In upstate New York, John Lundemo is making a living by making high end swords. He carves each sword with a distinctive style of his own, a style he developed over the years. Inspiration for his creativity comes from different places. And as Faiza Elmasry tells us, that’s what makes him a sword master. VOA’s Faith Lapidus narrates.
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Month: April 2017
Arts Program in Poor Performing Schools Boost Learning
President Trump’s proposed cuts to the federal budget for the arts is creating concern that it may impact a program started by former first lady Michelle Obama that is showing signs of success. Turnaround Arts gets some funding from federal tax dollars, and it helps some of the nation’s lowest performing schools improve learning in all educational subjects. VOA’s Elizabeth Lee reports from Los Angeles.
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Pope Urges Powerful to Act Humbly in Surprise TED Talk Appearance
Pope Francis made a surprise appearance at a TED talk conference on Tuesday, urging powerful leaders “to act humbly” and said he hoped technological innovation would not leave people behind.
The 18-minute video was filmed in Vatican City and broadcast to the audience at the annual TED 2017 conference in Vancouver.
“The more powerful you are, the more your actions will have an impact on people, the more responsible you are to act humbly,” said the pontiff, while seated at a desk.
“If you don’t, your power will ruin you, and you will ruin the other.”
WATCH: Pope delivers TED Talk
The comments echoed Francis’ frequent themes to not ignore the plight of immigrants, the poor and other vulnerable people. Speaking in Italian with subtitles, Francis urged solidarity to overcome a “culture of waste” that had affected not only food but people cast aside by economic systems that rely increasingly on automation.
“How wonderful would it be if the growth of scientific and technological innovation would come along with more equality and social inclusion,” he said.
TED Talk lectures have grown in popularity, having been viewed cumulatively over 4.6 billion times since going online in 2006 (www.ted.com).
Other speakers slated to appear at the annual conference this week include tennis superstar Serena Williams and entrepreneur Elon Musk.
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Bison Births Are First in Canadian National Park Area in 140 Years
Bison calves have been born in the area that makes up Alberta’s Banff National Park for the first time in 140 years, Parks Canada officials said Tuesday, marking a milestone in attempts to reintroduce a wild herd to the area.
Conservation officers said three calves had been born since Saturday in the remote Panther Valley on the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains and that seven more were expected.
Western Alberta is dealing with unseasonably cold spring weather, but Bill Hunt, resource conservation manager for Banff National Park, said the calves were well-equipped to deal with harsh conditions.
“Last night, we had 2 to 3 feet (60 to 90 centimeters) of snow, but fortunately bison are very well-adapted, so these little calves drop out, get their legs straightaway, start nursing and do fine,” Hunt said.
Parks Canada released a 16-strong herd of plains bison, including 10 pregnant females, in the country’s oldest national park in February.
They are keeping them under observation until summer 2018, when the animals will be released into the full 460-square-mile (1,189-square-kilometer) reintroduction zone after the females calve again next spring.
Bison herds of up to 30 million animals once migrated freely across North America. The shaggy, hump-shouldered animals, also widely known as buffalo, were nearly hunted to extinction in the late 19th century. Rangers estimate that bison have not grazed in Banff National Park since before it was established in 1885.
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Ella Fitzgerald’s 100th Birthday Marked with Grammy Exhibit
The Grammy Museum is putting rare Ella Fitzgerald memorabilia on display for what would have been the singing legend’s 100th birthday.
The museum’s “Ella at 100: Celebrating the Artistry of Ella Fitzgerald” exhibition includes the first Grammy Award that Fitzgerald won — the first awarded to an African-American woman — as well as some of her gowns, sheet music and personal telegrams.
Fitzgerald died in 1996 at 79 from complications with diabetes and left few possessions beyond personal notes, but the exhibit puts a focus on what made Fitzgerald a star — her voice.
Her voice is the key
Grammy Museum curator Nwaka Onwusa says she wants visitors to be captivated by her singing, so the exhibit includes video and audio of her early performances with jazz greats Count Basie or Duke Ellington.
The exhibit is one of several celebrations of Fitzgerald’s birthday on Tuesday. New York City declared it Ella Fitzgerald Day and the Smithsonian has also opened a special exhibit, while Starbucks stores in the United States played her music.
“Ella Fitzgerald’s is probably the single most important voice in American history,” said recording artist Miles Mosley. “If you’re going to start with any song before 1970, her version is the one you start from. That’s the ground floor. That is the most representative version of what the composer themselves wished their songs would sound like.”
Performed in many styles
Over the course of her career, she sang swing, bebop, pop, jazz. Among her best-known works are a 1938 novelty smash, “A-Tisket, A-Tasket,” which she co-wrote, and a series of eight album sets, each dedicated to an American songwriter or songwriting team. In addition to being best sellers, those albums helped establish the long-play record as a platform for deeper, more serious musical exploration.
Twenty-plus years after Fitzgerald’s death, the rave reviews keep pouring in.
Celebration of Fitzgerald’s 100th actually began March 31, as Dianne Reeves held a Fitzgerald tribute concert at the Library of Congress, which serves as home to Fitzgerald’s personal library. A day later, Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, which has long hosted a Fitzgerald exhibit, opened a new display, “First Lady of Song: Ella Fitzgerald at 100,” kicking off Jazz Appreciation Month.
Onwusa said Fitzgerald’s exhibit was not an easy display to put together, noting that the relatively new Grammy Museum, which opened in 2008, could not compete with the long-established Smithsonian and Library of Congress, which have long been collecting Fitzgerald memorabilia.
Gowns are a key attraction
But the Los Angeles-based Ella Fitzgerald Charitable Foundation and Fitzgerald estate came through with enough items to make for an attraction, including gowns Fitzgerald wore in performance, rare photographs, sheet music, newspaper articles, concert programs. Securing performance footage proved more challenging, but was critical for Onwusa.
“When you come to Ella at 100, immediately we want visitors to be captivated by her voice,” she explained. “That’s what draws you to Ella.”
To that end, there are viewing and listening stations, where exhibit visitors can watch and hear Fitzgerald performing in various points in her career. She was an active professional performer for some 65 years, going in semi-retirement in 1994, after having both of her legs amputated below the knee due to the effects of the diabetes.
‘100 Songs for a Centennial’
For those just being introduced to Fitzgerald, Verve/UMe has just released a career-spanning primer, the four-CD set “100 Songs for a Centennial.” For hardcore fans, there’s the lavish six-album vinyl limited-edition “Ella Fitzgerald Sings The George and Ira Gershwin Song Books,” which is newly packaged with lithographs, a book and a bonus track. Numerous other releases and events are planned throughout the year.
But once the celebration ends, it’s fairly clear that the Fitzgerald legacy will continue.
Grammy Museum executive director Scott Goldman singled out a relative newcomer such as Andra Day as a perfect example. “(Here’s) a young African-American artist who is blurring the lines between jazz and soul and R&B.” he noted. “If you listen to Andra Day, you’ll hear a little Ella Fitzgerald. And I think many artists carry that. I think that’s what makes Ella Fitzgerald so special. She lives.”
The exhibit runs through Sept. 10.
your ads here!Canada Increasingly Draws Trump’s Ire
President Donald Trump and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross on Tuesday said they did not fear a trade war with Canada after American punitive action on lumber and milk.
“They have a tremendous surplus with the United States,” Trump said, adding “people don’t realize Canada’s been very rough on the United States. … They’ve outsmarted our politicians for many years.”
Trump added that he wanted “a very big tax” on Canadian lumber and timber.
He made the comments at a meeting with American farmers where he signed an executive order aimed at helping agriculture and rural areas.
Trump also talked to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau Tuesday. Trudeau “refuted the baseless allegations by the U.S. Department of Commerce and the decision to impose unfair duties,” according to a summary of the call released by Trudeau’s office.
“The prime minister stressed that the government of Canada will vigorously defend the interests of the Canadian softwood industry, as we have successfully done in all past lumber disputes with the U.S.,” the statement said.
The White House later issued its own brief, three-sentence readout of the call, which it called “very amicable.”
The Canadian dollar fell to a 14-month low against the greenback after the United States imposed preliminary tariffs averaging 20 percent — more than $1 billion of countervailing duties — on imported Canadian softwood.
Earlier in the day, Trump vowed moves to protect the American dairy industry.
On Tuesday morning, he tweeted: “Canada has made business for our dairy farmers in Wisconsin and other border states very difficult. We will not stand for this. Watch!”
Against NAFTA
Trump, since his time campaigning for the presidency, has voiced his strong displeasure with the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), but until now he has vented most of his ire southward, toward Mexico.
Ross, speaking to reporters on the White House podium, would not explicitly characterize the actions on lumber and dairy as the opening shots on renegotiating NAFTA, but he did say: “Everything relates to everything else when you’re trying to negotiate.”
He described Canada as “generally a good neighbor,” asserting that its allegedly unfair trade practices regarding lumber and dairy were not very neighborly.
Asked on Tuesday in Kitchener, Ontario, about the U.S. trade actions and the fate of NAFTA, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau replied, “Standing up for Canada is my job, whether it’s softwood or software.”
Trudeau added, “Any two countries are going to have issues that will be irritants to the relationship and, quite frankly, having a good, constructive, working relationship allows us to work through those irritants.”
Some other Canadians were less diplomatic in their reactions.
“In Canada, the perception is that we’re always very nice,” said Unifor President Jerry Dias, representing forestry workers across the country. “But we can’t get trampled by this guy [Trump].”
‘Ignore, do not engage’
The majority of Canadians, including the prime minister and his colleagues, “understand that President Trump is prone to making ill-informed, off-the-cuff and arbitrary comments about a host of domestic and foreign policy issues,” Donald Abelson, the chairman of the political science department at the University of Western Ontario in London, told VOA.
“Canada will likely respond to Trump’s Tuesday tweet in a manner similar to how a competent parent responds to a child’s temper tantrum — ignore, do not engage,” added Abelson, who is also director of the school’s Canada-U.S. Institute.
Other Canadians displayed wry humor — a traditional reaction to irritations from south of the border (at least since the last U.S. invasion during the War of 1812), considering the asymmetry of power.
The president’s messages prompted immediate puns on Canadian social media, with tweets referencing “sacred cows” and calling the American trade action on dairy “udderly stupid” and “cheesy,” Sparkle Hayter, veteran Canadian journalist and author, told VOA.
The dairy dispute goes back decades. Currently, there is an overproduction of milk, according to dairy farmers on both sides of the border.
The U.S.-Canada lumber squabble is rooted in a couple of centuries of history.
In response to the proposed tariff on softwood lumber, “Canada to strike back by charging duties on exported Cdn actors,” tweeted the account of 22 Minutes, a satirical news program on national public broadcaster CBC.
Cows are No. 1
The Twitter account also noted the U.S. president “tweeted about Canadian dairy industry first thing this morning, so on his list of priorities: 1. Canadian Cows. 2. North Korea.”
Trump’s attention on Canada comes amid indications he is pivoting away — at least temporarily — from the southern border and his quest to quickly fund his border wall with Mexico.
“We have plenty of time” to complete the wall during his first term, Trump assured reporters Tuesday afternoon.
The presidential desire for border protection might find a better reception to the north, considering the comments from some Canadians.
“Some [in Canada] would like to separate from the U.S., like literally,” by digging a two-mile moat at the border “and filling it with beavers and mosquitoes,” quipped Hayter from her home province of Alberta.
But many Canadians see themselves confronting a cross-border creature bigger than a beaver.
“Sleeping with an elephant” is how the late Pierre Trudeau, the current Canadian prime minister’s father, once characterized relations with the United States, “affected by every twitch and grunt.”
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Trump to Unveil Tax Plan Wednesday
Anticipation of U.S. President Donald Trump’s plans for big corporate and individual tax cuts spurred Wall Street to record highs Tuesday, and sent Asian markets soaring overnight.
Trump is planning to unveil his tax plans Wednesday, with aides saying he will ask Congress to slash the current 35 percent rate down to 15 percent, a pledge he first made during last year’s presidential election campaign.
White House spokesman Sean Spicer said the U.S. has been “uncompetitive” against other countries in attracting new businesses, “largely because of our rates.”
U.S. lawmakers have for years vowed to adopt broad tax reforms, but the efforts have foundered. Congress has been unable to reconcile competing demands to eliminate tax breaks for some corporate and individual interests and raise taxes on others.
Trump’s tax plans are likely to face months of hearings and debate in Congress, where his Republican colleagues have their own ideas on how the tax code ought to be reshaped. Some lawmakers have expressed concerns that Trump’s call for a big corporate tax cut would balloon the nearly $20 trillion in long-term debt the U.S. has accumulated if there are not corresponding measures to raise more revenue.
U.S. Treasury chief Steven Mnuchin said Monday, “The tax reform will pay for itself with economic growth” that would boost tax revenues. Mnuchin called for tax simplification as well, saying U.S. reforms ideally would let taxpayers file their annual tax returns on a “large postcard.”
The argument that tax cuts pay for themselves has little support among economists.
The U.S. economy, the world’s largest, grew at a tepid 1.6 percent pace last year, a figure Trump is hoping to boost to 3 percent a year, which the United States has not reached since 2005.
Tax experts say the 35 percent U.S. corporate tax rate is the highest among the world’s 35 industrialized nations, although U.S. corporations rarely pay that much because they are permitted to deduct their business expenses from their revenues before. A number of profitable companies pay no U.S. income taxes.
When the 35 percent rate is added to the average state corporate tax rate, the figure reaches 38.9 percent, which ranks third in the world among 188 countries surveyed by the Washington-based Tax Foundation. The U.S. figure trails only that of the United Arab Emirates at 55 percent and the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico at 39 percent.
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Wikipedia Founder Launches Site to Fight Fake News
The founder of Wikipedia is starting a website he says will fight so-called fake news.
Jimmy Wales says his Wikitribune site will bring journalists and volunteer fact checkers together to stop the spread of false news stories.
“We want to make sure that you read fact-based articles that have a real impact in both local and global events,” according to the group’s website.
The volunteer fact checkers’ role will be similar to how editors work on Wikipedia. Any changes will be reviewed by other fact checkers.
The site will also carry stories by professional journalists.
Unlike most news sites, Wikitribune says it will post full transcripts of interviews “to the maximum extent possible.”
“It takes professional, standards-based journalism, and incorporates the radical idea from the world of wiki that a community of volunteers can and will reliably protect the integrity of information,” said Wales, according to CNN.
Money to fund the site will come from contributions as opposed to advertisements or subscriptions.
“[Fake news] is literally designed to show us what we want to see, to confirm our biases, and to keep us clicking at all cost,” Wales said. “It fundamentally breaks the news.”
Some experts as skeptical, saying the site may only appeal to journalists and people who read a lot of news.
“I wonder whether it will be able to scale up to make a significant impact on the information sphere, especially on social networks such as Facebook where the main problems of fake news and misinformation occur,” saidCharlie Beckett, a professor at the London School of Economics, in an interview with CNN.
Wales’ Wikipedia has long battled criticism that it contains misleading or false information.
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Jobs, Homes at Stake in US-Canada Trade Squabble
Canadian officials say a new tariff imposed by the Trump administration will raise the cost of new homes in the United States by $1,000 each, and shut 150,000 Americans out of home ownership. Washington’s decision also puts “thousands” of U.S. homebuilding jobs at risk, according to Canada’s ministers of natural resources and foreign affairs.
The comments follow preliminary action by the U.S. Commerce Department to impose a 20 percent tariff on $5.77 billion worth of soft wood imports from Canada to the United States. The wood is a key ingredient of family homes.
U.S. officials allege that Canada unfairly subsidizes exported wood. Subsidies could make the product cheaper, making it difficult for U.S. companies to compete on price.
Canada “strongly disagrees” with the decision to impose this “unfair and punitive” tax, says Canada’s resources minister, Jim Carr. Canada’s foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, says Canada will take the issue to court, where the United States has lost similar cases in the past.
U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross says this has been “a bad week” in U.S.-Canadian trade relations, noting an additional dispute over Canadian milk exports.
While the dispute over wood tariffs might raise the cost of new homes in the United States, a report published Tuesday by the Census Bureau shows sales of newly-constructed homes jumped upward by 5.8 percent last month. If sales continue at that pace for a year, 621,000 homes would change hands. Prices also rose.
A separate report from a business group called the Conference Board showed consumer confidence declined in April. Economists at Wells Fargo say that despite the drop, consumer confidence remains near a 12-year high. Experts watch consumer confidence for clues about consumer spending, which drives 70 percent of U.S. economic activity.
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Last Male Northern White Rhino Seeks Mate on Tinder
Dating app Tinder is hit or miss for humans, but wildlife conservationists hope it might lead to love for the world’s last male northern white rhino.
The move is seen as a last-ditch effort to keep the species alive.
“I don’t mean to be too forward, but the fate of the species literally depends on me,” the rhino’s profile says. “I perform well under pressure.”
Sudan is 43 years old, weighs nearly 2,270 kilograms and lives in Kenya. And while he has two female companions, they are unable to mate due to age and other limitations.
The campaign to find love for Sudan, called Most Eligible Bachelor by the Kenyan Ol Pejeta Conservancy, which came up with the idea.
While it’s unclear if any potential mates can swipe right on Sudan’s profile, the group hopes the move will raise $9 million for research into breeding methods such as in vitro fertilization.
“We partnered with Ol Pejeta conservancy to give the most eligible bachelor in the world a chance to meet his match,” said Matt David, the head of communications and marketing at Tinder in an interview with the Associated Press. “We are optimistic given Sudan’s profile (it) will be seen on Tinder in 190 countries and over 40 languages.”
Sudan and his two female friends — 17-year-old Najin and 27-year-old Fatu — live at the conservancy protected by 24-hour security.
“The plight that currently faces the northern white rhinos is a signal to the impact that humankind is having on many thousands of other species across the planet,” Richard Vigne, the conservancy’s chief executive officer, told AP. “Ultimately, the aim will be to reintroduce a viable population of northern white rhino back into the wild, which is where their true value will be realized.”
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LVMH to Consolidate Hold on Dior in Multibillion-euro Deal
The magnate behind LVMH is to incorporate Christian Dior into his luxury goods empire in a multibillion-dollar deal.
It’s the latest business coup for businessman Bernard Arnault, who has expanded his LVMH empire to include dozens of leading luxury brands — from high-end champagne and whiskies, to exclusive Vuitton handbags, Kenzo and Givenchy perfumes and Bulgari and TAG Heuer watches. Dior Couture, launched in 1946 and seen as the pinnacle of Paris style, would be a starring jewel in his empire.
Shares in Christian Dior and LVMH Moet Hennessy — Louis Vuitton rose after Tuesday’s long-awaited deal. The public offers values Dior at 260 euros per share. Shares in Dior spiked 12 percent to 253.95 euros by early afternoon trading Tuesday, while LVMH shares were up 4.3 percent at 223.95 euros.
According to the announcement, LVMH, which already owned Christian Dior cosmetics and perfumes, would buy Christian Dior Couture, its fashion business, for 6.5 billion euros ($7.1 billion). In addition, the Arnault Family Group is making a public offer for the Christian Dior shares it doesn’t currently hold.
The hope is that combining Dior’s entities under one roof and simplifying internal activities, savings will be generated.
The statement says the boards of both companies approved the transactions on Monday. The proposed deal will still need regulatory approval and consultations with workers. The companies also hope to issue the public offer in June, and finalize the purchase of Dior Couture in the second half of this year.
The companies laid out their hope that Dior’s fashion revenues and profit, which have risen in recent years, will be a “source of growth” for LVMH, particularly with development in the U.S., China and Japan.
your ads here!Google Targets ‘Fake News,’ Offensive Search Suggestions
Google has sprinkled some new ingredients into its search engine in an effort to prevent bogus information and offensive suggestions from souring its results.
The changes have been in the works for four months, but Google hadn’t publicly discussed most of them until now. The announcement in a blog post Tuesday reflects Google’s confidence in a new screening system designed to reduce the chances that its influential search engine will highlight untrue stories about people and events, a phenomenon commonly referred to as “fake news.”
“It’s not a problem that is going to go all the way to zero, but we now think we can stay a step ahead of things,” said Ben Gomes, Google’s vice president of engineering for search.
Correcting autocomplete
Besides taking steps to block fake news from appearing in its search results, Google also has reprogrammed a popular feature that automatically tries to predict what a person is looking for as a search request as being typed. The tool, called “autocomplete,” has been overhauled to omit derogatory suggestions, such as “are women evil,” or recommendations that promote violence.
Google also adding a feedback option that will enable users to complain about objectionable autocomplete suggestions so a human can review the wording.
Facebook, where fake news stories and other hoaxes have widely circulated on its social network, also has been trying to stem the tide of misleading information by working with The Associated Press and other news organizations to review suspect stories and set the record straight when warranted. Facebook also has provided its nearly 2 billion users ways to identify posts believed to contain false information, something that Google is now allowing users of its search engine to do for some of the news snippets featured in its results.
Why Google cares
Google began attacking fake news in late December after several embarrassing examples of misleading information appeared near the top of its search engine. Among other things, Google’s search engine pointed to a website that incorrectly reported then President-elect Donald Trump had won the popular vote in the U.S. election , that President Barack Obama was planning a coup and that the Holocaust never occurred during World War II.
Only about 0.25 percent of Google’s search results were being polluted with falsehoods, Gomes said. But that was still enough to threaten the integrity of a search engine that processes billions of search requests per day largely because it is widely regarded as the internet’s most authoritative source of information.
“They have a lot riding on this, reputation wise,” said Lucy Dalglish, who has been tracking the flow of false information as dean of the University of Maryland’s journalism department. “If your whole business model is based turning up the best search results, but those results turn up stuff that is total crap, where does that get you?”
To address the problem, Google began revising the closely guarded algorithms that generate its search with the help of 10,000 people who rate the quality and reliability of the recommendations during tests. Google also rewrote its 140-page book of rating guidelines that help the quality-control evaluators make their assessments.
Google as referee
Fighting fake news can be tricky because in some cases what is viewed as being blatantly misleading by one person might be interpreted as being mostly true by another. If Google, Facebook or other companies trying to block false information err in their judgment calls, they risk being accused of censorship or playing favorites.
But doing nothing to combat fake news would probably have caused even bigger headaches.
If too much misleading information appears in Google’s search results, the damage could go beyond harm to its reputation for reliability. It could also spook risk-averse advertisers, who don’t want their brands tied to content that can’t be trusted, said Larry Chiagouris, a marketing professor at Pace University in New York.
“Fake news is careening out of control in some people’s eyes, so advertisers are getting very skittish about it,” Chiagouris said. “Anything Google can do to show it is trying to put a lid on it and prevent it from getting out of hand, it will be seen as a good thing.”
Although it also sells ads on its other services and independently owned websites, Google still makes most of its money from the marketing links posted alongside its search results. Google says its new approach isn’t meant to placate advertisers.
your ads here!US Students Score Poorly on National Arts and Music Exam
When it comes to music and visual arts, American teenagers could use some help.
The National Center for Education Statistics reported Tuesday that in 2016, American eighth graders scored an average 147 in music and 149 in visual arts on a scale of 300. Some 8,800 eighth graders from public and private schools across the country took part in the test, which was part of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, often called the Nation’s Report Card.
Acting Commissioner Peggy Carr said the test shows students have a lot to learn in art and music and that no progress has been made since the same test was administered in 2008.
“When I saw the results, clearly there is room for improvement, because clearly there is a lot of content that students weren’t able to interact with correctly,” Carr told The Associated Press.
When asked to listen to George Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue,” only about half of the students were able to identify that the opening solo is played on a clarinet. Students who scored 182 were able to label all the eight notes in C major, students who got 150 were able to label one note.
While most students could point to one or two structural differences between two mother-and-child portraits, they usually struggled to explain the technical approach and meaning in an artist’s self-portrait.
“The average student does not know a lot of the content that was asked of them on this assessment,” said Carr. “It was a difficult assessment, a challenging assessment.”
On the bright side, the achievement gap has narrowed between white and Hispanic students from a difference of 32 to 23 points in an average score in music and from 26 to 19 points in arts since the previous test. Girls continued to outperform boys.
The black-white achievement gap, however, remained unchanged. While white students scored an average of 158, black students got 129 on the music test and the margin of difference was similar on the arts portion of the exam — 158 for white students and 128 for black students,
“Every student should have access to arts education to develop the creativity and problem-solving skills that lead to higher success both in and out of school,” said Ayanna Hudson, director of arts education at the National Endowment for the Arts. “Arts education can be especially valuable for our nations’ underserved students, leading to better grades, higher graduation rates and increased college enrollment.”
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Plastic Eating Worm Could Help Ease Pollution
A type of worm could help solve the growing problem of plastic pollution.
The common wax worm, or Galleria mellonella, researchers say, can eat plastic and could help reduce the waste caused by the one trillion polyethylene plastic bags used around the world annually.
“We have found that the larva of a common insect, Galleria mellonella, is able to biodegrade one of the toughest, most resilient, and most used plastics: polyethylene,” says Federica Bertocchini of the Institute of Biomedicine and Biotechnology of Cantabria in Spain.
The discovery about the caterpillar’s hunger for plastic was accidental, said Bertocchini, adding that the plastic bags containing the wax worms “became riddled with holes.”
She said the worms can “do damage to a plastic bag in less than an hour.” And after 12 hours, researchers saw “an obvious reduction in plastic mass.
They also found that the worms transformed polyethylene into ethylene glycol, an organic compound used in making polyester fibers as well as antifreeze. It is unclear if the worms produce enough to be commercially viable.
Plastic is not the natural food of the wax worm, but researchers say that since they lay their eggs in beehives, the hatchlings feed on beeswax.
“Wax is a polymer, a sort of ‘natural plastic,’ and has a chemical structure not dissimilar to polyethylene,” Bertocchini says.
Researchers say they still need to better understand how wax is digested, but that finding out could lead to a biotechnological solution to plastic waste.
“We are planning to implement this finding into a viable way to get rid of plastic waste, working towards a solution to save our oceans, rivers, and all the environment from the unavoidable consequences of plastic accumulation,” Bertocchini says. “However,” she adds, “we should not feel justified to dump polyethylene deliberately in our environment just because we now know how to biodegrade it.”
The study was published in the journal Current Biology.
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Winner of ‘Green Nobel’ says India Plundering not Protecting Tribal Lands
India is plundering the land of its indigenous people to profit from mining, with little regard of the devastation caused to poor tribal communities, said an Indian land rights activist who won the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize on Monday.
Prafulla Samantara, 66, from India’s eastern state of Odisha is one of six winners of the annual prize — often known as the “Green Nobel” — which honors grassroots activists for efforts to protect the environment, often at their own risk.
Samantara, recognized by the Goldman jury for winning a 12-year legal battle to stop a multi-national firm mining bauxite on tribal lands, said he was honored by the award but voiced concern at the continued mining threats faced by India’s tribes.
“The state has a history of not honoring legal protections of indigenous people in the constitution. Corporate influence and the promise of profits continues to tempt the government to disregard indigenous people’s rights,” Samantara told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in an interview.
“The mining-based industry has become priority for the government and the global market, but it does not support the common people. They are often led to believe that mining is for their own benefit, but then they are displaced by destructive development.”
India’s tribes make up almost 10 percent of its 1.3 billion population. Yet most live on the margins of society — inhabiting remote villages and eking out a living from farming, cattle rearing and collecting and selling forest produce.
Many live in mineral-rich regions such as Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand, and risk being chased off their ancestral land due to a rising number of mining projects.
While their land is protected under a decade-old law known as the Forest Rights Act, few know their rights — leaving them open to exploitation.
Fast-track
Since Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government swept to power almost three years ago, it has taken a pro-business approach by fast-tracking environmental clearances for mining firms in a bid to boost investment, jobs and growth.
The son of a village farmer who went on to college to study economics and then law, Samantara led a battle against the London-headquartered Vedanta Resources which wanted to mine bauxite from a mountain considered sacred by indigenous people in Odisha.
He was kidnapped, assaulted and attacked for his activism against, but in the end, a vote of villagers — which had been ordered by the Supreme Court — rejected the mine.
Samantara — described by the Goldman jury as an “iconic leader” — slammed the government for blocking the foreign funds of thousands of charities, including green groups.
“It is deplorable. Many are fighting legally and are being targeted by the government,” he said.
Despite increasing threats to the environment and to those fighting to protect it, Samantara said he remained optimistic.
“I feel there is a growing threat to the very existence of Mother Earth if man-made destruction of nature is not stopped. But I see a ray of light,” he said.
“Though my contributions may be a drop in the ocean, thousands like me in the world can bring a radical change in thinking and spur action, encouraging a shift from consumption to preservation and conservation for future generations.”
The Goldman Environmental Prize was established in 1989 by San Francisco philanthropists Richard and Rhoda Goldman and provides $175,000 cash award to each individual.
Other winners were Congolese Park Ranger Rodrigue Katembo, Guatemalan land rights activist Rodrigo Tot, Australian family farmer Wendy Bowman, Slovenian organic farmer Uros Macerl and a Los Angeles community organizer by the name of Mark Lopez.
your ads here!Fiat Chrysler, Google Begin Offering Rides in Self-driving Cars
Fiat Chrysler and Google for the first time will offer rides to the public in the self-driving automobiles they are building under an expanding partnership.
The companies announced in the spring of last year that they would build 100 self-driving Chrysler Pacifica hybrids minivans. Those vehicles have been tested in Arizona, California and Michigan.
Waymo, Google’s self-driving care project, said Tuesday that it will allow hundreds of people in Phoenix to take rides in the vehicles so that it can get feedback on the experience. People can apply on Waymo’s website.
The company also said that it’s expanding its fleet to 500 Pacifica hybrids.
Waymo – created by Google in 2009 – has given rides to the public before in its hometown of Mountain View, California. In 2015, it let a blind man ride around Austin, Texas, in one of its completely self-driving pods. The Phoenix program will be much larger in scale, and it will be the first to use the Pacifica minivans.
Others in the race to develop self-driving vehicles have been putting people in their cars since last fall. Uber has had self-driving Volvos on the road in Pittsburgh for some time. Boston startup nuTonomy is giving taxi rides to passengers in Singapore and Boston. In all cases, there is a backup driver behind the wheel.
Waymo said it wants to learn where people want to go in a self-driving vehicle, how they communicate with it and what kinds of information and controls they want.
Fiat Chrysler builds the Pacifica minivan in Windsor, Canada, just across the border from Detroit. It adds Waymo’s self-driving software and hardware, including sensors and cameras, at a facility in Michigan. Fiat Chrysler’s U.S. headquarters is in Auburn Hills, Michigan.
“This collaboration is helping both companies learn how to bring self-driving cars to market, and realize the safety and mobility benefits of this technology,” said Waymo chief John Krafcik in a company release.
Our early riders will play an important role in shaping the way we bring self-driving technology into the world – through personal cars, public transportation, ride-hailing, logistics and more. Self-driving cars have the potential to reshape each and every one of these areas, transforming our lives and our cities by making them safer, more convenient and more accessible.
Waymo has made clear that it intends to form partnerships with automakers and not build its own self-driving cars. It’s also in talks with Honda Motor Co. about a potential collaboration.
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Pope Pays to Rent Beach Space for Disabled Youths
The papal almsgiver has made a donation, in the name of Pope Francis, to cover the annual rent for a beach area near Rome used by disabled youths.
The Madonnina, an association that runs the beach establishment near Rome without barriers for the disabled, in a statement Tuesday announced the donation for the area just outside the town of Fiumicino. No money figure was cited.
Past charity initiatives by Pope Francis have included day-trips to the beach for homeless people.
your ads here!Egypt’s Tourism Officials Insist Popular Sites Are Safe
Egypt’s tourism levels are still around a third of what they once were and, despite security concerns, Egypt’s tourism minister on Monday insisted the country’s popular Red Sea resorts and Ancient Egyptian sites are a safe choice for travelers.
“We are saying that the tourism sector is safe, the airports are secure, the hotels are secure,” Mohamed Yehia Rashed said, adding that there have not been security breaches at tourist sites.
He said Germany represents the largest visitor market, particularly to Red Sea diving spots around Hurghada and Sharm el-Sheikh, followed by travelers from Saudi Arabia.
While he declined to give tourism figures for the first quarter of 2017, the ministry says that tourism from Arab countries represented around 36 percent of total traffic to Egypt last year. More than half-a-million tourists from Saudi Arabia visited Egypt in 2016, followed by Jordan with 180,000 visitors.
Before Egypt’s 2011 uprising, Italy, the UK and Russia were Egypt’s top markets, in addition to Germany. The uprising, however, decimated Egypt’s multibillion dollar tourism industry, which is a vital pillar of the country’s economy and employs millions of people.
The year before the upheaval, nearly 15 million tourists visited Egypt. Last year, the figure was 5.3 million tourists, according to Chairman of Egypt’s Tourism Authority Hicham al-Demairi.
Both officials spoke to The Associated Press at the Arabian Travel Market convention in Dubai, where Egypt had a large booth advertising its many destinations, hotels and attractions.
Russia, however, continues to ban all flights to Egypt and Egypt’s national carrier is still barred from flying to Russia following the downing of a Russian passenger jetliner in the Sinai Peninsula in 2015 that killed all 224 aboard. A Sinai-based Islamic Stage group affiliate claimed it was behind the incident and Russia says an explosive device was the cause, though the investigation has not yet formally concluded.
Egypt’s currency has also plunged from around 5 pounds to the dollar before the uprising to 18 pounds to the dollar. This, however, has made travel to Egypt more affordable for many tourists, al-Demairi said.
He said Egypt is aiming to draw between 7 and 10 million tourists in 2017. Rather than rely on traditional Western European markets, which comprise the bulk of all tourists to Egypt, al-Demairi said the country is working on new strategies that target Latin American, Eastern European and Asian travelers.
“We don’t want to only depend on coastal and cultural tourism,” he said, referring to tourists who visit Egypt’s pristine beaches and Ancient Egyptian sites in Cairo, Luxor and Aswan.
your ads here!Artifacts Preserve Holocaust Stories for Future Generations
The small wicker doll chair was a modest toy, but it meant the world to Louise Lawrence-Israels. A gift for her second birthday, it was the only toy she possessed during the approximately three years she spent hiding from the Nazis in Amsterdam, just five blocks from the house where Anne Frank wrote in her diary.
The chair is one of thousands of artifacts housed in the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum’s new conservation and research center, which opened Monday on the annual memorial day for the 6 million Jews killed by Nazi Germany during World War II.
“It was a big thing for me to actually give the chair, because it was a significant thing,” said Lawrence-Israels, 75, one of about two dozen Holocaust survivors who attended the center’s opening. “A lot of people can look at it and see how it was for a little child in hiding.”
The David and Fela Shapell Family Collections, Conservation and Research Center, located in the suburbs of the nation’s capital, is a state-of-the-art facility with 103,000 square feet (9,570 sq. meters) for documents and artifacts, with room for expansion.
The center houses thousands of items in eight climate-controlled vaults in a building designed to withstand tornadoes and hurricanes. Its collection includes everyday objects, from children’s toys and clothes to sewing machines used in concentration camps.
Travis Roxlau, director of collections services, said center officials have spent 25 years gathering the items.
“We collect stories, and all of the objects that go along with those stories, because as the surviving generation passes on, these are going to be the objects that are left to help us tell the history of the Holocaust,” Roxlau said.
Survivors say the center’s holdings are critical to preserving the reality of the Holocaust.
“I think the most important thing is to make sure that the memory of the Holocaust isn’t forgotten,” said Alfred Munzer, 75, who donated a silver teething ring that went with him at the age of nine months when he was put into hiding with a Dutch-Indonesian family in the Netherlands in 1942. He also donated two small photographs of him that his mother kept hidden while she was confined in concentration camps.
Munzer, of Washington, D.C., said the center and its artifacts will serve “as a lesson to the world as to where hate can lead to.”
Lawrence-Israels, of Bethesda, Maryland, noted that she and other Holocaust survivors are “not going to be here forever, and once we’re not here anymore the museum and this institution will speak for us.”
“This is the only evidence that we leave behind, and with the climate today it’s important that people see that this was real,” Lawrence-Israels said.
Scholars and researchers will have access to materials in the facility. A reading room is scheduled to open in the next year. The museum also is in the process of making documents and images available online.
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Chinese Takeover Bid for US-based MoneyGram Scrutinized
The financial industry is closely watching Alibaba affiliate Ant Financial’s attempt to acquire Dallas-based MoneyGram International, the world’s second biggest money transfer company after Western Union. Ant is offering $1.2 billion, more than U.S.-based competitor Euronet Worldwide.
If successful, the deal would turn Ant Financial into a financial behemoth with access to MoneyGram’s vast network of 350,000 outlets of retail shops, post offices and banks across 200 countries. At present, Ant’s business is largely based on the Chinese yuan. The acquisition would also give it access to U.S. dollar funds and escrow accounts for managing the funds.
“If you look at MoneyGram, what they might be doing here (to Ant Financial) is bringing a unique extra key that has much to do with that escrow account surplus and be able to hold a lot of dollars,” Jacob Cooke, chief executive officer of Web Presence in China, told VOA. “That, of course, will give them access to a whole bunch more opportunities to Ant’s financial services.”
Bidding war
As Euronet entered the race, Ant Financial hiked its bid by 36 percent, leaving no one in doubt about its determination to acquire MoneyGram and take on Western Union, the world’s biggest money transfer company, on its own terms. But Euronet has so far refused to give up, saying it is reviewing the new situation.
Euronet is also battling the Ant’s bid at another level. It has gone public in saying the Chinese acquisition bid poses serious security risks as payment companies hold vast amounts of financial data of their customers.
Protectionist moves
For Ant Financial, the biggest challenge would be obtaining approval of the Committee for Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS). Some analysts see it as the first major test for Chinese investments in the face of protectionist moves by the Trump administration.
“Getting approval from CFIUS might be more difficult this year. Plus, Chinese acquisitions are more on the media radar than before,” Jeffrey Towson, professor of Investments at Peking University’s Guanghua School of Management, said. “And finally, there is also a competing bidder, Euronet, and they will probably push for a regulatory denial based on security concerns”.
Two members of the U.S. House of Representatives, Kevin Yoder and Eddie Bernice Johnson, have written to Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin questioning the deal.
“The proposal merits careful evaluation as it would provide Chinese access to the U.S. financial infrastructure, a move that would pose significant national security risks if completed,” they said.
Allaying concerns
Ant Financial has tried to allay security concerns, saying that MoneyGram’s data will be stored in “iron-clad U.S.-based servers.”
In an open letter to MoneyGram’s shareholders, Douglas Feagin said MoneyGram will “continue to be headquartered in Dallas and run by its current U.S.-based management team after the deal closes.” He also promised Ant will “continue to invest in MoneyGram’s systems and compliance programs.”
Alibaba Group chairman Jack Ma was among the first to visit Trump Towers after Donald Trump won the U.S. presidency. Trump recently met Chinese president Xi Jinping, and later said he does not regard China as a currency manipulator anymore. Some analysts see these developments as positives for Ant Financial.
“Though CFIUS has given thumbs down to quite a few recent attempted Chinese takeovers, there isn’t an obvious national security case here as to why they should stop the transaction,” said Peter Fuhrman, chairman of consultancy firm, China First Capital.
Alibaba magic again?
An important question is whether it will also enhance the capabilities of the online shopping giant, Alibaba, and in turn pose a new challenge to similar players like Ebay. Ant Financial has served as a platform for carrying out Alibaba’s financial transactions in the past, analysts said.
“Ant Financial was born out of the fact that Alibaba’s e-commerce platforms were holding huge sums of money in escrow while transactions were completed between buyers and sellers,” Cooke of Web Presence in China, said. “So the natural assumption is that Alibaba can utilize MoneyGram’s escrow accounts and add to its own strengths”.
Jacob Kirkegaard, a fellow at the Washington-based Peterson Institute of International Economics, said, “Alibaba is arguably the world’s most sophisticated internet finance company. If they see a potential for MoneyGram in their product portfolio, I have no doubt that they can execute the deal and ensure integration.”
When contacted, Ant Financial did not reply to VOA’s questions and referred VOA to past statements by the company. A public relations firm representing Ant said the company has no relationship with Alibaba and refused further comment.
But several analysts, and most recent media reports, describe Ant Financial as a financial affiliate of Alibaba.
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US Senator Calls for ‘True Reciprocity’ in US-China Trade and Diplomacy
U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan on Monday called on both the American and Chinese governments to exercise “true reciprocity” in relations, including trade and diplomacy.
The Republican senator from Alaska, in a speech concerning Chinese outbound investment, and in an interview with VOA afterward, said China has been aggressively buying companies in key sectors such as robotics, biotech, advanced machineries, software, entertainment and media “throughout America and Western Europe. But if you’re an American firm, or a firm from Germany, and you want to go to China and buy Chinese companies in those same sectors, you would be told ‘no;’ you would be prohibited.”
Making “true reciprocity” US policy
Sullivan’s proposed “true reciprocity” is rather simple and straightforward: “If Chinese companies want to invest in America’s biotech sector, then American companies should be able to invest in China’s biotech sector. It’s simple, it’s fair, it’s what China has said it wants to do but it doesn’t do, and we need to be much more serious about implementing it.”
Should China continue to ignore Washington’s calls for equal treatment and a level playing field, Sullivan says he is prepared to introduce legislation aiming at closing what he identifies as China’s “credibility gap,” and making sure that “true reciprocity” becomes official U.S. policy.
The Alaska Republican, who serves on both the Senate’s Commerce and Armed Services Committees, called on the U.S. government to reject “Middle Kingdom diplomatic practices” that fail to grant U.S. diplomats the same level of access Chinese diplomats receive in Washington.
“Middle kingdom” diplomatic practices
Quoting from a study done by the New York-based Asia Society, Sullivan said “for a number of years, the U.S. ambassador in Beijing was only getting deputy minister level access while we, of course, give higher access to Chinese ambassadors here in Washington.”He called the solution to such unequal diplomatic treatments “a no brainer.”
“If our ambassador in Beijing only gets deputy minister level access, then that’s what we should provide China’s ambassador in Washington, period. Middle Kingdom diplomatic practices should be firmly and aggressively rejected by the U.S. government everywhere,” Sullivan said.
He agreed that his proposed “true reciprocity” ought to also include issues such as granting journalists visas and access in both countries.
Growing domestic consensus
Sullivan said “there’s growing domestic consensus” in the United States that America’s strategic interests, including strategic economic interests, outweigh the market price of individual transactions, while acknowledging that each individual American businessman or woman naturally want the highest return for their individual product.
“The broader strategic interest of having a strong U.S. economy, and signaling to the next biggest economy in the world, China, that you need to play by the rules we play by, is also very important; and in my view, that importance strategically overrides the interest of the ability of American firms to sell to Chinese investment funds.”
Senator Dan Sullivan: China needs to play by rules we play by
Geo-economics
Daniel Twining, counselor and director of the Asia Program at the German Marshall Fund of the United States and an associate of the U.S. National Intelligence Council, thinks the U.S. economic power so far has not been sufficiently utilized to advance the nation’s overall strategic, political and economic interests.
“The U.S. is used to this traditional foreign policy tool kit that involves the armed forces, the diplomatic corps and development (foreign aid), but there’s really a fourth link here, which is our economic statecraft,” he told VOA.
Twining said other major powers, including China, appear to be much more adept at what he called “geo-economics,” using trade and investment “quite actively” and “quite smartly” to advance overall national interests.“It may be smart for us to think more about our economic strategies in the world,” including acknowledging and adopting strategies accordingly based on the fact that “market forces are not working everywhere, including in an economy like China that is still somewhat closed or controlled in some respects.”
Daniel Twining: Market forces are not working everywhere
Forgoing short-term profit
A newly released report by Baker McKenzie put Chinese worldwide outbound investment at $200 billion in 2016, nearly half of which targeted assets in North America and Europe.
According to Robert Shapiro, chairman of Sonecon and former U.S. Undersecretary of Commerce for Economic Affairs, the primary goal of China’s overseas investments does not lie in short-term profit but rather in gaining strategic advantage, and that means not necessarily in gaining immediate economic return.
Robert Shapiro: China playing the long game
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Dental Students Play Doctor in Virtual Reality
There’s a big difference between practicing dentistry, and finding a way to practice being a dentist. But thanks to the world of virtual reality, dentists-in-training have a new way to practice their craft through the relatively new technology of mixed reality (MR), where the virtual world meets the real world. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.
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