Category Archives: Resource Based Economy

The COVID-19 pandemic has slammed the brakes on the global economy, putting a number of industries including higher education in peril. Some colleges and universities fear for their very existence, but even those on more solid footing face tough financial choices. The Gazette spoke withThomas J. Hollister, Harvards vice president for finance and chief financial officer, to learn more about the latest developments in how the coronavirus has affected the Universitys finances, altered budgets in its Schools and Units, and left leadership with difficult decisions about the best way to protect the health of the community while preserving Harvards enduring mission.

GAZETTE: As Executive Vice President Katie Lapp wrote in a message to the community several weeks back, Harvard is facing significant financial challenges. The Universitys revenue for this fiscal year is estimated to be $415 million less due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and next year, Harvard is projecting a $750 million revenue shortfall. Can you provide some more context for these figures?

HOLLISTER: The COVID-19 pandemic and the corresponding economic downturn have disrupted every aspect of the Universitys operations, and in turn reduced all sources of revenue. Its important to underline that the $750 million projection for the coming fiscal year is an estimate. There are many unanswered questions that we, and our peers in higher education, just dont know the answers to, such as how many students will enroll this coming year, when will they be back on campus, how much increased financial aid will they need, when will research resume, how will donations be affected, among many others that will affect the operating environment and University revenues. So, the $750 million estimate could end up being less than that, or unfortunately, it could be much more.

GAZETTE: The state of the endowment, of course, has a lot to do with the Universitys budgetary health. And as youve said before in this space, every penny of the annual distribution from the endowment is subscribed and utilized in support of Harvards mission. Can you give us a sense as to how this works?

HOLLISTER:The endowment has been adversely affected by the economic downturn and the recent declines in the capital markets. As you mentioned, and contrary to the oft-voiced public opinion that the endowment is hidden away and unused, earnings from the endowment are distributed annually without fail and represent Harvards largest source of revenue for teaching, learning, and research.

Moreover, a singular Harvard endowment does not exist; there are 13,000 individual endowments across the University, and earnings from these 13,000 endowed funds cannot be spent freely. Harvard has to honor each donors wishes through legally binding gift agreements that specify two inescapable fiduciary obligations: First, 70 percent of Harvards endowed funds must be spent on specific, donor-chosen restricted purposes, and second, 100 percent of Harvards endowed funds must distribute earnings annually and in perpetuity. This means that endowed funds are not savings accounts that can be all saved up for a rainy day, used for whatever is judged the most important purpose at the moment, or liquidated by choice. Think of the endowment as a collection of annuities, mostly restricted in purpose, whose annual distributions are affected by the capital markets and inexorably tied to the market value of the endowment. We cannot escape the fact that a lower market value for the endowment means less revenue for Harvard.

Also, contrary to popular perception, Harvard does not have unlimited wealth. Harvards resources, whether measured in annual revenues or the endowments capacity to make distributions, are subject to the economy, capital markets, and the generosity of donors. As a reminder, during the 20082009 recession, the endowment lost approximately 25 percent of its value, and distributions had to be cut approximately 20 percent.

GAZETTE: What does this mean for the coming years endowment distribution and operating budgets for the Schools and Units?

HOLLISTER: Harvard does not intend to be miserly on planned endowment distributions for the coming year, intending to distribute as much as it responsibly can. The total dollar amount will be 2 percent less than the current year, but depending upon how the stock market behaves, it is likely to be the largest in many years as a percentage of the market value of the endowment.

GAZETTE:Can you talk a little about the special assessment that will come into play in the coming fiscal year?

HOLLISTER: Yes. Members of the Corporation recently voted a special assessment, which is a one-time assessment on the coming years distribution, with the proceeds to be used at the discretion of the deans of Harvards Schools to cover the unexpected and immediate costs of the pandemic, including room and board rebates and students moving costs, as well as expenses in the coming year to enhance the excellence of remote learning, provide increased financial aid, reopen and reconfigure labs, as well as many other steps across campus to create a protective public health environment for the community.

So, although the endowment distribution across Harvard for FY21 will be 2 percent less than in FY20, the net effect is effectively 6 percent less to underlying fund beneficiaries, as the special assessment is about a 4 percent charge to begin to cover the pandemic-related costs.

GAZETTE: Harvard has invested significantly in protections for its workforce in the short term, guaranteeing pay to workers who may no longer have work to do based on the move to virtual learning through June 28. But the revenue declines are massive. The University will undoubtedly need to make tough decisions as the pandemics economic impact grows. Already, Harvard has instituted a hiring and salary freeze, while limiting discretionary spending and freezing many of its capital projects. Lapps recent letter said that furloughs and layoffs may have to be considered. Can you provide some further context for how this, or other difficult decisions related to the Universitys finances, might play out?

HOLLISTER: An immutable and inescapable financial reality for any organization is that the outflows of money must match the inflows. Harvards inflows in the form of revenues have been sharply curtailed during the current pandemic, and so our outflows on spending must soon be similarly curtailed. A second financial reality is that resources are never limitless, and contrary to what some imagine, Harvard is no exception. Unfortunately, these two realities mean that we cannot do what everyone wants; choices are necessary; and more difficult decisions will need to be made.

Already, weve seen peer institutions forced to suspend retirement contributions for their employees, as well as the announcement of furloughs and layoffs. The very existence of some colleges and universities is seriously threatened. Harvards Schools and Units have already instituted a host of cost-saving measures to help manage against the revenue losses we are projecting. Youve mentioned many of those, all of which weve undertaken prior to considering any workforce actions, but furloughs and/or layoffs may be necessary. As Executive Vice President Lapp wrote in her letter, Harvard is committed to limiting the extent of any workforce actions.

GAZETTE: Throughout all of this, University leadership has continued to reference Harvards core mission to teaching and scholarship. How can we continue to invest in this mission during such challenging times?

HOLLISTER: Ive previously mentioned that we extensively interviewed community members who were involved across Harvard in the 0809 recession and learned that when tough decisions had to be made, the community took solace and pride when teaching and research were placed at the top of the priority list. These core activities are at the top of the priority list now.

One advantage that Harvard has, beginning with the School deans, is an extraordinary group of talented leaders across its Schools who are accustomed to making local resource decisions in the best interests of their respective missions. In this respect, Harvards decentralization is a real plus, as it allows for decision-making based in the specific needs of its individual Schools.

On the other hand, the University is committed to One Harvard, and its critical in difficult times such as these to have principled leaders who share clear priorities. Weve seen this in the University-wide leadership, from President [Larry] Bacow, Provost [Alan] Garber, and from EVP Lapp, that first and foremost, Harvard is devoted to ensuring the health and safety of its community members, and secondly, to preserving the integrity of its mission to teaching and learning. The road ahead will be difficult, but I am hopeful that Harvard will find the best path forward thanks to the leadership of our deans, and the countless contributions of faculty and staff to carry on and sustain our teaching, learning, and research activities with a continuing eye on excellence, despite the unexpected adversity.

Interview was edited for clarity and condensed for space.

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CFO offers updates on the University's future - Harvard Gazette

How are you bastards doing this evening? the young boy holding the mike shouted out to the vast audience in front of him.

It was a cold January evening in the sleepy town of Lekhapani, Upper Assam. The occasion was one of the early editions of the Dehing Patkai Festival initiated by the Assam government in order to bring the tourist potentialities of the catchment areas of the river Dehing and the Patkai foothills into the limelight.

That evening, the pandal was jam packed, the chairs mostly taken by families with small babies and elderly women. The organisers welcomed on stage an important patron of culture (a successful contractor of coal or oil, perhaps a former militant a powerful local figure), the patron in a heavily slurred tongue introduces his young son: a rising star, based in Delhi, winning many awards in Western music.

As the rising star delivers one heavy metal rock number after another, laced with abuses and expletives, I look around the crowd. The aunties and grandmothers look numb, thankfully oblivious to the alien abuses and cuss words. The young crowd, standing at the back, seeming relatively responsive but not really enthralled either. The prevailing mood was one of tolerance not of anger and irritation, as one would usually expect.

The seemingly mundane episode gave me glimpse into the ways everyday life unfolds in the resource frontiers of Northeast India. It was an insight into the heartland of a militarised carbon landscape, into lives built around tea, oil, coal and coated with vernacular ideas of power, status, obligation.

In recent times, news about a few government decisions to expand resource extraction in parts of Northeast India has led to significant opposition across a wide spectrum, alleging potential irreparable ecological damage to sensitive biodiversity zones. These include the reported clearance given for open-cast coal mining by the National Board of Wildlife (NBWL) inside the Saleki Proposed Reserve Forest (part of Dehing Patkai elephant reserve), the Union Ministry for Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) giving clearance for the extension of drilling and testing of hydrocarbons at seven locations by OIL under the Dibru-Saikhowa National Park area (that includes the Maguri-Motapong wetland area considered crucial for migratory birds) and the go-ahead given (and subsequently put on hold) for the Etalin mega hydroelectric project at Dibang valley, Arunachal Pradesh.

Also read: We Must Remember this Earth and All That it Gives Us

While the reactions and the oppositional machinations triggered by these series of announcements have received significant attention, it is also a good time to understand the complex equation between nature, nation state and the nationalities that makes up these spaces. An equation that is at the heart of unlocking the perpetual environmental crisis that the region seems to be going through.

For this, one needs to engage with the ways the region has been historically conceptualised and continues to be reproduced as a resource frontier, as empty or under-populated wilderness, which hold the promise for high rates of return on investment. An inevitable product of capitalist globalisation, when capital actively seeks out and establishes new resource peripheries, thereby reproducing uneven development and marginalisation. For this we need to understand the (yet unfolding) history of these frontier spaces invested in resource appropriation.

A region on the cusp of empires

Take these to your queen and tell her these are the weapons we fight with. You cannot enter Thibet, it is against the order of the Chinese Government. Go back, or we will kill you, a Mishimi chief told Thomas Thornvill Cooper after presenting him a Dao (native sword) and spear.

Cooper was the first Englishman to extensively tour the Mishmi Hills and who was exploring a trade route from India to China via the Mishimi region (present Lohit district of Arunachal Pradesh). Although the tragic rebellion didnt hold in the long run, this episode, in essence, reflects a lot on the dynamics that were to unfold in the region in the years to come.

The 19th-century discovery of oil, tea and coal in the eastern Himalayan foothills had a profound impact on the life in the region that endures the passages of time. With these discoveries, the region turned into one of the most important eastern frontier outposts of the British India empire.

Due to its locational importance and resource capacity, the region also became a critical zone in the events of the Second World War. One needs to remember that the oil discovered in Digboi, leading to pioneering ventures in commercial oil in the subcontinent, was marketed under the brand Burmah Oil Company (BOC). The technical geological category Assam Arakan basin still persists in the dictions of oil exploration in the region.

Also read: The Govt is Trying to Make it Easier for Industries to Avoid Environmental Accountability

Thus, in the imagination of the empires (past and present), the cartographical region transforms into an extended resource frontier. In this way, the region one calls as Northeast India today is not unfamiliar to global trade, historically speaking.

Interestingly (but not surprisingly), the coal town of Ledo, at the heart of the recent protests, is also the starting point of the historic Stilwell road (locally known as Ledo road) from the Indian side, a road that connects Assam of India with Kunming, the capital of Yunnan province of China, passing through Northern Myanmar. While the Second World War heritage of the road is well known, what is not equally known is that the route has also been a major preferred route of migratory waves from across the Southeast Asian continent. The road and the surrounding borderland areas remains a major artery of nostalgia, historical bonds and goodwill for people living across both sides of the borders.

However, in the present circumstances, one is not sure whether the Act East Policy echoes similar sentiments of connectivity. Several measures have been undertaken under the aegis of the Act East policy to connect Northeast India with Southeast Asia. The era of the New Great Game played out between China and India has been a key influence on most of the geopolitical development in South and Southeast Asia, and this dynamic seems to be having potential environmental impacts for the northeastern region, with competing endeavours between India and China to strengthen respective user rights of the shared rivers by making dams, etc.

As recent examples from Southeast Asia (forest zones of Indonesia, Laos) show, frontier spaces can be actively peripheralised even while being integrated into a globalised economy. Thus, the important question to ask is what role does the coal from the rainforests, electricity from the mountain rivers, and oil from the forest wells, play in these grand schematics of the nations? After all, the state of nature reveals a lot on the nature of the state.

Politics as inevitably ecological, ecology as inherently political

The protest around the proposed measures have gained momentum mostly through social media and other internet-based forums, thus marking a coming of age of digital protest in the frontiers. The young people of the region are once again the prominent faces of the protest.

Students from different universities and colleges of the region (and also students from the region based in various institutions outside their home states) have taken the initiative to raise awareness and create wider public opinion against the proposed government decisions. The proactive role played by the students and young people of the region takes one back to a terrain of continuous struggles, that needs to be understood and made sense of. After all, slogans like We will give our blood, but not our oil have been a hallmark of tumultuous social movements in the region for the past many decades.

Fast forwarding to few decades in 2003, one comes across another case when the Netherlands-based Premier Oil Company enters an agreement with Hindustan Oil Exploration Company (HOEC) to explore for oil around Joypur Dehing Patkai forest ranges and withdraws later from the venture after intense local protests. The recent episodes also must be read in the context of the various social movements going on in these regions for the past many decades for land rights, against big dams, many localised resistance against mining of coal, oil, natural gas.

As positions taken by student-youth organisations like the All Assam Students Union, Asom Jatiyatabadi Yuba Chatra Parishad as well as by proscribed militant organisations like ULFA (Independent) show, natural resources and, as an extension, ecological identities are considered by them as an appendage to the ethno-nationalist aspirations, they belong to a people. What is natural is taken to be an extension of the national at different levels.

Also read: Govts and People Must Come Together to Preserve the Environmental Gains of the Lockdown

However, despite the decades of protest and activism, HOEC remains active in the area and besides it, Assam Petrochemicals Limited as well as North Eastern Coalfields (NEC) have sought permission in recent times to either expand their operations or initiate new operations around these ecologically sensitive zones. The stories about long lines of coal-laden trucks without number plate moving out every night from the coal towns, the parade of trucks mysteriously not stopped at any check posts, local scribes reporting on them disappearing, syndicates based on donations thriving, stories such as these coming out incessantly over the years from these places remind one of Gabriel Garcia Marquezs fictional town of Macondo, a space existing in the perilous ruins of capitalism. It must compel one to take a closer look on how a complex web of resource extraction, militarisation, aspirations and class formation makes up spaces like these.

Amidst this seemingly confusing scenario, what has become increasingly evident is that nature is no more a passive backdrop to political events. Furthermore, there need to be efforts to relate environmental change to aspects of political economy, cultural politics and social transformation. This also needs to be extended to understand the continuous (at times contradictory) engagement of conservationist NGOs in this region with various official schemes and policies on the environmental questions, to see how the resource frontier is also a salvage frontier.

The Amazon forests are a prime example of this, where plans were set in motion to save the environment in the process of destroying it. Where making, saving, and destroying resources are utterly mixed up, where zones of conservation, production, and resource sacrifice overlap almost fully, and canonical time frames of natures study, use, and preservation are reversed, conflated, and confused.

In their haplessness the two Amazons meet, the Amazon of the East with the South American Amazons! The recent episodes in Upper Assam and Arunachal Pradesh calls for a need to engage with ecological politics, an attempt to unravel the political forces at work in environmental access, management, and transformation, going beyond calls of environment conservation.

The rivers of imagination, forests of hope

The rainforests of Dehing Patkai, aquatic biosphere of Dibru Saikhowa and the mountain scapes of Dibang Valley are a prime example as to how the borderlands in Asia tend to be peripheral to the centres of state power, while they are at the same time a prime locus for the enactment and realisation of state authority (Asian Borderlands Research Network, 2016). In cases like India resources in these frontiers spaces are regulated both in the name of national interest as well as national security, often collapsed into one.

I want to end with a traditional Mishing folksong (Oi: Nitom) which depicts a vision of a life lived well:

O dear, lets build a houseEven if big or smallNear the bank of Bornoi (Brahmaputra)By our paddy fieldsThat will protect usfrom the rayof the Sun and the Moon.

Such assuring and heartwarming imaginations will move closer to realisation only when one begins to understand the ways questions of environment are inseparable from peoples everyday lived realities and their attachments with the land, and how these are placed in the schemas of the geo-political state.

Kaustubh Deka is assistant professor of political science at Dibrugarh University, Assam.

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Northeast India Makes it Amply Clear That Ecology Is Political - The Wire

LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Volvic has always valued the strength we receive from nature. Thats why ahead of World Environment Day, and as part of their ongoing sustainability efforts***, Volvic is sharing their newly awarded B Corp certification for the global brand and global carbon neutrality milestone. As part of their carbon neutral certification, in partnership with the climate solutions company South Pole, Volvic is supporting projects that protect two billion square meters of natural ecosystems in volcanic countries such as Peru, Congo and Uganda****.

At Volvic, we have long understood the value of natures strength and are encouraging all to return the favor, give back to nature and keep it strong, states Rita Pestana, Global VP of Volvic. We have been committed to continuously evolving, making nature and people stronger by ensuring that our source remains protected. We are on a journey to continue to use this business as a force for good and support our communities and the health of people and planet.

Hugh Jones, Managing Director Business Services, the Carbon Trust, adds: We are proud to have certified the Volvic brand as carbon neutral a significant achievement that represents a real commitment to decarbonisation, Nathan Gilbert, Executive Director, B Lab Europe comments: B Lab Europe is proud to welcome Volvic to the community of B Corporations. This achievement is part of an ongoing journey to build a more inclusive and sustainable economy. We look forward to working together with Volvic and the community of B Corps to inspire other businesses to join the movement. Now more than ever, it is necessary for all companies and individuals to take action and use business as a force for good.

Ends

NOTE TO EDITORS

ABOUT VOLVIC (WWW.VOLVIC.CO.UK)

Volvic is a unique natural mineral water born in a volcanic natural ecosystem in the Auvergne region of France. 13,500 years ago, a volcanic eruption created an immense natural filter where water flows through six layers of volcanic rock; this creates a one of a kind filtration system that only nature can provide and that is how Volvic comes to life. The water brand has been fighting to preserve these ecosystems for years in an effort to restore balance to allow nature to continue to give us its strength and guarantee the purity of the water. As a part of Danone, Volvic has committed to inspire more sustainable eating and drinking practices and is doing so through several environmentally focused efforts. To learn more about Volvic, please visit their website.

Volvic carbon neutrality certification

Volvic has been certified carbon neutral to the internationally-recognised standard PAS 2060 by the Carbon Trust, a global climate change and sustainability consultancy with almost two decades of experience in the sustainability sector. Achievement of this standard reflects the commitment and measures taken by Volvic to reduce direct carbon emissions arising from its own operations (Scope 1 and 2), indirect emissions from the value chain, and where residual emissions exist Volvic has compensated for these through good quality offsets achieved through its partnership with climate solutions company South Pole.

From now on, Volvic must be recertified every year to maintain its carbon neutral status. This requires the development and implementation of a yearly carbon reduction and management plan. Each year the certification process becomes more challenging as Volvic must begin to rely less on the compensation (the investment in funds which generate carbon credits) and more on a low carbon business model. The carbon emission reduction figures are based on the global life cycle assessment of the product.

*Excluding cap and label

**B Corp Certification:

Volvic is the biggest natural mineral water brand (revenue based) to receive this distinction.

B Lab is a nonprofit that serves a global movement of people using business as a force for good. B Labs initiatives include B Corp Certification, administration of the B Impact Management programs and software, and advocacy for governance structures like the benefit corporation.

Certified B Corporationsare new kinds of businesses that balance purpose and profit. They are legally required to consider the impact of their decisions on their workers, customers, suppliers, community, and the environment.

Certified B Corporations achieve a minimum verified score on the B Impact Assessmenta rigorous assessment of a companys impact on its workers, customers, community, and environmentand make their B Impact Report transparent on bcorporation.net. Certified B Corporations also amend their legal governing documents to require their board of directors to balance profit and purpose. Companies must recertify every three years.

In 2020 Volvic achieved the certification with a score of 81.1., being part of the less than 4% of companies that have engaged with B Impact Assessment online and achieve the score required. The B Corp assessment certifies 5 pillars: Governance, Workers, Community Environment and Customers. B Lab has highlighted the companys leadership in 3 mains areas:

While Volvic scored highest in governance practices and legal mission including societal and environmental impact on stakeholders in the decision making; employee benefits such as pension and healthcare plans; and the environmental policy and management, including rigorous monitoring and target, also identify the following areas of improvement: regular performance reviews for all employees and further engage with our suppliers on social and environmental aspects.

About South Pole

South Pole is a leading project developer and provider of global climate action solutions, with over 300 experts in 18 global offices. South Pole helps companies, capital markets, and the public sector reduce their impact on the climate while mitigating risk and creating value. South Pole is a science-based company and its expertise covers project finance, data collection, and climate risk analysis, as well as the development of environmental commodities, such as carbon and renewable energy credits. South Pole has mobilised climate finance to over 700 projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions in areas such as renewable energy, energy efficiency and sustainable land use. For more information, visit http://www.southpole.com or follow them on LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.

***CEPIV: protecting the natural environment and biodiversity since 2006

Socit des Eaux de Volvic is strongly committed to preserving the natural heritage, including the 38-km2 area where Volvic natural mineral water originates.

The Volvic impluvium is located in the unique geographical site of Chane des Puys / Limagne fault, inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage list since 2018.

Protecting and preserving the natural mineral water resource is at the heart of Volvics DNA. Co-created by Socit des Eaux de Volvic in 2006, the Environmental Committee for the Protection of the Volvic Impluvium (CEPIV) is a public-private partnership with the 4 local communities of the catchment area. Its mission is to implement actions with all territory stakeholders that reconcile local development and the protection of the catchment area and its biodiversity.

The mission of CEPIV focuses on three areas:

*****2 billion square meters equaling to 53 times the Volvic impluvium size which itself is 38km2

***** Calculation based on ADEME and actual Danone routes.

Volvic is part of the #WeActForWater movement.

Through #WeActForWater Danone Waters brands are:

WeActForWater falls within Danones recently announced 2 billion investment acceleration plan, investing between 2020-2022 to further transform their agriculture, energy and operations, packaging and digital capabilities.

Link:

Volvic Announces Global Carbon Neutrality and B Corp Certification, Also Pledging to Continue Protecting 2 Billion Square Meters of Natural Ecosystems...

While some places are tiptoeing around opening businesses by extending lockdown periods take Los Angeles county for example who extended stay-at-home orders through July other states are taking small steps towards reopening their economies.

This new trial opening is generally referred to as safer-at-home, which means curbside services are available, face masks are optional in outdoor recreational areas such as parks, and some non-essential businesses such as retail can open with limited numbers of workers. On top of that, some states are allowing social gatherings of 10 people and under. With that said, safer-at-home orders also mean people still need to follow the 6-foot social distancing rules, as well as wearing masks in indoor public spaces.

Even though this doesnt mean the pandemic is over or that were safe from contracting or transmitting the virus, itdoesmean that some of us may be able to enjoy one or two things from our old lifestyles.

Sounds great right? Maybe for some.

But its also possible that many of us are also feeling something unexpected anxiety.

As weve all been hunkered down, isolated, and dealing with the trauma of drastic, forced change for two or more months, reentering the world even with these small steps poses a whole new slew of psychological pitfalls.

And its okay to feel hesitant, anxious, stressed, or even scarred about returning to even a smidgen of normal life!

Lets take a closer look at what the heck is going on in our heads and how to handle this new transition!

ohurtsov/Pixabay

Maybe youve been waiting for a COVID-19 vaccine, but many people have simply been waiting for the reopening of the economy.

Yet, now that its partially here, many people are reporting an increase in their anxiety, stress, and fear.

This reopening anxiety probably stems from the list of uncertainties that face us as we return to society. From going back to your work cubicle to using public transportation to dropping your kids off at daycare and even visiting retailers and restaurants, there are a host of new invisible factors, as well as rules and regulations, that we all have to consider and follow.

First and foremost, humans are creatures of habit.

Over the last few months, many of us have taken very legitimate steps to create a shelter-at-home environment that was also a mentally healthy experience. From building an at-home-office to using exercise apps and online fitness classes to redesigning a new daily routine, many people have made shelter-at-home their new norm.

After months, were now used to shelter-at-home. Youve got virtual socializing on a timed schedule. Maybe youve started to enjoythe flexibility of working from home or the privacy of yoga in your living room. And now that youre used to this new way of life some of us even enjoying certain aspects of it were faced with yet another upheaval as businesses reopen and employers ask their workers to return.

Its frustrating, to say the least, and anxiety-provoking for sure!

Just because states have decided to edge towards reopening economies doesnt mean that COVID-19 has been extinguished. In fact, some populations are experiencing resurgences of COVID-19 cases in areas that have relaxed shelter-in-place rules.

Even though this was expected to happen, it doesnt help ease our anxieties about returning to the social stream.

On top of COVID-19 fears, theres also the anxiety of counting on those around us to keep us safe. In order to feel and be protected, coworkers, friends, family, neighbors, and all those strangers must follow proper hygiene with hand washing and sanitizing, wear masks, and practice social distancing of 6-feet or more. On top of that, we also have to trust that restaurants and retailers are properly training their staff and following strict COVID-19 guidelines behind the scenes when handling our food, beverages, and goods.

With that said, many people experience a break of this trust on a regular basis, therefore, how can you instill it in an entire society?

Its not just about returning to socializing. For many, theres the dilemma of work.

While some people may have the luxury of working from home, there are thousands of jobs that require workers to be on-site and hands-on.

These workers have to make money somehow and with economies reopening many of them face an ugly situation of returning to work to get paid or getting laid off. Yet returning to an enclosed work environment with other people increases your exposure. On top of that, if you have to send your children to daycare, thats yet another layer of exposure for your children and the rest of your family.

While the financial burden of shelter-in-place may be eased, the increased worry of contracting the virus increases.

Free-Photos/Pixabay

Understanding why you might be anxious about economies reopening and returning to a bit of normal life is only part of the puzzle. Its also important to understand how your psyche may have changed during the shelter-at-home phase of this pandemic. From post-traumatic stress to depression to burnout, most of us have been put through the wringer and its time to acknowledge, accept, and respect the journey weve been on!

While there is a diverse variety of mental health fall-out from shelter-in-place, these are the most commonly seen ramifications.

When it comes to PTSD caused by this pandemic, theres no simple cut-and-dry way of defining it. This is partly due to the fact that PTSD can crop up directly after the trauma or it could hide away within us and surface months or years later. On top of that, the pandemic could be stirring up PTSD from adifferentincident.

With that said, there are a few ways typically four in which PTSD may manifest:re-experiencing trauma, nightmares or flashbacks avoidance of certain situations, those that remind the person of that experience negative changes in emotions and beliefs, this could be how you think about yourself or those around you or hyperarousal, generally involves difficulty sleeping and concentrating or becoming easily startled.

While some people may experience PTSD from the trauma of being hospitalized with COVID-19, others may experience trauma from the environment that the COVID-19 pandemic has created including being blocked from loved ones, being isolated, and experiencing disruption to daily lives and routines.

Youve most likely already heard this term being used during regular life, yet in the pandemic, theres a whole new set of stressors that are linked to increased complaints of utter and total burnout.

Working from home can be a huge stress reducer in the right circumstances.These are not those circumstances.

Many people dont have a separate home office, therefore they are forced to share a non-ergonomic space with family, roommates, or partners. This includes children that require attention and supervision or other adults that are seeking space to do their work as well. Not only does this put additional stressors on our brains, but our bodies are also suffering from backaches, neck tension, increased risk of carpal tunnel syndrome, and increased eye strain.While organization, creating rotating schedules, and instituting strict routines are all great ways to work around shared home office space and keeping kids busy, its still incredibly difficult.

Add on to that the fact that people are burning out from total isolation or the opposite, zero alone time, and its a perpetual loop without an end!

This particular breed of burnout may also lead to more severe psychological issues such as disruption to our sense of self or even a traumatic loss of our own identity.

For those unable to work from home and furloughed from their jobs, theres the issue of financial security.

Yet, it goes deeper than that.

The states and most of the world is entering a recession due to the effects of an almost worldwide lockdown. This means that even those that are working are feeling the financial strains of the pandemic.

Financial stress cant be dealt with like normal stress. If you don have the money to pay your bills then you simply dont have the money. Mindfulness, meditation, and self-care wont cure this.With that said, these calming techniques mayoffer you the headspace and mind clarity necessary to start problem-solving.

Rework your budget. For those that have never budgeted, nows the time to get one started! Cut out the unnecessary spending basically anything that doesnt involve food to eat or the roof over your head. This means nix online retail shopping, think about halting streaming services, and try not to order food out. Look for government opportunities such as unemployment or other aid programs to get you through for the next couple of months. Take a day and look for online work opportunities such as customer service gigs.

Pexels/Pixabay

Luckily, you can prepare yourself for reopening!

The situation around the pandemic may be out of your control, but you have the ability to harness your own mental health and prepare your body and mind. Lets take a look at some best-practices for handling reopening anxieties:

Oftentimes, anxiety is linked to loss of control. While its important to accept the fact that we cant control the pandemic, its also helpful to realize youdo have controlover many other aspects of the situation.

For instance, we have complete control over our own habits such as COVID-19 hygiene guidelines, washing our hands, sanitizing, and wearing a mask social distancing ourselves from others, and choosing how to interact with those around you in a respectful and safe manner.

Youre already burned out from shelter-in-place whether its overworking due to lack of boundaries or juggling family responsibilities and work responsibilities and now youre being asked to add another layer of stress to this pandemic pie by returning into society.

Address your burnout and carve some decompression time at home.This can be as simple as taking a walk at the end of the day, journaling before bed, or taking a bath.

Its important to turn your home back into a place of reprieve, relaxation, and safety.

Part of your anxiety around reopening has a lot to do with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Maybe this is a bit far-flung for you to believe.

Have you been experiencing disturbances in your sleep patterns? Are you regularly mentally distracted? What about physical oddness such as dizziness, moments where you cant breathe, or severe lethargy?

These can all be signs of PTSD.

One of the least invasive and most influential ways to deal with PTSD at home on your own is through mindfulness practices. Being mindful can be completely tailored to you as a person. If youre a news junky, become more mindful about how and when you consume news stories. Be mindful about the use of tobacco, alcohol, and other drugs, which can worsen your mental health and physical well-being in the long term.

Its also important to be mindful about implementing a healthy routine and habits.

Mindfulness extends to your physical body such as being mindful about the food you eat and staying physically active. This includes self-care! Respect downtime, indulge in your favorite television shows and enjoy the foods you love. But make sure you do all these things mindfullyand not in excess, as these habits can quickly become unhealthy.

Youve probably seen this advice strewn throughout shelter-in-place articles.

Thats because meditation works!

While it may not be for everyone, if youre struggling with anxiety around the reopening of the economies, its definitely worth it to try. Meditation works for anxiety because it involves the habitual process of training your mind to focus and redirect your thoughts, which is exactly what needs to happen with an anxious mind. Being able to both confront and redirect anxious thoughts towards something positive is an incredibly adept way to deal with anxiety.

Along with managing reopening anxiety, you may also find that meditation is able to reduce stress, enhance self-awareness, lengthens your attention span, helps with memory loss, and improves your sleep.

Definitely worth a try!

If you can tackle anxiety through healthier personal habits, then thats definitely the way to go! Adopting healthy habits such as physical activity, self-care, meditation, and mindfulness provide you with real-time relief tools that you can use for the rest of your life. Plus, these techniques have also been shown to boost overall mental health, provide calm and clarity, and can even have positive physical effects.

With that said, in times such as these, we may need a bit more of a helping hand!

This is where natural supplements come into play and can be extremely useful. Some of the best anxiety-reducing natural supplements include omega-3 fatty acids, ashwagandha, green tea, valerian root, kava kava, and even dark chocolate!

Here are a few plant-based, trusted supplement brands to give a try: NaturaLife Labs Organic Ashwagandha, NOW Supplements Valerian Root, Zenwise Health Store Vegan Omega 3 Supplement, or these Vegan Organic 70% Cacao Hu Chocolate Bars.

Remember, youre not in this alone!

Even though were sheltering at home, it doesnt mean there arent resources available for those in need. If you feel that your anxiety is simply too much to conquer on. your own, try a few of these resources to get the telehealth help you need right away!

First off, there is the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Association, which offers aton of online resources, as well as their help hotline at1-800-662-4357.You can also access theNational Network of Depression Centers, offering a listing of resources based upon your specific need:

Looking for a bit of education? Try visiting the Everyday Health Depression Resource Center, theAnxiety and Depression Association of America, orMental Health America Depression Support and Advocacy.

Lavender Coconut Ice Cream/One Green Planet

Reducing your meat intake and eating more plant-based foods is known to help withchronic inflammation,heart health,mental wellbeing,fitness goals,nutritional needs,allergies,gut healthandmore!Dairy consumption also has been linked many health problems, includingacne,hormonal imbalance,cancer,prostate cancerand has manyside effects.

For those of you interested in eating more plant-based, we highly recommend downloading theFood Monster App with over 15,000 delicious recipes it is the largest plant-based recipe resource to help reduce your environmental footprint, save animals and get healthy! And, while you are at it, we encourage you to also learn about theenvironmentalandhealth benefitsof aplant-based diet.

Here are some great resources to get you started:

For more Animal, Earth, Life, Vegan Food, Health, and Recipe content published daily, subscribe to theOne Green Planet Newsletter!Lastly, being publicly-funded gives us a greater chance to continue providing you with high quality content. Please considersupporting usby donating!

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How to Prepare and Deal with the Anxiety Related to States Reopening - One Green Planet

Indeed, the state violence faced by the Persian center during the suppression of sporadic uprisings is an everyday reality for ethnic and religious minorities throughout Iran. As Iranian lawyer Gissou Nia has pointed out, many commentators based in the West, especially diaspora Persians, tend to severely misjudge anti-government protests in Iran because they fail to amplify or even listen to the voices of minorities that make up the backbone of current revolutionary movements. The projection of the urbanized Persian center as being representative of Iran is only solidified by media outlets who assume interviewing Persian-Americans alone is enough of a perspective on envisioning Iran and how to engage with the Iranian state. After all, when was the last time an Iranian Lur or Ahwazi was given a global platform to voice their opinion on Irans regime or western foreign policy towards Iran? How can non-recognized religious minorities such as Bahais or Sikhs speak globally from within a state that affords them no protections?

There is a unique set of consequences for minorities who speak out their grievances with the state, for anything said can be treated with the gravity of a national security threat. As the Iranian economy fails to provide for the non-elite and non-central populations, more revolutionary movements are sparked and quashed through targeted efforts to disenfranchise minorities. Any form of supposed connection to a militant group in Iran becomes grounds for execution. According to reports gathered by Iran Human Rights (IHR) between 2010 and 2018, among the 118 people who have been executed for affiliation with banned political and militant groups, there were 65 Kurds (55%), 29 Baluchis (25%) and 15 Arabs (13%), most of whom were Sunni Muslims in addition to being ethnic minorities.

The torture of imprisoned minorities in Iran is especially gruesome and sobering. Labor activist Sepideh Gholian, arrested for a notable strike in the southern province of Khuzestan, spoke out upon her temporary release on the torture of hundreds of Ahwazi women forced to confess that their husbands were members of Daesh (ISIS). The escalation of violence against Ahwazis in Khuzestan has gone hand in hand with increased interest in development projects in the resource-rich province, often displacing Ahwazis for projects that divert natural resources back to Tehran and other urban areas of the Persian-speaking center. In Irans November uprisings, at least 100 Ahwazi demonstrators were killed and 2,500 imprisoned. Ahwazis are regularly imprisoned under fabricated ties to international terror, often without any public acknowledgement. Baluchis also face torture and forced confession of association with militant groups such as Jundallah. This April, Baluchi prisoner Abdulvaset Dahani was executed in Zahedans Central Prison after writing to the world on experiences of torture and forced confession:

They tied my hands and suspended me from the ceiling. They subjected me to grilled chicken torture. They hit on the soles of my feet with a cable burned it with atomic lighters.

In March of 2020, when the Iranian government responded to hunger strikes and prison rebellions by selectively releasing prisoners during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, prisoners in Tehran were prioritized, and therefore ethnic minorities were far less likely to see freedom. No prisoner with national security threat listed on their charge sheet was eligible for release, a restriction which severely narrows the number of prisoners in Iran from lenient treatment and effectively bars ethnic minorities from release. While international praise for this selective release of prisoners ran high, the state nonetheless executed prisoners at an even higher rate than usual. Within ten days of April, 25 executions were recorded.

Religious minorities are likewise at risk of being accused of having dual loyalties. Jewish and Bahai Iranians are denigrated by propaganda that associates them with Zionism and the State of Israel. This accusation naturally leads to an atmosphere of fear, as Iranian Jews have family ties in Israel and the headquarters of the Bahai faith are in Haifa. Likewise, only a subset of the small Sikh minority in Iran have been able to receive Iranian passports despite living in the country for generations. Cremation is illegal in Iran, and the Sikh minority faces dangerous backlash for their practice. For years, the only place Sikhs have been able to legally engage in their funeral rites is at a cremation site hidden within the Indian embassy grounds in Tehran, a 24 hour train ride from the historic Sikh population center of Zahedan. Armenians also struggle with the image of being perpetual foreigners despite being present in the region for over a thousand years. Churches are monitored by the police, as any utterance or distribution of materials on Christianity in the Persian language is grounds for arrest.

Tests of ideology hinder opportunities for religious minorities beyond the realm of their religious practice. Exams legally implemented by the Islamic Republic to prove ones loyalty to the state religion prevent people from exercising complete citizenship rights. One cannot work in the public sector in Iran, for example, without passing examinations that prove loyalty to the state-sanctioned, Khomeinist version of Shia Islam. Theoretically recognized religious minorities (Zoroastrians, Jews, and Christians) may work in lower-rank positions should they pass an examination, but the segregation of the education system bars candidates from having the requisite familiarity with Islam to realistically pass. Furthermore, there has been a massive push by the regime to allocate and prioritize more positions for members of the Basij, Irans voluntary paramilitary organization, which staunchly adheres to Khomeinism.

In the realm of higher education, recognized religious minorities are consistently at odds with the efforts to Islamize any aspect of the university. Moreover, non-recognized religious minorities such as Bahais are officially forbidden from higher education. The underground universities run by the Bahai community face the constant threat of raids, arrests, and even execution for their work. Perhaps the most telling example of Irans stance towards the human value of non-recognized religious minorities can be seen through the qisas system or retaliation in kind. Retaliation of violence is allowed by a victims family, unless the victims family forgives the perpetrator or accepts a deal through blood money. However, if a Muslim kills a member of an non-recognized religious minority, there is no qisas requirement. In fact, no punishment is specified, giving judges the right to pursue no consequences for the murder of a non-recognized religious minority, even if the perpetrator is found guilty of a willful crime. The murder of Bahais is effectively permissible in Iran.

Afghan refugees are another vulnerable group that can legally be treated as subhuman. Irans population is estimated to be 82 million and there are up to 4 million Afghan refugees living in the country, yet 27 out of 31 provinces have partial or complete bans on the residence of Afghans. This cruel legislation is ironically most enforced in border regions across the country. Some provinces such as Sistan-Baluchistan which sits at the tri-border between Iran, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, allow Afghans to reside in urban areas, such as the capital of Zahedan, but not in the rest of the province. This prevents Afghans from moving freely and seeking opportunities for livelihoods. Each year the Iranian government chips away at opportunities to seek asylum or refugee status, and provides no legal recourse to those sentenced to deportation. Afghan children are often channeled into modern-day slavery and families are forced to pay exorbitant sums to be transported between locations or to live in unsanitary camps. Human Rights Watch has released several reports on Afghan child soldiers being sent to Syria by Irans Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (the IRGC) as well.

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No country for minorities: the inequality of state repression in Iran - Open Democracy

Two regional art organisations, the Arab Fund For Arts and Culture (Afac) and Culture Resource (Al Mawred Al Thaqafy), have launched an emergency fund of more than $1 million (Dh3.67 million) to support Lebanons struggling arts sector.

The organisations, both headquartered in Beirut, made the announcement as the country sinks deeper into its worst-ever economic crisis, compounded by the coronavirus pandemic.

We see this year as a turning point in the lives of [struggling arts] organisations, said Rima Mismar, Afacs executive director. We want to give them a bit of support to avoid any immediate crash just because they do not have access to their [bank] accounts or cannot carry on with their activities.

Helena Nassif, managing director of Culture Resource, added that the current economic crisis posed a threat to a number of organisations.

At the risk of sounding cheesy, every crisis has two sides to it

Rima Mismar, executive director of Afac

Lebanese banks restricted access to cash in American dollars after nationwide anti-government protests erupted last October, bringing the activities of many organisations, artistic or otherwise, to a halt as the value of the local currency plummeted.

As a result, a lot of artists or cultural practitioners would either need to leave the sector or leave the country, Nassif said.

To be eligible for a one-time grant via the solidarity fund, which is sponsored by the US Open Society Foundations and the Ford Foundation, organisations must be at least two years old and have a track record of proven social engagement with local communities.

Though they do not have to be headed by artists of Lebanese nationality, they must be based in the country. Depending on the jurys assessment, up to 16 structures will receive between $20,000 and $80,000 each. The deadline for applications is Monday, June 15.

This is the first fund set up collaboratively by the two organisations, which have been co-ordinating closely since Culture Resource moved its headquarters from Cairo to Beirut in 2017.

It felt natural. We want to extend our support and solidarity to the arts and culture sector as two regional organisations, as well as stand in solidarity with each other, said Mismar.

The grants can be spent on whatever the winning organisations deem necessary, from staff salaries and rent to collaborations.

We do not expect these organisations, at this point in time, to actually have a full strategy or vision on how they will adapt to the situation, said Mismar. We were more sensitive to the fact that they need time and some resources to be able to sit together, think and reflect on their mission and their engagement with their communities.

Both Mismar and Nassif are optimistic, however, that disruptions caused by Covid-19 and the economic crisis represent a moment of opportunity for the arts sector.

At the risk of sounding cheesy, every crisis has two sides to it. There are definitely challenges and negative impacts. At the same time, it does somehow open a moment to think of things differently. This is where aligning immediate needs with longer-term strategies needs to be balanced well, said Mismar.

The same kind of questions that were raised in Lebanon last October and November are now discussed elsewhere in the world [about] the value system we carry and the role of the arts in contributing to creating and imagining a better or different kind of society, said Nassif. The moment of questioning we had in Lebanon is now global.

Lebanons arts and culture scene also contributes significantly to the local economy, Nassif adds. Its important to think of this sector as productive. Its not a bunch of artists in a bubble, she said.

Lebanons cultural sector represents 5 per cent of the countrys GDP, or $1 billion and 6,000 companies, the director of the French Cultural Institute in Beirut, Veronique Aulagnon, told local newspaper LOrient-Le Jour on Friday.

The moment of questioning we had in Lebanon is now global

Helena Nassif, managing director of Culture Resource

Individual artists are excluded from the solidarity fund but both Afac and Culture Resource support them separately on a regional level.

On Tuesday, June 2, Afac will launch a scheme to sponsor up to 150 artists with $3,000 each while they stay at home.

In mid-May, Culture Resource added a specific Covid-19 component to a pre-existing programme, Stand For Art, that gives grants to artists at risk. The initiative, which targets artists experiencing hardships as a consequence of Covid-19, will be re-assessed later in 2020 based on how the pandemic develops.

For more information about the solidarity fund, visit arabculturefund.org

Updated: May 30, 2020 05:40 PM

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'This year is a turning point': More than $1 million available for Lebanons struggling arts and culture organisations - The National

Humans are now experts in consumption and deem excess consumption a right derived from financial freedom.

How did we reach this point in time where consumerism dictates our attitude towards each other, our appetite for debt, our perceptions of what is important, and our disregard for what lies ahead. How is it that we are willing to buy a product that we know will only last for a limited time without the option to repair it? How is it that we dont care where the materials come from which are found in that product, nor care where the materials go when we are done with it?

Certain groups of people have been deemed as greenies for standing up for the environment, being ridiculed for making our lives a little less comfortable by trying to change our behaviour towards the way we consume.

Being a Circular Economy activist comes with many challenges. Telling people about a different way of doing things is one of those challenges. Lets walk more and drive less; lets start our own food gardens; lets compost our food waste; lets only buy products that are local; lets avoid plastics; lets plant more trees.

Yet the time is upon us where these actions are no longer connected with activism, but are essential for our well being and our species future survival on earth.

The way forward for the global economy will not be based on how things were done recently. We need to look further back to a time when we produced our own food, products were manufactured to last a lifetime, and if something went wrong it was fixable. We need to become more resource-aware again. It really is a no-brainer when we are not wasting resources, and products we use retain their value for longer.

This is the essence of the Circular Economy. It is not a philosophy; its a cross-sectoral way of doing things that benefits society, our environment, and crucially, our economy. The way forward is human-centric and comes from a combination of our past values with current, and future technology developments and opportunities.

This is the first of a ten-part series on what the Circular Economy is, and what we can do to become active in this space, whether as individuals, groups, or institutions. For further reading visit The African Circular Economy Network and The Ellen Mcarthur Foundation.

This content has been created as part of our freelancer relief programme. We are supporting journalists and freelance writers impacted by the economic slowdown caused by #lockdownlife.

If you are a freelancer looking to contribute to The South African,read more here.

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What is a Circular Economy, and how does it look in 2020? - The South African

One of the core narratives of Bitcoin (BTC) since inception is the oft-stated goal of separating money and state. While this has certainly been a powerful creed in the currencys early adoption by the crypto-anarchist and techno-libertarian communities, what does this actually mean? Its quite simply a call for a neutral form of money.

When stripped of the more political messaging, Bitcoin is fundamentally the introduction of a credibly neutral, global system of value transfer that is open and permissionless yet cryptographically secure and verifiable. This burgeoning crypto economy is still relatively early in its development, yet in the ten-plus years since its launch, it has fundamentally shifted the discourse around what money could or ought to become in the future.

Bitcoins third halving on May 11, a 50% reduction in the BTC block subsidy that rewards miners for validating transactions and securing the network, represents a clear distinction between fiat monetary systems governed by whim and crypto monetary systems executed through software. A global crisis such as the one were facing now is a crucible for any monetary system, often showing what the priorities of the powers that be are.

The unlimited ability to print money in the fiat world operates in stark contrast to Bitcoin periodically reducing the issuance through an immutable monetary policy. The Bitcoin halving in the context of the pandemic provided an interesting starting point in discussing the core difference between the fiat and crypto paradigms and the distribution of power in both.

The predominant monetary systems of the world are fiat systems that are backed by the sovereign entity of the state through arbitrary decree. Such currencies have value because the state enforces their use as a medium of exchange, store of value and unit of account: the three qualities of money. The most obvious evidence of this enforcement is that the state requires taxes to be paid in the national currency.

This relationship between state authorities and money goes back hundreds of years to when governments and empires would stamp the visage of the current ruler of the territory into the hard metal currency. Today, fiat money takes the form of printed pieces of paper issued by a central mint overseen by a state department. This money is backed by the state rather than any commodity.

The United States used to operate on a gold standard, with bank notes backed and redeemable for precious metal reserves, but the mass capital flight to a secure store of value in gold during the Great Depression prompted the government to untether the dollar from the underlying commodity. The systemic challenges of a monetary system based on gold would have inevitably led to the state further abstracting the connection to the underlying resource to the point where the scaffolding would have become the building, in a sense. In short, fiat currency can be seen as a technical response in simplifying the management of money at great scale.

There is a multitude of fiat currencies circulating throughout the global economy, but only one has achieved hegemonic status: the U.S. dollar. Following the end of World War II, an agreement established the dollar as the global reserve currency. Even though the agreement implied that the dollar would be backed by gold and thus ended when the gold standard was abandoned outright during the Nixon administration, organizations like the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank were formed to maintain a neutral, international monetary system with the dollar at the center.

As the government is able to print pieces of paper backed by nothing but the power afforded to it by itself, people place a lot of trust and responsibility in the government to properly oversee the mint and avoid economic instability. If a government prints too much money, inflation occurs, sharply devaluing the value of the money in the economy. Some governments have severely mismanaged the money supply, leading to hyperinflation where the volatility for the price of a countrys currency against other global currencies starts to decrease rapidly, eventually becoming more valuable as kindling or paper-mache than a reliable medium of exchange.

Does this make the state a boogeyman that chains the populace into arbitrary financial systems that it cant opt out of? There are certainly many proponents of Bitcoin that would support that claim, but lets look at the larger pattern. The reason why state-managed currencies gained prominence is because people agreed to the unwritten social contract behind the money, entrusting the state to manage the complexities of such a system. This issue of trust is paramount and is essential to understanding what Bitcoin brings to the table.

While fiat monetary systems feature monetary policies highly subject to what the lawmakers believe is necessary, Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are decentralized, autonomous monetary systems with rules hardcoded from their launch. Programmable, predictable and trust-minimized from day one, cryptocurrencies are radical experiments in value creation and distribution enforced through an unrivaled display of digital certainty.

Bitcoins monetary policy is unique in that it is executable through open-source software rather than a central mint overseen by treasurers and politicians. Its core features include a capped supply of 21 million BTC, around 10-minute block times, an incentivized issuance mechanism for minting BTC and an adaptive mining difficulty to maintain this economic clock.

A critical part of Bitcoins monetary policy, the halving, is a periodic change to the BTC supply schedule that occurs every 210,000 blocks, or roughly every four years. This preprogrammed, automatic deflationary measure is unprecedented in the history of money and presents a stark contrast to the dominant fiat systems of the world.

These protocol design choices, combined with novel economic incentives and cryptographic security, allow Bitcoin to uphold four core attributes: resistance to confiscation, resistance to censorship, resistance to counterfeiting and resistance to inflation. Or to put it simply, resistance to the very failings that have beset monetary systems past and present.

So, where does this place Bitcoin in relation to fiat currencies? While many narratives have waxed and waned over the years electronic cash, End the Fed, digital gold, bank the unbanked, etc. the most relevant one at the time of writing and perhaps moving forward is the notion of money neutrality.

The subject of money neutrality is enfolded in a much larger discourse on the distribution of power in society. The circulation of currency indicates the overall health of the economy and its inhabitants. If resources such as currency are not widespread or accessible in different strata of society, pathologies develop much like disrupted blood flow in a human body.

The true crucible for complex systems such as money or the economy is how they adapt to crises. The sudden arrival of crises unprecedented or severely ignored tends to reveal the inherent weaknesses within our infrastructure and where the priorities of the powers that be truly lie.

Within a few months, the ongoing coronavirus pandemic has incapacitated entire economies, supply chains and various systems that support peoples health and well-being. Much of the core infrastructure of society has been and will be disrupted by the first- and second-order effects of the virus.

In times of crisis, such as an oncoming recession or potential risk of inflation, governments will implement a monetary policy known as quantitative easing, or QE, in which the central bank prints a large amount of money and injects said money into the economy by buying financial instruments such as stocks, bonds and others. While the goal is to keep the economy afloat by maintaining target inflation levels, ensuring the stability of the monetary system and securing citizens trust in the currency, it can result in increased inflation and distrust in the currency, even making cryptocurrencies appear a viable alternative to investors and the populace alike.

A large portion of the U.S. governments multitrillion-dollar stimulus package is using QE to combat the precipitous drop in the market. In doing so, the government is favoring large corporations over small to medium-sized businesses which have limited loan programs and the millions of individuals and families adversely affected by the pandemic set to receive a single $1,200 check (at the time of writing). Why does it appear that the government is prioritizing keeping banks and corporations afloat, printing trillions of dollars to do so, rather than ensuring the well-being of its citizens first and foremost?

To no small degree, the weaknesses and contrivances of the legacy financial system are a system design problem. A particularly useful framework for understanding how the situation came to be is the Cantillon effect, an 18th-century theory developed by French banker and philosopher Richard Cantillon that states the printing and distribution of money and wealth in society often follows a top-down hierarchy of institutions before reaching the common people.

The financial systems and intermediaries at the top of the pyramid in closer proximity to the rulers operate better than the disjointed and inefficient systems further down the chain. Thus the rich have initial access to new money by design, with the value eventually trickling down to everyone else over time something that many do not have. This is an easily observable phenomenon of a legacy financial system that favors Wall Street over Main Street.

While fiat systems are subject to full control by their overseers, cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin are governed entirely by the execution of software that is itself rooted in high mathematical certainty. While fiat systems as implemented by the U.S. government are showing considerable strain and favoritism in the midst of a global crisis, the economic clock of Bitcoin is ticking without interruption in a series of predetermined protocol upgrades of its supply schedule based not on a whim but by programmable design since launch.

Bitcoin halving is the antithesis of the quantitative easing monetary policy of the fiat world. Rather than rapidly increasing the supply of money, Bitcoins monetary policy reduces the issuance of the BTC currency in set intervals of time in a process some have called quantitative hardening or quantitative tightening. The entire ecosystem of stakeholders in the Bitcoin space the miners, traders and holders have to adapt to the rules of this software, never the other way around.

However, there are some considerations to make in assessing the distribution of power in the Bitcoin network and its neutrality. Firstly, if we analyze Bitcoin through the lens of the Cantillon Effect, we can indeed see a hierarchical distribution of value in motion. While the network is distributed and decentralized, as opposed to the fiat system with a literal central bank, the issuance of Bitcoin goes through certain intermediaries before it can circulate freely: the miners.

The block subsidy is not only the economic incentive for miners to allocate considerable resources in securing the network but also the minting process for the currency itself. The first new Bitcoin in existence is held by miners as they compete to solve the proof-of-work algorithm. While the sell rate varies according to business models, operating expenses, capital expenditure costs and so on, Bitcoin does not circulate until miners sell it into the open market, which is in turn rife with speculation.

Miners are theoretically the only entities capable of compromising the network through collusion with over 50% of the hash power. While there are strong economic incentives in place to prevent this from happening, it is important to acknowledge that the distribution of power in a literal sense as well vastly favors these particular actors in the network.

Also, one can point out that having an absolutely immutable monetary policy can produce complications down the line. Certainty and determinacy are unique and powerful features of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, but this does not protect the system from unpredictable volatilities and distortions in the future.

For example, in the field of chaos theory, there is the notion that seemingly deterministic systems can shift to disorder or chaos because they are highly sensitive to their state of initial conditions. In the context of Bitcoin, the proof-of-work model could perhaps lead to further consolidation and monopolization of the network such that its decentralization and distribution is minimized to a cartel of industry players. Furthermore, the pyramidal distribution of wealth in the crypto ecosystem may also repeat the sins of fiat.

An advantage of an open-source financial system is that such discourse around Bitcoins resilience can enrich and influence its ongoing development. While it may not adapt fast, it will ultimately do so through a global consensus.

Is Bitcoin a perfectly neutral monetary system? Not yet. It is, however, the crest of a powerful techno-social movement that aims to build credibly neutral systems that support lives and well-being. In an age of uncertainty, a monetary system owned and maintained in common by a global network of peers and bound by a shared set of rules could become increasingly attractive as the cracks begin to show within the legacy structures to which humanity has become accustomed.

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Crypto and Fiat Currencies Are Worlds Apart, Here Are the Reasons Why - Cointelegraph

As the clothing industry went into lockdown, factories were shuttered, huge fashion brands cancelled orders, their warehouses full and nowhere to put new stock, which now sits in containers on wharves.

Jimmy D design studio James Dobson & Bernadette Casey Photo: Bernadette Casey

Some brands even refused to pay for orders or demanded a discount, according to the Workers Rights Consortium, which monitors factories worldwide.

In Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Cambodia, millions of garment makers have lost their income and the United Nations is now trying to prevent a humanitarian crisis. The process of recycling waste fabric has also come to a halt.

A Wellington research and development company is looking at long-term solutions to the life of garments to combat the global issue, and the world has its sights on New Zealand too.

The Formary co-founder, Bernadette Casey, told Karyn Hay that New Zealand was the ideal place to test system changes as a small country and there had been a lot of interest from overseas in their trial projects.

Their projects will be presented to the Western Australian government, in London at global fashion conference, and even France, Casey said.

But it was the countries that relied heavily on the textile industry that were overexposed to the impacts from Covid-19, she said.

Labourers wearing facemasks work in a garment factory during a government-imposed lockdown as a preventative measure against the COVID-19 coronavirus in Asulia, on the outskirts of Dhaka on April 7, 2020. Photo: Munir Uz Zaman / AFP

For example, in Bangladesh about 4 million people work in textile, which accounts for about 80 percent of the country's exports, she said.

"When there's a problem within the industry, it's just catastrophe for the whole economy and country. So places like Sri Lanka and Cambodia, [textile is] about 50 percent of exports ... it's just turned into this absolute humanitarian crisis."

The companies that employ these labourers tend to already pay low wages, have no tax to pay, and be in already indebted countries, meaning the likelihood of a government bailout was low, she said.

"So the companies that produce there, they really have to step up because there's no safety net for these people. So if you're going to produce in these low cut centres, you really got to make sure you're doing more than just paying wages.

"There are sustainability initiatives but they're all sort of cherry picked and so when the industry is under pressure they can just turn and walk away, and we've seen the abandonment of whole supply teams."

Typically what happens is places like China, Cambodia and Vietnam send garments made in their factories to the West, where after use and disposal in US and Europe get sent off to Sub-Sahara Africa. Whereas most of the clothes from New Zealand's get shipped off to Papua New Guinea.

"We export over $10 million worth of clothes every year at like 10 cents a kilo," Casey said.

Then rag traders try to sell what they can, and the rest of it gets dumped.

"So that's an environmental problem, because they're such a small margin, they don't send them to landfill, they just get dumped on the side of the road. Then you've got the leeching of the chemicals and dyes and etc," Casey said.

"So we are outsourcing our waste to regions that have less capability to deal with it than we do."

One of the solutions The Formary is putting forward is a digital platform called Usefully with a takeback scheme, where a garment is resold, or sorted, mended, reengineered and made into new garments or products.

"The first thing we did to get oversight of what comes into the country is to develop this platform, [clothing companies] register your garments on, and then you have full oversight over them through when they're being decommissioned and what happens to them, how they're being reused and then you can calculate the environment impacts and the financial impact. So you just have better resource management."

The best option would be for garments to be resold if they are reusable, Casey said, considering the resources that went into producing them. For example a pair of jeans takes about 10,000 litres of water just to make them.

"Then they kind of work their way down this hierarchy to where they're no longer usable or wearable. So we do the research and development around what we can do around these textile resources, what are the products they can go back into, and how can we really extend their value."

The Formary has done a trial with Wellington Zoo for a decommissioning of their zookeepers' uniform, where they were debranded and turned into other products. Casey said that saved about 800,000 litres of water and a "huge amount of carbon".

"Wellington Zoo took that project or case study to the world zoos and aquariums, and it now forms their sustainability for zoos and aquariums worldwide as best practice."

One of the next things they are working on is a product stewardship scheme, where people pay a little extra for the management of the end of life of garments.

"It helps to pay for all the technologies that are needed to complete the system, there's great technologies like fibre-to-fibre, which we tested with Air New Zealand uniforms," Casey said.

"We took the koru dresses and because they're made of polyester, we put them through this process of green chemistry, [which] breaks it down to its molecular parts, and then it can be re-extruded as a filaments. I like to make more polyester garments [from it], or it can be used in any plastic-based industry, you can make it into furniture, or glasses' frames, or you can make it into any number of things."

The Formary is now building a business case to bring that technology onshore.

Excerpt from:

Bernadette Casey: Changing the way we think about clothes - RNZ

Picture used for illustrative purpose only.

The Ministry of Finance, MoF, issued three new decisions for federal entities across the UAE, as part of its remit to revise and reduce federal fees.

These decisions are: Cabinet Resolution No. (36) of 2020 on registering suppliers in the Federal Supplier Register, Cabinet Resolution No. (37) of 2020 on amending certain provisions of Cabinet Resolution No. (4) of 2019 on Procurement Regulation and Storehouse Management in Federal Government, and Cabinet Resolution No. (38) of 2020 on amending Cabinet Resolution No. (4) of 2015 on Fees for services provided by the Ministry of Infrastructure Development.

The decisions are part of the ministrys efforts to boost the national economy and stimulate the countrys business environment.

Commenting on this, Younis Haji Al Khouri, Undersecretary of MoF, said that the move is in adherence with the directives of the wise leadership to reduce fees, and provide incentives to investors and companies operating in the country. This is to enhance the national economy and enable business growth and achieve economic balance in the country, especially in light of the repercussions of COVID-19 pandemic.

He said: The Ministry of Finance coordinates its efforts with all relevant federal ministries to review government fees that could be abolished or reduced. This is based on in-depth studies and benchmarks set to enhance the attractiveness of the national economy to investors and to reduce the cost of doing business, to strengthen the nations standing in global competitiveness indicators, in line with the goals of UAE Vision 2021.

The decisions included: reduction of fees of Registering suppliers in the Federal Supplier Register at MoF and the Ministry of Infrastructure Development by 50 per cent from Dhs1,000 to Dhs500, as well as cancellation of registration renewal fees.

Furthermore, MoF has modified Procurement Regulation and Storehouse Management in Federal Government, by cancelling fees for selling tender documents in federal entities (ministries and authorities). These decisions will be effective upon their publication in the Official Gazette.

The Ministry of Finance virtually held the Financial Policy Coordination Councils second meeting recently.

Younis Haji Al Khoori, Undersecretary of MoF and Chairman of the Council chaired the meeting, alongside Saeed Rashid Al Yateem, Assistant Undersecretary of Resources and Budget Sector and Vice-President of the Council.

Al Khoori underscored the importance of the meeting, which was in light of the unprecedented circumstances the world is experiencing due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

He highlighted the efforts made by members and representatives of financial departments and the Central Bank to deal effectively with the challenges posed by the pandemic.

He said, The Council seeks to find solutions that contribute to facing the economic challenges of the current crisis and to prepare for the requirements of the next stage. This will be done in a manner that ensures the integrity of the financial system in the country and enhances the efficiency of the governments financial work.

During the meeting, the Council reviewed the latest developments on the requirements for exchanging information for tax purposes. The participants also shared success stories related to the MoFs Federal Automated Revenue Estimation System, and reviewed the research and development expenditure projects, as well as the data collection process.

Furthermore, the Cabinet Resolution No. (1/7) of 2020 on preparing for the post-COVID-19 era was discussed. Additionally, the implementation of the previous meetings recommendations were reviewed. The Central Bank also gave a presentation on vital monetary and banking developments in the country.

Three such meetings are held annually, and the Council is reconstituted every three years. The Government Financial Policy Coordination Council was formed by the UAE Cabinets decision No. 39 in 2008. Its members consist of the Undersecretary of the Ministry of Finance, representatives from local UAE governments and a representative of the UAE Central Bank.

MoF has also announced recently the launch of the Federal Automated Revenue Estimation System, FARES, as part of its strategy to further enhance government operations in order to advance digital transformation in the country.

The system will automate the ministrys revenue estimations model and further improve integration of data to calculate estimates based on statistical and accounting standards.

Saeed Rashid Al Yateem, Assistant Undersecretary of Resource and Budget Sector, pointed out the importance FARES, which coincides with the revenue cycle of 2022-2026. The Ministry of Finance is preparing for the next cycle with the end of the current one being at the end of 2021.

Al Yateem reaffirmed the ministrys efforts to enhance financial technologies and launch new digital initiatives that bolster the UAE Vision 2021, as well as the goals of the UAE Artificial Intelligence Strategy 2031.

He said, MoF embraces the latest technological solutions, including AI to prepare for the Fourth Industrial Revolution. We are on course to digitise the governments financial operations in line with highest international standards.

WAM

Excerpt from:

MoF announces new decisions for federal entities in the UAE - Gulf Today