[asia-apec 1820] Food Rights Watch

[Anuradha Mittal]

Welcome to Food Rights Watch. Food Rights Watch provides information 
about economic and social human rights in the belief that education 
leads to 
action. Please read on, forward to friends, send story ideas, 
and most importantly- take action!!!

>From Food First - For Land and Liberty, Jobs and Justice!

Stephanie Yan

Editor
*****************************************************************

United States

(1) In Yukon, Fears U.S. Drilling Could Upset Delicate Balance
(2) Small Businesses, Limping, Feel Neglected by Aid Efforts
(3) A University of Pennsylvania Study Uncovers 400,00 American Children 

Using Survival Sex for Food and Shelter 



INTERNATIONAL

(4) Diamond Miners still work for just 12p a day
(5) Britain blocks protection for indigenous people
(6) Anti-GM smallholders in the Amazon demand justice over series
    of killings
(7) Poverty, Health Problems Worse in Developing Countries
    Dependent on Oil And Mining
(8) Plenty of Pain to Share in Zimbabwe Land Reform



United States

(1) In Yukon, Fears U.S. Drilling Could Upset Delicate Balance

To the Vuntut Gwitchin people where the caribou migrated to have their 
young 
was sacred ground. Even hunger would not allow the people to enter it to 
hunt 
for food.  Now, the Gwitchin fear, the caribou are threatened by a U.S. 
energy 
bill that would open the way for oil and gas drilling in Alaska's Arctic 
National 
Wildlife Refuge. The Gwitchin say drilling would disrupt the annual 
migration 
of the caribou and kill a human lifestyle that has survived thousands of 
years. 
 The calving grounds, which cover millions of acres, straddle the 
U.S.-Canada 
border. The most sensitive part lies on 1.5 million acres on a coastal 
plain in the 
Alaskan preserve. "We are not doing this because we don't like oil 
companies," 
said Newman, as she sat in the Gwitchin office in Old Crow. " We are 
doing this 
to preserve the land for our children. . . . When our children are 
hungry, we cannot 
give them oil."  The Senate Majority Leader Thomas A. Daschle (D-S.D.) 
has 
said "I truly believe that the vast majority of the American people want 
us to find 
our oil elsewhere. They don't want the trade-off that ANWR presents. 
It's six 
months of energy destroying in perpetuity a very pristine, very special 
part of our 
country.  "In the North, when you see the prices we pay for food, you 
will see how 
expensive it is to live up here. We could definitely use the money," 
Newman said. 
"However, there are other ways to make money. We don't need that oil 
money. 
We can't sacrifice our children's lives for that."  

Source:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A1754-2001Sep9?language=printer
By DeNeen L. Brown
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, September 10, 2001; Page A13

The fossil fuel industry spends $156 billion annually to find more oil 
and gas, yet 
the fossil fuels we already have will cause irreversible damage to our 
planet. 
Demand an alternative: 

Please sign the petition urging President Bush and your senators to vote 

to protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. 

When the issue comes to the floor of the Senate, your senators votes are 

critical in deciding the outcome. Its important that they hear directly 
from 
concerned constituents like you today. Action on this issue could now 
come 
at any time so please contact  your senator today. 

Thanks for urging bipartisanship in these difficult times
 for our nation.
http://www.senate.gov/contacting/index.cfm

Get a  sample letter that you can fax to your senator.
http://www.defenders.org/wildlife/arctic/actnow/sampleletter.html

Learn more about the Arctic Refuge and why oil from this pristine area 
will not 
lessen our dependence on foreign oil.
http://www.defenders.org/wildlife/arctic/actnow/about01.html

***********************************************************************

(2) Small Businesses, Limping, Feel Neglected by Aid Efforts

Many small businesses near the fallen World Trade Center are barely 
clinging to 
life, but unlike big business concerns from Midtown to Wall Street, the 
mom-and-pop 
shops, owners say, are dying fast below the radar of public knowledge or 
official
 concern.  But many businesses have not yet decided whether to close up 
shop 
for good. They are waiting to hear how much relief they can expect from 
the 
Federal Emergency Management Agency, insurance companies and other 
sources 
of grants and low-interest loans before making that decision.  The 
federal 
Small Business Administration has issued more than 15,000 applications 
for 
low-interest loans, but has received back only 1,300 requests, "a very 
small 
rate of return," said Cynthia Speed, a spokeswoman for the agency. She 
said it probably reflected the fact that many small-business owners were 

already worried about their debt burdens. "They're thinking, `If I'm 
about to 
lose my business, what do I need a loan for?' " Ms. Speed said that 
since 
Sept. 11, 260 loans have been approved for $26 million. Nonetheless, 
many 
owners seem to want the cash flow that comes from grant money, and are 
showing signs of pessimism about getting large chunks of it.  "As of 
today, 
no one has said anything to us about assistance," said Vivia Amalfitano, 

whose family owns three restaurants in the red zone that have been shut 
down since the attacks. "Why hasn't someone from the city or the state 
said, `Look, we'll help you'?"


Source:
By SUSAN SAULNY
New York Times
October 12, 2001
***********************************************************************

(3) A University of Pennsylvania Study Uncovers 400,00 American Children 

Using Survival Sex for Food and Shelter 

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania unveiled the grim results 
of a 
three-year study of children under 18 living in the U.S. They found that 
roughly 
400,000 children, or 1 in 100, are victims of commercial sexual 
exploitation.  
Commercial sexual exploitation is defined in the study as a one-on-one, 
interpersonal interaction in exchange for goods and services. And while 
researchers found that most of these kids engage in sex to stay alive, 
or 
for "survival sex," using their bodies to secure food, shelter, or 
clothing, some 
children were also having sex for drugs or products they might not 
otherwise 
be able to afford.  Most "customers" are men, often married with 
children of 
their own, and men who are away from home for stretches at a time, at 
conventions for example, or at truck stops during long road trips. Dr. 
Neil 
Weiner, a senior research associate at the Center for the Study of Youth 

Policy at Penn, and one of the studys co-authors said,  "There was no 
prior work we felt was credible. So we started out not knowing, hoping 
the numbers would be insignificant. Unfortunately," he adds, "we were 
wrong." 

Source:
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,174482,00.html
Monday, Sep. 10, 2001


***********************************************************************

INTERNATIONAL


(4) Diamond Miners Still Work for Just 12p a Day

Sierra Leone  this is where "conflict diamonds" come from. A middleman 
sent from Freetown pays men working in the gold mines 500 leones (12p)
 a day plus a cup of rice. "This is the only job around here because the 
war 
has ended our agriculture," Rahman says. Some people say peace has come 
to Sierra Leone after 10 years in which tens of thousands of people died 

so that the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) could enrich itself by 
winning control of the country's lucrative alluvial diamond deposits. 
Even 
though some measure of disarmament is going on, elections are planned 
and a sponsor of the war, the Liberian President, Charles Taylor, is 
subjected to United Nations sanctions, little has been done by the 
United Nations and Britain to regulate the diamond trade the root 
cause of the war. 

 Mr Sessay's rebels have been responsible for hundreds of child 
abductions, 
rapes and amputations. "Everyone is mining for diamonds here," 
Brigadier Issa Sessay, leader of the RUF, says. "There are people 
mining for the government, for the civil defense forces and for private 
individuals  not just the RUF." And he is speaking the truth: the 
Freetown 
government is also deeply involved. There is nothing illegal in that the 
diamonds 
are here, and they are among the finest and cheapest to exploit in the 
world. 
Morlai Kamara, from the Canadian-backed Campaign For Just Mining, says: 
"You could say there are no longer blood diamonds coming out of Sierra 
Leone. 
But children are still being put to work by middlemen and the conditions 

endured by the miners continue to be appalling."

Source:


For related stories:
ASIA-PACIFIC ACTIVISTS PLAN TO FIGHT MULTINATIONAL MINING, 

Follow the Mining Money: An Activist Toolkit for Direct Corporate 
Campaigning

***********************************************************************

(5)  Britain Blocks Protection for Indigenous People
At the World Conference Against Racism in Durban, the Government is 
backing a clause in the final declaration stating that "the use of the 
term 
'indigenous peoples'... cannot be construed as having any implications 
to 
rights under international law".  The 300 million indigenous people 
includes 
Maoris, Aboriginals and Native Americans.  Britain does not have 
indigenous 
minorities. But political sources said the Government, represented by 
the Home 
Office minister Angela Eagle, was acting on behalf of Canada and 
Australia 
because those countries would be in a "politically difficult" position 
if they
 tried openly to curtail the rights of their own minorities.  Joe 
Hedger, an 
Aboriginal representing the Human Rights Council of Australia, said: 
"The 
move totally undermines the pursuit of self-determination and thus 
fundamental rights like land ownership, culture, language, fishing and 
hunting 
rights. It is a slap in the face to human rights."  

Source:
http://www.eniar.org/news/independent3.html
World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and 
Related Intolerance


***********************************************************************

(6) Anti-GM Amallholders in the Amazon Demand Justice over Series of 
Killings

Ranchers allegedly arranged the murders of eight Brazilian peasant 
leaders this 
summer to silence them or to grab their smallholdings in Amazonia, and 
45 
farmers are said to be on a new hitlist in a long-running dispute over 
their 
right to grow GM-free crops. About 800 organic soya-bean farmers 
gathered 
in the city of Belem last week with members of the Landless Workers' 
Movement 
and aid workers to demand the killers be brought to justice. They say 
the ranchers' 
political clout and military backing has led to 19 deaths in their 
ranks, eight this year. 
The ranchers, with outside investors, are putting pressure on the 
cash-strapped
 federal government to drop a longstanding ban on GM crops. The farmers 
also 
complained that large-scale cattle farming and timber felling was 
ruining the 
drainage in the state of Para, where they farm. 

At a citizens' court in the city, a jury voted unanimously before the 
planting 
season to uphold a ban on genetically modified crops. Martin Dickler, 
from 
the British agency ActionAid, who attended the trial, said:"[The 
farmers] are 
insisting on sufficient laboratory research before doing field tests, 
much less
 patenting and commercialization of genetically modified organisms."

The bulk of the farmers' harvests goes to the suppliers of British
supermarkets Asda and Tesco, which have policies not to sell the 
meat or milk of animals fed with GM soya. The farmers fear that lifting
 the ban would threaten their farming methods and increase dependence 
on multinational GM seed firms such as Monsanto. 

Source:
http://www.independent.co.uk/story.jsp?story=98230
By Jan McGirk, Latin America Correspondent
08 October 2001

For more on GM debate: 
A CALL TO ACTION:NATIONAL DAY OF LABELING ACTION AGAINST 
GENETICALLY ENGINEERED FOOD.
October 30th 2001 - First national day of GE food labeling -
The Citizens Voluntary Labeling Brigade needs you!
Action ideas:
* take peaceful direct action to label products
* Frankenstein could visit the local supermarket
* table at a supermarket 
* Write to your local newspaper
* Talk to local farmers about GE
* lobby your representative..
Institute for Social Ecology, Biotechnology Project
Northeast Resistance Against Genetic Engineering 
1118 Maple Hill Road                               
Plainfield, VT 05667                                
(802) 454-9957                                      
info at nerage.org  |  www.nerage.org 
***********************************************************************

(7) Poverty, Health Problems Worse in Developing Countries Dependent
 on Oil and Mining

Developing countries that rely heavily on oil or mineral exports suffer 
higher 
rates of poverty and child mortality, and spend more on their militaries 
than 
similar countries with more diverse economies, according to a study 
released 
by Oxfam America.  The report contests the conventional economic wisdom 
that developing nations prosper by extracting and exporting their oil 
and 
mineral wealth. 

According to the Oxfam report, that when countries are dependent on oil 
and mineral exports, "they have difficulty diversifying their economy 
and 
promoting sectors like agriculture and manufacturing... [this 
dependence] 
becomes an obstacle to pro-poor types of economic activity." There are 
some measures it proposes should be applied: help poor countries 
diversify 
their economies to make them less dependent on oil and mining, removal 
by 
OECD states of tariff barriers that block export of processed minerals 
and 
petroleum products, transparency of loans to governments, aid only to 
states 
committed to democracy and fighting poverty, and careful monitoring of 
revenues. 

Recent protests against the World Bank have focused on the 
bank's support for large-scale oil and mining projects, which critics 
see as environmentally and socially destructive. As a result, the Bank 
will 
begin a review of its involvement in these sectors, consulting with 
industry 
representatives, governments, and nongovernmental organizations. The 
Bank launches the review in Brussels on Oct. 29. Keith Slack, a policy 
advisor for Oxfam America, says "the Bank should begin its review by 
questioning whether these sectors really do contribute to sustainable 
poverty reduction." 

Source:
http://www.business-humanrights.org/Children.htm

For more information see , or the World Bank's extractive industries 
review website at . 
Contact: 
Keith Slack or Andy Izquierdo, Oxfam America 202/496-1197
Prof. Michael Ross, UCLA 310/710-7115 
Deborah Rephan, Fenton Communications 202/822-5200  
***********************************************************************


(8) Plenty of Pain to Share in Zimbabwe Land Reform

Mr. Mugabe, 77, first came to power in 1980 in elections that ended all 
white rule. He vowed then to return land that was stolen by British 
settlers 
from blacks in this country. It is a promise that few people have 
forgotten, 
and with his standing waning after 21 years in power, the president 
has spent the past year reviving an issue that has great resonance 
among black voters. On hundreds of farms across the country, government
 officials and black squatters say they are reviving their young 
country's
 liberation struggle and redrawing the colonial map that left a tiny 
white 
minority with more than half this nation's fertile land. 

After 18 months of attacks against white farmers, black farm workers and 

opposition party supporters that have left more than 30 people dead, 
both 
whites and blacks here at Uitkyk farm and elsewhere are feeling 
increasingly betrayed. Zimbabwe promised last month to remove illegal 
squatters, to crack down on violence and intimidation and to carry out 
its 
land program lawfully. In return, Britain agreed to help finance the 
purchase of land for black settlers. But conflicts have continued. In 
recent 
weeks, government officials, who often say they have successfully 
resettled 130,000 households, have acknowledged that many black 
families have actually been stranded on arid stretches without adequate 
water or sanitation. The government, which publicly claims to have 
acquired 
as many as 4,000 farms over the past 18 months, has acquired only about 
91, court records and government reports show. But few deny that 
Zimbabwe is paying a devastating price for a land program that has 
yet to bear much fruit. 

The invasions of white-owned farms and the recent waves of political
 violence have left an already struggling economy in tatters. Between 
1999 and 2000, foreign investment plunged by 89 percent, government 
statistics show. The economy is expected to shrink by 8 percent this 
year. Unemployment stands at about 60 percent, and for the first time 
in a decade, severe hunger is settling over parts of the country. In an 
interview, a senior official acknowledged for the first time that a 
small 
number of people have already died from hunger in the southern district
 of Mberengwa, a community of about 170,000. Experts say the food 
shortages have been caused primarily by two seasons of unusually bad 
weather, with alternating periods of severe flooding and drought 
destroying
 the crops of black farmers with small holdings. But they say the farm
 invasions have also played a role. "The problem is not with them, 
really,"
 Mrs. Campbell, a white farm owner said. "We can see that the problem of
 land has to be addressed. We know there is a need for change. We
 just want government to follow the law. And then, we will all just try 
to pick up the pieces and try to start again."

Source:
http://profileafrica.com/Inthenews9.htm
By RACHEL L. SWARNS
October 7, 2001


 

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