Daily Archives: June 24, 2021

The new World Bank report,Banking on Protected Areas: Promoting Sustainable Protected Area Tourism to Benefit Local Communities, was launched on June 14, 2021. The report estimates the economic impact of tourism in protected areas on the local economies and makes the case that the promotion of sustainable tourism in protected areas should be actively included in economic development and recovery strategies given its ability to support economic growth, generate jobs and conserve biodiversity.

At this online seminar, co-authors of the report, Urvashi Narain, Lead Economist, Environment, Natural Resources and Blue Economy Global Practice, andPhoebe Spencer, Environment Specialist, Environment, Natural Resources, and Blue Economy Global Practice, will introduce the main points of the report. This seminar will be conducted in English, without interpretation into Japanese.

8am-9am, Friday June 25, 2021 (Japan Standard Time)

https://youtu.be/Y-Kyl-bLjEU

Please send your questions to the speakers via online form posted on this webpage.

Urvashi Narain is a lead economist in the World Banks Environment, Natural Resources, and Blue Economy global practice, with over 20 years experience on issues at the intersection of environment and development policy. Her areas of expertise span from air pollution management, and watershed management, to nature-based tourism. She led the 2016 World Bank publication: The Cost of Air Pollution: Strengthening the Economic Case for Action that influenced World Bank operations in air quality management across South Asia, Middle East and North Africa, and Eastern Europe and Central Asia. Currently she leads the Air Pollution and COVID-19 initiative at the Bank. For the past six years she has developed a partnership with the Natural Capital Project to bring innovative tools to World Bank operations on watershed management mapping, valuing, and prioritizing investments in ecosystem services. Until recently she led the Nature-based Tourism Community at the World Bank, and currently leads the Environmental Economics Community, a group of 40 environmental economists at the World Bank. She has published widely in peer-reviewed journals including Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Environmental and Resource Economics, and Land Economics.

Phoebe Spencer joined the World Bank in 2017 and entered the Young Professionals Program in September 2020, working with the Environment, Natural Resources, and Blue Economy Global Practice in the East & Southern Africa Region. Phoebe currently works on the economics of protected area tourism, avoiding degradation of forest resources in Madagascar, implementing the World Banks Environmental and Social Framework, and understanding relationships between natural resource management, fragility, and conflict. Phoebe holds a PhD in Natural Resources and an MSc in Community Development and Applied Economics from the University of Vermont and a BA in Anthropology and Geography from McGill University. Prior to joining the World Bank, she conducted research with the UN Statistics Division and the McGill Institute for Health and Social Policy.

Banking on Protected Areas: Promoting Sustainable Protected Area Tourism to Benefit Local Communities (PDF)

World Bank Group Morning Seminar

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World Bank Online Morning Seminar #111 Banking on Protected Areas: Promoting Sustainable Protected Area Tourism to Benefit Local Communities - World...

Photograph Source: Cover of Hinterland: Americas New Landscape of Class and Conflict by Phil A. Neel

When the U.S. had its first great break-up in 1861, the geography was fairly well defined. The core area of the Southern slaveocracy versus the rising industrial North. There were conflicts within the border states that stuck with the Union. Copperhead confederacy sympathizers existed in pockets of the North. But the lines of battle were pretty clear.

The geographies of todays cold civil war are far more complicated. States are split between urban and rural.Metropolitan regions are splintered.Urban cores and increasingly multiethnic and working-class inner suburbs are in tension with largely White outer suburbs and exurbs.

The fragmented geography of a dividing U.S. is the center of a recent book by Phil A. Neel,Hinterland: Americas New Landscape of Class and Conflict.(Reaktion Books, London, 2018). In this two-part series, I first offer Neels overview of this fractured landscape, then in the second part give my own analysis with some ideas on how to pull it back together.

As the title indicates, Neel sees the national terrain ripped by class divisions in an increasingly unequal society, setting rural areas where employment possibilities have collapsed against metropolitan regions where the winners are concentrated.But not everyone.Neel illuminates the complex rifts within the metropole, where the number of poor in suburban areas exceeded those in cities proper by 2011, and White flight to the outer rings has created the core geography of the U.S. right.

Neel defines the loser regions as two hinterlands, mostly defined by distance from prosperous urban cores. A far hinterland of collapsed economies is mostly rural. The near hinterland is largely those inner suburban rings where working class people unable to afford increasingly expensive cities are being driven.

Neel brings a unique perspective, a framework of hard left analysis built on a foundation of hard knocks life experiences. He has seen the degradation of rural areas. Neel grew up in a trailer in the Siskiyou Mountains near the California-Oregon border, where natural resource-based economies have declined, and worked in the northern Nevada town of Winnemucca.

The way of life has been destroyed in a devastating, irrevocable fashion, essential industries torn out from under us, ecosystems razed, and everyone left suffering not just material deprivation but an expansive social and cultural collapse that can only be characterized as apocalyptic, Neel writes. The meth-sodden tweaker is the vanguard of whatevers coming. . . the most basic recognition of the ways in which the far hinterland has been made futureless, an organic nihilism emerging from the American countryside, unprecedented and unpredictable.

With traditional economies in decline, rural areas become dependent on climate-driven disaster industries funded by government.If timber and ore were the gods of the old west, fire and flood are the gods of the new one. Highway departments fix roads washed out by annual landslides. Wildfires draw in armies of firefighters, their efforts setting the stage for even larger fires. There is no final crisis, just the continual management of widening collapse.

The far hinterlands extreme crisis acts as a sort of window into the future of class conflict in the United States.Neel is critical of both left and liberal approaches to rural areas.Liberals do not much care about such low-output, low-population areas.Being substantially from the managerial class, they are focused on the important part of the economy, the metropolitan.Meanwhile, the left has largely retreated from the far hinterland, where it traditionally did labor organizing, to coastal cities and college towns, downplaying issues of class and poverty that cuts across ethnic lines in favor of identity politics.

One group is organizing in the far hinterland, though. Neel provides a chilling description of efforts by Patriot groups such as the Oathkeeperswho anticipate a coming civil war between conservative rural areas and liberal cities. They are moving into the gaps left by failing public services, offering their own substitutes. Building power in the underserved interstices hearkens to competitive control concepts of insurgency, Neel notes.The thing that makes the Patriots unique, then, is their recognition of the need to build power within these wastelands . . . Resistance will first emerge in the far hinterland, where the right can organize and form a rural base of power aimed at taking control of federal lands and resources.Neels writing calls to mind rancher Ammon Bundys war with federal land managers.

Neel cites writings from Jack Donovan, leader of the Cascadia chapter of the Wolves of Vineland, a neo-pagan, White ethno-nationalist cult.Donovan speaks of creating tribes that go back to the land to build autonomous zones. The appropriation of languages common in anarchist and other subcultures, even the bioregional descriptor Cascadia, should raise red flags.Tendencies that look to third way organizing, where left and right supposedly meet, can easily fall into traps. The litmus test, Neel accurately points out, is whether the politics supports a circle-the-wagons approach to the outer world, or affirms the commonality of humanity. For instance, should public lands be placed under local control or kept in the common domain? Local organizing that addresses local needs is crucial on every landscape, but it must connect to broader causes, inclusionary rather than exclusionary.

The author has also experienced urban life from the bottom end. Neel describes how he journeyed south into California in a barely functional car looking for work.Finding none he ventured north to Seattle, where he still lives.

Skyscrapers and construction cranes glinted in the late-setting September sun. Staring at the skyline, you could almost hear the capital pouring in from the other end of the Pacific Rim . . . It was my first time attempting to live in such a city in any city, really.People often dont realize that the barriers to entry for these narrow corridors of prosperity are almost impossibly high for those of us migrating from the countryside. Neel found work in an industrial kitchen on the south end. That hinterland of decaying, industrialized suburbia seemed to offer a certain counterpoint to the creative class and its urban palace. From this distance, hidden sightlines could be found and the occluded core of the regions economy unveiled.

What Neel saw in that area near Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, also a major truck-rail link and warehousing hub for the seaport with its strategic location close to the markets of Asia, was the true center of the world economy . . . not to be found in the creative, financialized, or high-tech downtown cores of its global cities, but instead in the complex mesh of material infrastructure that links them together . . . the vast logistics-industrial spaces that extend laterally from these cores. . .

That near hinterland will likely be the central theater in the coming class war . . . large populations of people who have been made surplus to the economy live and work along its integral corridors. In another place, he writes, . . . the near hinterland is particularly important, since future struggles on such sites have the capacity to fundamentally cripple global supply chains in a way that occupation of parliaments or parks in front of financial centers do not . . . giving them the ability to spread disruption beyond the local sphere in a way not dependent on media spectacle.

Meanwhile, the whitening exurb, not the rural area, is the material core of the far right. It is where wealthier landholders, business owners, cops, soldiers and self-employed contractors tend to live. This is the geography of latent civil war, the interests of the wealthy downtown core aligned with its extremities in the form of the militarized white exurb, a recruiting hub for the far right. The exurb is the link point between metropolitan and non-metropolitan forces, and will be central to attempts to control the near hinterland, he asserts.

Neel reports on his own journey to an early struggle in the near hinterland. He and a group of black-clad friends, all of whom met during the 2011 Occupy Seattle protests, visited Ferguson, Missouri, site of the 2014 Black Lives Matter protests that followed the police killing of Michael Brown. The first round of riots was then only major uprising in an American suburb within living memory. Ferguson is the unambiguous entry of the United States into the global era of riots, born of a collapsing social order.Events since have born him out.

The uprising was grounded in the deindustrialization of the St. Louis era, last hired-first fired Black people seeking cheaper rents in the suburbs, and systematic police abuse. Ferguson covers declining revenues with tickets, court fees and warrants. In 2013, when 35,975 warrants were out in a town of 21,000, tickets and fees represented 20% of the towns budget.

The author and his friends were there to observe and learn. He contrasted cities, heavily surveilled and policed, having dense land use patterns that lend themselves to crowd control, with near hinterland placessuch as Ferguson. A minimum of streetlights, many back streets onto which protestors could escape, fewer police.

Neels future is one of a long crisis, of conflict ramifying to conflict, with unpredictable outcomes. He sees himself and his cohort as not a single, temporarily fucked generation but instead the first in a grand parade of the futureless. When the next bubbles burst and the gains of the tech industry are shown to be hollow .. . those within the hinterland will increasingly be thrown into a condition of survival on the edge. . . Younger generations will bear the brunt.. . . I dont know whats coming, even though I know something is rolling toward us in darkness, and the world can end in more ways than one.

In the next part, I will offer my analysis of how class struggles intersect with a geographically fragmented U.S., including some crucial dynamics within the urban core that I think Neel underplays.Are there slivers of daylight in a darkness Neel all too accurately depicts? Ill try to begin answering that question.

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Conflict in the Hinterlands: the Fragmented Geography of the Cold Civil War - CounterPunch.org - CounterPunch

VANCOUVER, British Columbia, June 24, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Cornish Metals Inc. (TSX-V/AIM: CUSN) (Cornish Metals or the Company), a mineral exploration and development company focused on its projects in Cornwall, United Kingdom, is pleased to announce that it has released its interim financial statements and management, discussion and analysis (MD&A) for the three months ended 30 April 2021. The reports are available under the Companys profile on SEDAR (www.sedar.com) and on the Companys website (www.cornishmetals.com).

Highlights for the three months ended April 30, 2021 and for the period ending June 23, 2021

Richard Williams, CEO of Cornish Metals, stated, I am delighted with what the Company has achieved in the last few months a highly successful listing on AIM which surpassed our expectations, the conversion of the Osisko loan note into two royalties which endorsed the quality of the Companys projects in Cornwall, a substantial increase in mineral resource for South Crofty and the commencement of the exploration programme at United Downs. I look forward to reporting imminently on the initial results of that exploration programme once the assays from the first few drill holes have been assessed.

Longer term, we are continuing to assess various financing options to progress South Crofty which remains a key strategic asset for the Company. South Crofty could potentially play a pivotal role in securing a domestic and sustainable source of battery metals as the UK transitions to a low carbon economy.

Key financial metrics for the first quarter

Outlook

The proceeds from the recently completed AIM listing are to be used to conduct a drill program at the United Downs exploration project, to conduct initial field work on other high priority exploration targets within transport distance of South Crofty, and for general working capital purposes. Management believes that, subject to drilling success, the proceeds from the AIM listing will result in the Company being fully funded to the completion of a maiden JORC resource at the United Downs exploration project.

Within 12 to 18 months of the date of the AIM listing, the Company plans to:

In the longer term, the Company intends to develop the South Crofty tin project as and when economic conditions and cashflows are supportive.

ABOUT CORNISH METALS

Cornish Metals completed the acquisition of the South Crofty tin and United Downs copper / tin projects, plus additional mineral rights located in Cornwall, UK, in July 2016 (see Company news release dated July 12, 2016). The additional mineral rights cover an area of approximately 15,000 hectares and are distributed throughout Cornwall. Some of these mineral rights cover old mines that were historically worked for copper, tin, zinc, and tungsten.

ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Richard D. WilliamsRichard D. Williams, P.Geo

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

Caution regarding forward looking statements

This news release contains "forward-looking statements", including but not limited to, statements with respect to the continued listing and trading of the Common Shares on the TSX-V and AIM; and the expected commencement of future exploration programs at the United Downs and the South Crofty Mine.

Forward-looking statements, while based on management's best estimates and assumptions at the time such statements are made, are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements, including but not limited to: risks related to receipt of regulatory approvals, risks related to general economic and market conditions; risks related to the COVID-19 global pandemic and any variants of COVID-19 which may arise; risks related to the availability of financing; the timing and content of upcoming work programs; actual results of proposed exploration activities; possible variations in Mineral Resources or grade; failure of plant, equipment or processes to operate as anticipated; accidents, labour disputes, title disputes, claims and limitations on insurance coverage and other risks of the mining industry; changes in national and local government regulation of mining operations, tax rules and regulations.

Although Cornish Metals has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in forward-looking statements, there may be other factors that cause results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such statements. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Cornish Metals undertakes no obligation or responsibility to update forward-looking statements, except as required by law.

Market Abuse Regulation (MAR) Disclosure

This announcement contains inside information for the purposes of Article 7 of the Market Abuse Regulation (EU) 596/2014 as it forms part of UK domestic law by virtue of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 ("MAR"), and is disclosed in accordance with the Company's obligations under Article 17 of MAR.

CONSOLIDATED CONDENSED INTERIM STATEMENTS OF FINANCIAL POSITION(Unaudited Prepared by Management)(Expressed in Canadian dollars)

CONSOLIDATED CONDENSED INTERIM STATEMENTS OF LOSS AND COMPREHENSIVE LOSS(Unaudited Prepared by Management)(Expressed in Canadian dollars)

CONSOLIDATED CONDENSED INTERIM STATEMENTS OF CASH FLOWS(Unaudited Prepared by Management) (Expressed in Canadian dollars)

CONSOLIDATED CONDENSED INTERIM STATEMENTS OF CHANGES IN SHAREHOLDERS EQUITYTHREE MONTHS ENDED APRIL 30(Unaudited Prepared by Management) (Expressed in Canadian dollars)

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Cornish Metals Releases Financial Statements and Management's Discussion and Analysis for the Three Months Ending 30 - GlobeNewswire

In the context of Chinas continued growth story despite COVID-19, we look at how businesses invested in the region can strategize to survive and succeed.

The purpose of restructuring in China should go beyond survival from the health crisis. Enterprises in all sectors and industries in China must plan for the next phase when choosing to restructure their business to adapt to a more competitive market, to be a stronger player in a niche sector, to enter a promising sector more speedily, to reshape the market strategy of the group company, to be in better control of the business, and to keep the corporate structure more nimble and flexible to be more resilient in case of any future setbacks.

The last year and a half has been challenging for businesses around the world. With the COVID-19 pandemic recorded early in 2020, and still ongoing as several countries confront new waves of the outbreak, companies around the world are having to make difficult decisions.

An unpredictable global business environment, supply chain disruptions, cash flow concerns, and matters relating to staff management collectively put pressure on companies who are likely planning for their survival during what is now an extended crisis period.

While some businesses have given up and filed for bankruptcy, many others are exploring strategies to address their sustainability, such as through restructuring their company and operations. In fact, a surge of restructuring activity is expected to continue through the year.

Restructuring can be simply understood as a combination of corporate actions taken to modify the companys debt exposure and liabilities, operations, and/or the entity structure to limit financial harm and improve the business viability. Restructuring can help companies in many aspects, such as reducing and consolidating their debt, ensuring talent retention, adoption of new technologies, focus on key products or accounts, and establishing strategies to cut costs, etc.

Following a restructuring, the company should be left with a more streamlined and economically sound business operation, which is risk resilient and competitive in the market. This is not only important for businesses to get through the immediate challenges posed by financial and operational pressures, but also so that they can take advantage of new opportunities that emerge during crises, particularly relevant in the context of China.

In the next sections, we will discuss how the Chinese economy has rebounded from the disruption caused by the initial outbreak of the disease and witnessed the resurgence of economic activity and has presented one of the few centers of growth in a bleak world economy. That has made it even more important for businesses invested in the region to strategize to survive and succeed.

After businesses and factories reopened and internal movement relaxed following the successful implementation of COVID-19 control measures, China proved itself to be a reliable investment destination.

According to official data released by Chinas National Statistic Bureau, foreign direct investment (FDI) into China rose by 6.2 percent year-on-year to RMB 999.98 billion (US$154.58 billion) in 2020, with 38,570 foreign-invested enterprises (FIE) having newly established. China has overtaken the US to become the worlds largest FDI destination. Leading multinational companies, such as ExxoMobil, BMW, Toyota, and Invista, increased their investment into China.

This is in great contrast to the 35 percent plunge in global FDI inflows in 2020, to US$1 trillion from US$1.5 trillion the previous year, according to the World Investment Report 2021, released by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) in June 2021. The report projects that global FDI flows will bottom out in 2021 and recover some lost ground with an increase of 10 to 15 percent. Lockdowns implemented around the world to control the pandemic slowed down existing investment projects, and the prospects of a recession led multinational enterprises to reassess new projects. FDI into developed economies fell by 58 percent partly due to corporate restructuring and intrafirm financial flows. While FDI in developing economies was relatively resilient, declining by eight percent, mainly because of robust flows in Asia, the number of newly announced greenfield projects fell by 42 percent and international project finance deals important for infrastructure by 14 percent in developing countries. As per UNCTADs World Investment Report 2020, FDI into the US declined 64.5 percent in the first half of 2020, while Germany suffered a 23.5 percent FDI decline in the same period. Even Vietnam, the new favorite destination for foreign investors, saw its FDI inflow fall by 5.1 percent in the first eight months of 2020.

The most straightforward reason behind Chinas relatively quick stabilization and move to recovery has been its management of the COVID-19 outbreak, and most recently, its inoculation strategy. Beijing aims to fully inoculate 40 percent of the countrys 1.4 billion people by the end of June this year, and health authorities said on Sunday (June 20) that more than a billion vaccine doses have already been administered. Globally, as of June 19, more than 2.5 billion doses have been administered. Reuters reported Thursday morning that yesterday, June 23, China had administered 24.1 million doses, bringing the official national total to 1.096 billion.

Last year, Chinas COVID spread was overwhelmingly brought into control in February, around two months after the virus was first recognized. In April 2020, Wuhan, the epicenter of the pandemic, lifted its 2.5 months-long lockdown. Despite new clusters emerging across the country from time to time, China has shown its capability in the rapid containment and control of the infectious outbreaks. Most remarkably, it has been able to implement massive test and trace operations wherever the clusters happen, to expose any asymptomatic cases and expel chances of a wider spread of the virus. Such effectiveness in controlling the spread of the virus provides security and confidence to the people living in China, as well as businesses and foreign investors.

By April 2020, 99 percent of large-scale industrial enterprises and 84 percent of small- and medium- sized enterprises had restored their production nationwide. The rate of personnel returning to work was 94 percent by this time. The general public also gradually returned to their pre-epidemic lifestyle, with 637 million people hitting the road for domestic trips during the National Day Golden Week in early October, 79 percent of the numbers recorded in 2019. Consequently, China took the lead, globally, in achieving an economic rebound, having benefited from the early restart of production activity and reopening of logistic links. In the second quarter of 2020, Chinas economy bottomed out and rose by 3.2 percent, making it the only G20 country showing positive growth indicators. In the third quarter, China achieved a 4.9 percent year-on-year growth, in line with market projections.

Cut to 2021 and the Asian Development Bank projects that Chinas economic growth will surge by 8.1 percent in 2021 from 2.3 percent in 2020, before stabilizing at around 5.5 percent in 2022. A median forecast by Bloomberg, based on its survey of economists, put Chinas growth at 8.5 percent in 2021. This growth will be powered by strong exports and gradual recovery in household consumption; nevertheless, market watchers warn that port delays, supply chain disruptions, and declines in consumption activity could easily temper rebound trends.

In comparison, though, most other countries are still struggling to contain the spread of COVID-19 and are experimenting with extended home quarantines, social distancing in public spaces, travel curbs, and constant monitoring of public health. This keeps China in a uniquely advantageous position. With period waves of the pandemic hitting several countries, and new variants of COVID-19, like the latest Delta variant, introducing more severe threats, the proven capability of Chinas central and provincial governments to manage repercussions from unforeseen events and adapt to fast-changing scenarios is appealing to foreign investors.

China is therefore projected to play a bigger role in facilitating the survival of businesses in the global market as well as the rise of new and innovative ventures. Foreign investors who had seriously considered moving out of the country due to the US-China trade war, rising labor and compliance costs, and market competition, are now back to the drawing table to reassess their China strategy. And even if geopolitics play spoiler to regional agreements, like the EU-China CAI, global businesses remain insistent on strengthening and diversifying their China base and market exposure. This is reflected, for instance, in the 2021 American Business in China White Paper released by the American Chamber of Commerce in China on May 11. According to the White Paper, a majority of US businesses remain optimistic about growth opportunities in China and intend to increase their investments. They believe China will steadily increase the pace of its market opening and the focus is turning to Chinas domestic consumption power.

Beyond the swift measures taken to contain the economic fallout of COVID-19, China has other accumulated advantages to back up its outstanding position in the global market and maintain investor confidence.

Chinas sophisticated manufacturing and logistics infrastructure ensures it will not get replaced in the global supply chain easily. According to Xinhua, the state-run press agency, China is the only country that possesses all the industrial categories in the United Nations industrial classification, which allows firms to source goods easily. China also boasts of the largest network of high-speed rail and expressways in terms of mileage, which allows products to be transported efficiently.

The importance of these transport advantages became fully clear during the epidemic when overseas supply chains were seriously disrupted due to the implementation of infection control measures. From the production and supply of masks, protective suits, and medical equipment in the early stage of the epidemic, to consumer electronics, household goods, and festival products during later months, Chinas exports have made up for overseas shortages in all kinds of product segments.

Being the worlds second largest economy, Chinas rising purchasing power, expanding middle class, and a population approaching 1.4 billion, touts it to become the largest retail market in the near future. In 2019, for example, total retail sales of consumer goods hit RMB 41.17 trillion (US$5.97 trillion), according to the National Bureau of Statistics. This trend has remained in the wake of COVID-19. Chinas retail sales of consumer goods grew 17.7 percent year-on-year in April to reach RMB 3.32 trillion (US$515.9 billion), and up 0.32 percent month-on-month, according to the National Bureau of Statistics. In the first four months of 2021, Chinas retail sales of consumer goods grew 29.6 percent year-on-year to reach RMB 13.84 trillion; e-commerce during this period saw 27.6 percent year-on-year growth. While retail sales grew by 12.4 percent year-on-year in May, weaker than expected, it still shows that Chinas consumer and business confidences is picking up as a result of pent-up demand and widespread vaccination. This holds promising for the tourism, hospitality, and recreation industries as well.

The strong domestic market performance will benefit from Chinas dual circulation strategy, which intends to spur Chinas domestic demand, on one hand, and simultaneously create conditions to increase foreign investment and boost production for exports, on the other. The focus on tapping into Chinas internal consumption patterns and domestic markets aims to buffer the impact of global headwinds on the countrys economic and financial stability. This is why Chinas government at the central and provincial levels have sped up market opening reforms to make it easier for businesses to scale up, innovate, and boost economic activity, and as a result, fuel consumption growth.

Bearing this in mind, it is not hard to understand why foreign investors are once again betting big on China. Many have started to produce goods specifically for local consumption in the country, rather than only use China as a production base for export-led manufacturing as in the past. For many companies, China is now their largest market for growth.

China has endeavored to attract foreign investment by further relaxing market access restrictions and by continuously introducing improvements to the business and regulatory environment.

Among others, the negative lists, which indicates industries that are subject to special administrative measures for foreign investors, were shortened again this year. The 2020 National Negative List cut the number of restrictive measures by 17.5 percent, from 40 to 33, and the 2020 FTZ Negative List (covering free trade zones) cut restrictive measures by 18.9 percent, from 37 to 30. The 2020 Market Access Negative List, announced December 2020, has been shortened to 123 items from 131 in 2019 relaxing requirements in sectors, such as oil and gas, resource management, and trading and financial services.

Taking auto manufacturing as an example, the restrictions on the share ratio of foreign investment in commercial vehicle manufacturing has been liberalized. Before, the Chinese party shareholding percentage in commercial automobile manufacturing shall not be less than 50 percent.

Besides, with the Foreign Investment Law and supporting regulations coming into effect 2020, together with other reforms in the areas of company establishment, tax, finance, reporting and compliance management, foreign investors are playing on a more even ground with domestic competitors. Moreover, China has publicly stated its intentions to accelerate market opening reforms. More FTZs were announced to diversify scope and access to preferential incentives, test sector and region-based relaxation of entry norms. On September 21, 2020, China announced it will establish pilot FTZs in Beijing, Tianjin, and Anhui, raising the countrys FTZ tally to 21.

This also constitutes part of Chinas efforts to transform into a more innovative, service, and consumption-driven economy with high-end manufacturing capacity to attract international businesses. This trends towards high-tech innovation and market opening that was initially an outcome of US-China trade tensions will pave the ground for future and sustainable patterns of growth.

To summarize, Chinas containment of the coronavirus outbreak within its borders enabled the quick recovery of its economy. This was helped by Chinas stable social environment, integrated industrial system, efficient and advanced service and logistic networks, well-educated human resources, as well as a sizeable domestic market.

Cumulatively, these factors and outcomes helped the country avoid large-scale relocation of foreign and local companies. Given that COVID-19 is ongoing as the world battles new variants and waves of outbreaks as economies attempt to reopen, disease prevention is the new normal. Chinas performance in navigating this new normal adds to its potential to attract continued FDI.

Despite the upsides, it must be noted that businesses on the ground still face a highly competitive market, with a much smaller window of survival due to global economic turbulence. This is evident when we scrutinize the data more closely while China is leading the world in economic recovery, its growth rate is still vulnerable to global shocks and new outbreaks, such as the one experienced in the southern export powerhouse of Guangdong since May (see our coverage of the coronavirus outbreak in the country here: China Coronavirus Updates: Latest Developments and Business Advisory).

In addition, it can also be observed that large scale enterprises and state-owned enterprises will continue to be at a more advantageous position than smaller and privately-owned businesses. In this context, the purpose of restructuring in China should go beyond survival from the health crisis. Enterprises in all sectors and industries in China must plan for the next phase when choosing to restructure their business to adapt to a more competitive market, to be a stronger player in a niche sector, to enter a promising sector more speedily, to reshape the market strategy of the group company, to be in better control of the business, and to keep the corporate structure more nimble and flexible to be more resilient in case of any future setbacks.

Correspondingly, businesses that want to optimize their operations and resources should consider both external restructuring, that involves more than one party, and internal restructuring.

External restructuring usually refers to the restructuring of the company equity, control rights, and assets to achieve relevant business purposes, such as entering a niche market without directly setting up from scratch. Typical strategies under external restructuring include equity acquisition, asset transfer, merger, split-up, divestiture, etc.

Internal restructuring, in contrast, focuses on alterations in operations, procedures, departments, supply chains, human resources, legal frameworks, locations, computer systems and networks, etc. to enable the business to become more integrated, streamlined, and profitable. At the operational level, it could lead to reducing or eliminating production or service lines, closing facilities, relocating businesses and employees, adjustment of the company divisions, and adoption of new rules and advanced systems, such as supply chain management system (SCM), human capital management system (HCM), back office automation, and so on. Professional advisory services are often engaged in this process to ensure the effectiveness of the company restructuring.

Restructuring can be a challenging and painful process as the internal and external structure of a company is adjusted and human capital is affected. But a successful restructuring plan will result in smoother, more economically viable business operations. This is vitally important for businesses to survive, and to outperform in the new normal.

About Us

China Briefing is written and produced by Dezan Shira & Associates. The practice assists foreign investors into China and has done so since 1992 through offices in Beijing, Tianjin, Dalian, Qingdao, Shanghai, Hangzhou, Ningbo, Suzhou, Guangzhou, Dongguan, Zhongshan, Shenzhen, and Hong Kong. Please contact the firm for assistance in China at china@dezshira.com.

Dezan Shira & Associates has offices in Vietnam, Indonesia, Singapore, United States, Germany, Italy, India, and Russia, in addition to our trade research facilities along the Belt & Road Initiative. We also have partner firms assisting foreign investors in The Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, Bangladesh.

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Restructuring Your China Company to Survive, Stabilize, and Succeed - China Briefing

NEW YORK, June 24, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- GigaSpaces InsightEdge Smart Operational Data Store (ODS)/Digital Integration Hub (DIH) has been named the Best Data Tool and Platform of 2021 as part of the annual SIIA CODiE Awards.The CODiE Awards recognize the companies producing the most innovative business technology products across the country, and around the world.

"We are honored to receive this very prestigious award, that is based on a deep dive into our technology's differentiators and our powerful customer testimonials," said Eti Gwirtz, VP Product at GigaSpaces."With the new focus on the online economy triggered by COVID, companies are competing to see who can be the first to develop and deploy new differentiating online services, and we are proud to provide an award-winning technology that enables our customers to deliver superior user experiences."

The InsightEdge Smart ODS/DIH in-memory platform provides the required high performance, availability, and elastic scaling enabling enterprises to meet the most challenging data and analytics processing needs.InsightEdge executes data transactions and analytics 30X faster than NoSQL, and 6X faster than other in-memory platforms and run complex algorithms, as used in risk and fraud, in minutes compared with hours, while saving millions of dollars a year on resource provisioning compared to alternative solutions.

"Congratulations to all of the 2021 Business Technology CODiE Award winners," said SIIA President Jeff Joseph. "The products honored this year hold a particularly special place in the distinguished history of the CODiEs. Many of these winners literally helped business survive, and even thrive, as the global business community transitioned to remote status due to the pandemic. All those honored today demonstrate the resilience of this dynamic industry. Innovation continued even in the face of an unprecedented challenging year."

Acknowledged as the premier awards program for the software and information industries for over 35 years, the SIIA CODiE Awards are produced by the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA), the principal trade association for the software, education, media and digital content industries.

Details about the winners are listed at https://history.siia.net/codie/2021-Winners.

About the SIIA CODiE Awards

The SIIA CODiE Awards is the only peer-reviewed program to showcase business and education technology's finest products and services. Since 1986, thousands of products, services and solutions have been recognized for achieving excellence. For more information, visit siia.net/CODiE.

About GigaSpaces

The GigaSpaces InsightEdge portfolio delivers fastest, scalable and easiest to deploy in-memory computing platforms to meet the most challenging enterprise data and analytics processing needs for accelerating and scaling real-time applications, analytics and operational BI on any data, at any load, across any environment. One-click integrations with on-premises and cloud operational data stores, automatic data modeling, business-policy data tiering and AI-driven autonomous scaling reduce time-to-market and ensure rapid response times and highest performance levels, with lower TCO.

Hundreds of Tier-1 and Fortune-listed organizations and OEMs across financial services, retail, transportation, telecom, healthcare, and more trust GigaSpaces for powering their mission critical services to optimize business operations, comply with regulations and enhance the customer experience. GigaSpaces offices are located in the US, Europe and Israel with partners around the globe serving customers such as Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, CSX, Goldman Sachs, Socit Gnrale, Crdit Agricole, Avanza Bank, Avaya, Frequentis, CLSA, Groupe PSA and UBS.

For more information visit http://www.gigaspaces.com and http://www.gigaspaces.com/blog/, follow us on Twitter, or visit our YouTube and LinkedIn channels.

GigaSpaces Contact:Talya Mizrahi-Yaakov e. [emailprotected]

SIIA Communications Contact: e. [emailprotected]

SOURCE GigaSpaces

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GigaSpaces Announced Winner of SIIA's 2021 CODiE Best Data Tool and Platform Award - PRNewswire

VICTORIA -- A new independent study released by the Ancient Forest Alliance shows old-growth forests on Southern Vancouver Island could contribute greater economic benefit to the region when preserved than harvested.

The environmental group commissioned the two-and-a-half-year study by Vancouver-based environmental consultants ESSA Technologies. Using old-growth forests located in the Pacheedaht and Ditidaht territories near Port Renfrew, the researchers compared the economic benefits of recreation, tourism, carbon storage and coho salmon habitat to harvesting the timber from ancient forests.

"When decisions are made to log old-growth forests, typical economic analysis doesnt consider the value of ecosystem services," said Ancient Forest Alliance campaigner Andrea Inness.

"By only considering short-term job creation, revenue and impacts to GDP (gross domestic product), the economics arent telling the whole story," she said.

Inness says the environmental group commissioned the report to see what old-growth forests were worth to B.C.s economy when values like carbon storage, recreation and tourism were factors.

"If all old-growth forests in the study area were protected, society would be better off by $40 million compared to business as usual old-growth logging," said Inness. "Tourism alone would make up for any lost jobs by not timber harvesting and would cover almost 66 per cent of lost provincial GDP by not harvesting."

Inness says that under the same scenario, carbon emissions would be reduced by approximately 570,000 tonnes by preserving the ancient forests in the study area. She says the Port Renfrew region was chosen for the study because of its ecosystem services and its strong tourism and recreation base.

"We know that area has some of the finest old-growth stands on Vancouver Island," said Inness. "It's also an area that's well known, and throughout the course of this study the blockades were erected in that area and are ongoing, so it's drawn a lot of attention."

For the study, ESSA Technologies used computer modelling, provincial forest harvest data, and both market and non-market values for ecosystem services, such as, tourism, recreation and salmon habitat. It also considered non-timber products including research and educational opportunities.

The study is based on only a portion of the harvestable old-growth forest near Port Renfrew. The Ancient Forest Alliance says it does not include all ecosystem services like cultural values and it says the studys findings are underestimates of the value of standing old-growth forests.

"Our hope is that this report will create a dialogue and create change so that going forward we are accounting for things like carbon storage, tourism and recreation," said Inness.

"The Ancient Forest Alliance has long been calling on the B.C. government to act immediately to protect the most at-risk ancient old-growth forests and halt logging (of ancient forests)."

One Vancouver Island First Nation says it is disappointed in the Ancient Forest Alliance report.

In an emailed release, the Hutu-at-art First Nation in Port Alberni says the call for the immediate end of all old-growth logging did not take into consideration the constitutional rights and title of First Nations or their social, cultural and economic needs.

"Just like the rest of B.C., we need to develop a strong and vibrant economy so we can look after the needs of our people," said Hulu-any-aht First Nation Chief Councillor Robert J. Dennis Sr.

"We will follow the guidance of our elders and citizens to make the decisions we think are right. We are asking others to respect that process and follow our direction in our territory," he said.

On June 7, the Hutu-any-art, Ditidaht and Pacheedat Nations announced they had reached an agreement to defer old-growth logging in parts of southwestern Vancouver Island for the next two years.

The First Nations said they informed the B.C. government of their plan to suspend old-growth logging in the Fairy Creek and Central Walbran areas while they develop long-term resource stewardship plans.

In todays release, the Huu-ay-aht First Nation reaffirmed its commitment to developing and implementing an integrated resource management plan.

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Independent study finds old-growth forests worth more standing than harvested on Vancouver Island - CTV News VI

Immigrants and refugees in Oregon will enjoy expanded protections and benefits from legislation that majority Democrats passed during this years session. And lawmakers are continuing to press for more policies and spending to improve the lives of those new Oregonians in the sessions waning days.

Bills headed to the desk of Gov. Kate Brown will make Oregon a safer sanctuary state, create an Office of Immigrant and Refugee Advancement and expand a tax credit for working non-citizen parents of U.S. citizen children.

But not all proposed legislation intended to uplift immigrants made it through the Legislature. Champions of immigrants felt a particularly stinging loss when a bill to guarantee legal representation to Oregon residents facing deportation proceedings failed to advance out of the House.

Bills that cleared both chambers ranged from policy updates to expenditures aimed at helping refugees get a better start on their American dreams. The most heralded change, which passed both chambers on near-party line votes over Republican opposition, will strengthen Oregons status as a sanctuary state in which state and local government employees and agencies must remain neutral while federal authorities enforce immigration rules.

SANCTUARY PROMISE ACT

The Senate gave final passage Wednesday to House Bill 3265, which will expand Oregons sanctuary state status, first established in 1987. The new provisions prohibit law enforcement agencies from denying services, benefits, privileges or opportunities to an individual in custody, on parole or on probation based on their immigration status, said Rep. Teresa Alonso Len, a Democrat from Woodburn, a chief sponsor of the bill and herself an immigrant.

Immigration authorities also will be prohibited from detaining a person who is entering or leaving a courthouse or traveling to or from a court appointment. That will outlaw what had been a longstanding but controversial practice of making arrests when people show up for unrelated court business.

It also will prohibit Oregon jails from housing immigration detainees. None currently do so, but some have in the past, and the bill means no jails can resume or start doing so.

The bill also means people who experience violations of Oregons sanctuary law will be able to sue to enforce the law, a first. The bill also creates a Department of Justice hotline for reporting suspected violations.

Oregon is safest when all Oregonians can engage with public entities, local government, local law enforcement and the local court system without fearing that their accent or skin color will result in different treatment, Alonso Len said. Oregon is safest when all who live here feel they are free to be part of their community regardless of their race, ethnic background or place of birth.

The 1987 sanctuary law needed updates and clearer guidelines, she said. Oregon voters decided in 2018 to keep the states sanctuary law with a 63% vote.

OFFICE OF IMMIGRANT AND REFUGEE ADVANCEMENT

Championed by Sen. Kayse Jama, a Portland Democrat and the first former refugee in the Oregon Senate, Senate Bill 778 creates the Office of Immigrant and Refugee Advancement.

Jama said he was motivated to introduce the bill, passed by the Senate on June 16, when he noticed that there was no office specifically focused on economic justice, housing, health care or similar high priority services for one of the most vulnerable communities in Oregon.

This office is really more about strategy than anything else and just creating a pathway of being a voice for immigrant and refugee communities, but also serves as a resource for policy recommendations for the Legislature and other government entities as well, he said. We want to make sure theres long-term strategy planning for the state.

Gov. Kate Brown recently proclaimed June 20 as World Refugee Day in Oregon.

The history of refugees in Oregon is marked by a struggle for equality, justice, and prevailing over the adversity of exclusion, prosecution, discrimination and disparities, said the governors proclamation.

EARNED INCOME TAX CREDIT

Under both the federal and Oregon income tax systems, an Earned Income Tax Credit helps subsidize low-income working families to make it feasible for adults with children to both work and care for their family members. But both have required everyone in the household to have a social security number to benefit, even if they worked and paid all taxes owed.

A bill expected to achieve final passage in the sessions final few days would expand the program to non-citizen working Oregonians who pay their taxes using taxpayer identification numbers, so their children can benefit.

Originally a freestanding bill, House Bill 2819 became part of an omnibus tax credit bill that largely accomplishes the same goal, said Rep. Wlnsvey Campos, a chief sponsor.

These Oregonians are investing into the system and are virtually invisible when it comes to a tax credit designed to help children of working-class taxpayers thrive, she said. I see economic (support) for some and the invalidation of others as a social injustice.

Most of the 90,000 citizens living in Oregon households consisting of both citizens and non-citizens are children, Leland Baxter-Neal, advocacy director for the Latino Network, said June 10 in testimony supporting the bill. Nationally, the Earned Income Tax Credit is viewed as perhaps the most effective mechanism for helping lift families with children out of poverty.

Its an unfortunate truth that many jobs pay too little for workers to make ends meet and support their families, Baxter-Neal said.

All workers, regardless of how they file taxes, should earn enough to be able to care for their families, said Karla Cruz, executive director for Fuerza Oregon Advocacy Association, speaking in support of the bill during an immigration-focused town hall on June 16. As an accountant, she said she sees how the Earned Income Tax Credit strengthens workers economic stability.

My values, morals and professional ethics have caused me to see the class struggle and how excluding our hardworking community from life changing credit can make or break a familys financial circumstances, she said.

REFUGEE SUPPORT

Senate Bill 718 would have appropriated money to refugee resettlement agencies, but it did not move past the Ways and Means committee. Refugee agencies are expecting 1,400 refugees to arrive in Oregon between October 2021 and September 2022, said Francis Kham, a community organizer for the Immigrant and Refugee Community Organization.

Refugees arriving to Oregon are often confronted with language barriers, cultural differences and lack of support, said Kham, who came to Oregon as a refugee from Myanmar in 2015.

The state is currently able to fund help for half of its refugees, said Sen. Michael Dembrow, a Portland Democrat. Although the bill didnt pass, $4.3 million will nevertheless go to fund refugee resettlement under Senate Bill 5520, which funds a variety of human services, he said. The refugee money is desigated to be used to extend case management and employment support services, he said.

Its critical that the state help to support this work financially, he said.

HEALTH CARE INTERPRETERS

After more than a year of medical emergencies stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic, House Bill 2359 will require health care providers to work with certified interpreters when communicating with patients who prefer languages other than English.

Rep. Andrea Salinas, D-Lake Oswego, who has proposed this bill for several years, said calls for racial equity gave her proposal more of a chance this session than in previous ones. Loopholes in existing law allowed untrained health care interpreters to do the work and didnt have accountability measures for providers who did not work with qualified interpreters.

To fully achieve health equity, we must remove the language barrier between a provider and a patient to get the best health care results, two leaders of the Oregon Health Care Interpreters Association said in their testimony in support of the bill.

IMMIGRATION LEGISLATION THAT DIED

A pilot program in Portland that provides legal representation for refugees and undocumented people facing deportation proceedings would have expanded statewide under House Bill 3230, which died for lack of support this session.

A $2 million allocation in a bill destined for passage this week will allow the Portland program to continue, Salinas said. But she said she is disappointed it will not extend to all immigrants in Oregon.

Its this continuum of care for our undocumented and our refugees who really are building their lives as theyre seeking to become citizens, she said. Having this type of support from the state for people who are actually working and living here as part of our community I feel is important.

House Democrats supported a bill that would have granted overtime pay to Oregon farmworkers a strenuous job completed in often hazardous conditions. Oregon farmers said the bill requiring overtime pay would have threatened their business and the states agricultural economy. A final effort to salvage parts of the bill was considered late in the session, but to ultimately failed.

Farmworkers were excluded from the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act that allows other employees to receive time-and-a-half pay for working more than 40 hours per week. This Jim Crow era decision excluded agricultural workers, most of whom were Black, intentionally.

For me, this is about trying to reckon with that past and making sure we are building a future that is more equitable, Salinas said in March.

This story was updated at 10:45 a.m. on June 24 to reflect the correct number of refugees expected to arrive in Oregon between October 2021 and September 2022.

-- April Rubin; arubin@oregonian.com; @AprilMRubin

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Bills focused on improving lives of immigrants and refugees pass during last days of session - OregonLive

Jegajimouxw and Thichala lead blockade on Stillwater Mainline in solidarity with land defenders

Indigenous youth Jegajimouxw (whose English name is TaKaiya Blaney) and Thichala (whose English name is Ace Harry) set up a blockade at the Western Forest Products (WFP) access road on Stillwater Mainline in the qathet region in solidarity with land defenders resisting old-growth logging in the Fairy Creek area.

Thichala and Jegajimouxw set up the blockade early on Wednesday, June 23, and were joined throughout the day by Tlaamin Nation citizens and elders, as well as non-Indigenous qathet residents.

This is first and foremost a solidarity action, Jegajimouxw told the Peak. We stand with Nuu-chah-nulth land defenders whose territories are being encroached upon by Western Forest Products, and their old-growth ancestral forests are being removed without the free, prior and informed consent of the collective nation.

The BC government recently announced a two-year deferral on old-growth logging in the Fairy Creek watershed and Central Walbran, but advocates say old-growth trees around those areas and elsewhere remain unprotected. WFP holds tree farm licence 44, which includes areas adjacent to the Fairy Creek area.

Jegajimouxw said WFP also has a history of operations in Tlaamin territory.

As Tlaamin youth, we are unable to access the forest that our elders talk about, and were able to harvest from and have a relationship with when they were our age, and that is the direct result of the legacy of corporations like WFP and forestry based economies that have been such a driving force of colonization in Tlaamin territories, added Jegajimouxw. Not only are we standing in solidarity with other Indigenous nations, which WFP is not abiding by their consent, but were also calling into question the practices of WFP on our own lands, because our people have never been able to engage with its economy in a way that hasnt been coercive.

Jegajimouxw said the plan was to maintain the blockade for all of Wednesday, and hopes the action will foster a sense of empowerment among Indigenous youth.

This applies beyond forestry, said Jegajimouxw. Any industry that is operating on Indigenous territories needs to be obtaining free, prior and informed consent of the nation whose land theyre operating on.

Band council approval of resource extraction projects, said Jegajimouxw, does not amount to consent if there are community members who feel silenced by the elected leadership or excluded from the negotiation process.

We would like to remind Canadians that the colonially imposed systems of government that Canada brings to the negotiation table, theyre imposed by Canada, so they dont always work in the favour of the best interests of our people and of our land, said Jegajimouxw.

Thichala said legislation such as the Indian Act serves as a tool to divide Indigenous peoples and undermine traditional systems of accountability.

It was only possible first of all after biological warfare was used to reduce the numbers, said Thichala. After that point [settlers] were then able to move onto separate reserves and begin separating us from our relatives, and separating us from our family units, which are integral to Indigenous culture, because our cultures were based on systems of accountability that were very effective, but those systems dont work if you dont have the relationships that are the foundation of those.

The blockade, said Jegajimouxw, has been met with mixed responses by forestry workers, with some expressing respect and curiosity, and others acting more aggressively. RCMP members briefly stopped by to ask how long they planned on maintaining the blockade, but did not seem concerned, she added.

The blockade has received support from community members, with some bringing food and chairs.

Weve had quite a good response overall, because we really just want to focus on lifting our people up at the end of the day, and as for those who are frustrated, we never intend to attack workers, explained Jegajimouxw. We take measures like this because weve never been listened to historically, and its important for it to be said that this is our land, and we have jurisdiction and we have power here.

Jegajimouxw said resource companies must change how they operate regardless of whether settlers support the cause.

Its not just about our continued existence, culturally or even physically on these territories; its about the land itself, she added.

In a statement sent to the Peak, WFP stated: Western is working to understand the concerns of the protesters and have been in contact with the leadership of the Tlaamin Nation. We will be in a position to provide more information once we understand the nature of the issue and the interests of the Tlaamin Nation more specifically.

In the interim, we are working to ensure the safety and security of the protesters and our contractors and crews.

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Blockade blocks WFP road south of Powell River - Powell River Peak

The Word, in the towns Market Place, has been selected as one of six new outposts of the British Librarys Business and IP Centres (BIPCs) scheme.

And the brains behind the initiative hope it will help the boroughs aspiring entrepreneurs turn an idea into a successful business.

Joan Atkinson, deputy leader of South Tyneside Council, said: This is going to be an invaluable resource for our business community, particularly residents looking to start-up their own company and entrepreneurs wanting to develop their business idea.

Experts in residence will be on hand to offer specialist advice in areas including intellectual property, legal, financial, innovation and digital guidance.

Businesses will also be able to access databases providing information about company statistics, market trends and consumer behaviours as well as finding funding opportunities to help develop or explore new markets.

Its fantastic news that we will have this free service with trained staff within the borough.

It will make a key contribution in supporting businesses to emerge from the challenging coronavirus pandemic.

The British Library (BL) set up its first BIPC outside London in Newcastle in 2011 and since then has supported more than 14,000 new or expanding firms, offering resources such as up-to-date market research and business databases, as well as workshops and one-to-one mentoring.

During the coronavirus pandemic its services have helped protect about 600 North East jobs.

A 13million government grant has helped the scheme expand even further, with 690,000 of this to back six new centres in the North East.

One of the firms to have benefited already from the scheme is South Shields-based Sincero, which specialises in finding funding solutions and opportunities for other companies.

Director Julie Skevington said: I recently received help from BIPC Newcastle via the Citylife Business Support Programme.

This was fully funded and gave me access to Ann English, who created a fantastic Visual Doodle as a marketing tool.

This will help me with my online promotion and is an effective and engaging way of explaining what we offer to our customers and assisting them to secure the very best finance available.

Its wonderful to see the BIPC extending to local areas its a great resources for local businesses.

As well as the Word, officially known as the National Centre for the Written Word, the BIPC is adding five further outposts, in addition to its main base at Newcastle City Library.

Sunderlands historic Elephant Tea Rooms is also set to host one of the centres, with more planned for North Shields, Berwick, Morpeth and Hexham.

The expansion is due to take the schemes tally from 14 across the country, to more than 100.

Liz Jolly, the BLs chief librarian, said: At their heart, libraries are trusted spaces with professional staff who have a mission to connect people with information.

BIPC Network harnesses the power of libraries, bringing in expertise from the local community to help people from all walks of life turn an idea into a successful business.

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New business centre in South Shields The Word will 'help boost borough's economy' - Shields Gazette

New Delhi: On June 23, a group of researchers and experts penned a letter and analysis of the changes proposed in the Indian governments draft Lakshadweep Development Authority Regulation 2021, addressed to the President of India. It is reproduced in full below.

To,

Honble Shri Ram Nath KovindThe President of the Republic of IndiaJune 23, 2021

Subject: Request to intervene to withdraw the Draft Lakshadweep Development Authority Regulation (LDAR) 2021

Honble President,

The proposed Lakshadweep Town and Country Planning Regulation, also being referred to as the draft Lakshadweep Development Authority Regulation of 2021 (henceforth LDAR), is highly problematic and, should it become law, will work against existing legal provisions that safeguard the resilience of Lakshadweeps ecology, livelihood and culture. It is at odds with the inherent ecological fragility and cultural uniqueness of Lakshadweep, and has been put together with scant regard for its implications for Lakshadweeps environment and people. As Indias smallest Union Territory and our only atoll system, Lakshadweep holds a special place in the Indian union. Yet, its unique geography, underlying ecology and long human history place natural limits on the kinds of development the archipelago can support.

As a collective of concerned scientists who have conducted research in Lakshadweep for many years, and citizens who care deeply for the survival and well-being of Lakshadweeps people and ecosystems, we respectfully request you to intervene to withdraw this draft and request a serious re-evaluation of the developmental paradigms currently being promoted for the archipelago, under your constitutional powers and duties to ensure peace, progress and good governance for Lakshadweep.

Our principal concerns, which we detail in this letter and appendices that follow, include the following:

i. The LDAR ignores a scientific understanding of Lakshadweeps unique geography, ecology and culture, which place clear limits on the developmental possibilities on island, lagoon and reef, already constrained by climate change.

ii. Local livelihoods and wellbeing are embedded in current land use and ocean practices and environmental stewardship which the provisions of LDAR will endanger. The draft has been formulated without consulting local communities of these consequences.

iii. The LDAR violates several existing regulations as well as international commitments that protect the ecological integrity of the islands and ensure sustainable development across this fragile archipelago.

iv. In its spirit, the LDAR embraces a questionable vision of development that is neither sustainable in design nor likely to improve local wellbeing, or safeguard the future habitability of the archipelago.

A coral reef in Lakshadweep. Photo: M. Rajshekhar

i.Lakshadweeps inherent environmental vulnerability:

Lakshadweep is home to 70,000+ people, who have lived here for around 1500 years. Population densities are among the highest in the country, and basic land and water resources are extremely limiting. Between these pressures and the rising threat of climate change, the archipelago and its people face serious existential threats (see Annexures 1 and 2). As mid-oceanic coral atolls, Lakshadweep depends completely on the health of its surrounding reefs; the living coral framework and the lagoon it encloses, together buffer the islands from waves, storms, land loss and saline ingress into groundwater. However, over the last two decades, Lakshadweep has experienced catastrophic climate change-related coral mass mortality events, straining the accretion and buffer capacity of the reefs. Some reefs, including the capital, Kavaratti, are already eroding more than they are growing. Added to this, the increasing trend of commercial reef fishing is undermining the natural ability of reefs to recover from disturbance events. Of particular concern are lagoons, which are impacted by land-based pollution, boat traffic, dredging, and seagrass meadow decline. Lagoons are vital to both populated and unpopulated atolls as critical resource areas and as reef insurance sites for climate resilience. Unless urgent action is taken now to reverse these trajectories, scientific studies conclude that between reef decline, sea level rise, land loss, cyclones, and declining freshwater, the majority of low-lying atolls like Lakshadweep will become unlivable by mid-century. The plans for development the LDAR proposes are strangely unheeding of these self-evident realities. Any further large-scale infrastructural development will have an ecological and social footprint much too large for these islands, lagoons and reefs to sustain and potentially accelerate the rates of decline.

Also read: As Praful Patel Visits Lakshadweep, Island Leaders Call for Black Day, Boycott Events

ii.Undermining of local livelihoods:

The proposed legislation is in direct conflict with the rights of local people to land, livelihood and healthy ecosystems. Lakshadweep society is organised around its limited land and freshwater resources on the one hand, and its vast ocean resources on the other. Coconut products and pelagic tuna are the mainstays of Lakshadweeps economy. Importantly, these activities work within sustainable limits of land use, water use and fisheries production. To be successful, these activities need access to land for coconuts, beach area to process tuna and copra, and freshwater. The lagoon forms a natural extension of the land, and supports several critical ecological goods and services. This is true for uninhabited atolls as well; they are places of active tenure, used for cultivation, fishing and fish processing. The lagoon and beach are vital social spaces for all sections of Lakshadweep society, including women, children and the elderly. By granting authorities unqualified rights to appropriate land, beach and lagoon resources, the LDAR acts directly against the livelihood interests of local communities and jeopardises a way of life, and an entire economy.

iii. Overriding of existing legislations and commitments:

The proposed regulation imperils Indias international commitments in meeting SDG goals, the CBD convention, CMS convention, UN Framework convention on Climate Change, among others. It also works against Indias own laws like the Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013, the Biological Diversity Act 2002, The Environment (Protection) Act, 1986, the Ecotourism Guidelines 2019 among others. Of greater concern, the proposed LDAR ignores existing regulations from Lakshadweep itself. These regulations explicitly acknowledge the unique vulnerability of Lakshadweep and her communities, and take special pains to ensure that the boundary conditions established by Lakshadweeps ecology are not breached by unsustainable development. We acknowledge in particular the recommendations of the Justice Raveendran Committee Report of 2014 which were incorporated in the subsequent IIMPs as approved and notified by the Ministry of Environment and Forests, in its NotificationNo.19011/16/91-IA.III dated 23 October 2015, and the Lakshadweep Panchayats Regulation 1994 in this regard. Together they provide a comprehensive existing framework for holistic development whose benefits accrue to local communitieswhile securing ecological integrity, and ensure decentralised development decision-making. We believe that the legal authority and vision of these regulations should prevail over the socially disruptive and ecologically dangerous provisions of the proposed LDAR.

Women and children from Lakshadweep pose during the protest called by Save Lakshadweep Forum, on June 07, 2021. Photo: By arrangement.

iv. Questionable developmental paradigm:

Rashtrapati ji, Lakshadweep stands today as a beacon of social cohesion, wellbeing and national integration. By nearly every reliable metric of societal wellbeing literacy, health, crime rate, income inequality, gender ratio, population growth rate, sanitation, etc Lakshadweep either betters the national average or leads it. For every measure that matters for a fulfilled life, Lakshadweep is a fully developed state and a paragon to be emulated by the rest of the country. This enviable status is the result of careful planning, institution building, skill development and wise investment by various governmental and non-governmental institutions and the people of Lakshadweep over several decades. In addition, it is due to local enterprise, social reform and judicious resource use by Lakshadweep society over centuries. Against this reality, the guiding development doctrine implicit in the LDAR and its provisions is deeply problematic. It is based on the conception that, despite seven decades of independence, Lakshadweep is woefully underdeveloped and needs to be fast-tracked on a path of rapid growth. This embraces a narrow interpretation of development that favours investment in physical infrastructure, high-end tourism, market mechanisms and resource exploitation over local rights, societal wellbeing and existing ecological infrastructure.

Local communities of Lakshadweep demonstrate a strong sense of stewardship, strong social cohesion, the ability to self-govern, ability to forfeit short-term personal gains in the larger long-term interests of the community and to resolve conflicts internally. These are considered ideal and critical prerequisites within a community to facilitate not just equitable social development, but more importantly, to facilitate economic development. The LDAR in its current form fails to build on and leverage the inherent strengths of the local community to sustainably manage and use the resources on these islands. Instead, it will deprive them of their rights over land and ocean and undermine the social fabric that binds the community together.

Based on all that we have listed above, Lakshadweep requires a more prudent, less invasive approach to development based on securing and enhancing critical ecological infrastructure of island, lagoon and reef, preparing local institutions adequately for the vicissitudes of climate change. And it should celebrate Lakshadweep as a vital and vibrant contributor to Indias diverse culture and history.

In the light of these concerns, we the undersigned humbly request you to:

I. Intervene to withdraw the incautious draft Lakshadweep Development Authority Regulation of 2021.

II. Restore and reinvigorate the Justice Raveendran Committee recommendations set up by the Honble Supreme Court and ensure that they are robustly implemented and monitored. III. Establish a committee of scientists, policy makers and local representatives to re-evaluate the broader development plans and directions of which the LDAR is a part, in the context of Lakshadweeps unique culture, ecological fragility and climate vulnerability.

Lakshadweep needs careful development, but this development needs to be calibrated against the realities of climate change, existing population pressures, cultural sensitivities and basic human rights. Anydevelopment in Lakshadweep should aim to strengthen, not weaken existing ecological and social infrastructure that currently work to protect the island and its people.

Theaccompanying annexuresoutline our detailed concerns about this proposed legislation against a scientific understanding of Lakshadweeps social and ecological realities and suggest alternative models of development for this part of the country.

Sincerely,

The Lakshadweep Research Collective(Naveen Namboothri, Rohan Arthur, Dipani Sutaria,Aarthi Sridhar, Rucha Karkarey, Ishaan Khot, Divya Panicker,Stella James, Vineetha Venugopal & Neha Sinha)

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Experts Write to President to Withdraw 'Incautious' Draft Lakshadweep Regulation 2021 - The Wire