1 Free trade has hurt some, admits World Bank (Kamal
Ahmed on BBC) The World Bank has admitted the growth of global free trade has
not been a success for all. An internal briefing document says the effects of
globalisation on advanced economies is "often uneven" and "may
have led to rising wage inequality".
The bank, which provides loans to developing
countries, also says that "adjustment costs", such as helping people
who have lost their jobs, have been higher than expected.
Dr Jim Kim, the head of the World Bank, told the BBC
that he understood why people were angry in advanced economies despite the fact
that free trade was one of the "most powerful" drivers of growth and
prosperity.
Dr Kim said that 20% of jobs lost in advanced
economies could be linked to trade, with the rest down to automation and the
need for new skills. The document, written by World Bank economists, does say
that "trade has played a powerful role in creating jobs and contributing
to rising incomes in advanced economies", as well as in emerging
economies.
But it highlights problems that have been created. "Recent
evidence for the US suggests that adjustment costs for those employed in
sectors exposed to import competition from China are much higher than
previously thought," the document says.
Dr Kim said that if developed countries start
throwing up trade barriers, ambitious targets to eradicate poverty by 2030
could be missed because global economic growth would be slower. "We can
build all the infrastructure we want and we can increase trade among the
emerging market countries, [but] at the end of the day if global trade does not
grow at a more robust rate it is going to be very hard to make those targets.”
2 Abu Dhabi not to have any private cars on roads
(Khaleej Times) Abu Dhabi is working on a futuristic integrated public transport
plan that will take on the dependence on private cars. The Department of
Municipality and Transport (Dmat) said the surface transport project which will
be built in phases in 25 years "aims to change transport behaviour from
dependence on private cars to a fully integrated public transport system that
makes use of new and upcoming technologies."
The plan sets out the required strategies to support
the expanding capital, which complements Abu Dhabi's vision and goals including
clear policy and infrastructure directions. The plan is designed to meet
clearly articulated goals to improve the quality of life for the residents,
supporting the economic development of the city and minimise harmful effects on
the environment by using sustainable alternatives that supports Plan Capital
Abu Dhabi 2030.
Dmat also invited engineering and planning students
from universities to participate, given that they will have a major role in
delivering the Plan in the future. An independent panel of five international
experts provided a peer review of the Plan.
3 Gandhi statue banished in Ghana (Jason Burke in
The Guardian) A statue of Mahatma Gandhi will be removed from a university
campus in Ghana after professors launched a petition claiming the revered
Indian independence leader and thinker was racist.
The statue of Gandhi was unveiled in June at the
University of Ghana campus in Accra by Pranab Mukherjee, the president of
India, as a symbol of close ties between the two countries. But in September a
group of professors started a petition calling for the removal of the statue,
saying Gandhi was racist and that the university should put African heroes and
heroines “first and foremost”.
The petition states “it is better to stand up for
our dignity than to kowtow to the wishes of a burgeoning Eurasian super power”,
and quotes passages written by Gandhi which say Indians are “infinitely
superior” to black Africans.
More than 1,000 people signed the petition, which
claimed that not only was Gandhi racist towards black South Africans when he
lived in South Africa as a young man, but that he campaigned for the
maintenance of India’s caste system, an ancient social hierarchy that still defines
the status in that country of hundreds of millions of people.
Statues on university campuses have recently prompted
bitter arguments in Africa as students wrestle with the legacy of colonialism
and history of racism on the continent. Last year students in South Africa
successfully campaigned for the removal, from the University of Cape Town
campus, of a statue of Cecil Rhodes, a notoriously racist mining magnate who
died in 1902.
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