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Population eNews
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|Jun 5
|World Environment Day
|Jun 8
|World Ocean Day
|Jun 16
|Day of the African Child
|Jun 17
|World Day to Combat Desertification
|Jul 11
|World Population Day
|Aug 12
|International Youth Day
|Aug 13
|Earth Overshoot Day (2015)The day when humanity has consumed all the resources the planet will produce this year (advances every year)
|Sep 4
|World Sexual Health Day
|Sep 26
|World Day for Universal Access to Contraceptives
|Sep 28
|Day of Action to Decriminalise Abortion in Latin America and the Caribbean
|Oct 11
|International Day of the Girl
Population and Sustainability Network Promoting Reproductive Rights for Sustainable Development
Transition Earth Promotes human rights and nature's rights in a world of unsustainable population and economic growth and advocates for global systems change to enable the shift to a sustainable planet for all
Pathfinder A Global Leader in Sexual and Reproductive Health
Population Connection Education and Action for a Better World
Population Media Center Strives to improve the health and well-being of people around the world through the use of entertainment-education strategies, like serialized dramas on radio and television, in which characters evolve into role models for the audience for positive behavior change."
PAI Healthy Families, Healthy Planet (formerly Population Action International)
EngenderHealth For 65 years, Engenderhealth has improved the lives of men, women, and families through its work in family planning, maternal health, HIV, and AIDS, gender equality, and many other programs
Central Asia Institute Mission: To promote and support community-based education, especially for girls, in remote areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan. 'Three Cups of Tea' is the inspiring book about the founder of this organization
Sierra Club Global Population and Environment Program
Seeks to protect the global environment, preserve natural resources for future generations, and foster healthy communities by advancing sustainable development solutions by:
- promoting increased access to voluntary family planning and reproductive
health information and services
- advocating for women's and girls' basic rights, including health care, education, and economic opportunity
- raising public awareness of wasteful resource consumption in the context of social and economic equity
- empowering youth leaders
Population Council Population Research. Ideas. Evidence. Impact
The Population Resource Center Bringing the latest demographic data to policymakers through policy briefings
Population Matters Vision for a sustainable future
Wilson Center Tackling global issues through independent research, open dialog, and actionable ideas
Center for Biological Diversity - Population and Sustainability "Through the empowerment of women, education of all people, universal access to birth control, and a societal commitment to ensuring that all species are given a chance to live and thrive, we can reduce our own population to an ecologically sustainable level. This will decrease human poverty and crowding, increase our standard of living, and sustain the lives of plants, animals, and ecosystems everywhere." .... Follow the link to a beautiful presentation on Overpopulation.
Global Footprint Network Our mission is to promote a sustainable economy by advancing the Ecological Footprint, a measurement tool that makes the reality of planetary limits relevant to decision-makers.
GrowthBusters The End of Growth - Can We Embrace It? Urban growth, population growth, consumption growth, economic growth.
WOA!s Population Basics Slideshow Two hours of WOA!s favorite population and development travel slides combined with videos found on YouTube
People's Rights, Planet's Rights - Holistic Approaches to a Sustainable Population (pdf) Suzanne York, Institute for Population Studies
Art Elphick's Population Slide Show Online or 'in person' in San Diego area
Videos, Presentations
WOA!s Population Impacts and Solutions (Youtube playlist) The consequnces of overpopulation could be catastrophic, and resources are already being seriously depleted, but if we spend more money on the various and already successful programs for education and voluntary family planning, we have a good chance to soften the damage.
Desertification and Its Real Cause: Human Overpopulation Desertification is caused by overpopulation
World Population : An Interactive Experience Explore population growth from 1 C.E. to 2050. Watch population growth appear on the map as dots representing concentrations of one million people. Learn about important milestones in human history and view other key data including land use, fertility rates, CO2 emissions, life expectancy, and urbanization.
Everything You Need to Know About Consent That You Never Learned in Sex Ed Over the past couple of years, we have started emphasizing the importance of sexual consent more than ever before in U.S. history. But what often gets left out of these discussions is how exactly you go about the business of obtaining and providing consent in real-life sexual situations. And especially, how to do it without the much-feared "ruining of the mood."
"Green Sex" for Climate's Sake Climate change presents an existential threat to our species. There is no doubt left about that. Activists around the world are grappling with the issue in many ways - by protesting coal powered plants and blocking oil tankers, promoting renewable energy like solar and wind, or even changing ones own lifestyle with growing one's own food and adopting plant based diets. But, Alisha Graves has another idea altogether. She calls it "green sex" for the sake of the climate.
When Abortion was Illegal: Untold Stories (1992) This Academy Award-nominated film features compelling first person accounts which reveal the physical, legal, and emotional consequences during the era when abortion was a criminal act. Remembrances include those of women who experienced illegal abortions, doctors who risked imprisonment and loss of their licenses for providing illegal abortions, and individuals who broke the law by helping women find safe abortions.
PSI: Delivering Health in the Developing World Like mothers and fathers the world over, Sara dreams of a happy life for her daughter. But in many parts of the developing world, even meeting her basic health needs can be difficult. At PSI, we help Sara fulfill her dreams by providing solutions to some of her family's serious health challenges.
Saving Lives by Saving Trees Dr. Kinari Webb founded Health In Harmony as a response to the devastation she saw in the rainforests of Borneo. Health In Harmony's mission is to recognize the inextricable link between human and environmental health and focus on providing healthcare as an incentive to protect natural resources. After completing her medical training, she returned and spent a year traveling around the country looking for ways to help reduce the damage to the rainforest and to the villagers who lived within it. Today, the clinic she founded provides affordable healthcare for the communities of Gunung Palung, and has not just improved the lives of residents, but also introduced alternative income sources and dramatically reduced illegal logging of the rainforest.
Girls Stand Up to Stop Child Marriage In Sub-Saharan Africa, around 7 million girls are forced into an early marriage. It is one of the regions worst hit by child marriage across the world. Child brides are made to give up their education in order to raise families, and their health and wellbeing is put at serious risk. Watch how children's groups set up by Plan International are empowering children to know their rights and to stand up and say: 'No I don't want to be married. I want to continue with my education.'
"London Crawling" - Talking About Population a short film from Population Matters, directed by Tom Martin of the Media Trust. Britain's population has grown by one third since 1950 and London's population is now approaching nine million, with an additional million inhabitants expected over the next ten years. London's experience is that of many cities worldwide, while global population is increasing by 80 million
Twenty Signs China's Pollution Has Reached Apocalyptic Levels 9 out 10 cities in China have failed government pollution standards according to China's Ministry of Environmental Protection. A quarter of million Chinese die every year from pollution, rivers turn blood red, and by 2030, China will be COMPLETELY OUT OF WATER! These are just a few of the signs that China's pollution has reached apocalyptic levels, and it's having a global effect on climate change.
Ohio Officials Support Planned Parenthood? If you like heavily-edited videos, like the one made about Planned Parenthood by an anti-choice organization, this one is for you. From Majority Ohio
Kenya: Promoting Healthy, Empowered and Self-Sustainable Living Delivering health care and family planning to the Masaai in Kenya
How Abortion Stigma Negatively Affects Media Coverage Carlos Maza of Media Matters for America talks to Erin Matson, co-founder of Reproaction, and Hannah Groch-Begley, research director for NARAL Pro-Choice America, to help break down what abortion stigma is and how the media perpetuates it through faulty, biased coverage.
How Much Nature Do We Have? How Much Do We Use? Mathis Wakernagle of Global Footprint Network in an important TEDx Talk on Footprints and Sustainable Development
Lord Man Parable Video Images from the book Overdevelopment, Overpopulation Overshoot which speaks to how man once lived peacefully with all of the Earth's beauty but has quickly taken-for-granted all the resources and animals causing great environmental and sustainability issues.
The Imams, the Taliban and the Condoms In Afghanistan, half of all deaths among women aged 15 to 49 are because of pregnancy and childbirth, according to UNICEF - and most are preventable.
Paving the Way: Ethiopia's Youth on the Road to Sustainability Paving the Way: Ethiopia's Youth on the Road to Sustainability transports viewers to an innovative development project in Ethiopia's Gurage Zone where youth and their parents are working together to build a more sustainable future by connecting the dots between conservation, access to health care, and sustainable livelihoods. It is the final installment in the Wilson Center's "Healthy People, Healthy Environment" trilogy, which explores integrated population, health, and environment (PHE) projects around the world.
How We Can Make the World a Better Place by 2030 Can we end hunger and poverty, halt climate change and achieve gender equality in the next 15 years? The governments of the world think we can. Meeting at the UN in September 2015, they agreed to a new set of Global Goals for the development of the world to 2030. Social progress expert Michael Green invites us to imagine how these goals and their vision for a better world can be achieved.
Broken Landscape: Confronting India's Water-Energy Choke Point In resource-rich Meghalaya, India, the demand for coal is transforming the environment and the people who depend on it. Coal mine owners are prospering from booming production, but few laws regulate the dangerous and polluting practice of rat hole coal mining. Until now. State officials recently banned rat hole mining in the region, shutting down the economy. Coal mine owners and workers staged protests, while people living downstream from the mines are trying to cope with a dead river that once provided their livelihoods, food, and drinking water. Nepalese migrants who crossed the border to mine coal are stuck in the middle.
Conversation Earth Radio Series Launch Welcome to Conversation Earth, a new radio series and podcast that will explore some of the most critical issues of our time. Radio stations and podcast listeners find more information and subscribe at http://www.conversationearth.org. We plan to publish a new radio episode every Tuesday at http://www.prx.org, with podcast to follow on Thursday. Each conversation will offer just under a half-hour of philosophy, ethics, science, psychology and/or economics '�� examining, at a macro level, our relationship with the planet we call home.
Paving the Way: Ethiopia's Youth on the Road to Sustainability Tesema Merga was part of a vanguard of young Ethiopians who brought the first roads to the Gurage in the 1960s. He and others went on to form the Gurage People's Self-help Development Organization (GPSDO). Today, Tesema and GPSDO are working with the next generation of local leaders to establish PHE clubs at local schools and encourage girls education and empowerment.
World Population Clink on the link to see Population Education's interactive map and video (an expansion of Population Connection's 'Dot' video). The 'dot' video is still impressive after all these years.
A Warrior's Cry Against Child Marriage Memory Banda's life took a divergent path from her sister's. When her sister reached puberty, she was sent to a traditional "initiation camp" that teaches girls "how to sexually please a man." She got pregnant there - at age 11. Banda, however, refused to go. Instead, she organized others and asked her community's leader to issue a bylaw that no girl should be forced to marry before turning 18. She pushed on to the national level '�� with incredible results for girls across Malawi.
Global Land Cover Change From 8000 BP to -50 BP This animation shows the global pattern of human land use over the last eight thousand years, a time when human populations began expanding following the origins of agriculture. The earliest areas of human land use are in Mesopotamia and the Fertile Crescent areas of southwest Asia, followed by increasing areas of land use in China, India, and Europe.
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Note: not all articles align with WOA!s position
Perceptions of Human Overpopulation: Disavowal and Dysfunction in Salt Lake City
are like every other species in being able to reproduce beyond the carrying capacity of any finite habitat. are like no other species in that are capable of thinking about this fact and discovering its consequences.
—William R. Catton, Jr.
Doctors Urged to Advise Patients About Risks of Abstinence-centric Sex Education Only 50% of high school students receive sex education that meets the recommendations of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In the last quarter-century, programs emphasizing abstinence as the optimal way to avoid pregnancy and STIs have received more than $2bn in funding from the federal government. Comprehensive sex education, by contrast, has no dedicated federal funding stream.
Four Ways Research Has Reframed the Abortion Debate
There has been little or no publicly funded research on abortion in the United States, so for years basic information about abortion was lacking—from how often patients have complications to what happens to women who want the procedure but can't obtain it. Many of the new abortion restrictions were justified by assertions that often had no scientific basis—for example that clinics were teeming with incompetent and unscrupulous doctors, that abandoned patients were flooding emergency rooms, or that the psychological damage caused by grief and regret after abortions often persist for years and ruin women's lives. The research initiative became more urgent after the high court held in 2007 that in cases of "medical and scientific uncertainty," legislatures could have "wide discretion" to pass laws restricting abortion. Since then, a primary objective of abortion rights supporters has been to establish a high level of medical certainty—both about the safety of the procedure and about what happens when a woman's reproductive options are drastically curtailed or eliminated. Over the last 15 years, a number of academic institutions and private organizations have received funding for abortion research, and here are four areas where their work has changed the conversation:
Mental health
7 Sexual Health Issues Facing Teen Girls Globally - and How You Can Help Of the more than 7 billion people in the world, approximately 1 billion are young girls between the ages of 10 and 24. Today, 1 in 3 girls in developing nations are married by the time they're 18 years old. It's estimated that 1 in every 3 women globally will experience physical or sexual violence in her lifetime. More than 225 million women and girls have an unmet need for modern family planning methods, such as birth control, IUDs and condoms.
Champions for Change, African Youths Take Family Planning to Next Level Family Planning 2020 Commitment was that by 2020, 120 million more women and girls in 69 of the least developed countries, would have voluntary access to contraceptives and information about planning their families. Over 60 % of adolescents who want to use contraceptives are not able to.
The Vast Majority of Fertility Apps Are Ineffective Forms of Birth Control Of the 95 apps available, 55 of them had disclaimers saying they should not be relied upon as birth control, and 10 did not attempt to predict the fertile days in a woman's cycle. off the remaining 30 apps, only six of the apps got a perfect score on accuracy, meaning they made fertility predictions that reflected the women's actual fertility windows.
Want Birth Control Pills Without Visiting the Doctor? There's An App for That; New smartphone apps and websites give women access to prescription birth control without ever having to visit a doctor. The Times found at least six private companies and nonprofits offering the services.
The Real Reason We Don't Have Male Birth Control -- the Cut Women usually release one egg per month, but men can produce 1,000 sperm per second. The target is a lot bigger. Using hormones to prevent sperm creation requires really high doses that cause side effects.
Lawmakers Looking to Close Birth Control Privacy Loophole Congresswoman Suzan DelBene (WA-01) said the information you share in those workplace wellness programs could be shared back with your employer. Her legislation would change privacy laws she said right now don't explicitly forbid this from happening.
1 in 5 University of California Students Struggles with Hunger, Study Finds Nearly 1 in 5 of its students had gone hungry in the past year and that another 23 % also were "food insecure" . Racial disparities were stark, with black and Latino students reporting food insecurity around twice the rate of white students -- roughly 60 %. About 40 % of Asian-American students reported experiencing food insecurity.
On World Population Day Let's Do More for the World When the birth control pill was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 1960, the world's population was 3 billion. On the first World Population Day in 1989 it had just crossed 5 billion. Now, in mid-2016, it has climbed to almost 7.4 billion, and is projected to rise to almost 10 billion by 2040 and more than 11 billion by 2100. If it bothers you that nearly 3 billion people live in dire poverty on less than $2 per day, support voluntary family planning programs.
Ending Harmful Practices and Equipping the Next Generation
How do you put an end to harmful traditions that go back over 2,000 years? How do you address deeply entrenched beliefs that have caused pain and suffering to girls and women around the world, or call into question long-standing, hierarchical gender norms?
Family Planning is An Investment in Development - Women & Girls Hub More than 220 million women in the developing world who don't want to be pregnant aren't using modern contraception. As a result, 74 million unplanned pregnancies occur each year. Driven by population growth in sub-Saharan Africa (where many of the women with unmet need for contraception live), the number of people in Africa is projected to quadruple by 2100, to nearly 4 billion.
While Supplies Last: Time for Countries to Invest More in Contraceptives UNFPA is currently facing a nearly 40% funding gap of its supplies program. While more than half of the 26 African countries with budget information available have contraceptive budget lines, many of them are symbolic and do not cover a significant part of contraceptive needs. 24 of the 26 countries depend on external donors to fund more than half of their contraceptive needs for the public health system.
Solving Overpopulation by Empowering Women Through TV Dramas The world population will reach a staggering 9.6 billion inhabitants by 2050. When Yeken Kignit and Dhimbibba aired in Ethiopia between 2002 to 2004, the demand for contraceptives increased by 157%.
'we Can Provide Family Planning Services for Additional 120m Women if...' "We are at the halfway point and we are not on track. We are yet to meet the FP 2020 goal of 120 million women having voluntary access to contraceptives."
Cms Provides New Clarity for Family Planning Under Medicaid 20 % of U.S. women of reproductive age (15-44) are enrolled in Medicaid, including 47 % of those living below the federal poverty level.
The Great Barrier Reef: a Catastrophe Laid Bare With 1,600 species of fish, 130 types of sharks and rays, and more than 30 species of whales and dolphins, the Great Barrier Reef is one of the most complex ecosystems on the planet. 93% of the almost 3,000 individual reefs have been touched by bleaching, and almost a quarter - 22% - of coral over the entire Great Barrier Reef has been killed by this bleaching event.
An Investment in Girls is An Investment for All 15 million girls marry before the age of 18 each year, or one every 2 seconds. While Ethiopia has made strides in lowering its total fertility rate - currently at 4.1 - its population is still projected to increase from 99 million today to over 127 million by 2037.
The Undeclared War on Contraception Republican leaders in the House this week revealed their plans to fund the fight against the Zika virus by eliminating funds for Title X, a federal program that has been helping to provide contraceptive services to low-income households since 1969. A House majority, under Republican leadership, has voted four times in recent years to defund Title X.
New Hawaii Law Requires Insurers to Cover a Year's Supply of Birth Control Hawaii joins Washington, D.C., which also requires public and private insurers to cover up to 12 months of birth control at a time. 56 % of pregnancies in Hawaii are unintended, compared to the national average of 45 %. Women who received a year's supply of birth control were about a third less likely to experience an unplanned pregnancy and were 46% less likely to have an abortion, compared to those receiving a one- or three-month supply.
Pakistan Misses Family Planning Targets The total population of Pakistan was projected to be 188.02 million in 2014 but next year it increased by 3.69 million reaching 191.71 million in year 2015. In 2015 while the child mortality rate has decreased from 88 per thousand children in 2012 to 81 per thousand children in 201. The overall contraceptive performance for the year 2014-15 in terms of Couple Years of Protection (CYP) has decreased by 7.2 % in comparison with the last year 2013-14.
More Second-trimester Abortions Occurred Under Texas Law Even as the total number of abortions dropped in 2014, the first full year the law was in effect, there was a 27 percent increase in abortions after 12 weeks, from 4,814 procedures in 2013 to 6,117 in 2014.
Everything You Own in a Photo: a Look at Our Worldly Possessions : the Picture Show Peter Menzel and other photographers took portraits of 30 statistically average families with all of their worldly possessions displayed outside their homes.
Statement by Usaid Administrator Gayle Smith on the Passage of the Global Food Security Act On July 6, 2016 the United States Congress passed the Global Food Security Act of 2016, marking a historic step toward ending global hunger and malnutrition. USAID and our many partners around the world are committed to continuing our work to end hunger and malnutrition by 2030.
Weekly Dose: New Morning After Pill Makes it Difficult to Choose Which to Take Almost 200,000 unplanned pregnancies occur in Australia each year, though not all go full term. EllaOne is an oral tablet (30 mg) that is taken as a single dose and is currently only available on prescription in Australia. While levonorgestrel should be taken within 72 hours, ulipristal should be taken up to 120 hours (five days) after unprotected sex or contraceptive failure.
Days After Scotus Ruling, Texas Drops Dramatic Abortion Data In 2013, 16,189 Texans got medical abortions; in 2014, that number dropped to almost 5,000. In 2013, over 24,000 of Texans who got abortions were Hispanic; in 2014, that number decreased by 18 % to under 20,000. The numbers also show a 7.7 % decrease among black Texans who got abortions. Overall, the number of abortions in Texas decreased by 14% from almost 64,000 in 2013 to almost 55,000 in 2014.
One Step Closer to Repealing Helms The Democratic Platform Drafting Committee also announced that the 2016 party platform will include the repeal of the Helms Amendment. Every year, more than 47,000 women in the developing world lose their lives to unsafe abortions. For more than four decades the U.S. has not been able to save their lives by funding safe abortions because of the Helms Amendment.
Population Matters' New Journal Population and Sustainability Has Its First Issue Published This Month. The journal aims to act as an interdisciplinary hub for researchers to share their work on the relationship between human numbers and environmental issues.
Free at Rio Olympics: 9 million forest-friendly condoms Brazil's government will hand out 9 million condoms for free around Rio de Janeiro during the Olympics in August.
New Study Examines Why Women in Developing Countries Who Wish To Avoid Pregnancy Do Not Use Contraceptives In 21 of the 52 countries studied, married women with unmet need most commonly cite concerns about side effects and health risks as a reason for contraceptive nonuse. One in 10 women aged 15-49 in developing regions wish to avoid a pregnancy but are not using any contraceptive method.
Nepalese Girls Take Photos of All the Things They Can't Touch During Their Periods Due to Menstrual Taboos In Nepal girls during their periods are considered to be 'impure' or 'contaminated'. The tradition is called Chhaupadi, popular in western-nepalese hindu communities, it is common for girls to remain excluded from interaction with the family for up to 6-10 days. Chhaupadi was outlawed by the Supreme Court of Nepal in 2005, however it is still commonplace in rural communities.
Women's Rights in Protected Areas: Championing Gender Equality in Environmental Conservation Policy Of the 1,290 World Heritage Convention State of Conservation Reports analyzed, for example, only nine gender keyword mentions were found, and the keyword was the same for all references-women. Only 12 reports (0.7% of the total reports examined) discussed women's capacity to drive environmental and policy change.
Engaging Men as Allies and Partners In the DRC, 92 % of men surveyed report they have talked with another man about women's rights and the need to prevent sexual and gender-based violence, compared to 56 % before the program. In Afghanistan, 51 % of male graduates surveyed report they took action to reduce gender-based violence, compared to 13 % before the program.
A Girl Band in Ethiopia is Changing the Lives of Millions of People - Here's How In Ethiopia, one in three girls don't go to school. One in five girls say they don't have any friends. A band called Yegna aims to create a positive change for these women through storytelling, relatable content and music. 44 % of listeners say Yegna made it easier for them to discuss life issues.
Adolescent Pregnancy and Childbearing in Southeastern Ghana a Pathway to Adulthood Where Educational and Employment Opportunities Limited Adolescent fertility,defined as a live birth or current pregnancy before age 20, occurred in 17% of relationships. In Ghana, adolescent pregnancy and childbearing most often occur outside of marriage.
US Government Sued for Denying Abortions and Birth Control to Immigrant Teens The US government is being sued by the American Civil Liberties Union for withholding contraception and abortion services from immigrant minors in its care. In 2015 alone, 33,726 unaccompanied refugee minors came into the care of the ORR.
What's Brexit Got to Do with International Family Planning? a Lot In practical terms, £100 million would buy $150 million worth of contraceptives on the international market before polls closed on the Brexit vote. At its lowest dip during the day, the same £100 million would only buy $133 million worth of contraceptives. In 2014, the U.K. provided nearly a quarter of all the funds for international family planning, or US$327.6 million.
New Video Game Just Showed Us All How to Respect Women
If Gamergate taught us anything, it's that mainstream gamer culture struggles with some deep-seated gender issues. Images of violence against women and girls has long been a scourge of popular games; merely image searching the words "video game" and "women" leads straight to over-sexualized, violent, and oftentimes disturbing photos.
Enter BREAKAWAY, a video game for kids ages 8-15, created by a large group of students and teachers at Champlain College (with the support of the Vermont-based Population Media Center (PMC) and the United Nations Population Fund). BREAKAWAY not only steers clear of violence against women—it actively promotes gender equality from within its storyline. And perhaps the most remarkable part about the game: it works.
Beijing is Sinking at An Alarming Rate: Study Loss of groundwater is causing China's capital city to sink by as much as four inches per year in some districts. Beijing, home to more than 20 million people, is considered one of the most water stressed cities in the world.
Planned Parenthood Announces it Will Fight Abortion Laws in Eight States After Supreme Court Ruling Before Monday's court decision, 10 states also required doctors who terminated pregnancies to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital. The Supreme Court declined to review court cases challenging Wisconsin's and Mississippi's rules, upholding lower court rulings that bar admitting-privilege laws. The eight states whose regulations Planned Parenthood intends to soon fight are Arizona, Florida, Michigan, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia.
Nichols: Court's Hb2 Ruling is First Step to Improve Abortion Access Abortion is extremely safe, with less than 1 % complication rate. The Supreme Court has made it clear that politicians cannot pass laws to block access to safe, legal abortion.
Head of UN Women Vows to Tackle Laws Blocking Women's Economic Progress A global action plan to empower women economically by 2030 will focus on six areas, including addressing legislation that blocks women's progress, the head of UN Women says. The core areas to be addressed are digital and financial inclusion; childcare and unpaid care duties; pay equality; structuring the informal sector; entrepreneurship; legislation and international conventions.
What Did Pope Francis Actually Say About Contraception? Despite a rush of headlines claiming Pope Francis is softening the Church's stance on contraception, a closer look at his recent remarks could suggest otherwise.
Pope Suggests Contraceptives OK to Slow Zika 8% of Mexicans, 91% of Colombians and 93% of Brazilians support the use of contraceptives. But the Catholic catechism states that aside from natural family planning, anything that works to "'render procreation impossible' is intrinsically evil."
Comprehensive Sex Education Can Be Transformational
Why am I passionate about sexuality education? As a young feminist working on sexual and reproductive rights, I am often asked this question. There are so many issues facing women and girls, so many devastating consequences of gender inequality—violence against women, forced and early marriage and unsafe abortion to name a few—but too often, we don't invest in programs that can prevent the discrimination that women and girls face and empower them to make informed decisions about their own lives.
I grew up in Caracas, Venezuela. Leaving childhood is a scary experience—especially for girls. But, as many Venezuelan women would attest, my sexuality education did not teach me the things I needed to know when my body began changing and I started to experience new feelings. Instead, I heard things like: "You are a lady, so you have to take care." And: "You are too young to be interested in boys."
Out with 'family' Planning, in with 'future' Planning In Kenya, the "Future Fab" teen lifestyle brand is taking off. Around the world, young people are rallying around the term "future planning." And in West Africa, youth ambassadors are mobilizing their peers to encourage their governments to invest in contraceptive security.
With Men Gone, Women Shake Up Farming in Rural Nepal At least 2.2 million Nepalis - nearly 10 percent of the population - work abroad.
25 Facts in Observance of World Population Day July 11 There are over 7.4 billion people on earth now and it's estimated that 108 billion people have lived throughout history. The difference in average life expectancy between people in developed countries and poor nations is about 20 years, or 77.1 years compared to 55.9 years, respectively. 1/3 of population growth in the world is due to accidental or unwanted pregnancies, often because of a lack of basic education, family planning, or healthcare.
Murders, Violence on Rise as Parched Central India Battles for Water As northern and central India continue to suffer thorough severe drought and oppressive heat, police in Bundelkhand and several other regions are reporting a rise in violent - and often deadly - clashes over water. After almost 10 years of below-average rainfall and several consecutive years of drought, the region's rivers, lakes, reservoirs and wells are drying up.
Do Forest Fires Have a Significant Impact on Global Warming? The Indonesian fires, in 1997, were estimated to have released between 0.81 and 2.57 gigatons of carbon-between 13 % and 40 % of the world's annual emissions at the time. For every acre of primarily coniferous forest burned, approximately 4.81 metric tons of carbon is released into the atmosphere-between 80 % and 90 % in the form of carbon dioxide, with the rest as carbon monoxide and methane.
Two More Supreme Court Decisions Support Abortion Access
The U.S. Supreme Court let stand lower court rulings on Tuesday that blocked restrictions on doctors who perform abortions in Mississippi and Wisconsin a day after the court struck down a similar measure in Texas.
The laws in both states required doctors to have "admitting privileges," a type of difficult-to-obtain formal affiliation, with a hospital within 30 miles of the abortion clinic. Both were put on hold by lower courts. The Mississippi law would have shut down the only clinic in the state if it had gone into effect.
Supreme Court Rejects Challenge to Washington Law Requiring Pharmacies to Stock Plan B In 2007, the Washington State Board of Pharmacy adopted rules governing the mandatory stocking and delivery of emergency contraception.
Commentary Highlights Role of Reproductive Rights in Addressing Zika Crisis
The Zika virus "has highlighted another long-standing public health challenge: the often hostile policy, programmatic and legal environment women face on issues surrounding pregnancy, whether they are looking to have a healthy birth and raise their child, prevent an pregnancy or obtain an abortion," according to Joerg Dreweke, senior policy communications associate at the Guttmacher Institute.
Dreweke wrote that officials in the Caribbean, Latin America and the United States "are scrambling to counter the threat of the Zika virus, which has been causally linked to an increase in births of infants with microcephaly, a condition in which children have unusually small heads." He noted that as of early May, there were 290,000 suspected cases of the mosquito-borne, sexually transmittable virus in Latin America and the Caribbean, more than 700 confirmed cases in several U.S. territories and more than 500 confirmed cases in the continental United States.
Over-populated Or Under-developed? the Real Story of Population Growth Global population hit 7.3 billion midway through 2015, an increase of 2 billion since 1990. Low-income countries have the highest fertility rates as a general rule, with Niger the highest at an average of 7.6 children per woman. More than 40 countries are expected to decrease their population between 2015 and 2050. Fertility in all European countries is now below the level required for "full replacement of the population in the long run
Britain Succumbs to Fear - Europe Shattered by Deteriorating Physical and Political Climate In places like India and Bangladesh, in the US Southwest, in Brazil, in Southern Europe, in Africa, and along the coastal cities of the world, the next wave of migrants is building.
Gigantic Gravity Waves to Mix Summer with Winter? Wrecked Jet Stream Now Runs From Pole-to-pole An injection of hot, Summer air from the Northern Hemisphere into Southern Hemisphere Winter appears to have aided in the generation of 8 C above average temperatures over Western Antarctica during June of 2016.
The Atmosphere Has Hit a Grim Milestone - and Scientists Say We'll Never Go Back 'within Our Lifetimes' Carbon dioxide concentrations in the pre-industrial atmosphere were around 280 parts per million. Scientists forecast that we will probably never live to see carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere once again fall below a level of 400 parts per million (ppm).
Three States' Abortion Laws Just Fell Thanks to the Supreme Court. These States Could Be Next. Texas-like abortion laws in three states -- Alabama, Mississippi and Wisconsin -- just hit legal dead ends less than a day after the 5-3 ruling declaring Texas's law unconstitutional. The past five years account for a quarter of all abortion restrictions enacted since the Supreme Court legalized abortion in 1973.
Scientists Find 'water Windfall' Beneath California's Central Valley When deeper sources of groundwater are factored in, the amount of usable groundwater in the Central Valley increases to 2,700 cubic kilometers - or almost triple the state's current estimates. California is in the midst of its fifth year of severe drought, and in 2014 Gov. Jerry Brown declared a drought emergency in the state.
News Digest
Africa's Population Boom is Both Danger and Opportunity
The biggest problem is jobs. Robots may beat workers to the punchJuly 7, 2016, Financial Times Ltd By: David Pilling
[Note: WOA's comments are in brackets].
Unlike the 911 terror attacks which changed the world overnight, the rapid increase of Africa's population is a stealth event.
While the populations of Europe and the Americas are close to zero growth, Africa's population of one billion will double to 2 billion within 35 years. By 2100, its population could easily have doubled again, with at least 4 billion of the world's predicted 11 billion people will be African.
In Africa, infant mortality has dropped dramatically, and life expectancy has improved. Until Africa's fertility rate falls sharply, its population will grow exponentially.
According to some, this is a huge "demographic dividend", seeing millions of teenagers becoming "consumers" and "markets". Paul Krugman predicted economic growth due to added inputs of labor. But one does not have to be Thomas Malthus to take a more skeptical view.
By 2035, more than half of all new jobseekers will be African. [but will they find jobs?].
Asia's successful economies had obvious advantages: high savings, competent civil services and a sense of national identity that is lacking in relatively new African countries thrown together by colonialist cartographers. What was a boon for Asia could be a bomb for Africa.
Africa is a net importer of food. Most farming is for subsistence. In Tanzania, where the population has more than quintupled from 10 million at independence to an estimated 55 million today, 70% of farmers use nothing more sophisticated than a hoe. Fortunately, it is fertile and about twice the size of California. [Tanzania is also subject to droughts]. Even so, it will have to double food production just to stand still. Disputes over land are intensifying because of the competing demands of peasant and commercial farmers and those of development. [Tanzania is also cutting down trees in large numbers to produce charcoal for cooking].
In drought-stricken Niger, several million of the 17 million inhabitants have only precarious access to food. Women in Niger have, on average, 7.6 babies. By 2100, Niger could be one of the 10 most populous countries on earth. (Four of the others are likely to be Nigeria, Ethiopia, Democratic Republic of Congo and Tanzania.)
Africa's urban population will rise from 470 million to 1.3 billion in the next 35 years, says the Mo Ibrahim Foundation. Today there are 56 cities in Africa with populations over a million, and by 2030 there will be nearly 100. While these cities should be vertical, to maximize creativity, productivity and efficiency, most are sprawling and unplanned. About half of Africa's city dwellers live in slums.
Only a few African countries have anything like a coherent industrial policy. Robots may beat African workers to the punch.
Bringing fertility rates down so that dependency ratios fall, an agricultural revolution, planned cities, tens of millions of formal, taxable jobs, and trustworthy institutions are necessary. Get it right and Africa could yet be an engine for the world. Get it wrong, and Africa will see mass migration, terrorism and conflict.
Despicable: Anti-Women's Health Politicians in Congress Just Passed a Bill That Would End Funding for Family PlanningJuly 8, 2016, Planned Parenthood Action Fund
Republican leadership in a House committee passed a shameful budget bill that eliminates federal funding for the nation's family planning program. Earlier Republican leaders tanked a Zika emergency funding bill that would have helped get family planning services to areas most impacted by Zika, such as Puerto Rico.
This budget bill prohibit funding for Title X, the nation's only dedicated source of federal funding for family planning services, eliminate the evidence-based Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program, and waste millions in taxpayer dollars by funding ineffective abstinence-only programs.
Four million women and men currently rely these family planning services and these are the very services even more in demand with the looming public health crisis with Zika." Planned Parenthood health centers provide preventive care to approximately a third of the people served by the program.
This bill includes a rider which would allow employers and health insurance companies to refuse to provide coverage of any health care service - such as abortion (even when the abortion is medically necessary to save a woman's life or health.) - on the basis of religious or moral convictions.
In 2014 alone, Title X health centers provided more than 800,000 Pap tests, breast exams to 1.3 million women, and more than 5.8 million tests for sexually transmitted infections (STIs), including 1 million HIV tests.
The Title X program also provides millions of people with access to birth control, helping to prevent one million unintended pregnancies each year. Access to birth control and family planning is one of the biggest drivers of women's economic gains - leading to more education and higher wages.
The Title X program offers preventive health care services to those most in need. Nearly 90% of Title X clients have incomes below 200% of the federal poverty level, and 54%are uninsured.
The Title X program disproportionately serves people of color, providing critical health care services to populations that face significant reproductive health disparities.
For every public dollar invested in family planning, $7.09 is saved in Medicaid-related costs. That's savings to both federal and state governments and taxpayers. 77% of American voters support continuing the efforts of the Title X family planning program.
The bill would also slash evidence-based sex education, choosing instead to waste taxpayer dollars on harmful abstinence-only programs. In particular, the bill would decimate the evidence-based Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program (TPPP), which has a proven track record of helping young people make responsible decisions to keep them safe and healthy. TPPP and other evidence-based interventions enjoy vast public support because of their crucial role in providing the information and education that young people need to grow into healthy adults. But instead of investing in sex education that actually works, the bill misguidedly doubles down on abstinence-only grants - which are harmful and ineffective.
Teen pregnancy accounts for $9.4 billion a year in costs to U.S. taxpayers. TPPP is a cost effective way to fund sex education programs for youth that have been proven to reduce sexual risk behaviors, thus contributing to reductions in teen pregnancy.
Evidence-based sex education programs - like the Get Real program - can help teens delay sex, use condoms and birth control when they do have sex, reduce the number of sexual partners, and reduce the frequency of sex.
Politicians who want to eliminate these vital services are working against a solution, and are part of the problem.
Text "VOTE 2016" to 69866 to join the Planned Parenthood Action Mobile Network for updates on the election and important to reproductive rights issues! (You can text STOP to quit anytime. Data and standard message rates apply.)
The Next Big Fight for the Pro-Choice Movement: Taxpayer-Funded Abortions
Once a political 'third rail,' the effort to repeal the Hyde Amendment has gone mainstreamJuly 8, 2016, The Nation By: Zoë Carpenter
40 years ago, only three years after Roe v Wade, millions of poor women were cut off from abortion coverage via a provision barring Medicaid from covering the procedure. The provision was called the Hyde amendment after Henry Hide, the Republican who sponsored the amendment. "If rich women want to enjoy their high-priced vices, that is their responsibility...that is fine, but not at the taxpayers' expense," he said. Later he admitted he would have liked to prevent anybody from having an abortion.
Representative Barbara Lee, a young congressional staffer at the time recalled: "It was really earth-shattering for me as a young African-American woman, you know -- why this guy would even want to interfere with women's rights and women's health-care decisions."
Hyde is only a temporary provision, but Congress tacks it onto an appropriations bill every year. The abortion coverage ban has been extended to other people dependent on public insurance, including military service members, Native Americans, and federal employees. There have been a few attempts to repeal the ban over the years - only Bill Clinton tried in 1993.
However last year, Lee, along with Representatives Jan Schakowsky and Diana DeGette, introduced a bill that would ensure that anyone with federally funded health insurance has coverage for abortion care and they now have more than 115 co-sponsors. Now the Democratic Party platform draft explicitly calls for repealing Hyde, as well as the Helms Amendment, which applies to foreign aid-for funding of abortion.
Destiny Lopez, the chair of a coalition called 'All* Above All' formed specifically to advocate for ending the ban on public abortion funding, said the Hyde Amendment is "one of, if not the most, onerous barriers to abortion care." Effectively, it puts the legal right to abortion out of reach for many women on the basis of their income -- and their skin color, as women of color are more likely to rely on Medicaid than other groups. Medicare alone covers nearly one of every six American women of reproductive age, and that number has likely gone up since Medicaid programs were expanded under the Affordable Care Act.
20 million women rely on one of the insurance programs affected by the ban on public funding for abortion. Hyde forces some women to delay an abortion while they round up the money, which can make their procedure both more expensive and more complicated. It forces others to have children against their will: Studies in a number of states indicate that as many as 35% of women who want to end a pregnancy ultimately carry it to term when public funding is cut off.
The abortions procedure can cost from $300 to $2,000, as well as travel costs and other associated expenses. Clinic closures and other restrictive laws in states like Texas can make abortions even costlier. About 116,000 people call abortion-fund help lines every year; they contemplate not paying rent, pawning furniture, or not buying as much food for their other children if they can't get help. Not all of them can be funded.
Yamani Hernandez is the executive director of the National Network of Abortion Funds (NNAF) explains: "You have people, even middle-class people, who don't have an extra $500 laying around somewhere."
"The anti-choice forces have just gone to far to the extreme," Representative Lee said. "I said, enough is enough." To top it off, Republicans have recently proposed to gut the Title X family planning program that provides contraceptives for low-income adults, and $108 million for teen pregnancy prevention. "You can't anymore be moderate with members of congress who are all the way right wing on this-trying to deny women just basic rights," Lee said.
All* Above All formed in 2013, sparked by a convention on abortion access for poor women organized by NNAF and the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health. The coalition launched a national bus tour and social-media campaign the following year to raise awareness and galvanize a movement for overturning Hyde. Another reproductive justice group, URGE, held rallies in 20 cities. All* Above All commissioned a poll, which showed that 86% of voters, regardless of how they felt about abortion, thought that "politicians should not be allowed to deny a woman's health coverage because she is poor." Even 62% of Republicans agreed that "as long as abortion is legal, the amount of money a woman has or does not have should not prevent her from being able to have an abortion."
The reproductive-rights groups began pushing members of Congress and Democrats did began to push back, last year holding up two bills to which Republicans had attached Hyde-like provisions. Lee says all of that activism and advocacy "actually created the climate for us" to introduce the EACH Woman Act, and to incorporate the call for repeal into the party platform.
They framed "abortion as a normal event in women's lives and a basic part of health care," Katha Pollitt wrote. Political space has grown for a discussion about economic and racial inequality, thanks to movements like Black Lives Matter. Now advocates can put Hyde in the context of a broader national conversation about poverty, racism, and justice-and to shift the moral compass.
In the wake of the Supreme Court's ruling against two abortion restrictions in Texas, the pro-choice movement is eager for an offensive. That means pushing to expand abortion coverage at the state level, too; currently 17 states fund abortion care for Medicaid recipients themselves, though most do so not voluntarily but to comply with court orders. Other states ban even private insurance from covering abortion.
Overpopulation: World Struggles to Meet Basic NeedsJuly 6, 2016, Stockton Record By: Lee W. Miller
July 11 is Population Awareness Day. The extent of the population problem is gargantuan as the increase in the number of humans on our planet earth is 228,000 per day, more than 9,500 per hour, 158 per minute. To visualize this, think of 900 jumbo jets landing and deplaning 250 people per day at your local airport.
This horrendous increase in our numbers is ecologically and economically unsustainable. The economist's myth of infinite growth on a finite planet needs to be dispelled and soon. The possible collapse of civilization and the misery that entails should motivate our leaders to face up to the population problem rather than continuing to treat the symptoms.
We encounter congested highways and the clogging grows worse daily. The news is of a world struggling to handle a record 65.3 million ecological and economic refugees. Population pressures are the main cause of this Diaspora. We have spent $1.6 trillion on the war on terror in the past 13 years. Terrorists often are created when young men face economic insecurity as is the case in the Middle East where high birth rates are endemic.
Failed states are characterized by high birth rates, high illiteracy and populations that have outstripped resources and governance. More failed states are coming, e.g. Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, Egypt, India, Ethiopia. Reducing birth rates by empowering and educating women is a better investment in the long term than military expenditures to kill terrorists or dealing with the consequences of failed states.
This year's Population Awareness theme is "investing in teenage girls." There never has been a larger generation of young people on Earth, and millions of young women around the world aren't getting the modern family planning resources they want and need. Millions of women cannot exercise what should be a basic human right to fertility control.
Too few leaders associate overpopulation with current world dysfunction. The issues of refugees, wars and conflicts, conservation of species, biodiversity, ores, fuels, soils, forests, ocean life, and controlling global warming all would be much easier to manage and perhaps even resolve, if the population were either stable or in decline. We are currently 7.4 billion and heading for 9.7 billion by 2050, but in 1960, when I graduated from college, we were only 3 billion. This is an unprecedented increase in our numbers and our impact on the planet is a function of both our numbers and rates of resource consumption.
We would be much better off if our numbers were heading toward 3 billion instead of toward 9.7 billion, especially if we want to continue having enough food to eat. We currently use 10 calories of fossil energy to put one calorie of food on the table; clearly this is not sustainable. Finite fossil energy is over half gone and substitutes for it in agriculture and our auto culture are miniscule.
How can we achieve a decline in our numbers? It will take a Herculean effort and serious changes in our priorities and thinking. Empowering women by education and providing contraception and health care through voluntary family planning programs is an essential effective investment in development. We need to spend much more money to make such programs effective. Most women in the US have some level of access to contraception, yet 50 percent of pregnancies here are unplanned and it is much worse in the third world. An estimated 225 million women in the third world nations can't access modern contraceptives despite a desire to delay or prevent pregnancy.
There are things we can do and need to do quickly. European nations, feeling the economic pinch or recession, have had to cut back on family planning aid funding by half. The Republican Congress is stingy with aid for population assistance. Only public awareness and pressure on politicians can change our priorities. Just investing 1 percent of our enormous defense budget would provide $10 billion to fund family planning assistance at a realistic level.
Unfortunately, we live in a nation of many science deniers and uncritical thinkers, so it is hard to be optimistic and yet we are one of the few nations with the resources to deal with this problem. It may be too late to avoid great suffering even if we do all that is necessary. However, fewer children dying of malnutrition or starvation is a worthy goal to work for.
If you have a cause, it is a lost cause unless we reduce our numbers and our impact on our environment. It is for this reason that population always has been my cause - to continue civilization's best benefits and values for future generations.
World Population DayJuly 11, 2016, Transition Earth
World Population Day is coming up on July 11. The more we know about population dynamics, the more we can have positive discussions on how to have healthy people and a thriving natural environment.
This year's theme for World Population Day is "investing in teenage girls." Addressing the needs of young people is critical to having a vibrant planet and society. According to the UN report, The Power of 1.8 Billion, "Our world is home to 1.8 billion young people between the ages of 10 and 24, and the youth population is growing fastest in the poorest nations. Within this generation are 600 million adolescent girls with specific needs, challenges and aspirations for the future."
U.S.: Medicaid Programs Urged to Boost Use of Long-Lasting ContraceptivesJune 15, 2016, Chicago Tribune By: Michelle Andrews
The federal government, which spends billions of dollars each year covering unintended pregnancies, is encouraging states to adopt policies intended to boost the number of Medicaid enrollees who use long-acting, reversible contraceptives (LARCs). Medicaid is the state/federal health program for low-income people.
Vikki Wachino, deputy administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), wrote in a recent bulletin to state programs: "They are cost-effective, have high efficacy and continuation rates, require minimal maintenance, and are rated highest in patient satisfaction." ... "More can be done to increase this form of contraception," she said.
The nation's rate of unintended pregnancies is one of the highest among developed countries and the costs for these pregnancies are significant not only for the families involved but also for the federal and state governments. In 2010, the latest year for which data are available, the federal government spent $14.6 billion and states another $6.4 billion on unplanned pregnancies.
LARCs include intrauterine devices and under-the-skin hormonal implants that provide nearly complete protection against pregnancy for three to 10 years. Birth-control pills are only about 90% effective and must be taken daily.
Under Medicaid states must cover family-planning services for women and men without charge. these programs have generally included most methods of birth control. Yet in 2012, only about 11% of low-income beneficiaries used a LARC, similar to the percentage of U.S. women overall. Policies related to how LARCs are paid for and how services are provided can hamper access to LARCs, the CMS bulletin noted.
Now some states are making changes to expand LARC use. For example, it often is more efficient for a woman who has just delivered a baby to have an IUD inserted while she is still at the hospital rather than wait until a postpartum visit several weeks later. But labor and delivery services are bundled for payment to be paid to the provider, and IUD insertion is not included. However, Alabama, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Montana, New Mexico, New York and South Carolina have implemented policies that reimburse providers separately for inserting an IUD or hormonal implant right after a woman gives birth.
There is the high upfront cost of long-acting contraceptives. But this can be overcome by increasing payment rates to doctors as an incentive for them buying and stocking the devices.
Other hurdles need to be removed, as they stand in the way of use: some state programs require that Medicaid participants first try a different contraceptive method before moving to a LARC. Or they require a plan's prior authorization, which can delay or even block women from getting that method.
The nonprofit NICHQ said last month: "Unplanned pregnancies are both medically difficult, with higher rates of pre-term birth and low-birth weight babies, and incredibly costly. Wider adoption of LARC is a significant opportunity for states to reduce unnecessary expenditures in Medicaid programs."
U.S.: Water Knives in the Near Future - 16 Year Drought Brings Lake Mead to New Record LowJune 23, 2016, Robertscribbler By: Robertscribbler
Over the past four days (June 23, 2016), highs have peaked at 109 to 111 F. Similar heat blasted all up and down the Colorado River Basin, squeezing moisture out of a key water supply for 25 million people in California, Arizona, and Nevada.
For over the past 16 years the Colorado River has been assailed by drought. This is a new kind of mega-drought that has almost certainly been spurred by a human-forced warming of the world.
As of June 21, 2016, the water level for Lake Mead was 3 feet below the 1075 mark breached for the first time in the reservoir's history last year. And if Lake Mead remains below that line by the end of this year, it will mean mandatory cuts to Arizona and Nevada's water supply.
The US Bureau of Reclamation predicts a 64% likelihood that Lake Mead will not only remain below the 1075 foot level by 2019, but that it will plunge to as low as 1025 feet -- only 125 feet above Lake Mead's dead pool line of 900 feet. This would mean mandatory water cuts all up and down the Colorado River Basin.
California retains senior rights to the river's water supply. If the 16 year drought along the Colorado River basin continues, 6 million people and related industries in Nevada and Arizona will be first hit; water rationing is almost certain to take effect in Arizona and Nevada over the next few years.
If the drought continues, and the water level hits 1025 feet at Lake Mead by 2019 to 2022, then the Department of the Interior will step in to take control of Lake Mead's water management. At that point, all bets are off even for California and its 19 million people using Lake Mead water - who would likely then see a 10% reduction in the water provided them by Lake Mead.
Studies indicate that factors related to human-caused climate change prevent weather systems bearing precipitation from reaching the US West Coast. The most intense drying is expected to occur in the Southwest. Record to near record high temperatures results in greatly increased rates of evaporation. So what rain does fall doesn't stay in rivers or in the soil as long.
NASA notes that reductions in fossil fuel emissions help to blunt the intensity of the coming droughts, but that worsening drought conditions will still occur.
Long in the Background, Population Becoming a Bigger Issue at Climate Change DiscussionsNovember 10, 2015, New Security Beat By: Robert Engelman
Unfortunately the topic of population is fraught with the potential for shaming of high-fertility groups and individuals, and scars from coercive population programs by some governments in the past.
However, in late 2014 IPCC made a strong statement on the contributions of population growth to rising greenhouse gas emissions and touted the benefits of wider access to voluntary family planning services.
Recently (Nov 2015), the word 'population' (referring to size or growth) appears 20 times in a 66-page synthesis of country pledges to cut greenhouse-gas emissions by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change's (UNFCCC) Secretariat.
The country pledges to reduce emissions - "intended nationally determined contributions," or INDCs - offered in advance of Paris mark an intriguing step forward for governments.
Both developed and developing countries were asked to quantify the proportion of global emissions reductions they can contribute between now and 2030 to help keep the planet's average temperature from rising more than two degrees Celsius higher than the pre-industrial average. This quantification is a country pledge for "intended nationally determined contributions," or INDCs. [162 countries have submitted their INDCs]
In order to fit their pledged contributions into the global picture, governments must consider how many people will live within their borders in 15 years and how per-capita emissions multiplied by population might evolve. Any specific pledge a government makes to cut, cap, or restrain growth in national emissions, it soon becomes obvious, will be more challenging to achieve the more a country's population grows. Per-capita emissions will need to decline to meet and sustain pledges as populations grow.
The UNFCCC synthesis report takes into account different population growth scenarios for the next decade and a half and references the latest UN Population Division estimates and projections of world population, which only came out this July.
In the synthesis report, in addition to population changes, some governments also let it be known that population growth is a significant challenge as they try both to restrain emissions and adapt to climate change already experienced or expected. Several governments state, the UNFCCC authors report, that their countries' population growth or density constrains their ability to adapt to climate change and protect their citizens.
This should not be a surprise. Non-government researchers and advocates have called attention to the connections between population and climate change for years. At the same time they've touted the co-benefits that improving reproductive health, education, and the status of women worldwide has for climate change adaptation and mitigation.
The Worldwatch Institute and the Population Reference Bureau assembled an expert group from the reproductive-health and climate fields to consider the link the effect that family planning has on climate-compatible development. There is no reason to stigmatize the relationship, they said. It is not about pointing fingers, but linking arms - in developed as well as developing countries - to empower women and men to achieve their desired family sizes and improve the well-being of current and future generations.
Connecting population and climate change can support epochal improvements in the lives of women and girls. It supplements the many other arguments for sweeping away barriers to the use of contraception in all countries.
Linking population and climate change can help combat gender-related abuses such as child marriage since very young wives are often pressured to bear children early and often. The resulting high fertility rates lead to a higher proportion of dependent young people to economically productive adults - the reverse of the much-touted "demographic dividend" that helps economies prosper. The same high fertility increases population growth, contributing to the challenges some governments say hold back their efforts to mitigate and adapt to climate change.
The impact of population on climate change and other environmental changes is so important, that governments are being compelled to explore and acknowledge the relationship. As national governments plan for and try to constrain climate change, they may pull international agencies and experts into more dialogue on demography too. Vigilance to assure that any policies that result are based on the rights and reproductive choices of individuals and couples can help assure that this emerging interest promotes human well-being in more ways than one.
The Boiling Pot Post Carbon InstituteMay 28, 2016, Post Crabon Institute By: Richard Heinberg
So far, 2016 is the hottest year in history: every single month so far has set a record. This handy little animation (click here) shows a climate system that is shooting off the rails.
Slow, linear change is giving way to self-reinforcing feedbacks and non-linear lurches. Last December, delegates to climate talks in Paris agreed to try to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees centigrade. Extend the temperature trend shown in that animation for just another few months and we may well be beyond that threshold.
Arctic sea ice this month is at the lowest ever recorded; temperatures in Siberia are rising four times faster than in the rest of the world, releasing enormous amounts of methane and carbon stored in permafrost.
Conventional oil production flatlined starting in 2005, however the growth of unconventional oil and gas supplies appears to have postponed peak oil for a decade; all the supply increase since then has come from tight oil, tar sands, heavy oil, and deepwater oil) -- but at what cost? Unconventional oil production brings about greater environmental damage and risks, including increased greenhouse gases.
And then there is the massive investment to finance the surge in unconventionals. Easy-money central bank policies lengthened the fracking boom which would have been an unnoticeable blip without them. High prices weakened demand for oil, just as drillers flooded the market with the wrong grades of crude in the wrong places at the wrong time. This lead to an oil price crash and financial bloodletting within the industry.
Oil prices are now either high enough to stimulate new supply, in which case they are also high enough to cripple the economy; or they are low enough to stimulate the economy, but also so low as to decimate the industry.
Today's price of $50 per barrel is high in historic terms, but still too low to allow the industry to recover from the past two years of staggering losses. The U.S. energy sector is drowning in $370 billion of debt, twice the amount a decade ago, according to FactSet and Yahoo Finance. Interest payments were $16.7 billion in 2015 -- half of their total operating profit. Now, after the first quarter of 2016, over 86% of energy sector operating profits are going to interest payments. Unless prices zoom back past $100 a barrel, the tens of billions of dollars in debt coming due between 2017 and 2020 will likely trigger a wave of defaults and bankruptcies.
The economy that has been on life support for the last 8 years, buoyed up by low interest rates, bailouts, and quantitative easing, though at the cost of more financial bubbles (in housing, fracking, and tech) and increased economic inequality. But when things turn ugly again what will finance wizards do? Negative interest rates will not help savers, and throwing trillions more at banks and investors won't help the masses afford to pay interest on their mounting debt or to buy more consumer goods.
A lot depends on the outcome of the U.S. presidential election, but a good outcome is hard to imagine; only shades of bad.
Whoever the next president turns out to be, her or his term in office will likely coincide with another financial crash, which could well turn out to be much worse than the 2008 debacle. Social pressures from rising inequality and dashed expectations will build to explosive levels. And climate impacts may well take forms that even a Donald Trump cannot ignore.
Karen Gaia says: Of course the tremendous consumption of oil is due to growth in people and per capita consumption.
I left out most talk about presidential candidates in this summary. Please follow the link in the headline to see it and the great graphic on warming.
Overpopulation is Pushing Israel Over the Edge, Expert SaysJune 5, 2016, Jerusalem Post By: Michelle Malka Grossman
Israel encourages its denizens to heed the biblical call to "be fruitful and multiply," but Dr. Alon Tal, a lecturer at Ben-Gurion University, said that the most pressing issue facing Israel today is overpopulation.
"There was a time when [having large families] was important for Israel," Tal told The Jerusalem Post.
"Those days are past." ... "We would need to be building 60,000 new apartments each year to keep up, but that's not happening," he said.
Tal will soon be releasing a book on overpopulation, titled The Land Is Full.
Tal slammed Israel's "culture of dependency" that assumes society will foot the bill for large families. "I know of cases where families didn't have a third or forth kid because they couldn't afford it," he said, yet noted that these same people "are being asked to subsidize families of 10, 12, 14 kids who aren't responsible. That's not fair."
Tal's analysis showed that "most poor children are in large families." He wants the government to cancel the "perverse incentives" of subsidies and other benefits for each child born in a family.
He also said that adoption is a wonderful way for people to have children while keeping the population balanced and therefore "there's no reason for spending so much money on fertility treatments. There should not be children in the system that don't have a home," he said.
The country will have 50 million people in the next few decades even if policies changed today.
Karen Gaia says: In the U.S., removing welfare for large families has been proven counterproductive because improverished families have less access to contraception. Women below the poverty line are 5 times more likely to have an unintended pregnancy.
Our Children Will Die of Thirst: Egypt Simmers as Water Shortages Fuel ProtestsJune 14, 2016, Egypt Commercial News
Ramadan is in two weeks and water shortages have not only left many Egyptians unable to quench their thirst after fasting in scorching heat, but also their ability to perform ablutions - ritual washing before prayers - during Islam's holiest month.
For some areas the shortages last for days and are more likely to strike poorer areas with stronger severity. Residents in the impoverished south have begun cutting off roads and highways to draw attention to their plight.
Armed men in the Sinai Peninsula seized a government-owned water tanker, and, in another area, protesters forcibly shut down local water valves and illegally tapped into the drinking water supply themselves.
Food prices increased by 12.7% in April compared to the same month last year. The cost of rice, an Egyptian staple, has more than doubled compared to last year's Ramadan.
Falling tourism revenues have pushed up the cost of living, which is a further blow to the country's most vulnerable, especially following government closures of Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist-affiliated charitable organizations which have traditionally assisted them.
The open canals are used to irrigate crops from the Aswan High Dam lose up to three billion cubic metres of water - or the equivalent of 1.2 million Olympic-size swimming pools - each year through evaporation.
While water crises are nothing new to Egypt, it has already fallen below the United Nations' water poverty threshold. Water per person has decreased by more than 60% over the past 40 years.
The UN predicts that Egypt could become officially water scarce as early as 2025. Eighty percent of Egypt's water is used for agriculture to feed its booming population, which is expected to reach 116 million by 2030.
Egyptian authorities are concerned that Ethiopia's Renaissance Dam, which would be the largest hydroelectric power plant in Africa will decrease their share of Nile river water.
Push to Increase Access to IUD, Implants is Working in Northeast OhioMay 26, 2016, Cleveland OH Local News By: Brie Zeltner
A partnership called Better Birth Control NEO is engaged in a Ohio statewide effort to increase access to more effective, long-acting birth control options such as intrauterine devices, or IUDs, and implants, and their efforts are starting to pay off.
The aim of the partnership, is to drive down infant mortality. Ohio's infant mortality rate is 21% above the national average.
Michelle Clark, an Ohio Department of Health public health nurse specialist said: "If we can do that by helping women choose when they want to become pregnant and help them to have healthy pregnancies, that's our goal."
Unintended pregnancies, which are often too closely spaced, make babies more likely to be born too soon or too small. Both low-birth weight and preterm birth are known risk factors for infant mortality. Over 80% of teen pregnancies and more than half of overall pregnancies in the state are unplanned.
LARCs are 20 times more effective at preventing pregnancy than the pill, yet they are underused. The reasons are: There are still a lot of myths about their safety and perceived expense compared to other methods that need to be dispelled. Access is also a problem. Health clinics often don't have sufficient stock or training to be able to provide LARCs on the same day a woman visits, and many won't come back for a second appointment.
The coalition has spent more than $580,000 to train clinic staff, increase stock, launch a marketing and education campaign and evaluate the effectiveness of their efforts.
Two-day LARC crash courses were given by a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit, Upstream USA, whose sole mission is to help women more conveniently access all birth control options.
Training includes technical support for doctors on inserting the new generation of IUDs using pelvic simulators. Clinic support staff learn about how to field questions from patients, teens and parents in waiting rooms. All staff are trained on the relative effectiveness of birth control methods, their side effects and costs.
In the seven clinics studied, use of LARCs jumped from 4% to 10% of women. More than 90% of the women said they very much felt staff listened to their thoughts about birth control options, and 99% said the choice of birth control was their own.
Each training costs about $10,000, which would amount to about $1.3 million for the entire Northeast Ohio hospital community to go through the training.
In Colorado, a statewide effort to increase access to LARCs began in 2009. After two years, use of these contraceptive methods among young women had increased from 5% to almost 20%.
In areas where the program was rolled out, high-risk births declined by 24%, abortion rates fell by 34% among teens and statewide enrollment in the federal Women Infants and Children (WIC) program fell by almost a quarter.
Almost $6 in avoided Medicaid costs were realized for prenatal, delivery and first-year infant care for every $1 invested in the program.
In St. Louis, a study of 1400 young women found similar results. Researchers projected that if their model was adopted nationally, the teen pregnancy rate could be cut by more than half.
Women are usually convinced when they hear how much more effective LARCs are, the low complication rates for the new devices and implants, and that the methods are recommended as the first choice contraception method by the CDC and the American College of Obstetricians.
Demand for Abortions Soars in Countries Hit by Zika Outbreak, Study Finds
Women in Latin America, where abortion is often illegal, are seeking online help in unprecedented numbers in response to the virus linked to birth defectsJune 22, 2016, Guardian By: Sarah Boseley
With the spread of the Zika virus, women living in countries in Latin America have given rise to a soaring demand for abortions because Zika has been connected with severe birth defects, reports a study in the New England Journal of Medicine.
In unprecedented numbers, they are accessing the website Women on Web, which has helped those in countries where abortion is illegal to obtain pills which will terminate an early pregnancy. In Brazil, Venezuela and Ecuador the requests for help have doubled, while in other Latin American countries they have risen by a third.
Anxiety rose as golfer Rory McIlroy pulled out of the Olympics in Rio, concerned about his family getting a Zika infection.
The World Health Organization advises travelers to the Olympics to practice safe sex using condoms or abstain for eight weeks after their return.
Many women living in Latin America in areas where mosquitoes readily breed are unable to protect themselves against the mosquitoes and do not have the option of termination in the event of an unwanted pregnancy.
The researchers have published some of the emails to Women on Web which reveal their fears. "I need to do an abortion because of the great risk of infection with Zika here ... Please help me. My economic situation is extremely difficult," a woman in Brazil said.
A woman in Venezuela said: "We are going through a really serious situation for the economic and humanitarian crisis unleashed by Zika. There are no treatments, contraceptives nor pills to abort. I want to terminate my pregnancy but I cannot."
"There is a huge surge," said researcher Dr Catherine Aiken, academic clinical lecturer in the department of obstetrics and gynaecology of the University of Cambridge. "It's over 100% increase in demand in some of the countries we looked at - almost 110% increase in Brazil." In those countries with no Zika outbreak, there was no such rise in demand.
Women on Web helps women who are less than 10 weeks pregnant obtain an abortion, after an online consultation with a doctor. They will tell a woman where she can get the pills locally that will bring about an abortion or, if necessary, send them to her.
However, women who live in very poor rural areas have no internet and are in very dire straits and will be driven to less safe methods of illegal and underground abortion.


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Sold out matches create history-WICB
GROS ISLET, St.Lucia, CMC- The West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) has confirmed that a day's play was sold out in advance for the first time in the history of West Indies cricket.
WICB issued a statement on Monday referring to matches on two separate days in the Trinidad leg of the Caribbean T20 tournament which ended over the weekend.
Last Saturday's double header at the Queen's Park oval which climaxed with a commanding 80 run win by the host over Guyana as well as the opening night of competition, were sold out.
"Tickets were sold out from as early as Thursday while the opening night on Sunday January 6th was also sold out," the Board said.
"Overall, attendance to the Trinidad matches of the CT20 has been beyond WICB and TTCB projections with cricket fans turning out in huge numbers to support their favourite teams".
The S.Lucia leg of the tournament begins on Tuesday at Beausejour Cricket Ground with Guyana facing Jamaica and Windwards playing Trinidad and Tobago.
Meantime, President Dr. Julian Hunte has praised the Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board's hosting of the preliminary round of the Caribbean Twenty20.
"The planning, preparation and logistics were of the highest standard and they all lent to the successful hosting of the first portion of the tournament in CT20," said Dr. Hunte.
"Overall we can look back without doubt that the CT20 was very well organized and hosted in Trinidad and it sets the standard very high and we trust that the St Lucia leg will live up to the high expectations".
Aussie Lynn upstages Munro as Amazon Warriors remain unbeaten
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, CMC – Colin Munro smashed a sensational maiden Twenty20 hundred but it proved in vain as Guyana Amazon Warriors produced an audacious run chase to shock Trinbago Knight Riders by six wickets here Saturday night.
Will it be third time lucky for RCB?
The Indian Premier League will have a new champion either one of Royal Challengers Bangalore or Sunrisers Hyderabad, who will come up against each other in the Final of VIVO IPL 2016, will be crowned champions tonight.
Captain Smith takes Australia to victory with ton
(Reuters) – Steven Smith maintained his purple patch to hit a brilliant unbeaten 102 to secure Australia's three-wicket victory against England in a high-scoring tri-series match at Hobart on Friday.
Chanderpaul sparkles for Floodlights in win over Bel Air Rubis
Playing with a leather ball might be his forte but Guyana and West Indies middle order batsman Shivnarine Chanderpaul is also very adept at playing with a ball of a much softer variety.
Griffith hits maiden Inter County century
A maiden unbeaten century by Demerara opener Trevon Griffith left opponents Berbice facing a daunting 378 more runs for victory heading into today's fourth and final day in round one of the Guyana Cricket Board (GCB) Inter-County four-day tournament.
Development Team in six-wicket defeat of Essequibo
By Delvon Mc Ewan A dominant all-round performance by Steven Jacobs led his side to a convincing victory over Essequibo as the Guyana Cricket Board (GCB) Development Team got off to a winning start in their GCB Senior inter-county four-day campaign yesterday at the Demerara Cricket Club (DCC) ground.

subset: commoncrawl


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yamnoun [ C or U ]uk /jæm/ us /jæm/
› US a sweet potato
Thesaurus: synonyms and related words
(Definition of "yam" from the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary & Thesaurus © Cambridge University Press)
(Definition of "yam" from the Cambridge Academic Content Dictionary © Cambridge University Press)
Get a quick, free translation!
Create and share your own word lists and quizzes for free!
Más definiciones de "yam" en inglés
Palabra del día
a type of heavy cloth that has a pattern woven into it that is the same colour as the cloth
Palabras nuevas


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Foursquare © 2016 Lovingly made in NYC & SF
7B Horseshoe Bar aka Vazacs
Dive Bar · $
108 Avenue B (at E 7th St)
"Great sports bar. Super low key. Great location."
Botanica Bar
47 E Houston St (btwn Mott & Mulberry St)
"one of the last great dive bars in the neighborhood. crappy furniture tossed about, amazing happy hour specials, and classic rock playing loudly above. perfect after-work spot with friends/co-workers"
Tom & Jerry's
Dive Bar · $$
288 Elizabeth St (at E Houston St)
"Dog friendly & great gin drink with cucumber & limeade"
Mission Chinese Food
Chinese · $$$
171 E Broadway (btwn Rutgers & Jefferson St)
"i don't eat red meat or pork but was still able to have a very fulfilling (& spicy) meal. High energy level. Staff is great. The fried rice was the best I've ever tasted. Drinks? Get the re-animator!"
Clockwork Bar
Bar · $
21 Essex St (Hester St)
"A fun, inexpensive, and considerably less crowded alternative to 169 Bar. The bartenders are friendly, the cocktails are great, and there's complimentary popcorn!"
Bar · $$
35 Canal St (at Ludlow St)
"Great neighborhood place. Chill music, good beer, nice patio out back, and always a few open seats"
15 Great Late Night Bites on the Lower East Side
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DIY : Workout T-Shirt
A great way to up-cycle some t-shirts! A Splendid Assemblage
You basically take any t-shirt chop a little here and there and tadaaaa!
Afterwards you have a fashionable back baring top that is perfect for working out or a simple yet chic outfit on those hot summer days :)
You will need around 20 minutes, a pair of scissors and a t-shirt. That is all! No sewing!
This post was created by a user and has not been vetted or endorsed by BuzzFeed's editorial staff. BuzzFeed Community is a place where anyone can post awesome lists and creations. Learn more or post your buzz!
- It's on: Hillary Clinton has officially accepted the Democratic party's presidential nomination with some fiery words for Donald Trump 🇺🇸
- Amazon's in its Prime. The company's profits rose 831% this quarter thanks to its growing cloud computing business ☁💸
- Old-school MTV is returning Aug. 1 with shows like "Daria," "Beavis & Butt-Head," "Cribs," and "Punk'd" 📺 🙌


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Home > News > Zweave to Provide Services to ARMORsmith
March 13th, 2007
Zweave to Provide Services to ARMORsmith
ARMORsmith Company develops next generation armor solutions for both male and female protection that incorporate the latest in nanotechnology, high strength lightweight materials, microclimate systems, transparent armor, data-communications, and power systems. The lightweight & scalable defensive technological advancements greatly enhance protection for the warfighter and police officer with anthropometrically developed armor solutions that can be produced cost effectively in volume.
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Quantum drag:University of Iowa physicist says current in one iron magnetic sheet can create quantized spin waves in another, separate sheet July 22nd, 2016
Scientists develop way to upsize nanostructures into light, flexible 3-D printed materials: Virginia Tech, Livermore National Lab researchers develop hierarchical 3-D printed metallic materials July 20th, 2016
Rice's 'antenna-reactor' catalysts offer best of both worlds: Technology marries light-harvesting nanoantennas to high-reaction-rate catalysts July 18th, 2016
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New method can identify chemical warfare agents more easily: The method could help governments protect people from horrifying toxic effects July 15th, 2016
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Leti and Korea Institute of Science and Technology to Explore Collaboration on Advanced Technologies for Digital Era July 14th, 2016
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Santa arrives this weekend
The Jolly Old Elf is coming to three Milwaukee area malls this weekend. Santa arrives at Southridge and Mayfair Friday, Nov. 9th, and at Brookfield Square on Saturday, Nov. 10.
Bayshore Town Center is sticking with the traditional weekend-before-Thanksgiving Santa debut, with a parade at 6 p.m. Friday, Nov. 16.
- Two new Ross Dress for Less stores set to open Saturday
- Meijer store in Sussex to open Tuesday
- National Business Furniture grand opening set for June 14
- Men's retailer Richard Bennett Tailors moving to Brookfield Square from Mayfair
- Bon-Ton Stores Inc. planning to sell, lease back three more stores
- Hallmark aiming for another touchdown: Packer Jordy Nelson is 2016 Keepsake ornament
- Wisconsin's first Akira store opens Friday at Brookfield Square
- Downtown Boston Store's new furniture department debuts Thursday
- Meijer partners with Froedtert & Medical College of Wisconsin network
- Fox Bros. Piggly Wiggly lands meat contest awards
Southwest clashes with investors on best path to revenue growth
New faces, new places for July 29
Hamburger Mary's moving to La Perla site
Aviation and aerospace center proposed for Milwaukee
Oracle buying 'cloud' business software provider NetSuite
Earnings slip almost 4% for parent of First Business Bank-Milwaukee
Volkswagen retakes spot as world's largest automaker
Expansion in India is paying off for Amazon
U.S. homeownership rate drops to lowest Since 1965
Gearbox Express raises $1.5 million
Railroads might have to let rivals use their tracks
Markable Inc. raises$1.3 million in equity funding
Harley-Davidson profit slips, company reduces bike shipments
Marcus reports higher earnings despite revenue drop
Oshkosh Corp. profit down despite 36% jump in military sales
Retail Business News
Expansion in India is paying off for Amazon
Amazon.com Inc. projected revenue for the third quarter that may beat analysts' estimates, after a second Prime Day event led to record device sales and an expansion in India is paying off.
Among the key points in the company's quarterly reports:
■ Revenue in the current quarter will be $31 billion to $33.5 billion, the company said Thursday in a statement. Analysts estimated $31.6 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.