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MINE – YOURS – ITS – HERS – HIS – OURS – THEIRS – WHOSE PROJECT???

2011-07-02T11:21:00.006+05:30

Many would argue that who owns what in development is a key aspect, if not the aspect, to a project’s or program’s success.

And so a person’s choice word choice when describing their work or do-gooder endeavor can actually reveal quite a lot.

Some may think I’m just being fussy about semantics. They’ll argue that that well done is more important than well said. They’ll point to the fact that international assistance is constantly riddled with phrases and jargon that are eventually forgotten or rendered meaningless. But it’s deeper than that and I’m not talking nouns and acronyms.

I’m talking about possessive adjectives. MINE – YOURS – ITS – HERS – HIS – OURS – THEIRS – WHOSE.

Let’s be honest. How many of you, when talking to a friend, another NGO colleague, or donor refers to “our program” in [insert Country X or District Y or Village Z]?

But let me ask you something – Do you live in Country X or District Y or Village Z?

If you don’t, that should be your first clue that “my project” or “our program” is not the phrase for you to use. Here’s some others.

When people from your community are knocking on your door for help and you are working day and night to help fulfill their self-identified needs, then yes, by all means, lay your claim.

When you are coming up with the ideas and steps forward, based on a collective process to generate solutions to shared problems with your neighbors’ and fellow community members, then yes, “our project” is appropriate.

When you are implementing a project and it’s not just a job or a hobby, it is a matter of life and personal responsibility to people you face every day, go ahead, “our project” can be yours.

When you can identify with the people you’re serving to such an extent that you feel an obligation to be directly accountable to them in a tangible rather than an abstract way, the program is truly “yours.”

Essentially, unless you’re on the ground, doing the work with and on behalf of your own community on a daily basis, I believe a program cannot and should not ever be considered “yours,” grammatically or otherwise. Without this awareness, “our project” can be dismissive and disrespectful to local activists and grassroots leaders.

Every aid worker probably has their own bugaboos. ( These come and go as the aid lexicon shifts and changes with the latest development trend. There was a time near the turn of this century when I felt as if I had to discuss the definition of CABA (children affected by AIDS) then later OVC (orphans and vulnerable children) in one more stakeholder meeting, I would literally pitch a fit like a three-year-old.

But this “our project” issue for me has never left. When I was with [insert US-based, corporate aid agency here], though we claimed to work in partnership with local implementing organizations, all the programs were conceived of and spoken of as “ours.” This always struck me as extremely hypocritical, and frankly counter-productive to sound and proven principles of assets-based, community-driven development.

What made them our programs? The fact that we wrote the proposals? (Eh hum, in consultation with our partners of course.) Or were they our programs because, through our funding of local partners, we ultimately controlled how each cent was spent? Or because we were supposedly the ones who had to be accountable to Funding agency

How is community ownership possible under such circumstances? Local partners and communities didn’t have a chance to make the projects theirs. If a project is considered to be someone else’s, and your sense of agency and autonomy are clearly not on their radar, why would you even bother?

Similarly, I hear “our project” used just as egregiously and social enterprise folks. How many times have I had to endure hearing all about “our project” ? As I nod and listen, I’m silently thinking to myself that the fact that this project is “yours,” will more than likely contribute to its downfall.

In the keystone survey 2010,INGO Survey initiative to measure the performance of northern NGOs, local organizations sent a clear message. They do not want to be treated as sub-contractors, carrying out international agencies’ projects and priorities. Rather they want help from aid agencies to become independent and influential organizations in their own right, enabling them to respond flexibly to local people’s needs.

When are we going to realize that participation is not just a nice-to-have in this work? Nor is it even enough.

To bring about real change, we need to be talking ownership.

And not our own.

Source:howmatters.org

“FARMERS ARE OWNER OF LANDS, BUT OTHERS RULE THEM”

2011-02-23T12:41:00.001+05:30

In Recent years, thousands of farmers in India have committed suicide because their dignity is violated. Farmers are the most dignified people in the world. They produce with their mind, soul and body. A farmer would rather defend this dignity with his death than lose it through the dehumanization that comes with loss of control of production methods and the loss of food sovereignty. Climate change and economic policies are adversely impacting the food sovereignty of millions of people and both need to be combated. They both take away a basic human right – the right to adequate food. There are two immediate concerns in the context of the possible consequences of global warming and changing weather patterns. The first is the increasing number of natural disasters. The second is the issue of food sovereignty. Food sovereignty indicates the ability and power of a country or community to control and manage its own sources and modes of food production. Food sovereignty involves the right of people and the community over land, water and forests which would enable them to control the sources and means of production. There is a decrease in food production in many countries, particularly among small and marginal farmers. This has to do with both the changing weather pattern and the takeover of agriculture by corporate monopolies and rich countries. We are seeing a repetition of colonial sins with the way food is produced and distributed today. Some of the new “revolutions” to combat climate change and promote food security are manifestations of this new colonialism. Millions of hectares of land have been taken over by rich companies and rich countries at the cost of small and marginal farmers and food sovereignty of the community. The adverse impacts of climate change on ecosystems also affect sovereignty over food production. First, because life cannot adapt as quickly as the climate is changing. We are experiencing unprecedented natural disasters. Secondly, migration from rural to urban areas increases due to lack of water, natural disasters and the non-viability of small and medium farming. The urban poor across the world are environmental, economic and social refugees. The urban-centric, energy-intensive economic growth model induces rural to urban migration, which has reached unprecedented levels, and further accentuates the high carbon-emitting economic growth model. This, on the one hand, affects food production and the viability of sustainable agriculture in rural areas, and on the other hand increases human density in urban areas to unprecedented levels, with consequent pressure on environmental resources, demand for water and resultant pollution etc. Food sovereignty of nations and people can only be realized by strengthening sustainable agriculture and protecting the right of small and marginal farmers to live in dignity. Governments must protect this without compromising the climate and environment. The struggles for justice and human rights have to be at every level. A person’s right to food is non-negotiable. The adverse impact of climate change and corporatization of agriculture undermines our right to food. We need to ask hard questions about the nature of consumption and the nature of the economic growth model. Climate change is an issue of justice, as is food rights. A call to act for justice -- ecological, economic and social -- should precede the technical negotiations on climate change. If human dignity is rooted in divinity, and the idea of divinity is rooted in our search for the truth, then the truth is that there is something terribly wrong and immoral in the way we exploit the beauty and bounty of the earth and all that makes it a sustainable habitat for millions of living species. Such a truth should help us to be free -- free to imagine different choices of life, consumption and living.

अंतर्द्वंद- दशा एक देश की... दिशा एक देश की

2010-07-19T15:33:00.009+05:30

अंतर्द्वंद- दशा एक देश की... दिशा एक देश की

पिछले कुछ दिनों हमने एक बार फिर काश्मीरइ को धधकते हुए देखा। इस समय करीब सात प्रदेश नक्सल वाद से प्रभावित है जबकि भारत के पूर्वी राज्य के लोग सालों से अपने अस्तित्व की लड़ाई लड़ रहे है ! इस २८ में से १५ राज्य अंतर द्वंध...इन अंतर द्वन्द को छोर दे देश तो भारत देश की जनता को कभी जाती तो कभी धर्म और कभी भाषा के नाम पर उकसाया गया है...आजादी के ६० साल इस तरह की खतरनाक स्तिथि सोचने पर मजबूर करती है की कही कुछ गड़बड़ है ! २०१० चल रहा है और भारत एक उभरती हुई अर्थ व्यवस्था के रूप में देखि जा रही है तो कुछ सवाल भी उठाते है की ये क्या चल रहा है तो जवाब आता है यही भारत है..चाहे इसे नेताओं ,चाहे भ्रस्त अधिकारीयों या अनपढ़ जनता को दे...चलता है , कौन ध्यान देता है खास्स्कर वो लोग जो शहरों में रह रहे है उनको इस १५ समस्यों से कोई प्रभाव न पद रहा है और न ही उनका कोई लेना देना है ....नक्सालियों ने अभी तक न किसी पांच सितारा होटल पर आक्रमण किया है और न ही किसी सतातीं पर (जैसा मुंबई में करीब २ साल पहले आतंकवादियों ने किया था ) और पूर्वी राज्यों की कौन सोचें वो तो काफी दूर है .....सवाल ये भी उठता है की ये सब गतिविधयां हमें किस दिशा में ले जायेंगी ......सच तो यह है की उदारीकरण के बाद भी आज सुविधाएं सभी भारतियों को नहीं पहुच पा रही है .....ये केवल १० प्रतिसत लोग तक पहुच रही जब की ९० % लोग आज भी इस से काफी दूर है ....सचाई यही है वे किसी advertiser sका टार्गेट ग्रुप नहीं है तो न तो उनकी कोई आवाज है और यहाँ तकmedia ko भी उनकी आवाज़ नहीं सुनना चाहता है ....बाकी काम उनकी जाती और भेद भाव पूरी कर देती है । न तो उनके पास नौकरी के अवसर है और ऊपर से ये SOCIAL WELFARE SCHEMES JO KI भ्रस्ताचार का ठिकाना बन गयी है......ये उस दिशा में जा रही है जिसका गुस्सा abhi में रहने वाले लोग नहीं समझ पायेंगे और शायद काफ्फी देर हो जाए अगर sarkaar सही रास्ता नहीं akhtiyaar kari है..शायद यही कारण है एक जवान आदमी जिसके सामने पूरी जिंदगी पड़ी है बन्दूक उठाने को मजबूर हो जाते है ! अभी तो हम इसमें उलझे है की CRPF काफी है नक्सल वाद से निपटने के लिए या ARMY ko भी इस्म्मे सामिल करना पड़ेगा ...विडम्बना ये है की हम crocin khilane per lage hai jab ki jarrorat antibiotics ki hai ......जब तक ये गों के लोग और जवान लोग को अच्छा जीवन नहीं दिही देगा तब तक ये दिक्कतें आएँगी और बढती जायेंगी ....तो क्या कर सकते है इसको रोकने के लिए ..सहर और गाँव के बीच में आदान प्रदान बढ़ाना होगा ......बहुत पढ़े लिखे लोग सहर में है जबकि आज भी वो पूरी जसंखाया का छोटा हिस्सा है ...हर छात्र कुछ समय गाँव में बिताये और कुछ samay baad सहर गाँव की समझ sahari सामाज में ले कर आये ..बड़ी बड़ी कंपनी छोटे सहर में रहने के लिए अच्चा package दे सकती है ....कोई और रास्ता नहीं है .....ये मेरा हरदमmanana rahi है की regional imbalance ही समस्यों को जनम देती है...aur ko suljhane ka ek hi raasta hai -balance regional development...

Cities should be for people, not cars

2009-12-16T17:47:00.002+05:30

Denver, San Francisco and Seoul are demolishing their freeways and highways and attempting to return their cities to their people, not their cars, says Enrique Penalosa, former mayor of Bogota and founder of the BRTS in his city, advising India to learn from the mistakes of these cities

The greatest people, although hardboiled journalists hesitate to use that superlative, are able to come to the heart of a problem, to cut to the chase. Enrique Penalosa, the mercurial former Mayor of Bogota, in Colombia, is one such person who has carved out a niche for himself in promoting environment-friendly cities in general, and bus transport in particular.

He was in Ahmedabad and Mumbai recently. The former has just launched its bus rapid transit system (BRTS), which is a lot better than that in Delhi, the pioneer in India, which has come in for a lot of flak. Much of this, one must hasten to add, is the outrage of the influential motorists’ lobby and is often irrational, if not plainly wrong, factually.

Penalosa, who started the world-renowned Transmilenio bus system in the capital, praises Ahmedabad for possessing the best BRTS in this country so far. Around 83 cities in the world have adopted BRTS; nine Indian cities have, or are about to.

Penalosa is a highly respected urbanist and was elected Mayor of Bogota -- one of the world’s most violent cities, due to the presence of drug cartels and guerrillas, between 1998 and 2001. He could have been a presidential candidate for 2010 but decided instead to stand for a second term as mayor. He lost by 15 percentage points. He is now president of the board of directors of the Institute for Transportation and Development Policy (ITDP), based in New York. On November 24, he shared the Goteborg award, considered the environmental equivalent of the Nobel, in the Swedish town of that name.

As a canny one-time politician, Penalosa is too sharp to deal head-on with his pet theme: how buses are the lifeline in any city of the world, irrespective of how rich or poor. He cites how the earliest quests in history were for acquiring land in the colonies. Subsequently it was to acquire capital, which is the bedrock of modern-day capitalism, however much it is cloaked today in sophisticated terminology like derivatives and the like. Today, he almost muses aloud, it could well be about acquiring a good quality of life.

He illustrates this with a telling example. Ask any graduate from a top business or engineering institution here which city he would like to get his first job in, given any choice in the world, and the chances are he will opt for London, New York or Paris, not necessarily in that order. The reason is that these are well-planned and orderly cities with terrific public transport, parks and so on -- in a word, an excellent quality of life. Incidentally, even a senior-most executive posted in these cities will think nothing of taking a train or bus to work, something unimaginable in Mumbai or Delhi. Can one measure real economic development therefore by the quality of life rather than per capita income (rather like Bhutan’s Gross National Happiness Index)?

Penalosa draws a parallel between Mumbai and Bogota. Between 2010 and 2060, Maharashtra’s urban population is expected to grow from 40% to 60%, just like Colombia’s grew between 1950 and 2000. Colombia’s cities grew by 1,000% in that half-century, however, which is not the case in this country which doesn’t suffer from “primate” capital cities. Indeed, the National Commission on Urbanisation, headed by Charles Correa, pointed out 20 years ago that contrary to popular impression, India’s urban growth is not rapid and quite evenly dispersed.

Penalosa is keen that India learns from the mistakes of Latin American and North American cities. There are no excuses for repeating the craziness that is epitomised in Los Angeles’ interminable sprawl of highways. “You start up with transport and end up in almost ‘religious’ issues,” he observes, referring to the choice between quality of life and speed. For him, the ideal city is “a city where people want to be outside,” the first of many profound statements. This is precisely the opposite of Indian cities, where the rich have cocooned themselves at home against the chaos, heat and dust outside.

He lists these amenities, which seem obvious but are worthy of repetition: the provision of plazas, parks, facilities for the elderly, handicapped and the poor. “Most cities are planned by adult males with cars for adult males with cars!” he complains. Cities ought to be planned for people, not cars; pedestrians ought to get the biggest priority (most trips by private or public transport involve some amount of walking).

This columnist, who moderated Penalosa’s talk to the Urban Development Research Institute at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Museum, informed him that 55% of Mumbaikars -- the population as a whole, as distinct from ‘commuters’ -- walk or cycle to work, an astonishing proportion. In Delhi, it is 40%. “Cycling is only a more efficient way of walking,” says Penalosa. “People should not feel inferior if they are on a cycle. The public good must always prevail over the private.”

He then makes one of those profound statements, but so matter-of-factly that anyone not paying close attention may almost miss their import. At the very least, he asserts, it should be possible for the state to provide “quality of life equality, at least for children to realise their potential.” Thus, public city infrastructure by way of good schools, swimming pools, football pitches (in Latin America; cricket for our sub-continent!), could be made available to all citizens at a not very considerable cost. As he keeps emphasising, this is a political decision rather than an economic one.

This columnist observed first-hand such an egalitarian approach in Sao Paulo, Brazil, last year at the Urban Age conference. One must realise that Bogota and Sao Paulo are two of the most dangerous cities in the world (my Brazilian journalist friend cautioned me to return to my hotel at 5 pm in Sao Paulo, some 15 years ago; he also warned me never to catch a taxi on the road, for fear that I might never reach my destination…). However, the slums we visited in Sao Paulo had excellent gymnasia and football grounds, which have kept the youth away from drugs and other petty crimes.

Penalosa reminds us, as he did before his speech when he interacted with a range of city and state government officials in Mumbai, that under the Indian Constitution, all citizens are equal before the law. It wasn’t as if citizens with cars were more equal than others! All the infrastructure on city roads, most of which in Mumbai and other Indian cities caters to motorists rather than public transport, amounted to diverting funds away from the poor. In Bogota, he turned down a recommendation by the Japanese official aid agency that the city should have more highways. “Having a high-velocity road in the middle of a city is like keeping an electrified fence in the middle of a cow pasture!”

He repeatedly cites how the mere mention of the warning “Watch out, a car is coming!” is sufficient to send children scurrying for cover. As many as 250,000 children are killed by cars on the world’s roads every year -- the number escalates if you add those killed in cars -– but this is treated as “normal”. (This is reminiscent of Hannah Arendt’s phrase, in relation to the Nazi extermination of Jews, as the “banality of evil”.) Cities like Denver and San Francisco are now demolishing their freeways. In Bogota, he pedestrianised a 24-km-long street. “We must show respect for human dignity,” he believes.

Penalosa would love to see promenades for pedestrians and cyclists only. “Footpaths are the most important element of a democratic city. Parking isn’t a constitutional right, unlike health or education. It’s a private issue.” Motorists should provide for their parking at their own cost, not that of the state. “Road space is most valuable (he had earlier asked me how much the most expensive apartments in Mumbai cost. When I mentioned that a flat in the National Centre for Performing Arts building had exchanged hands for $2,000 a square foot, he exclaimed that the most expensive flat in Bogota would only cost three-quarters as much).

In his demonology, malls hold a high rank: “They are the same shops everywhere in the world, with the same temperature.” At the same time, he is candid enough to examine why people visit malls. It isn’t only because of the sanitised atmosphere, as many may imagine; it is also because it provides, surprisingly and contradictorily, “pedestrianised space” where children can walk without fear of being run over.

He extols New York for having carved out Central Park in 1880, when the city was poorer than Mumbai is today. “Mumbai should create a Central Park every year!” he exhorts, though his is a cry in the wilderness. The 300 hectare park was bought by New York City when it was outside the city limits. “One can have a completely different alignment elsewhere: for example, a park could be 300 metres wide but 10 km long, which would completely transform a city.” Access to green is something that low-income people should always have; otherwise it could be the most important factor in exclusion, since the poor don’t have access to gymkhanas and private clubs where the rich have appropriated green space.

Waterfronts in world cities are another instance where land could be turned over to the public. Unfortunately, city planners have traditionally built highways parallel to waterfronts in cities like Paris -- “a huge mistake” because there was no need for intersections. They are now tearing them down, like in Seoul at a cost of $9 billion, to revive a central city waterfront along a river. In Paris, one highway along the Seine is converted for a whole month in summer into the “Paris beach”, replete with sand on the pavement for sunbathers, to humanise this most iconic precinct of the city.

In advanced cities, the upper class use public transport not because it is fashionable to do so but because they are forced to. Penalosa would like to see a system where 40% of cars by the three last digits on their number plates every day are restricted from entering the central business district during the two-hour rush in the morning, and again in the evening. He castigates planners for permitting cars or motorcycles to be parked on footpaths. Cars ought to be taxed higher than public transport -- in India the converse is true. At the same time, with his penchant for pragmatism, he is against banning cars per se, only their use. In New York, some 30% of citizens own cars, but only 6% use them daily.

He had done his homework on Mumbai and met the chief minister the previous day to enquire about the city’s BRTS. It isn’t just the number of cars on the roads that matter but the number of trips and the length of each. Mumbai adds 150,000 cars per year (far less than Delhi), which, if put back-to-back, would form a line the distance from Mumbai to London!

“There is no ‘natural’ level for cars in any city,” Penalosa explains, doubtless in answer to such queries in countless cities across the globe. It is always a political decision rather than a technocratic one. “London has some of the best public transport in the world, but this doesn’t mean that there’s no congestion on the roads.”

With his political shrewdness, he turns to his pet theme -- the bus as the preferred means of city transport -- only towards the end of his speech. If he introduced the concept without first spelling out his vision of the humane, democratic city, it would encounter opposition. Rather than propagate buses, he turns to a critique of the metro (underground/overground railway). Only in Mexico City does the proportion of commuters anywhere in the world using the system exceed 12% of the total (Delhi, which is admittedly incomplete, has 8%), and it costs $1.20-$1.30 per person per trip to build and maintain. A typical underground metro costs $150 million per km to build; a BRTS only $5 million. London has the oldest and one of the best in the world, with 1,800 km of track, but this doesn’t prevent 1 million more commuters using buses every day in the British capital.

Penalosa’s pride and joy is the Transmilenio -- true to his pitch it should always be grandly branded and appear state-of-the-art technology, whereas buses have a battered, dirty reputation otherwise. In the Bogotá busways, all four doors of a bus, with at least another attached to it, open simultaneously so that 50 people can exit and enter at the same time, in seconds. They carry between 140 and 200 passengers at a time. The entire system carries twice as many people as the Delhi metro, at a fraction of the cost.

Delhi’s BRTS, advocated by Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, who was re-elected recently, was “heroic” in that it reserved road space for buses, much to the ire of motorists. In a typical BRTS, commuters have to walk shorter distances to and from the bus station than a metro station. They also travel at a higher frequency. “It is painful to take space away from cars,” Penalosa observes, “but that is a political decision.”

The mother of all BRTS systems will open in Guangzhou in December, which will carry a staggering 1 million passengers. The “father” of these flexible and dynamic bus systems is Jamie Lerner, the former architect-mayor of Curitiba in Brazil, whose experience Penalosa learned from. In Sao Paulo last year, Lerner, now in his early-70s, explained to this columnist, drawing on a notebook somewhat shakily, how a “bi-articulated” bus -- one main vehicle with two joined to it -- has the same capacity as a metro (because of higher frequency and high speed due to reserved lanes).

Nine cities in India have got one, or are about to under the National Urban Renewal Mission, though planners pay lip-service to it, like in Mumbai, with half-baked, domestically-designed hybrid systems. But prejudices abound, typically whether the streets in a congested city like Mumbai are too narrow to accommodate such a system. The point is, as Penalosa never tires of explaining, cars are occupying too much of this space; restrict them and the bus is the way to go.

Asked if there is a minimum density in a city that makes the BRTS possible, Penalosa responds by pointing out that commuting corridors with 120 people per hectare is good for a public transport system. Bogota has 220 people per hectare on average, half that of Mumbai. In a typical US suburb, with its sprawl and excessive reliance on the automobile, it is only 50, which obviously rules out the BRTS.

Questioned about how open areas and parks in his ideal cities of the developing world aren’t squatted upon by slum-dwellers, he recalls that he had never removed a single slum during his tenure in Bogota; on the contrary, he legalised 400 neighbourhoods. Every home has running water and sanitation. If people are assured that they won’t be evicted, he believes, they will protect such areas because they and their children stand to benefit most from them. It has all to do, as he endlessly reiterates, with one’s vision of a city: who is it meant for?

Source: Info Change

PENGUINS ARE TALKING ABOUT US....

2009-10-16T10:22:00.005+05:30

CLIMATE CHANGE & World Peace

Two penguins are sitting over ice and worried about human Beings. No, human are not making them as prey or selling their beautiful skin in market. They are talking on us and thinking over phrase “Man is most intelligent creature on this earth.” Let’s read what they are talking..

Penguin 1: Environment has become a hot topic in last few decades and..

and Penguin 2interrupted and speak: climate change is now source of revenue for many companies and people (Exception is always there].

Penguin 1: Ya! I have read WHO report which say- These climate changes killed around 150000 people and invited five million illnesses.

Penguin 2: I am sure WHO do not have statistics for those creatures who are part of ecological system and dying beneath sea or any part of earth. What do you think about Kyoto protocol???

Penguin 1: Kyoto protocol was a failure and reason of failure is inaction of so called big and developed countries. Let’s see what happens next, all eyes are on meet on Copenhagen meet in December. Few years ago,

Penguin 2: Do these billion of people still think that countries are studying penguins?

Penguin 1: I do not think , they have any clue about what is going on this dead land??

Penguin 2: Do not say it a dead land. It is our mother land..

Penguin 1; I did not mean that. I have heard in our penguin folklores. Arctic and Antarctic were never colonized because of its climatic condition. Climate change is reason for melting of these regions. Some of countries are trying to exploit these regions. Do u know about it???

Penguin 2: ya! I know dude!! I was very fast like any news channel in india. Take Case of North Pole: it is known that arctic is melting very rapidly. It is estimated over 50% of ice cover in arctic region has disappeared since last 2-3 years.

Penguin 1: How did you get this statistics::

Penguin 2: I am GOD ..Just joking folk …According to US ecological survey and Statoilhydro [Norway based Company] -–Arctic region has 25 % of world’s undiscovered oil and gas deposit. It can be around 86 trillion cubic feet of gas and 9 bn barrels of oil. The countries who are trying to part of this commercial exploitation are: Russia, Norway, Denmark & Canada

Penguin 1: I thought these countries are top on HDI index and they do not care about these rat race of oil.

Penguin 2; either You are fool or you do not know human nature. They are clever and these countries also discovered sea routes which are saving lot of money for these countries. Many companies are using breakers ship to cut ice.

Penguin 1(shocked): Clever or shrewd?? I have heard they have invented internet and they can communicate to any part of the world..

Penguin 2: You are right bloke…..But we are wondering from our conversation….Do you know about their activity in other pole..

Penguin 1: I know, they are doing some mining but I like to be away from thses complex creature…after listening your word..I am scared.

Penguin 2; Do not be scare dude…man is enemy of himself…GOD made them like that …leave it
..While taking the case of South Pole, Antarctic region holds fresh water- 30 mn cubic kilometers of ice equivalent to 35% of earth’s water. It is also found by seismic test that there could be around 60 bn oil beneath Antarctic Ocean floor.

Penguin 1: Ya!! I have heard about it from my grandpa.. He died few years ago and said that one day human will come to this dead land and exploit the land..

Penguin 2: Your grandpa was visionary… You know -Tweleve countries have signed Antarctic treaty. Argentina and Brazilian control over various areas. Chile also claimed his part of land recently

Penguin 1: I have read in Penguin history book in my college days.

Recently, Seven countries [France,Chile,Australia, Argentina, brazil, New Zealand, Norway] made eight territorial claims and these claims are recognized by only these self-proclaimed countries.

Penguin2: I too read that news in penguin times.

Penguin 1: Imagine, Uncle sam enters in this dead land and claim a valuable part of these two regions and say it will go to war with any countries which will oppose him.

Penguin 2 : will they treat them as AFGHANISTAN or IRAQ??

Penguin 1:World peace is already in danger but such exploitation will be lead it to next level of chaos. Poor men!!

Penguin 2: They are not only killing themselves but also taking our freedom…Huhh!!

Both penguins giggled and came down....

Talking Walking

2009-10-07T16:31:00.005+05:30

Everyday Traffic jam in urban cities has become a way of life. The average person spends three years of their lifein traffic. it is not a joke ,it is matter of concern.

So, What is more important in your life- Walking or Driving??? Conventionally,It is found that personal motor vehicle travel is far more important than walking, So waht about walkability??? Are Walking or walkability same??

Walking is the activity- a minor mode of travel, While Walkability is -the quality of walking conditions, including safety, comfort and convenience deserves only modest public support. walkability is about urban density,public transport & spaces.

It is found that that walking plays an important role even as vehicles are increasing everyday, and that many people want to walk for both transportation and recreational purposes.Walking is undervalued because it is:

Difficult to measure
Consider as lower status activity
Taken for Granted by decision maker

There can be lot of benefit from walkability - It can Be Economic, Social & Environmental. Economically, it can Improved accessibility-particularly for non-drivers,Reduced transportation costs,Increased parking efficiency (parking facilities can serve more destinations). Socially-Increased neighborhood interaction and community cohesion,Improved accessibility for people
who are transport disadvantaged,Reduced external transportation costs (crash risk, pollution, etc.).Environmentally- Reduced land needed for roads and parking facilities,Reduced energy consumption and pollution emissions & heat island effect.if You take example of big cities like - london, Singapore,Paris- all of them are walkable at core while in india walkability is rarely considered in urban planning.

From health point of view- these days people (esp: children) lack regular physical activity. this inactivity inviting disease like- Heart Disease,obesity, hypertension,depression,diabetes Although there are many ways to be physically active, walking is one of the most practical ways to increase physical activity among a broad population.

In many situations the best way to improve urban transport is to improve walking and cycling conditions and reduce automobile movement. It iill improve convenience, comfort and affordability of access to destinations.

P.S:Wilbur Smith Associates indicated that around 40 % of all trips in urban india involved no motorised vehicles at all- 28% walked & 11% Cycled.

Migration- An Overview

2009-10-06T15:08:00.004+05:30

Discussions about migration typically start from the perspective of flows from developing countries into the rich countries of Europe, North America and Australasia. Yet most movement in the world does not take place between developing and developed countries; it does not even take place between countries. The overwhelming majority of people who move do so inside their own country. Using a conservative definition, we estimate that approximately 740 million people are internal migrants—almost four times as many asthose who have moved internationally. Amongpeople who have moved across national borders,just over a third moved from a developing to a developed country—fewer than 70 million people.Most of the world’s 200 million international migrants moved from one developing country to another or between developed countries.Most migrants, internal and international,reap gains in the form of higher incomes, better access to education and health, and improved prospects for their children. Surveys of migrants report that most are happy in their destination,despite the range of adjustments and obstacles typically involved in moving. Once established,migrants are often more likely than local residents to join unions or religious and other groups. Yet there are trade-offs and the gains from mobility are unequally distributed.People displaced by insecurity and conflictface special challenges. There are an estimated 14 million refugees living outside their country of citizenship, representing about 7 percent of the world’s migrants. Most remain near the country they fled, typically living in camps until conditions at home allow their return, but around half a million per year travel to developed countries and seek asylum there. A much larger number,some 26 million, have been internally displaced.They have crossed no frontiers, but may face special difficulties away from home in a country riven by conflict or racked by natural disasters. Another
vulnerable group consists of people—mainly young women—who have been trafficked. Often duped with promises of a better life, their movement is not one of free will but of duress, sometimes accompanied by violence and sexual abuse. In general, however, people move of their
own volition, to better-off places. More than three quarters of international migrants go to a country with a higher level of human development than their country of origin. Yet they are significantly constrained, both by policies that impose barriers to entry and by the resources they have available to enable their move. People in poor countries are the least mobile: for example,fewer than 1 percent of Africans have moved to Europe. Indeed, history and contemporary evidence suggest that development and migration go hand in hand: the median emigration rate in a country with low human development is below 4 percent, compared to more than 8 percent from countries with high levels of human development.Barriers to movement The share of international migrants in the world’s population has remained remarkably stable at around 3 percent over the past 50 years, despite factors that could have been expected to increase flows. Demographic trends—an aging population in developed countries and young, still-rising populations in developing countries—and growing employment opportunities, combined with cheaper communications and transport, have increased the ‘demand’ for migration. However, those wishing to migrate have increasingly come up against government-imposed barriers to movement.Over the past century, the number of nation states has quadrupled to almost 200,creating more borders to cross, while policy changes have further limited the scale of migration even as barriers to trade fell. Barriers to mobility are especially high for people with low skills, despite the demand for their labour in many rich countries. Policies generally favour the admission of the better educated, for instance by allowing students to stay after graduation and inviting professionals to settle with their families. But governments tend to be far more ambivalent with respect to low-skilled workers, whose status and treatment often leave much to be desired. In many countries,agriculture, construction, manufacturing and service sectors have jobs that are filled by such migrants. Yet governments often try to rotate less educated people in and out of the country,sometimes treating temporary and irregular workers like water from a tap that can be turned on and off at will. An estimated 50 million people today are living and working abroad with irregular status. Some countries, such as Thailand and the United States, tolerate large numbers of unauthorized workers. This may allow those individuals to access better paying jobs than at home, but although they often do the same work and pay the same taxes as local residents, they may lack access to basic services and face the risk of being deported. Some governments, such as those of Italy and Spain, have recognized that unskilled migrants contribute to their societies and have regularized the status of those in work,while other countries, such as Canada and New Zealand, have well designed seasonal migrant programmes for sectors such as agriculture.

Most migrants, internal and international, reap gains in the form of higher incomes, better access to education and health, and improved prospects for their children While there is broad consensus about the value of skilled migration to destination countries, low-skilled migrant workers generate much controversy. It is widely believed that, while these migrants fill vacant jobs, they also displace local workers and reduce wages. Other concerns posed by migrant inflows include heightened risk of crime, added burdens on local services and the fear of losing social and cultural cohesion. But these concerns are often exaggerated.While research has found that migration can, in certain circumstances, have negative effects on locally born workers with comparable skills, the body of evidence suggests that these effects are generally small and may, in some contexts, be entirely absent.

The case for mobility
This report argues that migrants boost economic output, at little or no cost to locals. Indeed, there may be broader positive effects, for instance when the availability of migrants for childcare allows resident mothers to work outside the home. As migrants acquire the language and other skills needed to move up the income ladder, many integrate quite naturally, making fears about inassimilable foreigners—similar to those expressed early in the 20th century in America about the Irish, for example—seem equally unwarranted with respect to newcomers today. Yet it is also true that many migrants face systemic disadvantages, making it difficult or impossible for them to access local services on equal terms with local people. And these problems are especially severe for temporary and irregular workers. In migrants’ countries of origin, the impacts of movement are felt in higher incomes and consumption, better education and improved health, as well as at a broader cultural and social level. Moving generally brings benefits, most directly in the form of remittances sent to immediate family members. However, the benefits are also spread more broadly as remittances are spent—thereby generating jobs for local workers—and as behaviour changes in response to ideas from abroad. Women, in particular, may be liberated from traditional roles. The nature and extent of these impacts depend on who moves, how they fare abroad and whether they stay connected to their roots through flows of money, knowledge and ideas.Because migrants tend to come in large numbers from specific places—for example, Kerala in India or Fujian Province in China—community-level effects can typically be larger than national ones. However, over the longer term, the flow of ideas from human movement can have far-reaching effects on social norms and class structures across a whole country. The outflow of skills is sometimes seen as negative, particularly for the delivery of services such as education or health. Yet, even when this is the case, the best response is policies that address underlying structural problems, such as low pay, inadequate financing and weak institutions. Blaming the loss of skilled workers on the workers themselves largely misses the point, and restraints on their mobility are likely to be counter-productive— not to mention the fact that they deny the basic human right to leave one’s own country.However, international migration, even if well managed, does not amount to a national human development strategy. With few exceptions (mainly small island states where more than 40 percent of inhabitants move abroad),emigration is unlikely to shape the development prospects of an entire nation. Migration is at best an avenue that complements broader local and national efforts to reduce poverty and improve human development. These efforts remain as critical as ever. At the time of writing, the world is undergoing the most severe economic crisis in over half a century. Shrinking economies and layoffs are affecting millions of workers, including migrants.We believe that the current downturn should be seized as an opportunity to institute a new deal for migrants—one that will benefit workers at home and abroad while guarding against aprotectionist backlash. With recovery, many of the same underlying trends that have been driving movement during the past half-century will resurface, attracting more people to move. It is vital that governments put in place the necessary measures to prepare for this.

An Overview :UNDP's HDR report 2009