Jul 15

Ugandan Sex Workers Ward off Police Rape

It should come as no surprise that prostitution is a dangerous, yet pervasive, profession for individuals around the globe.  Whether involvement is due to free-will or force the consequences can be detrimental or deadly.  It exists in many forms and individuals, most of the time women and children, enter this lifestyle for a variety of reasons.  Regardless of whether or not you agree or disagree with prostitution as an undertaking or not, one thing is for sure—no woman, no matter what circumstance prevails, ever deserves to be raped.

The capital of Uganda, Kampala, contains a red light district in which prostitutes operate freely despite it being illegal in the country.  Sex workers in Africa are some of the most marginalized and abused in the world, facing criminalization, exploitation, police corruption, rejection from families and communities, and a tremendous risk of contracting HIV/AIDS and/or other sexually transmitted diseases.  Women and children who enter the sex trade often do so in order to escape poverty or conflict.  Some are coerced by traffickers falsely offering a means to a better way of life.  Some are refugees fleeing conflict-stricken zones.  Some are pressured to sell their bodies by their own family members who are struggling financially.  Yet, some are even well-educated women, such as teachers, who view prostitution as more lucrative than teaching.

One thing that stands out to me the most regarding the sex workers of Kampala is their courageous spirit and tenacious attitudes.  Although their trade is illegal and frowned upon in society, they congregate and advocate for their human rights—one being the right to be protected from police rape.  Sex workers of Kampala have reported ongoing incidences of police rape, with prevalence as high as twice per week.  In response to the many human rights violations experienced by sex workers in the area, grassroots initiatives led by those involved in prostitution have been ever present.  One such initiative is the Lady Mermaid’s Bureau (LMB), an alliance of sex workers working in collaboration with various human rights organizations, seeking to advance the rights of sex workers and their children.  Their main objectives are to:

  1. Advocate for the adoption of international human rights in national legislation and policies for sex workers
  2. Disseminate sexual health and HIV/AIDS information to sex workers
  3. Report in media about sex work and sex worker’s rights violations

The alliance recently went to the Platform for Labour Action (PLA), an NGO protecting the rights of vulnerable and marginalized groups, seeking legal assistance in getting the Ugandan police to stop raping sex workers.  The PLA contemplated what kind of effective actions they could take, believing that pursuing criminal prosecutions or filing reports with the police department and government would not suffice due to corruption.  PLA came up with a plan to treat rape cases just as they are—rape cases—and represent the sex workers in court as they filed civil lawsuits.  More importantly than monetary gain would be the public display of case details, shaming the perpetrators and ultimately reducing the problem of police rape overall.  They asked the sex workers to begin writing down the names, badge numbers and patrol car numbers for perpetrator identification purposes to file lawsuits.

After six weeks, the women returned to PLA and reported that not one of their sex workers was raped, beaten, or arrested.  Rather than discreetly collecting identifying Continue reading

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Jul 15

Invest in the Future

If you have been paying attention to the news for the past few weeks, you know that there has been a lot of controversy surrounding the United States’ debt ceiling. Theoretically, we have a debt ceiling to control federal spending. This ceiling puts a cap on the amount of bonds the Treasury can issue. If our overall debt surpasses the current debt ceiling ($14.3 trillion), we might not be able to pay off interest on existing debt.

Our current debt has effectively reached the debt ceiling. This means, if our politicians don’t act soon, our government may default on its debts. Such a default would be bad for our credit ratings and potentially catastrophic to the global economy.

Though this news may seem alarming at first, it shouldn’t be that scary. Our politicians know how bad it would be to default on debts, and in the past, have passed legislation to raise the debt ceiling as needed. In fact, the debt ceiling has been raised 74 times since 1962, including 10 times since 2001.

Given this statistic, it seems pretty clear that the debt ceiling doesn’t do that good of a job controlling federal spending. Regardless of what the debt ceiling is, Congress often decides to spend beyond its means under the assumption that an increase on the debt ceiling will easily be passed. After all, the consequences of not passing such legislation are calamitous.

But for whatever reason, our Congressmen have been hesitant to raise the debt ceiling instantly this time around. Both sides are using the need to raise the debt ceiling as an excuse to push their own political agenda and make the other side look bad. The Republican majority has issued an ultimatum, refusing to raise the ceiling unless Democrats promise to cut spending by $2.4 trillion and abstain from raising taxes. Although Democrats agree that spending should be curtailed to some extent, they think that they should raise taxes on the rich to help generate.

Because of their incompatible preferences, our politicians have reached a standstill. But decisions on federal spending are far too important to be made hastily and under a gun. For example, it is not fair to American citizens for our politicians to pass huge cuts on Continue reading

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Jul 15

The March on Washington D.C.

Due to the heated debates and reforms regarding public education in the United States, many teachers and parents have decided to take action.  The July 30th march, which is referred to as the Save Our Schools March, wants to bring parents and teachers together in order to regain control of schools.  The purpose of the demonstration in the nation’s capital is to show that the budget cuts, changes, and overhaul of teachers are negatively impacting students.  Furthermore, the march is supposed to show that the education system needs to be saved by destructive policies being passed by the federal government on an almost daily basis.

The march in Washington D.C. is said to be unique because it is not advocating for a single change, but protesting against education reform as it stands today.  A myriad of school teachers want to educate others about the difficulties schools have been, and will continue, to face with the budget cuts and policies passed by government officials.  Since the march is bringing together parents and teachers from almost all fifty states, the demonstration has made national news.  It has attracted the attention of education activists, like former Assistant Secretary of Education Diane Ravitch, and celebrities such as Matt Damon.  Educators hope that the wide-spread media attention the march is garnering will cause the White House to consider the desires of teachers and parents.

So what exactly is the march calling for?  Other than wanting to bring more attention to education reform, participants in the march want the federal government to have less control over reform policies.  A myriad of activists and reformers feel that the federal government has too much power over teachers and the way schools are run.  In order to solve issues within the education system, organizers of the march state that more control should be given locally.  In this way, parents and teachers who have a vested interest in the success of the students of their town or city will try harder to fix the education system. 

Several federal changes to the education system, such as the No Child Left Behind Act and Race to the Top, are purportedly hurting schools instead of helping them.  Though the U.S. Constitution does not state that the federal government needs to be involved with education reform, the government does provide money to schools for free lunch programs and the general wellness of students.  However, since the pass of the NCLB Act in 2001, Congress has been renewing the act on a yearly basis.  Though the Obama administration has been putting pressure on Congress to repeal or reconsider the act, Congress has continuously stated that the president cannot put a deadline on them to repeal the act.  For that reason, participants of the Save Our School march hope to push Congress along on reconsidering the NCLB Act.   

University of New Hampshire education professor, Sarah Stitzlein, states that many federal reforms unnecessarily stress standardized tests.  Though these tests are important, they penalize teachers from cities that have low standardized test scores instead of giving them feedback as to how to help students.  Furthermore, students and teachers become so caught up in producing high test scores, the quality of education becomes less about creativity, growth, and understanding, and more about making a quota. 

 The Save Our Schools March hopes to address all the issues faced by the education system, teachers, parents, and students.  Organizers and participants of the march want to regain control of their schools in order to make changes that will benefit and not harm American students.  Hopefully, the White House and congress will pay close attention to what the protestors are saying, and look into what will strengthen the education of millions of children instead of budget cuts.  It is time for children to build their skills and knowledge when they go to school, and not face setbacks due to federal reforms. 

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Jul 14

King Crops: The Dangers of Monocrops (Part III)

The Demise of Biodiversity

I come from a family of amateur farmers. For as long as I can remember, my backyard in New Jersey has been filled with several types of cucumber, tomato, hot peppers, basil and lettuce plants, all courtesy of the tender ministrations of my grandfather and father.  Growing up around such a variety of fresh foods has naturally made me a foodie.  My innate love for food has caused me to learn as much as I can about it – whether it be reading an article of agricultural development, or simply perusing one of my favorite recipe websites.  Most recently, I was surprised to learn that out of the hundreds of varieties of produce that existed a scant 100 years ago, only a handful of them are grown on farms today.  It’s estimated that about 75% of the world’s crop varieties have already disappeared.  What has led to this loss of biodiversity, you ask?  Well, much of this loss can be attributed to the focus on monocrops.

My fellow intern Julia has written several posts on the dangers of king crops and production of biofuel.  Not only are monocrops damaging to the environment, but these crop varieties are also a form of bad, unsustainable agriculture that impacts our present and future access to food.  With poverty and food crises already affecting countries throughout the world, focus on monocrops is drastically reducing biodiversity and plays a role in the potential for a food shortage to hit the USA.  This focus on monocrops arose primarily during the Green Revolution in the 1960s with the goal of spreading mass cultivation of specific varieties of high-yielding crops (e.g. corn and wheat) to developing countries as a way of combating famine.  While this was initially a positive endeavor, the monocropping strategy has actually made our future less secure.

As time went on, farmers began to rely more and more on the adapted high-yield crops that were introduced to them, and began to stop cultivating local crop varieties.  While this monocropping greatly increased the harvest and began to feed more people, these uniform crop varieties are also genetically weaker crops in comparison to traditional farming, and are not only more susceptible to disease but in constant need of chemicals and pesticides to grow.  This pushing out of local crop varieties has greatly reduced biodiversity and resulted in a permanent loss of what were very valuable genetic traits.  For thousands of years, farmers had developed food crops suited to their local environment.  Each crop was suited for a specific problem in a specific place.  Unfortunately, we have now become entirely dependent on these monocrops to feed ourselves, and in the near future might desperately need one of the varieties we’ve allowed to go extinct.

A prime example of this, is the world’s current fear of the decimation of wheat crops.  Ug99 (named because first discovered in Uganda in 1999) is a fungus that affects wheat crops and is quickly spreading across the globe.  In the past few years it has spread throughout countries in Africa and even made it to Iran.  Scientists are predicting that it’s only a matter of time before Ug99 makes it to India, China and Russia.  There is also the fear that this fungus will also eventually hit US wheat crops.  It’s estimated that about 90% of the world’s wheat is defenseless against Ug99.  If it continues to spread and we do nothing about it, about 1 billion people in Africa and Asia would be left without their primary food source.  And if it spreads to the USA, about $1 billion of wheat would be lost.

In short, our focus on increasing the amount of food via monocrops has put us at high risk for food shortages in the near future.  Instead of adapting seeds to local conditions, we’ve resorted to adapting farms to the seeds of genetically uniform crops, which are also genetically weak.  It’s imperative that we begin cultivating the crops that we had originally developed to not only reintroduce variety in our crops, but also as a way to combat the potential hazards that environmental changes will have on our current monocrops.  If we introduce biodiversity back into our food and return to traditional methods of farming that allow for the cultivation of a variety of crops on farmland, this could greatly reduce the crop’s risk to drought or disease, as well as reducing our risk to famine.  After all, I’m not sure I could help feed so many people through the small garden variety in my backyard!

Yvonne Chen is a SISGI Group Program and Research Intern.  Her focuses are in environmental sustainability, human rights issues, and economic aid in developing countries. 

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Jul 14

People Comprehension Part IV

I’ve written several posts explaining how and why I think people comprehension skills should be taught in the public education system. Developing these skills in elementary school and middle school allows students to have exposure to different types of conflict, foster a greater understanding of opposing viewpoints, and build basic negotiation skills. In high school, it’s time to continue developing those skills by applying them to real world scenarios.

With a more mature and exposed outlook on the world, high school students should be given the opportunity to practice their people comprehension skills while analyzing real world political, social, and historical conflicts. That way, they can really put their skills to the test and negotiate real issues that could have a much greater impact. Additionally, these “people comprehension lessons” don’t necessarily need to be given a specific time period in the students’ schedule (like I proposed for elementary and middle school students) – the exercises can be integrated into the lesson plans of specific classes that are relevant to applicable scenarios.

For example, one type of exercise that can be included in a history class is re-visiting a conflict at any point in time – like a war – and transforming the classroom into an imaginary setting of a peace or negotiation talk. Students will be placed into groups representing four perspectives: the two opponents, the mediator or facilitator, and a policy maker. The opposing groups will debate – with the help of the mediator, who can also ask each group questions – and explain each point of view to the policy maker, who will ultimately create a peace treaty that benefits both sides of the conflict. Students in each group will be forced to analyze the situation, understand the opposing viewpoints, and and work together – all while gaining experience resolving conflict nonviolently. This would also be a valuable exercise in a lesson plan that allows for greater knowledge of a historical conflict, as students would also leave with a much deeper understanding of the situation than if they simply read about it in a textbook.

This type of exercise can also be used to analyze current (or historical) political conflict. If students were learning about the differences between United States political parties, for example, this would be a great way to teach them each party’s point of view on particular issues. The set-up would be similar to the example above, with four groups of students representing four different perspectives on an issue, but instead of figuring out how to avoid war, they would determine compromises on the various social and political issues.

By the end of high school, students should have not only successfully developed their people comprehension skills so they can understand each other, but have also had experience in practicing those skills in real world scenarios. The truth is that there will always be differing opinions, clashing perspectives, and general conflict – but the best way to prevent it from escalating into violence and war is to be equipped with the skills to negotiate. Building people comprehension skills from kindergarten through 12th grade enables children to develop into open minded adults, and consequently closes the gap of understanding between points of view. Teaching these skills through the U.S. public education system – and therefore reaching the overwhelming majority of students – can create a society of greater understanding.

To learn more about my proposal for implementing people comprehension skills in the U.S. public education system, please check out part I, II, and III of the blog series and my webinar presentation titled “How to Teach Kids How to Understand Each Other.”

Rebecca Birnbaum is a Program and Research Intern with the SISGI Group focusing on nonviolent conflict resolution, nonprofit management, and sustainable development. She is a senior at the University of Michigan, where she studies Anthropology, Political Science, and Peace and Social Justice. To learn more about the SISGI Group, visit www.sisgigroup.org.
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Jul 14

South Sudan – What Now?

Now that South Sudan’s independence is a reality, a new set of challenges awaits

On July 9th, South Sudan became an independent nation. The United Nations is currently working its way towards the vote that will officiate South Sudan as a member of the UN. On Wednesday afternoon, the UN Security Council decided to recommend that the UN General Assembly vote in favor of membership for South Sudan. It is widely considered that this vote is a formality and that by the end of  July 14th, South Sudan will be the 193rd member of the United Nations.

All of this is, of course, a reason to celebrate. But now that the cars in Juba, South Sudan’s capital, have stopped honking their horns in jubilation, many are wondering what moves South Sudan will make next. Building a country from scratch is no easy task, after all. Think of how much goes into developing a new legislative system, a new government structure, a new currency, new institutions…the list goes on and on.

One key issue is that of oil, something I’ve written about before. Traditionally, South Sudan’s oil has been pumped out through pipelines that lead to the Republic of Sudan in the north. This allows the Republic of Sudan great control over South Sudan’s main export. There are still contested oil rich regions along the border between the north and the south where each side is vying for control. Temporarily, a force of Ethiopian peacekeepers is keeping the situation from exploding into outright war, but this force cannot pacify the region forever. While there is talk of developing a pipeline through Kenya and beyond that would eliminate the need to pump oil through the north and potentially reduce these tensions, no tangible plan has yet been agreed upon that would allow this to happen. For the time being, South Sudan must rely on its northern brother for transportation of the vital resource.

“The resources with which nature has endowed our land are abundant enough to attract the interest of development partners both from the public and private sectors from many countries across the world, so we should exploit these possibilities to better the lives of our people.” –South Sudan President Salva Kiir

To put the importance of this oil in perspective, keep in mind that 98% of South Sudan’s revenues comes from oil. Salva Kiir, South Sudan’s President, and other officials understand the need to develop other sectors in their industry beyond oil. They have their eyes on agriculture, which could be a booming industry. With only 30 miles of paved road in the entire country, however, it’s hard to get any industry up and running. These are the issues that South Sudan must now address. Much could be accomplished in the way of developing infrastructure to jumpstart agriculture with the hundreds of millions of dollars in direct aid South Sudan will be receiving – if it is used properly.

And here lies another problem. What measures are in place that will ensure the leaders of South Sudan do not simply exploit the country for all it is worth and do little to advance the wellbeing of its people? Allegedly, President Salva Kiir demanded and was granted absolute power in the South Sudan Legislative Assembly. If this news is true, the people of South Sudan may be in for a rude awakening if he turns out to be less than the democratic leader they had hoped for.

In hopes of helping steer the new country from the mire of corruption, an anti-corruption and security US firm with experience in similar situations has opened a branch in South Sudan. Knowing the potential for rampant corruption, I’m sure this firm is eager to turn a profit. Regardless, their services will most definitely be needed and appreciated.

Between the oil and the basic challenges of setting up a new nation, South Sudan is in for quite a year. Let’s hope that the new government delivers the people what they are hoping for – a free, independent and sustainable nation.

Ryan Pavel is a Program and Research Intern with the SISGI Group focusing on foreign military involvement, policy and strategy into conflicts and motivations behind and impact of foreign aid. To learn more about the SISGI Group visit www.sisgigroup.org
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Jul 13

King Crops: The dangers of monocrops (part II)

2)Biofuels: a Trojan horse?

In a previous post I discussed one of the reasons why some crops (such as corn and soybean) have gained so much importance in our agriculture. Our food system and our food quality are set up in a way that inevitably increases the demand of these two crops, and economical and political systems have incentivized the cultivation of these two crops.

Another reason, which I believe allows these bad agricultural practices to persist, is the increasing demand for “bio products”, such as biodiesel and bioplastics-among many others-.

The popularity of these products has grown because they are perceived as being “green” and environmentally friendly. But if you take a deeper look into what are the impacts of these products, and what is required to produce them, it is inevitable to raise the question of how “green” the products really are. Let’s take a closer look at biodiesel.

Biodiesel is proposed as an alternative to fossil fuels. In recent years, biofuels have been praised as a solution to climate change, green house gas emissions, and foreign-energy dependance.  But the reality is that some biofuels may impact more severely the environment than what is often perceived. How is that so? First of all, we have to understand: where do biofuels come from?

Biofuel is any type of fuel that originates from biomass. Biomass is anything that comes directly from living/dying nature. Biofuel can be generated from plants (vegetable oil), excrements, algae, etc.

I will only discuss the impacts of biodiesels that originate from vegetable oils, because they are the ones that involve the agricultural industry. The vegetable oil that produces biodiesels comes mostly from palm trees, soybeans, corn and sugar cane. The

photo from Greenpeace

increasing demand to produce biodiesel has put a higher value (increased the price) of corn, soy, sugar cane and palm trees. The rising prices of these crops have two important consequences: they increase deforestation rates and they decrease food supply.

Rising prices in these crops has increased deforestation because the profits that governments and companies get when they grow “biofuel plants” has increased. Governments and enterprises have clear-cut rainforests and peatlands to cultivate palm trees, sugar cane and soybeans. Palm tree and sugar cane grow in tropical climates; therefore countries such as Brazil and Indonesia are the ones to have greatly reduced their forests. And as the demand rises more and more, prices go higher and higher, giving more incentives (because profits increase) to clear cut carbon rich tropical forests. Producing biofuels from crops that are grown in land that use to be rainforest is especially damaging to the environment since it emits more greenhouse gases. Biofuels that originate from vegetable oil increase climate change because all the trees that would trap green houses gases are being cut to grow crops that are used to produce biofuel. In such conditions, biofuels have the function of an environmental Trojan horse (see a report here): they are perceived as a solution to green house gas emissions, but in reality they damage the environment in a more important level.

Therefore, due to its massive destruction of rainforests, it is not surprising that Indonesia is becoming the 3rd largest greenhouse gas emitter (see here). In large scale palm oil plantations in Borneo and Sumatra, and sugar cane plantations in Brazil, waste water and pollution, over-fertilization, soil erosion and chemical spraying, are all major problems that add to the negative impacts of agro fuels. If we want to use biofuel, the only vegetable oil that would be useful is the one that is recycled directly from kitchens. The oil that we use to fry our potatoes is the one that we should recycle and produce biofuel with, but we should not be tempted to increase vegetable oil production.

On the other hand, producing biofuels is severely distortionning the food market. A World Bank study suggest tat 70 to 75% of the increase in food commodity prices from 2002 to 2008 was due to agrofuels  and related consequences such as low grain stocks, large land use shifts and speculation. That’s when the production of biofuels becomes not only a matter of protecting the environment but also of human rights and food security. Is it fair that to feed our thirst of cars and transportation comfort we should sacrifice the food security of other people?

It is true that the corn that is produced for ethanol is not eatable; so the land that is used to produce the type of corn that feeds cars could be used to grow a crop that would actually feed people. It is not just a matter of appropriately distributing the food, it is also a matter of growing the right crop.

What’s more, the protectionist agricultural policies of the United States have banned the imports of sugar cane from Brazil, even though sugar cane is much more efficient than corn to produce biofuels. Banning sugar cane from Brazil increases corn production in the U.S, therefore the ban only benefits the corn industry of the U.S (and brazilian farmers are negatively affected, because their crop is not sold).

In spite of all these disadvantages that go into producing biofuels, the demand has continued to rise. Europe has set a goal to increase it’s biofuel consumption, hopefully a goal that will be reverted; in the Unites States, the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 mandated a renewable fuel standard requiring that by 2015 the United States will be using 15 billion gallons of corn-based ethanol.

The demand for biofuels is damaging our environment and our food supply. To stop it, the economical incentives (agricultural subsidies promoting production of corn) and political incentives (countries’ goals to increase biofuel use) to produce it should be modified. We could reallocate our resources to produce better crops and healthier food. Food is a human need, it is not like any other commodity.  Until we regulate our agricultural markets wisely- in a way that is environmentally friendly and ensures human rights- biofuels will continue to be an important contributor to bad agricultural practices.

Julia Naime is a research intern at the SISGI Group. She is a student at New York University majoring at Economics. One of her greatest fears is high-fructose corn syrup; this has lead her to make Sustainable development and Environmental Policies a focus of her research with the SISGI Group. She also researches on issues in International Development. To learn more about the SISGI Group, visit www.sisgigroup.org

 

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Jul 13

Tourism Ethics

The World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) announced on July 7th that it will be coming together with Spain to organize the First International Congress on Ethics and Tourism.  The conference will be held on the 15th and 16th of September in Madrid and will cover issues such as responsible tourism, fair tourism and poverty reduction, and the role of the private sector in sustainable tourism.  For those of you not in the know (as I was about 45 minutes ago), a Global Code of Ethics for Tourism was adopted by the General Assembly of the World Tourism Organization in 1999 and by the United Nations 2 years later.  One of the main goals of this conference is to bring awareness of the Code of Ethics to the tourism industry and to the general public, which will hopefully then increase responsible and sustainable tourism.

The Code of Ethics has 10 principles, which cover the economic, social, cultural, and environmental aspects of tourism.  They are, in brief:

  1. Tourism’s contribution to mutual understanding and respect between peoples and societies
  2. Tourism as a vehicle for individual and collective fulfillment
  3. Tourism, a factor of sustainable development
  4. Tourism, a user of the cultural heritage of mankind and contributor to its enhancement
  5. Tourism, a beneficial activity for host countries and communities
  6. Obligations of stakeholders in tourism development
  7. Right to tourism
  8. Liberty of tourist movements
  9. Rights of the workers and entrepreneurs in the tourism industry
  10. Implementation of the principles of the Global Code of Ethics for Tourism

(For a more in-depth description of the principles, click here.)

Basically, the Code of Ethics is intended to be a guideline to reduce the negative impact tourism can have on the environment and on local communities.  Ideally, tourism brings money and growth to the host community, but in reality tourism is often a bleak industry.  The environment is destroyed, foreign workers brought in, and cultural heritages manipulated.  For example, last summer I spent a week in Colorado for a family reunion and one of our outings was to historic Manitou cliff dwellings.  Seems like an innocent trip, right?  Wander through some cliff dwellings, look at native plants, learn a little bit, and buy some moccasins.  One hitch: the cliff dwellings are absolutely not historic.  The Anasazi Indians actually lived several hundred miles away in the Four Corners area—the same area the building stones for the Manitou dwellings were taken from.  The stones were shipped to Manitou and used to build the fake dwellings, which were then presented as authentic.  The set-up was intended only to draw tourists, and while it certainly succeeded, what was the cost?  Relics were taken from their true site, shipped hundreds of miles, and a false history was presented to anyone who would listen.

Of course, that is just a mild example of cultural exploitation and the potential dangers of tourism.  But with international tourism forecasted to reach 1.6 billion travelers by 2020, something needs to be done to ensure that the local communities and the environment benefit from the industry, and that the tourism is sustainable.  That’s why the Code of Ethics and the conference are so important.  Tourism is a massive industry and will continue to grow, and so it has the potential to bring much-needed jobs and economic growth and development.  The conference will hopefully go a long way towards spreading information about the Code and the ways in which responsible and sustainable tourism can benefit a community, but it won’t be enough to spark a huge change.  Tourists and tourism providers have a lot of work to do before the tourism industry lives up to the standards set in the Code of Ethics.  But hopefully this conference will provide a starting point and help shed some light into the complex business that is responsible tourism.

Michelle Bovée is a SISGI Group Program and Research Intern focused on international affairs, economic development, and responsible tourism. To learn more about the SISGI Group visit www.sisgigroup.org

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Jul 12

Understanding Your Food: Part II

Debunking Some of the Myths About Organic Food

Last week I wrote on the importance of understanding your food, based on knowing where your food comes from, and how to eat organically or locally in a bid to be environmentally friendly and health conscious.  While making the move to organic foods products is a good move towards bettering the environment and sustainable agricultural practices, we still need to be knowledgeable consumers.  We cannot blindly go to the supermarket and assume that everything labeled “Organic!  Cage free!  Grass-fed Beef!” is truly organic, was raised cage free, or was fed only grass.  The truth about our food is that there is surprisingly little policing on how food is labeled and marketed.  What official labeling of organic foods that does come from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) is also prone to problems.  Furthermore, organic may not necessarily mean that it’s better for the environment and sustainable.

In the midst of this food revolution, many companies falsely use these labels to lure us as consumers, relying on the fact that we so often buy things on good faith.  While we’d like to think that organic is always better, many industrial farms are beginning to capitalize on the public’s move towards organics and mass-producing organic products.  One of the major reasons we cannot always trust organic labels in the supermarket is because of corporate takeover in the organic industry.  Because corporations are recognizing that marketing foods as organic is good business, more and more people want to capitalize on this trendy food revolution.  This however, means they’re gradually pushing out the original small organic farmers who farm with the environment in mind.  Corporations often end up farming in ways that aren’t good for the land and often only meet the bare minimum requirements for organic certification.  For example, organic farmers are typically supposed to give animals access to outdoors, but some farms confine the animals and meet the “outdoors” requirement just because there are screen windows in place.  The USDA supports this practice, even though truly sustainable systems would allow animals to behave as if in nature.  Another reason organic food isn’t sustainable in all situations is because Continue reading

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Jul 12

Panetta’s Candor

When it comes to explaining military engagements abroad, candor is key. Defense Secretary Panetta seems to agree.

Five years ago, I had just begun my studies of the Arabic language at the Defense Language Institute. Almost all of the instructors were native to Arab speaking nations, allowing us exposure to a variety of backgrounds and dialects. Some were much more qualified to teach beginning students than others. My class and I quickly learned which instructors we could joke around with and which demanded a serious classroom environment. One of my favorite teachers, Jean Baho, could switch from jovial to stone cold sober in a split second. As a former dentist in the Syrian army, he had a thing or two to say about what it’s like to serve one’s country. In a one-on-one session that I had with him in the early stages of the course, I started complaining about the Marine detachment I was stationed with at the Institute and how it seemed they foolishly wanted us to spend more time on military drills than on studying our assigned languages. When I had exhausted my limited Arabic vocabulary, I shrugged and waited for his response. “Sami,” he said, using my Arabic alias, “la yujid muntaq bil jaysh” which loosely translates to “There is no logic in the military.” I smirked, but I didn’t think much of his comment at the time.

As the years progressed and I experienced more and more of the military lifestyle, I began to understand where Baho was coming from. At many instances throughout my short five-year career, decisions were made by those in charge that made absolutely no sense to those of us on the lower rungs of the ladder. I suppose part of this goes with the universal territory of being in the military. In pre-deployment training for example, some of the training we did had no practical application to what we’d be doing while deployed. If we asked why we were doing it, we were often told to do it simply because we were told to do it. How cyclical. “No logic in the army” became sort of a mantra for me, something I would repeat and chuckle about instead of getting angrier at a situation I didn’t have the rank or power to change.

The funny thing about being put in so many apparently illogical situations is how refreshing it becomes when someone speaks with candor. If I understood the reason behind something, I was much more likely to support it. I remember attending in the last couple of months of my second Iraq deployment a Q&A session with Admiral Mike Mullen, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, where someone boldly asked whether or not we had won in Iraq yet. Without padding his answer with jargon and statistics, he simply replied that the typical concept of victory doesn’t apply to our operations in Iraq or Afghanistan. He defended his point further, but it was this initial statement that hit me. As a junior Marine who wasn’t used to hearing much outside of bravado and patriotism when military personnel discussed Iraq, I was blown away by how direct and atypical his comment was. Knowing that the man in the most senior position of the US military shared my opinion on victory in Iraq, or lack thereof, was a great reassurance to me.

Recently, former CIA director Leon Panetta became the Secretary of Defense. While I’ve read a fair amount of arguments for and against his appointment to this position, it wasn’t until an article I read the other morning that I moved towards one camp or the other. The article discussed Secretary Panetta’s recent visit to Iraq and Afghanistan, where he spent time with foreign dignitaries as well as US forces. Apparently, the Secretary had no intention of mincing words and delivered his speeches and answered questions in a remarkably blunt manner. When discussing the possibility of extending US presence in Iraq, a decision currently resting in the hands of the tenuous Iraqi government, he ended by saying, “But dammit, make a decision.” He isn’t pandering to anyone; he’s just expressing his understandable frustration at the matter – something many Americans can relate to.

The disadvantage of such candid statements is the trouble Secretary Panetta gets himself into by misspeaking. News articles covering his recent trip point out the clean up job his aids undertook to clarify and correct some of things the Secretary said. On Libya, he said the main goal was to oust the good Colonel’s regime, contradictory to the UN’s actual stated mission of protecting innocent civilians there. On Iraq, he linked the 2003 US invasion to the pre-invasion presence of al-Qaeda there, a concept which has been repeatedly challenged since the operation began. Oops.

Regardless of these slip-ups, I find Secretary Panetta’s candor reassuring. I would gladly trade direct and honest speech with a few hiccups, for a flawless speech that leaves behind a puzzled audience that is no more informed than before the speech began. I don’t agree with everything the Secretary said or stands for, but at least I know where he stands – there’s definitely something to be said for that.

Candor helps explain the logic of military engagements abroad, the semantics of which are too important to not understand. This holds especially true for the service members with boots on the ground abroad. It is not the same as full transparency, which some people call for. It is an honest explanation of decisions and plans that have been made. Understanding the public position of the Secretary of Defense and other ranking officials is an important aspect of a deployment for a junior service member, an aspect that is often overlooked. All too often, US forces fight without knowing why. Directly answering the questions of these military personnel as Secretary Panetta has done helps demonstrate some of the logic of military operations. This is something my former instructor Jean Baho, myself and anyone else who has served can certainly appreciate.

Ryan Pavel is a Program and Research Intern with the SISGI Group focusing on foreign military involvement, policy and strategy into conflicts and motivations behind and impact of foreign aid. To learn more about the SISGI Group visit www.sisgigroup.org
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