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Saturday, June 19, 2010

[ALOCHONA] River shown 'stagnant' for fish farming



Mukteshwari leased to fish farmers with ruling party links since 1980
 


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[ALOCHONA] From Union Carbide to Exxon to BP



From Union Carbide to Exxon to BP

By P. SAINATH

Over 20,000 killed. Over half a million victims maimed, disabled or otherwise affected. Compensation of around Rs. 12,414 per victim on average on the 1989 value of the rupee. $ 470 million total. And that divided between 574,367 victims.) Over a quarter of a century's wait. To see seven former officials of Union Carbide Corporation's Indian subsidiary sentenced to two years in prison and fined $2100. Not a single person from the far more responsible parent US company punished.

Yet, the notion that the main injustice to Bhopal is a failure to extradite then UCC chief Warren Anderson from America is mildly ridiculous.  Trying to evade the lessons the 1984 Bhopal Gas disaster threw  up on the tyranny of giant corporations is completely so. Well over two decades after its MIC gas slaughtered 20,000 (mostly very poor) human beings, Bhopal still pays the price of Carbide's criminality. (Evident from the long-term impact on the health of the gas-affected. And from the poisoned soil and water around the former Carbide plant.) While the Indian government's appalling Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill, if adopted, would  give legal cover to such conduct across the country.

Bhopal marked the horrific beginning of a new era. One that signalled the collapse of restraint on corporate power.  The ongoing BP spill in the Mexican Gulf  --  with estimates ranging from 30,000  to 80,000 barrels per day  --  tops off a quarter of a century where corporations could  (and have) done anything in the pursuit of profit, at any human cost. Barack Obama's 'hard words' on BP are mostly pre-November poll-rants. BP can take a lot of comfort  from two US Supreme Court judgements in the past two years.

The first of these came in 2008. That was in the case of the Exxon Valdez oil spill of 1989  -- till then the biggest recorded (or admitted to) oil spill in history.  Simply put, BP's blowout is recreating an Exxon Valdez every eight days or so. And has been doing that since late April.  In the Exxon case, a jury in 1994 imposed penalties of $ 5 billion on the company.  In 2006, points out Sharon Smith in an incisive piece in counterpunch.org, "an appeals court halved the punitive claim to $2.5 billion." And in June 2008, "the Supreme Court reduced that amount by 80 percent, to roughly $500 million—an average of $15,000 per plaintiff."  Exxon CEO Lee Raymond who fiercely fought the damages, retired with a $400 million package all for himself. While Exxon Valdez's victims, points out Smith, ended up with roughly the same  amount  --  only, it was shared amongst 33,000 of them. That is about 10 per cent of the original award and roughly $15,000 per victim

In September the same year, Wall Street's kleptocrats famously tanked the world economy. Their actions cost millions in America and elsewhere their jobs and livelihoods. Yet, US CEOs took home billions in bonuses that very year. Even the New York Times felt the need to say in a lead editorial at the time: "Just weeks after the Treasury Department gave nine of the nation's top banks $125 billion in taxpayer dollars to save them from unprecedented calamity, bank executives are salting money away in billionaire bonus pools to reward themselves for their performance." (In that election year, Big Oil also drummed up support for offshore drilling with this cheery slogan: 'Drill, Baby, Drill.' What'll it be now?  'Spill, Baby, Spill?')

This year, barely three months before BP turned the Gulf of Mexico into a sludge pond, the US Supreme Court further strengthened corporate power with its ruling in the Citizens United Vs. Federal Election Commission case. As Ralph Nader put it: " With this decision, corporations can now directly pour vast amounts of corporate money... into the electoral swamp already flooded with ...(corporate) dollars ...corporations can (now) reward or intimidate people running for office at the local, state, and national levels."

Mason Gaffney makes the point in the CounterPunch newsletter that "The ideas behind this are that a corporation is a 'legal person,' with all the rights (if not all the duties) of a human being; that, as such, it has a right of free speech; and that donating money is a form of speech." So chin up, BP, there's still hope. Remember how many who make it to Congress and Senate get there on Big Oil's big bucks.  

While on the BP spill, spare a thought for the victims of such disasters who are not American or white-skinned. As Foreign Policy in Focus columnist Conn Hallinan points out: "Nigerian government figures show there have been more than 9000 spills between 1970 and 2000, and there are currently 2,000 official spill sites." But then, what are African lives  worth?

Seven years after Bhopal, Larry Summers, then chief economist at the world bank, wrote his infamous memo. This said, among other things: "Just between you and me, shouldn't the World Bank be encouraging MORE migration of the dirty industries to the LDCs [Less Developed Countries]?" Summers suggested that "the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that." Summers was to later say that he was joking, being sarcastic, and so on. Few buy that pathetic plea. Still, he went on to become President of Harvard and is now President Obama's chief economic adviser, And his memo's logic holds in the real world. It is exactly what has happened since Bhopal.

The ruling UPA's response to the Bhopal sentences shows the government's ethics to be as despicable as they were in 1984. To mourn Bhopal and ready the nuclear liability bill is a hypocrisy hard to match. Bhopal was a post-facto sell-out. With this bill, the government sells out in advance. But is it only governments that have something to hide from Bhopal 1984? Even at the time, newspapers gladly carried planted stories suggesting "sabotage by Carbide's workers" had caused the disaster. Four years later, a UCC funded 'study' claimed to prove that the disaster was caused by a disgruntled worker at the plant. Carbide also ensured it could not be sued in US courts. In December 1985, some of India's great legal luminaries, including Nani Palkhivala, helped persuade US courts there that  Indian courts were the appropriate forum to deal with the case. (With results that we now live with.)  That spared Carbide the relatively much higher damages that US courts might have imposed.

Barely ten years later, Enron emerged the symbol of the new era of liberalization. Top academics, 'experts,'  and columnists worked hard to tell us what nice guys the Enron mob were. All this, after much initial criticism of the Enron deal. The change of heart was possibly a transplant funded by tens of millions of dollars set up by that company to "educate" Indian opinion-makers, law-makers etc.

Advertising too, flowed freely. One famous newspaper started out very critical of Enron, only to switch to being one of its cheerleaders. Many others, too did the same. I guess that kind of fund buys a lot of education. For Maharashtra and India, it bought disaster. The once profit-making state electricity board piled up millions in losses. The state in turn slashed money from welfare projects and services. Enron, fraud that it was, collapsed in the US, some of its top guns turning fugitives from the law. The mess remains with us. The one chance of evading disaster vanished when the Supreme Court threw out a petition against the Enron deal brought by the CITU and Abhay Mehta and that was that.

Meanwhile, Obama's rhetoric seems to have hurt British sentiments. The truth is that the United States has helped, even subsidised BP in the past. In what Alexander Cockburn calls  "the biggest bailout in history," the CIA staged a now infamous coup in Iran in 1953 to get rid of Mohammed Mossadegh's government.

The Iranian Parliament had by unanimous vote nationalised the exploitative Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. Mossadegh was toppled. Installed in his place was "Shah Reza Pahlevi, the creature  of the West's oil companies , with full tyrannical powers. The AIOC got back 40 per cent of its old concession and became an internationally owned consortium, renamed --  British Petroleum." The lists of corporate-sponsored coups in the third world would fill volumes.

All that Union Carbide did and got away with in Bhopal is shocking. But not, alas, surprising. In the quarter of a century since then, corporate power has only grown. Bhopals happen when societies privilege corporations over communities, and private profit over public interest. Curb corporate power, Indian or American, or it will rip you apart.

Remember too, that important thing Bhopal victims say over and over again: "we should see that this can never happen again." However, we seem to be ensuring quite the opposite. The Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill in its present form ensures that US corporations causing any nuclear accidents on Indian soil  will get away with minimal damages. A compensation now seen as a crime in Bhopal could be a legal norm in the future. Welcome back, Larry Summers.

P. Sainath is the rural affairs editor of The Hindu, where this piece appears, and is the author of Everybody Loves a Good Drought: Stories From India's Poorest Districts. He can be reached at: psainath@vsnl.com
 
 
 


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[ALOCHONA] Budget for agriculture: promoting unsuitable technologies and ignoring farmers



Budget for agriculture: promoting unsuitable technologies and ignoring farmers
 

It is a matter of concern that agriculture is no more an independent sector in the national budget. The budget speech of Abul Maal Abdul Muhit, finance minister of the Awami League-led government on June 10, put agriculture under the section "Agriculture and Rural development". The finance minister stated that the government does not perceive agriculture as a separate sector. He said "we treat rural non-farm sector, rural development including rural infrastructure, rural electrification, rural housing, using land and water resources and development of rural small and medium enterprises as an integral part of agriculture".

How can that be? We can only say, agriculture is integral to rural development, but that does not mean any rural development is necessarily promoting agriculture. On top of that the finance minister made a point that "food security along with accelerated economic growth can be achieved by developing the rural economy". This is the beginning of what the finance minister said for agriculture in his budget speech. Making agriculture less important leads to denial of importance of cultivation of food and other crops, ensuring self sufficiency in food and livelihood of people engaged in farming, fishing and livestock rearing. If this is the attitude towards agriculture, then what can we expect?

Compared to other sectors, agriculture was given very low priority, allocating Tk 7,492 crore, only 5.4 percent of the budget. With this very anti-agriculture vis-a-vis anti-farmer perception, it is not at all surprising that agriculture got all mixed up with many other things, which are part of donor-driven so called rural development model.

To any Bangladeshi person, agriculture is about farmers. But here in the budget, farmers are not subject rather they are the object of the government plan. Strangely, they are referred under "agro-input assistance card holders", "boro-farmers" (because of hybrid boro cultivation), or as members of 'Farmers Marketing Group' and 'Farmers Club', as if they are under a corporate system.

However, it must also be acknowledged that the provisions are made in the budget to keep fertiliser prices within the reach of the farmers and the government has taken a programme to distribute organic, green and bio fertilisers to 97 lakh families in the country to popularise the use of natural fertilisers in kitchen farming with a view to increase agricultural production. That's all, about reaching the farmers!

On the other hand, the subsidy on the fertilisers has been reduced by Tk 950 crore from last year and in this fiscal year Tk. 4,000 crore is allocated for subsidy in agricultural sector.

The distribution of agro-input assistance cards for 1.82 crore farmer families is a plan only to support the boro-rice farmers and boro rice cultivation is mainly for hybrid rice. What about aman rice growing farmers and other winter crops? This is a continuation of the hybrid boro rice cultivation programme of the previous undemocratic Care Taker Government (2007-2008) and unfortunately the newly elected government carried on the programme in the fiscal year 2009-10. An amount of Tk 750 crore was distributed among 92 lakh boro-farmers across the country to help them purchase diesel in the boro-season of FY2009-10. The finance minister was happy to say, "By showing this agro-input card, farmers are now able to open a bank account with only Tk 10. By utilising this card, I hope that in future, we will be able to bring agro-input assistances in a more transparent manner directly to the farmers' doorsteps". This is nothing but a strong promotion of the hybrid boro cultivation which is firstly an imposition upon the farmers to use imported seeds and also to move away from cultivation of other food crops during boro season.

According to a research conducted by UBINIG, there is a declining trend of hybrid rice acreage because the farmers have been rejecting hybrid rice for disease pest susceptibility, narrow adaptability to local environment, low yield and inferior quality of grains. Even in 2009-10 boro season, there was a heavy loss of hybrid rice crop in the north eastern region of the country due to early flood. It was observed in the field that the local varieties of boro rice were harvested by the end of Chaitra (mid April). The flash flood came in Baishakh (April-May) when the hybrids were in immature stages. It caused a heavy loss to the farmers. Local boro varieties should be grown in the traditional boro rice areas.


The other concern is that the government is suggesting the introduction of salinity resistant BRRI 47, in 50 percent of salinity affected 10 lakh hectares of land for coastal areas of southern part of the country where crops are affected by the intrusion of saline water due to climate change. This rice variety has now raised many questions. The scientists at the Bangladesh Rice Research Institute (BRRI) are not sure if it will work under such high level of salinity. There are around 28 lakh hectares of agricultural land in the coastal districts of Bangladesh.


Agricultural researchers of two major research organisations– Bangladesh Rice Research Institute (BRRI) and Bangladesh Atomic Energy Commission — are involved in developing saline tolerant varieties. These rice varieties are known as salinity-tolerant varieties i.e. claiming to have strengths to resist higher level of salinity. BRRI 47 is claimed to have tolerance of 8-10 deci-seimen per meter (dS/m) at all growth stage (Deci-seimen per meter is a unit to measure salinity). However, the salinity of soil and irrigation water reaches upto 9.64 – 29.07 dS/m and 11.84 – 28.70 dS/m respectively in April, according to researchers in coastal areas. That means, this level of salinity tolerance of the new variety cannot meet the salinity of soil that the coastal areas are facing. The salinity is highest in the boro season. It can rise up to 29.07 dS/m.


According to a research paper "Food Security in the Climate Change Vulnerable Coastal Belts: Strengthening Cultivation of Local Rice" (by Mia et al) presented at the Bangladesh Seed Conference and Exhibition, 2010 held during 9 – 11 March, 2010 organised by Seed Wing of the Ministry of Agriculture and Bangladesh Seed Association, the locally selected boro rice for the coastal region are Kala boro, Khaiya boro, Chaita Boro and Toba boro and they are more competent to adopt in the ever changing ecosystem. The paper concludes, "As the HYV and hybrids are unlikely to fight the present and future challenge of climate change, strengthening the cultivation of high yield potential local rice may definitely be an alternative to attain food security in the coast". On the other hand, newspaper reports show that in 2009-10 boro season, there have been several cases of crop loss in BRRI 47 in the coastal region of Bangladesh (the Jai Jai Din, 16 May 2010). We are surprised that despite such well established facts, the government is going ahead with budget allocation for large scale extension of BRRI 47 in coastal areas in 50 per cent of 10 lakh hectares and no allocation for research and promotion of any high yielding local boro rice varieties which have much more potentiality of adaptability to climate change conditions. This will not only impose vulnerability of crops but also induce food insecurity of the people.


Lastly while we are concerned about the unbalanced emphasis on hybrids, we are encouraged to see that the agriculture ministry has taken some positive steps towards stopping tobacco cultivation which has become part of agricultural policy issue because it occupies the land under food cultivation. During last two years, extensive tobacco cultivation in over 74,000 hectares has caused severe food crisis and environmental hazards in some districts such as Kushtia, Rangpur, Cox'sbazar and Bandarban. Tobacco companies are gradually moving to many more districts including fertile areas like Chalan Beel for tobacco cultivation. In this budget, the three positive steps taken to stop tobacco cultivation are:


1. The government has for the first time imposed 10 percent tariff on the export of raw tobacco to discourage cultivation of tobacco on farmland because tobacco cultivation has affected farmlands adversely and it is also threatening food security. At present all types of export items are free of tax and tariff.
2. The Ministry of Agriculture has declared to stop providing subsidised fertiliser to the tobacco companies to cultivate tobacco as part of discouraging tobacco cultivation. The field worker of agriculture extension department are working to discourage tobacco cultivators and encouraging to growing another profitable crops.
3. The Bangladesh Bank, the central bank of the country, in a circular on 18 April 2010 has ordered all scheduled commercial banks for not granting any loan for tobacco farming. The Bangladesh Bank has taken this decision keeping in view the concerns about public health, economic condition, food crisis and environment.
There must be a land use policy to regulate tobacco cultivation in the land where food crops are grown.

http://opinion.bdnews24.com/2010/06/18/budget-for-agriculture-promoting-unsuitable-technologies-and-ignoring-farmers/


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[ALOCHONA] My poem on Mahmudur Rahman



Dear All,

I am not a poet in any respect but I could not restrain myself from writing a poem on Mahmudur Rahman. It is available at:


সবাই ব্যস্ত ছিল ভাগ-বাটোয়ারা নিয়ে
সাথে চলছিল জালিমের জয়গান।
রাজপথের লড়াকু সৈনিক,
কিংবা সদা প্রতিবাদী লেখক-বুদ্ধিজীবি
কোন মন্ত্রবলে সকলে হয়ে গেলো
স্বৈরাচারের অনুগত রাজসিক।
আর যারা একান্তই মানতে পারছিল না,
তারা ঘুমের মধ্যে জেলখানার
দু:স্বপ্নে কেপে কেপে উঠে
আর বিদেশীদের বারান্দায় গিয়ে
কান্নাকটি করে ভাবলো,
দু:সময়ে এর থেকে বেশী কিছু করা
বুদ্ধিমানের কাজ হবে না।

তখন তুমি অকুতোভয়
মাহমুদুর রহমান
.....

Best regards.

Dalia Satter




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