Oily assault for the polar bears

Sounds like US are venturing to jeopardize the balance of Nature and its possession.
The US administration has given acquiescence to seven oil companies to drill oil in the Chuckchi Sea, which is the habitat of a large number of polar bears. Sounds like what President Bush told in his 2006 State of the Union address now finds the way to actuality- “ we have a serious problem, America is addicted to oil.” Now this addiction becomes an obssession and is poised to destabilize the existence of polar bears. At this juncture, one point that comes first in mind is why the US companies are targeting the Chuckchi Sea. According to the Mineral Management Service, Chuckchi Sea is one of the few frontier areas where oil and gas deposits could amount to 30 billion barrels of oil (more than Prudhoe Bay). At the same time, Chuckchi sea is also the owner of another rare natural vanity- 10 percent of the world’s polar bear population.
Polar bears are the first creature that was enlisted as the first creature to be affected by the climatic change. The huge loss of ice in summer in 2007 has lead many scientists to believe that Arctic could be ice-free in summer as early as 2012. Though the polar bears were declared as endangered species, the official announcement of which was supposed to come on January 9th ,silence reigned in the US Fish and Wildlife Department. This portentous silence, as it might be called, facilitated the auction of 30 million acres of area in Chuckchi Sea, worth $2.6 billion in spite of 670,000 comments in support of protecting the polar bear under Endangered Species Act including letters from eminent polar bear experts and more than 60 members of Congress. The loss of habitat for the polar bears, lack of food might be fatal. Also melting of ice due to oil operations will affect the polar bears as they might drown in the water. At this stage, what comes at the top of the mind is that, had the polar bears been declared endangered on January 9th, the auction of Chuckchi Sea would not have occurred so effortlessly. Adds to this is the productive game of hunting poar bears which is a 2-million dollar per years income for the people of northwest Canada.
Such kind of drill is likely to affect not only the polar bears, but also bowhead whales and gray whales. Though the industry claims that it has good records of maintaining the safety measures, it might not be the case everywhere. Oil drilling cannot be done safely in the Arctic offshore ecosystem. There is also a chance of an oil spill which might cause ecological debacle. The Inupiat people’s maritime culture will be hampered. Besides this, normal industry operation like seismic survey, vessel traffic, aircraft, pipe construction will have to bear the impact of the lease. However, the US government showed its furtive attitude to set the auction for only $2.6 billions as several lawsuits are still awaiting. So , there is a feeble possibility that might nullify the sale altogether and the Government has to return the money to the bidders and stop petroleum operation there completely.
At the end of the day, as it seems now, President Bush is correct about how addicted US is to oil, inviting their grief themselves- climatic change, pollution and hence pillaging the resource. The situation is alarming. Keeping in view the battle royale in November, its time to relook into the matter with political intercession.

DRC- Dilemma of Resources for Congo

Democratic Republic of Congo, the third largest country in the world, almost the size of Western Europe is grasping after the noose of poverty and hunger has strangled its economic throat. Gaining its independence in 1960, DRC has been put into frying pan from fire.It has since then been witnessing ethnical riots and pseudo-colonial aggression from countries like USA and EU who have been vying desperately to grab the natural resources of the country which is the largest exporter of cobalt and fourth largest exporter of diamond, DRC has suffered from ethnic scuffle. Carrying a huge resource for bio-fuel, Congo is also carter of an odd 56% mal-nourished people and 70% of people suffering from hunger, Congo is baffled how to use the natural resources at its disposal.
According to UN reports by economist Dr. Schmidhuber, there are 85- 115 millions of hectares of land of which only four millions can be irrigated. Yet after having such land resources which can cultivate food for 2-3 billion of people, the country has to import food from European Union. The blatant reason lies in the fact that only 5% of land in Congo is cultivable.
So, if DRC has such potentiality, doled out by Nature, for its people why it is so lowly placed? The greedy Goliaths of the world are eyeing DRC as their prime prey. Of these economic giants, China has successfully forayed into territory of bio-fuel resources in DRC. According to a report by John Farmer and Ann Talbot China has established itself in Congo by providing US$ 8 billion dollars for infrastructure projects and mining operations. This will give China control over several important copper and cobalt mines. This is just the beginning with mines. Still Congo has eerie 85- 115 hectares of land left and tropical forests. These forests can be planned to be used for palm plantation to meet the spiralling need for agro fuel for European and US cars as well as China’s demand for palm oil.
UN economist Dr. Schmidhuber says that Congo can use the maverick expanse of land for cultivation of palm oil. He says that the palm oil can help the poor farmers in Congo who live earning less than half US$ per day to produce their own fuel and limit food production. But there is a possibility that it might lead to ecological imbalance. If palm oil plantation wrack those people who are dependent on the forests for their livelihood, it is certain that it will disturb equilibrium between economy and ecology. Palm oil plantation will be possible when the forest will be accessed. This means forest will be logged, timber will be sold and revenue will result.
Already a Chinese company has signed a billion-dollar contract to start cultivation of palm oil in 3 million hectare of land which means a huge loss of forestry. Congo’s fuel price problem has reached nadir point resulting in hunger problem. Dr. Schimidhuber stresses too much on the cultivation of fuel crop. But if fuel crop is cultivated at the cost of food crop how the productive land will help to eradicate hunger, one of the burning problems of the country? If most of the farm land is used for cultivating palm oil, 145,000 small-scale farmers will finally migrate to cities which will aggravate the agro-based problems.

Karza maafi

Maharashtra- the state which carved a special place in history with the largest number of farmer suicides in a span of one year also witnessed another important event along with the rest of the country- ‘the world’s richest cricket tournament’- Indian Premier League (IPL). We cannot call this govt. to be a biased govt. who mainly works as a ‘pro-poor people’ or is an ‘aam aadmi’ govt. if the Govt. gives a Rs.9, 310 crore Loan waiver for the poor people of Maharashtra, then the IPL also gets a waiver of Rs.10 crore. Mumbai will host 10 IPL matches including the final. The govt. of Maharashtra is said to have given a waiver of Rs.10 crore in revenue only. The direct recipient of this loan will be the rich businessmen and the film stars of Mumbai who found pleasure in auctioning teams and players. According to law, any event of amusement, whether be it a cricket match or any cultural event has to pay the entertainment tax. Though the IPL will hold 10 matches in Mumbai, it will not pay the tax. This is not for the first time that tax is being written off by the Govt. The BCCI always had political blessings. But it is also not for the first time that tax is being exempted by the govt- whether state or union. If we look at the period from 2000-2004, we will see that the nationalized bank wrote off Rs.44, 000 crore. Most of this went to a small number of affluent people. The most glaring example was the write off given to a company owned by Ketan Parekh group. The write-off in this case was Rs. 60 crore. However, those waivers were given mutely.
In 2004, the last reigning year of the NDA, the write-off percentage went up to 16% and has never come down since then. If this is the figure with the rich people, then how much a poor can expect? Behold. The number of farmers in Maharashtra owning less than one hectare land is 7.2 million and a like number of them have accounts in banks. The total outstanding against the accounts is Rs.20,499 crores. If we take a closer look we will see that it is the same amount the bank writes-off as bad debt in the manufacturing sector. Now, the number of farmers owning land between one to two hectares is 5.9 millions. Similarly, a like number if them have accounts in banks and the amount outstanding in their name is Rs. 20,758 crores, which makes that some 13 million people have outstanding of less than Rs.44,000 crores which has been written-off, by almost Rs.3,000 crores. The NDA govt. can give the waiver to the rich people but what did the poor get? Yet after such a budget by UPA, which gave farm loan waiver analysis of which was done by CEOs of companies and stock brokers, and business editors (what a pity!!), some attractive face on the TV screen will say –“now some budget bad news. India Inc.’s plea for a cut from the corporate tax went unheeded.”
The Union budget this year carried a loan waiver of Rs. 60,000 crore for the farm people. But there was also a spoil game played by Union Agriculture Minister Mr. Sharad Pawar (also known as ‘cricket minister’). Regardless of, why the waiver came in 2008 only, let us have a look how it was distributed.
The most crisis area of Maharashtra was Vidarbh and Yavatmal. But why more loan was given to the farmers outside Vidarbh? Why more loan went to West Maharashtra- Mr. Sharad Pawar’s strong foothold? The sugarcane farmers of Vidarbh outside Rs. 13,000 per acre as average crop loan. Apart from this, Rs.18, 000 per acre was given to the farmers for drip irrigation. And the grape growers outside Vidarbh saw the pinnacle- Rs. 80,000 per acre as average loan. But, Vidarbh farmers got average loan of Rs.4,440 per acre.
The IPL reports came shortly after CAG reported on ‘Farmer’s Packages’ in the state. Though, the report carried the information that the number of suicides increased to 1414 in 2006-07, the MLAs did not pay any heed. The CAG said that no proper attempt was made for the evaluation of distress. Tens of crores of rupees for farmers in the state were never spent; cheques given to people were dishonoured because of ‘want of cash.’ The self-help groups were given subsidies in excess. Parts of farm loans were not released at all. A major part of the loan went under-utilized. This how a fund of Rs.4, 825 crore was utilized by the Govt. so why is this 10-crore loan for IPL? The CAG also reported that the when the farmers of Maharashtra wanted some assistance for real price, the Govt was busy. giving waiver to IPL. Matters like seed requirement were dealt indifferently.
In the state this year, there have been over 360 farm suicides and 200 of them pre-waiver with 153 in January and February, then calculate how many in post-waiver? Though, the Govt. regarded only 18 of them as eligible, it did not forget to give waiver to IPL, the real people who need ‘waiver’.