Month: June 2018

Govt: Hundreds of Venezuelan Children Victims of Child Labor in Colombia

Posted on by Coeco

A campaign by Colombia to eradicate child labor discovered nearly 5,000 children working in the past three months, including hundreds from economically stricken Venezuela, the government said on Tuesday.

While child labor rates have fallen in recent years, overall about 850,000 children aged 5 to 17 are estimated to be working and not attending school full-time or at all, government figures show.

Of the 5,000 cases of child labor found, more than a third were uncovered by government mobile units on farms and streets, while under half were reported through a free telephone hotline, according to Colombia’s child protection agency (ICBF).

Under Colombian law, children under 15 are not allowed to work and no child can be employed in a hazardous job that poses a risk to health or life.

“We have found children working in markets, in public spaces, at the traffic lights, in rural areas,” Karen Abudinen head of ICBF, told media on Tuesday.

The ICBF has identified 350 Venezuelan children who were victims of child labour in Colombia since March, particularly in those provinces sharing a border with Venezuela, Abudinen said.

In Colombia’s northern border city of Cucuta, Venezuelan teenagers can be seen working as street vendors, and young children beg with their parents on sidewalks.

About 672,000 Venezuelans have crossed into Colombia, legally and illegally, since 2015, according to Colombian authorities, fleeing economic turmoil and severe shortages of food and medicine.

Those migrating to Colombia without passports and work visas are vulnerable to labor exploitation, the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) in Colombia has said.

Along with poverty, driving child labor rates are local cultural attitudes. Work is seen as building character, as a normal part of development and as a responsibility children have to contribute to the home. Abudinen called it “a cultural problem that we can’t ignore.”

The concerted public awareness campaign against child labor began in February, which also aims to encourage people to come forward and report cases of children working.

“Child labor is a factory of inequality because a child who works does not have the same opportunities as those who are studying,” Abudinen said in a statement.

Globally, 152 million children aged 5 to 17 are victims of forced labor, according to the International Labor Organization (ILO).

Children toil in homes, mines, fields and factories, carrying heavy loads, working long hours and suffering exposure to pesticides and other toxic substances, it said.

“Their very lives can be at risk,” the ILO said in a statement on Tuesday.

The ILO said latest figures show from 2012 through 2016 that almost no progress was made on reducing child labor among the youngest aged 5 to 11, and the number of young children in hazardous work has increased.
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Smurf the Whole Day Long – Belgium Celebrates Cartoon Heroes

Posted on by Corts

Belgium is celebrating the 60th birthday of the Smurfs by giving fans the chance to experience living in their village and take a virtual reality ride through mystical forests and caves.

Cartoonist Pierre Culliford, who wrote under the pseudonym Peyo, struck gold with the incidental creation of the Smurfs in 1958, as he initially had only invented them as supporting characters in his comic of medieval heroes Johan And Peewit.

After a great public response and demand for more Smurf adventures, the Belgian put the blue-skinned creatures center stage with their own comic book the following year.

That set off a global conquest of the family of Smurf characters as they fight off sorcerer Gargamel, who wants to turn them into gold – culminating in a Hollywood hit grossing half a billion dollars in box office takings in 2011.

​In the Smurf Experience at Brussels Expo, which will run until late January 2019, visitors are taken through the Smurf village, with human sized mushroom shaped homes, and the virtual reality ride, while fighting Gargamel.

In a linguistically divided country, the Smurfs have become a unifying symbol in Belgium alongside chocolate, waffles, beer and the national soccer team.

“They (Smurfs) are a symbol of Belgian culture and of Belgian heritage,” said Chloé Beaufays, the spokeswoman of the exhibition.

Organizers hope to take the exhibition to other European countries as well as the United States and Asia over next five years.
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Colombia’s Rightist Contender Duque Seeks High Investment to Bolster Growth

Posted on by Coeco

Ivan Duque, the frontrunner to win Colombia’s presidential election on Sunday, said tax cuts he is proposing would bolster investment in the Andean nation by a third over the next four years and help stimulate sluggish economic growth.

The right-wing 41-year-old lawyer and former senator, running almost 20 points ahead of leftist rival Gustavo Petro in polls, told Reuters in an interview late on Monday that he hopes to attract fresh investment to help lift economic growth to as much as 5 percent from 1.8 percent last year.

Petro, a former mayor of Bogota and one-time rebel from the now-defunct M19 insurgency, has spooked investors with plans to overhaul Colombia’s market-oriented economic model and gradually abandon dependence on the production of oil and coal.

Business-friendly Duque, on the other hand, has pledged to maintain crude and coal production, reduce taxes on businesses and raise government finances by cutting tax evasion.

“First of all, I want growth triggered by a high rate of investment, more than 30 percent of gross domestic product,” Duque said at his campaign headquarters.

“I know it’s ambitious, but that has to be a goal we set, domestic investment and foreign investment.”

Total investment reached 23.1 percent of GDP last year, up 0.6 percent from the previous year, according to the DANE statistics department.

Duque, who is backed by powerful former president Alvaro Uribe, said he would seek investment from infrastructure, agriculture, the service industry and tourism.

“Investors can have absolute clarity that my goal is for them to come to the country and that their investments translate into an improvement in the living conditions of Colombians,” he said, adding that he would guarantee the rule of law and clear investment rules.

The additional investment and a crackdown on tax evasion would help compensate for cuts in business duties, Duque said.

He also plans to reduce government spending and make it more efficient.

He said he believed his administration could cut value added tax and income tax evasion by 50 percent, allowing overall tax rates to come down and in turn attract more investment.

Duque, who worked at the Inter-American Development Bank in Washington until 2014, said he would abide by the so-called fiscal rule, which obliges the government to reduce the fiscal deficit, as well as cut debt levels in the $320 billion economy, Latin America’s fourth largest.

Colombia registered a fiscal deficit of 3.6 percent of GDP in 2017 and is expected to see it fall to 3.1 percent this year.
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Fruit and Veg Off the Menu for Indonesian Girls as Myths Fuel Malnutrition

Posted on by Cosc

From fears that eating chicken wings makes it hard to find a husband to beliefs that pineapple jeopardizes fertility, a host of food taboos are fueling malnutrition among Indonesian girls, experts said as they launched an adolescent health drive.

Nutritionists said girls ate very little protein, vegetables or fruit, preferring to fill up with rice and processed snacks which were often sweet or fried.

“Indonesian girls are being left behind when it comes to nutrition,” said Kecia Bertermann of Girl Effect, a non-profit that uses mobile technology to empower girls.

“They don’t understand why their health is important, nor how nutrition is connected to doing well at school, at work or for their futures.”

The U.N. children’s agency UNICEF says Indonesia has some of the world’s most troubling nutrition statistics.

Two in five adolescent girls are thin due to undernutrition, which is a particular concern given many girls begin childbearing in their teens.

Experts said the food taboos were part of a wider system of cultural and social habits leading to poor adolescent nutrition, which could impact girls’ education and opportunities.

One myth is that cucumber stimulates excessive vaginal discharge, another that eating pineapple can prevent girls from conceiving later on or cause miscarriages in pregnant women.

Others believe spicy food can cause appendicitis and make breast milk spicy, oily foods can cause sore throats and peanuts can cause acne, while chicken feet – like chicken wings – can cause girls to struggle finding a husband.

Research by Girl Effect found urban girls ate little or no breakfast, snacked on “empty foods” throughout the day and thought feeling full was the same as being well nourished.

Snacks tended to be carbohydrate-heavy, leaving girls short of protein, vitamins and minerals.

Girl Effect is teaming up with global organization Nutrition International to improve girls’ eating habits via its Springster mobile app, a platform providing interactive content for girls on health and social issues.

If successful, the initiative could be expanded to the Philippines and Nigeria.

Experts said Indonesia was a country with “a double burden of malnutrition” with some people stunted and others overweight but also lacking micronutrients.

Marion Roche, a specialist in adolescent health at Nutrition International, said the poor nutritional knowledge among girls was particularly striking given infant nutrition had improved in Indonesia.

“Adolescent girls don’t know what healthy looks like, as health is understood as the absence of illness,” she said. “We need to give them the knowledge to make healthy choices.”
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Living with a Monster: Tourism at a Guatemala Volcano

Posted on by Coeco

Tourists reached out to feel the heat from the still-smoldering lava, tossed sticks to see them burst into flames or watched a guide toast marshmallows on hot rocks as they hiked on Guatemala’s Pacaya volcano, which days earlier had spewed lava.  

From the peak of Pacaya they had a clear view of the nearby Volcano of Fire, which erupted June 3, emitting a fast-moving avalanche of super-heated muck that killed at least 110 people and left about 200 missing.

“I would encourage people to come and see the beauty of the place; there’s nothing necessarily to fear,” said Maximilian Penn, a chef from New York gazing at the breathtaking view. “It’s just important to have an understanding of what’s going on here. It’s a dangerous place, so you should have respect.” 

Volcano tourism is the life blood of villages like San Francisco de Sales, perched near Pacaya’s peak, and for locals it is a question of learning to live with a generous monster. Pacaya is the main tourist draw as it is more accessible while also offering a clear view of the Volcano of Fire. 

Silvia Sazo, one of the few female tour guides at Pacaya, saw her own home destroyed by a 2010 eruption. Her family rebuilt in the same place, and there are still spots on the ground near her house where vapor and heat stream from the ground. 

“You can put eggs, corn and chayotes in the ground, and they cook,” she said. “We don’t have anywhere else to live. … This is our way of life.”

The Pacaya volcano began having effusive eruptions in 2006 while the deadly blast of ash and rock from the Volcano of Fire was an explosive eruption. 

Although locals don’t use the scientific terms, they know the difference: Explosive eruptions of ash, gas and rock can easily kill, while effusive eruptions — lava flows — can be interesting for tourists to look at. Some volcanos have both types, and Pacaya had an explosive blast in 2010 that killed a reporter and two locals. 

But there is always danger with both types, including the emission of toxic gases, notes John Stix, a professor at the earth and planetary sciences department at McGill University in Canada.

“I think anyone who visits an active volcano needs to appreciate that there is some risk involved, and the risk increases as one gets closer to the active vent or crater,” Stix wrote.

Which, in far less scientific terms, is what locals say.

“We don’t worry about the lava, we worry about the crater” from which explosive eruptions come, said Sazo.

Residents who depend on Pacaya for their livelihood have learned to respect and read the volcano, like park maintenance worker Juan Francisco Alfaro, who lives in the nearby hamlet of Patrocinio. 

“We are always alert. You don’t wait, you go if there is an explosive eruption,” Alfaro said. 

Many carefully watch the color of the plumes coming from the crater: White is OK, but black means danger. 

“We have a lot of respect for it,” Alfaro said. “One sees what happened to San Miguel Los Lotes,” which was destroyed by the Volcano of Fire eruption.

Jose Quezada, who has guided tours for 18 years, estimates half the people in San Francisco de Sales earn a living from volcano tourism. 

“Over time, we have learned to live with the volcano,” he said. “You don’t fool around with the volcano.”

Each day, Quezada gets reports from residents who have hiked up the mountain earlier in the day about where it is safe to take tour groups. Going to the summit and peering into the crater is no longer allowed. 

“If there is a change in the volcano, a change in its activity, we return immediately,” he said. 

Tourists come to Pacaya for the altitude, cool weather, stunning views and singular experience of seeing the force of nature. 

The altitude — the volcanos are the only geographic features rising off the steamy plains — is one reason why many people live in villages like San Francisco de Sales. It is perfect for growing coffee, but after a plant disease wiped out coffee trees, people recently began planting avocados. 

“Coffee is no longer profitable after we got coffee rust,” said farmer Roberto Mijango. “We’re only getting paid $18 for a 100-pound (46-kilogram) sack of coffee berries. The fertilizer costs more than that.”

But the 3- and 4-year-old avocado trees won’t bear enough fruit to support the farmers for another few years. So without the tourism income, the villages around Pacaya would be impoverished.  

Samuel Dandoy, a tourist from a town in Belgium near the French border, stood near the top of Pacaya on Friday looking at the lava flow. 

“I really came for the volcanos in Guatemala,” said Dandoy. “I feel amazed. It’s really impressive.”

Dandoy and his traveling companion, Camille Bourbeau of Montreal, lived through the ash that fell on Antigua from the Volcano of Fire. 

The two joined relief efforts, making sandwiches and distributing them to victims and rescuers. 

“I couldn’t just sit there, I had to do something,” said Bourbeau. “I volunteered a bit. I made sandwiches for them. I went to give the supplies that were donated, so I felt I tried to help.”
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Teen Girl Coders Choreograph Digital Dance

Posted on by Cobiz

By mixing dance with the disciplines of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, an all-girl public school in New York encourages its students to go into the Stem fields. According to the U.S. National Science Foundation, while women make up half of the college-educated workforce, less that 30 percent of science and engineering jobs are filled by women. VOA Correspondent Mariama Diallo reports.
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Hungarian Filmmaker Tells Domestic Slave’s Story – and Helps Her Escape

Posted on by Corts

When filmmaker Bernadett Tuza-Ritter met 52-year-old Marish, a Hungarian factory worker and maid, she was drawn to her haggard face – one that seemed as if it belonged to a much older woman.

Tuza-Ritter asked if she could film Marish’s life, factory by day and househelp by night, for a few days to make a five-minute film. But those few days turned into 18 months as the director slowly understood the dark reality she was capturing.

“I’m not sure there was a moment I realized my film was uncovering modern slavery; it was a gradual process,” said the director of “A Woman Captured” — an 85-minute documentary about domestic slavery screened at the Sheffield Doc Fest this week.

“My eyes are open now and it will be impossible to keep them closed again,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation at the U.K. premiere of her film, which was featured at Sundance in January.

The documentary closely follows the life of Marish, a single mother who has been trapped for more than a decade as an unpaid domestic worker in Hungary by an abusive employer called Eta.

One of millions of women worldwide enslaved in domestic servitude – through physical or psychological coercion – Marish sleeps on a sofa, only eats leftovers, and is forced to take out loans for her boss and hand over her wages from the factory.

In the film, Marish yearns to be reunited with her teenage daughter who had been driven from the house by Eta years before.

“Happiness is not for me,” she tells Tuza-Ritter on camera, which remains almost entirely fixed on Marish during the film.

Eta – who has two other maids employed in similar conditions – allows the filmmaker into her home in exchange for payment and in the belief that she has nothing to hide or be ashamed of.

“It’s not like she’s under control,” Eta says in the film – off-screen as her face is never revealed – explaining how she provides Marish with food, cigarettes and a roof over her head.

Despite her initial hopelessness, Marish grows in confidence through her bond with Tuza-Ritter and the film culminates in her escape by night and an eventual reunion with her young daughter.

“I felt responsible for her and I felt guilty,” Tuza-Ritter said at Britain’s biggest documentary festival. “I know documentary filmmakers talk of observational filming, but that was impossible.”

Anti-slavery activists hope the film will shine a light on the hidden nature of domestic servitude and modern slavery – an industry that affects an estimated 40 million people worldwide.

“The heart-breaking story of Marish shows the reality of millions of women trapped in slavery across the world … All too often, slavery is also hidden in plain sight,” said Klara Skrivankova of London-based charity Anti-Slavery International. “We should look closely around us and be aware that domestic slavery – coercion and violence – can be happening next door.”
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Mozart Score Among Hundreds of Manuscripts to Be Auctioned in Paris

Posted on by Corts

A score by Mozart and a letter from Vincent Van Gogh are among hundreds of lots up for grabs this month in auctions of items by composers, artists and writers.

They are going under the hammer in Paris as part of a series of sales aimed at liquidating a 130,000-item collection of art, music and literary works put together by French group Aristophil, which was set up in 1990 and raised funds from investors in exchange for a share in the pieces.

The group went bankrupt in 2015 and Aristophil founder Gerard Lheritier has put under investigation for fraud, a charge he has denied.

The first sale took place in December and the next round kicks off this week, with the Mozart score estimated to fetch between 120,000 euros and 150,000 euros ($141,500 to $177,000) and a letter with illustrations from Van Gogh to his friend Anthon van Rappard seen selling at around 250,000-300,000 euros.

“The market is awaiting these sales because Aristophil bought everything for several years,” Claude Aguttes of Aguttes auctioneers said.

“Now all of these works are available again, so people are happy first to be able to see them at various exhibitions and then to bid on them and maybe acquire them.”
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US Has FIFA Edge Over Risky Morocco in 2026 World Cup Vote

Posted on by Corts

If the football federations follow FIFA’s guidance, the 2026 World Cup should be awarded to the North American bid on Wednesday.

Success for Morocco relies on the electorate to follow the trend of recent hosting decisions and vote for a risky bid facing doubts about the ability to pull off the vast reconstruction project required to stage soccer’s showpiece.

The 16 stadiums proposed by the joint United States-Canada-Mexico bid already exist and only need minor upgrades over eight years.

All 14 Moroccan venues must be built or renovated as part of the $16 billion investment in new infrastructure the African nation says is required.

FIFA’s inspection reports highlighted three “high-risk” elements to Morocco’s bid: stadiums, hotels and transport.

When FIFA President Gianni Infantino last week urged the more than 200 voting federations to “look at the report,” it seemed a clear signal of the governing body’s preference for security and stability offered them in North America.

A consequence of concerns expressed about the 2010 contest that resulted in hosting rights awarded to Russia for 2018 and to Qatar for 2022 was a more rigorous bidding process that required candidates to produce human rights strategies.

Morocco’s bid was singled out for “unexplored risks” in evaluations of those strategies that were produced by the BSR organization for FIFA.

In the evaluation, BSR said the Moroccan bid documents “lack consideration of topics highlighted as potential human rights risks in key international documents covering mega sporting events.”

BSR expressed apprehension about “discrimination against LGBTQ,” a reference the Moroccan law that criminalizes homosexuality. 

Qatar’s World Cup preparations have been dogged by concerns about working conditions on stadiums, which could make voting members nervous considering a Moroccan victory would require years of extensive building work on stadium or training facilities.

An “assessment of risks associated with working conditions is insufficiently developed,” BSR said, “and does not provide detailed information on risks associated specifically with health and safety, working hours, wage, and the prevalence of informal economy in the country.”

Morocco’s bid proposes completing a 93,000-capacity Grand Stade de Casablanca one year before the World Cup kicks off. Several of its 14 venues would meet the World Cup minimum 40,000-capacity, then be scaled back to 25,000 after the tournament. In a pitch to voters in Moscow this week justifying the vast infrastructure required, Morocco tourism minister Lamia Boutaleb talked of needing to create jobs in her country “to reach the next level.”

The joint bid from North America offers a choice from 23 stadiums including three each in Canada and Mexico, which are each scheduled to host 10 games. The United States would stage 60 games, and the 87,000-capacity MetLife Stadium near New York is proposed for the final.

Here’s a closer look at the bids:

Money

The big numbers for projected budgets, revenues and profits used in World Cup and Olympic bidding are best treated with caution. 

FIFA foresaw at least $1.76 billion from North American estimates of selling 5 million match tickets. However, that would have to cover $390 million in expected stadium rental fees. Hospitality sales are predicted at $1.3 billion.

Morocco’s combined tickets and hospitality revenue would be $1.07 billion, according to FIFA analysis. Free use of stadiums is promised.

Morocco topped only one of the nine categories scored by FIFA — offering lower tournament running costs due to planning for 14 stadiums in only 12 cities compared with a 16-stadium, 16-city project in three countries. 

On broadcast rights income for FIFA, Morocco stresses its sweet spot in a time zone that’s good for European and African viewers. 

Picking the North Americans would earn FIFA $300 million in bonuses from broadcasters, including Fox and Telemundo, who already secured 2026 rights three years ago before knowing if it would be a “home” tournament. FIFA awarded those in a no-tender process to avoid legal action for moving the 2022 tournament dates in Qatar from the middle to the end of the year.

Politics 

A World Cup vote always has real world politics factored in.

President Donald Trump’s attempted travel ban targeting some Muslim-majority countries, and some comments that offended African and Central American countries, framed some of the early 2026 campaigning. 

Although FIFA vice president Sandor Csanyi on Tuesday said “I think there is no anti-United feeling.” 

In recent weeks, Trump publicly reminded traditional U.S. allies he is watching who they support when FIFA publishes each national football federation’s pick after the vote.

The Western Sahara issue also arose in campaigning, with some voters reminded that Morocco annexed the former Spanish colony in 1975. The Polisario Front liberation movement aims to end Morocco’s presence there.

“Football people have to stay away from non-football reasons (to vote),” said Estonia football president Aivar Pohlak, who is a FIFA ethics committee judge. 

Transport

North America’s bid is spread over four time zones and will necessitate air travel for a large percentage of traveling fans, and FIFA’s panel was unimpressed with some city public transport services.

Morocco promises fans can move around the country by road or train in a single time zone aligned with big European television markets. FIFA’s panel classed as “medium risk” Morocco’s plans for “a very large number of ambitious” transport projects by 2026.

Voting

Though FIFA voters rarely reveal their intentions in advance, the North Americans appear to have enough momentum to carry the 104 votes which would guarantee a first-ballot victory.  

With FIFA rules denying the candidate countries a vote, and Kosovo expected to be absent, 206 of FIFA’s 211 member federations should take part. Previously, FIFA’s elected board members chose World Cup hosts in private.
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Florida Georgia Line Built Legacy One Hit Song at a Time

Posted on by Corts

Country duo Florida Georgia Line has built its career one hit song at a time thanks to key collaborations, while also taking quiet steps to establish a lasting songwriting legacy in Nashville.

 

Since blasting into the music scene in 2012 with “Cruise,” featuring Nelly, the duo of Tyler Hubbard and Brian Kelley is once again commanding the charts with Bebe Rexha on their co-written mid-tempo smash “Meant to Be.” The pop crossover hit is already three-times platinum and surpassed the number of weeks that “Cruise” spent on top the Billboard Hot Country chart. “Meant To Be” has been at the top for 28 weeks now, marking the longest time for a song by a woman to reign at No. 1, but it’s still behind the all-time country chart leader “Body Like a Backroad” by Sam Hunt at 34 weeks.

 

But aside from the unprecedented chart success, the duo has been investing a lot of their time in building up their publishing company, Tree Vibez, and its roster of more than a half-dozen writers, producers and artists.

 

In the posh Hillsboro Village neighborhood of Nashville, Hubbard and Kelley talked about the importance of songwriting inside their Tree Vibez headquarters. The front of the building is clothing store that Kelley and his wife Brittney own, but the rest of the building has sunlit rooms filled with guitars, including a studio, an office and small balconies that look out onto leafy magnolia trees and nearby campus of Belmont University, where they met as students.

 

“We’ve been on a hot streak lately,” said Hubbard as he stood on one of the balconies with Kelley. “I feel like all our writers are inspired. I don’t know if it’s this building. There’s such a cool energy here and I think that comes through and translates through the songs.”

 

Florida Georgia Line is arguably the biggest duo in country music since Brooks & Dunn, and their genre-less approach to country music has gained them both plenty of fans and haters. They have three of the five longest-leading songs atop Billboard’s Hot Country chart, including “Cruise,” “H.O.L.Y” and now “Meant To Be.”

 

“They tend to write the songs that make the whole world sing,” said Craig Wiseman, writer and owner of Big Loud, the publishing, management and record company that initially signed the duo.

 

They’ve collaborated with artists like The Chainsmokers, Hailee Steinfeld and the Backstreet Boys and have teased new collaborations with Jason Derulo and Jason Aldean that will be on their upcoming fourth album, which doesn’t have an official release date yet.

 

“Meant to Be” came out of an improbable last-minute co-write in Los Angeles set up by their respective managers. Hubbard said they were at a loss for ideas as they headed over to the studio when his wife Hayley offered some advice.

 

“We were all talking about what’s this going to be like and who is Bebe Rexha anyway?” Hubbard said. “My wife says, ‘You know what, you’ve already written a great song today. If it’s meant to be, it’ll be. Don’t worry about it.'”

 

Within hours, the three took that line and made it the chorus of the song. Although initially marketed as a pop song, the song quickly crossed over to country markets. Rexha has clapped back at critics who have questioned whether “Meant To Be” belongs on the country chart.

 

“I just think some people are small minded,”Rexha said at the Academy of Country Music Awards in Las Vegas in April, where they all performed. “And what’s happening with country music and the country world, it’s expanding. And you know Maren Morris over there, she is doing that also with Zedd and doing her own thing. And I think that’s really special. It’s like blurring the lines a little bit. I like shaking things up.”

 

At a party this month celebrating FGL’s last four hit singles, Hubbard said the song introduced them to new international audience, while Rexha “gained a bunch of redneck fans.”

 

“I don’t ever think we’re writing for FGL anymore,” Hubbard said. “I think we’re just writing a hit song and then it goes where it goes. Usually if another artist is in the room, we’re trying to write their next single.”

 

The pair has survived being initially painted as bro-country partiers following their first album, “Here’s to the Good Times.” Each successive album has allowed them to reshape their image as they write about their faith and their families. Both are married and Hubbard is a new father to a baby girl. Their newest single, “Simple,” is yet another re-invention with a more stripped down, folk-rock sound.

 

After honored as trailblazers by Billboard magazine recently, Kelley said they’ve been successful by not following a traditional path in country music.

 

“I think a trailblazer is someone that finds a different piece of real estate that they can own in the country music industry in a sense,” said Kelley, “We found our piece of real estate and owned it.”

 

Their collaborators and co-writers say that they are hard workers and committed to writing as often as possible. When not in Nashville, the duo has a Tree Vibez writing bus that will go out on the road with them, or with other artists, which gives them a place to write and cut demos just about anywhere. Each Friday their writers send them demos of songs and they’ll respond back with comments and critiques.

 

Downstairs in the TreeVibez studio, writer/producer Corey Crowder was working on a new track from country singer Frankie Ballard when Kelley and Hubbard walked in. Crowder, whose best known for working as a producer and writer with Chris Young, played the song for Hubbard and Kelley. Kelley leaned over the board and made a suggestion for a breakdown in the bridge of the song, before declaring that Ballard’s voice is “like butter.”

 

Wiseman said in the midst of all their success, the two have always made time to help out new artists or writers that they believe in. One example is Jordan Schmidt, one of their writers who has co-written three recent No. 1 country singles — Jason Aldean’s “Lights Come On” and “You Make It Easy” and Kane Brown’s two-week chart topper “What Ifs” with Lauren Alaina.

 

If you asked the pair how they’ve been able to write hit after hit, they attribute it to God’s plan to work through them.

 

“God’s at work and he’s kind of showing out,” said Hubbard. “By no stretch of the imagination do I think BK and I are doing all this. I do think it’s really fun to be open and let him be in control.”
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WHO Chief: ‘We Are Still at War’ With Ebola

Posted on by Cosc

The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) on Tuesday cautioned against declaring victory too early in Congo’s Ebola epidemic, despite encouraging signs that it may be brought under control.

“The outbreak is stabilizing, but still the outbreak is not over,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told journalists on a visit to Democratic Republic of Congo’s capital Kinshasa. “We are still at war, and we need to continue to strengthen our surveillance and … be very vigilant.”

WHO officials on Friday expressed cautious optimism that the epidemic of the deadly virus was stabilizing, partly owing to the swift deployment of vaccines.

But a day earlier, Congo’s health ministry reported its first confirmed case of Ebola in over a week, in the rural community of Iboko.

Ghebreyesus said 2,200 people had been vaccinated, and that case management and tracing contacts of victims had gone well.

But he said: “It’s not over until it is over. Even if one case crosses into Congo (Republic) and gets to an urban area, that could trigger another epidemic.”

The hemorrhagic fever has killed 27 people since the outbreak began in April, and there have been 62 cases, 38 of which were confirmed in a laboratory. A further 14 are probable Ebola cases, and 10 more people are suspected of having Ebola.

In contrast to past Ebola outbreaks health workers have moved quickly to halt Congo’s latest epidemic. Ebola killed at least 11,300 people in 2013-16 in West Africa and during that outbreak WHO was criticized for not taking it seriously enough in its early stages.
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Frustrated AMA Adopts Sweeping Policies to Cut Gun Violence

Posted on by Cosc

With frustration mounting over lawmakers’ inaction on gun control, the American Medical Association on Tuesday pressed for a ban on assault weapons and came out against arming teachers as a way to fight what it calls a public health crisis.

At its annual policymaking meeting, the nation’s largest physicians group bowed to unprecedented demands from doctor-members to take a stronger stand on gun violence — a problem the organizations says is as menacing as a lethal infectious disease.

The action comes against a backdrop of recurrent school shootings, everyday street violence in the nation’s inner cities, and rising U.S. suicide rates.

“We as physicians are the witnesses to the human toll of this disease,” Dr. Megan Ranney, an emergency-medicine specialist at Brown University, said at the meeting.

AMA delegates voted to adopt several of nearly a dozen gun-related proposals presented from doctor groups that are part of the AMA’s membership. They agreed to:

 — Support laws that would require licensing and safety courses for gun owners and registration of all firearms.

 — Press for legislation that would allow relatives of suicidal people or those who have threatened imminent violence to seek court-ordered removal of guns from the home.

 — Encourage better training for physicians in how to recognize patients at risk for suicide.

 — Push for eliminating loopholes in laws preventing the purchase or possession of guns by people found guilty of domestic violence, including expanding such measures to cover convicted stalkers.

Many AMA members are gun owners or supporters, including a doctor from Montana who told delegates of learning to shoot at a firing range in the basement of her middle school as part of gym class. But support for banning assault weapons was overwhelming, with the measure adopted in a 446-99 vote.

“There’s a place to start and this should be it,” Dr. Jim Hinsdale, a San Jose, California, trauma surgeon, said before the vote. 

Gun violence is not a new issue for the AMA; it has supported past efforts to ban assault weapons; declared gun violence a public health crisis; backed background checks, waiting periods and better funding for mental health services; and pressed for more research on gun violence prevention.

But Dr. David Barbe, whose one-year term as AMA president ended Tuesday, called the number of related measures on this year’s agenda extraordinary and said recent violence, including the Parkland, Florida, school shooting and the Las Vegas massacre, “spurred a new sense of urgency … while Congress fails to act.”

“It has been frustrating that we have seen so little action from either state or federal legislators,” he said. “The most important audience for our message right now is our legislators, and second most important is the public, because sometimes it requires public pressure on the legislators.”

While it is no longer viewed as the unified voice of American medicine, the AMA has more clout with politicians and the public than other doctor groups. It counted more than 243,000 members in 2017, up slightly for the seventh straight year. But it represents less than one-quarter of the nation’s million-plus physicians.

AMA members cited U.S. government data showing almost 40,000 deaths by gun in 2016, including suicides, and nearly 111,000 gun injuries. Both have been rising in recent years. 

By comparison, U.S. deaths from diabetes in 2016 totaled almost 80,000; Alzheimer’s, 111,000; and lung disease, 155,000. The leaders are heart disease, with 634,000 deaths in 2016, and cancer, about 600,000.
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Malaria Drug May Fall Short for Children, Pregnant Women

Posted on by Cosc

The most widely used antimalarial therapy may not fully treat some children and pregnant women, according to a new study.

These patients’ bloodstreams contained lower concentrations of one active ingredient compared to adults who aren’t pregnant.

The research may explain why standard doses of artemether-lumefantrine combination therapy (ACT) sometimes fail to cure these sensitive groups. It suggests a change in the treatment regimen may help raise cure rates and prevent resistance.

But experts say this study alone is not enough to warrant changing treatment recommendations.

Treatment failures

Malaria cases have fallen by 60 percent since 2000, thanks to an intensive, multibillion-dollar global campaign of prevention and treatment. But the disease still claims more than 400,000 lives per year, mostly young children in sub-Saharan Africa.

Pills combining artemether and lumefantrine are the most commonly used antimalarial treatment worldwide. The 3-day treatment is generally safe and effective.

However, most drug trials have not included children and pregnant women, who may absorb or metabolize drugs differently than others.

Some studies have found they are more likely than others to contract malaria again within weeks of ACT treatment. Results vary, but some research found failure rates as high as 20 percent.

Lower blood levels

Writing in the journal PLOS Medicine, researchers combined data from 31 studies including more than 4,000 patients. They looked at concentrations of lumefantrine in the blood seven days after treatment began.

Lumefantrine is the longer-lasting part of the drug combination. It is intended to prevent relapses.

The study found lumefantrine levels were 20 percent lower than average in pregnant women’s blood, and 15 to 25 percent less in children.

“This is pretty important,” said lead author Frank Kloprogge at University College London. Drug levels that far below average “can really make a difference.”

Treatment failure is not the only risk. Malaria parasites exposed to lower levels of the drug may survive treatment and produce resistant strains. “And this is, of course, a longer term, potentially, really big problem,” he said.

The scientists developed a model that suggests taking the pills for 5 days would be more effective than the current 3-day schedule.

More information needed

The study is “very well done and important,” said Andrea Bosman, Malaria Prevention, Diagnosis and Treatment Coordinator at the World Health Organization.

However, Bosman added, “it is still a modeling study, and we do not generally make recommendations based on modeling studies alone. We require clinical data.”

Changing therapies is complicated, he notes. The longer treatment lasts, the less people stick to it. That, too, raises the risk that treatment will fail and resistance will develop.

Also, he adds, the bigger issue is poor-quality drugs, which are widespread in much of the malaria-prone world.

Opinions are split over how big a problem the reports of treatment failure in children and pregnant women are.

Earlier this year, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention analyzed 21 studies. “They thought we should keep the regime exactly where it is,” noted molecular biologist Brian Grimberg at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine.

Sleepy parasites

Scientists are still debating why treatment fails. The parasites may have developed resistance, or they may be what Grimberg calls “sleepy parasites.”

“They’re not resistant to the drug. They just go to sleep,” he said. “If it’s true that they’re sleepy, then maybe a longer duration of the treatment regime would be helpful.”

Kloprogge and colleagues are applying for funding to conduct a clinical trial of the 5-day treatment schedule. It will be several years before results are available.
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High-Profile Suicides Could Influence Students, Teens

Posted on by Cosc

The recent suicides of high-profile celebrities lead experts to worry that young people will copy the act of taking their own lives.

“They think, ‘Well, OK, that person hung themselves from a banister using 10-foot rope,’ then that might be something that they want to emulate,” said Blaise Aguirre, M.D., a psychiatrist specializing in mood and personality disorders in adolescents at McLean Hospital outside Boston. 

“The sensationalism can make this option seem attractive,” comedian Bridget Phetasy, who has struggled with suicidal thoughts, wrote in a New York Post op-ed. “In all these cases, I’ve heard more details about their deaths than I care to know, and I can’t help but feel like the way we’re covering these deaths isn’t helping.” 

Suicide is the second-leading cause of death among 15- to 29-year-olds around the world, according to the World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva, and has more than doubled in the past decade. Only road traffic fatalities top suicide as the primary cause of adolescent deaths, with boys accounting for 77 percent of those deaths worldwide. 

Experts say they are frustrated by the attention given to celebrity suicides, such as travel TV host Anthony Bourdain and fashion designer Kate Spade last week, and the impact on youths at risk. High-profile suicide can trigger contagion, which acts like a virus and may push others to take their lives. After the 2014 suicide of Robin Williams, a popular comedian and actor, researchers saw a nearly 10 percent increase in suicides. People grieving a suicide were 65 percent more likely to attempt to take their own life, a study from the University of London showed. 

No one is sure why the contagion effect exists, Aguirre said. He said he thinks that hearing or reading about a suicide “activates neurons that are correlated with suicide” and makes suicide more acceptable to those at risk. Contagion does not influence people who are not at risk, he said.

Many experts say media about suicide amplifies contagion. The popular show 13 Reasons Why, based on a young-adult novel by Jay Asher, follows 17-year-old Clay Jensen as he listens to tapes left by his deceased classmate Hannah, explaining why she killed herself. Asher’s novel was published in 2007 and made the American Library Association’s list of most banned books in 2012 and again in 2017, the year the Netflix show first aired.

Critics say the show and its explicit portrayal of Hannah’s suicide is irresponsible. The suicide is more graphic in the TV series than the book. 

“In a person who is not at risk, it’s not a dangerous show,” Aguirre said. “But in a person who is at risk, it’s a very dangerous show.”

Nic Sheff, who wrote the episode that portrays Hannah’s suicide, defended himself in a Vanity Fair op-ed.

“Facing these issues head-on — talking about them, being open about them — will always be our best defense against losing another life,” he wrote. “It overwhelmingly seems to me that the most irresponsible thing we could’ve done would have been not to show the death at all.”

The controversy remains fresh. Katrina Sheffield, a Florida mom, said the show inspired her daughter’s suicide attempt in May. Her daughter sent a text during her attempt, saying that it was “taking longer” than on 13 Reasons Why, and her method was similar to Hannah’s.

“I have told our daughter that instead of finding 13 reasons why — let’s find 14 on why not!” Sheffield wrote. In a Facebook video, she urged parents to talk to their children about suicide. 

Females are more likely to have suicidal thoughts, called ideation, although the suicide rate is almost four times higher in males. In the U.S., rates are increasing overall, reports the CDC. 

Research suggests that age and race are closely correlated with self-harm statistics. Black children aged 5 to 12 are twice as likely to commit suicide as their white peers, but black teens aged 13 to 17 are 50 percent less likely to do so than white teens. 

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and other (LGBTQ+) students are also at high-risk — they’re more than twice as likely to consider suicide and over three times more likely to attempt it than their heterosexual peers. Nearly 45 percent of transgender respondents to a Canadian survey reported that they had planned an attempt at least once. 

Facebook has released a program intended to spot users at risk of suicide or self-harm based on their posts, even if no one reports it. 

The World Health Organization offers a guide on reporting suicide, advising the media to be cautious “in reporting celebrity suicides.” 

“Don’t place stories about suicide prominently, and do not unduly repeat such stories,” WHO advised. It discourages describing suicide details, such as method or location.

“The more detail that you give legitimizes that way of doing it. Why not just say the person died by suicide and have that be its own talking point?” Aguirre said. Describing the suicide in detail “doesn’t tell you about the underlying mental health.”

American mental health advocacy groups called for increased attention to and funding for mental health issues following news last week of the death of Bourdain and Spade.

“Too many people in America do not have access to mental health services, and too often we neglect the impacts of traumatic events that sometimes fester for decades before taking people’s lives,” Paul Gionfriddo, president and CEO of Mental Health America, said in a statement.

“With all of us working together, and by collectively making a massive investment in suicide prevention research, resources and quality mental health care, we can, and we will, reverse the rising suicide rate,” the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention wrote.

“Suicide Prevention is a social justice Issue,” tweeted mental health advocate Jacob Griffin. 

South African law student, writer and activist Luke Waltham called for action.

“Actively make your spaces brave ones where people, including yourself, can speak about your feelings and experiences,” Waltham tweeted.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-TALK (8255)
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European Central Bank to Weigh End to Stimulus Program

Posted on by Coeco

The European Central Bank will on Thursday weigh when and how to end its bond-buying stimulus program — an exit that will have far-reaching consequences across the economy, from long-suffering savers to Europe’s indebted governments.

 

The bank, which sets monetary policy for the 19 countries that use the euro, has been buying 30 billion euros ($35.5 billion) a month in government and corporate bonds from banks. The purchases are slated to run at least through September, and longer if necessary.

 

Analysts say that decisions on the exit path, which could include several intermediate steps, might come Thursday or at the July 26 meeting. Scenarios include reducing the purchases past September, and then stopping them at the end of the year.

 

An end to the stimulus would be part of a major shift in the global economy. The ECB would be joining the U.S. Federal Reserve in withdrawing the massive monetary stimulus deployed to combat the Great Recession and its aftermath. The Fed is expected to raise rates at its meeting Wednesday.

 

The ECB’s bond purchases, which started in March 2015, pump newly printed money into the economy, which in theory should help raise inflation toward the bank’s goal of just under 2 percent. Inflation was an annual 1.9 percent in May, but the bank needs to be able to say that inflation will stay in line with its target even after the stimulus is withdrawn.

 

Market participants pricked up their ears last week when top ECB official Peter Praet said Thursday’s meeting would be an occasion to consider when to wind down the program. Praet supervises economics at the ECB as a member of its six-member executive board and in that capacity proposes monetary policy moves for debate and decision by the 25-member governing council. That gives his words extra weight.

 

The impact of the ECB’s bond-buying stimulus has been felt across the economy.

 

It has pushed up the prices of assets like stocks, bonds and real estate but also lowered returns for savers. It has helped keep borrowing costs low for European governments as the ECB purchases have driven bond prices up and yields down. Yields and prices move in opposite directions.

 

For example, the Italian government, which is burdened with the second-highest debt load in the eurozone after Greece at 132 percent of gross domestic product, pays only 2.79 percent annually to borrow for 10 years. That’s less than the 2.96 percent yield on 10-year U.S. Treasurys.

 

The ECB meeting will be held in Riga, Latvia, as one of the ECB’s occasional road meetings away from its Frankfurt headquarters to underline its role as a pan-European institution. A bribery investigation is expected to keep the head of the host central bank, Ilmars Rimsevics, from attending the meeting and news conference with ECB President Mario Draghi.

The ECB is continuing its slow progress toward withdrawing the stimulus despite turbulence in Italy, where the new populist government has questioned the spending and debt restrictions required of euro members. Concerns over Italian politics caused big swings in the country’s financial markets for several days last month, before easing.

 

Analysts Joerg Kraemer and Michael Schubert at Commerzbank said that the ECB may soon have to end its stimulus program anyway as it risks running out of bonds that are eligible for purchase. The ECB has limited itself to no more than one-third of any member country’s outstanding bonds to avoid becoming the dominant creditor of member states.

 

With the purchases widely expected to be stopped at the end of this year, they said, attention would now turn to how long the bank would wait after the bond-purchase exit before starting to raise its interest rate benchmarks.

 

“The ECB probably wants to ensure that the end of bond purchases does not unleash speculation about interest rate hikes,” they wrote in a research note. “The ECB Council… might declare that rates will not be increased for ‘at least’ six months after the end of purchases.”

 

Currently the short-term interest rate benchmark is zero, and the rate on deposits left by commercial banks at the ECB is negative 0.4 percent. The negative rate is a penalty aimed at pushing banks to lend that money instead of hoard it.

 

 
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Vietnam Passes Sweeping New Cybersecurity Law

Posted on by Cobiz

Vietnamese lawmakers have approved a new cybersecurity law that human rights activists say will stifle freedom of speech.

The law will require online content providers such as Google and Facebook to remove content deemed offensive by authorities within 24 hours, and store the personal data of its customers on servers based in Vietnam, and to open offices in the Communist-run country.

Clare Agar, Amnesty International’s director of global operations, issued a statement denouncing Tuesday’s passage of the law. Agar said “the online space was a relative refuge” within Vietnam’s “deeply repressive climate” where people could go to share ideas and opinions “with less fear of censure by the authorities.”

The new law now means “there is no safe place left,” Agar said.

The United States and Canada urged Vietnam to delay passage of the bill, citing concerns it could pose “obstacles to Vietnam’s cybersecurity and digital innovation future.” 

The Vietnam Digital Communication Association says the law could reduce the country’s gross domestic product by 1.7 percent, and wipe out 3.1 percent of foreign investment.

Vo Trong Viet, the head of the government’s defense and security committee, acknowledged that requiring content providers to open data centers inside Vietnam would increase their costs, but said it was necessary ensure the country’s cybersecurity.
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Tired of Unemployment, Kashmir Women Decide to Open Their Online Business

Posted on by Coeco

The separatist campaign in Indian-administered Kashmir broke out into major violence in 1989. More than 60,000 people are estimated to have died and 10,000 to have disappeared in the disputed Himalayan region. That has pushed their families into poverty. For the region’s youth, earning a living has been a challenge, especially educated young women. However, one group of young entrepreneurs is taking matters into their own hands. Yusuf Jameel has more, in this report narrated by Bezhan Hamdard.
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Young Entrepreneurs Motivated by Purpose, Not Just Profit

Posted on by Coeco

The new generation of global entrepreneurs is going into business motivated by purpose rather than just profit, according to research by the HSBC banking group released on Tuesday.

One in four entrepreneurs aged under 35 said they were more motivated by social impact than by moneymaking, compared to just over one in 10 of those aged over 55, according the results of the HSBC survey.

“Our research suggests this is a generational shift,” Stuart Parkinson, global chief investment officer of HSBC, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. “Younger entrepreneurs are focused on environmental and social concerns and that’s because they see these values as being their own.”

The bank surveyed 3,700 entrepreneurs in 11 countries. One in five said their priority as a business owner was to deliver solutions to environmental and social challenges.

Parkinson said social media had brought greater scrutiny of businesses, while awareness of the social and environmental impacts of business practices had also increased.

“Social enterprise has taken off as this new formula for success, which is this combination of capitalism and doing good, and younger entrepreneurs are clearly leading this,” he said.

Social enterprises are businesses with a mission to benefit society or the environment as well as turn a profit and Britain is seen as a global leader in the innovative sector.

Last year it had about 70,000 employing nearly 1 million people last year, according to membership organization Social Enterprise UK, up from 55,000 businesses in 2007.

Zakia Moulaoui runs the social enterprise Invisible Cities, which employs homeless people as city guides in Edinburgh, and plans to expand the business to Manchester and Glasgow by the end of the year.

The 31-year-old said there was a greater awareness amongst her generation that being able to address social issues and earn an income was possible.

“People who thought they couldn’t do that because they needed to make a living for themselves might have just worked in a regular business and volunteered at the weekend, but now people know they can reconcile the two,” Moulaoui said.

Britain’s Confederation of British Industry (CBI), an employers’ group, has found that two thirds of 18- to 34-year-olds think companies should put society’s interest first.

“This is a view shared by employees, customers and communities. CEOs of firms of all sizes are clearer than ever before — purpose and profit go hand in hand,” said Josh Hardie, deputy director-general of the CBI.
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Indonesian Agency Tries to Flex Soft Power Through Art

Posted on by Corts

Indonesia is rich in commodities such as oil, gas, gold and tin, but a handful of government officials think its most powerful resources are cultural. 

They belong to a dynamic young body called the Creative Economy Agency, or BEKRAF (an acronym derived from its Indonesian name) that was created in 2015 by President Joko Widodo to promote Indonesia’s cultural output both at home and abroad.

“Oil and gas are finite resources. The only thing that lasts forever is creativity,” said Boni Pudjianto, BEKRAF’s director for international markets. 

BEKRAF’s staff was appointed meritocratically through an open call to government officers, regardless of background. Boni, for instance, has a doctorate in engineering and was posted at the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology before he joined BEKRAF. 

“It’s an experimental agency,” he said. “It’s a new model for a governmental body.” 

BEKRAF wants to promote the arts of the world’s fourth largest country more effectively to a global audience.

The agency was behind Indonesia’s acclaimed pavilion at this year’s Venice Architecture Biennale, called “Sunyata: The Poetics of Emptiness.” It was Indonesia’s second time at the biennale, following a debut effort in 2014. This entry was overseen from start to finish by BEKRAF, from the selection of six curators to the opening ceremony on May 25. 

“Indonesia is trying to put our architecture at the same level as [that of] other countries,” said Boni, in Venice last month. “And we want to leverage this exposure on the international stage to promote the field back home.”

Key industries

BEKRAF is a “quasi-governmental institution,” according to Boni, that combines representatives of the private sector with competitively chosen government officials. 

It supports Indonesian exhibits at international fairs like Venice’s art and architecture biennales, as well as sundry fashion weeks, expos and film festivals. BEKRAF also backs small businesses and enterprises in creative sectors, like the upstart batik (traditional wax-resist dyed cloth) brand called Rajasamas Batik. 

“Any major festival in the world, we want to participate in it and show the best contemporary art in Indonesia,” said Triawan Munuf, BEKRAF’s chairman. So far, he said, what people know of Indonesian culture, if anything, is Bali (the Hindu-majority island that is popular with tourists) and traditional arts like wayang kulit, or shadow-puppet drama. “But we also have to show our state of the art projects, although it’s not something we can change overnight.”

For example, the late Nelson Mandela famously wore batik, said Triawan. “But we weren’t able to catalyze that into more interest in the batik industry.”

It’s a cautionary tale about relying on any silver bullet to raise an industry’s profile. His vision runs on a longer time frame of years and decades, and on backing many horses across all the creative industries: food, fashion, architecture, art, film, video games and so on.

BEKRAF’s current slate of supported programs includes startup funding workshops in seven cities, a performance by the Jakarta City Philharmonic, an installation of an “Indonesia Music Market” in Cannes, and a booth at the world’s largest technology exhibition in Taiwan.

One early success that Triawan cites is that BEKRAF has helped increase the number of Indonesian films that are seen by Indonesians themselves.

“We went from about 5 percent [of films shown in Indonesian theaters that are made in Indonesia] three years ago to 20 percent today,” he said. BEKRAF deployed incentives like removing films from the “negative investments” list in 2016, and opening the movie industry for foreign investment. “By next year, I hope that number is 50 percent,” Triawan said.

Plans to expand

Arts and culture once fell under the purview of Indonesia’s tourism ministry, but Widodo created BEKRAF as a stand-alone body to further his greater goal of economic growth. 

Indonesia’s creative industries contributed 990.4 trillion Indonesian rupiah, or $71 billion, to the country’s GDP in 2017, about 7.6 percent of the total, and provided jobs for 16.2 million people.

But almost 98 percent of creative industry businesses only market their products locally, according to BEKRAF, due in part to funding and intellectual property constraints. Dealing with those issues on a granular level is BEKRAF’s next big task, beyond big-ticket events like the biennale. 

BEKRAF reportedly got off to a rough start in 2015, taking six months to fill its senior leadership and facing a budget that barely covered its daily operations. But within three years, it has grown into its identity as a unique body within Indonesia’s governing apparatus. 

In Venice, Triawan concluded the inauguration of the Indonesia pavilion, which took the form of an expansive, white, Tvyek-paper parabola, by strolling through some of the neighboring exhibits. He passed the Italian pavilion, which unfolded through several chambers of a warehouse in the Arsenale complex and included dioramas, screens, hanging mobiles, rolling film clips and oblong tables of sculptural objects. Its cerebral and eclectic approach contrasted with Indonesia’s, which primed simplicity and striking visuals. 

Triawan was impressed.

“In 10 years,” he said, gesturing around the warehouse, “We must be like this, too.” Boni agreed.

“We love Italy,” he said. “They are not the most industralized country in Europe. But their products have a special touch of craftsmanship, just like in Indonesia. Everyone knows what ‘Made in Italy’ means. We want them to know what ‘Made in Indonesia’ means, too.”
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New Disclosure Shows Growing Kushner Wealth, Debt

Posted on by Coeco

Financial disclosure forms released late Monday show that White House special adviser — and President Donald Trump’s son-in-law — Jared Kushner’s wealth and debt both appear to have risen over the year, an indication of the complex state of his finances and the potential conflicts that confront some of his investments.

 

Disclosures issued by the White House for Kushner and his wife, Trump’s daughter Ivanka, showed that Kushner held assets totaling at least $181 million. His previous 2017 disclosure had showed assets in at least the $140 million range. Kushner and Ivanka Trump, jointly held at least $240 million in assets last year.

 

The financial disclosures released by the White House and filed with the U.S. Office of Government Ethics routinely show both assets and debts compiled in broad ranges between low and high estimates, making it difficult to precisely chart the rise and fall of the financial portfolios of federal government officials.

 

The White House released the disclosures for Kushner and Ivanka Trump on a heavy news day, while the world’s media lavished attention on President Trump’s preparations to meet with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un for talks over nuclear weapons. The White House had released the president’s own financial report last month.

 

A spokesman for the couple said Monday that the couple’s disclosure portrayed both assets and debts that have not changed much over the past year — and stressed that Kushner and Ivanka Trump have both complied with all federal ethics rules.

 

“Since joining the administration, Mr. Kushner and Ms. Trump have complied with the rules and restrictions as set out by the Office of Government Ethics,” said Peter Mirijanian, a spokesman for the couple’s ethics lawyer, Abbe Lowell. “As to the current filing which OGE also reviews, their net worth remains largely the same, with changes reflecting more the way the form requires disclosure than any substantial difference in assets or liabilities.”

 

One of Kushner’s biggest holdings, a real estate tech startup called Cadre that he co-founded with his brother, Joshua, rose sharply in value. The latest disclosure shows it was worth at least $25 million at the end of last year, up from a minimum value of $5 million in his previous disclosure.

 

The bulk of Ivanka Trump’s assets — more than $50 million worth — was contained in a trust that holds her business and corporations. That trust generated over $5 million in revenue last year.

 

She reported a stake in the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., worth between $5 million and $25 million. The hotel has been a focus of lawsuits against the president and ethics watchdogs who say Trump is violating the Constitution by profiting from his office as diplomats spend big money there.

 

The disclosure also showed that Kushner has assumed growing debt over the past year, both expanding his use of revolving lines of credit and taking on additional debt of between $5 million and $25 million as part of his family company’s purchase last year of a New Jersey apartment complex.

 

A series of interim financial reports last year showed that Kushner had increased lines of credit with Bank of America, New York Community Bank and Signature Bank, each from at least $1 million to $5 million. Such moves do not mean that Kushner has yet accumulated that debt, but has the ability to do so.

 

The new disclosure shows that Kushner did take on a new debt last year with Bank of America worth between $5 million and $25 million — but jointly with other investors in Quail Ridge LLC, a company used for his family firm’s purchase of Quail Ridge, a 1,032-unit apartment community in Plainsboro, N.J., near Princeton. The disclosures also showed that Ivanka Trump owns an interest in that purchase through a family trust.

 

The disclosure showed that Kushner reported making at least $5 million in income from the development since Kushner Companies bought the complex in September. The family business has made a splash with high-profile deals for buildings in New York City in the past decade, but lately has been returning to its roots by buying garden apartments in the suburbs.

 

Under an ethics agreement he signed when he joined the administration in early 2017, Kushner withdrew from his position as CEO of Kushner Companies. But even as a passive investor, he retains many lucrative investments — which ethics critics have warned could raise conflicts of interest.
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Erdogan Seizes on Growth Figures to Persuade Skeptical Public 

Posted on by Coeco

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is campaigning for re-election, seized on the latest Turkish growth figures as a vindication of his economic policies in the face of skepticism from not only voters but international investors of the country’s economic strength.

The economy grew by 7.4 percent in the first quarter, beating expectations. “We continue to be one of the fastest-rowing countries in the world,” Erdogan said at an electoral rally in Istanbul. He also claimed victory against what he called “conspirators” whom he blamed for last month’s heavy falls of the Turkish lira.

In May, the currency fell more than 10 percent as international investors fled the Turkish market over concerns about double-digit inflation and a growing current account deficit. Financial order was only restored by a steep emergency increase in interest rates, which saw the lira recoup some its losses.

Fueling concerns

But analysts warn the strong growth figures will only fuel concerns that the government policy of priming growth by massive public expenditures is unsustainable.

“The current account deficit is more than 6 percent of GDP and inflation above 12 percent, the starting point for the rebalancing process is bad, and a prolonged commitment to a tighter policy mix after the elections will be necessary to avoid further market pressure,” economist Inan Demir of Nomura Holding wrote Monday.

Tighter economic policy usually means reduced government expenditure and higher interest rates.

Turkey’s robust economy has been the bedrock of Erdogan and his ruling AK Party’s 16 years of electoral success. But despite more than a year of sustained strong growth, opinion polls have recorded voter dissatisfaction over the government’s handling of the economy.

Fifty-one percent of voters polled cited the economy as a primary concern, according to the Metropoll polling firm. Last year, security worries topped voter worries. Other polls found that a majority of voters blamed the government for their economic concerns.

“It’s a tremendous liability for Erdogan,” analyst Atilla Yesilada of Global Source Partners said. “This is an economy that grows, but not in labor-intensive way. Employment has decreased in the second quarter (2019), and things have become more expensive, and nobody is investing into new factories because loans have increased in excess of 22 percent.

“And clearly the wealth is not trickling down, whatever wealth has been created is not be felt by people on the streets, so there is a lot of public discontent,” Yesilada added.

The unemployment rate remains about 10 percent, according to recent Turkish Statistical Institute data.

Payments ahead of elections

In May, Erdogan announced two payments of over $200 for pensioners to coincide with religious holidays. The first installment is due this week, and is part of a multibillion-dollar giveaway to voters ahead of elections.

But analyst Yesilada warned the benefits of the payments are being overshadowed by the financial pain of this month’s increase in interest rates.

“We all use loans, the middle class use loans to buy houses; businesses use loans to expand. Even before the latest (interest) hikes, they were already at a 10-year high. Banks have nearly stopped making new loans; we are going into a credit crunch. For me, the recession is inevitable,” Yesilada said.

The president’s challengers are focusing on economic fears.

“Erdogan can’t survive this economic crisis,” CHP Party candidate Muharrem İnce said during a rally in Istanbul Monday. “Turkey is heading to dark days. Don’t be surprised if the Turkish lira hits 8 or 10 to the (U.S.) dollar. When troubled days have come to countries around the world, they couldn’t get through them unless they changed leaders.”

In May, at the start of the presidential and parliamentary elections, the lira was less than four against the U.S. dollar. It now stands at over 4.5, peaking at nearly 5 against the U.S. dollar.

Erdogan’s public construction boom, including building one of the world’s biggest airports as well as some of the longest bridges and tunnels, is also now an electoral target.

“Turkey has resources, but they are in the pockets of thieves. (The government) ran up $453 billion in debt. They collected $2 trillion from your pockets. What happened in return? Did your son find a job?” İYİ (Good) Party presidential candidate Meral Aksener asked.

Critical elections

Analysts predict the two-pronged attack by Erdogan’s challengers over the economy is likely to intensify, as economic concerns are expected to continue to dominate the critical elections.

“This election cycle is happening against a background of a volatile economic environment with a lot of stress on the currency with uncertainty where the economy is heading. This is turning the election campaign into a less certain outcome,” said Sinan Ulgen, head of the Istanbul-based Edam think tank.

Opponents accuse the president of calling elections 18 months early in a bid to take advantage of the country’s strong growth. But many opinion polls now indicate Erdogan’s lead narrowing and being forced into an electoral runoff. Analysts warn the economy that was once the president’s most significant asset could ultimately be what ousts him from power.
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Analog Charm of World Cup Sticker Book Endures Among Fans

Posted on by Corts

Eighth-grade teacher Ari Mascarenhas could have picked high-tech gadgets or modern apps to help his students learn Portuguese, but he instead went old school with the World Cup sticker book.

He’s been a fan since 1986 — when he was 8 — and the attraction for the collectibles has trickled down generations and endured for adults who still trade the stickers in Brazil, the United States and other countries.

Mascarenhas said his soccer-loving students develop critical language skills by studying every part of the 80-page book filled with team rosters, country flags and historical info. They read stats, names and other information while associating it with colors, illustrations and other visual cues.

“With the sticker book, they see that language goes beyond verbal. I loved the way they interacted swapping stickers, so I thought this year I could use an analog cue in this digital world,” said Mascarenhas, a teacher at German-Brazilian Colegio Humboldt in Sao Paulo.

The book’s popularity has spread as the World Cup nears its opening in Russia on June 14, despite sticker prices nearly doubling in some countries, including Brazil. That led to some grumbling in the South American nation, which has been in a financial crisis for the past three years with widespread poverty. Still, most of the 7 million sticker books put on the market quickly sold.

Panini, the Italian collectibles company that publishes the books, declined to say how profitable the World Cup books are, but the company itself had revenue of 631 million euros ($743 million U.S. dollars) in 2016, with products sold in more than 120 countries. Brazil is the largest market for the sticker books, followed by the United States with its sizable Latino population and England.

The allure for the books is similar to baseball or Pokemon cards — challenging fans to complete the set. Each book has spots for 681 stickers depicting things like stadiums, players, host cities. The stickers themselves are sold in packs of six.

The days leading up to the tournament have become crunch time for collectors.

Making trades

Actress Bruna Marquezine, the girlfriend of Brazil superstar Neymar, noticed high demand of stickers depicting the player. So, she decided to swap stickers autographed by her boyfriend for those she still needs.

“I know this is cheating a little, but I will not have my sticker book incomplete this time,” Marquezine joked on social media as she lured swappers.

Experts say fans would need to buy about 970 packs to fill their books without trades, because of the rarity of some of the stickers, though Panini CEO Mark Warsop said there’s no difference in the frequency of stickers.

Mathematics professor Sebastiao de Amorim of the Universidade de Campinas said some stickers being hard to find is part of what makes collecting them enticing.  Some are even sold at inflated prices.

“The minimum figure to complete the album is of 137 packages, but the odds of getting that, especially because some stickers are harder to find, are the same of winning the lottery,” De Amorim said.

Digital version

Panini is also hoping that a digital, mobile version of its paper product gains steam, like Pokemon and other titles that have proven popular in multiple formats. 

Panini’s sticker book app was downloaded more than 1.5 million times, introducing new ways to get stickers for users, including product placements. Warsop said he thinks it will pick up during future World Cups.

“The nice thing about the digital is that you can also swap and trade wherever you are,” he said. “We want people to trade even if they are not in the same place.”

Widespread use might be a way off for adults who are currently introducing the hobby to kids.

“I can’t sell my stickers there [on the app]. People want paper,” said salesman Renato Chaves, who took a van with more than 4,000 stickers to sell outside Brazil’s training camp in Teresopolis, outside Rio de Janeiro.

Georgia Bulgackov, a 13-year-old student learning from the sticker book in Sao Paulo, said it’s amazing to learn from a toy.

“What we love is to mix learning with something from our daily life, that made me understand more what the teacher wanted,” she said.

Mascarenhas, her teacher, said he hopes his pupils can stretch their interaction with the sticker book to other parts of their lives.

“There are not many products that bring people together. In such a divisive world we can still swap, trade and have something in common,” he said.
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