According to the “Turn down the heat; why 4°C warmer world must be avoided” report published for the World Bank by the Posdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and Climate Analytics, even with the current mitigation protocol and pledges fully implemented, there is still roughly a 20 percent chance of exceeding 4°C by 2100. The anticipated results of such a warming level will pose unprecedented challenges to humanity. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Forbes Latest
The interim government tasked with putting Egypt back on track after president Mohamed Morsi’s ouster faces enormous challenges, from fixing the shattered economy to restoring security and democracy, experts say.
The new cabinet does have several factors working in its favour, however.
A wide section of the population that was bitterly disillusioned with Morsi’s rule, including several ministers, is supported by the country’s top religious authorities, both Muslim and Christian.
Separately, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait threw Egypt a financial lifeline last week, pledging $12 billion in aid and allaying fears of the country going bankrupt in the short term.
But major risks remain, with the threat of more violence between members of Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood and the security forces, and a surge in deadly attacks by militants in the Sinai, home to Egypt’s luxury Red Sea resorts.
Interim president Adly Mansour has set the government a tight timetable for reforming the constitution and holding fresh elections, while structural economic problems, including unaffordable food and fuel subsidies and a bloated public sector, must be confronted.
“There are a variety of challenges and unfortunately they can be overwhelming,” said Samer Shehata, who teaches Arab studies at Georgetown University.
Islamist parties and movements are totally absent from the new 34-member cabinet, in which a number of well-known technocrats hold senior positions.
Foreign Minister Nabil Fahmy is a seasoned diplomat and former ambassador to Washington, accomplished economist and World Bank veteran Ahmed Galal heads the finance ministry, and Ziad Bahaa Eldin, another finance expert, was nominated minister for international cooperation.
Leftwing activist Kamal Abu Eita, a respected trade union leader, was appointed labour minister.
Army chief Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s appointment as deputy premier bolsters the military’s strong support for the government, while also raising suspicions about the cabinet’s independence from the generals who toppled Morsi.
Shehata says restoring security, which has sharply deteriorated since the fall of former strongman Hosni Mubarak in 2011, is essential.
A key task facing the government, namely how to bring back international investment and attract tourists, “has to be predicated on some kind of stability or security”, he said.
Reforming the police, known for its brutal methods and a leadership little-changed since the Mubarak era, is another pressing issue.
“The police hated the Brotherhood and now the police are newly elevated and I’m afraid calls for reform of the interior ministry in a meaningful way are not going to be heard or are not going to be executed,” Shehata said.
Sophie Pommier, an expert on the Arab world at Sciences-Po university in Paris, says the new government is under greater pressure to achieve results than its predecessor.
“Lacking the legitimacy of an elected government, it will have to earn it through concrete results,” she said.
Besides fixing the economy, the cabinet headed by liberal economist Hazem al-Beblawi “must meet high expectations in terms of the redistribution” of wealth, with Egyptians “waiting for quick signs that things are going in the right direction,” Pommier added.
But continuing violence “will complicate the situation”, she said.
The Brotherhood, weakened but not defeated after Morsi’s overthrow, has certainly …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
The World Bank has approved a new energy initiative that will severely limit funding of coal-fired power plants and projects around the world, meaning developing countries could be unable to obtain access to cheap electricity.
“It will make a difference. [It will] be more expensive for underdeveloped countries to obtain the cheapest form of electricity,” Milton Catelin, Chief Executive for the World Coal Association, told FoxNews.com. “I think the World Bank has moved away from their original purpose and they have failed with poverty eradication so they are jumping on the climate control bandwagon.
“But for the benefit of society as a whole, they [the World Bank] should be at a balance between eradicating poverty and climate control,” he added.
The World Bank’s board said on Tuesday it was seeking to balance environmental efforts with energy needs in poorer, undeveloped countries and was limiting funding of coal-fired power plants and projects to only “rare circumstances.”
Its “Energy Sector Directions Paper” also said it would increase backing of hydroelectric power, which it had originally abandoned nearly two decades ago.
Officials from the World Bank told FoxNews.com that while they are now operating under the new energy initiative, they would look at energy-related issues on a case-by-case basis.
“We think that there will be a certain amount of countries within the next ten years that will not be able to use another viable source of energy,” said Rachel Kyte, Vice President Sustainable Development for the World Bank. “We don’t want to turn around and say that they will have to wait fifteen years for a new source.
“It’s impossible to improve the economy and meet the needs of the poor without having energy,” Kyte said. You cannot have entrepreneurialism going if you cannot flip on the power. What we firmly believe is that you can’t end poverty without addressing energy.”
She added that the World Bank will make allowances for Greenfield coal power generation on a case-by-case basis. The Greenfield method involves an “end point” for a power plant, when its land is restored to its original condition.
The World Bank has been going in a new direction under current president Jim Yong Kim, the first scientist to head the group, and has taken a more aggressive stance on climate change.
In the past, multilateral organizations have been criticized for urging global action to cut carbon dioxide emissions while funding coal-powered plants at the same time.
The World Bank previously defended itself by saying some of the poorest countries in the world have no other choice and need energy from coal to end poverty.
Now, Catelin said, “The reality is that they listen to the administration in Washington which has taken a negative stance on coal.
“It’s ridiculous to think that the World Bank has anything to do with poverty eradication anymore. They’ve become nothing more than another international body.”
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Pollution and other environmental degradation costs India $80 billion a year, nearly six percent of gross domestic product, the World Bank said in a report released on Wednesday. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Phys.org
When university student Ayodeji Adewunmi faced daunting hurdles in starting his own business in Nigeria, he turned to an unlikely source of inspiration: the country’s huge youth unemployment problem.
“Our mission was to have the largest active job list in the country,” he told AFP.
He may have accomplished the goal. Adewunmi’s Jobberman.com now claims to be the leading job-finder site in Africa’s most populous country, with a staff of more than 50 and some 9,000 companies posting positions.
His story is both an example of the possibilities here as well as a warning of the perils facing budding entrepreneurs and, in some ways, the country as a whole.
Jobberman’s offices in the upmarket Lagos suburb of Lekki stand in contrast to many businesses in the city of some 15 million people.
A small fleet of polished cars branded with the Jobberman logo were parked outside, with a young workforce buzzing around the two-floor interior.
But Adewunmi’s journey here wasn’t always so smooth.
When he first considered opening a business, he confronted challenges facing many aspiring entrepreneurs, but which in Nigeria are especially daunting.
He had no cash, no contacts and little hope of finding either.
“I think in our own case we lacked all that…from a capital standpoint and from a connections standpoint,” said Adewunmi.
Nigeria has long been regarded as one of the world most corrupt countries, where cronyism is rampant.
Starting a medium-sized or large business without the help of a powerful patron can border on impossible, especially in dominant sectors like oil and gas, Adewunmi told AFP.
He turned to the Internet because it “has little or nothing to do with the establishment.”
Adewunmi got the idea for a job-finder site from a friend who had developed the concept but taken no action.
It would be a business with a ready-made market. Some 37.5 percent of Nigerians under 25 are out of work, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.
In a 2010 report on the job market in Nigeria, the World Bank documented the continued rise of youth unemployment despite key economic reforms since the end of military rule in 1999.
The economy has grown, but poverty has worsened, according to official statistics, with the likely culprit an excessive reliance on Africa’s largest oil sector, which generates few jobs.
Among its many recommendations, the World Bank report said forging closing ties between training institutions and job candidates was crucial if Nigeria hoped to improve its grim jobs picture.
— Youth unemployment: a time bomb —
Analysts have described the problem of youth unemployment in Nigeria as a potential time bomb considering the risk of youths turning to crime or extremist movements if they view their economic situation as hopeless.
But beyond the obvious need for such a service, Adewunmi also had another major factor playing in his favour. Nigeria has seen fast growth in Internet access, thanks in large part to an explosion in the number of mobile phones.
In 2009, when his lecturers at the southern Obafemi Awolowo University were on strike, Adewunmi used the idle time to launch Jobberman.
In a country of some 160 …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
By Jens F. Laurson and George Pieler, Contributor
Led by China, the five “BRICS” states (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) plan to set up a development bank of their own. This is loosely characterized as an IMF and World Bank rival, which is to say an unholy combination of the two. Does this mean the fast-growing graduates of the Developing World are finally coming together as a potent force?
The Promise of Equal Futures
In response to President Obama’s challenge to other heads of state to break down barriers to women’s political and economic participation, on September 24, 2012, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton launched the Equal Futures Partnership on behalf of the United States along with 12 other founding members (Australia, Benin, Bangladesh, Denmark, Finland, Indonesia, Jordan, the Netherlands, Peru, Senegal, and Tunisia; as well as the European Union). Each founding member made national commitments to policy, legal, and regulatory reforms to promote two mutually reinforcing goals: expanded economic opportunity for women and increased political and civic participation by women at local, state and national levels. Multilateral stakeholders including UN Women and the World Bank and leading businesses and non-profit institutions also pledged support for the partnership.
Moving from Promise to Progress
Following the launch of the initiative, Equal Futures members have worked to identify priorities for action through consultations with civil society and other stakeholders and by establishing coordinating bodies or steering committees to develop and oversee the implementation of Equal Futures commitments. Going forward, Equal Futures countries will report on progress within the Partnership, and evaluate and strengthen commitments to ensure real impact.
Highlights from progress on U.S. commitments:
As a founding member of the Equal Futures Partnership, the United States made commitments in four key areas, and has achieved significant progress in each of these areas. Highlights include:
Opening Doors to Quality Education and High-Paying Career Opportunities in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math: Federal agencies and private partners have made great progress on connecting young women to high-quality science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM)-related resources. In just seven months, over 20,000 students interacted with 500 women mentors via Harvey Mudd and Piazza’s online platform WitsOn, while the National Science Foundation, Office of Personnel Management, and non-profit partners joined forces to train Federal scientists and engineers on serving as a resource for girls interested in STEM.
Promoting Civic Education and Public Leadership for Girls: The Administration has advanced new efforts to promote girls’ leadership and civic education, including sponsoring an “app challenge,” hosting a conference on girls’ leadership and civic education at the White House with the Department of Education and the Rutgers Center for American Women and Politics (CAWP), and advising on the development of a new initiative, Teach a Girl to Lead (TAG) – featuring online resources and a national speakers’ bureau.
Breaking the Cycle of Violence and Ensuring Economic Security for Survivors of Violence: To ensure that women who are victims of domestic violence are getting the support and tools they need to achieve economic independence, the Administration is now providing training on employment rights to lawyers and consumer advocates, working with state domestic violence coalitions and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) to ensure that victims know about employment protections under federal law, and expanding research on domestic violence to include information about economic abuse.
Expanding Support for Women Entrepreneurs: The Administration has strengthened support for women entrepreneurs at
Authorities charged the son of Senegal‘s former president with illicit enrichment Wednesday following a months-long investigation into how he amassed a fortune of more than $1.3 billion.
Karim Wade was ordered held in jail pending his trial, according to his lawyer El Hadj Amadou Sall. Police had detained the 44-year-old former government minister Monday.
Wade’s lawyers have said he is being unjustly accused and vigorously deny the allegations that have long swirled around him. Authorities formally began investigating him not long after his father left office.
Abdoulaye Wade lost a presidential runoff vote in March 2012 and stepped down after 12 years in power, though his quest for a third term in his 80s prompted deadly street protests that unsettled this peaceful democracy on Africa‘s western coast.
The new administration of President Macky Sall has probed several officials from the Wade regime, though the investigation into Karim Wade has been the strongest blow against the ex-president.
Karim Wade‘s popularity had plummeted in the final years of his father’s presidency as Abdoulaye Wade appeared to be grooming his son as a successor.
Senegalese derisively called Karim Wade the “Minister of the Sky and of the Earth” after his father handed him a “super ministry” with responsibility for international relations, development, infrastructure and air transport.
The post gave him control over the key sectors of the Senegalese economy. Wade’s personal fortunate has been estimated at more than $1.3 billion. By comparison, Senegal‘s national gross domestic product was $14.29 billion, according to World Bank statistics.
“We are a country of law, and I think anyone who has had managed the public purse should be monitored by the state because it is the people’s money,” said Amadou Sy, a civil servant.
Youths from Wade’s party have protested outside the police station where he was held, leading officers to fire tear gas earlier this week in an attempt to disperse the crowds.
___
Associated Press writer Mamadou Dia contributed to this report.
From: http://feeds.foxnews.com/~r/foxnews/world/~3/ocx3_ojofN8/
By Business Wirevia The Motley Fool
Filed under: Investing
MoneyGram and First National Bank Launch Mobile Money Transfer Service in South Africa
New mobile offering is Africa’s first for MoneyGram
JOHANNESBURG–(BUSINESS WIRE)– MoneyGram (NYS: MGI) , a leading global money transfer company, and First National Bank (FNB), one of the largest banks in South Africa, have launched their first mobile money transfer service in Africa, giving FNB account holders throughout South Africa provinces the convenient option for sending and receiving international money transfers using their mobile devices.
The service features an advanced data encryption system that protects account holder information. Transactions sent from a mobile device are available for collection within 10 minutes, subject to an agent’s hours of operation and local laws and regulations.
“In less than a year into our relationship with FNB, we have extended our product services to offer a mobile service in Africa,” said Carl Scheible, MoneyGram executive vice president for Africa and Europe. “This additionally supports our vision of driving convenience and accessibility for our customers. We are committed to using mobile technology that complements and augments our traditional agent locations, both in South Africa and other parts of the world. We believe that with an array of alternative channels in hand, we will cater to the specific needs of a discerning and burgeoning market. Our mobile offering with FNB is yet another option for customers in South Africa to send and receive money.”
According to Jacques Celliers, chief executive officer of business banking at FNB, “Our relationship with MoneyGram has enhanced the customer experience by making it easier and more affordable for FNB customers in both customer facing and electronic channels to send money abroad.”
Last year, MoneyGram announced an agreement with First National Bank that significantly increased MoneyGram’s agent network in South Africa. The relationship solidifies MoneyGram’s growing position in South Africa and makes it one of the largest money transfer companies in the region. Adding FNB to its agent network means customers have an additional nearly 1,000 MoneyGram money transfer locations across South Africa from which to send and receive money.
MoneyGram reported strong fourth quarter and full year 2012 performance from its online, kiosk and mobile alliances, including online transaction growth of 58 percent with revenue growth of 23 percent, both of which accelerated greatly from the third quarter.
According to the World Bank, South Africa is the third …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance
The former president of the World Bank has withdrawn from a Pennsylvania college’s commencement following critical comments posted on a school newspaper forum.
Robert Zoellick, a 1975 alumnus of Swarthmore College, also declined to receive an honorary degree, according to an announcement by Swarthmore President Rebecca Chopp that was obtained and first reported by the Philadelphia Inquirer.
“I don’t want to disrupt what should be a special day for the graduates, their families, and friends,” Zoellick wrote in an email Chopp distributed on Friday. “Nor do I have an interest in participating in an unnecessarily controversial event.”
Chopp, in the email, praised Zoellick’s “knowledge of the global economy” with a vision of how it can address poverty, social equality and justice.
“He is a model for students who want to combine knowledge with service, ethics with outreach, and wisdom with a commitment to the wider world,” the email, which was obtained by FoxNews.com, continued. “Swarthmore is very proud to claim him as an alumnus and stands by its decision to award him the honorary degree.”
Zoellick, a senior fellow at Harvard University’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, served as the 11th president of the World Bank Group from 2007 to 2012. He has also worked as the executive vice president of Fannie Mae and a senior international adviser to Goldman Sachs.
During a forum hosted by the school’s newspaper, a user who identified themselves as Will L. took issue with Zoellick’s tenure at the three institutions and claimed his role helped “build an ideological foundation” for the Iraq war.
“His whole career has been built on one morally dubious enterprise after another,” the posting read.
In 1998, Zoellick, the newspaper notes, was among the members of the Project for the New American Century — a conservative think tank — who signed a letter urging President Bill Clinton to remove then-Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein from power because of an assumption that Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. Donald Rumsfeld also signed the letter and would later lead the invasion of Iraq as President George W. Bush’s secretary of defense.
Other students generally defended the choice of Zoellick for June 2 commencement, the Inquirer reports.
Swarthmore College is a private university with roughly 1,500 students about 10 miles southwest of Philadelphia.
Click for more from the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox US News
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Watch Out, World Bank. Here Comes the BRIC Bank!
(First column, 18th story, link)
…read more
Source: Drudge Report
Iraqi oil: Once seen as U.S. boon, now it's mostly China's...
(First column, 15th story, link)
…read more
Source: Drudge Report
Putin's bodyguards fight with security; told to put 'nuclear suitcase' through X-ray...
(First column, 17th story, link)
…read more
Source: Drudge Report
China and Brazil Ditch US Dollar...
(First column, 13th story, link)
…read more
Source: Drudge Report
Assad Appeals to BRICS for Help...
(First column, 13th story, link)
…read more
Source: Drudge Report
PAPER: New global visions are welcomed...
(First column, 15th story, link)
…read more
Source: Drudge Report
Leaders of the five BRICS nations fueling global economic growth plan the creation of a development bank in a direct challenge to the World Bank that they accuse of Western bias.
The bank would use $50 billion of seed capital shared equally between Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa but would undoubtedly be dominated by China. It would be the first institution of the informal forum started in 2009 amid the economic meltdown to chart a new and more equitable world economic order.
President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday gave Russia‘s support to the bank but cautioned it “must work on market principles.”
India‘s trade minister says BRICS will “have a defining influence on the global order of this century.”
By Morgan Housel, The Motley Fool
Filed under: Investing
Cyprus is now the most talked-about economy in the world — an odd position to be in for a country that few could find on a map until this week.
Cyprus‘ $13 billion bailout, combined with roughly $6 billion of uninsured deposits whose future is in high doubt, seems minuscule compared with other international crises. And it is. But when put into context of how tiny a country Cyprus is, the numbers become staggering.
Cyprus has an annual GDP of $24.7 billion, according to the World Bank. Its combined bailout and deposit losses, therefore, total something around 75% of GDP.
If the United States required a bailout of equal proportion, the bill would total $12 trillion, or 18 times the size of the 2008 TARP bank bailout. Cyprus‘ deposit losses alone total up to the American equivalent of $4 trillion, or roughly equal to all the deposits held by Bank of America, Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase, and Citigroup combined.
Cyprus Popular Bank reported a loss of $5 billion in the year ended September 2012, according to S&P Capital IQ. The equivalent of 20% of GDP, a similar loss in the United States would total $3.2 trillion, or nearly one-quarter of the entire market capitalization of the S&P 500 . And that was just one year’s loss at one bank. In the last two years, Cyprus Popular Bank lost $8.6 billion, or more than a third of Cypriot GDP. The American equivalent would be like losing the annual output of California, Texas, New York, and Florida combined.
These comparisons are useful only because they lead squarely to one point: The Cypriot banking sector was grotesquely large in relation to its economy. This is largely because the tiny island country became a haven for foreign cash, drawing in assets at a rate many times disproportionate to the wealth of its citizens. Peter Gumbel of TIME writes:
Over the past 30 years, since the fall of the Berlin Wall, the island has banked on its ability to attract money from Russia and elsewhere as an offshore center. Oversight has been tightened up since Cyprus joined the E.U. in 2004, but it remains relatively lax by international standards, and foreign companies pay a flat tax rate of just 10%. For a while the strategy seemed to work well; Cyprus built up a gargantuan banking industry, which is currently about five times the size of its total economy, according to Standard & Poor’s.
The flood of foreign cash further relied on the belief that Cyprus‘ EU neighbors and the continent’s central bank would could to the rescue should its banking sector stumble. To an extent, they did. But not before large depositors were forced to take large haircuts on their cash. Now, senior finance members of the EU are signaling that similar deals can be used as a template for future bailouts.
The idea of a banking haven is done, in other words. After the dust settles, it is unavoidable that Cyprus …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance
By hnn
It had the potential to be another Afghanistan Buddha disaster, recalling the Taliban’s destruction of two ancient statues that had stood for centuries in this country’s west: A buried Buddhist city lost to time was about to be obliterated by what promised to be one of the largest copper mines in the world.
Now, however, thanks to delays in construction of the massive mine and a hefty influx of cash from the World Bank, the 1.5-square-mile Mes Aynak complex is an archaeological triumph – though bittersweet.
An international team of archaeologists and more than 550 local laborers are now frantically excavating what turns out to be a unique window into Afghanistan’s role on the ancient Silk Road connecting China and India with the Mediterranean.
With its Buddhist city, a ring of perhaps a half-dozen monasteries and a striking complex of workshops and mine shafts built into a high mountain ridgeline at an altitude of 8,200 feet, the site shows the interplay of Buddhism, mining and trade during the years it was in operation, now thought to be from the fifth to the late eighth centuries….
…read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at History News Network – George Mason University
By Business Wirevia The Motley Fool
Filed under: Investing
Gold Reserve Inc. Further Updates Shareholders on U.S. Listing Status
SPOKANE, Wash.–(BUSINESS WIRE)– Gold Reserve Inc. (TSX.V:GRZ) (OTCQB:GDRZF) (the “Company”) announces that effective March 15, 2013 the Company anticipates its common shares will begin to trade on the OTCQB Marketplace under the ticker symbol “GDRZF“. Investors will be able to view the Real Time Level II stock quotes for “GDRZF” at http://www.otcmarkets.com/stock/GDRZF/quote.
CAUTIONARY STATEMENT REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS
This release contains forward-looking statements that state Gold Reserve’s or its management’s intentions, hopes, beliefs, expectations or predictions for the future. In this release, forward-looking statements are necessarily based upon a number of estimates and assumptions that, while considered reasonable by management at this time, are inherently subject to significant business, economic and competitive uncertainties and contingencies.
We caution that such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other risks that may cause the actual outcomes, financial results, performance, or achievements of Gold Reserve to be materially different from our estimated outcomes, future results, performance, or achievements expressed or implied by those forward-looking statements.
Numerous factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements, including without limitation: our ability to continue to satisfy the continued listing requirements of the TSX.V or other ongoing listing standards which may result in the delisting of the Company’s Class A common shares from the relevant exchange; the outcome of our arbitration under the Additional Facility Rules of the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes of the World Bank, in Washington, D.C. to determine compensation claimed by us resulting from our claims against the Venezuelan government and its agents and agencies; corruption and uncertain legal enforcement; political and social instability; requests for improper payments; competition with companies that are not subject to or do not follow Canadian and U.S. laws and regulations; regulatory, political and economic risks associated with Venezuela including changes in laws and legal regimes; impact of currency, metal prices and metal production volatility; our dependence upon the abilities and continued participation of certain key employees; potential volatility of our Class A common shares, including dilution as a result of the conversion of the convertible notes …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance
