By Nile Bowie Often touted as the centerpiece of the Obama administration’s re-engagement with Asia, a close vote in the US Senate has brought the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) a major step closer to becoming law. Facing significant opposition within his…
Danielle Nierenberg Around 15 percent of the world’s food is now grown in urban areas. According to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), urban farms already supply food to about 700 million residents of cities, representing about a quarter…
Addis Ababa – There is no one-size, fits-all solution for financing for development, remarked Mr. Wu Hong Bo, United Nations (UN) Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs and Secretary-General of the Third International Conference on Financing for Development (FfD3), in…
Misconceptions about climate-induced migration could lead to inadequate support for affected populations, according to the Worldwatch Institute’sState of the World 2015 Washington, D.C.-Between 2008 and 2013, some 140 million people were displaced by weather-related disasters; meanwhile, gradual displacements, such as…
Danielle Nierenberg Farmers are the backbone of resilient local and regional food systems, yet many are aging or retiring. The FarmLASTS Project at the University of Vermont estimates that 70 percent of farmland in the United States will change hands…
By Ed Vulliamy Classified documents and research show that British, American and French governments were negotiating to cede ‘safe area’ town to Serbs The fall of Srebrenica in Bosnia 20 years ago, prompting the worst massacre inEurope since the Third…
Robert J. Burrowes I routinely come across efforts to change an individual’s attitude, belief and/or value by using education to teach the ‘right’ one. This is most usually intended to lead to a better behavioural outcome, such as someone who…
Danielle Nierenberg Last week, I had the honor of talking to permaculture experts in Malawi. Permaculture is an innovative ethics and design based process used to make agriculture more sustainable, restore soil, conserve water, and redirect waste streams. The process…
By Sunita Narain What societies eat reflects their position on the modernity trajectory. Poorer countries have health problems because of lack of food. Then as people get rich, they end up losing the health advantage of food availability. They eat…
Danielle Nierenberg The routine use of antibiotics on livestock leads to the emergence of antibiotic resistant bacteria that can impact humans. According to the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), in 2010, almost 52 percent of chicken breasts tested were contaminated…
Sudhirendar Sharma The stories of human sufferings in an unjust world are often subsumed in dominant political-economy discourses that focus on resource extraction as a means of so-called human development. Charlie Hebdo killings may have moved the world but continuing…
By Nava Thakuria The media fraternity of Assam in northeast India has come out to the street demanding the legitimate protection for media persons across the country. Journalists representing both print and television media, while demonstrating their angers against the…
M A Gofran Biogas is an old technology. Volta invented biogas in 1776. In Bangladesh it was introduced by Dr. Karim in 1972. At present, there are about 100,000 biogas plants in the country. Biogas technology is now known in…
Robert J. Burrowes In an article I wrote a year ago, the following words appeared: ‘If a child is crying and you comfort them, you will (presumably unintentionally) scare them out of feeling their sadness when, in fact, their crying…
Masum Billah Reading education materials is one of the important early aspects in the process of learning and being educated. We do reading usually in two ways such as oral or loud reading and silent reading. Knowing the difference between…
Danielle Nierenberg Greetings from Zambia! There are hundreds of women who inspire us at Food Tank. They are entrepreneurs, stewards of the land, business owners, researchers, farmers, and innovators, who are the backbone of the world’s food systems. In fact,…
By Chandra Muzaffar It is utterly disgraceful that the first democratically elected president of Egypt has become the first Egyptian president in history to be sentenced to death by the highest judicial and religious authorities in his country. Dr. Mohamed…
Mostafa Kamal Majumder A senior journalist-turned writer has said to this writer the other day that the main opposition Bangladeshis Nationalist Party commands the support of at least 70 percent of voters but has not succeeded to mobilise them to…
Sinha M. A. Sayeed On April 17, 2015, Prashant Jha, Associate Editor, Hindustan Times, and CASI Spring 2015 Visiting Fellow, presented a paper “Big Brother or Elder Brother?: India’s Role in the Nepali Transition” at the Center for the Advanced…
Robert J. Burrowes I have just read Andre Vltchek’s new book ‘Exposing Lies of the Empire’. http://badak-merah.weebly.com/exposing-lies-of-the-empire.html Let me tell you something about this book of 800 pages. Vltchek writes with passion and poetry, describing the true horror experienced by…
Danielle Nierenberg Chefs have a unique part to play in making the food system more environmentally sustainable, socially just, and delicious. They connect producers and consumers, understand where food comes from, and know what consumers want. Food Tank is excited…
Mostafa Kamal Majumder The visit of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been looked upon here in Bangladesh from only one perspective – what the leader of the largest and virtually the only neighbour has in his store for the…
Danielle Nierenberg This Friday, June 5, is World Environment Day (WED) which celebrates positive environmental action and calls on each of us to create change. The theme of WED—“Seven Billion Dreams. One Planet. Consume with Care”—reminds us that we only…
Dr. Sinha M. A. Sayeed Anybody interested in knowing and understanding India and its overall policies towards Bangladesh, first of all, instantly appears before him/her is to look at the seven sisters in the north eastern zone and then ask…
Sinha M. A. Sayeed Leadership is a condition precedent for a group, association, body or organisation, whatever the circumstances appear to be. A state sans leadership in various areas covering politics, business, education, religion, culture economics, science and technology is…
Sudhirendar Sharma Would you believe that being ‘smart’ isn’t the in-thing it used to be in not too distant past! I am not the only one who seems to have sensed it. Wear your thinking cap or glasses or shirt…
By Chandra Muzaffar It is commendable that the Malaysian government has undertaken a systematic Search and Rescue (SAR) operation in the Andaman Sea and the Bay of Bengal aimed at saving the lives of thousands of stranded Rohingyas and Bangladeshis.…
Robert J. Burrowes I sometimes read that drone strikes are counterproductive to western security interests because each person killed by a drone results in more new ‘terrorists’. See, for example, ‘The more civilians US drones kill in the Mideast, the…
Danielle Nierenberg May 22 is the International Day of Biodiversity—an opportunity to increase understanding and awareness of the Earth’s flora and fauna. This year’s theme is biodiversity for sustainable development. Human health and livelihoods are linked to biodiversity, the variety…
Mostafa Kamal Majumder An ever smiling, unassuming, guardian figure and lovable elderly image of a vetern journalist that used to fill our minds with the utterance of the name – Hasanuzzaman Khan – is in the other world today. Admitted…