Sustainable Economic Development - Articles - Zimbio

Vast distances a barrier to combating HIV/AIDS in India

Wed, 5 Jun 2008 04:30:00 GMT

posted by suraniku
Vast distances are a major hurdle to India's efforts to curb its soaring HIV rate.

India, which has the world's third largest HIV-positive caseload, gives drugs for free to HIV/AIDS patients. But doctors say this is not enough to stop the spread of HIV which is making inroads in rural India, especially among women infected by itinerant husbands, and also children.

For three days a month, Sambit squeezes into a crowded and often filthy train for a three hour journey to Delhi to receive HIV treatment.

"There's no seat and I am very weak," said the 30-year-old former tailor, who asked that his full name not be revealed. He can't afford lodging in Delhi and can barely afford the train tickets.

"I need to borrow money from my family for all these trips," he said.

Many patients in the same position simply give up treatment, an anathema in HIV therapy as it gives rise to drug resistance. These patients may then need more powerful second line treatment, which is not freely available in India.

"Travel can affect drug compliance. Patients who don't get family support, women who may not like to travel alone will just give up," said a doctor at a New Delhi hospital, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he did not have permission to speak to reporters.

There are 147 "antiretroviral therapy" or ART centers in the country, part of a government drive that has been encouraged by the World Health Organisation in a bid to prevent HIV from becoming a major health problem.

Delhi has nine such centers and is far better served than many other states. Up to 6,000 patients receive treatment in Delhi, nearly half of these live outside the capital.

The government now plans to build "link centers," small facilities that are closer to where patients live so people like Sambit can obtain their medications more easily.

"They just come to pick up the drugs if they have no side effects and they go home ... that saves transport and other costs," Rao said, adding that the plan was to have as many as 500 such centers all over India.

INFECTION FIGURES AREN'T GOING DOWN

India has 2.47 million HIV cases, according to the latest figures, but health workers say the number is rising rapidly and spreading to new population groups.

"Our numbers are going up," said Loon Gangte, South Asia coordinator of the Collaborative Fund for HIV Treatment Preparedness.

"It's not confined to high risk groups, it's going into the general population. It's not a problem of sex workers, drug users or truck drivers. These people have wives and children at home and the disease is making its way into the general population."

Sujatha Rao, director-general of the government's National AIDS Control Organisation, says doctors are increasingly seeing women infected by their husbands.

In some clinics, 1 out of 100 women who come for ante-natal care checkups are HIV positive, she said.

"It is a generalized epidemic," she said. "We have pockets where the prevalence is more than 1 percent among ante-natal care mothers, so we need to intensify our work."

Out of India's 611 districts, HIV prevalence is more than 1 percent of the population in 156 districts.

"The epidemic is getting deeper into (certain) rural, general areas of the country ... it is migrant-related. They go to work and then they take back the infection to their homes," she said.

Even though HIV drugs are free, only about 155,000 people have access to retroviral drugs, up from 20,000 just two years ago.

Health expert say there are many people who do not know they are infected or who do not know that treatment is available.

Some health professionals believe India's HIV problem is closely intertwined with poverty and that the government must tackle poverty if it seeks to curb the spread of HIV.

"Many of these people are very poor, they worry about food, shelter. So they may not think their HIV status is a problem because they don't even know where their next meal is coming from," said Errol Arnette of the help group Sahara.

"A lot of AIDS patients die of TB because it's hard for hospitals to keep them (in hospital). HIV patients are just thrown in a corner because of heavy stigma."

Source : news.yahoo.com

Designers on quest to build $12 computer

Tue, 6 Aug 2008 16:28:00 GMT

posted by Solmn

By Jerry Kronenberg
Monday, August 4, 2008
http://www.bostonherald.com/Technology Coverage

Photo by Jess Gately
Derek Lomas, Jesse Austin-Breneman and other designers want to create a computer that Third World residents can buy for less than you probably spend on lunch.

“We see this as a model that could increase economic opportunities for people in developing countries,” said Lomas, part of a team that’s trying to develop a $12 computer at this month’s MIT International Development Design Summit. “If you just know how to type, that can be the difference between earning $1 an hour instead of $1 a day.”

MIT’s Nicholas Negroponte has been working since 2005 to provide $100 laptops to Third World kids, but Lomas and his colleagues want to knock the price down even further. They aim to build a stripped down computer-like device for about one-tenth of what Negroponte’s One Laptop Per Child project is creating.

A $12 computer of sorts - a cheap keyboard and Nintendo-like console - already exists in India, where people hook the devices to home TVs to run simple games and programs. But Lomas, an American graduate student who stumbled across the computers in Bangalore while on an internship last summer, hit on the idea of upgrading the devices’ 1980s-era technology.
He and others at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology symposium hope to soup up the systems - which are based on old Apple II computers - with rudimentary Web access and more.
“My generation all had Apple IIs that we learned to type and play games on,” the 27-year-old said. “If we can get buy-in from programmers, we can develop these devices and give (Third World) schools Apple II computer labs like the ones I grew up with.”

A six-member team at the MIT conference is working on writing improved programs and hooking the devices to the Web through cell phones. The group also wants to add memory chips - which the devices currently lack - to allow users to write and store their own programs.
Team members have already recruited Apple II enthusiasts to help with the programming.
The group has also contacted an Indian nonprofit that expressed interest in using the devices to train village “micro-loan” officers.

Also, the team’s foreign members - who hail from Brazil, Ghana and India - plan to do market research on the souped-up devices back home.

“We think we can develop a really good educational tool that could give kids exposure to keyboards, typing and mouse usage at an early age,” said Austin-Breneman, a 25-year-old MIT graduate and a mechanical engineer.
Article URL: http://www.bostonherald.com/business/technology/general/view.bg?articleid=1110870

HIV/Aids Part Two

Mon, 18 Dec 2007 16:21:00 GMT

posted by Del

With reference to my previous post under March 2007 (NGO Charities & HIV/Aids).

I have brought the subject up again, as I hope the information will reach out to many more people out there. Almost daily there is more and more information on this Virus.

If you have not gone for an HIV test, I suggest you go for one! I know many might think it is Taboo, but to start a New Life we must get tested. Not only for your benefit but for the protection of others around you. Even if a pregnant woman is HIV, she can still give her unborn baby a new life and not to contract the disease by going on anti-retrovirals. Also if you know your status you can protect yourself by either living a better sexual life and practising safe sex and also by not passing the virus onto to someone else intentionally or without knowledge of having it. It does not mean because you are on the pill that you must not still use a condom. YOU MUST USE A CONDOM (And remember a condom is not 100% effective in prevention of transmission of HIV/Sexually transmitted Diseases or Pregnancy) If sexually active and you are not married, try to have a monogamus relationship with your partner. And if married, try to stay faithful to your partner and find ways to improve your sexual relations if you feel you might be interested in someone else. And also communication in any relationship is important.

But even if you have HIV, it is not the end of the world, you can still live a positive life filled with happiness. By taking care of your health, having a social life and making use of your talents, eating the right foods and going on Anti-Retrovirals and gaining Spirituality.

Usually with HIV infected babies/children they are given Nevirapine.

Nevirapine (Viramune) is an anti-HIV drug that reduces the amount of virus in the body. Anti-HIV drugs such as nevirapine slow down or prevent damage to the immune system, and reduce the risk of developing AIDS-related illnesses. As with other anitretroviral drugs, HIV rapidly develops resistance if nevirapine is used alone, so recommended therapy consists of combinations of three or more antiretrovirals.

HIV/Aids is on the increase by the minute.

Reasons being:-
* Lack of knowledge on the virus
* Ignorance that it exists
* Belief that God will perform a miracle (THERE IS NO CURE)
* Sleeping with a virgin or an innocent baby/child/minor
* Prostitution (lack of protection)
* Poverty
* Rape/Abuse
* Sharing of Needles used with drug addicts
* Contact with contaminated blood
* Infidelity between couples
* Mother to baby transmission

TB and Pneumonia can be HIV related.

The list can go on and on, but they are all true.

NON OF US ARE SAFE FROM IT, AS IT DOES NOT DISCRIMINATE, WHETHER YOU ARE POOR, RICH, HAPPY, SAD, A CHURCH GOER ETC

Some people might have not experienced the effect of it first hand, but I have. Someone very special to me died from it. It affected me so much because I saw what it does to you. You can look like incredible hulk then one minute you look as if you are a 10 year malnourished child, unable to breath without an Oxygen Pump, unable to use the toilet without a Catheter and unable to eat without being on a Drip. It is not a sight for anyone, but it is around us and eradicating the human species. It eats at your body worse than a cancer. As I said before it is viciously deadly.

SO DO NOT BE IGNORANT!

Look after yourself and others, protect your planet and enjoy it to the maximum, filled with happiness and love.

A Quote for you:

God loves you, and He wants you to be His child more than you want to be His. In John 1:12-13, He explains that even more important to Him than how you were born physically is that you become His child by receiving Him: "But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God." God wanted so much to give you the right to become His child that he left the wonders of heaven and died for you. He has added to your family and your blessings, because now you not only have your natural family, but also the family of God, with members like Abraham. Paul wrote in Galatians 3:9, "So then those who are of faith are blessed with Abraham, the believer."

Poll on Brazilian Attitudes Regarding Sustainable Consumption

Fri, 31 Mar 2007 02:44:00 GMT

posted by ioman01
TemasEtUnam

The Foundation for the Defense of the Consumer of São Paulo State (Fundação de Proteção e Defesa do Consumidor - "PROCON-SP") has just released the results of a recent survey it conducted on the attitudes of Brazilian consumers regarding "sustainable consumption and living." PROCON is the state consumer protection agency created in 1976, a full fifteen years before Brazil adopted its Consumer Code (Código de Defesa do Consumidor - CDC).

The survey is not scientific (but PROCON-SP does not pretend that it is):

it was done via PROCON-SP's website, and therefore only touched people with internet access, who are interested enough in consumer issues to visit PROCON-SP's site, and in all likelihood, mostly SP residents, who are not necessarily representative of the rest of the country;
only 392 respondents during the 07 February - 05 March survey period, a small sampling form which to draw sweeping conclusions;
the survey did not allow for meaningful nuances — respondents were asked to reply "always," "never" or "sometimes";
no breakdown provided by gender, occupation, income or education levels, so no way of telling how representative this sampling is of any population segment.

That said, the results are still worth checking out, contemplating and discussing. If, as I suspect, most of the respondents are educated, internet-savvy paulistas of the middle and upper classes, and their responses were as outlined below, then Brazil still has a ways to go in environmental education.

But some of the answers suggest that in Brazil — well, in SP at least — consumers are becoming more aware of the environmental impact of their personal choices. [I would suggest further, more careful and scientific surveying to confirm just how typical (or atypical) these results are.] Consumer product companies targeting the large SP market would be advised to take this into account in the product development and marketing strategies.

In each of the pie graphs that follow drawn from PROCON's report, blue signifies "always," red "never" and yellow "sometimes."

Waste/Litter/Recycling

Packaging. Many products sold in the Brazilian market now carry an indication of the material or materials their packaging is made of and whether or not it is recyclable. Several states now have laws with special rules on nonreturnable packaging, and there are a number of proposals at municipal, state and federal levels to require recyclability and/or recycling of nonreturnable packaging. And let's forget that Brazil has become one of the world's biggest recyclers of aluminum cans and PET containers.

In the graph at right (click to enlarge), the survey asked "Quando você compra um produto, procura saber se a embalagem é reciclável?" ("When you buy a product, do you check that the packaging is recyclable?"). A thin majority (51.53%) say they don't, most of the rest say that they only check at times. Actually, to a North American or European audience, that response might sound bad, but I find it encouraging in the Latin American context to find almost half of consumers anywhere even occassionally think about the recycling of their product's packaging. That is an improvement, believe it or not.

Trash Separation. A growing number of Brazilian cities have introduced what is known in Brazil as "selective collection" — a system where trash service consumers are asked to sort out their recyclables to be picked up separately from the nonrecyclable waste.

In the graph at right (click to enlarge), the survey asked "Você separa o seu lixo reciclável (como vidro, lata, papel, plástico, etc.)?" ("Do you separate your recyclable trash (such as glass, cans, paper, plastic, etc.)?"). Only 41% said that they never do, which is a surprisingly low figure, and 36% said that they always do (which is surprisingly high for a LAC audience).

Spent Batteries. A 1999 national regulation requires battery vendors to take back spent batteries and electrochemical piles (pilhas, or what in US we would call common household batteries) and for manufacturers/importers to arrange for their collection and proper recycling, treatment and/or disposal if they contain certain amounts of cadmium, lead or mercury. The President at the time, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, even made a radio address to the nation urging consumers to save and turn in their spent batteries and piles rather than throw them in the trash bin. Have Brazilian consumers gotten the message?

In the graph at right (click to enlarge), the survey asked "Costuma retornar as baterias usadas para o fabricante?" ("Are you accustomed to returning used batteries to the manufacturer?"). Most (nearly 56%) replied "never," and only a little more than quarter insisted that they always do.

Beach Litter. Brazil is one of the biggest and most faithful participants in the annual International Coastal Clean-up Day, and groups such as Instituto Ecologico Aqualung organize several other beach clean-ups throughout the rest of the year. So how conscious are paulistas about the need to keep their beaches clean?

In the graph at right (click to enlarge), the survey asked "Quando você vai à praia, preocupa-se em jogar o lixo no latão disponível ou, não havendo, leva-o para casa?" ("When you go to the beach, do you concern yourself with throwing trash in the available bin, or if there isn't one, carrying the trash back home?"). Here the overwhelming majority 90% responded that they do avoid littering beaches.

Rational Use of Water and Electricity

Wasting Water. Brazil has areas where water supplies can become tight during the year, but (so far) SP is not one of them. In the graph at right (click to enlarge), where the survey asked "Você costuma deixar a torneira aberta enquanto escova os dentes?" ("Are you accustomed to leaving the faucet open while you brush your teeth?"). Some 69% responded that they never do, which is an astonishingly high rate.

In this second graph (click to enlarge), the survey asked "O seu banho passa de dez minutos?" ("Does your shower go over ten minutes?"). Only 19% responded that they avoid long showers. This is unfortunate, not only because of the water wasted, but also because of the large number of power-hungry electric shower heads used in Brazil to heat the water.

Wasting Electricity. In a third question, the survey asked (click to enlarge) "Você deixa a luz acesa quando sai de um ambiente?" ("Do you leave the light on when you leave an area?"). Most (52%) insisted that they never do. I personally know many Brazilians that are good about turning off lights, especially after the power shortage a few years ago. Not certain I believe the percentage is that high among the average citizens in the street, however.

In the graph at right (click to enlarge), the survey asked "Você junta uma grande quantidade de roupas para passar?" ("Do you iron a lot of clothes at the same time?"). 71% claimed that they do.

Corporate Social Responsibility

More and more Brazilian firms are becoming involved in that country's "corporate social responsibility" (CSR) movement, joining organizations such as Instituto Ethos and/or the local affiliate of the World Business Council on Sustainable Development, the Conselho Empresarial Brasileiro para o Desenvolvimento Sustentável (CEBDS). Is that having an impact on how the Brazilian consumer selects his/her products to purchase?

In the graph at right (click to enlarge), the survey asked "Quando escolhe seus produtos, você se interessa em saber se a empresa tem preocupação ambiental e social?" ("When you pick your products, are you interested to know if the company is environmentally and socially concerned?").

The interesting thing here is that a majority said that they do want to know — about 22% always do, 34% consider it occassionally. If that result would hold for the rest of Brazil (a big "if"), it represents a major shift in Brazilian consumer attitudes. Maybe the companies joining Ethos and CEBDS are on to something…

– Keith R

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Eco-tourism vs. Sustainable Tourism

Sun, 1 Jan 2007 02:02:24 GMT

posted by ioman01

In one of our early posts on this blog, we featured an essay on sustainable tourism by Green Team member Jaime. If you haven't read it yet, I suggest checking it out before proceeding with this entry.

I recently read a slightly different take on the issue in the 14 December edition of the BBC's "Green Room," its page of op-eds on environmental issues. Dr. James Mair of the Centre for Marine Biodiversity and Biotechnology at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh asks if "eco-tourism" is "a sustainable trade." The op-ed raises some interesting issues and questions, not only for tourism generally, but for tourism regarding small islands in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) in particular.

I have a few problems with the opinion piece, not the least of which is that he freely utilizes the term "eco-tourism" without ever defining it. In my experience there are dozens of different definitions of "eco-tourism," and no real consensus on just what that encompasses. How can we determine if something is sustainable without first agreeing on which "something" we're examining. I find "eco-tourism" too vague and much abused and distorted, which is why I (like Jaime) tend to focus instead on "sustainable" tourism.

That aside, here are few excerpts worth considering:

The regime change caused by the conveyor belt of tourism brings income and employment; the down-side is a drain on freshwater, loss of biodiversity and habitat, and contaminants washed up by seasonal waves or continuous tides of visitors.

Jaime discusses the same tension between coastal environment and tourism development in his essay. It can be seen not only on the small islands that Mair focuses on, but probably any coastal area undergoing rapid (and usually unplanned or under-planned) tourism development.

Islands of the Las Perlas Archipelago (LPA) are characteristic of where tourism and conservation are in an embryonic stage.

Within a two-week period in late November and early December of this year, the LPA Municipality published a decree, with government backing, for the establishment of a hydrological reserve in the largest of the islands to protect over 9,800 hectares of important watershed environments, home to 14 endemic bird species.

Meanwhile the central government promulgated another decree announcing major large-scale tourist development plans.

The left hand protects the ecology, the right hand builds on it.

I can't count the number of times we've seen this in play in the Dominican Republic, no matter who is in the presidential palace. All too often the Environment Minister will declare that such-and-such protected area cannot be touched by resort developers because of its status under the General Environment Law, only days later to have the President reveal that he changed the boundaries or the protected status of that area by executive decree.

Many tourists who visit such places become fascinated by, and protective of, reef fish, corals, nesting turtles, migrating cetaceans, whale sharks and so on. They will often actively support conservation initiatives; but they may also be the unwitting necrotic traveling agents of change.

Some truth to this. Sometimes when tourism successfully promotes conservation and ecological concerns, its success can unwittingly create new problems to the very areas people want to help or protect. It is a high wire balancing act.

The sight of small islands drowning under congregations of tourists "thonging" on beaches, and others who could be termed "pleasure-seekers" with opportunistic predatory instincts already springing silently on novel niche destinations, begs the question: when will the organic growth of island eco-tourism reach its carrying capacity?

An excellent question I've often wondered about myself. How many of the island governments have seriously attempted to calculate their carrying capacity?

...has anyone asked the indigenous island peoples, with their fragile eco/social systems, what they want for themselves and their own descendants?

I'm a bit puzzled by this one, at least if Dr. Mair is continuing to speak of LAC islands. How many Caribbean islands still have indigenous cultures on them? It is, however, an excellent question to pose to those mainland tourism areas where resorts, especially all-inclusives, often displace and marginalize the locals.

Many economists think conservationists mean "no-development" when proposing "sustainable development".

Maybe it would be a start if both sides could try to agree at least on the definition of "unsustainable" developments.

It's true that many economists and tourism promoters, including many a Tourism Minister, think that conservationists and environment NGOs simply oppose any type of development, and thus tend to dismiss them and their input. On the other hand, too many environmental activists oppose any type of touristic development and all too often think economists and tourism promoters can never be convinced to undertake serious steps to make tourism poles sustainable. And he's right, if we have such a hard time agreeing on what is "sustainable," why not open dialog among the parties by at least agreeing on what is "unsustainable."

Dr. Mair mentions the "Malta Guidelines on Sustainable Tourism" agreed by the United Nations' World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) earlier this year, and then asks

Can the "contracts" that the (possibly well-meaning but often environmentally inept) World Bank or Inter-American Development Bank come up with for what is termed development assistance "converge" with the principles of the UNWTO statement?

Have the World Bank and IDB taken up the Malta Guidelines? Maybe, but I have yet to see concrete signs of it. How best to do so? That, in itself, should be the basis of a broad and deep discussion.

Not long after reading Dr. Mair's piece, I came across a reaction to it on a blog devoted to issues involving Jamaica, Cucumber Juice. I quote them here with the author's permission. Although she addresses it to local circumstances, I think some of what she says will resonate with those who know the DR well.

Sometimes I think people drive around in their gas-guzzling SUVs, scouting for beautiful, untouched areas in Jamaica to 'develop' with little or no regard for the delicate ecosystem that governs the island. Either that or they dream up these grandiose and ridculous plans meant to spur 'progress' and bring 'development.' Must be the consequence of sitting in a vehicle too high off the ground - you begin to feel like you're above it all and know it all. I mean, c'mon, isn't it common sense to consider, at least in the top 3 considerations of suggesting/envisioning any project, the environmental impact? And not just the next 3 - 5 years but the next 25 - 30 years...talk to the people, find out about the land and how things have been. Our people, especially in the rural areas - are the best source of information on Jamaica's environment...country bumpkins they are not.

I'm all for bringing clean running water, electricity, phones, vibrant city-centres, etc... to rural areas (because the strain on parish capitals, particularly, Kingston & MoBay is already disastrous and deteriorating daily) but this wholesale whoredom that the Government of Jamaica subscribes to is unacceptable: Baha'i, Cockpit Country, a coal-burning power plant, the Causeway Bridge expansion, more and more hotels on the fragile coastline, bauxite mining (in general), bridges built too low for a river's rising, houses built in a river bed (still cyaan get over that one). Really, which is worse: our myopic vision and planning or a largely, and surprisingly, dormant civil society that let's too many things slide right on by them?

What do you think?

-- Keith R

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