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This year, over 18 million people in the Sahel region of West Africa were affected by a severe food crisis caused by drought, a failure of several crops, and sharp rises in food prices. The lives of over 1 million children were at risk from severe malnutrition. Communities across the Sahel suffered (and malnutrition rates remain dangerously high) but a major humanitarian operation, acting earlier than ever before, managed to protect the lives and livelihoods of millions of people.
Oxfam played a major part in this effort. We provided urgently needed assistance to over 1 million people throughout the year. Over 600,000 of our supporters worldwide joined us in campaigning to raise the alarm and to mobilize the international community into action.
At the end of 2012, good rainfall and better harvests have provided some relief. Cereal production is 13 percent higher than last year, but this does not mean the crisis is over. Food prices remain high and many farmers were unable to take advantage of the better rains to plant their crops. Malnutrition rates for children remain above emergency levels in many parts of the region. Millions of people still require sustained support to recover from the crisis, to rebuild their assets and livelihoods, and to be able to support their families.
As well as dealing with the immediate challenges of helping people recover, we need to work together to tackle the underlying causes of food crises in the Sahel. Even when the harvests are good, 230,000 children die of malnutrition-related causes each year. Oxfam is dedicated to supporting small-scale farmers so they can produce more food, supporting the incomes of the poorest people through cash-for-work programs, and building systems of food reserves. These are just some of ways we can help to build the resilience of communities to future shocks, and avoid crises in the future.
]]>"It is hard not to be able to feed your children," says Adama Diallo. "You can't be at peace. You can't sleep at night."
Diallo, who lives in the village of Tankanto Escale, Senegal, is no stranger to hunger. Each year in the run-up to the fall harvest, those who depend on agriculture experience a lean season, when the last of the stored food runs out and they must cope as best they can—reducing their meals to a minimum while they eke out an uncertain income from day labor, trading, and in some cases mining for flecks of gold.
But this year, the lean season in Senegal—as in much of the western Sahel—began months early, and the consequences have been harsh. More than half a year on a sparse diet of millet and rice has left many children severely and visibly malnourished. And farmers, many of whom have had to sell off their labor-saving equipment and draft animals to buy food, face the difficult task of cultivating crops while hungry and fatigued.
Diallo's own story is not unusual: after the disastrous harvest of 2011, her stocks of food ran out quickly, and she resorted to a hand-to-mouth existence as a trader in the marketplace, beginning each day with no money and only borrowed goods to sell, and ending with—if she was lucky—enough food to get through another day.
"If the food is not sufficient," she says, "we only give it to the children."
Diallo's struggles didn't go unnoticed: Oxfam's partner FODDE (in English, Forum for Sustainable Indigenous Development) included her in a program to distribute cash to the people most in need in this emergency. So recently she traveled to a credit union in the nearest large town, presented her cash voucher card and ID, and received enough money—provided by Oxfam—to feed a household of 10 people for a month (about $8 per person).
Why distribute cash rather than food during a food crisis?
It is a surprising fact that in the midst of a food crisis, marketplaces may be overflowing with food. In the Kolda market, for example, which serves Tankanto Escale, some local farmers – despite the crop failures—have managed to gather or grow a few items for sale. They ran out of rice months ago, but traders have filled that gap and many others by importing goods from other regions.
As long as food is available, there's no need for an aid provider to undertake the costly and time-consuming process of shipping it in. Yet people who have lost their harvest—and with it their main source of income—may not be able to afford the food that's there. For that, they need cash.
Cash payments quickly go to work in the local markets, benefiting not only the people who receive the money directly but also the local farmers and vendors they buy from.
And cash provides flexibility. A food distribution might involve fixed rations of beans and grains—the non-perishables that can travel long distances— but people who receive cash can buy a variety of foods, including eggs, fresh fruit, and vegetables. Furthermore, those who have pressing medical concerns can make the choice to spend some of their money on doctors and medicines.
So in southern Senegal and some of the other crisis-affected regions, Oxfam is focusing not on providing food but on providing the means to purchase the foods and critical services that are available locally.
Diallo used her first payment to buy rice, soap, and cooking oil. "Once we received the cash, there was a big change," she says. "Before, we ate twice a day, but never enough. The children ate three times a day, but it never filled them. After the payment, there was enough for everyone."
The money not only helped her meet immediate needs—it released her from the daily imperative of earning money in the marketplace, so she has had a chance to plant her fields. Which means that if this season's promising rains continue, she will likely have a harvest in October or November that will help her get back on her feet.
"Now I have peace," she said, "and I am sleeping well."
Read blogs about Oxfam's cash and public health programs in Senegal.
Read about Oxfam's response to the food crisis throughout the western Sahel.
Donate now to the Sahel food crisis fund.
]]>On distribution day in the village of Louga, women and children sat patiently, waiting for their names to be called as workers carefully measured each family's allotment. Here, every grain is precious. Though Oxfam has selected the most vulnerable villagers to receive the food—widows, divorcees, and people caring for orphans—in reality the sorely needed calories will be shared widely among many. It's one of the survival strategies common in Louga, where the homes sit close together along dusty paths and the temperature soars to 104 degrees.
"Solidarity here in this community is very strong," says Khadidja Idriss, a mother of six children. She shared with 10 other families some of the food she received on distribution day, which included 75 pounds of corn, 9 to 11 pounds of beans, a little more than two quarts of oil, and close to a pound of salt.
"My neighbors have virtually nothing either, but they will even feed my children if I'm out. We help each other, regardless of how little we have," Idriss says. "This is how we survive."
Before the distribution, Idriss , who suffers from increasing pain in her legs, had been struggling to find enough food for her family. Meals consisted of corn flour mixed with water, and a sauce made from leaves gathered by her children.
"The children often don't manage to sleep and they cry because they are hungry," said Idriss. "Sometimes I have no words of comfort for my children. I boil water with a bit of salt for them to drink, which will fill them up."
But there is no comfort like food, and when Idriss learned that her family had been selected for the distribution, she could hardly wait to convey the news.
"I told my children straight away and they were so happy and joyful and haven't talked about anything else since," she said.
The day before the distribution, a neighborhood child, propped near the doorway of Adoaga Ousmane's home, chewed on a pit from a piece of fruit . The fruit was long gone, but the chewing helped stave off hunger. For Ousmane, caring for a house full of children and grandchildren, hunger has been no stranger. Her family, too, was among those selected to receive the monthly rations. And like Idriss, her share went far beyond her own threshold.
"I shared the food I received with three other families," said Ousmane. "I can't eat my food while other people go hungry. We always share if we can. There is a strong feeling of solidarity in the village. I have to help others who are in need as they would help me if I asked."
]]>On the edge of the Taffoga cooperative, in a clearing among the huge mango trees that populate the community, we are welcomed by about 30 women, who describe the horticultural work they are able to carry out with the support of Oxfam, through its local partner ATAD. In the vegetable plot they have planted cabbages, aubergines, gombo (a local vegetable), onions, and garlic. These will enable the women to improve the variety of their diet and they will be able to sell any surplus.
Ramata Zore stops for a few minutes to talk to us while her colleagues water and weed the plot. She is 25 and has 4 children to look after. And at the moment she is on her own, as her husband has gone to the Ivory Coast to look for work.
"The vegetable plot is a help to me, because what I get from it goes somewhere towards feeding my family," she says. "If I sell some of the vegetables, I can buy millet, which is the staple part of our diet. Also, in these difficult times, we make a recipe based on millet with a few cabbage leaves, which the children love."
But gardeners here face a daily struggle: Water.
"There isn't enough water and the wells are drying up," says Zore. "We've had to organize ourselves into two groups: one group does the watering one day and the other does it the following day. In fact…after a few hours of watering, the well is dry and we have to wait a while before we can fill up the buckets again".
After we have been talking to her for a few minutes, we notice that the coming and going of the women up and down the rows is starting to slow. The four wells on the perimeter of the garden have dried up and the women are congregating around them with their buckets and watering cans, waiting for the water levels to rise again.
"I live in Taffogo and in spite of our having large fields for growing crops, we've only harvested four sacks of millet this year, compared with the 20 we can get in a normal year," says Zore. "But it's a long time since we had a normal year. Last year, the floods destroyed much of the harvest. We go from one catastrophe to another, either because of too much water or too little."
"Before, when rain wasn't in short supply, we had 15 small sheep and cattle," Zore says. "But we've had to sell them all and have now only got one small goat left. As I've got nothing else, I'll have to sell her to buy seeds for next season."
How to feed her children is always on Zore's mind.
"Often they tell me they're hungry and all I can offer them is comfort," she says. "If there's something to eat, I give it to them, and if not, I ask the neighbors."
"My dreams?" Zore asks, surprised at my question about her wishes for the future. "To have enough food to feed my family and a house built of bricks, instead of a shack like the one I live in now. I'd also like to keep up the vegetable plot for five years. Then, if I manage to find something else to do which will enable me to supplement my income, I'll be able to start a small business. I want to carry on with the vegetable plot and earn money to help my children."
Oxfam is aiming to help 1.2 million people across seven countries with programs that include cash transfers and cash-for-work initiatives, veterinary care for the livestock on which many families depend, and access to clean water and sanitation. We are also campaigning to change the root causes of this crisis. Find out how you can support our efforts.
]]>The singer and his band, The Orchestre Daande Lenol ("voice of the people" in the Fulani language), held an all-night concert in Wodobere village to raise funds for affected communities.
Maal paused during the concert attended by 1,000 people in the remote village to speak about the food crisis in Senegal and other parts of West Africa. "There is a need to act fast to avoid the situation getting worse. We saw children who don't even have water to drink. Everywhere it is dry, wells have dried up, and dead animals are littered everywhere."
The morning after the concert, Maal visited the village of Mbelone located two and a half miles from Wodobere. "We face serious problems here. Our livestock are dying before our eyes," said Ely Hamady Diallo, the chief of Mbelone, to Maal and a group of journalists. "If we humans do not have food to eat how can we feed our animals? Every other day we lose an animal -- the livestock are our livelihood."
"I am here with Oxfam to call on governments and the international community to come and help," Baaba Maal said to journalists after listening to the villagers. "We are demonstrating that artists are not just there to perform and make money. We can be agents of development."
More than 18 million people are affected by the food crisis in the Sahel region of West Africa owing to irregular rainfall last year, a lack of animal fodder, poor harvests, and lingering vulnerability from the 2010 food crisis. Rising food prices across the region and political conflict in Mali compound the situation. In Senegal, 850,000 people are affected. Oxfam's response to the crisis will include: cash transfers so families can purchase food and agricultural inputs like seeds, as well as assistance to ensure people have clean water, sanitation, and hygiene assistance. With sufficient food and seeds, families stand a much better chance of a successful harvest this year.
Oxfam is aiming to help 1.2 million people across seven countries with programs that include cash transfers and cash-for-work initiatives, veterinary care for the livestock on which many families depend, and access to clean water and sanitation. We are also campaigning to change the root causes of this crisis. Find out how you can support our efforts.
]]>"I harvested practically nothing," Founé Danfakha says of her 2011 yield. She grows groundnuts, maize, and rice in Bembou, a small village about 50 kilometers east of Kedougou, near the border with Mali. The 60-year-old mother of five children and grandmother of four says, "If the rain comes normally, I can get 20 sacks of groundnuts. Last year I got only five."
Danfakha has about five acres of land. She says her last harvest was dismal: She got three bags of rice, which is about 30 percent of the normal harvest. She planted about an acre of maize, but harvested none at all.
No seed, no harvest
Danfakha is sitting in front of her home, with her four-year-old grandson on her lap. The boy is quiet, and seems to have little energy. Danfakha says she is feeding everyone in the household regularly, despite the fact that the food she grew last year lasted only two months after the harvest in November. Usually she grows enough to last four months. She says she is meeting her family needs with money sent from her daughter, who is digging for gold in a nearby mining area.
When the rains start, Danfakha's daughter will come back to help her prepare her fields and plant. "I think we will have to cover our needs growing groundnuts," she says. "I don't have enough rice seed, but I think I have enough groundnut seed." When her daughter comes back they will have no income from mining while she works in the fields, so it is a calculated risk.
"The situation is difficult here. There's a problem of rain," Danfakha says. "It's been irregular. If there's not enough rain, there won't be a harvest. And if there is no seed, there'll be no harvest."
Oxfam is collaborating with local organizations in Kedougou to help farmers there and in other areas of West Africa with crucial agricultural support, so they can plant this spring. Oxfam is also planning work that will help keep drinking water clean and safe, and provide food or short-term employment for cash wages, so farmers can meet their food needs over the summer while they work their fields.
Oxfam is aiming to help 1.2 million people across seven countries with programs that include cash transfers and cash-for-work initiatives, veterinary care for the livestock on which many families depend, and access to clean water and sanitation. We are also campaigning to change the root causes of this crisis. Find out how you can support our efforts.
]]>She planted a maize field and hoped to grow a ton, but only got one 50-kg bag. She says the poor result was due to "lack of rain, lack of good equipment for cultivation, and lack of money to pay for labor."
Her situation is rather typical in the small village of Bandafassy, about 15 kilometers from the town of Kedougou in eastern Senegal, where erratic rain last year hit farmers hard. The resulting high demand for food grown in other parts of the country is pushing up prices, and forcing farmers who were already struggling to feed their families to find creative ways of coping.
Camara is the one in the family responsible for agriculture, but her husband Nicolas Keita helps prepare fields for planting and the harvest – when he is not away mining for gold to earn cash.
Keita says they planted in early June, but by the end of the month it had stopped raining, and what they were growing dried out in July. They replanted in August, and invested in some fertilizer. The rains were intermittent in September and stopped altogether in the beginning of October. "The rain gap in June and July prevented any decent harvest," he says.
"Things are going to go badly," Camara says she realized after the harvest. "But we will make every effort." She turned to gathering wild fruits in the forest, such as the seed pods of the baobab tree and jujube berries to feed her family.
To earn money, her mother-in-law began making clay pots for storing water; Camara walks 15 kilometers to Kedougou (carrying a 10-pound pot on her head) where she sells the pots for about $5 each. If she can make a sale, she buys food and returns. In a good week, she can sell two or three pots.
Camara reports that after a good harvest she can feed her family for about six months, but this past year the food only lasted about four. She says she is down to her last two bags of rice, one of which she wants to save for seed. "We will always find a way to get by," she says with a certain resignation. The threat to farmers like Camara is that of another year of diminished harvests: Successive bad years can lead to a downward spiral that even the most resourceful farmer can't avoid.
Oxfam is designing programs to help farmers like Camara get the resources they need to plant crops this year, so that when the rains come people will have an opportunity to grow what they need for food. Cherif Sow, who works for the Kedougou Association for Action and Development, an Oxfam partner, says the need for support in the area is crucial. "We have to help the communities as quickly as possible to help them survive the lean time, otherwise it will have an impact on their agricultural production."
Oxfam is aiming to help 1.2 million people across seven countries with programs that include cash transfers and cash-for-work initiatives, veterinary care for the livestock on which many families depend, and access to clean water and sanitation. We are also campaigning to change the root causes of this crisis. Find out how you can support our efforts.
]]>The conflict in northern Mali, one of the driving factors of last week's coup d'état and the temporary closure of borders, had already posed a major risk to vulnerable communities in Mali and the region. Now there are signs that the escalation in the country's instability is further affecting the already serious food insecurity across West Africa, meaning a rapid increase in humanitarian assistance to the region is urgently needed.
While Oxfam and other agencies continue to operate and provide assistance to vulnerable populations in zones affected by conflict, a further degradation of security may risk hampering humanitarian access and provision of basic services to areas of greatest need.
In Northern Nigeria, an increase in conflict over recent months has also affected communities who are struggling with the food crisis. Some border posts in Borno and Yobe states have been closed due to growing violence, while at other borders exports have been dramatically reduced, having a major impact on the ability of hard hit countries such as Niger and Chad – where 9.7 million risk going hungry this year – to import food. There has also been a sharp downturn in the migration of workers – an important way that families cope in hard times – due to fears of violence.
"The Sahel was already facing a serious and complex food crisis this year, and the growing security concerns in the region risk aggravating the situation further," said Al Hassan Cissé, Oxfam Regional Food Security Policy Manager. "Regional food markets are not able to function properly in such conditions, meaning greater assistance is rapidly needed to protect millions of people who risk going hungry across the Sahel."
Responding to the increased humanitarian needs of displaced people, Oxfam is already providing food, water and sanitation to refugees and host communities at three sites in the Tillabery region of Niger, as well as the Fassala transit camp in the Nema region of Mauritania. Preparations are also being made to provide assistance to 19,000 refugees in Burkina Faso. Overall, Oxfam plans to reach 350,000 people in Mali and 1.2 million people across the Sahel with humanitarian assistance.
"The insecurity in Mali must not prevent the urgent efforts needed to deal with the other crisis in this country: the lack of affordable food that threatens the lives and livelihoods of 3.5 million Malians," said Eric Mamboué, Oxfam Country Director in Mali. "While Oxfam continues to work alongside others to tackle this crisis, dealing with the urgent nutritional needs of the Malian population must remain a top priority for all actors in the country, and access to desperately needed humanitarian assistance must be ensured".
Some 13 million people in the Sahel are facing a major food crisis in 2012 as poor rains and locust attacks led to a drop in cereal production of 25%, while in some regions such as Gao in northern Mali prices of food remain over 70% higher than the five year average.
What has the erratic weather—drought, flooding—meant for the people of Kolda in southern Senegal? It's made them among the most food-insecure in the entire country, said Greg Matthews, a humanitarian livelihoods officer with Oxfam America, who recently returned from a field visit.
"In the village of Karcia bordering the region of Sedhiou, the overall production has dropped by 80 percent compared to last year," added Isaac Massaga, an Oxfam America humanitarian program officer in Senegal. "A woman we talked to said she harvested 400 kilograms of rice last year and only 80 this year—on the same size of land."
Massaga said lack of rain has also hurt the production of vegetables, an activity that usually provides a substantial source of income for women and their households.
Peanuts, the cash crop that many farmers in the Kolda area depend on to support their families, have taken a severe hit as well. During the last harvest in October, production plummeted by 60 percent, said Matthews, leaving families with less money to buy food. And at a time when they need to purchase even more of it to make up for what their fields couldn't produce, the shortages are beginning to take a toll.
When there is a lack of food—or money to buy it—families resort to other ways of coping. They may borrow food or cut down on the number of meals they eat each day. Often, they turn to searching for wild foods, such as roots, fruits, or grasses
"In the south, families showed us the clover-type grasses they were collecting for their households," said Matthews. "People told us how they had borrowed rice from family or friends, or money so they could buy a kilo to feed their children."
Normally January and February are times of plenty around Kolda. Farmers have cash from their harvests. They have stocks of food. Their families can eat three times a day, every day. But not this year.
"Now, they're saying they'll eat, definitely once, usually twice, and maybe three times—if they have enough money, or if they happen to sell a goat," Matthews said.
To get cash, more people are resorting to a hard—and environmentally destructive—solution: They are fanning out into protected forests and cutting trees, which they then turn into charcoal. Senegal's capital, Dakar, has an enormous appetite for charcoal, said Matthews, as it is the main cooking fuel used there. Neighboring Gambia is also a big market.
"You see huge trucks filled way higher than they should be—filled with thousands of sacks of charcoal—going into Gambia," Matthews said.
"In our conversations with Abdou Seydi, the regional director of rural development for Kolda, he expressed deep concern about this phenomenon," said Massaga. "It's not only accelerating deforestation in an already fragile ecosystem, but it also heavily affects the soil fertility, and thus impacts the medium-to-long-term agricultural productivity in Kolda."
But without alternatives for feeding their families, people are not likely to stop cutting trees added Seydou Wane, the executive secretary of FODDE, a local organization Oxfam works with.
What complicates the food situation in Senegal is that while one community may be struggling to ensure there is enough to eat, just a few short miles away another community may be faring fine—a disparity that makes generalizations impossible. Poor rainfall was not universal.
"We went into one village, Balkamissa, and the first thing I saw were these stacks—chest high—of millet that had been harvested, dried, and stored under a tent," said Matthews.
As bountiful as the harvest may have been in Balkamissa, it's clear from the assessment missions Oxfam has undertaken that many families are struggling and need help to make it through to the next harvest. In a three-phased response, Oxfam plans to help tens of thousands of Senegalese meet their immediate needs, recover some of their losses, and better prepare for the next time trouble strikes. And among the initiatives around Kolda will be income=generating activities so families won't have to rely on dwindling forests for their survival.
"When my kids are having fun, when they're not hungry, when they jump left, right, and center, that's the most pleasure I get," she said.
But with rain in short supply, Senussi is worried about what the future will hold. Across the Sahel region of West Africa, a number of conditions are converging that could trigger a new food crisis. Low rainfall and water levels, poor harvests, lack of pasture, and high food prices are all causing serious problems, even as people are still trying to recover from the last food crisis in 2010 which affected 10 million of them.
"If the rain does not fall, it will be a disaster for us," said Senussi. "The animals and the people need the rainy season. Pastures grow during the rainy season. Without rain there is no life. We'll have to migrate but now we don't know what will become of us."
For many families, hunger is a hardship they have long endured.
"Usually, a family should eat three times a day, but now that is not the case," said Koubra Hamid, a 40-year-old mother of eight children who lives in Sallal, Chad. She has only enough food to prepare one meal a day for her family—a ball made of rice or flour and served with a sauce.
That single meal a day is all Hamid's family has had for several years. They don't have the resources for more. To buy grain in the market, families may first have to sell one of their animals to get cash.
"If we had animals, we could feed our children more often," she said, but as the pastureland has shrunk, so has the size of their herd. And in the harsh calculus herders know well, the 13 camels Hamid's family has held onto don't add up to full stomachs for her children.
"To prepare two meals a day in one household like ours, the head of the family should own at least 30 animals," said Hamid. "Our only source of income comes from the rain. Rain falls, grass grows, animals graze this grass, then we sell the animals to provide for us. If the rain doesn't fall, we cannot talk of life here."
Nor is it easy to speak of hunger and its devastating consequences.
"The truth is, we don't have the right to say that someone has died because of hunger," said Ashta Hamid, Senussi's older sister. "We cover this and say they died because they were sick, but really, lack of food kills."
In Chad, where crop production from a recent harvest was down 50 percent, reports have indicated that 13 out of 22 regions could be affected by food insecurity.
Oxfam is gearing up to address the needs of the most vulnerable people in the region and in some places across the Sahel the organization has already been working with communities to increase their resilience.
In the village of Kouzi Wahid in northern Chad, Fatna Bakhit is growing tomatoes, watermelons, turnips, and onions with seeds and gardening tools she received from Oxfam. She's counting on the produce to help tide her family over: The last harvest was poor and they lost most of their crops. And her husband has now gone off to look for work.
"When this effort bears fruit, I will be able to take care of my small family whilst awaiting support from my husband," said Bakhit.
Across West Africa a new food crisis is looming over a population that has already endured three of them since 2005. The last—in 2010—affected 10 million people.
But with early action, the hardship and loss so many have suffered through in the past seven years could be softened and that's what Oxfam America's humanitarian workers Isaac Massaga, Julie Savane, and Greg Matthews are taking the first steps to put in place. They are just back from Boulal, a collection of villages in the north, where they were working to identify the greatest needs and the responses that would best fill them—now, and longer-term.
"We're in a good position now to mitigate the serious consequences of an acute food crisis and to help people not resort to selling assets and cattle to meet their basic needs," said Matthews, speaking from the Oxfam office in Dakar, Senegal's capital.
Selling valuables—livestock, farm tools—is one of the strategies poor families without cash employ as a last resort when faced with no other way to get food: They'll use the money to buy it in the market. But in selling these important assets, they are also limiting their ability to make a living, and that drags them deeper into poverty. Halting that cycle is key to averting a crisis.
During the last growing season, rainfall in Louga was erratic, said Matthews, sometimes coming in great gushes and sometimes not at all. For the crops—millet, cowpeas, and peanuts—the result was dismal. The yields are off dramatically.
One farmer Matthews spoke with said he and his family had just consumed the last of the millet they had harvested in the end of October—300 kilograms worth. That was five times less than he would get in a good year. And the next planting season is still four months away.
How will people manage? Some, like the millet-grower, will pursue petty commerce, such as hunting for wood that they can sell as fuel in the market. But for many herders facing lean times, their strategy is to migrate with their livestock in the hope of finding pasture elsewhere.
In Boulal this year, that migration has started much earlier than usual, said Matthews.
"The hardest months for pastoralists are April, May, and June—right before the rains begin," he said. "But they're starting to experience that now, in the beginning of February, so most of their productive animals have already started to migrate." That means families must take their kids out of school prematurely and abandon other livelihood efforts, like gardens and small shops, that could help support them.
Poor harvests are also adding to the stress herders are feeling. With fewer crops pulled in from the fields that means fewer leftovers of leaves and stalks to feed to the livestock. And as the health of their animals declines, so does the value of sheep, goats and cattle.
Coupled with all of this, said Matthews, are climbing prices in the markets. A 50-kilogram sack of rice that once could be had in a trade of one sheep now costs a herder two or three.
"Because of all this, people are starting to employ early coping strategies," Mathews said. "They are starting to change the way they eat and manage their finances to prepare for a long, hungry season."
But even as they take these steps, the future hangs heavily.
"People are really worried about what will happen a month from now," Mathews said. "Most of the food reserves are already exhausted."
Among the responses Oxfam is weighing are cash transfers—a tool that would allow hard-hit families to carry on as they would normally. With cash, they could buy the essentials they need during this critical period but not have to sell vital assets to do it, said Matthews. A second approach might be to help herders get access to fodder for their livestock, which provides both food and income for families.
But longer-term, the goal is to help communities become more resilient.
"The bottom line is working with communities to take charge of the issues and find solutions themselves," said Matthews, pointing to a milking cooperative that had worked successfully in the area for a while. "It's not about money. It's about having, at the base community level, the desire to work together and the capacity to manage working collectively."
"By early 2009, about 452,000 hectares of land had been allocated in Ghana, including a single allocation of 400 hectares for the cultivation of jatropha and related plants for bio-fuels" said Kingsley Offei-Nkansah, the secretary of Ghana Agricultural Workers Union (GAWU) and Chairman of Food Security Policy Advocacy Network (FOODSPAN), the lead speaker at the press conference. "Even though the country is yearning for foreign investments, this new wave of land deals is not the new investment in agriculture that millions of Ghanaians have been waiting for."
At 2.47 acres per hectare, this puts more than a million acres of land under cultivation of biofuel crops instead of food in Ghana, where experts are concerned that more than a million people in the country of nearly 25 million are facing shortages of food.
Continued Offei-Nkansah; "the government must put in place effective national regulations and enforcements to ensure that land owners provide secure access to land for small scale farmers, especially women." He went on to say that women constitute the largest part of the agricultural labor force in Ghana accounting for more than 50 percent of farmers and producing more than 70 percent of the total food consumed.
Oxfam's country director in Ghana, Sebastian Tiah, noted that the only way out of the dire food insecurity threatening more than 1.2 million people in the country is support to rural women farmers. "Supporting women is equal to reducing poverty and underdevelopment," he said.
The press conference was part of Oxfam's GROW campaign to urge policy makers to do more to support small-scale farmers and improve the access to food for the poorest people in the world.
]]>"I'm using this mandate," Addo announces, like a seasoned politician, and starts ticking off her issues. Most of them are related to problems with water, funding for education, jobs for young people, and compensation for the damage and loss of land from a large gold mine established near Akatekyeso.
It's a village of dirt paths, and cracked, crumbling, concrete structures. There is one well near the main road with a large group of women and children pumping water, filling buckets, and carrying them off.
"We had a hill over there," Addo motions behind her home. "That was our water shed, but they blasted it and destroyed it. We had streams flowing out of it and there was no water scarcity. But it was all destroyed and now there is no water." The mining company, AngloGold Ashanti, drilled two wells for the community, only one of which is currently functioning and now serves hundreds of people in the area.
To some, Addo may seem an unlikely leader: she's a woman with little formal education. But she has the training and knowledge she needs to be effective, thanks to her work with the local human rights and environmental organization Wacam.
"Formerly, nobody consulted us," Addo says of the mining company. "After we got training from Wacam, we understood our rights. Now they know if they want to work here they need to come and ask for our consent. Now they recognize we know our rights, and that is why they are respecting us."
Addo is part of a growing group of village advocates in rural Ghana trained by Wacam that is bringing their concerns to companies and government bodies, and pushing for changes. Wacam has been building this network for 16 years, and it is now gathering momentum.
Addo is aware of her responsibilities to effect change, and knows she has to do it honestly. "I am always very concerned about the truth," Addo says, walking down a path near her home. "Whatever I say, I investigate it, and double check to make sure I come out with the truth."
Addo believes blasting rocks with explosives in nearby mine pits caused the cracks visible on so many of the buildings in Akatakyeso. She says the blasting near her home was quite violent: She was actually in her kitchen (a wood-frame shelter next to her home where she did all the cooking on an open fire) when it nearly collapsed on top of her and her family after one particularly large explosion. They just made it out from under its metal roof before the entire structure came down.
Even the best trained community representatives negotiating compensation from a mining company for blasting damage require hard, indisputable information and facts. Several hours to the north of Akatakyeso is a community called Dormaah Bypass, which worked with Wacam to close the information gap and get a commitment from another mining company, Newmont, which runs the Ahafo mine, to repair the community's buildings.
Dormaah Bypass is just on the other side of the bypass road built for the excavation of Ahafo, less than a mile from the pit. Emmanuel Kuduah, 62, lives just off the bypass road, where he farms citrus fruit and leads a small evangelical church. "The main problem here is blasting," he says, sitting in the shade of a tree outside his house. "The pit is so close, it is cracking our buildings, and in one case a building collapsed on someone and he died."
A brief walk around Kuduah's house, where he lives with his wife and eight children, showed more than a dozen cracked areas, many of which had been repaired. But some of the repairs were opening up again, and Kuduah says the continued blasting makes it look like some areas were never repaired.
Wacam's trainers helped people from this community to hold meetings with Newmont to discuss the building damage but the company was reluctant to accept responsibility in all cases. The company did however offer to pay for an engineer to survey the buildings and make a recommendation.
Kuduah says Wacam warned villagers that an engineer hired and paid by Newmont might not be independent enough to make a fair analysis. Wacam recommended that the community members press Newmont to pay for the study, but to allow community members to pick the expert engineer. "Wacam helped us find an engineer. We held a meeting at the assembly hall to present the expert's report, and that was when the company accepted responsibility for the cracks in the buildings and said they would repair them."
Kuduah says this engineering study is just one of the ways Wacam has been able to help his community negotiate with Newmont. "They have consistently provided us with knowledge and ways to organize and lead our struggle, so we have the strategies and leadership we need. Whenever we have asked for ideas and knowledge, Wacam has helped us."
]]>The main training is in Ghana's Minerals and Mining Act, which accords citizen's rights to fair, adequate, and prompt compensation for land lost to mines. Activists also learn how to monitor the negative environmental effects of mining, particularly pollution to water bodies by cyanide (used to separate gold from rocks), which is shockingly frequent in Ghana. "Wacam has carried out investigations in water bodies in mining communities," says Hannah Owusu-Koranteng, while riding in a van from Ghana's second city Kumasi to the capital Accra, just one of the scores of trips she makes every year to train local activists. "Out of the 400 water bodies we tested, 250 were polluted. We presented the report to the Environmental Protection Agency and they are doing an investigation. It also helped inform a recent assessment in which the EPA rated the mining companies, and all the mining companies in Ghana were scored poor or unsatisfactory.
"This has all emerged from the communities, where activists identify pollution sources, and we contract researchers to analyze the water bodies and come out with findings we present to the government."
Informed communities now know what to do if they find dead fish in rivers and streams: collect and preserve samples to verify the presence of cyanide contamination, contact the Environmental Protection Agency, and negotiate compensation from the company responsible for the spill. Local activists are also trained how to communicate with the media, in cases where government and company responses to such accidents are slow or non-existent.
Oxfam also supports the legal aid organization the Center for Public Interest Law, (CEPIL), which assists communities pressing their grievances through the courts. CEPIL's work has helped several communities get compensation for cyanide spills, including a $250,000 development fund from mining company Goldfields Ghana, agreed in an out-of-court settlement for the community of Abekoase in 2007. CEPIL is also helping plaintiffs in Dumasi press for compensation from Bogoso goldmines for a cyanide spill. This case has been in and out of court since 2004, and further delaying tactics by the defendant are trying the patience of community members.
It was in Dumasi where one of Wacam's most energetic local activists emerged: Joanna Manu. Manu was one of the local farmers who learned about the cyanide spill in the nearby Aprepre Rriver in 2004, and went there immediately to collect dead fish and warn people not to touch or drink the water. She and her fellow activist Nii Anyetei pressed the case for compensation with the EPA and mining company.
Manu had also previously suffered the indignation of being arrested for farming her own lands, but successfully stood up in court and invoked the Minerals and Mining Act, pointing out to the judge that as she had received no compensation, the land did not belong to Bogoso . "I am farming that land still," she told this writer in 2007.
In the meantime, Manu has pursued her studies, finishing high school in her mid-30s. She is now pursuing her ambition to become a member of Ghana's parliament. She recently achieved a significant milestone on that road: she was elected to the District Assembly of the Western Region.
There's a saying in the local Twi language in western Ghana, Adwem anu balofo tirmuI: knowledge is not only in the head of one person. "Wacam has taught me about the basic rights of people, their rights to own property, to information, to live as a human being. And that a leader has to listen to people, be humble before them, understand their issues, and that I have to have the courage, commitment, and confidence to represent them," Manu says during a brief networking visit with other activists in the small city of Prestea, a gritty mining town near Dumasi.
For a community leader, especially a woman, to speak truth to power in Ghana, like many parts of Africa, is a challenge. Criticizing or challenging elders, or those in power, is risky – not only is it considered rude by many, it can lead to isolation. However in Ghana, there is a polite way to do this: one must seek permission to raise something publicly that might not be pleasant. This permission, called sebi, is a crucial way of working. "Wacam taught me how to do that," Manu says.
In between villagers in her voting districts, Manu says she is setting her priorities for her work in the District Assembly. Chief among them is to ensure communities understand their rights in the face of industrial mining. "I know from my experience that when your land is taken from you, you will be jobless," Manu says. "You will not get money to feed your family. I want the assembly to know about this so they will help people negotiate well, so they can get something for themselves."


text:
Biaya penambahan orang dalam kamar mungkin berlaku dan berbeda-beda menurut kebijakan hotel.
Sewaktu check-in diperlukan tanda pengenal dengan foto yang resmi dikeluarkan oleh pemerintah dan kartu kredit atau deposit tunai untuk menutup biaya tak terduga.
Pemenuhan permintaan khusus bergantung pada ketersediaan sewaktu check-in dan mungkin menimbulkan biaya tambahan. Permintaan khusus tidak dijamin akan terpenuhi.
Fasilitas rekreasi lainnya di hotel mencakup kolam renang dalam ruangan dan pusat kebugaran.
Aktivitas rekreasi yang tercantum di bawah tersedia di properti atau di sekitarnya; mungkin dikenakan biaya.
Biaya dan deposit berikut mungkin ditagihkan oleh properti saat memberikan layanan, check-in, atau check-out.
Daftar di atas mungkin tidak lengkap. Biaya dan deposit mungkin belum mencakup pajak dan dapat berubah tanpa pemberitahuan sebelumnya.
Biaya penambahan orang dalam kamar mungkin berlaku dan berbeda-beda menurut kebijakan hotel.
Sewaktu check-in diperlukan tanda pengenal dengan foto yang resmi dikeluarkan oleh pemerintah dan kartu kredit atau deposit tunai untuk menutup biaya tak terduga.
Pemenuhan permintaan khusus bergantung pada ketersediaan sewaktu check-in dan mungkin menimbulkan biaya tambahan. Permintaan khusus tidak dijamin akan terpenuhi.
The road to Arlington passes by the solemn Lincoln Memorial and leads to hallowed ground: the Arlington National Cemetery. This resting spot includes the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and the graves of John F. and Robert Kennedy. Arlington County is home to other symbols of US military might, including the Pentagon and the US Marine Corps War Memorial, better known as the Iwo Jima Memorial.
lihat semua hotel di Arlington"convinent to arlington cemetary"
adequateUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
Fantastic hotel!! Front desk staff was so nice. We even got upgraded to a suite at no additional charge once we arrived. The lobby was beautiful & the room was wonderful. Super comfortable bed. Would definitely recommend!!Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
Room is relatively big, nice view. Beside Muffins and Coffee there was no breakfast available when I was there - I have been recommended not to buy the croissants and the cones because they would be 2 days!!! old. Very disappointing - breakfast is for me as important as a good night sleep. Came back to the hotel at 4 pm and I wanted to buy a bottle […] of water: the gift shop was closed till 5 pm. I have never seen something like that. Metro Station - Hotel : prop 8 min with hotel bus which leaves every 30 min. WIFI cost $ 11. I wouldn't book this hotel again. Baca selengkapnyaUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
Great!Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Great location to Pentagon"
great rateUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Convenient to my daughter but not to DC events"
Very pleasant lobby and rooms. Disappointed that they charge for WiFI. I just used my phone as a hotspot. WiFi in hotels now is like long distance was a few years ago. A hotel rip-offUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"great place to stay"
The view from the upper floors is beautiful. The only bad things areall the road construction, but I can't fault the hotel for that and a lack of free wifi service. parking is a breeze through their private garage. The beds are firm, rooms are well-maintained. Will stay again next time I am in Arlington.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
My room smelled strongly of smoke triggering allergies for the length of my stay. The wifi was $12/day, which I guess is typical in DC but would be nice if it was included.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
Very nice and close the Reagan Airport.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Bates Motel"
Not worth the money spent. I thought the quality of the hotel would be much more than what was presented. Reminded me of a motel 6. Hotel seemed seedy and some on the people checking in seemed very seedyUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Very Nice hotel"
Excellent !!Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"family vac"
front desk was roddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddd.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"So dirty"
I receive the room without cleaned from before residence, and they don't allow me to change the room . I don't like it so much .Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
Tanggapan dari Sheraton Pentagon City Hotel Dear Haider, Thank you for taking the time to share your experience with us. Your experience is absolutely unacceptable and I am working with our Team to understand why and how this could happen. I certainly apology to you for this error as this should never happen to a Guest. Again, thank you for your feedback. Best regards, SPCGM
"Not traveller friendly"
Reception understaffed. 2 people dealing with tour groups, individuals, conferences and phone calls. Paid a premium for large room with view. Had a severe problem with toilet blocking at 2am. Staff member did not seem too worried about the problem. Only after us requesting were we moved to another room. Replacement room was a down grade, with no view. […] We were told the room was not a downgrade, Baca selengkapnyaUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Nice Place to Spend the Night"
Although the location is a little difficult to get to off the highway, it is a very clean, quiet and affordable hotel. The staff was friendly. The bed was amazingly comfortable and the free shuttle service to the Reagan National Airport was an added bonus. The only downfall was the fact that there was no free internet service offered in your bedroom. […] In this day and age having access to the internet is vital and should be included considering the amount that is paid on the room. Baca selengkapnyaUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Comfortable stay...convenient"
Very enjoyable stay.....over and beyond our expectations...Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
It was the prefect location for what we needed. Hallway carpets looked very worn and room carpets were very stained. The staff was very helpful and sis a great job. The bed was so comfortable and amazing!! The room was very nice, except for the carpet stains - definitely need to replace their carpets!Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Prepaid for a King size and got a double!"
We booked a prepaid 2 night stay for King bed w/city view. When I checked in they did not have any king /city view rooms left and instead they had to put us in a double regular bed room. The next morning I had to repack all my belonging by check out and wait for them to have a king size bedroom available for me for my second night. I was not reimbursed […] for the extra cost i had prepaid for the king room. Also, house keeping woke us up at 9;50 am on our first night when checkout isn't even until noon. They knocked multiple times until we got out of bed and opened the door. On our second night we put the Do Not Disturb sign on the door and the next morning we were not bothered. Baca selengkapnyaUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Very Good"
I had a beautiful room overlooking the city. The shuttle service to and from Pentahon City was very good always on time.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Painting the Lot, Buit clean the windows"
I like this hotel and it's really convenient for 395 and the DC region. They were painting the lot and I realize that's an isolated incident, but the smell gave me a headache for the better part of my hour drive after checking out. However, I had a great view of the Air Force Memorial, Pentagon and DC across the Pentagon, but the outside of the window […] hadn't been cleaned since the hotel was built. It would have been nce to have a clean view after the ling day before. Baca selengkapnyaUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
Stayed here for three nights with friends before running the Marine Corps Marathon. The location was great, free shuttle service to the metro, and the staff were all friendly and helpful. They even waved my parking fees on checkout!Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
A bit noisy at night that I could not filter out with the fan.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
Staff was great. Lobby was very nice. Room was just OKUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Excellent location"
The staff were extremely accomodating and informative. We were able to access every location on our agenda. The shuttle service was timely. Room service exceeded our expectations. Not only did the food arrive at the requested time, but the cuisine was enjoyable. Definitely a place to consider for a return trip.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"very good except one thing"
Had a very good stay there. The hotel was very clean and the bed and room seemed spacious, new and nice. The only complaint was that their outlets needed to be replaced. We had a very difficult time getting our plugs to stay in the wall and some outlets didn't seem to work. This was also the case in a friends room as well. Basically, I had to push my […] plug ends together to help the plug stay in the wall. Baca selengkapnyaUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Nice and close to the Pentagon for the ATM"
It was a nice and clean hotel, the room was nice, the bed was comfortable, the only negative was the restaurant had a very limited menu for a vegetarian and was very pricey. When I asked at the hotel if there was another restaurant in walking distance I was told no, however when I went and walked around there was a great little Ethiopian place in the […] next block that was amazing. Baca selengkapnyaUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Congested area"
The restaurant service and menu was very good. We arrived after closing hours and they still seated us and did not hurry us. The waiter and manager were very pleasant. The night desk clerk was not very friendly or personable. We had to drag information out of him. He could have cracked even a hint of a smile. The room was ok but not anywhere near what […] I had expected of the Sheraton. The convention areas were nice but the rooms were just so-so. The sheets were stiff and uncomfortable. Disappointed. Baca selengkapnyaUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
This was the first time I stayed at this hotel and will not be there again, disappionted by the way they handle it. TV did not turn on. Managermant was not good enoughUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"One of the best!!!"
Very good service all the way around front the lobby to the kitchen keep the good work guys I will be back !! Location is fantastic !Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Nice place"
The stay was very niceUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Good value, free shuttle makes it worth it"
Even though the location isn't in metro DC, their every-half-hour complimentary shuttle service directly to the closest metro stop (Pentagon City), made getting into the city relatively convenient. I loved their courteous staff, who were very welcoming and accommodating when we needed to leave our bags there for an additional 8 hours after checkout […] . Baca selengkapnyaUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
l love it ... it was my first time and i really enjoyed staying there.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Close to DC and comfortable"
Good view and close to a lot of businesses and DC (where we wanted to go).Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Just a hotel"
The hotel was decent.. nothing spectacular Therefore the restaurant is terrible, food and service. Employees are extremely rude.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Will consider other properties in future"
Staff was helpful. I had called ahead to let them know of a late arrival and to confirm my King room. At 5 pm, I was assured of my King bed. Upon arrival, we entered our double room, no more king bedrooms left. The staff gave me free parking and 2 days of breakfast. The carpets were old and dated throughout our section of the hotel. We stayed for the […] convenience between Georgetown and Alexandria. Limited amenities with in walking distance Baca selengkapnyaUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Shuttle bus very helpful"
Good price at weekend, like the shuttle bus. Location good, reachable by metro and taxi if missed the shuttle.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Best bang for buck"
First rate hotel in a great location For a great price. Even with on-going construction easy to get to and out of.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"The food is awful"
The place could use some good chef and customer service training, particularly in the restaurant.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Nice Stay with minor drawbacks"
There were a few drawbacks but all in all it was a very nice stay. Pluses: -Hotel Staff very friendly, knowledgeable and accommodating -Great complimentary shuttle service to Pentagon City Metro and Reagan National (Every :30 minutes from 6:15 to 11:30p/Pentagon City; Reagan National starts at 5:00 am, not sure of frequency) -Convenient restaurant with […] breakfast buffet (not complimentary). -Nice comfy king size bed -HDTV (though some of the channels showed very dark) -Nice little souvenir shop for last minute souvenirs. -Walking distance to Air Force Memorial, Marine Corps Exchange, Arlington Cemetery and Fort Myer. Minuses: -Hotel had an odd smell, especially in our room. It smelled like a cat had been in the room. -Age. Some the wallpaper was peeling. Because our primary conveyances were the metro and walking the complimentary shuttle was a great resource. Clearly the +'s outweigh the –'s and I would stay here again with no hesitation. Baca selengkapnyaUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
Very pleasant. Staff was most accommodating. Helped make it easy to get into town and to the airport.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
Everything was perfect. Location is a but far from center, free shuttle to the metro to Washington. Please note that parking is not included as well as breakfast. Additional payment is required for the same.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
It was nice. However, the service was a disaster. I requsted milk for my coffe & i never recived it & when i went to the cafateria they wanted $3 for milk.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Nice pet friendly hotel"
Nice place, they were very dog friendly but we did have to pay $10 for parking which was annoying. Overall this place was clean and what we expected.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
The service in front disk was not that goodUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Beautiful Hotel"
The location is not ideal due to lots of construction and being on the outskirts of Pentagon city. That said, it's still convenient to many things and our view of the city from the 9th floor was spectacular. The hotel is beautiful and sparkling clean and comfortable. We really enjoyed our stay.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
The hotel is excellent, the restaurant was great. The staff was very nice and helpful. Always willing to help.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Best view of Washington Mall"
The hotel offered the best price in Arlington area, but I was surprised by the beautiful view of the Washington mall, from Lincoln Memorial to Capital bldg.The room was super clean and quiet spacious. Breakfast choice was excellent. Parking arrangement was bit tricky, but it was a minor detail.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Short Metro ride to all the sights."
The hotel was very nice and well kept. The only thing that I had an issue with was no vending machines for late night snacks or drinks. Your only option is the gift shop till 11pm or the bar/restaurant that was very overpriced for what it offered. 8.95 for a bowl of cereal is a little crazy. Overall it was a great stay and I would stay here again. I […] was close to shopping, Arlington National Cemetery, The pentagon and much, much more all right in this hotels back yard. Baca selengkapnyaUlasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Decent, but beware of east building"
When booking a last-minute deal, the hotel should make it clear that guests will be staying in the "east building" which is code for "old building that is not as nice" the rooms were older and smaller and definitely not 3.5 stars. Also I had to go back to the front desk to find my room because no one told me it was in this "east building".Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
"Great Hotel at a Great Price!"
We were only there for a short night, but we found the great deal on Hotels.com. There was a carpet stain in the room, but everything else was top notch.Ulasan otentik tamu Hotels.com
Ulasan dan peringkat yang ada di situs ini merupakan pendapat pribadi dari pelanggan dan suplier yang bersangkutan; ulasan tersebut tidak mencerminkan posisi Hotels.com. Baik Hotels.com maupun pihak yang terlibat untuk pengadaaan konten ulasan tidak dapat dimintai pertanggungjawaban untuk kerugian dalam bentuk apa pun yang disebabkan dari penggunaan ulasan ini

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Jones Day and Sullivan & Cromwell are advising on the $2.5 billion sale of the Cooper Tire & Rubber Company to India's Apollo Tyres, while Blank Rome and Honigman Miller are handling business information provider IHS's $1.4 billion buy of R.L. Polk & Co., the parent of used-car data service Carfax.
Font Size:
Four Firms Burn Rubber on Big U.S. Auto Sector Sales
The Am Law Daily
June 12, 2013


text:
The Vikings scored first, but Navarre scored more often Friday in the Raiders' first-ever football win at Fort Walton Beach.
Navarre (4-4, 3-1 District 2-6A) gained more than 500 yards in total offense and the defense forced four turnovers – including three interceptions by Demetrious Brown – to seal the 35-14 win at Steve Riggs Stadium.
The win gave Navarre consecutive victories for the first time this season and created a three-way tie atop the district standings. Choctawhatchee, Navarre and Niceville all sport 3-1 district records heading into this week's final district games. The Raiders are scheduled to play Mosley (4-4, 1-3) at 7 p.m. Thursday in Lynn Haven. On Friday, Choctawhatchee (6-2, 3-1) hosts Fort Walton Beach and Niceville (5-4, 3-1) hosts Crestview (4-5, 2-2). If there's a three-way tie for the district's two playoff spots, tiebreakers will be played Monday, Nov. 7, at a site to be determined.
For more on this story, see the Nov. 3 issue of Navarre Press or subscribe online.


text:
Frisco68 recently posted this video of her friend getting into a car accident that causes her vehicle to flip. It's amazing how she stays so calm and collected, given the violence of the crash. Luckily nobody was hurt.
Dang, wrong franchise...
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New Meme Alert - The 60 Year Old Girl
To the Designer of This Soap Dispenser: I Salute You
Pick Your Site Name
Tell me more


text:
Mother's Day Gift Ideas for the Migraine »
Does that special someone in your life suffer from migraines? Looking for gift ideas that won't trigger them? Follow this list of do's and don'ts... Gifts worth giving: 1. Chocolate, preferably dark chocolate, and preferably in small to moderate amounts - chocolate contains many chemicals that promote general health, and may even help


text:
Ok it might be a little early to crown Rihanna as the "Best Dressed" at the 54th Annual Grammy Awards but her Scarface inspired gown and Christian Louboutin heels have me pretty excited! As part of a collaboration between RiRi and Armani, the low-cut black gown showed off her fit bod as it hugged her in all the right places.
For those of you that follow my fashion coverage during any awards show, you KNOW how much I prefer colorful or metallic gowns to black ones. I think that the red carpet is a time to step out of your comfort zone and really show off your fun personality.
But the 23-year-old has proven me wrong. A black dress can be sexy, stylish and VA-VA-VA Voom! Well done Rihanna, you looked FIERCE!
If this is an example of what we can expect to see from her capsule collection from Armani, I can't wait to see it!
The native Barbadian has already claimed a Grammy this evening for "Best Rap/Sung Collaboration" for "All of the Lights" alongside Kid Cudi and Fergie and one for "Best Rap Song" also for "All of the Lights" and is up for a few more.
Good luck!
Photo Cred: Getty Images
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text:
Join us in Chat. Click link in menu bar to join. Unofficial chat day is every Friday night (US time).
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nice robot...jst curious but ::)who is the girl in the 1st video
so sweet then ...he sounds exactly like a girl...and smash ur 14
but yeah, its not going to kill me to click once
Started by jlowe64 Software
Started by 123laurens Robot Videos
Started by toy11 Software
Started by sherief92 Electronics


text:
- Musician's Friend Best Selection, Price & Service. Guaranteed.
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Need Help? Ask our Experts or call 800-449-9128
Heavy-duty roto-molded case with wheels for making transporting your heavy rack gear easier.
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text:
Type |
Solid Block |
Requirements |
None |
Physics |
No |
Transparency |
Yes |
Luminance |
Yes, 15 |
Blast resistance |
15 |
Tool |
Any tool |
Renewable |
No |
Stackable |
Yes (64) |
Flammable |
No |
First appearance | |
Tile Entity ID |
Beacon |
Data value |
dec: 138 hex: 8A bin: 10001010 |
Name |
beacon |
A Beacon is a block used to provide both a unique landmark, and selected buffs to all players in the vicinity. It is activated by placing it as the final block on top of a pyramid formation made up of one to four levels of mineral blocks: Diamond Blocks, Emerald Blocks, Gold Blocks, or Iron Blocks, in any combination.
The smallest pyramid that can be made to work with the Beacon block has 1 level and consists of 9 mineral blocks. By widening a pyramid by one block across an entire side, you can widen the pyramid, allowing you to place another Beacon without having to build an additional individual pyramid, which saves time, space, and resources.
With a viable pyramid beneath it, a Beacon will emit a blue beam of light into the sky, and its GUI will be available for choosing and activating the desired enhancements or protections. The range of these effects varies with the pyramid size. All players within range will have the chosen effect applied every few seconds, but when players move out of range, the effect will expire within 4–8 seconds.
Contents |
[edit] Crafting
Ingredients | Crafting recipe | ||||||||||||
+ Obsidian |
[edit] Usage
Beacon blocks provide two unique functions:
- An aesthetic landmark beam reaching into the sky, which can be visible from far away
- A functioning Beam is required in order to produce Powers, which buff players within a certain radius
Beacon blocks can also function as ordinary light sources, as they are brighter than Torches, with the same luminance and underwater function as Glowstone and Jack 'o' Lanterns. A pyramid is not required in order for Beacon blocks to emit ordinary light. Due to the rare crafting ingredients required for Beacons, Glowstone and Jack 'o' Lanterns generally make more sense for use in Survival mode, though Beacons offer Creative mode players an aesthetic alternative. Despite their bottom surfaces being dark-colored (possibly intended to represent the obsidian in their crafting recipe), beacon blocks emit equal light from each of their sides, including their bottoms.
[edit] Beam
In order to produce effects, beacons must be placed atop pyramid structures constructed from Iron Blocks, Gold Blocks, Emerald Blocks, or Diamond Blocks. They must also have a clear view of the sky with no obstructions (transparent blocks such as glass do not interfere). The type of block used to build the pyramid is entirely cosmetic and has no functional effect, so using the cheapest option (Iron Blocks) makes the most sense in Survival mode. Several different block types can also be mixed without affecting functionality.
The smallest pyramid that will make a Beacon block work is a simple single layer of 9 mineral blocks arranged in a 3x3 horizontal square. The Beacon block should then be placed on top of this square, in the center. See below for details on other pyramid sizes.
When constructed correctly, and after a short delay, the Beacon will emit a blue-grey beam of light into the sky; although at this point the Beacon beam is purely aesthetic. The beam of light is visible from up to 170 blocks away, depending on render distance. This provides a useful marker for short to mid-range gameplay.
[edit] Powers
Once the Beacon is emitting a beam, it can then be "fed" an Iron Ingot, Gold Ingot, Emerald, or Diamond, in order to provide Powers (buffs, or boosters, similar to those that might come from Potions) to players who remain within a certain radius. This is done through the Beacon's GUI, which is displayed by right-clicking the Beacon block.
In the GUI, place the item to be fed in the empty slot shown, and choose a Primary Power by clicking one of the choices displayed. Beacons sitting atop 4-level pyramids will also display Secondary Power choices, one of which can be clicked to provide a second simultaneous boost. When the "Done" button (green check mark) is clicked, the item will be consumed and the Power(s) will be activated. To set a Beacon to different Powers, another item must be consumed.
The more levels a pyramid has, the more Powers will be available to choose from, and the wider its area-of-effect will be. There are currently four possible pyramid heights:
- 1-Level Pyramid: requires 9 mineral blocks + 1 Beacon block (3x3 base)
- 2-Level Pyramid: requires 34 mineral blocks + 1 Beacon block (5x5 base + 3x3)
- 3-Level Pyramid: requires 83 mineral blocks + 1 Beacon block (7x7 base + 5x5 + 3x3)
- 4-Level Pyramid: requires 164 mineral blocks + 1 Beacon block (9x9 base + 7x7 + 5x5 + 3x3)
[edit] Multiple Beacons
Multiple Beacons can make use of the same mineral blocks below them, so it is possible to save space and resources by simply expanding pyramids to accommodate multiple adjacent beacons, rather than constructing multiple complete pyramids.
For example, 4 Beacons can be arranged 2x2 by building a pyramid with a 10x10 base layer (then an 8x8 layer, a 6x6 layer, a 4x4 layer, then the 2x2 Beacons at the top). Combining 4 Beacons in this way requires a total of 216 blocks.
Combined pyramids do not need to be symmetrical. The image to the right shows a 6-Beacon (2x3) pyramid (which is enough to provide all six powers currently available). It requires a total of 244 mineral blocks, with a base layer of 10x11.
[edit] Requirements
- Beacons require a pyramid below them as described above.
- Beacons require an unobstructed view of the sky, though transparent blocks (including other Beacon blocks) will not count as obstruction.
- Beacons can be placed, and function in The Nether, but this requires that all terrain above them be naturally generated, though transparent blocks can be placed above them.
- Beacons can be placed, and function in The End with a clear view of the sky, transparent blocks can be placed above the beacon here as well.
[edit] Pyramid damage
If the pyramid is damaged so that the Beacon is deactivated, it will still remember what powers it was set for, and once the pyramid is repaired, it will resume its previous function at no additional resource cost. This applies to piston-altered pyramids as well, making it possible for players to build Beacons that can be turned on and off with a sticky piston removing or replacing a pyramid block.
[edit] Powers
Powers will always be activated within the area-of-effect of the pyramid. The effective radius depends on the number of pyramid levels, with a 4-level pyramid providing the widest area-of-effect. When a player travels outside the area-of-effect, the powers will persist for 4–8 seconds.
Regardless of how many levels the pyramid has, only one Primary Power may be selected. Higher level pyramids merely serve to unlock more Powers and increase the area-of-effect. Multiple Primary/Secondary Powers require multiple Beacons.
[edit] Range
The Beacon forms a square area around itself, the size of which depends on the pyramid type. The buff has the same radius below the beacon as it does to the sides, however the buff travels up to the world ceiling (256) along the light beam, which makes it optimal to place Beacons near the bottom of the map. This serves for a more optimal coverage of volume (making beacon powers available in your mine for example).
Pyramid Type | Radius size |
Level 1 | 20 |
Level 2 | 30 |
Level 3 | 40 |
Level 4 | 50 |
Since these squares are centered on the Beacon, the radius indicates the distance from the Beacon to each side (in 5 directions, excluding top).
[edit] Power options
- See also: Status effect
The five primary powers are:
Speed: Increased movement (similar to a Potion of Swiftness).
Haste: Increased mining speed.
Resistance: Increased armor rating.
Jump Boost: Increased jumping distance and height.
Strength: Increased melee damage (similar to a Potion of Strength).
Level 4 pyramids can also select a secondary power. This can either be Regeneration or a level II variation of the selected primary power. When selecting the level II variant, Regeneration is no longer provided by the Beacon.
Level 1 Pyramid - (Speed or Haste)
Level 2 Pyramid - (Speed, Haste, Resistance or Jump Boost)
Level 3 Pyramid - (Speed, Haste, Resistance, Jump Boost or Strength)
Level 4 Pyramid - (Speed, Haste, Resistance, Jump Boost or Strength & Secondary Power)
Haste affects all gathering speed with tools. With that being said, it is less noticeable with slower items. To get the most out of your tools and beacon, use with the Efficiency V enchantment and the Haste II power. Haste will work with shears, shovels, pickaxes, and axes. The speed boost is 20% greater on materials such as wood, glowstone and cobblestone. Some materials such as mining stone with an Efficiency V diamond pickaxe are significantly faster than 20% while using the Haste II power, but others like leaves or cobwebs when using any shears are not. All testing done with no Efficiency, Efficiency IV, and Efficiency V while using a Haste II beacon.
There are many useful places to have a beacon set up. Some of them are as follows:
- Tree farm
- Cobblestone generator
- Sheep farm
- Any form of mining
- Mob farms (such as an Endermen farm)
- At a home/base or a Mob farm
- Zombies, Skeletons and other 2-punch kill experience farm (will turn it 1-punch). Note this does not include precision crushers at these farms.
Speed/Jump Boost:
- A home/base for easier traveling
- A manual reed farm
Keep in mind, some places will benefit much more greatly when using the 2nd tier of the power.
[edit] Video
[edit] Achievements
Icon | Achievement | In-game description | Prerequisites | Actual requirements (if different) | Version restriction | Xbox points earned |
Beaconator | Create a fully powered beacon | The Beginning. | PC | N/A |
[edit] History
Official release | ||
1.4.2 | 12w32a | Added beacon block, entitled "Work in Progress." in-game. |
12w34a | Removed beacon block from Creative menu. | |
12w36a | The "Work in Progress" block is now called "Beacon", can be found in the Creative menu and can be crafted. | |
The texture was changed from to and an animation was added. | ||
12w38a | Texture of block changed from to . Light beam changed from a semi-transparent smooth beam (which conflicted with water transparency) to a pattern with only 0%/100% opacity. | |
12w40a | Texture changed from to . Beacon beam also changed. | |
1.5 | 13w05a | Effect radius increased from 16/24/32/40 blocks to 20/30/40/50 blocks. |
[edit] Issues
Issues relating to "Beacon" are maintained on Mojira. Report issues there.
[edit] Trivia
- Placing a beacon in a pyramid shaped of blocks can make a resemblance to the Luxor Las Vegas hotel and casino which has the world's strongest beam and can be seen from 275 miles (450 km) away.
- The beacon light generated from the beacon block is 255 blocks tall. It is relative to the beacon block height, so several beacon block beams can stop at different heights.
- Some blocks like signs are very visible even when seen through several beams, becoming a lot more distinguishable from the rest of the landscape.
- The beacon light does not disappear until the chunk is unloaded, providing a great means to judge where places are.
- Adjacent beacons may share blocks in their pyramids, allowing for fairly efficient designs that provide multiple powers.
- The most efficient design allowing for all powers to be activated at the highest level, is a rectangular pyramid which is 4×5 at the top, and 10×11 at the bottom. This requires 244 blocks. Since 6 separate pyramids would require 984 blocks, this is more than a 75% reduction in materials, and only 50% more than what a single pyramid would cost.
- A single full-powered beacon requires 164 Blocks, this means it requires 1476 precious items (Diamond, Gold, Iron or Emerald) that are equivalent to 23.06 Stacks of ores (smelting is an extra cost for iron and gold).
- The player can leave a resource in the beacon block without clicking "Done".
- The only blocks that can be placed in the beacon's light without deactivating the beacon are anvils, glass, glass panes, iron bars, fences, fence Gates, enchanting tables, cauldrons, end portal frames, ender chests, piston, piston arms, dragon eggs, heads, cobblestone walls, Monster spawners, carpet, and other beacons. (non-opaque blocks)
- Like other light sources with a luminosity over 12, the Beacon Block's light is powerful enough to melt ice.
- Despite them being resource blocks, Lapis Lazuli blocks, Blocks of coal, and Blocks of Redstone will not work as part of the pyramid.
- Despite the new texture edge as of 12w38a resembling Diamond, the block still only needs Glass, Obsidian, and a Nether Star.
- Beacons do not work underwater. This is because beacons require a sky light level of 15 to function, and water blocks do not allow all light through them similar to ice and leaves.
- When a block is placed next to the beacon, the star's texture facing that block is unrendered. This happens because the block is not considered transparent, even though the texture is transparent. So, the game thinks the player can't see that texture, thus unrendering it.
- If the player flies more than one block above the top of the light beam, the beam will disappear until the player moves five blocks below it.
- The Beacon is one of the hardest blocks to obtain, requiring 3 obsidian blocks, 5 glass, and the Nether Star which is obtained by defeating the Wither.
- Water and Ice appear transparent when viewed through the swirling particle effect that you give off while you have a beacon power.
- A Beacon looks like a slab of obsidian with a glass dome on top, with a diamond block in the middle.
- A Beacon's light beam does not extend all the way up to the block limit, and becomes increasingly more difficult to see if you are not looking directly at it at higher levels.
- A Beacon's light beam will shine through lava, unlike water. This is because lava is considered a transparent block and lets light through without decreasing the light level.
[edit] Gallery
[edit] Pre-1.4
First image released by Jeb.


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Alex Schajer Enterprise
Head of Digital Technology at Aimia, the loyalty management company that owns and operates Nectar
06 September 2006 10:49am
My boss has asked me to put together a white paper on blogs and User Generated Content.
Whilst it is not a difficult task with lots of examples of big companies doing it I am having problems putting together a business case for it . Mainly I cannot get out of my mind the number of community sites in the 90s that had massive and popular forums (Mother and Baby for one) but were closed down because there was no money in it. Cost of moderation and supervision for one. A lot of talk about upsell and cross-selling to these people but it never materialised, brand loyalty etc.
What has changed 5-10 years later that suddenly it's big business ??
Hi Alex
When I get a moment I have my own (ironically) blog post stored up to rant about this very topic. For the moment, though, 3 short points:
1. User-Generated Content
I remember the "3Cs" of the dotcom boom - content, commerce and community. Isn't 'UGC' just 'community' re-hashed? Why should it work now? Have all consumers suddely woken up and decided 'you know what, I suddenly feel like generating masses of content'.Actually, there is an argument why "UGC" is now much more possible than it was in the dotcom days. I'll post more fully on this sometime but basically it's down to a mixture of 1. Broadband penetration 2. Changing Internet Usage 3. Better Tools/Services to enable UGC.
2. Blogs
Let's please not get obsessed again (dotcom style) by the particular medium, or tool, or functionality, and forget the actual message or content. In dotcom days we all needed "B2B exchanges" (except we didn't). Now we all need blogs?It isn't "blogs" or "Forums" or "widgets" or whatever else that is important. It is whether a) you actually have anything interesting to say and b) whether your users / customers actually want to engage with you in this way and c) whether there is a sensible business case.
Companies talk about doing blogs, but I wonder - who is going to do your blog? Where is that time coming from? And, most importantly, if you've really got something interesting to talk about, how come you weren't doing it already through press releases, white papers, seminars, a forum etc. etc.? With the arrival of blogs, have you suddenly woken up interesting?
Blogs are great, and can work very well for any company in a range of ways, but it's disappointing when the medium/tool (i.e. blogs) is what 'we must do' rather than focusing on the message / content / business case / desired outcome and then asking if blogs are appropriate.
3. The Business Case
The easiest (hard) business case for blogs (or forums)? Search engine optimisation. Cheap (text-rich, often-updated, thematically-focused) content created by willing customers / stakeholders = search engine fodder = traffic = sales / business value.Oh and I guess I should plug our own Blogging for Business training event...
Ashley Friedlein
E-consultancy.com -
Katy Howell Small Business Multi-user
Director at immediate future- social media consultancy
06 September 2006 12:55pm
Hi Alex
I agree with Ashley's points on why this medium is different in 2006. Recent Ofcom stats reveal that there is a greater shift to online as a priority source of information and entertainment. My personal thoughts are that there is a sea change in thinking amongst consumers. Now so much more marketing savvy, they are disillusioned with the big brand and moving to a more 'street'-based advocacy - with a greater propensity to use peer recommendations.
There is good business case for considering blogs and social media when getting close to your audience – the rewards are not just in monetising the blog or community, but in developing good brand communications with your customers. Customers who are now increasingly taking on board online opinions!
But be warned, it requires more than good writers and a bit of technology to create blogs and community. It requires a change in company culture to allow for transparency within the organisation. You need t be honest and open and be able to address difficult issues with personality and style. And do expect to grow a thick skin – as you open up conversations with consumers, don't expect them all to be good ones!
And as Ashley says, don't get too hung up on single tactics, the changes in consumer activity online allows companies to open up new avenues for dialogue that don't always require you to build your own blog or social media site.
David Jarvis Enterprise
Multichannel Strategy Director at Specialist Holidays Group - TUI Travel
14 September 2006 08:41am
Like most things to do with the web, people who say they "want a blog, like YESTERDAY!" need to be sat down in a quiet, calm room and asked "for what purpose?"
There are some benefits to blogs that are very generic and can be done with almost any CMS. The trouble is they have never been so darn EASY and cheap to do until the last few years.
These are things like:
- a content management interface that almost anyone can use (Blogger is living testament to this, thanks to Adaptive Path & Doug Bowman...)
- no-thought-required navigation scheme for content organisation built in
- search built in (most systems anyway!)
- comments & trackbacks from other like-minded people, create a conversation in minutes
- SEO friendly URLs, templates, HTML -- publish your blog and see it in days in Google - that's a big benefit...The blog crowd are largely *giving away* this software whereas in the past I have been involved (on more than one occasion I'm afraid) in six figure projects that were unable to deliver the simplicity of interface and depth of functionality now available in WordPress, Movable Type et al.
This *is* significant, particularly to Jo or Josephine Public who wants to publish their cat photos, holiday journal or hilarious lifestories.
For businesses though, technology on its own rarely creates value - humans do.
This is the point Ashley is making - unless you understand the human drivers around supply and demand for content, it's unlikely you're going to create a great business case. So it's all about your proposition for the blog, how the audience will respond, and how you can support that proposition over time to create value.