Day: July 5, 2017

Bolstering flood defenses and moving families away from risky areas are high on the agenda for Argentina’s Santa Fe as the river port city looks to grow its economy and improve its infrastructure under a new urban plan.

The inland city of around 400,000 in Argentina’s Pampas region also aims to cut violent crime, boost social inclusion and kick-start projects including a new airport, as it tries to create jobs and become better connected, said Santa Fe’s chief resilience officer, Andrea Valsagna.

Like many Latin American cities, as Santa Fe has expanded, new residents have settled in low-lying areas, she noted.

“The challenge is to organize the growth of the city in a way that reduces the risk of floods,” said Valsagna by telephone from Santa Fe in northeast Argentina.

The new resilience strategy will help position the city to “deal with the problems climate change is generating in the region,” she said, adding that heavy rains and flooding are likely to increase.

Santa Fe lies near the junction of two major waterways — the Parana and Salado rivers — and suffered serious floods in 2003 and 2007, which forced mass evacuations.

The city now has early warning systems in place, and relies on costly infrastructure made up of 40 miles (64 km) of defenses and pumps that help minimize flood risk from the rivers.

The new strategy — released under the 100 Resilient Cities initiative, a global network of cities working to tackle modern-day shocks and stresses — said Santa Fe had taken steps to reduce its vulnerability, but work was needed to bolster flood defenses, drainage systems and other critical infrastructure.

Santa Fe is one of Argentina’s oldest cities, with over 70 percent of its territory made up of rivers, lakes and marshes.

An effort to relocate nearly 4,000 people living in 1,500 homes situated in flood-prone areas and curb informal settlement must consider how to integrate communities, and provide education and job opportunities, said Valsagna.

“The problem of families in low-lying or informal settlements is multi-dimensional, and you can’t just think about the housing problem,” she said of the city which suffers from a shortage of accommodation.

“It’s very difficult to generate alternatives for many of these families — they have a history in these places … they have their links with work, schools, health,” she said.

Crime and waste

Major infrastructure projects, such as the proposed new airport for the regional capital and relocation of its river port, would broaden opportunities for economic growth and jobs, besides improving transport links, said Valsagna.

Santa Fe is expected to funnel 10 percent of its municipal budget into ways of making the city more resilient. City authorities are also talking to regional development banks, the private sector and the national government about funding the port and the airport, she said.

Reducing crime is another big challenge for Santa Fe, where homicides reached 22 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2014. Young men from poor, underserved neighborhoods are most at risk, while police corruption and a weak justice system compound the issue.

Valsagna said a new observatory would analyze crime in the city, which is seeking ways to bring more jobs and services to inhabitants of its poorest areas.

Other goals are to improve drainage and waste services in the city where more than 600 families, including children, make a living out of informal rubbish collection and are exposed to health risks and poor sanitation, said the report.

Santa Fe wants to halve their number within the next five years by offering alternative sources of income.

Santa Fe Mayor Jose Manuel Corral noted in the report that cities around the world are facing complex challenges.

“We believe that a resilience approach will allow us to tackle this complexity, putting the focus on the capacity of communities to face crises, prepare themselves for acute impacts but also to deal with and overcome chronic stresses,” he wrote.
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The global economic recovery “remains on track,” according to the International Monetary Fund, but other experts say advanced economies are in for a period of slow growth.

The IMF study is published as leaders from the G-20, the world’s major economies, are gathering in Hamburg, Germany to discuss growth, trade and other issues. The global lender urges nations to “work together” on economic issues because “there is no time for standing still.”

The study’s authors say the U.S. economy hit a “soft patch” earlier this year, while some European and Asian economies grew a bit faster than expected, with an upturn in manufacturing and trade.  

These experts also warn that weak productivity growth, uneven distribution of economic gains, and aging workforces, limit growth, particularly in advanced economies.  

A separate study by Fitch Ratings says advanced economies are likely to grow at a rate below 2 percent over the next several years. 

Fitch writes that while the U.S. average growth rate over many years is “just below 3 percent,” the outlook is just 1.8 percent. The study’s authors blame the aging of the workforce for the slow pace of expansion. 
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Almost a year after the Rio de Janeiro Olympics, Brazilian organizers are asking for help from the International Olympic Committee to satisfy creditors who are still owed about 130 million reals ($40 million).

Mario Andrada, a spokesman for the Rio organizing committee, said Brazilian Olympic Committee President Carlos Nuzman would meet officials next week at IOC offices in Switzerland.

“The IOC might help us gain leverage, might help us in this dialogue with the government,” Andrada said.

However, the IOC was cautious in a statement on Wednesday to The Associated Press. Contractually, host cities and countries are obligated to pay Olympic debts.

“The IOC continues to be ready to offer its help and expertise,” the statement said. “However, to do this we would need reliable and understandable information from those in charge, something which regrettably at the present time we do not have. Once we can be provided with a clear picture, then we can work out how best we can offer our support going forward.”

The Rio Olympics were battered by organizational problems and variable attendance, while the country faced a series of corruption scandals and the worst recession in decades.

Some infrastructure built for the Olympics has found uses — a subway line, a renovated port, and high-speed bus lines. But sporting venues are mostly vacant, a $20 million Olympic golf course is struggling to find players, and fewer than 10 percent of the apartments in the 3,600-unit Athletes Village are reported to have found buyers.

Last month, an AP analysis — supported by city, state and federal data — put the cost of the Olympics at $13.1 billion, a mix of public and private money. However, the exact figure is likely larger and may never be known.

Andrada, the Rio spokesman, said organizers were moving cautiously to get help from authorities in Brazil in paying the committee’s debt. He said negotiations had reached “a crucial point.”

Any such move to avoid possible bankruptcy is sure to meet resistance from the state of Rio de Janeiro, which is late paying teachers, police, pensions, and other public services.

This all comes as Brazilian President Michel Temer has been charged with corruption by Brazil’s top prosecutor and has a popularity rating of 7 percent.

“We need to connect dots that are very far apart in a very complicated political environment,” Andrada said. “The IOC is more guiding us rather than being the silver bullet.”
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A new report finds flourishing tourism in Africa is putting millions of people to work and adding billions of dollars to national economies. The UN Conference on Trade and Development’s annual Economic Development in Africa Report projects continued robust growth in tourism in the coming years.

Growth figures in Africa’s tourism sector are impressive. The World Travel and Tourism Council projects the total contribution of tourism to Africa’s Gross Domestic Product will amount to $296 billion by 2026.

This is a phenomenal increase considering that tourism’s direct contribution to Africa’s GDP was $30 billion between 1995 and 1998. The Tourism Council also expects the sector to generate nearly 29 million jobs in 2026 up from 21 million in 2016.

UNCTAD secretary-general, Mukhisa Kituyi says intra-African tourism, which now exceeds visitors from Europe, the United States and Asia is behind the fast growth in the industry.

“Also, importantly documented in this report is the fact that intra-African tourism is 12 months a year,” he said. “It does not wait for the north in winter and that way it underpins more continuing livelihoods than the seasonal tourism associated with the traditional South markets.”

But, Kituyi says African governments must liberalize air transport to realize the potential of intraregional tourism for the continent’s economic growth. Currently, he says four countries, South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia and Kenya, account for more than 90 percent of air traffic.

“Many countries that do not have a viable national airline, do not see the reason of giving concession for low-cost landing when there is no such benefit for their own airlines,” he said. “And, what it means is that you start finding abnormally high landing costs for airlines from other African countries.”

Kituyi says this short-sighted policy results in abnormally high costs for intra-African flying. This, he says, holds back greater potential revenue through the greater movement of persons across the continent.

 
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Rifts are widening in Theresa May’s Cabinet over Brexit with two rival schools of thoughts emerging, one favoring a sharp break with the European Union and the other, led by the ruling Conservatives’ increasingly influential Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond, wanting closer ties with the European bloc.

The mounting tensions are emerging as surveys suggest British voters are becoming more skittish over Brexit, possibly a reflection of increasingly bad news about the British economy, which is the worst performing major economy.

According to a YouGov poll, 60 percent of Britons believe trade with Europe should take priority in the departure negotiations with the bloc, rather than immigration issues, thought to be a key driver of the Brexit vote a year ago.

Rising public concern about post-Brexit economic prospects comes amid signs that Britain will need to improve the skills of its own workers rapidly or make better use of robots in manufacturing and assembly plants, as it could be faced with a crippling skills shortage.

The consultancy firm Deloitte found in a survey last week that 47 percent of highly skilled workers from other European countries are thinking of leaving. It warned that if they do, there will be a serious implications for employers.

“Overseas workers, especially those from the EU, tell us they are more likely to leave the UK than before,” said David Sproul of Deloitte.

The split within the upper echelons of the ruling Conservatives over Brexit has gotten sharper since last month’s inconclusive elections that left May weakened and her party remaining in government thanks to a voting deal she made with 10 Northern Ireland lawmakers to give her a slight working majority in the House of Commons.

Few analysts believe May will see out the year before she has to step down and is replaced. The battle is playing out in public with key ministers taking swipes at each other over how Britain should leave the European Union, adding to the sense of a government in disarray.

Hammond has warned that “petty politics” must not be allowed to “interfere with economic logic”, while the minister charged with overseeing Brexit negotiations with Brussels, David Davis, has remained firm that Britain should leave by March 2019 both the single market and customs union. It could remain in both, if London agreed to pay into the EU budget and accept the principle of free movement of labor.

The stark division within the party was illustrated Tuesday when a 2010 video surfaced of Conservative lawmaker Steve Baker speaking to a Libertarian Alliance gathering. Baker, a junior minister and a member of Davis’s Brexit negotiating team, branded the European Union as an “obstacle” to world peace and “incompatible” with a free society. He argued it should be “wholly torn down.”

That is not the position of most Conservative lawmakers, but reflective of a hard-core minority who are propping up May, fearful that if she goes Hammond would probably be the most likely to replace her.

Moderate backbench Conservative lawmakers have been reaching out to opposite numbers in the Labour and Liberal Democrat ranks to try to plot a parliamentary way forward to block a so-called hard Brexit and to fashion one that would allow Britain to retain membership of the Single Market and Customs Union. They are not being helped by Labour’s hard-left leader Jeremy Corbyn, who is presiding over a party almost as divided as the Conservatives over Brexit.

Labour’s position isn’t clear, it campaigned last month as a Brexit party that wants to withdraw Britain from the Single Market, doing so because it feared desertion by working-class voters angry over the large number of immigrants working in the country. Corbyn has talked since about wanting a jobs-focused Brexit, but has punished 49 Labour lawmakers who ignored him last week and supported a rebel amendment calling for Britain to stay in the single market and customs union.

European officials say with the incoherence underlining British politics they are becoming increasingly fearful that Brexit negotiations will collapse, leaving Britain exiting Europe with no trade deal.

They aren’t the only ones worried. This week the director of the Leave campaign during last year’s referendum, expressed grave doubts about Brexit. In a Twitter exchange Dominic Cummings said he feared a debacle in the EU negotiations and admitted the referendum had been a “dumb idea.” Leaving the European Union could be an error, he said.
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