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IDPs In Pakistan
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A long Q of IDPs waiting at the front of World Food Programme Food Distribution Point to get Food Items.

June 3, 2009 | 3:53 AM Comments  0 comments

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Where there is Smoke
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'World No Tobacco Day' has been marked here, as it has been around the world. NGOs forming a coalition against tobacco have staged a walk; at seminars the dangers of the substance have been highlighted and Pakistan Railways has taken a big leap forward by banning smoking on its trains. But is the battle against tobacco really being won? Statistics indicate that smoking is growing in Third World countries even as levels drop in the developed world. The reasons are linked to the fact that awareness campaigns mean people in the west are less likely than before to take up the habit. This means that for giant companies who earn profits at the cost of health, the parts of the world where people have less access to information now offers the most lucrative markets.

Has enough been done in our country to discourage tobacco? The fact is that while laws have come in, restricting sales to juveniles or smoking in public places, implementation has been very poor. There is also a need for more aggressive effort to drive home the message about tobacco. Cigarettes and the 'sheesha' which has arrived over the last decade remain something of a fashion statement for the young and trendy. Health of course is rarely an issue teenagers think deeply about. There is also a growing rate of smoking among young women. Somewhere, despite the warnings on cigarette packets and the other efforts made, there has not been as much success as we would like to see. Surveys show people remain willing to ignore warnings. The WHO campaign for pictures as well as words on the warning labels is one we need to take up, given the high rate of illiteracy – and the fact that often, quite literally, pictures drive home messages where sentences fail. We also need to focus on spreading the 'no tobacco' message among children. They after all are the smokers of the future; in many cases they also have been able to dissuade parents who smoke. This then is a group that needs to be targeted in a more focalized manner, so that in the coming years we can have a society where tobacco is less commonplace than what is currently the case.

June 3, 2009 | 3:51 AM Comments  0 comments

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Karachi a Atmospheric Brown Cloud hotspot
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Karachi and twelve other mega-cities of Asia has been declared as Atmospheric Brown Cloud (ABC) ‘hotspots’ by the UN environment agency as soot levels in these cities comprise ten per cent of the total mass of all man-made particles.
A three-kilometer-thick ‘brown cloud’ of man-made pollution, which stretches from the Arabian Peninsula to China to the western Pacific Ocean, is making Asian cities darker, speeding up the melting of Himalayan glaciers and impacting human health, says the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) in a regional assessment report with focus on Asia.
The report on ‘Atmospheric Brown Clouds’ released on Thursday states over the Asian hotspots, the annual natural plus anthropogenic (AOD) exceeds 0.3 and the absorption optical depth is about 10 per cent of the AOD, indicative of the presence of strong absorbing soot accounting for about 10 per cent of the amount of aerosols.
The annual mean surface dimming and atmospheric solar heating by ABCs over some of the hotspots range from 10 to 25 per cent, such as in Karachi, Beijing, Shanghai and New Delhi, says the report.
In addition to Karachi, the UNEP’s new publication points out Bangkok, Beijing, Cairo, Dhaka, Kolkata, Lagos, Mumbai, New Delhi, Seoul, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Tehran as being ABC ‘hotspots’.
Atmospheric Brown Clouds (ABCs), resulting from the burning of fossil fuels and biomass, has resulted in the formation of particles such as black carbon and soot which absorb sunlight and heat the air, experts write in the study released today in Beijing.
The clouds also ‘mask’ the actual warming impact of climate change by anywhere between 20 and 80 per cent because they include sulfates and other chemicals which reflect sunlight and cool the surface.
The artificial lowering of temperature by ABCs is leading to sharp shifts in weather patterns, causing significant drying in northern China while increasing the risk of flooding in the Asian nation’s south. Monsoon precipitation over India and South-East Asia has dropped up to 7 per cent since the 1950s, with the summer monsoon both weakening and shrinking.
Meanwhile, the health and food security of 3 billion people in Asia are threatened by ABCs, which impacts air quality and agriculture.
The solar heating of the atmosphere by ABCs is ‘suggested to be as important as greenhouse gas warming in accounting for the anomalously large warming trend observed in the elevated regions’ such as the Himalayan-Tibetan region, the study says, leading to the retreat of glaciers.
The acceleration of the retreat of the Hindu Kush-Himalayan-Tibetan (HKHT) glaciers since the 1970s, in conjunction with the decrease in the summer monsoon rainfall in the Indo-Gangetic Plain region, is a major environmental problem facing Asia, threatening both the water and the food security of South and East Asia. Glaciers and snow packs provide the head-waters for Asia’s major river systems, including the Indus, the Ganges, the Brahmaputra, the Mekong and the Yangtze.
If the current rate of retreat continues unabated, these glaciers and snow packs are expected to shrink by as much as 75 per cent before the year 2050, posing grave danger to the region’s water security. This potential threat should be viewed in the context of the low per-capita water availability in South and East Asia, around 2000 - 3000 m3/cap/year, far less than the world average of 8549 m3/cap/year, the report says.
The most serious health impacts of particles associated with the ABC include cardiovascular and pulmonary effects leading to chronic respiratory problems, hospital admissions and deaths. The clouds contain toxic aerosols, carcinogens and other harmful particles. Review of the available evidence indicates that there are likely to be very significant public health impacts from the ABC.
While the effects of the clouds on food production and farmers’ livelihood could be immense, more research must be done to determine their precise role, it acknowledges, adding that the possible impact of ABCs could include elevated levels of ground-level ozone, which could result in massive crop losses of up to 40 per cent in Asia.
Concern for a worsening situation in the future is highlighted by projections which suggest that the annual surface mean ozone concentrations in parts of South Asia will grow faster than anywhere else in the world and exceed 50 ppb by 2030.
Another important characteristic of ABC forcing in Asia is that it introduces large north-south asymmetries in the forcing and large land-sea contrasts. Since these are the driving forces for the monsoonal climate, ABCs have become major forcing terms for regional temperatures, circulation and precipitation.
There currently exist only a few unevenly distributed ozone monitoring sites across the whole of Asia, making it difficult to obtain a true picture of the current Asian ozone climate and how this varies by geographical characteristics
Global ozone projections suggest that some of the largest increases in ozone concentration will occur in South and Southeast Asia from now until 2030. Such projections would see South Asia becoming the most ozone polluted region in the world, with annual surface mean concentrations reaching 52.2 ppb (parts per billion).

November 15, 2008 | 1:00 AM Comments  0 comments

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Pakistan's Cost of War on Terror reaches new heights
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Pakistan’s estimated cost of war on terror has edged up to Rs678 billion in 2008-09 up 40 per cent from Rs484 billion spent over last year immensely impacting the socio-economic costs of the country.
As a result of being a partner in the international counter terrorism campaign, Pakistan is currently facing major challenges including growing fiscal and current account deficits; rising inflation; growth deterioration; and depleting foreign exchange reserves, revealed the draft Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) – II of the finance ministry.
The estimated costs include both direct (actually spent) and indirect-- on account of loss of exports, foreign investment, privatization, industrial output, tax collection, etc being a frontline state in the war on terror.
Statistics released by finance ministry showed that the expected direct cost due to war on terror would reach Rs114.03 billion in the year 2008-09 from Rs108.527 billion last year. While the indirect cost would edge up to Rs563.760 during the year under review against Rs484.367 billion last year.
According to the report, the anti-terrorist campaign, which began as a result of the unfortunate 9/11 event in the United States in 2001, over-strained Pakistan’s budget as allocation for law enforcement agencies had to be increased significantly, which meant erosion of resources for development projects all over Pakistan, particularly in FATA and nearby NWFP areas in addition to human sufferings and resettlement costs.
Several development projects, started earlier in the affected areas are afflicted with delays, which may ultimately result in large cost over-runs. Since the start of the anti-terrorism campaign, an overall sense of uncertainty has prevailed in the country, which has contributed to capital flight, as well as, slowed down domestic economic activity making foreign investors jittery.
It is apprehended that Foreign Direct Investment, which witnessed a steep rise over the past several years may be adversely affected by the on-going anti-terrorism campaign in FATA and other areas of NWFP.
Pakistan’s participation in the international campaign has led to an excessive increase in the country’s credit risk, which has in turn made borrowing from the market extremely expensive. Pakistan’s sovereign bonds have under-performed due to increased law and order concerns amongst other reasons including domestic political and economic instability. Besides this, the report said Pakistan’s participation in the anti-terrorism campaign has also led to massive unemployment in the affected regions. Frequent bombings, worsening law and order situation and displacement of the local population have taken a toll on the socio-economic fabric of the country.

November 15, 2008 | 12:46 AM Comments  0 comments

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Pakistan Rank in Gender Gap!
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According to Global Gender Gap report 2008 released by the World Economic Forum on Wednesday, Pakistan ranked 127 out of 130 countries in this year's Global Gender Gap rankings.
The Global Gap Report 2008 (GGGR), published each year by the World Economic Forum, said that the social and economic empowerment of women was still very low and they were still struggling for their livelihood and survival.
The report provides a comprehensive framework for assessing and comparing global gender gaps since the 1992 report. It ranks countries according to gender equality rather than women empowerment.
The report has fourteen gender gap indices. These include economic participation and opportunity available to women, educational attainment, health and survival as well as political empowerment. Pakistan has ranked poorly in almost all categories. However it has fared well in empowering women politically as it ranks 50th out of 130 countries.
Norway leads the world in closing the gender gap followed by Finland, Sweden and Iceland. Germany (11), United Kingdom (13) and Spain (17) slipped down the ranking, but remained in the top 20 slot. Many countries like Netherlands (9), Latvia (10), Sri Lanka (12) and France made significant gains.
The report identifies gaps in most socio-economic areas of the country. Pakistan ranks 117th in both women's literacy rate and workforce population. In life expectancy it ranked 115th. In enrollment for primary education the country ranked 110th. In wage equality for similar work Pakistan ranked 60th, while in years for a female head of state it ranked at number 5.

November 13, 2008 | 1:14 AM Comments  0 comments

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