephant Management Strategy that seeks to address the problem of the ballooning population." We have agreed on a work plan which we will start implementing this year," said Dr Mtsambiwa.
He said the work plan was agreed on at a meeting of director-generals of national parks in the region held in the town of Pemba in Mozambique in November last year. The meeting agreed that an aerial survey be conducted simultaneously in the respective countries to establish the population of the elephants in order to avoid double counting, he said.
Zimbabwe currently heads the regional task force on finding strategies to control the population of elephants in the region. At least some options have since been identified to control the elephant population, including contraception, culling and translocation. It was agreed that individual countries would take options depending on resources at their disposal, capacity and situation.
Contraception was a preferred option in view of pressure from animal rights groups against culling although it is expensive and sometimes does not work.

CLIMATE CHANGE TRADE SCAREs OVER: Kenya's Horticulture Sector Upbeat On 2008 Forecast

Source: Business Daily (Nairobi) by Allan Odhiambo
It may have had its share of breath taking scares across the year, but players in the robust horticulture industry are looking up to success in the coming year.
First to rattle the sub-sector was the food miles concept that threatened to lock local producers from key markets especially in Europe on grounds that shipments from far flung areas were contributing to global warming through carbon emissions.
Proponents of this concept argued that to discourage such threats of environmental degradation, all produce brought in through long haulage should be accorded cautionary labels such that buyers 'skipped them' for locally produced ones.
Then came a strengthening shilling against major international currencies such as the dollar that eroded producers' earnings from exports prompting a debate over possible switch to other currencies to avoid further damage.
That aside, there were the jitters of expiring preferential trade agreements that would have disrupted export trade with the EU come December 31.
"It has been a tough year for exporters" Hasit Shah, the vice chair at the Kenya Flower Council (KFC) says.
Luckily the industry 'lived through' these scares and analysts say it could be headed for firmer performance compared to last year, going by the strong run over the first half of this year.
The carbon miles debate was fizzled out by the fact that its proponents would not scientifically justify their claims against the long haul products while the fears of trade disruptions were put to rest after Kenya and other East African Community (EAC) member States initialised new trade deals with the EU waiting the signing of comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) by 2009-guaranteeing continued duty/quota free access of their goods into Europe.
The industry's spirits are further buoyed by statistics from the Leading Economic Indicators for September released by the Planning and National Development Ministry that showed the industry's earnings hit the Sh31 billion mark as at June, representing a 57 per cent growth over a similar period last year backed by a strong demand for cut flowers in key international markets.
Kenyan horticulturists have particularly cashed in on sharp changes in weather patterns over Europe where the bulk of exports are taken. Traditionally, the onset of summer in Europe towards June spelt lower sales for Kenyan horticultural exporters as their counterparts in the EU upped own business in the warmest months for the northern hemisphere.
This year, however, unstable weather patterns attributed to global climate change has set back horticultural production programmes in regions such as the UK, and that has meant a stronger than usual demand for imports from countries like Kenya.
Analysts now predict that backed by this massive growth, the industry is likely to surpass the Sh43 billion full-year earnings for last year.
"We look up to a very successful 2008 because massive transformations are being carried out," Jane Ngige, the chief executive officer at KFC told Business Daily.
The CEO says growth in the industry is likely to come from stronger audit of operations especially among the upcoming smallholder producers which would reduce the rate of rejection of goods turned up from trading in key markets.
Faced by stringent market safety requirements players in the industry have moved to adopt practices such as Kenya Good Agricultural Practices (Kenya-Gap) protocol to counter the threats with an aspect of self regulation now ensuring the country's producers and exporters maintained an emphatic run in key markets abroad.
Based on the successes of this concept of self regulation, a recent survey by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), titled : "Bridging the Gap Between Food Safety Policies" labels the Kenya horticulture industry as a global illustration of how standards can be used to tackle competition in key markets.
The UN agency said that through investments in high-care processing facilities, private laboratories, full supply chain traceability, improved sanitation, storage systems and Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) measures, the leading firms in Kenya's fresh produce industry have focused their attention and resources on premium-quality market segment and reaped significant benefit.
"In spite of more stringent standards applied by certain importing countries, some industries and supply chains in low-income countries have maintained or enhanced their competitiveness and market share," the document reads in part.
This concept of self regulation in Kenya has been bolstered by the recent accreditation of the Kenya Plant Health Inspection Services (KEPHIS) to carry out inspections of exports on behalf of the EU.
Previously, exports were checked for standards locally and later re-examined in Europe.
A step to harmonise the inspection procedure has however improved fortunes for Kenyan exporters in that their produce is only inspected once by Kephis and a binding certificate, application even in Europe, issued to them.

CLIMATE CHANGE and EQUITY: VICTORY! UK Carbon Footprint Campaign Fizzles Out

Kenyan growers rejoice at the success of their well-run campaign against food miles ignorance and for global social justice.

Source: The East African (Nairobi) by Catherine Riungu

The food miles debate that threw Kenya's flower industry into a spin at the beginning of 2007 has finally fizzled out as UK supermarkets have dropped their initial hardline stance.
According to Ron Fasol, managing director of Oserian Development Company, a leading flower exporter, although this may not have been publicly acknowledged, the food miles debate has flopped and is unlikely to resurface - unless Africa reaches the high pollution levels of the developed world.
The plane symbols put on imported produce by leading UK supermarkets Tesco and Marks & Spencer have been replaced by Kenya's "Grown Under the Sun" label which, according to Kenya Flower Council chief executive Jane Ngige, has led to increased interest in Kenya produce and a subsequent surge in earnings.
Mr Fasol said the supermarkets rushed to impose sanctions on air-freighted goods without proper scientific findings, a move that prompted urgent research into how much carbon dioxide was released into the atmosphere by airlifting of goods from Africa. Growers, trade associations and scientists conducted studies whose findings discounted the retailers' theory that banning imports would reduce global warming.
The Soil Association of the UK had said it would withdraw its organic certificates from air-freighted organically grown produce, effectively denying products from Africa a vital market.
In September, when the association was to have effected the ban, the British Department for International Development (DfID) organised a debate where it charged that, "while welcoming the Soil Association's concern about the impact of food production on climate change, the air-freighting of fruit and vegetables counts for only a small proportion - less than 1 per cent of UK greenhouse gas emissions. There can be no denying that food transport has an environmental and social cost, but most of this - about 85 per cent - comes from UK roads."
UK Trade and Development Minister Gareth Thomas said: "The distance food has travelled is not a good way to judge whether the food we eat is sustainable. Driving 6.5 miles to buy your shopping emits more carbon than flying a pack of Kenyan green beans to the UK."
Mr Thomas added that tackling climate change was a priority in the fight against world poverty.
"The only fair option, which considers the livelihoods of those in developing countries as well as the need to protect the environment, is to ensure that the prices of the goods we consume cover the costs of their environmental impact," he said.
He added that the government was encouraging more efficient distribution within the food and drink sector, and has proposed that food industry trade bodies look into achieving a 20 per cent reduction in the social costs of transporting food in the UK by 2012.
He added, "We must ensure the world's poorest producers are not penalised for the sins of the world's richest consumers."
In Kenya, for instance, carbon emissions are 200 kg a head, while in the UK they are almost 50 times that. African economies are currently growing by around 5 per cent or more - in part due to agricultural exports.
Agriculture remains the most likely source of economic growth and poverty reduction in most African countries. If Africa is to grow by 7 per cent, and halve poverty, get its children into school and achieve the Millennium Development Goals, it must be free to trade with the rest of the world, DfID said.
The DfID stand rubberstamped the Grown Under the Sun crusade, which set out to inform British consumers about the development benefits associated with buying fresh produce from Kenya even as the food miles and carbon footprints debate continued.
Kenya Flower Council chairman Erastus Mureithi said the campaign was aimed at demonstrating to consumers that unlike flowers grown in Europe under artificial light, Kenya's are produced under natural conditions.
The Grown Under the Sun campaign was launched by Kenya's High Commissioner to the UK, Joseph Muchemi, at the Royal Show - Britain's largest agricultural trade show - in July, when the debate was at fever pitch, at a seminar on the subject of carbon emissions and food miles. It was attended by representatives from Kenya, British retailers, the National Farmers Union and Farmer's Weekly magazine, published in London.
Mr Mureithi said UK scientists have proved to carbon miles crusaders that the subject had not been scientifically focused, leading to the current change of mind.
He, however, cautioned the flower industry against celebrating because, this being the high season, human-rights groups and environmental activists focus their attacks on the high sales on Valentine's Day which is observed on February 14 worldwide with red roses. The day is the single most important event in the flower business.