If God were a stonemason … Utah’s Arches National Park would be the back room of his workshop. The Arches National Park, established almost a century ago, is now one of the most popular destinations for Americans and tourists from around the world. The park has more than 2,000 natural stone arches, in addition to hundreds of soaring pinnacles, massive fins and giant balanced rocks. VOA’s Alex Yanevskyy had a chance to take in these majestic wonders.
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Month: December 2017
North Dakota: The Silicon Valley of Drones
North Dakota’s vast flatlands have long been known for fertile fields of canola seeds, grazing cattle, and oil drilling. But in recent years, those wide open spaces have also become the U.S. proving ground for commercial drone research and testing. VOA’s Lin Yang and Beibei Su recently visited Grand Forks, the Silicon Valley of drones.
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Satellite Technology Helps Protect Ocean Wildlife
Scientists around the world are increasingly using satellite technology to study life on earth. Small, inexpensive transponders attached to animals track their movement and interaction with humans, helping scientists and activists protect endangered species. Oceana, an international organization dedicated to the protection and restoration of the world’s oceans, teamed with shark researchers to study the fishing industry’s impact on one shark species. VOA’s George Putic reports.
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Argentina Blocks Two Activists From Entry on Eve of WTO Meeting
Argentina blocked two European activists from entering the country on the eve of the World Trade Organization’s ministerial meeting in Buenos Aires, the two told a local radio program Saturday.
Sally Burch, a British activist and journalist for the Latin American Information Agency, said Argentina had already revoked credentials given to her by the WTO to attend the meeting but thought she would be able to enter the country as a tourist.
“They found my name on a list and started asking questions … supposedly I was a false tourist,” Burch said on Radio 10.
“It’s not very democratic of Argentina’s government.”
Petter Titland, spokesman for the Norweigan NGO Attac Norge, said authorities denied him entry without explaining why.
Late last month, Argentina rescinded the credentials of 60 activists who had been accredited by the WTO to attend the meeting because it determined they would be “more disruptive than constructive.”
WTO meetings often attract protests by anti-globalization groups, but they have remained largely peaceful since riots broke out at the 1999 meeting in Seattle.
WTO’s spokesman, Keith Rockwell, reiterated on Saturday that it disagreed with Argentina’s decision to revoke activists’ credentials. “We didn’t have the same perspective but we’re now moving on,” Rockwell told journalists.
Argentina’s President Mauricio Macri has promoted business-friendly policies since taking office in December 2015, and Argentina will host global events as chair of the G-20 group of major economies next year.
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Law to Bring Down Mob Now Used Against Weinstein
The federal anti-racketeering law has been used since the late 1970s to bring down mob bosses. Could it be used to prosecute Harvey Weinstein?
Lawyers for six actresses who say they were sexually assaulted by the movie producer filed a lawsuit Wednesday in New York arguing that Weinstein was, essentially, a racketeer who used a legion of assistants, casting agents, security firms, gossip writers and others to supply himself with a steady stream of unwilling sexual partners and silence their complaints.
Their anti-racketeering suit was filed in a civil court, but it prompted discussions about whether prosecutors could make a similar criminal case.
Hurdles to criminal case
Maybe, said G. Robert Blakey, a professor emeritus at the University of Notre Dame law school who helped write the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. But it wouldn’t be easy.
“It would take imagination and intestinal fortitude,” he said. “Prosecutors have been singularly lacking in both when it comes to women making complaints of sexual assault against powerful men.”
The law was drafted to bring down organized crime but it isn’t limited to it, Blakey said. Prosecutors have used it to go after rule-breaking Wall Street firms and corrupt government contractors. Federal prosecutors are currently using it to battle alleged bribery in global soccer in a trial ongoing in Brooklyn.
But a criminal anti-racketeering case also has many hurdles, Blakey said. Federal prosecutors would have to prove that a criminal enterprise existed, it affected interstate commerce and the defendant was associated with and engaged in racketeering. It would also have to be brought within five years of the conspiracy ending, he said. The racketeering statute is a federal law, though some states, like New York and California, have similar state laws.
Weinstein, his enablers
The women suing Weinstein in civil court say the “Weinstein Sexual Enterprise” consisted of a long list of people who either enabled Weinstein’s assaults or covered them up.
Their claims were based partly on reporting by The New York Times and the New Yorker, both of which published exposes saying that Weinstein took extraordinary steps to conceal complaints, including hiring security firms to investigate reporters working on possible stories and working with other media to discredit women who might come forward.
“The goal of the (anti-racketeering) claim is to ensure not only do we get the head of the enterprise, but also those around him who enabled his conduct, whether they tampered with witnesses or destroyed evidence after the fact, or even delivered the women to him,” said Beth Fegan, the lead lawyer on the civil suit.
Weinstein’s attorneys, Blair Berk and Ben Brafman, said in a statement that all the allegations of sexual assault against him are false.
“Mr. Weinstein has never at any time committed an act of sexual assault, and it is wrong and irresponsible to conflate claims of impolitic behavior or consensual sexual contact later regretted, with an untrue claim of criminal conduct. There is a wide canyon between mere allegation and truth, and we are confident that any sober calculation of the facts will prove no legal wrongdoing occurred. Nonetheless, to those offended by Mr. Weinstein’s behavior, he remains deeply apologetic.”
They said he never used company resources at Miramax or The Weinstein Company for personal expenses, including the payment of any legal settlements. Weinstein, though a spokesman, has also denied the allegations that he sought damaging information on the actresses.
75 accusers, no criminal charges yet
At least 75 women have accused Weinstein of unwanted come-ons, groping and outright rape. He’s under criminal investigation in Los Angeles, London, Beverly Hills and in New York. No federal officials have said they are investigating him. As of yet, no criminal charges have been brought. Some of the allegations involve encounters with women many years ago, outside the statute of limitations.
“Law enforcement is having a tough enough of a time making out a simple sexual assault case against Weinstein; the idea that they could pull off a RICO indictment is pretty far out there,” said Jeffrey Lichtman, a defense attorney who defended John “Junior” Gotti, son of the infamous “Teflon Don” or “Dapper Don,” John Gotti.
“Prosecutors are concerned about one thing, getting a conviction and putting a bad guy away, and they attempt to do so in the simplest and straightforward manner possible due to the high beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard,” he wrote in an email.
On the other hand, a prosecutor could investigate the allegations in the civil complaint in an effort to seek broader accountability for complacency, said Julie O’Sullivan, a former federal prosecutor who teaches white collar criminal law at Georgetown Law.
“Assuming these allegations are true, if I were a prosecutor, I’d be asking: ‘Do I want to just go after him? Or do I think the larger criminal wrong involves a lot of people who facilitated this criminal conduct?’” she asked.
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Discovery of Two Tombs Dating Back 3,500 Years Announced in Egypt
Egypt authorities announced Saturday that archaeologists had discovered two small ancient tombs in Luxor, a southern city.
The tombs date back about 3,500 years and are located on the west bank of the river Nile.
“It’s truly an exceptional day. … The 18th dynasty private tombs were already known. But it’s the first time to enter inside the two tombs,” Antiquities Minister Khaled al-Anani said.
Egyptian officials hope the discovery will help the country’s efforts to revive tourism.
The minister said one tomb has five entrances that lead to a rectangular hall where two burial shafts are located on the northern and southern sides of the tomb.
The tomb contains a mummy wrapped in linen, clay vessels, a collection of about 450 statues, and painted wooden funerary masks.
Al-Anani said a cartouche carved on the ceiling bears the name of King Thutmose I of the early 18th dynasty.
The other tomb has a 6-meter burial shaft “leading to four side chambers,” which contained artifacts including fragments of wooden coffins. The wall inscriptions and paintings are believed to belong to an era between the reigns of King Amenhotep II and King Thutmose IV, both pharaohs of the 18th dynasty.
IN PHOTOS: Discovery of Two Ancient Tombs Announced in Egypt
The tombs are the latest discovery in Luxor, which is known for its temples and tombs from different dynasties of ancient Egyptian history.
Al-Anani also visited a nearby site where the famous Mortuary Temple of Hatshepsut is located. For the first time, the temple’s main sanctuary, known as the Holy of Holies, was opened.
The Antiquities Ministry has made a series of discoveries since the beginning of 2017.
In September, Egyptian archaeologists announced they had found the tomb of a royal goldsmith whose work was dedicated to the ancient Egyptian god Amun. The goldsmith lived more than 3,000 years ago. In the tomb, there were mummies, jewelry and statues.
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Discovery of Two Ancient Tombs Announced in Egypt
The tombs are the latest discovery in Luxor, which is known for its temples and tombs from different dynasties of ancient Egyptian history.
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Tears, Pomp, Extravagance as France Mourns Rocker Hallyday
France bid farewell to its biggest rock star Saturday, honoring Johnny Hallyday with an extravagant funeral procession down Paris’ Champs-Elysees Avenue, a presidential speech and a televised church ceremony filled with the country’s most famous faces.
Few figures in French history have earned a send-off with as much pomp as the man dubbed the “French Elvis,” who notched more than 110 million in record sales since rising to fame in the 1960s.
Hallyday died Wednesday at 74 after fighting lung cancer.
In an honor usually reserved for heads of state or literary giants like 19th-century novelist Victor Hugo, Hallyday’s funeral cortege rode past Napoleon’s Arc de Triomphe monument and down the Champs-Elysees to the Place de la Concorde plaza on the Seine River.
Adding a rock touch to the event, hundreds of motorcyclists accompanied the procession. It was a nod to the lifelong passion that Hallyday, born Jean-Philippe Smet, had for motorcycles. His biker image included signature leather jackets and myriad tattoos.
French President Emmanuel Macron — a Hallyday fan himself, like three generations of others across the French-speaking world — delivered an eulogy on the steps of Paris’ Madeleine Church for the star known to the public affectionately by only one name.
“Johnny belonged to you. Johnny belonged to his public. Johnny belonged to his country,” said Macron, whose voice was broadcast via speakers to the many thousands of often tearful mourners in central Paris.
“He should have fallen a hundred times, but what held him up and lifted him was your fervor, the love,” said Macron of the star’s health troubles and famously excessive lifestyle.
Hallyday’s death unleashed a wave of emotion across France, where he had been a symbol of national identity and stability for more than half a century — even though his private life had been far from stable.
Aside from the drinking, smoking and partying chronicled in juicy detail by the French press, Hallyday had been linked to a string of glamorous women and had married five times.
Chants of “Johnny! Johnny!” and thunderous applause rose up Saturday as fans broke out singing Hallyday classics including “Que je t’aime” (“How I love you”).
About 1,500 police officers secured the area in Paris, a police helicopter flew overhead and emergency vehicles filled nearby streets as tens of thousands of fans lined the procession route. Many dressed to emulate Hallyday’s flashy, rebellious style. Some climbed on fences or stoplights or even the roof of a luxury hotel to get a better view.
Catherine Frichot-Janin, 61, and her husband traveled from Switzerland to pay their respects — saying that the only thing older than their 39-year marriage was their mutual love for Hallyday.
“He’s the companion who’s always there when you have a worry. There will always be his music playing in a bistro,” she said.
Dubbed by some “the biggest rock star you’ve never heard of” — Hallyday’s position as one of the greatest-selling musical artists of all time is unusual as he remained largely unknown outside the Francophone world. But in France, he influenced styles, music and even children’s names.
Laura Dublot, a 30-year-old Parisian, and her brother David are among many who were named after Hallyday’s older children, Laura and David.
“He’s a national icon. This scale of funeral is not surprising — he’s united three generations of French,” Dublot said.
Laurenne Coral, 25, from Lyon, explained that “for the French, he’s like what Queen Elizabeth is for the English.”
A lineup of speakers paid homage inside the neo-classical Madeleine Church, including actors Marion Cotillard and Jean Reno and singer Patrick Bruel.
Bruel, an old friend, said when Hallyday died “it’s like they took away the Eiffel Tower in the middle of the night.”
Fittingly, the words “Thank you Johnny” are being displayed on the famed Paris monument over the weekend.
Hallyday likely would have approved of this send-off, having told French media he dreaded the idea of an isolated funeral like the one he attended for his father in 1989.
“That day, I was the only one there. Not a woman, not a friend. Absolute solitude in death. I wouldn’t like to end like that,” he said.
Other funeral guests included actor Jean Dujardin as well as former Presidents Francois Hollande and Nicolas Sarkozy, who officiated at Hallyday’s last marriage.
The scale of the French adoration for him impressed even those who were not fans.
“I don’t know Johnny. But today is a rare opportunity to walk down the Champs-Elysees with no cars,” said Qiao Pin, a 27-year-old student from Beijing. “Now, I see he’s a very famous star. There’s no one that popular in China.”
Hallyday is expected to be buried in the French Caribbean island of St. Barts where he owned a house. He is survived by his wife Laeticia, two of his former wives, four children and three grandchildren.
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Warming Arctic, Drier Regions, and Wildfires: Is There a Link?
Many scientists believe the Arctic, one of the fastest-changing places on the planet, could drive change in other parts of the world, including wildfire-ravaged Southern California.
In a recent NASA mission called Oceans Melting Greenland (OMG), climate scientist Josh Willis embarked on a journey to study ice in Greenland and surrounding oceans and how much oceans are eating away at the ice around the edges of the ice sheet. The data collected included the ocean’s temperature and salinity, and the shape and depth of the sea floor.
“The shape of the sea floor determines how much the warm water can reach in and touch the glaciers,” said Willis, who works at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory near Los Angeles.
“Warm water is widespread across the Greenland shelf, and it is very much a major threat to the glaciers,” Willis said. “The thing we really don’t know is how fast is Greenland’s ice going to disappear.
“If it takes a thousand years or two thousand years, then we can probably adapt. But if it happens in a few hundred, we should already be evacuating cities around the world,” he added.
Impact of sea ice
A separate study from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory suggests a link between sea ice melting in the Arctic and drier conditions in California. A new simulation that only looks at sea ice in the next two decades, shows a pressure ridge pushing the winter air masses north into Alaska and Canada, which impacts California.
“We saw quite substantial drying of California so with (looking at) the sea ice alone, we saw 10 to 15 percent decrease in precipitation over a 20-year period,” said Ivana Cvijanovic, an atmospheric scientist and post-doctoral researcher at the national laboratory.
Other factors such as greenhouse gases and particulate pollution can also affect the future of rainfall in California. The modeling framework used in the study at Lawrence Livermore helps scientists understand the impact of sea ice in isolation to these other factors.
“Ice is disappearing on the Arctic Ocean. It’s disappearing from Greenland and this is reshaping climate patterns all across the planet,” Willis said.
He and other scientists predict that as Arctic regions warm, the American Southwest will feel the impact.
“We will probably see drier conditions in the long run in the second half of the [21st] century in the Southwest and that means we’re going to struggle with water needs and also fire,” Willis said.
Intersection of wildland, people
Dry conditions plus a growing population and urban sprawl equals more wildfires and costly devastation, such as the ones in Southern California.
“We are in Southern California and a lot of the fires we find that happen right where people intersect with wildland happen because of people,” said Natasha Stavros, an applied science system engineer and fire expert at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
As the weather evolves and more wildfires burn, Stavros expects other environmental changes.
“As we experience climate changes and things become hotter and dryer, fire acts kind of like an eraser. It erases the landscape and it actually allows new ecosystems to establish because they don’t have to compete with what was there,” Stavros said.
The American Southwest is not the only place where change is predicted.
“As the atmosphere heats up, it becomes a better pipe for carrying water for picking it up from one place and dumping it in another,” Willis said. “This means that dry places are more likely to get drier and wet places are likely to get wetter. It also means that bigger more torrential downpours become more likely.”
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Warming Arctic, Drier Regions and Wildfires: Is There a Link?
A new report from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory predicts a link between sea ice melting in the Arctic and drier conditions in California over the next several decades. This finding comes at a time when several wildfires are raging across Southern California. VOA’s Elizabeth Lee reports on the work of scientists as they look at the global implications of the melting of glaciers and sea ice, and other impacts a changing climate could have around the world.
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Three Central Banks, Three Economic Outlooks for 2018
Three central banks, meeting on both sides of the Atlantic, will highlight the diverging fortunes of the world’s biggest economies as they head into 2018 after an exceptionally tranquil year.
While the growth cycle in the United States may be close to peaking, the eurozone is just getting comfortable with its economic run, and Britain is weighed down by Brexit uncertainty, suggesting that their monetary policies will be out of sync for years to come.
Indeed, the U.S. Federal Reserve is all but certain to raise rates Wednesday, likely predicting three more hikes for next year, even as the European Central Bank pledges Thursday to maintain super-low borrowing costs and the Bank of England promises only very gradual increases over the coming years.
Clouds far out on US horizon?
The U.S. economy will start the new year in the perfect spot but that would suggest that the only way is down, and a range of issues from uncertainty over tax cuts to midterm elections and high turnover atop the Fed, cloud the outlook.
“The music will keep playing for another year or so, but be wary of what is next,” BNP Paribas said. “In 2018, we think the U.S. economy will see its best year in terms of economic activity since 2005 with the unemployment rate dropping to its lowest level since 1969.”
“The turn of the cycle is in sight,” it added. “We see the recovery as long in the tooth and believe that cycles do die of old age.”
Tax cuts and rate hikes
Indeed, the economy is likely to face capacity constraints as the labor market tightens, pushing core inflation to the Fed’s target and raising prospects of overheating if a tax proposal, now in Congress, substantially increases deficit spending.
A big tax cut under discussion would — potentially — boost growth, and likely push the Fed to tighten more quickly.
“Better growth would increase downward pressure on the unemployment rate and upward pressure on inflation,” Bank of America Merrill Lynch said. “Hence the Fed would respond with a modestly steeper path of monetary policy.”
And in Europe
The eurozone economy is in a similarly sweet spot, but the growth cycle is still relatively young and only now beginning to broaden out so the ECB will remain reluctant to give up support.
“The ECB faces the best of the possible outlooks in years: the moderate expansion phase is set to continue in 2018 and 2019, with limited risks of a setback, absent signs of excesses in demand wages dynamics and in leverage,” Intesa Sanpaolo said in a research note.
The ECB is not in a hurry to alter communication both on asset purchases and interest rates, it added.
Indeed, after an October stimulus cut that actually loosened rather than tightened financial conditions, the ECB will likely say it is content with the reaction, suggesting it will not revisit its stance for some time.
It will also unveil initial 2020 inflation projections, which will likely show price growth at or just below target, rising only gradually over the coming three years, another argument not to take support away just yet.
In England
Meanwhile, the Bank of England will have to tread a fine line between sounding like more rate hikes are coming and not squashing growth that economists think may slow to around 1.3 percent next year from 1.5 percent in 2017.
Uncertainty over Brexit, low wage growth and weak productivity are weighing on the economy, but the BoE is not keen to see the pound weaken and add to an inflation rate that is expected to exceed its 2 percent target over the next three years.
Although Britain appears to have cleared a key hurdle in Brexit talks and focus can now move to a discussion of a trade agreement, slow progress so far suggests that uncertainty will remain high and even if an eventual deal is likely, its terms will not be clear for some time.
“For the doves, there has been no shortage of weak data since November, particularly related to the consumer sector and housing market,” HSBC said in a note to clients.
“The MPC seems minded to make another (hike), based more on weak supply growth than rising demand growth,” it added. “After that, we expect a long pause while it assesses the impact of its policy moves and given our expectation that activity growth will stay soft and wage growth weak.”
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Provocative Exhibition Looks at Artists’ Response to Post-9/11 ‘Age of Terror’
A new exhibition aims to show how the art world has responded to the global changes since the terror attacks in the United States on Sept. 11, 2001. Age of Terror: Art since 9/11 at London’s Imperial War Museum brings together 40 artists from across the world whose works reflect on conflict and society since that day. Henry Ridgwell reports.
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US Economy Adding Jobs, But Employers Say Skills Gap is Rising
The U.S. economy posted another impressive month, adding 228,000 jobs in November. The unemployment rate, now at a 17-year low, remains unchanged at 4.1 percent. But even as more Americans returned to the workforce, job recruiters say the job market is changing and both employers and employees need to be prepared. Mil Arcega reports.
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UN Members Sign Commitment to Reduce Plastic Pollution
The environmental group EcoWatch estimates that at least 1 million sea birds, and 100,000 marine mammals are killed every year by ingesting plastic or getting caught in it. It is an environmental nightmare, and it’s getting worse every year. But this week, more than 200 countries signed an agreement to begin dealing with the problem. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.
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Washington’s Annual Downtown Holiday Market Is Open for Business
Washington’s annual Downtown Holiday Market is open for business. For the last 13 years, this unique seasonal market has provided shopping and entertainment from just after Thanksgving until right before Christmas. VOA’s Eunjung Cho reports.
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At Yayoi Kusama Show, a Long Wait to Experience Infinity
If you want to experience infinity, you’re going to have to wait a long time.
On a recent Saturday, the line to see Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama’s new Infinity Mirror Rooms stretched all the way around a Manhattan city block, the end of the line even meeting up with the beginning at the entrance to David Zwirner Gallery, and the wait as long as six hours.
Some 5,000 people came through that day, the gallery says, the busiest day yet for the exhibit, and yet more proof — if it were needed — of the massive popularity of Kusama, who’s been described as the top-selling living female artist. Among the 5,000 was not, however, Alla Kondrateva. The 27-year-old New Yorker took one look at the line and gave up, returning on a chilly weekday a few days later when the wait was much shorter. She was happy she returned.
“She’s really quirky,” Kondrateva said of the 88-year-old artist. Her work, she said, “is interactive, and it just draws people in — her style is just out there, eccentric.”
Like many who have passed through the gallery since the exhibit opened at the beginning of November, Kondrateva had seen Kusama’s work on Instagram, where the artist is a presence. Her famous Infinity Mirror Rooms — two new ones are being debuted at the current exhibit, called “Festival of Life” — are perfect for selfies. Hardly anyone leaves without one, or two, or 26. But Kondrateva said she tried to limit the impulse: “I feel like it kind of takes away from the whole experience because you’re not experiencing the art, you’re spending the whole time on your phone.”
And that time isn’t very long. After the lengthy wait outside, visitors get one minute — yes, 60 seconds — in the first Infinity Room, called “Let’s Survive Forever,” a mirror-lined space in which only four to six people can fit amid a slew of shiny mirrored orbs, some hanging from the ceiling, some attached to the floor. In the middle of the room, one peeks into a box that splits images, well, infinitesimally. The room is ideal for selfie-takers; there seems to be no angle from which you cannot see yourself — and your smartphone.
In the second room, “Longing for Eternity,” one peers through round holes into a mirrored box, witnessing a light show with constantly changing colors. The view below appears infinite. It’s hard to take a selfie, but if you have that live-photo function, your photos will go through two color changes as you view them. You get 30 seconds in that room. (One couple got engaged early this week in an Infinity Room, the gallery says; presumably, they got a bit more time.)
After the Infinity Rooms, you’re led — white booties on your feet — into “With All My Love for the Tulips, I Pray Forever,” an earlier Kusama work appearing for the first time outside Asia. The entire room is white and covered with Kusama’s signature red polka dots, with huge sculptures of tulips (also white with red dots.)
Colleen Murphy, 23, stood recently in the center of the very photogenic room, taking selfies. She, too, said the wait — just under two hours that morning — was worth it. “It’s really special to see a lot of her work at once, having the context,” said the former art history major who now works in marketing. “Rather than seeing one or two pieces, as you would in a museum.”
In another room hang some 66 of the artist’s brightly colored paintings from her “My Eternal Soul” series, accompanied by a set of new and shiny floral sculptures. One visitor, Mahera Jeevanjee, a physical therapist from San Antonio, Texas, said she found the paintings fascinating as a onetime science major, because some design patterns “look like the anatomy of a cell.”
The Chelsea show closes December 16; a concurrent show of Kusama’s “Infinity Nets” paintings at the gallery’s Upper East Side location runs until December 22.
In a video message accompanying the show, Kusama — in a bright red wig — says that if her art “can inspire a deep love of humanity and acknowledge the amazingness of who we are, I will be very happy.”
“I am determined to continue to grow as an artist who can give hope and power to society,” says the artist, who has a history of neurosis and channels hallucinations into her work. “I want to accomplish work that leads to world peace and the empowerment of our collective future. I will continue to fight this battle and I invite you to fight it with me.”
Have some extra cash? All the works are for sale even the Infinity Mirror Rooms, though the gallery would not give prices on those, nor say how many editions would be available. As for the paintings, they’re listed for under $1 million.
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Wind, Fire, Ash Destroy Much of California Avocado Crop
The wildfire that roared through the orchards of California’s Ventura County destroyed much of the region’s avocado crop not just with flames, but also with fierce Santa Ana winds and a thick blanket of ash.
With the so-called Thomas Fire just 10 percent contained by Friday afternoon, after blackening more than 132,000 acres across Ventura County and destroying some 400 homes and other structures, it is too soon to know the extent of the damage to the upcoming avocado harvest.
But experts say even the mostly family-owned orchards spared by the epic conflagration may have suffered devastating losses to their crops from the hot, dry Santa Ana winds that blow out of the California desert, knocking avocados from the trees with gusts up to 80 miles per hour. (129 kilometers per hour)
The fruit cannot be sold for human consumption once it is on the ground because of food safety regulations.
“A lot of that fruit everybody was looking forward to harvesting next year is laying on the ground,” said John Krist, chief executive of the Ventura County Farm Bureau.
Vulnerable to the wind
Avocados are the rare produce trees planted in hillside groves because of their shallow roots, said Ben Faber, a University of California farm adviser in Ventura. The fruit, typically harvested in February or March, is full-sized and heavy by December, held by a long stem.
Those factors make avocados, already growing away from their natural environment in Central and South America, more vulnerable to the whipping winds than the lemon orchards dotting the flatlands of Ventura, Faber said.
Lemons are also a lighter fruit with a shorter, sturdier stem. Ventura County is California’s largest growing region for both lemons and avocados. The state produces about 90 percent of the nation’s avocado crop and 80 percent of its lemons.
Delayed impact
Some avocado trees that do not appear to have been scorched could also reveal damage later, collapsing from internal heat damage. Fruit that did not burn or get blown off the branches may be sunburned by the loss of canopy.
Both lemon and avocado crops are also likely to suffer further from the thick coating of ash left by the Thomas Fire, which interferes with the natural enemy insects that hunt the pests feeding on the fruit trees. Those enemy insects are known to growers as “bio-controls.”
“When you get all this ash, they can’t do their jobs,” Faber said of the enemy insects. “That’s going to cause a disruption to the bio controls that’s going to go on for a year or more. So the impact of the fires is not all immediate.”
Unlike grapes at wineries in California’s Napa Valley wine-growing region hit by wildfires in October, however, avocados and lemons will not be affected by smoke from the fires because of their thick skins.
Experts said at the time that the delicate grapes, if exposed to sustained heavy smoke, could be vulnerable to “smoke taint,” which can alter their taste and aroma.
Prices not likely to rise
Consumers are not expected to see an impact on avocado prices because Ventura County is only a small piece of the worldwide production chain dominated by Mexico and South America, the farm bureau’s Krist said.
Avocado prices have been higher in most U.S. markets during the second half of 2017, according to the Hass Avocado Board, in part because of a poor harvest last year in the United States and Mexico.
The wildfire news didn’t have a major effect on the stock price of the Limoneira Company, the nation’s largest avocado grower, as shares closed essentially unchanged on Friday.
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‘Worker Bee’ Round of NAFTA Talks to Focus on Easier Chapters
NAFTA trade negotiators convene in Washington next week for a limited round of talks unlikely to move the needle on major sticking points, but aimed at demonstrating some progress toward closing easier chapters.
Last month’s round of negotiations to update the North American Free Trade Agreement in Mexico City failed to resolve major differences, as Canada and Mexico pushed back on what they saw as unreasonable U.S. demands on automotive content rules, dispute settlement and a five-year sunset clause.
U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said that the United States wanted to see “meaningful progress” before year’s end.
The “intersessional” meetings in a Washington hotel come with lower expectations and without trade ministers from the three countries, who are due to attend a World Trade Organization meeting in Buenos Aires.
Some lobbyists and trade experts said that chapters with the best chances of showing progress were among those that Canada and Mexico had agreed to create or update in the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal: digital trade, food safety, state-owned enterprises and telecommunications.
NAFTA negotiators have not closed any chapters since completing talks on competition policy and small-medium enterprises in late September. Talks have since been dominated by U.S. demands, such as for half of all North American automotive content to be produced in the United States.
Less rhetoric, more substance
“The intersessional could be a chance to turn the temperature down,” said Max Baucus, a former U.S. senator who chairs Farmers for Free Trade, a coalition of U.S. farm sector groups. “This should be a round for the worker bees, with less rhetoric and more concrete negotiations.”
A senior Canadian government source said no progress would be made on the most contentious issues at the Washington talks.
Separately, Canada’s chief negotiator, Steve Verheul, said the U.S. “extreme proposals” were proving very hard to deal with.
“We will not accept U.S. proposals that would fundamentally weaken the benefits of NAFTA for Canada and undermine the competitiveness of the North American market in relation to the rest of the world,” Verheul told Canadian lawmakers this week.
The Washington meetings follow stepped-up lobbying efforts by NAFTA backers in the United States to warn against the dangers of withdrawing from the nearly 24-year-old trade pact.
Top Detroit auto executives met with Vice President Mike Pence, and pro-trade Republican senators met with President Donald Trump.
Moises Kalach, the head of Mexico’s CCE business lobby and a government consultant, said that the United States would need to back off from some of its “extreme” positions for compromises to be made.
“We’re ready to dance. The question is whether the American government is willing to do so,” Kalach told Reuters.
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First Black Astronaut Honored on 50th Anniversary of Death
AP Photo NY560, NY561, NY562
America’s first black astronaut, Air Force Maj. Robert Lawrence Jr., finally got full honors Friday on the 50th anniversary of his death.
Several hundred people gathered at Kennedy Space Center to commemorate Lawrence, who almost certainly would have gone on to fly in space had he not died in a plane crash on Dec. 8, 1967.
The crowd included NASA dignitaries, astronauts, fellow Omega Psi Phi fraternity members, schoolchildren, and relatives of Lawrence and other astronauts who have died in the line of duty.
Lawrence was part of a classified military space program in the 1960s called the Manned Orbiting Laboratory, meant to spy on the Soviet Union. He died when his F-104 Starfighter crashed at Edwards Air Force Base in California. He was 32.
Astronauts at Friday’s two-hour ceremony said Lawrence would have gone on to fly NASA’s space shuttles and that, after his death, he inspired all the African-American astronauts who followed him.
Like Lawrence, Robert Crippen was part of the Air Force’s program. It was canceled in 1969 without a single manned spaceflight, prompting Crippen and other astronauts to move on to NASA. Crippen was pilot of the first space shuttle flight in 1981.
With a doctoral degree in physical chemistry — a rarity among test pilots — Lawrence was “definitely on the fast track,” Crippen said. He graduated from high school at age 16 and college at 20.
“He had a great future ahead of him if he had not been lost 50 years ago today,” Crippen said.
Lawrence paved the way for Guy Bluford, who became the first African-American in space in 1983, Dr. Mae Jemison, the first African-American woman in space in 1992, and Charles Bolden Jr., a space shuttle commander who became NASA’s first black administrator in 2009. Next year, the International Space Station is getting its first African-American resident: NASA astronaut Jeanette Epps.
Another former African-American astronaut, Winston Scott, said his own shuttle rides into orbit would not have happened if not for a trailblazers like Lawrence. In tribute to Lawrence, a jazz lover, Scott and his jazz band serenaded the crowd with “Fly Me to the Moon” and other tunes.
Lawrence’s sister, Barbara, a retired educator, said he considered himself the luckiest man in the world for being able to combine the two things he loved most: chemistry and flying.
Lawrence’s name was etched into the Astronauts Memorial Foundation’s Space Mirror at Kennedy for the 30th anniversary of his death in 1997, following a long bureaucratic struggle. It took years for the Air Force to recognize Lawrence as an astronaut, given he’d never flown as high as the 1960s-required altitude of 50 miles.
The Space Mirror Memorial bears the names of two other African-Americans: Ronald McNair, who died aboard space shuttle Challenger in 1986, and Michael Anderson, who died on shuttle Columbia in 2003.
Marsalis Walton, 11, who drove from Tampa with his father, Sam, came away inspired. He dreams of becoming an astronaut.
“It feels good that everyone has a chance to do anything,” the boy said.
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From Poles to Filipinos? UK Food Industry Needs Post-Brexit Workers
Britons who voted for Brexit in the hope of slashing immigration seem set for disappointment. In the farming and food industries at least, any exodus of Polish and Romanian workers may simply be followed by arrivals of Ukrainians and Filipinos.
From dairy farms to abattoirs, employers say not enough Britons have an appetite for milking cows before dawn or disemboweling pig carcasses — jobs often performed by workers from the poorer, eastern member states of the European Union.
With unemployment at a four-decade low of 4.3 percent, even Brexit supporters acknowledge the industries will need some migrant workers after Britain leaves the EU in 2019, ending the automatic right of the bloc’s citizens to work in the country.
Employers praise eastern European staff for their skills and work ethic.
“They are a massively valuable part of our work force and a massively valuable part of the food industry overall,” said Adam Couch, chief executive of Cranswick plc, a meat processing group founded by pig farmers.
Food and drink is the largest U.K. manufacturing sector, with a turnover of 110 billion pounds ($147 billion) in 2015, government figures show. Much of it depends heavily on staff from elsewhere in the EU, mainly the post-communist east.
For example, the British Meat Processors Association says 63 percent of workers in the sector come from other EU countries, and in some plants it can be as high as 80 percent.
The proportion has risen partly due to increased demand for more labor-intensive products such as boneless meat.
Association members have found it impossible to recruit the additional employees needed from Britain, the BMPA says.
Pro-Brexit campaigners say Britain needs to reduce its reliance on EU workers.
“Our sights should be firmly set on raising the skill level of our own domestic workers, employing domestic whenever we possibly can and automating,” said Owen Paterson, a member of parliament for the ruling Conservatives.
But Paterson, who as a former Environment Secretary was responsible for U.K. agricultural policy from 2012-14, added: “Where there is a clear shortage and no technological solution, by all means bring in labor but the good news is we wouldn’t be limited to the EU. We will have the whole world to choose from.”
‘Money for a month’
On the meat production line, Romanian Dumidru Voicu explained the attractions of working at Cranswick’s plant in Milton Keynes, a town northwest of London.
“I just want to do something with my life, save some money and make my own business. The money for a week here is the money for a month in Romania,” said Voicu, who arrived in the country about the time that Britons voted to leave the EU in June last year.
An estimated 27,000 permanent staff from elsewhere in the EU worked in British agriculture last year, House of Commons staff noted in a briefing paper for members of parliament. This figure is swollen at times by around 75,000 seasonal workers.
A further 116,000 EU citizens worked in food manufacturing.
The Food and Drink Federation predicts the sector, which employs about 400,000 people, needs to recruit another 140,000 by 2024.
The government, which wants to reduce immigration sharply, has yet to announce its post-Brexit policy but farm minister George Eustice has recognized employers’ concerns. “Leaving the EU and establishing controlled migration does not mean closing off all immigration,” he told parliament in earlier this year.
However, a government document leaked in September showed that restrictions for all but the highest-skilled EU workers were under consideration.
Such a possibility alarms farm employers. “Without EU labor there will be no British pig industry as we know it,” said Zoe Davies, chief executive of the National Pig Association.
British farmers have relied on foreign labor for a long time, at least around harvest time. A Seasonal Agricultural Workers Scheme was introduced shortly after World War II.
The government ended it in 2013 before Romanians and Bulgarians won the automatic right to work in Britain, arguing that there were now enough EU workers to fill farm vacancies.
With EU citizens to lose that right on Brexit, the National Farmers’ Union (NFU) wants the scheme — or something similar — reinstated. This may mean going back to the time when people from beyond eastern Europe filled farm jobs.
Michael Oakes, chairman of the dairy board at the NFU, says older colleagues remember when people from countries such as the Philippines worked on British farms.
“There are other countries in the world that would help to solve the problem but at the moment because they are not within the EU they are not necessarily able to come in and work.”
Filipinos already work on New Zealand farms but such an idea could prove politically difficult in Britain as the pro-Brexit side fought the referendum on promises to curb immigration.
Many of the 17 million Britons who voted to leave are likely to be unhappy if they find eastern Europeans simply replaced by non-EU workers such as Filipinos or Ukrainians.
“Perhaps we need to broaden out the opportunities but a lot of people voted for Brexit because of immigration reasons, so it is a tricky one for the government,” said Oakes.
Making sacrifices
Any new seasonal plan could still recruit in the EU, but might be forced to widen its scope to get the required numbers.
Net migration to the UK fell to 230,000 in the year to June, far from the government’s ambition of arrivals “in the tens of thousands”. Still, EU citizens accounted for three quarters of the 106,000 drop, the Office for National Statistics reported.
The figures present a mixed picture, with a net 20,000 Poles leaving the country in 2016 but 50,000 Romanians arriving.
But some eastern Europeans say they feel less welcome since the referendum and resent the negative attitude of some Britons.
“I was quite upset. Why do you have a problem with me if I am coming to take a job you don’t want and I am paying tax?” said Zoltan Peter, who came to England in 2009 to work on a dairy farm in western England, initially leaving his wife and baby daughter at home in Romania.
Peter now works as a regional manager for LKL, a firm which recruits workers to the dairy industry, but says the early years were not easy. “I didn’t catch my daughter starting to talk, but you sometimes you make sacrifices and eastern European people are making sacrifices,” he told Reuters.
A drop in sterling since the referendum has also made Britain less attractive for farm workers who earn at least 7.20 pounds an hour. That was worth 41 Polish zlotys before the vote but now it buys only 34.
Part of the answer may lie in a drive to recruit and train more British workers, despite Peter’s doubts.
Oakes said he needed people prepared to work long, unsocial hours often in cold, wet conditions. Milking on his farm starts at 4.30 a.m. and the day does not end until 8 p.m. “It is an early start or a late finish, and occasionally on bad days you might have to do both,” he said.
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‘Star Wars’ Cast Reflects on Legacy of Fisher, Leia
Carrie Fisher may have been the “madcap Auntie Mame” to Mark Hamill’s “square” homebody, but despite their differences, the Star Wars siblings got along famously right till the end.
While both skyrocketed to celebrity with their Star Wars roles in 1977 and remained inextricably linked through their on-screen family, Hamill says he missed a lot of Fisher’s life — during “the Bryan Lourd years” and when her daughter Billie Lourd was an infant. That’s why, even before Fisher’s untimely death last year, he felt especially grateful to just get to spend time with his friend during the filming of Star Wars: The Last Jedi.
“I’d see her periodically during charity events or when there were Star Wars celebrations and so forth. But this was the first time where we could really hang and enjoy each other. Even if I wasn’t shooting, I was coming in for stunt training and this or that, hair tests, coming into her trailer and hanging out with her and [her dog] Gary,” Hamill said. “There was a comfort level we’d developed over all these years. She knew me. She knew I hadn’t really changed. She knew I wasn’t out to get something.”
Fisher was apparently beloved by all in the cast, both for who she was and what the character of Leia meant to them. Her death at age 60 came after filming had finished and deep into post-production, but presented a bit of a conundrum for the filmmakers who had anticipated Leia being part of the next film, too.
Closure comes later
The Last Jedi writer-director Rian Johnson said he ultimately didn’t end up changing anything about her role in this installment, which is the eighth in the Star Wars films about the lives and adventures of the Skywalker clan. That’ll be something J.J. Abrams will have to grapple with in Episode IX, in which Fisher was meant to have a much more prominent role.
“We’ll have to find a way to give her closure in IX, but we’ll never be able to replace her,” Hamill said.
Although no one can talk about exactly what Leia’s arc entails in The Last Jedi, out December 15, Johnson expects it will be an emotional experience.
“She is so good in it,” Johnson said. “I always think about the fans who didn’t know her in real life and grew up watching her, and it’s like they’re all going through their own type of loss. It’s really going to be emotional for people whom she means something to see this. I hope it’ll be good. I hope it’ll mean something to them.”
Many in the cast speak almost interchangeably about the feisty princess-turned-general and the unapologetic boldness of Hollywood royalty who embodied her. The women in particular recall being deeply affected by the Leia character when they were young.
“I truly remember thinking ‘She’s different. She’s not like all the rest,’ ” Gwendoline Christie said of seeing Leia for the first time when she was 6 or 7 years old. “I’m thinking, ‘I want to be like her.’ ”
But it was Fisher’s extraordinary persona that was atop call cast members’ minds.
“It’s hard to do it justice, describing the life of someone. She’s so complicated,” said Adam Driver, who plays her estranged son. “It is always exciting to see someone who is not interested in conforming to any way of how you should behave. And I think she embodied that with a really great sense of irony.”
Picture of courage
Fisher made newcomer Kelly Marie Tran realize “how much courage it takes to be yourself when you’re on a public platform.”
“She was so unapologetic and openly herself,” Tran said. “She will always be an icon as Leia but also as Carrie. What an example. I am so fortunate to have met her.”
But Fisher’s famed frankness and spirit was only one part of a complex person, according to Hamill, who, after 40 years of knowing her, got to see the nuance.
“As tough as she was and as venomous as her wit could be, she was really vulnerable in a way. Even though we weren’t really brother and sister, there was sort of a protectiveness I felt. I was defensive when people would criticize her, and I’d get mad at her when she was self-indulgent, which was quite a lot. But I loved her so much,” Hamill said.
“When I get mad and selfish and think, ‘Darn it, Carrie, your timing used to be perfect — why now?,’ you have to say, ‘At least we have that. We should be grateful for the time we had with her.’ And I do know one thing: She would want us to be laughing and happy, not morose and depressed over her not being around anymore.”
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Maldives Rushes Through Trade Pact With China Despite Opposition
The Maldives government signed a free trade agreement with China during a visit to Beijing by its leader, Abdulla Yameen, it said on Friday, despite criticism from the opposition over the speed at which the deal was concluded.
Under the deal – a document of more than 1,000 pages that the Maldives parliament signed off on last week after less than an hour of discussion – China and the archipelago nation will impose no tariffs on imports from each other.
Fisheries are the main export from the Maldives, an Indian Ocean country of 400,000 that also relies heavily on tourism.
“The free trade agreement between China and Maldives signed during the visit was a milestone in the development of China-Maldives economic and trade relations,” Yameen’s official website said in a joint communique.
The Maldives government also endorsed China’s proposed Maritime Silk Road business development project, part of its vast Belt and Road infrastructure project.
China’s state-run Xinhua news agency quoted Chinese President Xi Jinping as telling Yameen that the Belt and Road program matched up with the Maldives’ development strategies.
President Yameen’s government has had good relations with China since taking power in 2013. China has been striking deals with countries in Asia and Africa to improve its imports of key commodities and boost its diplomatic clout.
The main opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) said in a statement that the FTA contained technical details that should have been thoroughly reviewed and called for its implementation to be suspended until an independent feasibility study is conducted.
The government says the FTA will help diversify the $3.6 billion economy and boost fisheries exports, crucial since the European Union declined in 2014 to renew a tax concession on them. Fisheries account for 5 percent of Maldives’ economic output and earned the country $140 million in 2016.
The EU declined to extend the tax exemptions because the country has failed to comply with international conventions on freedom of religion, European diplomats in Colombo say.
Maldives law prohibits the practice by citizens of any religion other than Islam, while non-Muslims are barred from voting, gaining citizenship or holding public office.
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