One of the biggest hidden threats to ocean health comes from biofouling — the accumulation of algae, barnacles and microorganisms on ships’ hulls that can transport invasive species across oceans. Credit: Aaron Smulktis/Unsplash

By Kizito Makoye
MAFIA ISLAND, Tanzania , May 14 2026 (IPS)

Under the warm waters off Tanzania’s Mafia Island, marine scientist Asha Mgeni hovers above a coral reef she has studied for years. Small fish dart through the currents. To most divers, the reef appears pristine. But Mgeni notices something unusual.

Tucked between coral branches are invasive organisms disrupting the reef’s natural growth and species, which were not there before, she says.

“We know these reefs,” she tells IPS. “When something new appears, it stands out immediately.”

For communities along Tanzania’s coastline, coral reefs are ecological treasures. They cradle fish stocks, soften the blow of crashing waves and support coastal economies increasingly threatened by climate change and environmental degradation.

Scientists say one of the biggest hidden threats comes from biofouling — the accumulation of algae, barnacles and microorganisms on ships’ hulls that can transport invasive species across oceans. For decades, ballast water was considered shipping’s main pathway for spreading invasive aquatic species. But maritime experts now say biofouling can no longer be ignored.

“Ballast water has certainly, historically at least, been considered the primary vector for IAS introductions,” says Will Griffiths, Project Technical Analyst at the International Maritime Organization. “However, the role played by biofouling in this regard has become more recognised in recent years, with some studies suggesting that in some locations, such as parts of Hawaii and New Zealand, it may have been the primary vector.”

Fish vendors wait for the arrival of the day’s catch along the shoreline in coastal Tanzania, where fishing sustains thousands of livelihoods. Marine scientists say invasive aquatic species linked to international shipping could disrupt fisheries and threaten food security for vulnerable coastal communities. Credit: Kizito Makoye/IPS

As global shipping expands, marine experts warn that invasive species are spreading through trade routes, disrupting ecosystems and threatening biodiversity. Scientists and regulators say biofouling can transport  marine organisms and pathogens across ecosystems, threatening fisheries and coastal economies.

“It is also worth noting that biofouling can represent a great species richness in terms of species transported by ships and also, therefore, potential pathogens,” Griffiths tells IPS.

Mwanahija Shalli, a professor of Marine and Coastal Resources Management at the University of Dar es Salaam, says marine biodiversity underpins livelihoods for millions of coastal residents through fisheries and tourism.

“Invasive aquatic species threaten ecosystems and fisheries by displacing native species,” she says. “If we fail to manage biofouling, we undermine important conservation efforts.”

A broad alliance led by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and the International Maritime Organization (IMO) is stepping up efforts to confront a major environmental threat from shipping: the spread of invasive aquatic species through biofouling.

Port and maritime officials inspect a vessel at the Port of Dar es Salaam as part of efforts to monitor the environmental risks posed by invasive marine species spread through global shipping routes. Experts say biofouling on ship hulls has become a growing threat to marine biodiversity and coastal economies. Credit: Kizito Makoye/IPS

Known as the GloFouling Partnerships Project, the initiative aims to help countries strengthen regulations, improve monitoring systems and build technical capacity to reduce the transfer of invasive species through international shipping. The project supports  efforts to meet the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals — particularly the target to conserve and sustainably use oceans, seas and marine resources — while delivering climate benefits through improved vessel efficiency and lower emissions.

Scientists say organisms nestled on ship hulls increase drag, forcing vessels to burn more fuel and produce more emissions.

“Biofouling changes the affected ships’ hydrodynamics and increases drag, meaning there is increased fuel consumption and thus increased greenhouse gas emissions,” Griffiths says. “This can also be a major issue when fouling is on the ship’s propellers, which, due to shape, require specialist cleaning.”

He says biofouling can also interfere with vessel operations.

“There is also some anecdotal evidence to suggest fouling can cause blockages in seawater intakes, affect engine performance and even firefighting systems in extreme cases, which further increases fuel consumption,” he says.

Andrew Hume, Senior Environmental Specialist at the Global Environment Facility, says the initiative builds on earlier international efforts to control invasive species transported through ballast water.

“The GloFouling project builds on a long-standing partnership between the GEF UNDP and the IMO to address shipping impacts on the marine environment,” he says.

According to Hume, the project closes a major gap by targeting hull biofouling, another key pathway for invasive species transfer.

“Keeping ships’ hulls free from just a thin layer of slime could reduce a ship’s greenhouse gas emissions by up to 25 per cent,” Hume says.

A cargo ship enters the Port of Dar es Salaam, one of East Africa’s busiest maritime gateways. As shipping traffic increases, scientists and regulators are raising concerns about biofouling — the buildup of marine organisms on ship hulls that can transport invasive species across oceans. Credit: Kizito Makoye/IPS

Marine scientists warn that invasive aquatic species can dramatically alter ecosystems, outsmart native organisms and damage fisheries that support coastal livelihoods. The issue is  raising international concern as governments struggle to balance burgeoning maritime trade with the protection of ocean ecosystems. Griffiths says the international community has made substantial progress regulating ballast water through the Ballast Water Management Convention, but biofouling controls still lag behind.

“An important aspect to consider is that there is a robust international legal framework for managing ballast water, whereas at the international level biofouling provisions are, for the moment, recommendatory and only a few countries have biofouling regulations,” he explains.

Across East Africa, rising cargo traffic has increased concern about shipping’s ecological footprint. Similar efforts are underway globally. Indonesia estimates improved biofouling management could generate up to USD 7 million annually through healthier reefs, lower fuel consumption and reduced port maintenance costs.

In Peru, authorities are building a national aquatic biodiversity database to help scientists detect invasive species before they spread along the coastline.

“Collaboration in the project enabled the authorities to develop a national aquatic biodiversity catalogue providing the baseline knowledge to detect invasive species early and undertake rapid response,” Griffiths says.

In Fiji, the results are impressive.

“Fiji reported that as a result of the GloFouling dry dock training, they had improved the technical capacity of local personnel and gained access to resources to upgrade local facilities,” Griffiths says, adding that the programme had strengthened confidence among local maritime operators and enhanced Fiji’s position in the regional maritime services market

Meanwhile, Mauritius is encouraging private-sector investment in technologies designed to protect fragile marine ecosystems. Over the past six years, countries participating in the GloFouling initiative have moved toward stricter regulation and greater regional cooperation.

Australia and New Zealand have already introduced fully enforceable national regimes requiring clean hulls, biofouling management plans, record books and inspections consistent with the IMO’s 2023 Biofouling Guidelines. Griffiths says Brazil has emerged as a leader among developing nations.

“Brazil is the newest and most explicit adopter, directly embedding the 2023 guidelines into mandatory port state law,” he says. “Unlike the IMO’s voluntary approach, however, Brazil sets an explicit enforceable standard: vessels must arrive with no more than microfouling.”

The project has also expanded into maritime training and private-sector cooperation. Through the Global Industry Alliance, companies are testing hull coatings and cleaning technologies to limit the spread of invasive species.

“One of the project’s most transformative impacts has been creating a collaborative platform where technology innovators, regulators and industry leaders jointly develop and implement solutions for biofouling,” Griffiths says.

The alliance, initially created to support the project, has since evolved into a permanent collaboration. Griffiths says the group is expanding research into hull inspection technologies and the environmental impacts of antifouling coatings.

“The continuation of the GIA and its ongoing studies offers exceptional value as a driving force for industry innovation, standard-setting and knowledge dissemination,” he says.

Hume says the initiative builds on earlier GEF-supported efforts that led to the International Convention for the Control and Management of Ships’ Ballast Water and Sediments in 2004. He says the programme has since helped develop the IMO’s 2023 Biofouling Guidelines and supported pilot projects in 12 countries.

Hume says the GEF is preparing a second phase of investment aimed at helping more countries implement the IMO’s 2023 Biofouling Guidelines and strengthen international cooperation.

“The objective is to strengthen national and institutional capacity of developing countries to implement the guidelines in order to reduce invasive species and lower greenhouse gas emissions,” he says.

A second phase of investment expected before June  aims to strengthen national capacity, expand implementation and advance discussions toward a legally binding global framework on biofouling management. Although the GloFouling project officially concluded in May 2025, Griffiths says efforts are continuing through training programmes, technical studies and industry partnerships designed to maintain momentum ahead of anticipated binding international regulations by 2030.

Experts say cleaner hulls not only reduce the spread of invasive species but also lower fuel consumption and carbon emissions. However, scientists caution that poorly managed hull-cleaning practices can release chemicals and microplastics into marine environments.

Back on Mafia Island, Mgeni says the changes beneath the water are often subtle before they become irreversible.

“Once invasive species establish themselves, it becomes much harder to restore the balance,” she says.

For communities that depend on reefs for food, tourism and protection from storms, the battle against biofouling is becoming a fight to protect the ecosystems and livelihoods that depend on the ocean.

Note: The Eighth Global Environment Facility Assembly will be held from May 30 to June 6, 2026, in Samarkand, Uzbekistan.
This feature is published with the support of the GEF. IPS is solely responsible for the editorial content, and it does not necessarily reflect the views of the GEF.

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The OIC Group at an Aug. 12 press briefing to present their joint statement on recent developments in the Gaza Strip, following an OIC Group emergency meeting on Aug. 11 after Israel announced its plan to take complete military control of the Gaza Strip. Credit: Naomi Myint Breuer/IPS

By Naomi Myint Breuer
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 15 2025 (IPS)

The world is becoming increasingly outraged at Israel for its actions in the ongoing war against Hamas, particularly amid the recent killings of Palestinian journalists and Israel’s announcement of its plan to seize complete military control of the Gaza Strip.

The plan, which the Israeli Security Cabinet approved on August 8, includes disarming Hamas, returning all hostages, demilitarizing the Gaza Strip, implementing Israeli control of the Gaza Strip and establishing “an alternative civil administration that is neither Hamas nor the Palestinian Authority,” according to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s posts on X.

“The [Israel Defence Forces (IDF)] will prepare for taking control of Gaza City while distributing humanitarian assistance to the civilian population outside the combat zones,” Netanyahu posted on X.

The Organization of Islamic Cooperation to the United Nations (OIC Group) released a joint statement condemning and rejecting the plan on August 12. The statement was released following an OIC Group emergency meeting on August 11.

“We consider this announcement a dangerous and unacceptable escalation, a flagrant violation of international law, and an attempt to entrench the illegal occupation and impose a fait accompli by force, in contravention of international law, international humanitarian law and relevant United Nations resolutions,” the statement said.

The Group demanded an immediate and complete end to Israel’s violence against the Gaza Strip and an end to the damages to civilians and civilian infrastructure. They also demanded that Israel permit humanitarian assistance to enter and work in the Gaza Strip at scale.

“The group reaffirms that this declared course of action by Israel constitutes a continuation of its grave violations, including killing and starvation, attempts at forced displacement, and annexation of Palestinian land, the settler terrorism, which are crimes that may amount to crimes against humanity,” the statement said.

In a statement on August 8, United Nations (UN) Human Rights Chief Volker Türk demanded the “immediate halt” of the plan. The plan, he said, conflicts with the International Court of Justice’s (ICJ) ruling that Israel must end its occupation and agree to a two-State solution and that Palestinians have the right to self-determination.

“Instead of intensifying this war, the Israeli Government should put all its efforts into saving the lives of Gaza’s civilians by allowing the full, unfettered flow of humanitarian aid,” he said.

Another major topic of discussion is the Aug. 10 targeted killing of six journalists, including four Al-Jazeera journalists, in Gaza City, which increased discussion about Israel’s human rights violations. The Palestinian Journalists Syndicate (PJS) reported that 238 journalists have been killed since the war began.

“The deliberate targeting of journalists by Israel in the Gaza Strip reveals how these crimes are beyond imagination, amid the inability of the int’l community & its laws to stop this tragedy,” Qatari Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim bin Jaber Al Thani posted on X. “May God have mercy on journalists Anas Al-Sharif, Mohammed Qraiqea, & their colleagues.”

UN Secretary-General António Guterres called for an independent and impartial investigation into the killing.

“Journalists and media workers must be respected, they must be protected, and they must be allowed to carry out their work freely, free from fear and free from harassment,” Stéphane Dujarric, spokesperson for the Secretary-General, said on August 11.

The OIC Group will be hosting a special meeting to discuss next steps following this tragedy, according to Deputy Permanent Representative of Türkiye to the UN Fikriye Asli Güven. Asim Iftikhar Ahmad, Permanent Representative of Pakistan to the UN, said the OIC Group is also pressuring the Security Council to take action.

“This is a deliberate policy to silence the journalists, but we were all aware that the truth cannot be silenced,” Güven said.

Amid the developments in Gaza, Dr. Riyad Mansour, Permanent Observer of the State of Palestine, said the OIC Group and the Security Council are observing a more unified front developing against Israel.

“There is a merging cohesion and unity and outrage of what is really happening, and they are exerting tremendous amounts of pressure in order to stop the killing, stop the military operations to have a permanent ceasefire, to force allowing humanitarian assistance to take place,” Mansour said.

This shift is also visible in the positions an increasing number of countries criticizing Israel’s plans.

The foreign ministers of Australia, Austria, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, New Zealand, Norway, and the United Kingdom, as well as the High Representative of the European Union, released a joint statement on August 9 rejecting the Israeli plan for Gaza.

“The plans that the Government of Israel has announced risk violating international humanitarian law,” the statement said. “Any attempts at annexation or of settlement extension violate international law.”

The ministers urged for an end to the “terrible conflict” and for Israel to change its registration system of humanitarian organizations to allow humanitarian workers into the region.

“Their exclusion would be an egregious signal,” the statement said.

The ministers also asserted their support for a two-state solution.

Mansour praised the recent actions of European countries to pressure Israel, such as Spain’s reduction of arms sales to Israel and Germany’s arms export ban to Israel, which he called a “modest but it’s a very important step.”

He also praised Norway’s withdrawal of assets in Israel, Colombia’s withdrawal of coal trade, and Australia’s recognition of the state of Palestine. He calls these steps “practical” and a fast way to pressure Israel.

The OIC Group called upon the international community, especially the permanent members of the Security Council, to stop Israel’s policies undermining peace and violating international and international humanitarian law.

They also pushed for a two-State solution and the implementation of the Arab-Islamic reconstruction plan of the Gaza strip, a plan led by Egypt to rebuild Gaza, and participation in the upcoming reconstruction conference in Cairo.

“We affirm that a just and lasting peace can only be achieved through the implementation of the two-State solution,” the Group’s statement said.

For Mansour, a united global front will be crucial to accelerating the pace at which countries decide to take action against Israel.

“There is nothing that we can do about those who are killed, but we can do a lot about saving the lives of those who are still alive, and it is our responsibility to do everything possible in order to save their lives,” he said.

By September, Mansour said he hopes to have 100 more counties sign the New York Declaration on the Peaceful Settlement of the Question of Palestine and the Implementation of the Two-State solution, which was created by France and Saudi Arabia at the High-Level International Conference for the Peaceful Settlement of the Question of Palestine and the Implementation of the Two-State Solution in July. The conference will resume on September 22, according to Mansour. He said the New York Declaration must become the “blueprint” and “global consensus.”

“It is not the destiny of the Palestinian people to have an eternal conflict with Israel and to keep losing thousands of our children and women and our people at the hand of this war machine by Israel,” Mansour said. “It is our duty to convince everyone that there is another alternative, the alternative of immediate ceasefire.”

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Khumbu Glacier at the Mt. Everest base camp. Because of rising temperatures, glaciers are melting at a faster rate. Credit: Tanka Dhakal/IPS

By Tanka Dhakal
THE HAGUE, Dec 10 2024 (IPS)

At the International Court of Justice (ICJ), no matter if the country had high Himalayas, was a small island nation or was experiencing armed conflict, they all agreed that the due diligence principle and the obligation of states to prevent harm caused by climate change, especially for high greenhouse gas emitters, were non-negotiable.

On Monday, December 9, 2024, countries including Nepal, Pakistan, Nauru, New Zealand and the State of Palestine presented their cases before the highest court within the United Nations.

Countries within the Hindu Kush Himalaya Region, Nepal and Pakistan, included examples of recent years disasters, including flash floods and their impact on livelihoods, while the small island state of Nauru laid out the toll faced by its people because of rising sea level. The State of Palestine connected its plea to ongoing armed conflict and climate-environmental destruction.

At the request of Vanuatu, the UN General Assembly asked the ICJ to issue an advisory opinion on the obligations of UN member states in preventing climate change and ensuring the protection of the environment for present and future generations. While its advisory opinion will not be enforceable, the court will advise on the legal consequences for member states who have caused significant harm, particularly to small island developing states. So far, more than 70 countries have presented their case before the court.

Indigenous Sherpa women in the Khumbu region of Nepal. These mountain communities are already facing the impact of climate change in the form of low snowfall and glacier melting, which causes floods. Credit: Tanka Dhakal/IPS

Human Rights and Technology Transfer—Nepal

Nepal’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Arzu Rana Deuba, stressed climate change-induced disasters were hindering the human rights of people on the front lines and said countries responsible for emissions needed to fulfil their obligations.

“Climate change hinders the realization and enjoyment of human rights, including the right to life, right to food, right to health, right to adequate housing, sanitation and water,” Deuba said. “Moreover, it impacts the rights of women, children and people with disabilities, as well as the cultural rights of minorities and indigenous communities.”

Nepal says many vulnerable states were not able to meet the obligations under international human rights laws, as the actions and emissions arising from beyond their territory also had adverse effects on the human rights of their citizens. The country of mountains, including Mt. Everest, stressed the need for material, technical and financial support from the countries whose historic emissions have caused the crisis of anthropogenic climate change.

“This includes unhindered access to technology and the sharing of meteorological and glacial data,” Deuba said. “Nepal considers that the court’s advisory opinion will contribute to clarifying the law, especially the obligations of the states regarding climate change and the rules governing the consequences of the violation of these obligations.”

Suvanga Parajuli, Under Secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Nepal, added that the country was facing a gross injustice. “What countries like Nepal are calling for is not mere handouts of charity but compensation for real climate justice,” Parajuli said.

Court Opinion Could Help Avert Catastrophe—Pakistan

Another HKH region country, Pakistan, which faced devastating floods caused by climate change in 2022, stressed the need for support and knowledge sharing. Mansoor Usman Awan, the Attorney General of Pakistan, urged the court to give an opinion that clarifies the legal obligations of states to prevent, avoid, reduce, or mitigate greenhouse gas emissions.

“If lives and livelihoods are to be protected, if we want to avoid utter catastrophe, there simply is no time to lose. As has often been said, we are the first generation to feel the impact of climate change, and undoubtedly, we are the last generation that can do something about it.”

Awan continued, “For the human race, ignoring the climate emergency is no longer an option.”

We Are Facing Existential Threat—Nauru

Island country Nauru argues that climate change poses an existential threat to its security and well-being, highlighting the impact of rising sea levels, coastal erosion and drought at the UN court.

The island is a mere 21 km² (8.1 sq mi), oval-shaped island in the southwestern Pacific Ocean.

Representing Nauru Lionel Rouwen Aingimea, Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, emphasized the obligations of states in respect of climate change to be the obligations found in the principles of general international law.

“We urge this court to clarify the scope of the existing obligations of states with respect to climate change,” Aingimea said. “No more, but certainly no less, we seek your affirmation that the law protects the vulnerable and that our fundamental rights under general international law—to exist, to thrive, to safeguard our land—are upheld and respected.”

He urged the court to deliver an advisory opinion that reflects “the urgency, the dignity and the right of all peoples to exist in security.”

Island countries’ vulnerability was central to New Zealand’s arguments. Representing Pacific Island countries, Victoria Hallum, Deputy Secretary Multilateral and Legal Affairs Group at New Zealand’s Foreign Affairs and Trade ministry, emphasized the urgent need to address anthropogenic climate change. It said climate change was the single greatest threat to the Pacific Island regions.

Armed Conflict and Climate Change Connected—Palestine

The State of Palestine highlighted the intersection of climate change and international law, particularly the impacts of armed conflict and military activities.

Palestine positioned itself as a key contributor to the proceedings and referred to the ICJ’s advisory opinion on nuclear weapons to support its argument on the relationship between environmental protection and international law in armed conflict.

At the ICJ hearing, Ammar Hijazi, Ambassador of Palestine to International Organizations in The Hague, linked the relationship between climate change and emissions during armed conflict.

“The State of Palestine is responsible for less than 0.001% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Yet Palestine now grapples with unprecedented severe climate events, mainly due to Israel’s occupation and policies and practices,” Hijazi said. “Israel’s occupation curtails our ability to support climate policy. As a party to the UNFCCC and the Paris Agreement, Palestine is taking action to reduce 17.5 percent of its GHG by 2040, when our goal could be 26.6 percent if Israel’s occupation ends.”

Palestine argued that the court should not miss the opportunity to address the relation, obligation and rights of the people in the context of armed conflict and climate change in the historic opinion it will issue at the conclusion of these advisory proceedings. “This will fulfill the promise not to leave anyone behind and ensure that law applies to all,” Hijazi said.

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Excerpt:

New Zealand has one of the highest rates of domestic violence in the developing world. Recent legislation there that gives victims of domestic violence 10 days of paid leave, without having to present any documentation in support, has been praised across the globe.

The Domestic Violence – Victims’ Protection Bill was passed at the end of July with 63 to 57 votes and was launched by Green member of parliament Jan Logie.

“We were very happy to hear about the passage of legislation in New Zealand affording victims of domestic violence 10 days of paid leave and scheduled flexibility from their employment to leave their partners, find new homes and protect themselves and their children,” Kristine Lizdas, legal policy director at Battered Women’s Justice Project (BWJP), shared with IPS.

According to United Nations Women, 30 percent of women experience physical or sexual violence from an intimate partner, and in some countries that number goes up to 70 percent.

“Such policy can contribute to and facilitate the exercise of the right of women who experience domestic violence in New Zealand to support, services and protection for themselves and for their children,” Juncal Plazaola, an expert on ending gender violence at U.N. Women, told IPS.

Back in 2004, the Philippines also passed the Anti-Violence Against Women and Their Children Act of 2004, which provided the same 10 days of paid leave to victims of domestic violence.

Civil society and law experts have analysed the benefits of this new policy, given that women who suffer from domestic violence underperform at work. In the United States, victims of domestic violence lose around 10 days of paid work every year, and they work 10 percent of hours less than those who do not suffer from abuse at home.

Plazaola, from U.N. Women, explained: “Women can be constantly harassed at work, delayed getting to work or prevented from going to work. This can lead to either quitting their job or being terminated.” Seeing these types of occurrences, it is vital to promote a corporate environment that takes this reality into account.

“Women who experience domestic violence have high rates of absenteeism at work and such a measure can support them keep their employment. This policy can therefore contribute to more job security, economic opportunities and independence and greater chances for abused women to abandon an abusive relationship,” Plazaola added.

Employment and labour attorney Mark I. Shickman, from Freeland Cooper & Foreman LLP, also expressed his agreement with the New Zealand policy: “Employers can allow time off to do what is necessary legally or medically without fear of adverse work consequence or lack of confidentiality.”

However, he did not idealise it.

“Employment accommodations won’t solve every problem, but they are a big help. Vulnerable survivors do not want to risk the work situation which is often their most secure environment, so knowing that they cannot be retaliated against or fired for the time they need to speak to law enforcement, or to counsellors, or to children/family agencies, etc., is a huge help,” Schickman said.

Regarding the risks of the policy—as it does not require the victim to justify in any way that she/he is being abused—all experts seemed optimistic. The risk of the company being subject to fraud by its employees are low.

“The benefits of the law far outweigh the risks involved. The prevalence of false reporting is historically hyperbolised in many contexts. Very few individuals will fraudulently assert that they are victims of domestic violence for the sole purpose of receiving paid leave days,” Lizdas, from BWJP, said.

Plazaola agreed with her by saying that this policy “will most probably contribute to more empowered and satisfied staff with higher productivity.” The issue, she claimed, is not fraud, as most cases are not reported; less than 40 percent of women who have been abused look for help.

“Reasons for this often include shame, as well as blame, from one-self and from others. Therefore, it is not expected that this type of measures will lead to an over- or mis-use of it,” she concluded.

For Lizdas, this kind of policy was a good way to avoid victims’ isolation: “If awareness of intimate partner violence pervades the private/corporate sectors, as well as employers more generally, and if employers are incentivised to identify and provide assistance to employees suspected of being victims of IPV, this should have the effect of reducing victims’ isolation.”

Isolation, an abusive relationship, and a lack of external help increase the risk of domestic violence; at least half of the women victims of homicide every year have been killed by their intimate partners. But homicide is the last step of a violent relationship.

“An abusive relationship doesn’t start with murder, but the abuse escalates and without timely intervention and support, the women may end up murdered,” Plazaola said.

Asked how to avoid this fatal ending, Plazaola was adamant: “We need  legislation and policies on femicide, as well as the tools to properly investigate and punish all forms of violence against women, including femicide. Ending impunity is critical.”

Lizdas agreed: “Reducing intimate partner homicide requires a commitment from a wide variety of social sectors – legal, medical, public health, education, social service, military, etc.”

However, in the U.S, there is another factor that plays into the numbers of female homicide—the easy access to guns. In 2015, 55 percent of the intimate partner homicides in the U.S. were by gun. Shickman warned IPS: “The first issue is getting guns out of the house.”

“Abused women are five times more likely to be killed if the abuser has a gun,” he added.

For Plazaola, the solution to end, or at least reduce, the number of fatal victims on the hands of an intimate partner lies within the whole society.

“Understanding that femicide is the ultimate act in a chain of acts of violence against women, means understanding that health sector, social services, the police and the justice sectors must work together,” she said.

“Having policies that recognise the rights of abused women to protection as well as to other measures that will help them deal with the consequences and harm of this violence, can help us all have a better understanding of their realities, and can contribute to questioning the blaming and shaming too often associated with it.”

Peter Thiel speaking at Hy! Summit in Berlin, Germany, March 19, 2014. Photograph by Dan Taylor, www.heisenbergmedia.com

By Christopher Pala
WELLINGTON, Jun 8 2017 (IPS)

In January, the revelation that Peter Thiel, the libertarian Silicon Valley venture capitalist and Trump adviser, secretly got a New Zealand citizenship six years ago caused an uproar, mostly because he was the first to get one without pledging to live there.

It didn’t help that he wasn’t even required to fly to New Zealand to get his papers: the government allowed him to pick up his passport at its consulate in Santa Monica. The outrage was compounded by the government’s release in February of his 145-page naturalization file, which revealed a cascade of broken promises.Purchases by absentee foreign billionaires have been blamed for helping push up real estate prices and boosting homelessness, which at 1 percent is twice the US rate and three times the British one.

In his application dated June 2011, he described New Zealand as a utopia that “aligns more with my view of the future” than any other country. Thiel has said the maximum tax rates in the U.S. (now 39.6 percent) should be lowered to 20 percent or less and the shortfall in national income should be recovered by “disentangling some of those middle-class entitlements that people have gotten used to.”

In New Zealand, the top tax rate is 33 percent. It is the only OECD country without a capital gains or inheritance tax; it is run by the world’s most business-friendly bureaucracy and has a vibrant and under-capitalized tech sector.

Though it was the first country to give women the vote, in 1893, and has offered free dental care to schoolchildren since 1921, it swung from one of the most managed economies to one of the least regulated in the 1980s. As a result, 60 percent of its rivers are too polluted to swim in and its fisheries have been found to rest on a foundation of waste and official lies.

In 2015, Thiel bought a 193-hectare estate on Lake Wanaka, in the South Island. He also owns a mansion on Lake Wakatipu, an hour away. These and other purchases by absentee foreign billionaires have been blamed for helping push up real estate prices and boosting homelessness, which at 1 percent is twice the US rate and three times the British one. The cost of housing is the hottest issue in elections due this year.

In his citizenship application, Thiel wrote, “It would give me great pride to let it be known that I am citizen and an enthusiastic supporter of the country and its emerging high-tech industry.” He said he intended “to devote a significant amount of my time and resources to the people and businesses of NZ” and become “an active player in NZ’s venture capital industry.”

He explained that the year before, he had created an investment fund called Valar Ventures “dedicated exclusively to funding and aiding New Zealand technology companies.” Through it, he could “act in an advisory role in a way that (others) cannot because I have encountered and solved many of the problems that will confront entrepreneurs as they build their companies.”

At the government’s suggestion, according to the file, Thiel even donated NZ$1 million (830,000 U.S. dollars at the time) to an earthquake relief fund.

On July 8, 2011, three days after his application was accepted, he was the headline speaker at a conference at the Icehouse, a business development center in Auckland, the economic capital. But Thiel made no mention of his new citizenship, nor did he speak of becoming an active player on the local tech scene. Likewise, he made no mention of New Zealand to a New Yorker writer who interviewed him for a long profile headlined “No Death, no Taxes,” published that November.

“The last thing we want to do is give people the impression that our citizenship is up for sale, and this affair has certainly created that,” said Iain Lees-Galloway, the spokesman on immigration issues of the opposition Labour Party, in an interview. As for Thiel’s promises in his application, Lees-Galloway added, “He couldn’t have been all that proud (of becoming a Kiwi) because he didn’t tell anybody for six years.”

The government of the right-wing National Party glossed over the broken promises. Prime Minister Bill English, who was deputy PM in 2011, told local reporters, “If people come here and invest and get into philanthropy and are supportive of New Zealand, for us as a small country at the end of the world, that’s not a bad thing.” Thiel had been to New Zealand four times, his file showed, starting in 1993.

On February 4 came another disclosure: The Herald reported that nine months after Thiel was granted the citizenship, his Valar Ventures fund had accepted what the paper called a “sweetheart deal” from the New Zealand Venture Investment Fund, created in 2002 to encourage investments in local tech start-ups.

Valar and the fund would jointly invest in four local companies: Xero, with the largest share, as well as Vend, Booktrack and Pacific Fibre. Two years earlier, Thiel had separately invested three million dollars in Xero, a cloud-based accounting software that was already listed.

At the time, NZVIF’s standard contract had a clause that allowed the outside investor to buy, after five years, the government’s share at its initial cost, plus the yield of a five-year government bond. If the company shares went up, the investor pocketed the profits from the government’s share, too. If the shares fell, both lost equally.

In October 2016, after the shares of Xero soared, Valar Ventures exercised the clause. The exact size of its investment is not known, but the profits have been estimated at 23.5 million dollars for an investment of 6.8 million. Valar still owns 4.8 percent of Xero, down from a peak of 7 percent. Today, of the 13 companies in its portfolio, only two are from New Zealand: Xero and Vend.

Opposition politicians suggested that naïve government officials had made yet another transaction with Thiel that failed to benefit New Zealanders. “Thiel had already invested in Xero, it was hardly a risky venture,” pointed out Lees-Galloway, the Labour MP.

But while politicians denounced the deal as having essentially privatized the profits from a taxpayer-funded investment, the tech world saw things very differently.

Andrew Hamilton, the CEO of the Icehouse business center where Thiel gave his speech, declined to specify what else Thiel had done for startups, saying only: “Peter was and is awesome, and we are always grateful to people who contribute and help!”

Lance Wiggs, the founding director of the Punakaiki Fund, which invests in companies in the development and fast-growth phases, said Valar was “exactly the kind of fund New Zealand wanted to attract.” He said Thiel’s investment in Xero “was absolutely crucial at the time, he really helped them lift their game from being a local player to an international one.” Xero is now worth two billion dollars and has 1,400 employees around the world.

As for the government, Wiggs added, “I can see why they blinked and gave him a passport, though I can’t see why he needed it,” given that Thiel has a residency permit since 2006.

But unlike the permit, citizenship is “irrevocable,” as his lawyer pointed out in the application.

Adam Hunt, a tax administration specialist, offered one possible explanation: “It’s an attractive place for a rich person,” he said. Thiel could renounce his American citizenship and move to New Zealand. “If you’re rich and you move here, you can live off your capital gains,” which are not taxed. “You may have virtually no income here, and pay almost no taxes.”

Forbes estimates Thiel’s net worth at 2.7 billion dollars. He is 49 years old.

As for Thiel himself, who was born German and naturalized American, he declined to publicly defend the officials who did him the favor, or to make any new investments in New Zealand start-ups. His spokesman, Jeremiah Hall of Torch Communications in San Francisco, did not respond to three e-mails seeking comment.

“Just as the world is moving towards multi-polarity, so is Asia … The economic fragmentation of the region and the competitive pursuit of security interests may well consign the Asian Century into a brief interlude rather than a millennial transformation”. Photo credit: Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

By Shyam Saran
NEW DELHI, Jun 1 2015 (IPS)

It has been apparent for some time that we are in the midst of a historic shift of the centre of gravity of the global economy from the trans-Atlantic to what is now becoming known as the Indo-Pacific.  

This is an emerging centre of economic dynamism and comprises what was earlier confined to the Asia-Pacific but now includes the South Asian region as well.

This is a region which now accounts for nearly 40 percent of world gross domestic product (GDP), which is likely to rise to 50 percent or more by 2050.  Its share of world trade is now 30 percent and growing.

Shyam Saran

This year, the region has become the largest source of foreign direct investment (FDI), surpassing the European Union (EU) and the United States. China has been the main driver of this historic shift, but other Asian economies have also made significant contributions.

As the Chinese economy begins to slow, India shows promise of regaining an accelerated growth trajectory under a new and decisive political leadership. This will help extend the scale and direction of this shift. Its geopolitical consequences will be profound.

It must be recognised that the economic transformation of Asia, in particular the spectacular growth of China, has been enabled by an unusually extended and liberal global economic environment, underpinned by the faith in globalisation and open markets.

It has also been enabled by a U.S.-led security architecture in the region which kept in check, though did not resolve, the long-standing political fault lines and regional conflicts over competing territorial claims and unresolved disputes.

This relatively benign and supportive economic and security environment is in danger of unravelling precisely at a time when the situation in the region is becoming more complex and challenging.  Paradoxically, this is partly a consequence of the very success of the region in achieving relative economic prosperity.“The danger is that instead of an inclusive and regionally integrated Asia, we may end up with exclusive and competing clusters, moving at different speeds, with different norms and standards. This may well undermine the very basis of Asia’s economic dynamism”

We are witnessing new trends in the region which, unless managed with prudence and foresight, may well sour the prospects of an Asian Century.

The relatively open and liberal trade and investment regime, in particular access to the large consuming markets of the United States, European Union and Japan, is now under serious threat.

Protectionist trends are already visible in these advanced economies as they struggle with prolonged economic stagnation which is the fall-out of the global financial and economic crisis of 2007-2008.

Instead of the consolidation and expansion of the open and inclusive economic architecture that had hitherto been the hallmark of the regional and global economy, we are witnessing its steady fragmentation.

In the Indo-Pacific region, there are competing regional trade arrangements and investment regimes, with no clarity on the contours of a new and emerging economic architecture.

The United States is spearheading its Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) which will include some Asian economies, but not India and China.

China has countered by proposing a free trade area encompassing the current Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) membership.  This will include China and the United States but not India and some of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) economies.

The Regional Cooperation Economic Partnership (RCEP) would include all ASEAN countries plus China, Japan, Republic of Korea, India, Australia and New Zealand, but not the United States.

And finally, there is the East Asia Summit process (EAS) which includes all the above-mentioned countries but also the United States and Russia.

The danger is that instead of an inclusive and regionally integrated Asia, we may end up with exclusive and competing clusters, moving at different speeds, with different norms and standards.  This may well undermine the very basis of Asia’s economic dynamism.

In the security field, too, we are witnessing a growing salience of inter-state tensions and competitive military build-up.

The U.S.-led security architecture remains in place formally but its erstwhile predominance is diminished.

The gap between the military capabilities of China and the United State is closing steadily. As China’s security footprint expands beyond its shores, it will inevitably intersect with the existing deployment of the forces of the United States and its allies and partners.

Faced with an increasingly uncertain security environment and threatened by a more insistent assertion of territorial claims by China, the countries of the region, including Japan, Republic of Korea, members of ASEAN, Australia and India are building up their own defences, in particular maritime capabilities, and this itself is escalating tensions.

There is as yet no emerging regional security architecture which could help manage inter-state tensions in the region. This includes the growing possibilities of confrontation between the United States and China.

In the absence of such a regional security architecture, based on a broad political consensus and a mutually acceptable Code of Conduct, the region may well witness a heightening of tension and even conflict.  These developments would inevitably and adversely impact on the dense network of trade and investment relations that bind the countries of the region together and erode the very basis of their prosperity.

In this context, mention may be made of the Chinese One Belt One Road (OBOR) initiative which seeks to deploy China’s surplus capital to build a vast network of transport and infrastructural links not only across the Indo-Pacific but also straddling the Eurasian landmass.

The newly established Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) initiated and led by China would become a key financing instrument for the OBOR.  China has also recently come out with a new Defence White Paper, which puts forward a new strategy of Open Seas, shifting the emphasis from coastal and near sea defence to an expanding naval presence which matches China’s growing global profile and world-wide location of Chinese-controlled economic assets.

While China’s investment in regional infrastructure in Asia may be welcome, it will inevitably be accompanied by a security dimension which may heighten anxieties among countries in the Asian region and beyond.

It is apparent from the above analysis that it is no longer possible for any major power in the Indo-Pacific to unilaterally seek a position of overweening economic dominance or military pre-eminence of the kind that the United States enjoyed over much of the post-Second World War period.

Just as the world is moving towards multi-polarity, so is Asia.  It is now home to a cluster of major powers with significant economic and security capabilities and interests. The only practical means of avoiding a unilateral and potentially destructive pursuit of economic and security interests would be to put in place an inclusive economic architecture underpinned  by a similarly inclusive security architecture which provides mutual reassurance and shared opportunities for promoting prosperity.

The economic fragmentation of the region and the competitive pursuit of security interests may well consign the Asian Century into a brief interlude rather than a millennial transformation. (END/COLUMNIST SERVICE)

Edited by Phil Harris   

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, IPS – Inter Press Service. 

Excerpt:

These Haitian schoolchildren are being supported by a WFP school feeding programme designed to end malnutrition which, for many countries, can be a double burden where overweight and obesity exist side by side with under-nutrition. Credit: UN Photo/Albert González Farran

By Gloria Schiavi
ROME, Nov 23 2014 (IPS)

Not only do 805 million people go to bed hungry every day, with one-third of global food production (1.3 billion tons each year) being wasted, there is another scenario that reflects the nutrition paradox even more starkly: two billion people are affected by micronutrients deficiencies while 500 million individuals suffer from obesity.

The first-ever Global Nutrition Report, a peer-reviewed publication released this month, and figures from the Rome-based U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) highlight a multifaceted and complex phenomenon behind malnutrition.

“The double burden of malnutrition [is] a situation where overweight and obesity exist side by side with under-nutrition in the same country”, according to Anna Lartey, FAO’s Nutrition Director. “And we are seeing it in lots of the countries that are developing economically. These are the countries that are going through the nutrition transition”."The double burden of malnutrition [is] a situation where overweight and obesity exist side by side with under-nutrition in the same country. And we are seeing it in lots of the countries that are developing economically. These are the countries that are going through the nutrition transition” – Anna Lartey, FAO’s Nutrition Director

Beside hunger then, governments and development organisations have also been forced to start tackling over-nutrition.

“While under-nutrition still kills almost 1.5 million women and children every year, growing rates of overweight and obesity worldwide are driving rising diseases like cancer, heart disease, stroke and diabetes”, Francesco Branca, Director of Nutrition for Health and Development at the World Health Organisation (WHO), explained in a statement.

The solution does not lie in the realm of science, health or agriculture alone. It requires a cross sectorial and multi dimensional approach that includes education, women’s empowerment, market regulation, technological research and, above all, political commitment.

For this reason, representatives of governments, multilateral institutions, civil society and the private sector met in Rome for the Second International Conference on Nutrition (ICN2) that took place at FAO headquarters on Nov. 19-21. Jointly organised by FAO and WHO, the conference came 22 years after its first edition and, unfortunately, addressed the same unsolved problem.

Malnutrition, in all its forms, has repercussions on the capability of people to live a full life, work, care for their children, be productive, generate a positive cycle and improve their living conditions. Figures from the Global Nutrition Report estimate that the cost of malnutrition is around four to five percent of national GDP, suggesting that prevention would be more cost-effective.

With the goal of improving nutrition through the implementation of evidence-based policies and effective international cooperation, ICN2 produced two documents to help governments and stakeholders head in the right direction: the Rome Declaration on Nutrition and a Framework for Action.

The conference also heard a strong call for accountability and for the strengthening of nutrition in the post-2015 development agenda.

Flavio Valente, who represented civil society organisations at ICN2, remarked that “the current hegemonic food system and agro-industrial production model are not only unable to respond to the existing malnutrition problems but have contributed to the creation of different forms of malnutrition and the decrease of the diversity and quality of our diets.”

This position was shared by many speakers, who stressed the negative impact that advertising of unhealthy food has, mainly on children.

According to a participant from Chile, calling obesity a non-communicable disease is misleading, because it spreads through the media system very effectively. He added that Chile currently risks being brought before the World Trade Organisation (WTO) by multinational food companies for its commitment to protect public health by regulating the advertising of certain food.

This happens in a country where 60 percent of people suffer from over-nutrition and one obese person dies every hour, according to the permanent representative of Chile at FAO, Luis Fernando Ayala Gonzalez.

In an address to the conference, Queen Letizia of Spain also acknowledged the responsibility of the private sector: “It is necessary to help the economic interests converging towards public health. It is worth remembering that no country in the world has been able to reverse the epidemic of obesity in all age groups. None.”

The outcome of ICN2 brought consensus around a plan of action and some key targets.

Educating children about healthy habits and women who are in charge of feeding the family was recognised as crucial, as was breastfeeding, which should be encouraged (through paid maternity leave and breastfeeding facilities in the workplace), and the need to empower women working in agriculture.

Supporting small and family farming would also give people better opportunities to eat local, fresh and seasonal produce as well as fruit and vegetables, reducing the consumption of packaged, processed food that is often low in nutrients, vitamins and fibres and high in calories, sugar, salt and fats.

However, teaching people how to eat is not enough, if they cannot easily access quality food – hence the need for relevant policies targeting the food chain and distribution.

Initiatives like the Fruit in Schools programme proposed by New Zealand go in the right direction, especially when implemented within a coordinated policy that promotes physical activity and a healthy lifestyle that fights consumption of alcohol and tobacco.

(Edited by Phil Harris)

Samoan mother Siera Tifa Palemene receives financial support from her sons who emigrated to Australia and New Zealand for employment opportunities. Credit: Catherine Wilson/IPS

By Catherine Wilson
APIA, Sep 29 2014 (IPS)

The small South Pacific island state of Samoa, located northeast of Fiji, attracts tourists with its beaches, natural beauty and relaxed pace of life, but similar to other small nations with constrained economies, it is experiencing an exodus of young people, who are unable to find jobs.

Samoa has a net migration rate of -13.4, while in neighbouring Tonga it is -15.4 and in the western Pacific island state of Micronesia it is -15.7, in contrast to the average in small island developing states (SIDS) of -1.4.

In Apia, Samoa’s capital, Siera Tifa Palemene, a fit, active woman in her late sixties, is one of many mothers to have watched her children migrate to larger economies in the region.

Palemene presides over an extensive family, with five sons and five daughters. Four of her married sons, now in their thirties, live in Australia and New Zealand, where they work in construction and building trades, such as welding.

“A lot of our people are migrating overseas to earn a living, leaving behind their parents, so there are elderly people now who have no-one living with them." -- Tala Mauala, secretary-general of the Samoa Red Cross Society
“The salaries are too low here in Samoa and my children have large families,” Palemene told IPS, emphasising that one of her sons has seven children. “My sons want their children to get a better life because over here there are not that many opportunities.”

Contraceptive prevalence in Samoa is an estimated 29 percent and the total fertility rate is 4.2, one of the highest in the region. However, while the country has a high natural population increase rate of two percent, emigration reduces population growth to 0.8 percent. Emigrants residing predominantly in Australia, New Zealand and the United States number an estimated 120,400, which nearly matches Samoa’s population of 190,372.

Twenty years after the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) held in Cairo in 1994, many small island states are still striving for sustainable economic development, equality and employment growth to match bulging youth populations.

Despite stable governance, Samoa’s economy, dependent on agriculture, tourism and international development assistance, suffers from geographic isolation from main markets. It was also impacted by the 2008 global financial crisis, an earthquake and tsunami in 2009 and Cyclone Evan in 2012, which damaged infrastructure and crops.

Livelihoods for most people centre on fishing, subsistence and smallholder agriculture, as well as small commercial and informal trading, with an estimated 27 percent of households striving to meet basic needs.

International migration, therefore, is an important avenue to economic fulfilment for young educated people with increased lifestyle aspirations and there are benefits for family members living in Samoa, such as remittances.

“My sons send money to help out the family; this helps pay all the household bills, such as electricity, and to send the grandchildren here to school,” Palemene said. According to the World Bank, remittances to Samoa in 2012 were an estimated 142 million dollars, or about 23 percent of gross domestic product (GDP).

As Palemene’s offspring face more expenses with their own families, remittances are becoming infrequent.

“I know they have their families to support and that life overseas is very expensive with so much to pay for, but when I need it, I call them and they give me money,” she said.

Still, Palemene, who receives a state pension of 135 tala (about 57 dollars) per month, works as a housekeeper at a guesthouse in Apia for extra income.

She supports the decision of her sons to emigrate and is keen for them to “have their own good future,” but added, “The only thing is that I worry that something might happen to them when they are so far away.”

Elderly relatives who remain in Samoa also face vulnerabilities when the social safety net traditionally provided by the younger generation in extended families is diminished.

“A lot of our people are migrating overseas to earn a living, leaving behind their parents, so there are elderly people now who have no-one living with them,” Tala Mauala, secretary-general of the Samoa Red Cross Society, observed. So, in times of natural disaster, for example, they need extra forms of community or state assistance.

There are other losses for high emigration countries such as the outward flow of educated professionals, known as the ‘brain drain’, due to the lure of higher salaries in the developed world, making it more difficult to progress much needed infrastructure and public service development. In Samoa the emigration rate of those with a tertiary education is 76.4 percent.

According to UNESCO, remittances are also primarily spent on consumption, rather than contributing to productivity, and the state’s trade deficit has grown as families in Samoa with additional disposable cash demand more imported goods.

Palemene sees her children when they pay her airfare to visit them or when they attend family events, such as weddings, in Samoa, but she doubts they will return to live permanently in the beautiful Polynesian country.

This story originally appeared in a special edition TerraViva, ‘ICPD@20: Tracking Progress, Exploring Potential for Post-2015’, published with the support of UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund. The contents are the independent work of reporters and authors.

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

Doris Peltier, Aboriginal Women and Leadership Coordinator with CAAN, was diagnosed with AIDS at the age of 44. Credit: Neena Bhandari/IPS

By Neena Bhandari
SYDNEY, Jul 21 2014 (IPS)

Marama Pala, hailing from Waikanae on the west coast of the North Island of New Zealand, was diagnosed with HIV at 22. The news of her diagnosis spread like wildfire in her tight-knit Maori community.

That was in 1993 but even today, she says, there is a “shame and blame” attitude surrounding HIV, which disproportionately impacts the region’s indigenous population.

“If you are HIV positive, you are seen as ‘dirty’, as someone who must be a drug user or a prostitute. Our people are not seeking help because of this stigma, discrimination and criminalisation – the fear of being charged, hunted down, ostracised or put in jail,” says Pala, who, together with her Pacific Islander HIV-positive husband, runs the INA (Maori, Indigenous, South Pacific) HIV/AIDS Foundation.

“We can’t just pretend that HIV/AIDS exists in isolation. The problem of social justice is systemic. We have to encourage nation states to follow the recommendations from the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of the Indigenous People." -- Trevor Stratton, IIWGHA Coordinator for the Canadian Aboriginal AIDS Network (CAAN)
The Foundation takes a cultural approach to HIV/AIDS awareness, education, prevention and intervention.

“In the past five years the number of new infections has […] increased in the Pacific Island community living in New Zealand and especially among the Maoris because we are late testers. People who [engage] in risky behaviour [seldom] get tested until they are very, very sick,” Pala, a mother of two, tells IPS.

“Our women are dying because they are afraid to go on medication, partly because they are afraid of the stigma and discrimination. Antiretroviral drugs are widely available in our country and they should not be dying in this time and age,” says Pala, who is a member of the board of directors for the International Council of AIDS Service Organisations (ICASO).

With HIV and AIDS disproportionately affecting indigenous people across the world, there is a strong need for culturally appropriate programmes designed, championed and delivered by indigenous people, activists and experts say.

Many indigenous women are living in silence with even their immediate families not knowing that they have HIV.

“There are 130 aboriginal women who are living with HIV in Australia, but apart from myself there is only one other woman who speaks openly about living with HIV,” says Michelle Tobin, who contracted the disease at the age of 21.

She began dating a man who told her that he had HIV but “I was naïve and just believed that it wouldn’t happen to me,” she admits. “Within six months I was diagnosed with HIV. I had a baby so I focused all my attention on her.”

“In the early 1990s in Melbourne we weren’t offered treatments when we were first diagnosed. In those days we lost a lot of people in the early stage of the disease, including my late husband,” Tobin, who belongs to the Yorta Yorta Nation, tells IPS.

As a descendant of the Stolen Generation and an aboriginal woman living with HIV and now AIDS, she has experienced stigma and discrimination, especially from within her own family, who disowned her.

Some in her community still think she is contagious and don’t want to be near her, but her struggle has made Tobin a passionate and vocal advocate for indigenous women living with HIV/AIDS.

According to Tobin, chair of the Anwernekenhe National HIV Alliance and a committee member of PATSIN (Positive Aboriginal Torres Strait Islander Network), “Aboriginal women are a minority within the minority of the HIV epidemic. We need more resources and funding [to] enable women to speak out about prevention, treatments, isolation, confidentiality, housing and the whole spectrum of issues that impact us.”

In addition to endorsing targets set out in the United Nations Political Declaration on HIV and AIDS, Australia has also adopted the Eora Action Plan on HIV 2014, which sets strategic targets to bring greater attention to HIV prevention, including best clinical care for aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples living with HIV.

The recent International Indigenous Pre-conference on HIV and AIDS hosted by the International Indigenous Working Group on HIV & AIDS (IIWGHA) in partnership with the Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Organising Committee (AATSIOC), held in Sydney on Jul. 17-19, was themed ‘Our story, Our Time, Our Future.’

It highlighted the need for increased epidemiological data with a focus on indigenous ethnicity. Lack of data about the level of treatment take-up amongst indigenous people living with HIV is posing a challenge for Treatment as Prevention (TasP) strategies.

“We have evidence in Canada that aboriginal people are getting HIV three-and-a-half times faster than the rate of the general population,” Trevor Stratton, IIWGHA Coordinator for the Canadian Aboriginal AIDS Network (CAAN), tells IPS.

“We believe those trends exist all over the world, but we don’t have the epidemiological data. We are advocating for epidemiological evidence as that is what we need for the dominant cultures to recognise us as a key population at greater risk of HIV and AIDS along with gay men and sex workers, so governments can free up the money for us and we can create our own solutions,” he asserts.

Forty-nine-year-old Stratton, a citizen of the Mississaugas of the New Credit First Nation, Ontario, with mixed English and Ojibwe heritage, was diagnosed with HIV in 1990.

He believes that indigenous people are particularly vulnerable due to “colonisation, neo-colonialism, resource extraction, and assimilation amongst other similar issues” that push them down on social determinants of health and put them at higher risk of all poor health outcomes.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the rate of HIV diagnoses among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women was substantially greater than among Australian-born non-Indigenous women (1.5 compared with 0.4 per 100,000 population).

Between 2004 and 2014, 231 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people were diagnosed with HIV. In 2013, the rate of newly diagnosed HIV infections was greater in the indigenous population (5.4 per 100,000) compared to the Australian-born non-indigenous population (3.9 per 100,000).

“We can’t just pretend that HIV/AIDS exists in isolation,” Stratton says. “The problem of social justice is systemic. We have to be able to leverage international human rights mechanisms so countries can be held accountable.

“We have to encourage nation states to follow the recommendations from the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of the Indigenous People and the International Labour Organisation’s Convention 169, which talks of how to engage indigenous people,” he concludes.

IIWGHA has been working at increasing knowledge and addressing the entrenched stigma of HIV and AIDS within indigenous communities and supporting indigenous-directed research and awareness initiatives.

Its mandate and strategic plan are based on the 2006 ‘Toronto Charter: Indigenous People’s Action Plan’ that acknowledges the right of indigenous peoples to autonomy, social justice and human rights.

Doris Peltier, Aboriginal Women and Leadership Coordinator with CAAN, has been working with women living way below the poverty line, some of whom had their children taken away when they were diagnosed with HIV.

Diagnosed with AIDS at the age of 44 while actively using drugs in Toronto, Peltier believes systemic issues – such as the fear of losing one’s child to the authorities – act as barriers preventing people from discussing their condition.

“A social system that is supposed to be there to support women is actually the one that is putting barriers up for the women,” Peltier tells IPS.

When she decided to go home and reconnect with her family and her First Nations community in Wikwemikong, Ontario, some supported her but others remained reluctant to embrace her.

People wouldn’t let her use their dishes and asked her to clean the toilet after use.

“Soon rumours began to circulate and one of the words being used to talk about me was ‘Wiinaapineh’ (dirty disease). I stood my ground and became better with medication, and my family’s support and encouragement,” Peltier says.

“People have to know that there is help available, there is treatment and prevention and that they can have a good quality life,” concludes Peltier, who is today a great-grandmother.

For her, one of the key responses to high rates impacting indigenous women is to empower them to tap into their inner strength and resilience, and break the code of silence to speak up about HIV/AIDS

(END)

A new Pacific islands forum will seek to challenge the dominance of Australia and New Zealand in a regional body. The new grouping’s approach is being billed the ‘Pacific Way’, and also the ‘green and blue’ way for its commitment to environmentally sustainable oceans as well as land.

The new Pacific Islands Development Forum (PIDF) challenges the Pacific Island Forum (PIF), a 16-member inter-governmental organisation which includes 14 Pacific Island countries plus Australia and New Zealand. The PIF is headquartered in Fijian capital Suva. Fiji itself was suspended from the PIF in 2009 after naval commander Frank Bainimarama grabbed power in a coup in 2006 and refused to hold elections.

Pacific Islands Map. Credit: David Jackmanson/CC BY 2.0

Bainimarama, now prime minister of Fiji, said at the launch of the PIDF earlier this month that people “have largely been excluded from the decision-making process,” and that the PIDF would do it differently.

“It has been no secret that Commodore Bainimarama has great distaste for the Pacific Islands Forum, especially over the hypocritical way that the Forum has treated Fiji since the military coup,” Prof. David Robbie, director of the Auckland-based Pacific Media Centre, told IPS.

“Attempts by the Forum to destabilise Fiji have backfired. For all the criticisms of the Fiji regime, there are positive moves to ‘open up’ the region for greater development partnerships with Asia.”

Bainimarama is riding resentment among Pacific island nations that the PIF is dominated by highly-paid Australian, New Zealand and other western expatriates, trying to impose developed country solutions on Pacific problems.

“We’re so sheltered away from the rest of society,” Kiribati President Anote Tong said in an interview with Radio Australia. “We’re a club of our own in retreat and away from questions from people demanding answers.”

At closed-door PIF meetings, leaders usually come dressed in suits, while at the PIDF meeting they were all dressed in the colourful short-sleeve Pacific-style shirts, and all discussions were in open forum.

For the first time in a major Pacific Island forum, business, church and civil society leaders sat alongside national political leaders, and spoke at the same forums. Such interaction is being projected as a ‘Pacific Way’ of consultation.

The PIDF is gaining support, said Robbie. “Bainimarama achieved a coup in successfully getting Timor-Leste Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao to the PIDF in spite of Australian attempts to prevent him going. Having the East Timor leader there was an important bridge for Asia-Pacific relations.”

The launch of the PIDF reflects new realities in the region, where Australia and New Zealand no longer have a stranglehold on aid handouts. In the past decade China and many other Asian countries have begun to give aid to and invest in the region. The PIDF meeting was funded by grants from China, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates.

The leaders of the Solomon Islands, Kiribati and Nauru attended the meeting along with the deputy prime minister of Vanuatu and the vice-president of Micronesia. Senior ministers from most other Pacific nations and territories also attended.

While Australia and New Zealand sent observers to the meeting, special envoys came from China, Russia and a range of countries such as Chile and Cuba. Government ministers were sent to represent the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Qatar.

A clear division between Melanesian and Polynesian nations of the Pacific seems to have opened up, with leaders of Polynesian countries like Samoa, Tahiti and French Polynesia boycotting the meeting.

Polynesians are believed to be a mixture of Malay and Taiwanese who moved into the South Pacific islands more than 3,000 years ago. Melanesians are of Papuan stock, and are believed to have moved from parts of Indonesia and Papua New Guinea to other Pacific Islands like Fiji, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu more than 4,000 years ago.

The Polynesian nations have a tendency to side with Australia and New Zealand in regional affairs, but Melanesian nations make up about 90 percent of the Pacific Island population, and the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG) is an influential grouping in the region.

Australia blocked Commodore Bainimarama taking over the leadership of the MSG spearhead group within the PIF in 2010 – a decision that seems to have backfired.

“MSG is the real economic powerhouse of the Pacific and is a serious challenge to the old Forum (largely dominated by the Polynesian islands and Australia and New Zealand),” Robbie said. “And now the PIDF is a new threat.”

In an interview with IPS from Suva, executive director of the Pacific Islands Association of Non-Governmental Organisations (PIANGO) Emele Duituturaga said many now expect PIDF to give more value to Pacific expertise and to be founded on Pacific perspectives.

“More importantly the governing and secretariat structures will include all sectors, especially civil society, which the PIF has been overlooking,” she said.

“The new organisation should ensure that the process and structures that are put in place are inclusive,” she added. “It will be a mistake for the governments to just set it up and expect us to go along with it.”

School children in the Eastern Highlands Province of Papua New Guinea. Credit: Catherine Wilson/IPS

By Catherine Wilson
SYDNEY, Jul 7 2013 (IPS)

Many Pacific Island nations are celebrating the success of rising school enrolment rates, with 14 members of the 16-member Pacific Island Forum on target to meet Millennium Development Goal 2: achieving universal primary education by 2015.

But a closer look inside the classroom, and in communities surrounding these schools, reveals a shockingly low literacy rate.

Two organisations – the Asia South Pacific Association for Basic and Adult Education (ASPBAE) and Papua New Guinean Education Advocacy Network (PEAN) – teamed up to assess the impact of formal education on people between the ages of 15 and 60 years in the Madang Province of Papua New Guinea, a southwest Pacific Island nation of just over seven million people.

“There is very little exposure to books in the home and in schools, and many children do chores to supplement family income after school, so they have no time to read." -- Lice Taufaga, lecturer at the University of the South Pacific, Fiji.
Their findings suggest that so-called strides in education have not yielded much concrete success: the literacy rate in the national languages of English and Tok Pisin was just 23 percent, with many students unable to read or write after completing primary education.

Similar findings have been reported in Melanesian countries throughout the southwest Pacific region:  in 2011, ASPBAE surveyed 1,475 people aged over 15 years in the Shefa Province of the South Pacific nation of Vanuatu, and discovered that while 85 percent declared they could read and write a simple letter in the official languages of Bislama, French or English, individual testing confirmed that only 27.6 percent were literate.

Vanuatu boasts a primary enrolment rate of 88 percent, and although 90 percent of respondents had experienced some formal education, only 40 percent completed primary school.

In the Solomon Islands, an archipelago nation located southeast of Papua New Guinea, the government has claimed remarkable recovery from a five-year-long civil war (1998-2003), with primary school enrolment at 91 percent. However, poor school facilities in rural areas and disinterest in formal learning have been cited as contributing factors to a critically low literacy rate of 17 percent.

While 97.7 percent of the 2,200 people surveyed by ASPBAE in the capital, Honiara, and in Malaita Province agreed that it was important for children to attend school, 53.8 percent of females and 37.6 percent of males, aged 15 to 19 years, were not in education.

“The issue of low literacy is prevalent mainly with those who are learning in a language other than their primary one,” Lice Taufaga, lecturer at the school of education at the University of the South Pacific, Fiji, told IPS.  “Literacy is best learnt in one’s primary language, yet most learners in South Pacific countries are expected to achieve it in English, the language of business and administration.”

Taufaga added that there were also cultural challenges, as the solitary activity of reading was not always encouraged or supported in many communal-oriented Pacific societies.

“There is very little exposure to books in the home and in schools, and many children do chores to supplement family income after school, so they have no time to read,” she said.

The linguistic diversity of the region, which contains a population of 10 million and one fifth of the world’s languages – plus European languages introduced during the colonial era – makes literacy a complex issue.

In Melanesian countries, there are hundreds of commonly used local vernacular languages, many of which are only oral. These are used by 88 percent of the population in Vanuatu, while 60 percent claim to utilise the national languages of Bislama, English or French in everyday communication.

Yet low literacy also extends to national indigenous languages, with a World Bank study last year in the Polynesian South Pacific state of Tonga concluding that only three in 10 students who had engaged with three years of primary education were able to read fluently enough in either English or Tongan to comprehend content.

More than a decade ago Pacific educationalists began rethinking the legacy of introduced western curriculums and claiming a priority for Pacific languages and cultures within the education process.  However, the reality is that a bilingual approach remains, with English and French perceived as necessary for engaging in a global world.

“The long term impacts of low literacy levels in English and French are a key concern because much of the information about development is only available in English or French, hence a higher level of literacy in these languages will enhance transfer of technology, information and knowledge at all levels of society,” Rex Horoi, director of the Foundation of the Peoples of the South Pacific told IPS, although he is supportive of translation into vernacular languages.

“It is critically important that Pacific people have direct access to information relevant for their sustainable livelihoods and improvement of life in the language they understand and communicate in…” Horoi emphasised.

Government budgets do not appear to be the main issue, although their allocation raises questions about the delivery of quality education.

According to the World Bank, 23.7 percent of Vanuatu’s government expenditure is allocated to education and this rises to 34 percent in the Solomon Islands, compared to approximately 16.1 percent in New Zealand and 13.5 percent in Australia.

However, up to 90 percent of Pacific Island education budgets are committed to teachers’ salaries, with little funds left to develop education systems, infrastructure and resources.

Inadequately qualified teachers are another issue, especially in light of evidence that only 29 percent of teachers in the Solomon Islands and 54 percent in Vanuatu are trained.

According to Taufaga, many “who are teaching English lack the proficiency to model or teach it well.”  She also pointed out that urban class sizes in the region can be as large as 40 to 50 students and most schools cannot afford suitable books for reading.

Remote students remain the most disadvantaged, with poor education facilities and lack of basic materials plaguing rural communities. In Papua New Guinea, similar to the neighbouring Solomon Islands, approximately 80 percent of schools do not have libraries.

“People keep talking about quality education,” a school graduate named Niniu Oligao told IPS in Honiara. “I believe in people reading books in order to be able to write in full sentences and be exposed to meaningful ideas.”

Oligao is so concerned about the repercussions of the absence of a library in the Takwa Community Primary and High School, an institution of 2,000 students based in the North Malaita Province, that he has taken it upon himself to build a collection of donated books. Though he has no funding, he hopes this initiative will form the beginnings of a library for students’ research.

Addressing poor literacy now is vital to improving students’ chances of completing secondary and tertiary qualifications and empowering Pacific Islanders to contribute to social and economic development, whether at the local, national or regional level.