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No crops, no brides: how rising seas are killing India’s coastal villages

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As the sea inundates Odisha’s coastline, livelihoods have withered with the harvest and weddings are a rarity as young women refuse to move to areas where they see no future

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The need to meet net zero carbon emissions by 2050 will require a complete overhaul of how we meet our basic needs, from the cars we drive to the homes we live in to the way our energy is created. To achieve an energy transition, a lot of focus has been placed on renewable technologies like wind and solar power. These alternatives to fossil fuels can produce electricity without any direct carbon emissions - however, they also suffer from the problem of being intermittent. They only produce energy when the sun shines or the wind blows.

Coal and gas, on the other hand, produce large amounts of carbon emissions, but work exactly when you need them to. Is there still a place, then, for fossil fuels in a future energy system?

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Water and carbon update: Capturing carbon - Hodder Education Magazines

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UPDATES WATER AND CARBON UPDATE: Capturing carbon UPDATES WATER AND CARBON UPDATE Capturing carbon A modular carbon capture unit attached to an incinerator in Hinwil, outside Zurich © Orjan Ellingvag/Alamy Stock Photo The need to meet net zero carbon emissions by 2050 will require a complete overhaul of how we meet our basic needs, from [...]

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The big picture: The 2023 Morocco earthquake - Hodder Education Magazines

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NEW HORIZONS THE BIG PICTURE: The 2023 Morocco earthquake NEW HORIZONS THE BIG PICTURE The 2023 Morocco earthquake © Jamie Woodward On 8 September 2023 at about 11:00 p.m. local time, a magnitude 6.8 earthquake struck the High Atlas Mountains of Morocco. The epicentre was approximately 70 kilometres south of Marrakesh. The disaster claimed over […]

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Agricultural production can take the form of arable farming (growing crops) or pastoral farming (rearing cattle and other animals). Agriculture can have an impact on both the quantity and quality of water in rivers. These in turn can affect the value of rivers for water resources and can impact on aquatic ecology.

This post considers some common agricultural practices, and their impacts on hydrological systems.
Irrigation
In arid areas, soil needs to be irrigated to sustain the crops being grown, often using water from nearby rivers, or stored in the bedrock (groundwater). Most of this water will be used in transpiration by plants and some will evaporate directly from the soil. This means it is lost to the atmosphere as water vapour, so there is less water in rivers as they flow downstream.

Similarly, repeated extraction of groundwater reduces the amount of water held in this store. In areas where rainfall is strongly seasonal, groundwater extracted for irrigation may recharge during the wet season, but in regions which are dry for most of the year, these stores will take much longer to recover. There may come a point where it is no longer possible to extract groundwater, so irrigation will not be possible, and farmland may have to be abandoned.
Salination
Repeated irrigation also has implications for water quality. Most streams contain dissolved salts and other ions, which come from weathering of rocks in the catchment. When this salt-containing water is used to irrigate soils, the water is lost through evapotranspiration, but the salts are left behind in the soil. If there are repeated cycles of irrigation, salts can build up in soils over time. This is salination.

If soils become too wet, and not all the water can be stored by the soil, the excess water may wash some of these salts out of the soil and back into rivers, further increasing their salinity as they flow downstream. A combination of reducing the amount of water in the river, and increasing the number of salts entering the river, can lead to a much higher concentrations of salts in the river downstream of an agricultural area.
Soil saturation
Some farmers leave fields fallow between harvests, to allow the nutrients in the soil to replenish before crops are sown again. Soils can be left bare, or they might have minimal vegetation in the form of stubble. Fields with sparse vegetation cover can also be found on pastoral farms, if they have been overgrazed, the lack of vegetation cover means less water will be intercepted, so a greater proportion of rainfall reaches the soil.

Transpiration is also reduced. The combination of reduced interception and reduced transpiration means that when fields lie fallow more water reaches and stays in the soil. These soils become closer to saturation - all the pore spaces are full of water. During heavy rainfall events, water is less able to enter the soil and instead it moves over the ground as saturation excess overland flow.
Compaction and crusting
The lack of interception on fallow land means that raindrops are not slowed down by hitting obstacles like leaves and branches, and so they hit the ground rapidly. Heavy raindrop impact can redistribute soil particles to form an impermeable 'crust' on the soil surface.

The use of heavy farm vehicles and machinery can have similar effects. As machines pass over the soil, their weight compacts it, forcing individual soil particles closer together and reducing the volume of pore spaces that water can enter. High grazing densities can have a similar effect, with soil compacted by cattle trampling the land. Crusting and compaction reduce the infiltration rate, so that during heavy storms not all the rainfall can enter the soil but flows over the land towards rivers as infiltration excess overland flow.
Flow channelisation
Fallow agricultural land is also susceptible to soil loss through erosion. Soil particles are detached by heavy rainfall or erosive overland flows. These soil particles can then be washed over the surface, or in some cases, blown by wind. Soil erosion leads to the development of rills or gullies, which channel water across fields.

Ploughing also can create small channels in the soil - furrows. In areas where soils are very wet, some farmers create surface or sub-surface drainage channels to rapidly remove the water from the soil. These drainage channels usually discharge directly into nearby rivers.
Flooding
The practices described above lead to decreases in infiltration, and increases in overland flow and channelised flow, especially at times of high rainfall. These changes have implications for flood risk.

Overland flow travels faster than throughflow, as there are fewer barriers to slow it down. This is particularly the case over bare soil. The lack of vegetation decreases surface roughness, so there are fewer obstacles for the water to flow around, and it moves faster. Water in channels such as rills, gullies, furrows, and ditches travel faster, reaching rivers very rapidly. This means that large quantities of water can be delivered to rivers in a short space of time, decreasing lag time and increasing peak discharge, and making flooding more likely.
Water quality
Soil particles removed by erosion can get washed into rivers where they may either be held as suspended sediment or fall to the riverbed. Increased levels of fine sediment in streams can be bad for aquatic plants, as it can make the water cloudy (turbid), blocking out the sunlight they need to photosynthesise. It can also be harmful to fish and other aquatic fauna, as fine sediment can disrupt some stages of their life cycles.
Fertilisers and pesticides
Farmers use fertilisers and pesticides to boost crop growth, or to improve grassland for grazing. Fertilisers are high in nutrients, including nitrogen and potassium. Manure or slurry, which also have high nutrient contents, are also used as fertilisers. If fertilisers are applied in large quantities, or if it rains shortly after application, they can get washed from fields into rivers. Once these nutrients enter waterways, they can stimulate the growth of algae and other aquatic plants. This growth can become excessive causing eutrophication. Some species of algae produce substances that are toxic to mammals, including humans. When the excess growth of plants dies back, the bacteria which decompose the dead vegetation use a lot of the oxygen in the water. This depletes the oxygen available for use by other species, which can be fatal for fish and other aquatic life.

Like fertilisers, pesticides can also get washed into waterways. These can be ingested by small organisms, which then get eaten by larger ones. In this way, concentrations of pesticide increase up the food chain. High concentrations of pesticides are harmful to fish and mammals, and can kill them.

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In what ways do farming practices affect rivers?

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THE FIRST-EVER water shortage declared for the Colorado River is just one sign of troubles to come; as the climate changes, century-old water habits and policies must change with it. Israel's Pegasus spyware has raised concerns the world over, but the country is loth to curb its exports of hacking tools. And the resurgence of a beloved and funky Nigerian seasoning. Runtime 19 min

For full access to print, digital and audio editions of The Economist, subscribe here www.economist.com/intelligenceoffer

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"Folks have gotten used to depending on water they really shouldn't have"-the American West dries up

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THE FIRST-EVER water shortage declared for the Colorado River is just one sign of troubles to come; as the climate changes, century-old water habits and policies must change with it. Israel's Pegasus spyware has raised concerns the world over, but the country is loth to curb its exports of hacking tools.

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How do farming practices affect out waterways?

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How do farming practices affect out waterways?

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How do farming practices affect our waterways

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By Justin Rowlatt
Climate editor

Some shooting estates in England burn deep peat moorland in protected areas despite a government ban, say the RSPB and Greenpeace.

England's deep peat soils support rare ecosystems and store huge amounts of carbon.

Peatland vegetation has traditionally been burnt to create and maintain habitats to raise grouse for shooting.

The government last year introduced a ban on burning peat deeper than 40cm in some protected areas of England.

Peatlands cover around 12% of the land in the UK and store an estimated 3 billion tonnes of carbon, equivalent to all the forests in the UK, Germany and France put together.

The government has called England's peatlands its "national rainforests" due to the amount of carbon they store.

But evidence collected by the bird protection charity, the RSPB, and the environmental campaigning organisation Greenpeace, suggests these "rainforests" are still being set on fire illegally in England.

The government told the BBC it has received evidence which claims to show illegal fires and said: "any cases where a breach of consent or regulation is suspected will be investigated".

A traditional practice on shooting estates, burning clears the way for the new green shoots grouse like to eat, but also releases stored carbon into the atmosphere.

Burning on upland peat soils is already restricted to a "season" that runs from 1 October to the 15 April each year.

When the government introduced the new regulations, it said there was "consensus that burning vegetation on blanket bog is damaging to peatland formation and habitat condition."

Blanket bog is a rare ecosystem made up of large areas of deep peat soil.

It said the new rules in England were intended to protect these rare and delicate habitats and to help the UK hit its target to cut emissions to net zero carbon by 2050.

The only exception to the ban would be if a licence has been granted or the land is steep or rocky, but no licences to burn on deep peat were issued during the latest burning season, the government has told the BBC.

The Moorland Association, which represents moorland landowners, says careful burning has been a traditional part of moorland management for more than a century.

It says vegetation typically recovers from well managed burns within three years and that the practice can promote biodiversity and dramatically reduce the risk of wildfires.

Tracking down fires

The RSPB says it has sent the government evidence of 79 fires it believes are in breach of the new regulations. It has created a mobile phone app that allows people to report burns as they see them.

Greenpeace has taken a more high tech approach. It used a NASA satellite to identify "hotspots" - unusually high temperatures - in areas shown on government maps as protected peat moorlands.

Satellite images were then used to confirm fires had taken place.

Sometimes fires were visible in the images at the coordinates identified by NASA.

Your device may not support this visualisation

Where cloud cover made that impossible, the researchers compared before and after pictures to identify burn scars at the location.

The BBC visited two of the estates identified by Greenpeace.

At one, the Bowes estate in the Yorkshire Dales National Park, we found burn scars at and around the coordinates identified by the satellite data.

We tested the peat with the help of a leading expert on UK peatlands, Dr Ben Clutterbuck of Nottingham Trent University, and found it was consistently deeper than 40cm.

We delivered letters to the landowner's registered address with our findings but received no reply.

At another estate the BBC did not find any evidence of burning on deep peat. The landowner appeared to have taken care to only set fire to heather on areas where the peat is less than 40cm deep.

On both estates, we stayed close to a public footpath and took care not to disturb any ground-nesting birds by walking on burnt heather.

Greenpeace visited two other estates. It said there was only evidence of burning on deep peat on one. It says the reason some sites identified as illegal burns turned out to be located on shallow peat is because the government peat map it used as a guide is not definitive.

"Our findings show how important it is that all the locations we have identified are confirmed with site visits", said Emma Howard, a researcher with Greenpeace's investigative journalism unit, Unearthed.

The Moorland Association, which represents the owners of moorland estates, told the BBC it welcomed the government investigation.

It said its members would "cooperate fully and help with any queries". In the meantime, a spokesperson said, they would continue to follow best practice guidelines.

The RSPB and Greenpeace are calling for a blanket ban on burning on all peat.

"Intensive and damaging land management practices such as burning continue to harm and further threaten these vital carbon and nature-rich ecosystems", said Dr Patrick Thompson, a senior policy officer at RSPB UK.

"Why on earth is the government allowing grouse moor owners to turn swathes of national parks and protected sites into charred wasteland for the private gain of a few landowners?" asked Rebecca Newsom, head of politics at Greenpeace UK.

The Labour Party has told the BBC it also wants to see the ban extended to cover all moorland peat.

An estimated 80% of the UK's peatlands are in a damaged and deteriorating condition because of present and past land management activities including drainage, peat cutting, and fire, according to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.

It estimates that damaged UK peatlands are already releasing almost 3.7 million tonnes of CO2 each year - equivalent to the average emissions of around 660,000 UK households - more than all the households of Edinburgh, Cardiff and Leeds combined.

These emissions are likely to increase with further peatland deterioration as the climate changes, the IUCN says.

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Peat soil fires: Campaigners say England's 'rainforests' illegally burned

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By Justin Rowlatt Climate editor Some shooting estates in England burn deep peat moorland in protected areas despite a government ban, say the RSPB and Greenpeace. England's deep peat soils support rare ecosystems and store huge amounts of carbon. Peatland vegetation has traditionally been burnt to create and maintain habitats to raise grouse for shooting.

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Water, Carbon, Climate and Life on Earth

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Water, Carbon, Climate and Life on Earth

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How the UK is adapting to our changing hydrological cycle?

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How the UK is adapting to our changing hydrological cycle?

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08 Lucy Hattie   How is the UK adapting to our changing hydrological cycle mp4

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The target of 1.5 set at the 2015 Paris Agreement looks set to be breached this year.

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Mark PoyntingClimate and environment researcher

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2024 ‘virtually certain’ to be world’s warmest year on record

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It is also set to be the world’s first breach of 1.5C of warming across an entire calendar year.

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In a speech today (Monday 1 July) the chief executive of the business organisation the CBI will warn of the risks of trying to "separate the economy from net zero" and tell whoever forms the next Government they " can't be pro-growth and deliver for our people and communities, without being pro-green."
See below for the full speech Check against delivery
Good morning everyone.

I don't think any of us, when we signed up to this conference...

...realised how timely it would be, in the final days of the general election. I know there's a fantastic line-up for today, with so many important and expert views on our preparedness and the costs of adapting to climate change.

I want to set out why we at the CBI, as the voice of business, think whoever forms the next government can't be pro-growth and deliver for our people, planet and communities, without being pro-green.

And I want to lay out five steps, to get there.
Deafening silence
With a name like mine, talk about the weather tends to follow me.

I don't know about you, though, but in recent years I've noticed a darker edge to it. And I can see in the natural world all around us.

I remember sitting at a table during the Hay festival in mid Wales about five years ago with an octogenarian farmer, in a particularly hot May. He said he could see first-hand how much the climate, the biodiversity around us, had changed from when he was a young farmer.

The impact of climate change is already here - it's in our soil, our air quality, and yes, our weather patterns.

This statistics will be all too familiar to this audience. Yet this election, you might have noticed what seems like less focus, less animation from all parties about the issue of climate change. About biodiversity loss, net zero and our planet. At times, it has felt that the silence has been deafening.

As Chris Stark said recently, the oxygen was sucked right out of the UK net zero debate - even before the election began.

Instead, parties are focused on the economy, immigration, work and skills. And of course - all those issues are important.

But on the economy especially, it's a dangerous error to try and separate it from net zero.

There is still too much in our political discourse that amounts to - 'can we afford to go for net zero?'

But the real question is - can we afford not to?

According to the GFI's recent excellent report ongoing damage to nature could lead to a 12 per cent loss in GDP over the next decade - unless we act now.

But there is another cost on top of all that - the cost of falling behind in the global race for cheaper, more reliable, more efficient energy.

The huge emerging markets for new technologies.
The size of the prize
We're in an age when green tech is transforming in the blink of an eye.

Solar PV went from something that was seen as too costly to make a difference in the early 2010s...

And the countries that move fast in these markets, are securing huge global advantages.

Not only making clean energy and carbon storage cheaper, accelerating the global race to net zero...

...but securing economic success, cleaner air, better jobs, higher living standards and quality of life - for their people.

The numbers speak for themselves. In 2023, a year when the UK economy flatlined our net zero sector grew by 9 per cent.

And the UK really has been an early global leader in green.

We were the first to write net zero into law.

We launched groundbreaking contracts for difference to speed up investment.

And in 2020, we were investing the biggest GDP share of any country in the energy transition.

But now we've fallen down the table, behind both France and Germany in overall green investment.

We've lost our nimble first-mover advantage...

...to titanic economic packages from the EU and the US.

We can't outspend competition like that. The US package alone is estimated at over $1 trillion. 5

But we can outsmart them - by playing to our strengths and acting fast.
A whole-economy perspective
As one business leader asked me...

Will the new government, whoever it is, be serious about this?

Will they be prepared to make decisions early so we can have more world-leading clusters like the Solent, which has the potential to develop hydrogen and CCUS to help decarbonise industry and transport?

Or Yorkshire and the Humber, where Phillips 66 are working to decarbonise their refinery and deliver greener, EV battery-grade graphite, with Enfinium leading on CCUS technologies. 6

Will they ensure nuclear is part of the mix for the electrification we need? Will they reform planning, get the grid connections we need? Will they do what it takes?

Those are the questions the silence this election has left.

And they must be answered. Because we still have powerful strategic advantages that must not be wasted.

But to use them to get the sustainable growth we need, we must deliver systems change at speed and scale. And we must think about climate and nature together - not separately - but as two sides of the same coin.

Nothing less than a whole-economy, whole-government, cross-party approach to land management. Which works with our farming communities as custodians of our land and nature. To make the whole greater than the sum of its parts - in the race to transform our economy and the world that surrounds us.

That's what we do at the CBI.

With input from every sector, we feed into government how we can help the UK get ahead of the competition to win the race for green growth.

And I'm delighted to share that, we have four more great globally listed companies joining us in that journey, as members:

Schroders, Phoenix Group, JLL and Smith & Nephew.

Together, and with our members across sectors, we're going to press the next government fast on the reality that net-zero is the opportunity of a lifetime. And if you don't go for green, you don't get growth. Not in the long-term.

Business get it - by playing to the UK's advantages, by giving up short-term politics for long-term plans...

...by 2030 the next government could add as much as £57bn or around 2.4% to the economy from green growth. 7
Five steps to recharge our economy
Now I want to use the rest of my time to set out five short steps...

...to get us there.

First - the next government needs to be loud and proud in making green growth part of a new investor pitch for brand Britain.

No more wavering, no more rowed back commitments. Whoever forms the next government has to let the world know it's serious about the investment opportunities from net zero, and we're in this for the long-haul. Make decisions and stick to them.

Whether it's continuing with the 'five growth sector' strategy, or part of a new plan for sustainable growth, the next Chancellor must set out our national stall.
2: More than a department
Second, if net zero can't be delivered by one part of the economy, we need to get past the fantasy that it can be delivered by just one department.

The truth is, Whitehall has never been good at working cross-department, and we must make sure that doesn't hamper us on green.

So business wants to see a new Office for Net Zero Delivery based in the Cabinet Office, to coordinate and take a truly strategic approach.

So we need to see the next Secretary of State for Net Zero not confined to one ministry...

...but hammering on the door of every department to get this done.
3: A Net Zero Investment Plan
Step three: none of this makes any difference, if the money's not flowing.

So the way we outmanoeuvre our competitors...

...is using public spending to crowd in private spending.

This is a model that we know works.

So what business want to see from the next government, is a Net Zero Investment Plan.

To shine a light on the barriers to investment...

...and take a market-making approach that crowds in the private finance we need.

And in our tax and green investment report, we've laid out ideas ...

...like a green super-deduction of 120% - to get investment flowing where it's needed most.
4: Transformational tech:
Step 4: is backing the innovation for the transition.

Innovation is at the heart of reaching net zero, and there is huge first-mover advantage for those who can get ahead.

It's one of the most exciting parts of my job to see the work businesses, innovators and researchers are already doing right across the UK, bringing new tech to market.

But there's more the next government can do to back them - and help big ideas scale up to big business.

Like a new Green Innovation Credit to unlock private R&D...

...and lowering corporation tax on green tech profits.
5: A very old opportunity
The final step is maybe the most practically important: the grid.

A century ago next year, the UK pioneered the world's first fully integrated national electricity grid. It was a source of national pride.

Other countries followed and national grids sprouted up around the world because of UK know-how.

But since then, from leaders, our investment has fallen behind.

And now, to meet our net zero targets, we're going to have to build five times more onshore transmission lines by 2030...

...than we've built in the last three decades. 8

So from a source of national pride, our grid has become the Achilles heel of any net zero project.

I heard from one member in the North East, one of their projects had been held back 15 years waiting to connect to the grid.

And any recent attempts to expand and upgrade it...

...have run up against nimbyism and local political snares.

This matters: tens of billions of pounds of net zero investment - and the future attractiveness of the UK as a place to invest at all - hinge on the grid.

So it's obvious the next government must back rapid grid upgrades...

...and work in partnership with business - to get them done.

Without that, there's no net zero, no green growth.

But it's important to remember, this isn't just a problem for us. When I was at the B7, the business equivalent of the G7...

...it was clear that grid upgrades are a challenge for every country.

So if we move fast here, and show the way to a future-proof, flexible, digitised grid...

...then, just like a century ago, we can export British engineering -

For our economy, our people - and our planet.

So there you have it five steps to green growth. But I have one final ask.
The value of trust
Polling from Opinium and RenewableUK shows four out of five people want a cross-party consensus to boost green investment. 10

And most people still back our net zero targets.

The problem is, because of all the politicking in the last few years.

The inconsistency and rowing back on commitments...

So our last ask for the next government comes down to one word: trust.

Business can do our part.

But we need politicians to restore trust, and bring the public with them, to get net zero and the energy transition done.

Politicians have to be honest - more honest than perhaps they've been.

There is a cost to energy transition. In public spending, to crowd in private investment.

But when you compare that to the cost of falling behind in new markets that could regenerate our economy...

To the cost of repairing the climate damage you're going to hear about throughout today...

And to the cost of failing in our moral duty to our children and future generations...

It's clear we need to act now. And fast.

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CBI CEO tells the next government you can't be pro-growth without being pro-green - full speech text | CBI

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CBI CEO tells the next government you can't be pro-growth without being pro-green - full speech text

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'A Global Sense of Place' by Doreen Massey

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'A Global Sense of Place' by Doreen Massey

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Discusses concept of place, considering the links between places.

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Place and Identity: the view from environmental psychology – Materializing Sheffield | Place, Culture, Identity

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Factors affecting the character of Cambridge

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Factors affecting the character of Cambridge

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History is inescapable in Cambridge. It is inconceivable that a British institution as old as our University would not have been touched by colonial practices of enslavement and enforced labour –

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Really interesting article about the tangible impacts of place perception. This links nicely with 'The Danger of a Single Story' lecture below.

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Negative stereotypes in international media cost Africa £3.2bn a year – report

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Focus on conflict, corruption and poverty heightens perception of risk, raising interest on sovereign debt, authors say

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Our lives, our cultures, are composed of many overlapping stories. Novelist Chimamanda Adichie tells the story of how she found her authentic cultural voice -- and warns that if we hear only a single story about another person or country, we risk a critical misunderstanding.

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Levelling Up: The seaside town debating what change is needed

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Levelling Up: The seaside town debating what change is needed

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Unless ministers rethink the detail of plans to reduce regional inequality and "level up" Britain, the scheme could fail whole communities, says a charity.

The Salvation Army says thousands of lives could be harmed if the plans do not embrace the needs of residents.

BBC News is following the fortunes of the levelling up agenda in the seaside town of Rhyl, which has the two poorest neighbourhoods in Wales.

Rhyl is one of dozens of British towns eligible for a share of the £4.8bn levelling up fund under the UK government's flagship policy to reduce regional inequality.

A separate, huge spending programme has already transformed Rhyl's seafront.

But some locals question how the money is being spent and ask who benefits from the changes.

"Things are looking really bright for Rhyl," says Jamie Groves, managing director of council-owned Denbighshire Leisure Ltd.

Behind him lies a vast expanse of sandy beach and a sparkling sea.

"Rhyl had decades of promises and master plans, decades of all these visions and not one person delivered them," says Mr Groves, who grew up locally.

A stroll on the prom reveals new bars, restaurants and hotels, plus the revamped Victorian Pavilion theatre where Welsh icon Tom Jones will perform in September.

More than £120m from Denbighshire County Council, the Welsh government and the EU has helped transform the ageing promenade which fell into disrepair when the tourists spurned "Sunny Rhyl" in favour of sangria on the Costa del Sol.

The vision is for high quality facilities and the jewel in the crown, the SC2 waterpark, is fully booked for the summer - but some locals feel priced out.

A few streets away, Peter Saunders watches three of his 12 children play in a paddling pool he inflated and plonked in a parking bay outside his house.

Like many residents who spoke to the BBC, he bemoans the loss of the free paddling pool that once stood on the site now occupied by SC2.

It costs £48 for two-and-a-half hours in the waterpark for a family of four, although there are sometimes concessions.

For Peter, who says the town has many large families like his, the waterpark "just costs too much money... It's not right really, not for the people of Rhyl."

"In an ideal world most visitor attractions would be cheaper," Mr Groves admits, but he adds: "We've got to strike a balance between affordability and viability."

"We actually think this presents really good value for money," he says, pointing out that the waterpark employs local people.

A world away

It would probably take one of the town's many seagulls less than a minute to fly from the Good News Mission to the seafront in search of chips to scavenge - but it feels a world away.

"People need to come three or four streets back and see where the poverty is," says Natasha Harper, an outreach worker based at the former church which helps about 100 families a week.

"We had one family who were sleeping on the floor for quite a while because they couldn't afford beds."

She wants the people making decisions about the town to visit "for 10 minutes... and maybe the money wouldn't be trying to make the front look pretty but actually put into where it's needed."

The difference of opinion over the waterpark highlights national tensions over how to transform the fortunes of some of our poorest communities.

The Salvation Army says coastal areas in particular are "in dire need" but its report, published on Wednesday, highlights a lack of consultation.

"We want to encourage the government to listen to the communities who need their help, look up from the spreadsheet and see what we are seeing on the ground," says Rebecca Keating, the charity's director of employment services.

Post-pandemic jobs

"The pandemic has been devastating for the area in general," says Suzi Taylor, an employment development co-ordinator with the Salvation Army in Rhyl.

"In an instant the tourism stopped. The jobs which people rely on were in one fell swoop gone."

The number of people claiming unemployment benefits in the resort rose sharply.

This includes not just people who lost their jobs but also those whose earnings fell low enough to be eligible to claim.

Denver Jeff dislikes relying on hand-outs but looking for a job during successive lockdowns was tough.

The 64-year-old former labourer says it was "impossible for me because I didn't have internet, the libraries were shut so I couldn't use their tablets, the job centre was shut".

The Salvation Army helped him find a part-time job as a cleaner at a local supermarket.

Suzi says any attempt to level up Rhyl must start with better skills training for the many local people on short-term or zero-hour contracts.

A lot of local jobs "just don't give the financial security that people need to be able to move on and see there's more to life than benefits".

'A good place'

In a statement, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said levelling up would encompass "all areas of the country, with billions of pounds of investment to support and regenerate communities, including coastal areas".

Officials will take into account "productivity, unemployment  and skills" when identifying areas most in need of support, the spokesperson added.

Denbighshire County Council's leader, Hugh Evans, says he understands how locals have felt neglected in efforts to change the town: "but we had to start somewhere".

"The challenge is marrying up the level of investment to the benefit of the people in the more deprived areas."

He says money has been invested in improving schools and housing and hopes the levelling up funds will improve Rhyl's decaying town centre.

"The vision is quite clear: It's about a good place to live, a good place to visit and a good place to work."

Additional reporting by Michael Buchanan.

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Levelling up: The seaside town debating what change is needed

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Unless ministers rethink the detail of plans to reduce regional inequality and "level up" Britain, the scheme could fail whole communities, says a charity. The Salvation Army says thousands of lives could be harmed if the plans do not embrace the needs of residents.

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ities are now home to more than half of the global population, a share that will rise to two-thirds by 2050. That means the forces shaping life in cities now also shape our world as a whole. Cities throughout history have been the great incubators of human progress, through their power to bring us closer together - something we need now more than ever. Many of the answers to our greatest challenges are to be found in reforming our cities, but if we fail to take action, cities will magnify the perils that lie ahead.

The populist politics of recent years has been tinged with resentment against global metropolises such as London and New York. These cities have boomed while others have struggled. But while the gulf between thriving cities and everywhere else has widened, so too has the disparity within these cities. Inequality has risen in most metropolitan areas in the US since 1980, but it has risen fastest in large, thriving cities such as New York, San Francisco and Chicago, where it is now much higher than the national average. Wages for high-skilled knowledge workers in these places have soared, but pay for the low-skilled service workers supporting them has languished, a gulf that is compounded by the rapidly rising cost of living in these cities.

These global metropolises have increasingly come to resemble ivory towers, with a highly concentrated core of prosperity served by a sprawling periphery of disadvantage. Urban centres have seen increasing employment, falling crime and significant improvements in the performance of public services. Warehouses and factories from Kings Cross in London to Brooklyn in New York have been converted into upmarket apartments for well-educated (and typically white) professionals. Former working-class housing has been renovated or redeveloped. Trendy cafes and bars have appeared, along with high-end fitness studios and organic food stores.

Formerly affordable, working-class areas have seen significant gentrification. To be clear, the growth in the population size of inner cities has been modest compared to suburbanisation. In fact, a new ring of sprawl dubbed the "exurb" has emerged. What has changed is the socioeconomic makeup of the concentric circles of cities. Whereas once the well-off fled for suburbia, today in many cities they are heading back to the urban core, while poverty is increasingly moving out to the suburbs. The journalist Alan Ehrenhalt has aptly described this process as "the great inversion".

The increased attractiveness of many urban centres can be seen in the shifting profile of house prices within the concentric circles of cities. One study of the top 20 cities in the US over time found a major shift in recent decades in the relationship between house prices and distance from the city centre: while in 1980 house prices increased the further away a property was from the central business district, by 2010, that relationship had inverted. The premium on housing in urban centres has further increased since then: median home prices in the five inner boroughs of New York City increased at four times the rate of the rest of the metropolitan area between the start of 2010 and the start of 2020. The faster growth of suburban house prices during the pandemic has already tapered off, leaving the long-term picture largely unchanged.

What has led highly paid professionals to swap a freestanding house and garden in the suburbs for high-density living in urban centres?

Multiple factors have been at work. The reduction in urban pollution in rich countries in the latter decades of the 20th century, thanks to increasing regulation and the decline of dirty industries, is one reason. The River Thames, which runs through the heart of London, was long a source of revulsion for the city's residents. In 1858, industrial, human and animal waste combined with hot weather to produce such a horrible smell that it was named "the Great Stink". Despite subsequent efforts to improve the condition of the Thames, it remained abhorrently polluted, to the extent that it was declared "biologically dead" by the Natural History Museum in 1957. Thanks, however, to a multi-decade programme of cleaning and treatment, the river has made an impressive recovery.

Cities such as Chicago have experienced a similar reversal. The removal of lead from fuel and other environmental regulations have contributed to significant improvements in air quality in cities in rich countries, though there is still much to do. Air quality in London has come a long way since the great smog of 1952, which claimed thousands of lives.

A fundamental reconfiguration in lifestyle preferences has also been under way in recent decades, contributing to the growing desirability of living in urban centres. From the 1960s onwards, urban centres became especially attractive for those whose lives fell outside the conventional social mores. The LGBTQ+ community embraced the inner city as a place where they could escape the judgment of middle-class suburbanites. Amid rising immigration in the latter half of the 20th century, inner cities brought ethnic minorities together into diaspora communities, in contrast to the overwhelmingly white suburbs. As a result, inner cities developed a spirit of tolerance and openness that has been conspicuously absent from suburbia.

For an emerging educated elite that blended the aesthetic of the counterculture with the economic advantages bestowed on them by the transition to a knowledge economy, the mark of success is not a double-garage home in the suburbs, but a home in an inner-city neighbourhood surrounded by creativity, culture and convenience. Indeed, the lifecycle of gentrification in recent decades has tended to follow a predictable pattern: first come the artists, then the real estate developers and then the professionals. This same story has played out everywhere from London's Shoreditch to New York's SoHo to Sydney's Surry Hills.

The process of gentrification is not exactly new. In recent decades, however, the process has accelerated and extended into many neighbourhoods that once provided affordable homes to those on lower incomes, leaving large parts of the city out of their reach. We cannot let our cities descend into islands of privilege amid seas of disadvantage. Thankfully, with the right policies and investments, a better, more inclusive and sustainable future is possible.

he growing demand for inner-city living has coincided with the arrival of the millennial generation into adulthood. Urban centres have a magnetic pull for those just setting out on their careers, curious about the world and hungry for experiences. This is the time in a person's life when they may have achieved financial independence - or something close to it - but are not yet constrained by the need for a larger space to accommodate a family. Unbounded by such constraints, these individuals head to the city and all the excitement it has to offer.

The role of inner cities as marriage markets reinforces this. Even in an age of meeting online, very few couples choose to conduct their relationships entirely in the virtual realm, at least after the first few encounters. And the further one gets from busy urban centres, the lower the likelihood of finding a good match. As singles couple up and start a family, the pressure for more space increases, while time available for enjoying big-city life shrinks. The result is an exodus from cities for parents with young children.

We can see this lifecycle pattern clearly in the net migration flows in and out of the inner boroughs of London. While many teenagers leave the city after graduating from school to attend university, they return after their degrees are completed, and bring with them many more young adults from across the country. As a result, net migration into inner London flips from negative to positive for adults in their early 20s, and continues rising into the mid-20s. After that, it begins to taper off and eventually turns negative again as many adults have children and leave for the outer suburbs and commuter towns.

Over the past two decades, however, that story has evolved in two important ways. First, the amount of net migration into inner London by adults in their mid-20s has nearly tripled. Second, the age at which net migration flips direction - with more adults exiting than entering - has shifted by a full decade, from 34 to 44. The reason for this lies in changing demography. The average age of marriage has increased significantly in the past few decades. When Prince Charles and Lady Diana married in 1981, the average age of first marriage in the UK for women was 22 and for men 24; when Prince Harry and Meghan Markle married in 2018, these figures had risen to 30 and 32 respectively. Over the same time period, the average age of women at childbirth in the UK has risen from 27 to 31. As young people couple up and start families later, if at all, the pull of the urban lifestyle remains for longer. And while increasingly unaffordable housing in cities such as London is now pushing out a growing number of young people, many would rather stay.

The great inversion has taken an immense toll on many of society's most disadvantaged. As wealthy urbanites move in, the existing poor residents are pushed away. For those who happen to own their properties in gentrifying neighbourhoods, this process can create a windfall financial gain. Unfortunately, the most disadvantaged in these areas tend to be renters, who find themselves confronted with rapidly rising housing costs. While the effects of gentrification may be more muted in cases where the neighbourhood in question was once made up primarily of industrial and commercial real estate, the stock of such property has rapidly been exhausted in New York, Chicago and London. The result is a combination of increasingly concentrated disadvantage in a small number of inner-city neighbourhoods - such as the Bronx in New York or Englewood in Chicago - and a general outward movement of poorer people into the suburbs.

Often, those who are pushed out by gentrification end up far out in the exurbs, where property is cheap but jobs are sparse and commute times to the urban centre are oppressive, especially for those who cannot afford a car and rely on public transport. Sheila James, a public health worker, told the New York Times that property prices in San Francisco had forced her so far out of the city that she faced a 2.15am start on a normal working day. Between 2000 and 2015, the share of neighbourhoods in exurban areas with a poverty rate above 20% more than doubled in the US. And while commute times in the US have been rising across the board, they have been rising far more rapidly for Black and Hispanic workers. Whereas the truly disadvantaged were previously those trapped in poor, inner-city neighbourhoods, they are increasingly those trapped in low-density areas on the periphery of cities.

The takeover of inner-city areas by educated professionals has come at a great price, but it is unclear whether the alternative is any more appealing. The ability of cities to attract high-skill knowledge workers is essential for their success in today's economy. And these workers now want to live in trendy urban centres into their late 30s and beyond. The fact that gentrification has been slower or absent in struggling cities such as Detroit and Cleveland is not a coincidence.

hat should be done about this? Making today's cities work for all their inhabitants, not just a lucky minority, will require three pillars: fairer housing, fairer public transport and fairer schooling. To start with schooling, it is again instructive to look at rich countries that have succeeded in achieving relatively equal outcomes for students irrespective of their socioeconomic background. Japan's schooling system is perhaps best known for the demanding pressures it places on pupils, but it is also one of the most egalitarian systems in the world.

The approach to education in Japan offers a number of useful lessons. The first is to decouple the financing of schools from local revenue streams. In the US, nearly half of school funding comes from local government revenues, which vary heavily depending on the affluence of an area. By contrast, in Japan funding for teacher salaries, school buildings and other expenses primarily comes from national and prefectural governments. The fact that very few primary and lower secondary school students attend private schools in Japan also means that everybody participates in the same education system during these pivotal years.

The second lesson from Japan is to move away from the direct hiring of teachers by schools. Teachers in Japan are hired by prefectures - analogous to states - and typically rotate through multiple schools over the course of their career, especially early on. This allows the government to direct high-performing teachers to disadvantaged areas, rather than teacher quality acting as a mechanism for further widening the socioeconomic gap in school performance.

Many other ideas exist for reducing educational inequality - some easier, others harder. Research by Roland Fryer of Harvard has demonstrated that simply providing increased training for public school principals can have a meaningful impact on student achievement. In Britain, the teachers' union has advocated for a certain number of places in high-performing schools to be ringfenced for disadvantaged students from outside the catchment area. A similar concept exists in the US in the shape of "magnet schools", which focus on drawing together gifted students irrespective of background, though the impact on the disadvantaged students who are not fortunate enough to make the cutoff is unclear. Perhaps the most powerful mechanism for reducing disparities in educational outcomes within cities is to tackle the challenge of affordable housing, which prevents poorer families from accessing better schools in wealthier neighbourhoods.

n the early decades of the 20th century, as public concern continued to grow over the quality of life for the working poor in overcrowded and ramshackle inner-city housing, many rich countries began major efforts to clear such areas and replace them with social housing, a process that accelerated in the aftermath of the second world war. Britain was a particularly enthusiastic adopter, building more than 4m social houses between the end of the war and the start of the 1980s. Such initiatives were not without their critics. For example, in the 60s the urbanist Jane Jacobs argued forcefully against the prevailing approach in New York City of bulldozing slums and replacing them with lifeless, poorly designed housing projects that undermined local communities.

But social housing has played an important role in reducing inequality in cities by ensuring that all residents can have their basic need for shelter met. When interspersed through a city, it has also helped to combat the tendency towards socioeconomic segregation.

In London, for example, social housing was also incorporated into wealthy areas such as Chelsea or Primrose Hill in postwar decades, with the notable benefit of disadvantaged families gaining access to the same schools and local services as their wealthy neighbours. In the 80s, amid the free-market fundamentalism championed by Thatcher and Reagan, social housing fell out of favour in many countries. In Britain, Thatcher's right to buy policy led to millions of properties being sold to tenants, crippling the state's capacity in the following years to house people in need.

Economists began to advocate a more market-friendly model of providing direct financial support in the form of housing vouchers for poor families. As a result, socioeconomic segregation increased in many cities, as low-income households consolidated around low-income areas where rent is cheap. In recent years, Britain has sought to remedy this issue by requiring new residential developments above a certain size to incorporate a number of housing units that are rented out below market rates. Even including these homes, however, the combined supply of social and discounted housing in Britain has been in steady decline since the 1980s.

Cities such as Vienna illustrate the alternative. More than 60% of the inhabitants of the city live in subsidised rental housing - compared to around 20% in London and just over 5% in New York - roughly half of which is owned by the municipal government and the other half by subsidised non-profit cooperatives. A relatively liberal upper limit on the household income that qualifies for subsidised housing in Vienna - €53,340 (£46,125) for a single person or €79,490 (£68,738) for a couple - means these housing blocks bring together people across a relatively broad swathe of the socioeconomic spectrum.

The rapid increase in house prices in many major cities has made home ownership - and the wealth creation it brings - increasingly unattainable for many. House prices in London, Paris, New York and Sydney have grown much faster than median incomes in recent decades, making it hard to accumulate the savings needed to transition from renting to owning.

There are two main culprits behind the decline in housing affordability. The first is years of low interest rates, which until very recently made debt unusually cheap. That made it possible for those who already had the initial capital for a deposit to pay more for a home, either for themselves or as a rental investment, pushing up prices and making it harder for those without a deposit to get on the property ladder. The recent surge in interest rates has not helped, as the cost of home loans has risen by more than house prices have fallen. The second is the long-term deceleration in the building of new houses. Adjusting for population size, rich countries are now building fewer than half as many houses as they did in 1970. The problem is particularly acute in inner cities, many of which have seen very little growth in the housing supply in recent decades, with construction activity skewed towards refreshing the existing stock. Between 2010 and 2019, total housing units in New York City's five boroughs increased by just 6%, compared with job growth of 21%.

Cities need to stop growing outwards and start increasing density. This need not imply endless high-rise buildings and the destruction of heritage architecture - much could be achieved through greater use of mid-rise development and faster conversion of former offices and industrial spaces. As populations in rich countries age and as young people live alone for longer, accelerating the conversion of family homes into single units can also help.

he final pillar for fairer cities is fairer public transport. Access to cheap transportation has long been essential in giving the disadvantaged inhabitants of cities the means to access gainful employment. Yet the systems of public transport that exist in many major cities were often designed and built more than a century ago, at a time when the geography of poverty was very different. As inner-city areas become gentrified and poverty shifts outwards, the risk is that transit systems in many cities end up subsidising the population that least needs it. For instance, in London, the cost of a monthly travel pass is highest for those who need to commute from outer zones into the inner city, yet these areas are exactly where poverty is growing the fastest.

Questions also need to be answered around the financing of public transport. In London, tickets fund more than 70% of public transport income, twice the share in Paris. A monthly travel pass in London for zones 1 to 3 - which loosely corresponds to the inner boroughs - at the time of writing costs £184 (or €211). That compares to just €84 (£73) in Paris for an all-zones metro system pass that covers a similar distance.

Transit systems like London's, which rely on ticket revenue more than general taxation, place a greater financial burden on the poorest inhabitants of the city and increase the risk of them being trapped inside struggling neighbourhoods. Still, for all its flaws, the London system is far superior to car-centric cities in the US such as Los Angeles or Atlanta, where a distinct lack of public transit options acts as a poverty trap for any resident unable to afford a car.

Three years on from the pandemic-induced surge in remote working, a clearer picture is emerging of its impact on cities. Dire predictions of a widespread abandonment of inner-city neighbourhoods have not come true, with residents valuing more than just their commute time. Still, the drop in commuting into central business districts is taking a heavy toll, with offices left vacant, public transport systems left underutilised, and the ecosystem of businesses from retailers to restaurants that service commuters left struggling. The deteriorating state of downtown San Francisco, already burdened by a long-running homelessness problem exacerbated by wildly unaffordable housing, highlights the risks. Now is the time for bold action, based on fresh vision.

Cities are the source of dynamism in all societies. For 5,000 years they have been our engines of progress, spurring the cooperation, specialisation and creativity that have been the driving forces for human development. Today, more people live in them than at any time in history. It is imperative that we learn how to make cities sustainable, and ensure they work for all, not just a fortunate few.

This is an edited extract from Age of the City: Why Our Future Will Be Won or Lost Together by Ian Goldin and Tom Lee-Devlin, published by Bloomsbury and available at guardianbookshop.com.

Follow the Long Read on Twitter at @gdnlongread, listen to our podcasts here and sign up to the long read weekly email here.

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How to reduce the damage done by gentrification

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The long read : We cannot let our cities descend into islands of privilege amid seas of disadvantage. With the right policies and investments, a better future is possible

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Evaluating Regeneration in Moss Side, Manchester

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Evaluating Regeneration in Moss Side, Manchester

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Changing Places in Moss Side, Manchester

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It is 3.30pm on a Friday and 28-year-old German Lisa Wulff is in a half-hour queue for bubble tea and "toasts" at Amsterdam's Chun cafe.

"I've seen it on social media, and it looks good," she says. "My generation is more on Instagram, but I have a younger sister, so I saw it on TikTok."

She is one of 23 million overnight tourists expected this year in Amsterdam and is looking to eat in the city's famous De 9 Straatjes - "nine little streets". One brick road down, the queue for posh chip shop and fellow social media sensation Fabel Friet stretches across a bridge.

They are symptoms of a certain kind of tourism, inspired more by social media than classic attractions or guidebooks, also seen in Italy and Spain, but very evident in this small, heavily visited country.

While the number of tourists appears to be back at peak 2019 levels, Amsterdammers complain that many appear more inspired by Instagrammable food, lazy bike rides and "window shopping" in the red light district than by the city's top hotels, museums and galleries.

Some are particularly concerned about social media-influenced flash crowds in places used to a meandering stream. Outside Fabel Friet, a notice asks customers "kindly to respect our neighbours by not eating your fries in front of their houses" while Brenned Tieman on security duty asks tourists to move to the canal to eat their fries with "war" sauce (mayo, satay and onions).

Although Fabel Friet started promoting itself during the pandemic with viral TikTok clips handcutting chips or magically forming them into the shop's name, co-founder Floris Feilzer would prefer a Michelin star to social media fame.

"We are done with the TikTok label," he says. "If you don't have the quality, it won't come to anything. It's about having great products, and a heart for the business and for the neighbourhood. A lot of residents come here for chips."

At Chun cafe, owners Melissa Cheung and Kelvin Chan see things slightly differently: they feel social media - they use Instagram - gives small businesses a democratic and inclusive channel for promotion. "While we don't actively post on TikTok, we've been thrilled to see the spontaneous buzz generated by individuals who share their experiences," the couple said.

Chip shots: latest Amsterdam social media trend. Photograph: Judith Jockel/The Observer

But despite the efforts of both businesses to be good neighbours, around the corner on the Keizersgracht - the most expensive street in the Netherlands - some are unhappy. Multiple signs in windows and on stairs read: "No picnic: please do not sit here."

A local business owner, who asked not to be named, believes takeaways belong in the red light district. "This is a beautiful place, and now it's full of eating people," she says. "It's not that I don't want them to have success, but look at it for us: my clients stay away."

Lony Scharenborg, manager of the De 9 Straatjes shopping area, hopes the trend for performative tourism - copying influencer content - is temporary. "It's the general public that decides things on TikTok," she says. "It was all about takeaways - something you don't expect in the Canal Ring or next to chic hotels. A lot of young people come for chips or a biscuit, which is good for diversity and inclusivity, but if it becomes dominant, other shops will go away."

In the densely populated, tourist-heavy Netherlands, social media trends are evident. After enduring Instagram-happy visitors trampling the bulb crop, the Dutch tourist board this year imagined a "human-proof" tulip for its April fools' campaign.

"We're all aware that certain places can suffer from overtourism. We've been looking to spread that tourism," says Simone Sagi of the Netherlands Board of Tourism and Conventions, which uses social media to promote diverse destinations and "slow Sundays".

Amsterdam city council points out "it is a worldwide trend that because of social media, certain places and products are visited more for visitors to film or photograph themselves and share" and says it is ensuring businesses reduce nuisance and "keeping a close eye on developments".

A national law may give councils more power to control soaring numbers of fast food outlets. "And," adds Scharenborg, "of course it's never nice to eat on the street."

According to Dr Joris Demmers, associate professor and head of the marketing department at Amsterdam University's business school, flash crowds are not good for businesses.

"This is a relatively recent phenomenon so there's not too much scientific literature, but a few case studies show that for neighbourhoods, destinations and also business owners, it's very difficult to manage this in a good way," he says.

"It's like a plague of locusts: people come, they overwhelm a place, you have capacity problems, you start to think about hiring more people, but a week later they've all gone. It's hard to get a sustainable source of income." He adds that although social media may feel more "authentic", it fosters a monoculture since algorithms promote what was successful in the past.

"There are so many good things outside the centre," says Erik Schmit, tourism spokesman for D66 liberal democrats in Amsterdam, which successfully proposed closing a cruise ship terminal by the central station. "My tip: Amsterdam has unique shops, so look in other neighbourhoods." And for the best tips, adds Demmers: "Talk to the locals."

Back in the queue for what Fabel Friet aims to make "the tastiest chips in Amsterdam", this is what British tourists Olive Kennington and George Heading have done, asking the owner of their boat trip where to eat. "You can trust them a bit more," says Heading. "It's less of a tourist trap."

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TikTok food tourists leave a bitter taste in Amsterdam

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Shop owners and residents are not taking kindly to 'flash crowds' who come to pose and eat fast food in the city's quaint tangle of streets such as De 9 Straatjes

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Amsterdam's City Council is planning to launch a campaign to discourage foreign tourists from access to activities related to alcohol, drugs, and sex, and it is implementing a comprehensive package of measures to fight back 'nuisance' tourism.

Amsterdam's deputy mayor Sofyan Mbarki is embarking on a "discouraging campaign" to curb tourism nuisance by limiting several popular activities in the Dutch capital.

The proposed plan will affect millions of tourists that every year enter cannabis coffee shops, visit the Red Light District, and enjoy the pubs and bars.

Mbaki introduced a package of measures in late November that aim to clean up Amsterdam's "reputation," as many tourists associate the Dutch capital with drugs and alcohol and the Red Light District, which attracts "voyeuristic tourism."

The move is part of a wider plan to "clean up" tourism in Amsterdam by curbing those activities related to alcohol, drugs, and sex, and city councilors are concerned that such activities are attracting a kind of tourism perceived as unwelcome in the city by residents.

"The discouragement campaign aims to keep out visitors we do not want. If we love the city, we must take action now," said Mbarki in a press statement.

"Action is needed to prevent nuisance and overcrowding. Amsterdam is a world city, and bustle and liveliness come along with this, but to keep our city liveable, we need to choose limits instead of irresponsible growth," he continued.

Mbarki has also said the city had consulted residents, local businesses, experts, and interest groups to take this decision and concluded that there is an urgent need to reduce the amount of low-grade tourism.

Therefore, Amsterdam plans to start a campaign next spring, in line with the vision to clean the city's image.

The "Stay Away" campaign will start in early 2023 through a dissuasion campaign targeting foreign visitors that go to Amsterdam only "for alcohol, drugs, and sex."

Among the proposed measures, Mbkai aims to limit river cruises, tighten opening hours for pubs, bars, and restaurants, and window prostitution in the Red Light District during weekend nights. Furthermore, he wants to tackle nuisance bachelor parties and ban pub crawls and smoking activities in certain parts of the city center.

Amsterdam is one of Europe's most visited capital cities, with over 21 million tourists per year, according to the City Council.

The tolerance policy on cannabis and other so-called "soft drugs" and the regulation on prostitution have created an attractive mix of leisure activities for many tourists over the years.

However, the council of Amsterdam now wants to limit such activities that bother residents, according to a report titled "Vision of visitors economy in Amsterdam 2035".

"Nuisance and 'overtourism' are signals that the limit has been reached and that the quality of life is in danger. Visitors remain welcome in our city, but this should no longer be at the expense of livability and accessibility for our residents," the report reads.

The report complains that the international image of Amsterdam has been stereotyped by coffee shops, sex theatres, and the windows in the Red Light District, leading many tourists to misunderstand the idea of freedom with a lack of morality.

As a result, "groups of visitors are under the impression that Amsterdam is a city where anything goes," the report reads.

"We want to get rid of this type of tourism, so we're also tackling the offer specifically aimed at these groups," the report continues.

In particular, cannabis coffee shops and foreign cannabis users have recently been the target of Amsterdam's mayor, Femke Halsema, who has proposed to ban tourists from buying cannabis products from coffee shops.

The Dutch capital has over 160 coffee shops that sell cannabis products to hundreds of thousands of tourists every day. More than half (92) are located in the city center and have become one of the main activities for many tourists that visit Amsterdam.

According to a survey conducted by the government and non-profit research agency I&O Research quoted in the report, for 16% of tourists interviewed, the main reason to visit Amsterdam was to enter a coffee shop. Furthermore, about half of the incoming tourists in Amsterdam visit a cannabis coffee shop or claim they will certainly do so.

Another report by the market research of Breuer&Itraval shows that more than half of the visits to coffee shops in the city are made by foreign visitors.

In order to build sustainable and socially responsible tourism in Amsterdam, the councilors also aim to limit groups of tourists of any kind from accessing the city center.

Furthermore, bars and clubs in the city center may have limited opening hours to operate and could be forced to close by 2 am.

Such restrictions may apply to window prostitution and brothels in the Red Light District.

The proposed regulations also plan to tighten rules on Airbnb and short-term lets and encourage owners to turn them into homes for residents, and a tax could also be applied to tourists when the city is overcrowded.

Some plans are underway to also close some of the city's cannabis coffee shops, while smoking and drinking alcohol may become restricted in certain parts of the city.

The package of measures and the plan to create a new kind of tourism in Amsterdam by 2035 will be submitted to the City Council for approval on December 21.

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Amsterdam Wants Foreign Tourists To 'Stay Away' From Drugs, Alcohol, And Sex

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Amsterdam's City Council is planning to launch a campaign to discourage foreign tourists from access to activities related to alcohol, drugs, and sex, and it is implementing a comprehensive package of measures to fight back 'nuisance' tourism. Amsterdam's deputy mayor Sofyan Mbarki is embarking on a "discouraging campaign" to curb tourism nuisance by limiting several popular activities in the Dutch capital.

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Fuelled by climate change, the world's oceans have broken temperature records every single day over the past year, a BBC analysis finds.

Nearly 50 days have smashed existing highs for the time of year by the largest margin in the satellite era.

Planet-warming gases are mostly to blame, but the natural weather event El Niño has also helped warm the seas.

The super-heated oceans have hit marine life hard and driven a new wave of coral bleaching.

The analysis is based on data from the EU's Copernicus Climate Service.

Copernicus also confirmed that last month was the warmest April on record in terms of global air temperatures, extending that sequence of month-specific records to 11 in a row.

For many decades, the world's oceans have been the Earth's 'get-out-of-jail card' when it comes to climate change.

Not only do they absorb around a quarter of the carbon dioxide that humans produce, they also soak up around 90% of the excess heat.

But over the past year, the oceans have displayed the most concerning evidence yet that they are struggling to cope, with the sea surface particularly feeling the heat.

From March 2023, the average surface temperature of the global oceans started to shoot further and further above the long-term norm, hitting a new record high in August.

Recent months have brought no respite, with the sea surface reaching a new global average daily high of 21.09C in February and March this year, according to Copernicus data.

As the graph below shows, not only has every single day since 4 May 2023 broken the daily record for the time of year, but on some days the margin has been huge.

Around 47 days smashed the record for that day of the year by at least 0.3C, according to BBC analysis of Copernicus data.

Never before in the satellite era had the margin of record been this big.

The biggest record-breaking days were 23 August 2023, 3 January 2024 and 5 January 2024, when the previous high was beaten by around 0.34C.

"The fact that all this heat is going into the ocean, and in fact, it's warming in some respects even more rapidly than we thought it would, is a cause for great concern," says Prof Mike Meredith from the British Antarctic Survey.

"These are real signs of the environment moving into areas where we really don't want it to be and if it carries on in that direction the consequences will be severe."

This human-driven ocean warming is having considerable impacts on global sea life and may even be shifting the seasonal cycle of sea temperatures, according to a recent study.

Perhaps the most significant consequence of the recent warmth has been the mass bleaching of coral globally.

These key ocean nurseries turn white and die because the waters they live in grow too hot. They are a critical element in the ocean ecosystem, home to around a quarter of all marine species.

Unusually warm seas may also have taken a direct toll on one of the most beloved ocean-going creatures in the coldest continent, the emperor penguin.

"There have been examples of the sea-ice collapsing before emperor chicks have properly fledged, and there have been mass drowning events," says Prof Meredith.

"The emperor penguin is a threatened species because of climate change, and the sea-ice and the ocean temperatures are strongly implicated in that."

In the UK, rising sea temperatures are having an impact, with a number of creatures having vanished completely from coastal locations - some barnacle species, for example.

"The problem of climate change is that it's happening too quickly for evolution to catch up with it," says marine biologist Dr Nova Mieszkowska from the University of Liverpool.

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On the Welsh coast, a team from Aberystwyth University use the same technology the police use at a crime scene to track changes in the marine population of Cardigan Bay.

Collecting DNA traces from water samples, they show some invasive species are thriving, including a sea squirt that is believed to have originated in Japan and which grows like a carpet over the sea floor.

"They prevent the growth of native organisms in the areas that they colonise," says Prof Iain Barber, head of Life Sciences at Aberystwyth University. "Because they do so well in our environment, they can potentially take over huge areas of the seabed."

Species that are more invasive appear to be responding more strongly to global warming and the increasing water temperatures, Prof Barber says.

One important factor that's made the last year more impactful in seas all over the world has been the El Niño weather phenomenon, adding to human-driven emissions of warming gases.

El Niño sees warmer waters come to the surface of the Pacific. As a result, it tends to push up the global average.

El Niño kicked into gear in June 2023 - after a prolonged period of cooler La Niña conditions - and reached a peak in December, although it has since been fading away.

But other ocean basins that aren't usually affected by El Niño have also experienced record marine heatwaves - leaving scientists trying to work out exactly what is going on.

"The Atlantic has been warmer than usual, and this is not a pattern you normally associate with El Niño - so it's something somehow different," explains Carlo Buontempo, director of Copernicus.

This heat is still persisting in many ocean basins, including the tropical Atlantic.

Warmer seas give tropical storms extra energy, and this could help to fuel a potentially damaging hurricane season.

"There is still a large patch of warmer than usual water in the tropical Atlantic [and] this is the main development region for tropical cyclones," explains Dr Buontempo.

"We are almost a month ahead in the sea surface temperature in the Atlantic with respect to the annual cycle [...] so this is an area that has to be watched."

As well as these short-term impacts, researchers warn there will be long-term consequences that society will have to adapt to.

For example, ice-sheet melting and deep-ocean warming are likely to continue to fuel sea-level rise in the centuries to come.

"When we talk about climate change, we tend to reduce that to changes on the surface because we live there," said Angélique Melet, a researcher with Mercator Ocean International.

"However, the deep ocean is one of the aspects [of global warming] that is committing us to centuries and millennia of [climate] change."

But Dr Melet stresses that is not a reason to give up on cutting emissions.

"Depending on our actions, we can reduce the speed of that warming, and we can decrease the overall amplitude of that warming and sea-level rise."

Graphics by Erwan Rivault, Muskeen Liddar and Mark Poynting

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Climate change: World's oceans suffer from record-breaking year of heat

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Every single day of the past 12 months has seen a new global sea temperature high for the time of year.

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Water and carbon update: Adapting to changing rainfall across the UK - Hodder Education Magazines

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Climate change will have an impact on access to water around the UK. What practical measures can be put in place to deal with this?

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A range of resources looking at Mill Road. Also has a link to an email subscription where you can get up to date information on events being held.

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Since our memorial event to celebrate Allan's life in March 2021, the committee of the Mill Road History Society have been thinking about and receiving ideas for a more lasting public statement of our affection for him. We want to honour Allan in a way which acknowledges his very significant role in the community, with his various hats on, and we have also received some generous donations to help us do something.

We have been liaising closely with Janice Western, Allan's widow, and can tell you about a couple of projects now.

Allan's Broom

In 2021 the MRHS Committee was approached by Clare Phillips, Curator of 'Resonance-Cambridge' the Public Art programme for the Cambridge Investment Partnerships (CIP) programme of new housing.

CIP is building the housing development called Ironworks on the former site of the City Council Depot where Allan worked. Clare spoke to us about a memorial piece, supported by investment into the community engagement programme at Ironworks.

Together with Janice, we came up with the idea of creating a metal version of Allan's famous City Council broom, to be fixed propped up against a wall in a public area on the development. We wanted to commemorate the way Allan frequently leant his broom against a wall while he talked to people who passed by! Caro Wilson was keen to explore whether Mackays on East Road would be able to make it, and, with Janice, they took the original broom to the shop to see what could be done. To cut a long story short, the Mackays team were excited by the idea, and delighted to be involved. Tas Claydon volunteered to design and manufacture a copper-finished metal version, and he and his colleague Scott Bailey have created a brilliant artwork which will be fixed in a public space, up against a wall.

A plaque on the wall will have the following wording:

In memory of Allan Brigham, 1951-2020
Road sweeper for Cambridge City Council, trade unionist, historian, tour guide and community enthusiast.
Allan loved Mill Road and Mill Road loved him.
Broom designed and made by Scott Bailey and Tas Claydon of Mackays, Cambridge
Concept: Mill Road History Society

This is a really nice example of local organisations working together and we are extremely grateful to Cambridge Investment Partnership for supporting the project.

Allan's Bench

We would also like to place a memorial bench in a public area, and, again with Janice, we think the best position is the summit of Mill Road Bridge next to the bench dedicated to Suzy Oakes. Suzy's bench is well used and there is room for another alongside it. This seems to be a good place for several reasons: Allan and Suzy worked closely together over many pan Mill Road projects including, before she died, the early stages of the Mill Road History project. Like Suzy, Allan believed the bridge should be seen as uniting Romsey and Petersfield rather than dividing them. And, importantly, the site overlooks the Depot site where he worked, Mill Road which he loved and the Railway which featured heavily in most of his tours. If you went on one you will remember that question, aimed directly at one of his punters, perhaps even you, to make sure we were all concentrating: 'When did the Railway come to Cambridge?' We are delighted that City Councillor Richard Robertson has emailed us to say: I'm sure that Allan would very much approve of the idea of a second bench next to Suzy's. Like her, he saw Mill Road as one community and this proposal will help endorse that.

Whilst this is still very much in the planning stage, we are pleased to say that officers at the City Council have confirmed that they are happy to work with us to achieve this.

The heading for this post acknowledges the title of Allan's last book, A Brush with the Past, Cambridge local history, edited by Becky Proctor, 2020. This is available at the Museum of Cambridge, the CUP bookshop, David's and the bookstalls on the market. Waterstones also have copies (apparently in the UK travel section!) and it's still available to order on line at - https://hannahbrigham.wixsite.com/allanbrigham

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Since our memorial event to celebrate Allan's life in March 2021, the committee of the Mill Road History Society have been thinking about and receiving ideas for a more lasting public statement of our affection for him.

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Arindam Bhattacharya: Globalization isn’t declining -- it’s transforming | TED Talk

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Today’s headlines suggest that globalization is on the decline, but researcher Arindam Bhattacharya argues that it’s not going extinct -- it’s evolving. Old globalization was traditionally measured in goods traded. New globalization, as Bhattacharya describes, can be measured in cross-border data flow (which by 2025 could be worth more than the world’s exports combined). In other words, the world economy is far from dead -- it’s growing. Bhattacharya shares insights into this new normal and what it means for the world as we know it.

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Richard Wilkinson: How economic inequality harms societies | TED Talk

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We feel instinctively that societies with huge income gaps are somehow going wrong. Richard Wilkinson charts the hard data on economic inequality, and shows what gets worse when rich and poor are too far apart: real effects on health, lifespan, even such basic values as trust.

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Mike O’Sullivan: The end of globalization (and the beginning of something new) | TED Talk

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“Globalization is on its deathbed,” says economist Mike O’Sullivan. The question now is: What’s next? Tracing the historical successes and failures of globalization, O’Sullivan forecasts a new world order where countries come together over shared values rather than geography. Learn how big regional powers like the United States and China will be driven by distinct ways of governing trade, technology and people -- while smaller nations will forge new alliances to solve problems.

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In 2023 the value of the USA's imports of goods from China fell by over 20% compared to the previous year. This was part of a trend that had started in 2019, with small increases in imports from other Asian countries, including India, Japan, Thailand and Vietnam, together with slightly larger increases from Mexico during that time period (see Figure 1, below).

Similar trends have also been experienced by European Union (EU) countries, with imports from China falling by 10% in 2023 compared to 2022. The reasons for these trends are captured by the concepts of decoupling, reshoring, near-shoring and ally-shoring.

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Essential topic update: Is globalisation being rebranded? - Hodder Education Magazines

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UPDATES ESSENTIAL TOPIC UPDATE: Is globalisation being rebranded? UPDATES ESSENTIAL TOPIC UPDATE Is globalisation being rebranded? Decoupling, reshoring, near-shoring and ally-shoring © Kalyakan/stock.adobe.com In 2023 the value of the USA's imports of goods from China fell by over 20% compared to the previous year. This was part of a trend that had started in 2019, [...]

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BP sees biggest profit in 114 year history after oil and gas prices soar - BBC News

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Nick Edser, Daniel Thomas & Noor NanjiBusiness reporters

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BP scales back climate targets as profits hit record

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It is the latest energy giant to report record annual profits after oil and gas prices soared last year.

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The world is on track for record harvests this year (2025)

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The world is on track for record harvests this year (2025)

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The world is on track for record harvests this year

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What do the latest projections expect for global food production and yields of different crops?

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Food Security and El Nino/La Nina-great article looking at links to climate

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Food Security and El Nino/La Nina-great article looking at links to climate

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According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, almost three-in-ten people around the world went short of food in 2022, with more than a tenth severely food insecure.

Improving plant yields is one way to cut the shortfall, and there have been great advances. But while maize yields, for example, have tripled over the past hundred years, so has water usage.

"We need to be able to increase productivity without increasing further demand, particularly in terms of water," says Prof Steve Long of the University of Illinois.

One aspect of plant growth that hasn't seen significant improvement is conversion efficiency - how effectively a plant converts solar radiation to biomass through photosynthesis.

Prof Long says that photosynthesis in current varieties of crops, like wheat and soybeans, has barely improved in decades.

He is principal investigator and director of a project called Realizing Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency (Ripe), which aims to genetically tweak plants to increase their yields by improving their ability to photosynthesise.

The efficiency of photosynthesis in crop plants is well below the theoretical maximum, but has been hard to influence thanks to the complex nature of the process - there are more than 100 steps, coded for by even more genes, giving millions of potential permutations.

Prof Long and his team have used powerful computers to build a digital twin of the photosynthesis process. It can tweak that process in millions of ways.

From those millions of options the software can identify those that will make the biggest improvements.

"We then engineered these into crops, and if that results in an improvement in the glasshouse, then we take it to our experimental farm and test it in a real-world environment," says Prof Long.

That's already had promising results. Changes to the mechanism of photosynthesis in soybean plants have resulted in yield improvements of more than 20% in controlled environments, with field trials now underway.

One focus of the work is tweaking the way plants respond to changes in light levels.

The team has been working with three genes that code for proteins of the xanthophyll cycle. This occurs as leaves move from light to shade, preventing the plant from absorbing more light than it can use.

However, this process can take several minutes - and Ripe's gene changes mean that plants can adjust to changes in light levels more quickly.

Other teams around the world are also trying to pump-up photosynthesis.

Wild Bioscience, a spinout from Oxford University, is working to improve the proportion of each leaf that can photosynthesise, by ramping up the expression of a gene found in wild plants.

The process involves sophisticated computational biology: "What we're doing is trying to reverse engineer the naturally occurring upgrades to photosynthesis that are out there in the wild, so we can copy them in crops," says co-founder Ross Hendron.

Often, that gene is already present in the plant, and can be activated in different areas.

"We can look at wheat and find that gene is already in the wheat genome, it's just on in the wrong place," says Mr Hendron. "So when we want to improve this particular process in this part of the plant, what we need to do is flick on a switch and turn that gene on in that location."

Another example is a gene found in maize that helps the plant carry out what's known as C4 photosynthesis, a particularly efficient form of photosynthesis that's also found in millet; Wild Bioscience has activated it in wheat.

The company is working on wheat, soybean and maize, and has achieved increases of more than 20% in seed biomass, with field trials currently under evaluation. If all goes well, says Mr Hendron, crop plants could be available commercially by around 2030 or 2031.

Both Ripe and Wild BioScience are engaged in gene editing. It involves switching genes on and off by removing DNA, and is different from genetic modification (GM), which involves importing genes from other species.

Earlier this year the UK government relaxed the regulation of gene-edited crops to enable commercial growing in England.

The regulation of gene-edited and GM crops differs from country to country, with the European Union having the strictest rules.

Campaigners have long fought against the introduction of GM crops and are resisting gene-edited crops as well.

"This unproven science offers only a potential short-term relief of the symptoms of an unsustainable farming industry. In the meantime, it is diverting time, investment and attention away from real and already-proven solutions," Friends of the Earth Europe said in a report, titled Editing the Truth.

Researchers at Imperial College London are not at the stage of doing any gene editing yet.

They are in the early stages of investigating whether plants can be engineered to photosynthesise using lower-energy far-red light instead of visible light.

"There is potential under some circumstances, but we are still in the early phases of working out how it works and what are the pros and cons," says Prof Bill Rutherford of the Department of Life Sciences.

Some scientists are cautious about what's actually achievable in terms of crops in the field.

Matthew Paul, principal research scientist at agricultural research institution Rothamsted Research, suggests that increasing leaves' photosynthetic ability could simply result in smaller leaves, and that high rates of photosynthesis could mean more water loss, meaning plants would need more irrigation.

"For any GM or gene editing approach to have widespread impact it would need to be reproduced in varieties grown in different regions. Subtleties of expression control and interaction with genetic background of each variety will make this tricky," he says.

With work still in the early stages, it remains to be seen how much commercial yields can be improved through changes to photosynthesis.

However, Mr Hendron says different techniques could be used in combination to even greater effect.

"We know these are stackable improvements that can drive further and further increases," he says.

So there will be other technologies out there - Ripe will be one of them - so we can say both of us are doing this individually, but how much more powerful is this in combination?"

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The turbo-charged plants that could boost farm output

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Researchers are tweaking the photosynthesis process to raise the output of crops like soy, maize and wheat.

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The people racing to replant Africa

It's one of the most ambitious environmental projects ever planned - but even with millions of people's livelihoods at stake, it's quite possible that the Great Green Wall of Africa won't meet its jaw-dropping targets. Unless, some argue, plans to reforest an 8,000km cross-continental stretch can be pulled from the corridors of power and driven by local citizens. In the Gambia, one of Africa's smallest countries, that's starting to happen - but the clock is ticking.

"Seven years ago, we never bought rice from China. Today, my parents have to depend on my paycheck to buy bags of rice to supplement the little rice that we can grow here."

Kemo Fatty comes from a family of farmers living on the north bank of the Gambia river. For generations, they had grown everything they needed on the region's fertile floodplains. But in recent years, climate change and deforestation have made the region nearly uncultivable. As there isn't enough rainwater washing down the river, saltwater from the sea moves upstream and destroys crops. And because of the lack of trees, the soil has lost all its nutrients, and crops don't grow.

Like everywhere in the Sahel - the 3 million sq km region between the Sahara desert and the African rainforest - the Gambia is on the frontline of climate change. "It's a race against water," says Fatty. "Water is the real commodity here. We are losing more and more water, which is making people poorer and poorer."

Over the past few decades, the Sahel's natural resources have dwindled, leading to a loss of biodiversity, poverty, mass emigration, violence and food insecurity, in a region where most people rely on agriculture for subsistence - 60% live in rural areas.

Temperatures in the Sahel are expected to rise 1.5 times faster than in the rest of the world, and could reach up to five degrees celsius above pre-industrial times. That would make the region uninhabitable. Yet the Gambia is only responsible for 0.05% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions, according to a UN FCCC paper published in 2016.

"It has become personal now, because we see first-hand that we are a helpless nation," says Fatty. His own brother is among the many young people who have left the country to seek better opportunities in Europe, hoping to be able to help their families from abroad. "These are not economic migrants, they are climate migrants. Because the climate is affecting the economic power of our state."

Fatty stayed. Just 28 years old, he is now the executive director of Green Up Gambia, an NGO helping rural communities mitigate and adapt to climate change, and has recently joined Civic, a UK-based social enterprise working to drive positive change around the world, as head of community engagement. With both organisations, he's working on a mammoth project: Africa's Great Green Wall.

"The Sahel is the crucible of the biggest threats facing all of humanity today," says Alexander Asen, creative director at Civic, who recently produced a documentary on the project. Like Fatty, he sees a possible solution to those problems in the Great Green Wall, and previously led a campaign promoting it at the UN Convention to Combat Desertification.

The Great Green Wall is an African-led initiative that aims to build an 8,000km barrier of plants and trees at the southern border of the Sahara desert, from Senegal in the west, to Djibouti in the east, in the hope of rebuilding what used to be a lush and fertile region. The idea emerged in the 1980s, as climate change, unsustainable agricultural practices and population growth started depleting natural resources and visibly increased desertification. The project eventually launched in 2007, with the support of the African Union.

Almost 15 years later, progress has been slower than expected, with only about 18% of the wall planted. But the idea of a simple barrier of trees across Africa has evolved into something bigger: regenerating a whole region. The Great Green Wall is now a mosaic of local initiatives which, beyond rebuilding natural woodlands, are providing food through climate-smart agriculture, creating green jobs, supporting women to become more independent and rebuilding the economy for the younger generation.

So far, 18m hectares of degraded land has been restored and 350,000 jobs have been created across the Sahel. If the Great Green Wall achieves its objectives, by 2030, 100m hectares of land will have been restored, 250m tonnes of carbon captured, and 10m jobs created. But it will cost between $36bn and $43bn, on top of what's been spent already.

The project is funded by the member states of the African Union and international partners, including the World Bank and the European Investment Bank, who together in January 2021 committed $14bn to the 'Great Green Wall Accelerator'. This money will direct funding to local organisations, and help them coordinate and monitor their work.

There is a discrepancy between this growing political momentum in the corridors of power, and the awareness of the project in the regions affected. Efforts to engage local populations are needed, says Asen. "People on the frontlines often have no idea this movement is happening, we need far deeper awareness and incentives". The Great Green Wall can only succeed, he says, if local people - the "ultimate guardians" of the project - adopt it as their own.

"On one hand, there are financial challenges, and on the other, there are challenges around community engagement," Asen says.

In the Gambia, Civic is spearheading a new pilot programme, the Great Green Wall Frontline, in partnership with the African Union. The programme aims to encourage local people to help shape the future of the Gambia's section of the Great Green Wall, through citizens' assemblies. Fatty hopes to reach everyone across the northern bank of the Gambia river, starting with a "leadership briefing" that will involve all local leaders: head of districts, village heads and village development committees as well as traditional communicators, spiritual leaders and the elders.

"All of these structures in the village need to understand what it is that the Great Green Wall entails and how we are going to deliver it," says Fatty.

A lot of environmental initiatives have come and gone in the region, he explains, "but we are yet to see a visible, tangible impact of these projects." There needs to be "this cross-cutting dialogue, this intergenerational dialogue to really understand what has not been going well... What did we do wrong? How can we do it right?"

Rather than imposing decisions from the top down, Fatty says, the project needs to either reform or build on existing systems.

"The power must be put in the hands of the local people who are on the ground," he says - not in the hands of the international NGOs who come and go again with no lasting impact.

Community members should be involved in the main effort of tree planting, but they also need to understand that their behaviour needs to change, that they need to stop practices such as cutting down trees to create farming space or engaging in timber trade.

The citizens' assemblies will create a pilot model and a DIY toolkit that can be used by other activists across the country. Ultimately, a national assembly will present the government with feedback from local people that can feed into policies on land use, tree-planting incentives and so on. "We want the issues of climate change and land degradation to be mainstreamed across every sector of planning and development," says Fatty. He hopes other countries will follow.

"My brothers are jumping into the boat across the Mediterranean, because they feel like the pasture here is no longer green... to restore our pasture to make our place green, we need to revive the power of the soils.

"And this can only be done when there is a clear understanding, when there's a citizen-powered movement that can drive the change of delivering 12.5m trees on the soil in the Gambia, restoring hectares of degraded land across every community."

How to build a green wall

Trees need to be planted during the rainy season, which only lasts three months in the Gambia - down from six, because of climate change. Throughout the dry season, tree seedlings are grown in propagation centres - where they are kept in 'nurseries' and watered regularly. When the rainfall begins, they must be planted out quickly so that they can become mature and drought-resistant by the time the dry season starts.

With sufficient resources and planning, the Gambia stretch of the project could be completed in as little as five years. Many assume it takes decades to grow trees, but Fatty knows that's not the case: his father built a "live fence" about seven years ago by planting trees rather than using expensive barbed-wire fencing. The cashew trees are now fully grown, protect the land and provide Kemo's father with an income from selling nuts.

In certain areas, the focus is on using planting as a means of income generation, Fatty explains, getting "money back into the hands of the farmers and the young people".

Tried-and-tested solutions exist to do this. Creating interlocking systems where vegetables can be planted between the trees provides nutritious food to the local populations. Growing staple crops, such as cashews, rather than cash crops (those planted for export), supplies the local population with foodstuffs at a lower cost. Providing storage facilities means vegetables don't go to waste. And engaging younger generations, for example by using school gardens as propagation centres to grow tree seedlings, gives children hands-on environmental education.

Many ways to help

For the past few months, international law firm Hogan Lovells has been working with Fatty, Asen and others at Civic on their Gambia project, to help them set up the right corporate structure and legal entity for it.

"I was blown away by how amazing an idea it is," says Neil Mirchandani, partner at Hogan Lovells. "The idea of greening the Sahel... We thought this is something we want to support as best we can... There is almost no downside to it."

Hogan Lovells has worked in Africa for more than three decades. It has built a network of law firms across the continent, the "Go Far Together" initiative, with a view to empowering local lawyers and their practices.

Beyond sharing expertise, Hogan Lovells has been building deep connections, offering secondments, seminars and partnership opportunities to local practices on social impact projects, such as the Great Green Wall.

As a $2bn international law firm, Hogan Lovells is also using its global network of contacts to support the Great Green Wall. The firm also seeks to raise awareness of the initiative among its clients, which may be keen to offer logistical or financial support.

"ESG issues are very big issues for many of Hogan Lovells's clients," says Mirchandani. "The environmental side of this is something we can excite people with." And it's not only about money: expertise in a relevant field or equipment can make a huge difference.

Hogan Lovells engaged with Gambian lawyers to advise on the local Great Green Wall project. Sourcing support locally brings business to Gambian law firms and brings the project closer to the community.

While a top-down approach is needed - international funding, expertise and so on - initiatives need to be supported and coordinated on ground level. "You need both of those together, you can't have one without the other," says Gill McGreevy, partner at Hogan Lovells.

Bringing communities on side is a "huge task" says Mirchandani. "You think the ground side of things is a given. We are asking people to change their way of life for what we think is a better, easier way of life. But we do have to make sure they are convinced."

If local solutions are scaled up, the Great Green Wall could dramatically improve biodiversity, and reduce poverty, mass emigration, violence and food insecurity in the Sahel - all of which would have positive knock-on effects for other parts of the world by helping tackle climate change and mass migration.

But huge challenges remain. Even after world leaders committed $14bn in January, African Union president Moussa Faki Mahamat reminded them that the investments made until now had been much lower than sums committed - and were often characterised by a certain "cacophony", he said.

While international partners had shown enthusiasm for the initiative when it launched, 14 years later the "dream has somewhat faded", he added. While the Sahel was fighting against terrorism, political crises and conflicts, malnutrition, Covid-19 and other pandemics, it would be a "fatal mistake" to let climate degradation increase in the region.

Even if local people become aware of the problem, conflict and poverty mean they must do whatever they can to feed their family. "People understand the problem, but they are helpless. So they will chop down the last tree, in order to survive," says Fatty.

While timber trade is banned, millions of dollars worth of wood still leave the Gambia each year. The system is rife with corruption: $50 is enough to make a border guard avert his eyes when a truck full of logs passes by. Fatty, who used to work for the municipal council, explains that low wages make people more vulnerable to bribery. "When the police are not getting paid, they find it hard to serve and protect."

There needs to be a "spiritual" change, Fatty says: "To save the world, we need to get inside the problems of greed, ego and convenience." People in the Gambia used to be "as one with nature", he explains. Many ancient customs were rooted in the idea that one mustn't exploit the earth. He mentions the role of the Kankuran - a traditional spirit - who used to threaten villagers if they picked unripe fruit from the forest. Ancient laws used to safeguard natural resources; but colonisation and Western influence led Gambians to lose their sense of purpose, Fatty says.

He thinks the citizens' assemblies can help reconnect people with these values, and give them the power to take action at the same time.

"The solutions are already on the ground, it's a matter of how we scale this up... I think there's a lot of things that can be done for us to really get the productivity of our land back. It's just a matter of putting the right people at the wheel. And of course, providing them with the right help and the right tools that they need.

"We are building hope, once more, something we never really have. We have lived with frustration for far too long," says Fatty. The Great Green Wall was designed "in the corridors of the African Union", but has never been rolled out to people on the frontline, he adds - until now.

"We need to get people on the frontline to restore land. This, I think, is the only hope for our continent."
Top picture by Simon Townsley
All other photos courtesy of Great Green Wall
Design by Fanny Blanquier

This immersive feature was produced by Pioneers Post in partnership with Hogan Lovells and HL BaSE, the firm's impact economy practice.

Get in touch if you'd like to tell your story.

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The ambitious Great Green Wall project could have a huge impact - if, that is, it can be driven not just from the corridors of power but also by local citizens. In the Gambia, that's starting to happen. But the clock is ticking.

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Cross-curricular Link! Improving soils impact on climate change-the carbon cycle

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Cross-curricular Link! Improving soils impact on climate change-the carbon cycle

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Marginal improvements to agricultural soils around the world would store enough carbon to keep the world within 1.5C of global heating, new research suggests.

Farming techniques that improve long-term fertility and yields can also help to store more carbon in soils but are often ignored in favour of intensive techniques using large amounts of artificial fertiliser, much of it wasted, that can increase greenhouse gas emissions.

Using better farming techniques to store 1% more carbon in about half of the world's agricultural soils would be enough to absorb about 31 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide a year, according to new data. That amount is not far off the 32 gigatonnes gap between current planned emissions reduction globally per year and the amount of carbon that must be cut by 2030 to stay within 1.5C.

The estimates were carried out by Jacqueline McGlade, the former chief scientist at the UN environment programme and former executive director of the European Environment Agency. She found that storing more carbon in the top 30cm of agricultural soils would be feasible in many regions where soils are currently degraded.

McGlade now leads a commercial organisation that sells soil data to farmers. Downforce Technologies uses publicly available global data, satellite images and lidar to assess in detail how much carbon is stored in soils, which can now be done down to the level of individual fields.

"Outside the farming sector, people do not understand how important soils are to the climate," said McGlade. "Changing farming could make soils carbon negative, making them absorb carbon, and reducing the cost of farming."

She said farmers could face a short-term cost while they changed their methods, away from the overuse of artificial fertiliser, but after a transition period of two to three years their yields would improve and their soils would be much healthier.

She estimated it would cost about $1m (£790,000) to restore 40,000 hectares (99,000 acres) of what is currently badly degraded farmland in Kenya, an area that is home to about 300,000 people.

Downforce data could also allow farmers to sell carbon credits based on how much additionalcarbon dioxide their fields are absorbing. Soil has long been known to be one of Earth's biggest stores of carbon, but until now it has not been possible to examine in detail how much carbon soils in particular areas are locking up and how much they are emitting. About 40% of the world's farmland is now degraded, according to UN estimates.

Carbon dioxide removal, the name given to a suite of technologies and techniques that increase the uptake of carbon dioxide from the air and sequester the carbon in some form, is an increasing area of interest, as the world slips closer to the critical threshold of 1.5C of global heating above pre-industrial levels.

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Arable farmers could sequester more carbon within their soils by changing their crop rotation, planting cover crops such as clover, or using direct drilling, which allows crops to be planted without the need for ploughing. Livestock farmers could improve their soils by growing more native grasses.

Hedgerows also help to sequester carbon in the soil, because they have large underground networks of mycorrhizal fungi and microbes that can extend metres into the field. Farmers have spent decades removing hedgerows to make intensive farming easier, but restoring them, and maintaining existing hedgerows, would improve biodiversity, reduce the erosion of topsoil, and help to stop harmful agricultural runoff, which is a key polluter of rivers.

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Improving soil could keep world within 1.5C heating target, research suggests

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Better farming techniques across the world could lead to storage of 31 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide a year, data shows

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Is Somalia’s hunger and homelessness crisis beyond hope?

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Is Somalia’s hunger and homelessness crisis beyond hope?

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Is Somalia’s hunger and homelessness crisis beyond hope? | TV Shows | Al Jazeera

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Is Somalia's hunger and homelessness crisis beyond hope?

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Ever-more extreme weather and local conflicts push greater numbers of people into dire poverty.

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Air pollution listed as a cause of death in the UK for the first time

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Air pollution listed as a cause of death in the UK for the first time

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A nine-year-old girl who died following an asthma attack has become the first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as a cause of death.

Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah, who lived near the South Circular Road in Lewisham, south-east London, died in 2013.

Southwark Coroner's Court found that air pollution "made a material contribution" to Ella's death.

Prof Gavin Shaddick, a government adviser on air pollution, called it "a landmark decision".

At the conclusion of the two-week inquest, coroner Philip Barlow said Ella had been exposed to "excessive" levels of pollution.

The inquest heard that in the three years before her death, she had multiple seizures and was admitted to hospital 27 times.

Delivering a narrative verdict, Mr Barlow said levels of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) near Ella's home exceeded World Health Organization and European Union guidelines.

He added: "There was a recognised failure to reduce the levels of nitrogen dioxide, which possibly contributed to her death.

"There was also a lack of information given to Ella's mother that possibly contributed to her death."

Giving his conclusion over almost an hour, the coroner said: "I will conclude that Ella died of asthma, contributed to by exposure to excessive air pollution."

Ella's mother Rosamund Adoo-Kissi-Debrah, said: "We've got the justice for her which she so deserved.

"But also it's about other children still, as we walk around our city of high levels of air pollution."

Ms Adoo-Kissi-Debrah said she was "shocked" by how "decisive and comprehensive" the findings were.

'Barely breathing'

Ella was first taken to hospital in 2010 after a coughing fit, Ms Adoo-Kissi-Debrah had told the inquest.

As a six-year-old, she had to be placed in a medically induced coma for three days to try to stabilise her condition.

By the summer of 2012, Ella was classified as disabled and her mother said she often had to carry her by piggyback to get her around.

Ms Adoo-Kissi-Debrah said: "I think people need to understand when Ella was rushed into hospital, a lot of the time she was barely breathing.

"It was an emergency, cardiac arrest."

Ella died in the early hours of 15 February 2013, following a severe asthma attack.

A 2018 report found unlawful levels of pollution, which were detected at a monitoring station one mile from Ella's home, contributed to her fatal asthma attack.

The report's author Prof Sir Stephen Holgate said Ella had been "living on a knife edge" in the months before her death.

The inquest heard Ella's family did not know of the risks posed by air pollution.

Analysis

This is an historic verdict.

Typically, experts refer to air pollution being "associated" with premature deaths because they can't be sure any one individual's death was caused or partly caused by dirty air.

This case pins Ella's untimely death partly on to the air she breathed.

It will heighten the debate about social equity in the UK.

The poorest tend to suffer the worst air, whilst - on a national basis - the richest tend to drive furthest.

Campaigners now want emergency action - including expanding London's clean-air zone for vehicles out to the M25 and making Britain's streets better for walking and cycling.

But there are myriad sources of pollution. Gas boilers, construction equipment, paint and dust from brakes and tyres all contribute.

Ultimately, it won't be possible to completely clean the air in some of the UK's big cities.

Ahead of the conclusion of the inquest, Arnold Schwarzenegger wrote to Ms Adoo-Kissi-Debrah calling her "a hero".

The Hollywood actor and former governor of California, who has long been an advocate for better clean-air standards, thanked her for "exposing air pollution for the killer it is".

'Seismic shift'

Prof Shaddick, who leads Exeter University's data science department, said he hoped the inquest ruling "makes improving the air we breathe easier to achieve in the future".

"It's just regrettable it's taken this case to achieve it," he added.

Sadiq Khan, who as mayor of London was named as an interested party in the inquest, called the result "a landmark moment".

Mr Khan said: "Today must be a turning point so that other families do not have to suffer the same heartbreak as Ella's family.

"Ministers and the previous mayor have acted too slowly in the past, but they must now learn the lessons from the coroner's ruling."

Sarah Woolnough, chief executive of Asthma UK and the British Lung Foundation, called on the government to outline a public health plan to protect against "toxic air" immediately.

She said: "Our hearts go out to Ella's family who have fought tirelessly for today's landmark outcome.

"Today's verdict sets the precedent for a seismic shift in the pace and extent to which the government, local authorities and clinicians must now work together to tackle the country's air pollution health crisis."

Responding to the verdict, a government spokesman said: "Our thoughts remain with Ella's family and friends.

"We are delivering a £3.8bn plan to clean up transport and tackle NO2 pollution and going further in protecting communities from air pollution."

The mayor of Lewisham, Damien Egan, said Ms Adoo-Kissi-Debrah's campaign for clean air had been "hugely impactful".

He added: "Our hope is that today's ruling is the evidence needed to effect lasting change, to finally secure a national commitment to tackling air pollution in a meaningful way."

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Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah: Air pollution a factor in girl's death, inquest finds

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A nine-year-old girl who died following an asthma attack has become the first person in the UK to have air pollution listed as a cause of death. Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah, who lived near the South Circular Road in Lewisham, south-east London, died in 2013. Southwark Coroner's Court found that air pollution "made a material contribution" to Ella's death.

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Desertification is turning the Earth barren – but a solution is still within reach

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Desertification is turning the Earth barren – but a solution is still within reach

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Desertification is turning the Earth barren – but a solution is still within reach | David R Montgomery | The Guardian

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his summer's record-setting heatwaves and dramatic fires in southern Europe and the American west were stark reminders that the climate crisis has arrived. But as the world warms, there is also a quieter, lesser-known crisis unfolding underfoot. Desertification, long seen primarily as a threat to developing nations, is coming for Europe and North America too, as worsening droughts bake soils already degraded by conventional farming and grazing practices.

In Spain, for example, about a fifth of all land is now at high risk of desertification, as is much of the agricultural land across Italy, Greece, and western North America.

Desertification is a process that turns fertile farms into barren land through the interacting effects of human activity and climate extremes. Soil degradation is the diminishment of a soil's capacity to support crops and livestock, either because of the erosion of fertile topsoil or the loss of water-holding, nutrient-rich soil organic matter and the life it supports. Semi-arid grasslands like the Sahel and western plains of North America are most vulnerable because loss of drought tolerant native vegetation can trigger rapid soil degradation and loss of agricultural productivity.

A changing climate, however, is not the only cause behind desertification. How we treat the land - how we farm and ranch - matters too. Healthy, life-filled soils better retain the moisture that falls on farmers' fields.

Desertification is a growing problem. A 2018 report by EU auditors found that an area twice the size of Portugal had fallen into high risk of desertification in the preceding decade, in Europe alone. In recent decades 13 EU states declared themselves affected as the Mediterranean region experienced a significant expansion of drylands - regions with low rainfall. Soil degradation is estimated to cost the EU tens of billions of euros a year, and yet, how farmers treat their soil remains essentially unregulated in regard to soil health on both sides of the Atlantic.

The threat of desertification and land degradation will increase as the climate crisis progresses. A 2018 report found that land degradation already affects the wellbeing of at least 3.2 billion people - more than a third of humanity. Between 1982 and 2015 unsustainable land-use practices already desertified 6% of the world's drylands. Globally, the area of drylands is projected to increase by up to 23% this century.

Rising temperatures are already predicted to reduce yields of staple crops such as wheat, rice, maize and soya beans, by 3-7 % for each 1°C increase. In Washington state, for example, wheat yields are down this year by about half due to a devastating drought. Madagascar is now facing a climate change-induced famine.

But it's not just droughts driving the problem. Farming practices that degrade the soil reduce the resilience of crops as worsening conditions affect harvests. Drylands in particular are sensitive to degradation from both tillage and overgrazing. If it continues, soil degradation will further increase the threat to agricultural production in regions that humanity depends on for food.

Looking back through history, it's clear thatdesertification and soil degradation are not new problems. Since the arrival of agriculture humanity has degraded as much as a third of the world's potential farmland. This pattern reflects both a long history of tillage-induced erosion and more recent adoption of modern farming practices that deplete soil organic matter and disrupt soil ecosystems. Unfortunately, we are repeating the problem on a global scale.

Now-conventional farming and ranching practices that degrade the soil leave farmers around the world increasingly reliant on huge amounts of chemical fertilisers and pesticides. Declining soil health due to depletion of soil organic matter and soil life is increasingly recognised as a critical problem.

According to a 2015 UN report we are on track to degrade another third of global farmland over the course of the present century. We're leaving the land more fragile and our harvests more vulnerable at the same time climate change is creating unprecedented environmental pressures.

To combat and reverse the growing threat of desertification and land degradation we need to both reduce carbon emissions and change the way we farm. We don't have to relearn the lessons of past societies that degraded their land. But to avoid their fate we need to reorient agriculture around farming and grazing practices that regenerate soil health.

Several years ago, I visited and wrote about farms and ranches around the world that had restored fertility to once-degraded lands. I saw how regenerative farming and grazing based on soil-building practices can reverse soil degradation, rebuild soil health and make farms resilient to extreme weather - while maintaining good harvests. But it requires replacing conventional farming practices dependent on intensive tillage and massive chemical fertiliser use with practices that put soil health first.

In addition to intensive efforts to reduce fossil fuel-derived carbon emissions, we need a sustained global drive to rebuild the health of the world's agricultural soils. Fortunately, the latter can help with the former. Farming practices that build healthy soil convert carbon dioxide captured from the atmosphere into soil organic matter.While the potential of storing carbon in the soil remains hotly debated, even low-end estimates would help slow climate change.

The soil is the foundation for life on Earth. As we face a century of increasingly volatile weather and a growing population, we need it in its best shape to sustain us. Humanity must get serious about our collective intergenerational responsibility to preserve the health and fertility of our land - wherever we live.

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Desertification is turning the Earth barren - but a solution is still within reach | David R Montgomery

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his summer's record-setting heatwaves and dramatic fires in southern Europe and the American west were stark reminders that the climate crisis has arrived. But as the world warms, there is also a quieter, lesser-known crisis unfolding underfoot.

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How should countries deal with falling birth rates?

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How should countries deal with falling birth rates?

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https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c72p2vgd21no#:~:text=There%20are%20basically%20two%20main,can%20have%20large%2Dscale%20immigration.

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The first thing you need to know about the so-called demographic timebomb facing countries such as the UK and US is to never call it that.
With birth rates continuing to decline in both nations, it is tempting to use the timebomb term. However, it is greatly disliked by demographers, the experts that study population change.

"Number one, I hate the phrase," says Sarah Harper, professor of gerontology (the study of the impact of aging) at the University of Oxford.

"I do not think there is a demographic timebomb, it is part of the demographic transition. We knew this was going to happen, and happen across the 21st Century. So, it is not unexpected, and we should have been preparing for this for some time."

However, the scale of the future problem is immense. For a country in the developed world to increase or maintain its population it needs a birth rate of 2.1 children per woman on average. This is known as the "replacement rate".

Yet the latest figures for England and Wales show that the average birth rate, also called the total fertility rate, declined to 1.49 children per woman in 2022, from 1.55 in 2021. The rate has been falling since 2010.

It is a similar picture in Scotland and Northern Ireland, which record their data separately.

Meanwhile, in the US the fertility rate fell last year to 1.62, a record low. Back in 1960 it was 3.65.

"In fact, two thirds of the world's countries now have childbirth rates below the replacement rate," adds Prof Harper. "Japan is low, China is low, South Korea is the lowest in the world."

Population growth is really only limited to sub-Saharan Africa these days.

But why the concern about falling birth rates? The economic problems they can cause are significant, as countries face the impact of both aging and declining populations, and a smaller workforce in relation to the number of pensioners.

For example - where will a nation's economic growth come from if companies cannot recruit enough workers? And how can a smaller workforce afford to pay for the pensions of a much larger retired population? Those are questions that make government economists wince.

To try to increase birth rates, countries can make it easier for women to have children, by providing more generous childcare provision, such as tax breaks and extended, fully-paid maternity leave. In addition, companies could be compelled to offer new mums and dads more flexible working hours, and provide workplace creches.

However, while such policies might slow the decline, they rarely reverse it.

Put simply, the more women are educated, the more they work and save, the better their lives are.

Many women would instead prefer not to take the hit to their earnings and career prospects that becoming a mother often causes.

So they have fewer children, or none at all.

There are basically two main ways in which a country can deal with a falling birth rate - you can keep your population heathier and employed for longer, or you can have large-scale immigration.

Singapore is one of the fastest-ageing countries in the world, and it is going for the first option.

"There is a lot of effort being put into raising the retirement age, training in middle life, and encouraging companies - which have to offer you re-employment up to the age of 69 - to hire older workers," says Prof Angelique Chan. She is the inaugural executive director of Singapore's Centre for Ageing Research & Education.

By re-employment, Prof Chan means older workers being able to stay in work after they have reached retirement age, if they so wish.

Currently the retirement age in Singapore is 63, but this is due to rise to 64 in 2026, and to 65 by 2030. By that year the age to which people in re-employment can stay in work is expected to have risen to 70.

Prof Chan says that the Singaporean government is also increasing efforts to ensure that every citizen has a doctor "who must take care of you and monitor your condition, and make sure we have heathier cohorts who can continue to work".

She adds that Singapore is spending a huge amount of money "so we have the healthiest kind of population, giving people the opportunity to work [in their old age]".

In the US, Ronald Lee, emeritus professor of economics at the University of California, says that a growing number of older Americans are having to work to cover their living expenses.

"If we look at the proportion of consumption of 65-year-olds and older in the USA that is funded by continuing to work, it is significantly higher than in other developed countries," he says.

Prof Lee adds that this is not a bad thing. "I think it is fundamental for the whole world, to get over the idea that older people are entitled to an indefinitely long period of leisure at the end of their life.

"People are healthier, vigorous, cognitively sharper, and ready to go on at much older ages than used to be the case. I hope to see retirement ages rising well into the 70's."

Currently, Americans only get a full social security pension from 66 years and two months. But that will gradually rise to 67.

Prof Lee's thoughts may not be very popular with many people, but economically it looks inevitable. As life expectancy increases it becomes increasingly difficult to afford ever longer retirements. Something has to give, and working longer is the obvious solution.

There is, however, another answer to this problem, as Prof Harper makes clear - increased immigration. Yet this is obviously a hot political potato on both sides of the Atlantic.

"Migration could easily solve the problem of lower birth rates from a demographic point of view," she says. "There are political and policy issues, but demographically what we should be doing is allowing those countries with huge child-bearing rates, and with huge numbers of workers for maybe the next four decades, to be able to flow across the world and make up the slack."

We all know there are huge pressures against large-scale immigration, although even populist regimes often turn a blind eye to it when necessary.

Elizabeth Kuiper, associate director of the European Policy Centre think tank, says Hungary is a case in point. Its government claims to have a zero-tolerance attitude to migrants, but "we know that while these countries will not admit it publicly, in sectors like care and health care they have developed unspoken strategies for selective migration".

The problem is, of course, that in most of the developed world immigration is nowhere near the level necessary to make up for an aging population, and yet it is already deeply unpopular.

The demographic experts know something has to give - countries will need to make people work longer, or increase immigration, and probably both. But to do that needs political consensus, and politicians know that asking people to approve additional immigration, and the need to work for more years in later life, is not a vote winner.

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How can countries deal with falling birth rates?

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As the UK and US continue to see falling birth rates, options to deal with the issue are limited.

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Number of people going hungry could fall by 2030, counter to 'apocalyptic' predictions

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Number of people going hungry could fall by 2030, counter to 'apocalyptic' predictions

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Number of people going hungry could fall by 2030, counter to 'apocalyptic' predictions (telegraph.co.uk)

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However, he said their model, and its projections, were still not a good news story, despite the more positive outlook.

"We are still far away from the zero hunger objective," he said, referring to the Sustainable Development Goal to end hunger in all its forms by 2030.

In fact, the model predicts that 715 million people will still be affected by severe food insecurity by 2030, or 28.4 per cent of the world's population.

Around 790 million people, or almost 33 per cent of the world's current population, are currently affected - a leap on last year's numbers thanks to the impact of Covid-19 and lockdowns.

Professor Crespo Cuaresma said that the key finding from the paper, which was published in the journal Global Food Securityand also involved the IIASA and the World Data Lab, was that economic conditions are the key driver of hunger.

As such, tackling the root causes of poverty, GDP per capita and income per capita - for example, with interventions like improving education - could make a huge difference, he said.

The reason the Vienna and Harvard model paints a more positive picture than other reports is chiefly because, after recovering from the Covid-19 shock, the researchers believe that economies will pick. The team also visualised their findings in the "World Hunger Clock" online, showing what the future may hold.

However, the picture remains complex. For example, food insecurity may actually increase in some of the world's poorest countries, largely in sub-Saharan Africa, the model suggests, where 20 per cent of people are hungry in at least one region in every country except Gabon, Djibouti and Equatorial Guinea.

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Number of people going hungry could fall by 2030, counter to 'apocalyptic' predictions

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However, he said their model, and its projections, were still not a good news story, despite the more positive outlook. "We are still far away from the zero hunger objective," he said, referring to the Sustainable Development Goal to end hunger in all its forms by 2030.

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China's ageing population: A demographic crisis is unfolding for Xi

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China's ageing population: A demographic crisis is unfolding for Xi

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Ask 72-year-old farmer Huanchun Cao about his pension and he reacts with a throaty cackle.

He sucks on his home-rolled cigarette, narrows his brow and tilts his head - as if the very question is absurd. "No, no, we don't have a pension," he says looking at his wife of more than 45 years.

Mr Cao belongs to a generation that witnessed the birth of Communist China. Like his country, he has become old before he has become rich. Like many rural and migrant workers, he has no choice but to keep working and to keep earning, as he's fallen through a weak social safety net.

A slowing economy, shrinking government benefits and a decades-long one-child policy have created a creeping demographic crisis in in Xi Jinping's China.

The pension pot is running dry and the country is running out of time to build enough of a fund to care for the growing number of elderly.

Over the next decade, about 300 million people, who are currently aged 50 to 60, are set to leave the Chinese workforce. This is the country's largest age group, nearly equivalent to the size of the US population.

Who will look after them? The answer depends on where you go and who you ask.

Mr Cao and his wife live in the north-eastern province of Liaoning, China's former industrial heartland.

Vast swathes of farmland and mined hills surround the main city of Shenyang. Plumes of smoke from smelting factories fill the skyline, alongside some of the country's best-preserved world heritage sites from the Qing dynasty.

Nearly a quarter of the population here is 65 or older. An increasing number of working-age adults are leaving the heavy industries hub in search of better jobs in bigger cities.

Mr Cao's children have moved away too but they are still close enough to visit often.

"I think I can only keep doing this for another four or five years," Mr Cao says, after he and his wife return from collecting wood. Inside their home, flames crackle beneath a heated platform - called a "kang" - which is their main source of warmth.

The couple make around 20,000 yuan (£2,200; $2,700) a year. But the price for the corn they grow is going down and they cannot afford to get sick.

"In five years, if I'm still physically strong, maybe I can walk by myself. But if I'm feeble and weak, then I might be confined to bed. That's it. Over. I suppose I will become a burden for my children. They will need to look after me."

That is not the future 55-year-old Guohui Tang wants. Her husband had an accident at a construction site and their daughter's university education drained her savings.

So the former digger operator saw an opportunity in elderly care to fund her own old age. She opened a small care home about an hour from Shenyang.

The pigs and geese both honk a welcome at the back of the single-storey house surrounded by farmland. Ms Tang grows crops to feed her six residents. The animals are not pets - they are also dinner.

Ms Tang points to a group of four playing cards as the sun shines through the small conservatory.

"See that 85-year-old man - he doesn't have a pension, he's relying entirely on his son and daughter. His son pays one month, his daughter pays the next month, but they need to live too."

She is worried that she too will have to depend on her only daughter: "Now I will pay my pension every month, even if it means I cannot afford to eat or drink."

For generations, China has relied on filial piety to fill the gaps in elderly care. It was a son or daughter's duty to look after ageing parents.

But there are fewer sons and daughters for ageing parents to rely on - one reason is the "one-child" diktat which prevented couples from having two or more children between 1980 to 2015.

With rapid economic growth, young people have also moved away from their parents, leaving a rising number of seniors to look after themselves or rely on government payments.

But the pension fund could run out of money by 2035, according to the state-run Chinese Academy of Sciences. That was a 2019 estimate, before the pandemic shutdowns, which hit China's economy hard.

China may also be forced to raise the age of retirement, which has been on the cards for years. It has one of the lowest retirement ages in the world - 60 for men, 55 for white-collar women and 50 for working-class women.

But economists say this is just tinkering around the edges if China is to avoid what some fear could become a humanitarian crisis in 25 years.

Meanwhile, more and more elderly have been dipping into their pensions.

"Welcome to my home," beckons 78-year-old Grandma Feng, who only wanted to use her last name.

It's hard to keep up with her as she races along the corridor to warn her husband that guests are on the way to their room at the Sunshine Care Home. The morning exercise class, where she had been giggling and gossiping at the back with her friends, just ended.

The home was built to house more than 1,300 residents. Around 20 young people volunteer to live here for free in return for helping to look after some of the elderly. Private companies partly fund the home, taking the pressure off the local government.

This is an experiment as leaders hunt for solutions for an ageing China. Here in Hangzhou, in southern China, they can afford such experiments.

This is a different world from Liaoning - the shiny new buildings that are rising up host tech companies such as Alibaba and Ant, a magnet for ambitious, young entrepreneurs.

The Fengs have been here for eight years. The nursing home seems friendly and there is plenty to do - from gym and table tennis to singing and drama.

"It is very important to be able to finish the last part of life at a good place," Grandma Feng says. She and her husband have been married for more than 50 years. It was love at first sight, they say.

When their grandson graduated from junior high school, they decided their task was complete.

"There are few people of the same age who think like us," Grandma Feng says. "It seems we care more about enjoying life. Those who don't agree think it's unnecessary to pay a lot of money to live here while they have their own house."

But she says she is more "open-minded": "I thought it through. I just gave my house to my son. All we need now is our pension cards."

The couple's room at the care home costs around 2,000 yuan a month. As former employees of state-owned companies, they both have enough of a pension to cover the cost.

Their pension is far higher than the average in China, around 170 yuan a month in 2020, according to the UN's International Labour Organization.

But even with clients with decent pensions, the Sunshine Care Home is running at a loss. The director says care homes are costly to start and take time to turn a profit.

Beijing has been pressuring private firms to build daycare centres, wards and other age-care infrastructure to shore up gaps left by indebted local governments. But will they continue to invest if profits are far off?

Other East Asian countries such as Japan are also searching for funds to care for large numbers of elderly. But Japan was already wealthy by the time it had one of the world's largest ageing populations.

China, however, is ageing fast without that cushion. So, many older people are forced to make their own way - at an age when they should be planning their retirement.

Fifty-five-year-old Shuishui found a new career in what is being called "the silver-haired economy" - an attempt to harness the buying power of middle-class seniors.

"I think what we can do is try to influence the people around us to be more positive, and to keep on learning. Everybody might have different levels of household income, but whatever circumstances you are in, it's best to try to be positive."

Shuishui knows she is part of a privileged lot in China. But she is determined to hope for the best. The former businesswoman is now a newly-trained model.

On the sunny banks of the Grand Canal in Hangzhou, she and three other women, all over 55, are touching up their make-up and hair.

Each has chosen their own traditional Chinese outfit in red or gold - floor-length silk pattern skirts and short jackets lined with fur to keep out the spring chill. These glamorous grannies are modelling for social media.

They teeter precariously in high heels over the cobbled historic Gongchen bridge while trying to smile and laugh for the camera as a team of social media specialists shout instructions.

This is an image of greying gracefully that Shuishui is keen for the world to see, and she feels she is doing what she can to lift an ailing economy.

But this image belies the reality for millions of elderly in China.

Back in Liaoning, the wood smoke rises from chimneys, signalling lunchtime. Mr Cao is stoking the fire in his kitchen to heat water to cook rice.

"When I reach 80, I hope my children will come back to live with me," he says as he finds a saucepan.

"I'm not joining them in the cities. Their place has no lift and you need to walk up five floors. That's harder than climbing a hill."

For Mr Cao this is simply the way of things. He has to keep working until he cannot.

"Ordinary people like us live like this," he says, pointing to the fields outside which are still covered in frost. Spring will bring back the planting season - and more work for him and his wife.

"If you compare it with life in the city, of course, farmers have a tougher life. How can you make a living if you can't bear the toughness?"

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China's ageing population: A demographic crisis is unfolding for Xi

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The country is running out of time to build enough of a fund to care for its growing number of elderly.

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China to raise retirement age for first time since 1950s

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The plan, which will set in from January, has been on the cards for a few years as China’s population ages.

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Radio 4 Report on Ageing Population impact on State Pension

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Radio 4 Report on Ageing Population impact on State Pension

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Great for impacts of ageing population on state pension

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The Briefing Room - What's the future of the state pension? - What's the future of the state pension? - BBC Sounds

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Catch up on your favourite BBC radio show from your favourite DJ right here, whenever you like. Listen without limits with BBC Sounds.

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China records population decline for second straight year

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China records population decline for second straight year

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China's population has declined for a second consecutive year, underscoring concerns about the future growth of the world's second-largest economy.

Data released on Wednesday showed a population of 1.409 billion by the end of 2023 - a 2.08m decrease from 2022.

The most recent decline is double that of the previous year, which marked the first population drop in 60 years.

But experts say this fall is expected given the country's expanding urban class and record-low birth rate.

China is following the pattern of other countries that have rapidly deindustrialised, experts say, although the pace of change has been quick.

"It's not a surprise. They've got one of the lowest fertility rates in the world so this is just what happens - the population stops growing and starts to decline," said Prof Stuart Gietl-Basten, a population policy expert at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

"It's kind of locked in now... this is just the next year in this new era of population stagnation or decline for China."

Beijing on Wednesday said the birth rate was now down to 6.39 per 1,000 people on par with other advanced East Asian nations such as Japan and South Korea.

The country has seen falling birth rates for decades - after imposing in the 1980s a controversial one child-policy to control over-population at the time.

The government lifted the policy in 2015 to try and stem the population fall, and has brought in a series of other incentives too such as subsidies and payments to encourage people to start families. In 2021, it further relaxed the limit to allow couples to have up to three children.

However, the policies have borne little impact with young people in modern cities citing deterrents like the cost of living and career priorities after a three-year Covid period.

"My husband and I do want to have a kid but we can't afford it for now," said Wang Chengyi, a 31-year-old woman in Beijing.

She told the BBC she and her partner needed to save money for another three years to provide for the costs of having a child - taking into account school expenses in particular.

"I do want to get pregnant while I'm young as it's better for my health. However, I just don't have enough money for now so I have to postpone. It's a shame and I feel panic over it sometimes," she said.

Experts on Wednesday cited the impact of the pandemic in accelerating the decline in new births. However, they suggested that the underlying economic issues were a greater factor.

Chinese internet users also flagged cost pressures on Wednesday.

"If you let people live more easily, with more security, of course there will be more people wanting kids," one user wrote in a top-liked comment on Weibo.

China's economic woes came to the forefront in 2023, with the country battling a widespread property crisis, falling consumer spending and record youth joblessness in the aftermath of the pandemic.

Annual data on Wednesday confirmed the struggles - showing the economy had grown at one of its slowest rates in more than three decades - with GDP expanding at 5.2% to hit 126 trillion yuan ($17.5tn; £13.8tn) in 2023.

This marked the weakest performance since 1990 - excluding the pandemic years - which saw a record-low 3% GDP growth rate in 2022.

The latest population data is likely to reinforce some fears about the economy - with China having long relied on a now ageing workforce as a key driver of its economy.

The country is facing increased pressure on its healthcare and pension systems as its retiree population grows - projected to increase 60% to 400 million by 2035.

But experts say the country has time and resources to manage the transition in its workforce.

"China is no different to other countries that have deindustrialised and moved into the service sector. The population becomes more educated and skilled and healthier, and they want to do other jobs rather than work in factories or construction," said Prof Gietel-Basten.

The government is aware of this and has planned for this over the past decade and so it's expected to continue with this kind of direction."

Once the world's most populous nation, China was overtaken by India last year according to the UN. India's population stands at 1.425bn.

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China records population decline for second straight year

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The decline underscores concerns about the future growth of the world's second-largest economy.

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By Naomi Grimley & Camilla Horrox

The recruitment of nurses by high-income countries from poorer nations is "out of control", according to the head of one of the world's biggest nursing groups.

The comments come as the BBC finds evidence of how Ghana's health system is struggling due to the "brain-drain".

Many specialist nurses have left the West African country for better paid jobs overseas.

In 2022 more than 1,200 Ghanaian nurses joined the UK's nursing register.

This comes as the National Health Service (NHS) increasingly relies on staff from non-EU countries to fill vacancies.

Although the UK says active recruitment in Ghana is not allowed, social media means nurses can easily see the vacancies available in NHS trusts. They can then apply for those jobs directly. Ghana's dire economic situation acts as a big push factor.

Howard Catton from the International Council of Nurses (ICN) is concerned about the scale of the numbers leaving countries like Ghana.

"My sense is that the situation currently is out of control," he told the BBC.

"We have intense recruitment taking place mainly driven by six or seven high-income countries but with recruitment from countries which are some of the weakest and most vulnerable which can ill-afford to lose their nurses."

The head of nursing at Greater Accra Regional Hospital, Gifty Aryee, told the BBC her Intensive Care Unit alone had lost 20 nurses to the UK and US in the last six months - with grave implications.

"Care is affected as we are not able to take any more patients. There are delays and it costs more in mortality - patients die," she said.

She added that seriously ill patients often had to be held for longer in the emergency department due to the nursing shortages.

One nurse in the hospital estimated that half of those she had graduated with had left the country - and she wanted to join them.

'All our experienced nurses gone'

The BBC found a similar situation at Cape Coast Municipal Hospital.

The hospital's deputy head of nursing services, Caroline Agbodza, said she had seen 22 nurses leave for the UK in the last year.

"All our critical care nurses, our experienced nurses, have gone. So we end up having nothing - no experienced staff to work with. Even if the government recruits, we have to go through the pain of training nurses again."

Smaller clinics are also affected by staff migration because even one nurse leaving a small health centre can have a large knock-on effect.

At Ewim Health Clinic in Cape Coast, one nurse has left their small emergency department and another has left the outpatients unit. Both nurses were experienced and had found jobs in the UK.

The chief doctor there, Dr Justice Arthur, said the effects were enormous.

"Let's take services like immunisation of children. If we lose public health nurses, then the babies that have to be immunised will not get their immunisation and we are going to have babies die," he told the BBC.

He said adult patients would also die if there were not enough nurses to look after them after surgery.

Most of the nurses that the BBC team spoke to wanted to leave Ghana due to the fact they could earn more elsewhere.

At Kwaso healthcare centre near the city of Kumasi, Mercy Asare Afriyie explained that she was hoping to find a job in the UK soon.

"The exodus of nurses is not going to stop because of our poor conditions of service. Our salary is nothing to write home about and in two weeks you spend it. It's from hand to mouth."

Ghanaian nurses told the BBC that in the UK they could more than seven times what they are receiving in Ghana.

Perpetual Ofori-Ampofo from Ghana's Nurses and Midwives Association said her country's healthcare system needed more help.

"If you look at the numbers, then it is not ethical for the UK to recruit from Ghana because the numbers of professional nurses compared to trainee or auxiliary nurses is a problem for us," she said.

But she added that it was not possible to stop nurses from leaving as migration was a right and that the Ghanaian government needed to do more to persuade them to stay. The health ministry in the capital, Accra, declined to comment.

Ghana is on the World Health Organization's list of 55 vulnerable countries, which have low numbers of nurses per head of population. The list - dubbed by some as the "red list" - is designed to discourage systematic recruitment in these countries.

The UK government recently gave £15m ($18.6m) to Ghana, Nigeria and Kenya to help boost their healthcare workforces.

But the country is known to be looking at brokering a formal deal with Ghana whereby it might be able to recruit more proactively in return for giving the government there a sum of money per nurse.

It already has a similar agreement with Nepal.

But the ICN's Mr Catton questioned whether it was enough.

He told the BBC that he believed such deals were "trying to create a veneer of ethical respectability rather than a proper reflection of the true costs to the countries which are losing their nurses".

The WHO's Director of Health Workforce, Jim Campbell, explained to the BBC that Brexit had been a factor in the UK turning to African countries for nurses to fill NHS vacancies.

"The labour market is extremely competitive around the world and, having closed off the potential labour market from European freedom of movement, what we're seeing is the consequences of that in terms of attracting people from the Commonwealth and other jurisdictions."

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Ghana patients in danger as nurses head for NHS in UK - medics

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By Naomi Grimley & Camilla Horrox The recruitment of nurses by high-income countries from poorer nations is "out of control", according to the head of one of the world's biggest nursing groups. The comments come as the BBC finds evidence of how Ghana's health system is struggling due to the "brain-drain".

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https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-65047436
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-64825197

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Madeline Halpert & James FitzGeraldBBC News

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Immigration fuels Canada’s largest population growth of over 1 million

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The unprecedented surge in numbers is largely due to immigration, the government says.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crc6Zsm-y1U

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Changing the discourse on environmental migration | Natalie Haas | TEDxIxelles

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Japan's government is offering 1m yen ($7,500) per child to families who move out of greater Tokyo, in an attempt to reverse population decline in the regions.

The incentive - a dramatic rise from the previous relocation fee of 300,000 yen - will be introduced in April, according to Japanese media reports, as part of an official push to breathe life into declining towns and villages.

Although Tokyo's population fell for the first time last year- a trend partly attributed to the coronavirus pandemic - policymakers believe more should be done to lower the city's population density and encourage people to start new lives in "unfashionable" parts of the country that have been hit by ageing, shrinking populations and the migration of younger people to Tokyo, Osaka and other big cities.

The payment - which comes on top of up to 3m yen already available in financial support - will be offered to families living in the 23 "core" wards of Tokyo, other parts of the metropolitan area and the neighbouring commuter-belt prefectures of Saitama, Chiba and Kanagawa.

To receive the benefits, families must move outside the greater Tokyo area, although some could receive the cash if they relocate to mountainous areas that lie within the city's boundaries, the Kyodo news agency said, quoting officials.

About 1,300 municipalities - roughly 80% of the total - have joined the scheme, hoping to capitalise in a shift in public attitudes towards quality of life that gained momentum during the pandemic, when more workers discovered the benefits of working remotely.

Families hoping to secure an easy payday before returning to the capital will be disappointed, however. They must live in their new homes for at least five years and one member of the household must be in work or plan to open a new business. Those who move out before five years have passed will have to return the cash.

Officials hope the generous sums on offer will encourage families with children aged up to 18 to revitalise regions and ease pressure on space and public services in greater Tokyo, the world's biggest metropolis with a population of about 35 million.

In principle, relocating families receive 1m-3m yen per household provided they meet one of three criteria: employment at a small or midsize company in the area they move to; continuing in their old jobs via remote working; or starting a business in their new home, according to the Nikkei business newspaper. After the higher payments are factored in, a family with two children could be eligible for up to 5m yen.

Half of the cash will come from the central government, and the other half from local municipalities, Kyodo said.

The scheme has struggled to capture the public imagination since it was launched three years go, with support provided to 1,184 families in 2021 - the year teleworking became more common - compared with 71 in 2019 and 290 in 2020, the Nikkei said.

The government is hoping 10,000 people will have moved from Tokyo to rural areas by 2027, it added.

To attract new residents, Japan's hollowed-out towns and villages have highlighted the charms of rural life, easy access to undersubscribed childcare and, in the case of Otari village in Nagano prefecture, the availability of eligible men.

The latest attempt to reinvigorate the regions comes amid yet another drop in Japan 's population.

The population of the world's third-biggest economy suffered a record fall of 644,000 in 2020-21, according to government data. It is expected to plummet from its current 125 million to an estimated 88 million in 2065 - a 30% decline in 45 years.

While the number of over-65s continues to grow, the birthrate remains stubbornly low at 1.3 children- well below the 2.1 needed to sustain the current population size.

In 2021, the number of births totalled 811,604, the lowest since records were first kept in 1899. By contrast, the number of centenarians stands at more than 90,500 - compared with only 153 in 1963.

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Japanese government offers families 1m yen a child to leave Tokyo

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Japan's government is offering 1m yen ($7,500) per child to families who move out of greater Tokyo, in an attempt to reverse population decline in the regions. The incentive - a dramatic rise from the previous relocation fee of 300,000 yen - will be introduced in April, according to Japanese media reports, as part of an official push to breathe life into declining towns and villages.

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What Tanzania tells us about Africa’s population explosion as the world hits 8bn people

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What Tanzania tells us about Africa’s population explosion as the world hits 8bn people

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What Tanzania tells us about Africa’s population explosion as the world hits 8bn people | Global development | The Guardian

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What Tanzania tells us about Africa’s population explosion as the world hits 8bn people

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Dar es Salaam, which is heading for megacity status, typifies a region growing three times faster than the global average

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China to clamp down on abortions for ‘non-medical purposes’

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China to clamp down on abortions for ‘non-medical purposes’

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China to clamp down on abortions for ‘non-medical purposes’ | China | The Guardian

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China to clamp down on abortions for ‘non-medical purposes’

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Policy uses women as tool for economic goals and could endanger their lives, says rights group

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Ageing Population UK and impacts on state pension

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Ageing Population UK and impacts on state pension

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The retirement age will have to rise to 71 for middle-aged workers across the UK, according to research into the impact of growing life expectancy and falling birthrates on the state pension.

The UK pension age of 66 is set to rise to 67 between May 2026 and March 2028. From 2044, it is expected to rise to 68.

But the research suggests that this is not enough, and that anyone born after April 1970 may have to work until they are 71 before claiming their pension.

This age limit may need to be set even higher, say experts, thanks to the high rate of workers exiting the workforce before they reach state pension age, predominantly due to preventable ill health.

Les Mayhew, associate head of global research at the International Longevity Centre and author of the report State Pension Age and Demographic Change, said: "In the UK, state pension age would need to be 70 or 71 compared with 66 now, to maintain the status quo of the number of workers per state pensioner.

"But if you bring preventable ill health into the equation, that would have to increase even more," added Mayhew, who is also professor of statistics at Bayes Business School and has advised the government on rises to the state pension age multiple times as a senior civil servant and in his current roles.

By age 70, only 50% of adults in England and Wales are now disability-free and able to work. A smaller working population and a large economically inactive population reduces the tax base to pay for pensions - and creates huge labour shortages, which creates its own problems.

According to the Office for Budget Responsibility, pensioner benefits will cost the UK government £136bn in 2023-24, of which £124bn will be spent on state pensions.

Jonathan Cribb, associate director and head of retirement at the Institute for Fiscal Studies, said that while he did not disagree with a higher pension age, increasing it without addressing other cost-saving measures was not "realistic or equitable".

He added: "It would disproportionately impact poorer individuals whose ill-health means they have shorter lives, and so who receive pensions for less time."

While the ILC's solution is "illustrative of the kind of pressure that an ageing population puts on the public finance", a rise in the retirement age to 71 was not a "realistic policy option unless you have a real emergency", he added.

Cribb pointed out that while state pensions and pension benefits are estimated to increase by £45bn by 2050, the pressure on public finance from health and social care is estimated to increase by £105bn in today's terms over the same period. "The real issue is actually around the NHS and social care," he said.

The Intergenerational Foundation, an independent thinktank, agreed that the pension age had to rise, but questioned on whose shoulders that cost should fall.

Younger people, their research has found, do not have the financial assets that their parents and grandparents did. In 2010, those under 40 held £7.53 of every £100 of wealth. By 2020, that had fallen to £3.98. One-third of the UK's 14 million Gen-Xers are at high risk of retiring on insufficient income.

Angus Hanton, co-founder of the thinktank, said pension age should be based on life expectancy and occupation. He also supports a wealth tax to fund and pay more towards people's retirement, and reducing income tax and national insurance.

"The over-60s should finance their own extra retirement years since they have received such generous treatment from the state," he said. "The money raised can be used to invest in improving the health and prospects of younger generations so they are less of an economic burden as they age."

Andrew Scott, co-author of the 100-Year Life, whose new book, The Longevity Imperative, will be published shortly, said there needs to be a greater focus on preventing ill health not just in old age but from early age through adulthood.

"Increasing the state pension age would be a terrible policy - a really bad way of attempting to make people more productive," he said.

David Finch, assistant director at the Health Foundation, said increasing the state pension age without providing support for workers with health issues would worsen the situation by exacerbating existing health inequalities. "The government should provide more support for people already out of work due to health issues," he said. "Employers can help by adapting roles and maintaining contact with employees on sick leave."

The government said it would ensure that the state pension remained "a sustainable and fair foundation of income for future generations".

A spokesperson said: "We have committed £70m in employment and skills support for the over-50s, which has seen an extra 54,000 over-50s added to company payrolls. Our £2.5bn Back to Work plan is supporting people to stay fit and find work, in addition to £14.1bn to improve health services to help people live longer, healthier lives."

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UK state pension age will soon need to rise to 71, say experts

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Research on life expectancy and birth rates shows that ill health makes status quo unsustainable

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State Pension-Good for ageing population

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State Pension-Good for ageing population

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The Briefing Room - What's the future of the state pension? - What's the future of the state pension? - BBC Sounds

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Catch up on your favourite BBC radio show from your favourite DJ right here, whenever you like. Listen without limits with BBC Sounds.

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Adama and Moussa Sarr had lost track of the exact number of days they had been at sea.

The brothers were drifting somewhere off the coast of West Africa, in a traditional Senegalese fishing canoe known as a pirogue. They were two of 39 passengers in total - all malnourished, many close to death.

When a fishing vessel appeared in the distance one day, Adama, 21, was so weak he could only stare, he said. Moussa, 17, slipped into the water to swim.

He would almost certainly have drowned, had the fishing crew not spotted him in the water and plucked him to safety.

When they drew alongside the pirogue, they found Adama and the rest of the survivors and seven bodies. The pirogue had set out from Senegal five weeks earlier, with 101 souls on board.

The survivors had drifted hundreds of miles on one of the most dangerous migrant routes in the world - the North Atlantic sea passage from Senegal to the Canary Islands, a Spanish archipelago about 1,000 miles away by sea.

They had left on 10 July, from the coastal village of Fass Boye. Adama and Moussa came from a long line of fishermen in the village. The boys learned to fish together and worked a pirogue together.

But like many young people in Senegal, they felt the pull of Europe. "Everyone wants to go on the boats," Adama said. "It's the thing you're supposed to do."

He was sitting in the shaded courtyard of a family home, safely back in Senegal but noticeably thinner than before. The journey had begun at dusk, he said. He and Moussa, along with two cousins, Pape and Amsoutou, aged 40 and 20, joined the pirogue a little way off the coast as it set off into the night.

Unlike the Mediterranean, there are no patrols on the North Atlantic route - no-one proactively searching for lost or distressed boats. It is easy to founder without being seen. If you miss the Canaries, or Cape Verde, you can drift into the Atlantic and disappear.

For the first three days, Adama and Moussa's pirogue, powered by an outboard motor, battled against strong headwinds. But on the fourth day, the wind died down and the boat began to progress, Adama said. The passengers believed they had only a few more days at sea.

When the sixth day passed with no sight of land, an argument erupted over whether to push on or turn back.

"The captain ruled that we should push on, because we had enough food and water and the wind was quiet," Adama said.

The passengers grew confident again and began to eat lots of food, he said, and they used drinking water to wash their hands for prayers.

It was around day six that the food and water began to run out. There were four children on board, and some older people gave the last of their food to the young. Some hoarded even after people began to die.

Adama couldn't remember the exact date of the first death, but it was shortly after the first week passed, he said - a fishing captain, used to being on the water but not young. It was six more days until the next person died. Then the deaths came every day.

"At first, we said a prayer for each dead person and laid their body onto the ocean," Adama said. "Then later we just threw the bodies into the water because we didn't even have the energy to pray. We just needed to get rid of the corpses."

Back in Fass Boye, news was spreading through the village that the boat had not arrived. "We all knew it should be five or six days by boat to Spain," Adama's mother, Sokhna, said. "When a week had passed with no news I stopped eating. I became sick from stress."

Nearly everyone on the pirogue was from Fass Boye or nearby, and everyone in the village seemed to know someone aboard. The families began to do anything they could, alerting local authorities and migration NGOs. The founder of one NGO even tweeted a warning that the boat was missing, two weeks after its departure, but the warning went unheeded and the boat drifted for three more weeks.

On the pirogue, the four men from the family stuck together, but they were growing weaker and weaker. The eldest cousin, Pape, died first, Adama said. "Before he passed, he said, 'If death must happen, I wish that I die and you three survive'."

Then Adama's younger cousin, Amsoutou, disappeared. One morning they woke up and Amsoutou was simply gone.

Adama and Moussa hung on, sipping seawater and baking under the sun. Each night they looked for lights from the Canary Islands but the lights never appeared.

Nobody in Fass Boye seemed to blame the migrants for taking the risk. More than a third of the country lives in poverty, according to the World Bank. The young see few opportunities at home. "Macky Sall sold the ocean," said Assane Niang, a 23-year-old fishing captain, referring to the Senegalese president. Fishermen in Fass Boye say the government has granted too many licences to foreign trawlers, which overfish their waters and deplete the catch.

Niang was sitting on the beach in the shade of a pirogue, knitting generator covers he can sell to help make ends meet. "If we had other alternatives we would stay, but we cannot sit here and do nothing," he said. "We are trying to support our families."

There is social pressure on the young to try to leave on the boats, and there can be stigma attached to those who fail or never try.

So much so that the sea route to Spain has earned its own grim slang in Senegal's Wolof language: "Barcelona or death."

The wooden pirogues the smugglers use are not suitable for the voyage. They are often poorly constructed. They lack navigation technology and are liable to run out of petrol and be pushed off course. And yet the number of migrants using the route to reach Spain has been rising every year.

According to the International Organisation for Migration, about 68,000 people have successfully reached the Canary Islands by boat from West Africa since January 2020 and about 2,700 have been recorded dead or disappeared. But the number of casualties is likely significantly higher, because fatal accidents are more likely to go unrecorded on this route.

"We call them invisible shipwrecks," said Safa Msehli, a spokeswoman for the IOM. "A boat washes ashore with nobody aboard, or a body washes ashore not linked to a known capsized boat."

Part of the problem was that people leaving Fass Boye, particularly fishermen, were too confident in their chances, said Abdou Karim, a lifelong fisherman and the father of Pape Sarr, who died on the boat.

"The fisherman think that, if they get into trouble, they will be able to swim," he said. "But there is a limit. You cannot swim forever. The ocean will not hold you."

And yet, young fishermen in Fass Boye said they were still willing to take the risk.

"I am thinking about going on a boat right now," said Niang, the fisherman on the beach. "The tragedies will not stop us from trying."

About a month into Adama and Moussa's voyage, a large ship appeared on the horizon and more than 20 people decided to to take their chances in the water, Adama said. But he knew it was too far.

Many of the remaining survivors were barely able to move, he said. Then on 14 August, exactly five weeks after they had departed, they caught sight of the Spanish fishing boat that would rescue them.

The Spanish crew helped them aboard and put the seven bodies into plastic sheets. Adama and Moussa lay together on the deck of the fishing vessel.

They had survived the pirogue. But Moussa was too weak. He was the last of the 63 people who died on the voyage.

"He died right there on the deck," Adama said. "In front of my eyes."

The survivors were taken to Cape Verde and spent six days receiving medical treatment, before the majority were flown back to Dakar. Those who could walk were given prescriptions and sent back to Fass Boye.

When news had broken of the number of deaths, there was a brief spasm of violent protest in the village that brought the police to town. Some relatives were arrested, including a member of Adama and Moussa's family.

The survivors were harassed in their homes by curious residents and relatives of the dead, families said. So one day after they arrived home, they were all sent back out of Fass Boye to recuperate elsewhere. Adama and his mother Sokhna went to stay with close relatives nearby. They were spending their days resting, praying, and avoiding asking Adama about his ordeal.

The family had lost three sons and got one back. Fass Boye had seen 101 set out on the water and 37 come home.

"It changes a place," said Abdou Karim, Pape's father, silently counting prayer beads in one hand.

"Even one soul is a lot," he said. "And this is more than 60. It is a lot for one place."

Additional reporting by Sira Thierij. Mady Camara contributed to this report. Photographs by Joel Gunter.

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Four sons set out on a perilous migration route. Only one came home

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A survivor tells the story of a five-week ordeal on the North Atlantic passage to Europe.

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Principles of population ecology and their application to human populations

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Principles of population ecology and their application to human populations

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The infamous overpopulation bet: Simon vs. Ehrlich Video

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The infamous overpopulation bet: Simon vs. Ehrlich Video

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Soraya Field Fiorio: The infamous overpopulation bet: Simon vs. Ehrlich | TED Talk

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The infamous overpopulation bet: Simon vs. Ehrlich

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In 1980, Paul Ehrlich and Julian Simon bet $1,000 on a question with stakes that couldn’t be higher: would the earth run out of resources to sustain a growing human population? They bet $200 on the price of five metals. If the price of a metal decreased or held steady over the next decade, Simon won. If the price increased, Ehrlich won. So, what happened? Soraya Field Fiorio investigates. [Directed by Avi Ofer, narrated by Alexandra Panzer, music by Salil Bhayani and cAMP Studio].

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Dying too young: Maps show little has changed in 170 years

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Dying too young: Maps show little has changed in 170 years

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Dying too young: Maps show little has changed in 170 years - BBC News

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Christine JeavansData journalist, BBC News

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Dying too young: Maps show little has changed in 170 years

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Why do areas with high Covid death rates match places with the worst health in Victorian times?

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Difference Between Malthus and Boserup Theory

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Difference Between Malthus and Boserup Theory

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Malthus and Boserup had opposing views on the relationship between population expansion and food supply.

What is Malthus?

Reverend Malthus predicted in 1798 that the rate of global population growth would inevitably result in a population larger than could be fed, because the number of people was growing faster than the world's ability to produce food, and there would eventually be too many people for the available food. He predicted a disaster including hunger and conflict, after which the population would rebound to a level that could be sustained by the food available.

What is Boserup?

Ester Boserup coined the phrase "necessity is the mother of invention" in the 1960s. She believed that no matter how large the world's population increased, people would always be able to produce enough food to suit their requirements. She prophesied that when the world's food supply became depleted, people would respond with technical advancements that would improve food production. There would also be a population-wide effort to cut food consumption, which would 'buy' time for a solution to be devised.

Neither idea has been proven completely correct or incorrect. Famines have occurred in some locations, but overall, the production of food has maintained pace with population expansion.

Difference between Malthus and Boserup Theory: Comparison Chart

Summary

The Malthusian theory is named after Thomas Malthus, who proposed that the world population is growing exponentially while global resource production and extraction are only expanding arithmetically. As a result, he believes that there will come a day when the Earth's resources will no longer be able to feed the ever-increasing population.

Boserup's point of view is opposed. She thinks that the population is a resource in and of itself. Humans have the ability and knowledge to address resource scarcity by developing innovative methods of resource extraction and production. New methods of food production, such as fertilisers, food technology, genetically modified crops, and new techniques for finding oil reserves, all support this viewpoint. The Earth's carrying capacity is increased as a result of this (even though points of crisis may be encountered on the way).

Problems The Malthusian Hypothesis Theorem of Boserup Malthus thinks that the human population is a 'closed system.' Bosrup thinks that the human population is a 'closed system.' Food resources are not distributed in a fair and equal manner. Only the poorest people are truly hungry. Human actions have resulted in the desertification of vast swaths of land in some cases. Malthus could not have imagined the incredible technological advancements that have occurred since his time. Food shortages in LEDCs lead to emigration rather than innovation. The availability of food resources has not risen 'arithmetically.' MEDCs are the source of innovation, which isn't usually shared with LEDCs. The internationalisation of food supplies was not predicted by Malthus. Both views may be correct but in different ways. Boserup was talking about cultural and technical difficulties, whereas Malthus was referring to environmental restrictions.

FAQs

What is the basic differencebetween the Malthus and the boserup views on the relationship between population growth and resources?

The quantity and expansion of the population, according to Malthusian theory, are determined by food availability and agricultural systems. Agricultural practises, according to Boserup's idea, are dependent on population growth. When there isn't enough food for everyone, according to Malthus, the excess population will perish. The Malthusian theory is named after Thomas Malthus, who proposed that the world population is growing exponentially while global resource production and extraction are only expanding arithmetically. As a result, he believes that there will come a day when the Earth's resources will no longer be able to feed the ever-increasing population.

Boserup's point of view is opposed. She thinks that the population is a resource in and of itself. Humans have the ability and knowledge to overcome resource scarcity by developing innovative methods of resource extraction and production. New methods of food production, such as fertilisers, food technology, genetically modified crops, and new techniques for finding oil reserves, all support this viewpoint. The Earth's capacity factor is increased as a result of this (even though points of crisis may be encountered on the way).

What is boseruptheory of population?

Esther Boserup (1920-1999) was a Danish economist who lived from 1920 to 1999. He felt that population growth occurs in a different (and quicker) manner than food production. He prophesied that when the population outnumbers the food supply, famine, conflict, and illness will inevitably result. This results in a sharp drop in population.

According to Boserup, population increase is the cause, not the effect, of agricultural change, and the most significant shift is the intensification of land usage. According to Boserup, population expansion is independent of food availability, and population growth is a cause of agricultural changes. The interrelationships between population change and economic development, as well as between population increase and food supply, have been extensively studied. However, there has been little discussion of the impact of population growth on agriculture-on land use, technology, and land tenure-and it has been assumed for the most part that the consequences are negative, leading to overpopulation: farm subdivision and fragmentation, falling real wages, landlessness and underemployment, soil erosion, and overgrazing.

What did boserup believe about population and resources?

Esther Boserup (1920-1999) was a Danish economist who lived from 1920 to 1999. He felt that population growth occurs in a different (and quicker) manner than food production. He prophesied that when the population outnumbers the food supply, famine, conflict, and illness will inevitably result. This results in a sharp drop in population. The Boserupian hypothesis, which appeared in 1965, proposed an alternative rationale. This hypothesis was founded on the premise that population increase benefits people because it encourages them to come up with innovative ways to get more food when resources run out.

The planet's natural resources are being depleted at an alarming rate by the world's rapidly rising population. According to the Global Footprint Network, the world presently requires 1.6 Earths to meet the demand for natural resources, and this number might climb to 2 planets by 2030. Advanced nations (ACs) have the greatest levels of resource use, and if everyone on the earth lived like Americans, five planets would be required. Even though many established nations are starting to cut their consumption, emerging and developing countries (EDCs) continue to industrialize and consume more.

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Difference Between Malthus and Boserup Theory

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Difference Between Malthus and Boserup Theory Malthus and Boserup had opposing views on the relationship between population expansion and food supply. What is Malthus?

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The concept of hazard in a geographical context

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The concept of hazard in a geographical context

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Libya floods: The flawed response that increased Derna death toll

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Libya floods: The flawed response that increased Derna death toll

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Abdiraheem Saeed, Nader Ibrahim and Yassmin MahmoudBBC News Arabic

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Libya floods: The flawed response that increased Derna death toll

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The authorities made serious errors both before and after last month’s tragedy in Derna, the BBC is told.

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Turkey earthquake is country's worst disaster in 84 years

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Turkey earthquake is country's worst disaster in 84 years

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https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-64533851

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Huge quake toppled buildings in Turkey and Syria as people slept

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More than 280 deaths are confirmed in Turkey and more than 230 in neighbouring Syria.

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We may never be able to predict earthquakes - but we can already know enough to be prepared

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We may never be able to predict earthquakes - but we can already know enough to be prepared

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We may never be able to predict earthquakes – but we can already know enough to be prepared (theconversation.com)

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Yesterday's earthquake in eastern Victoria shook the ground for hundreds of kilometres around and damaged buildings as far away as Melbourne - and took many people by surprise.

While Australia doesn't compare with seismic hotspots like New Zealand and Japan, relatively small quakes are expected, with Geoscience Australia's quake tracker listing more than a dozen in the past week alone.

Read more: Melbourne earthquake: what exactly happened, and what's the best way to stay safe from aftershocks?

Even though earthquakes happen all the time, we still can't predict when the next one will strike, or where, or how big it will be. Unfortunately, we may never be able to make that kind of prediction.

But we can estimate the likelihood of future quakes - and often, that's enough to make sure our cities are prepared to cope with them.

Why we can't predict earthquakes

Earthquakes are caused by sudden slips or ruptures in the rock beneath our feet, driven by the movement of the enormous tectonic plates that make up the Earth's crust.

The exact timing and location of one of these slips are impossible for us to know in advance. Nobody has ever found a reliable and repeatable indicator that a quake is about to happen. We would need a highly detailed model of all the rock everywhere inside the Earth and an understanding of how it responds to tectonic stress to even stand a chance of predicting an earthquake.

However, suppose we understand the large forces driving the tectonic plates and the current level of earthquake activity, and we also study where faults have ruptured in the past. In that case, we can estimate the likelihood that different types of earthquakes might occur in the future.

What we can predict

To calculate the probability of future earthquakes, we look at the seismic activity measured since the development of seismometers about 100 years ago and knowledge of earlier earthquakes from the historical record, and combine these with information about the faults in the Earth's crust where quakes can occur.

Australia has relatively little seismic activity, but we know there are hundreds of small faults beneath the Australian landmass. These are places where pressure created by the movement of tectonic plates can cause fault rupture or "slip", which we experience as earthquakes that generate seismic waves and ground shaking.

When we discover a fault, from studying earthquakes or looking at aerial imagery, we often send out teams of geologists to dig trenches across the fault to find traces of past, often prehistoric, earthquake rupture. Depending on the type of signature past earthquakes have left in the soil profile, we can estimate the age and extent of fault movement and develop a history of earthquake activity extending hundreds or often thousands of years into the past.

Identifying prehistoric events is important because the time between large earthquakes on major faults may be longer than the instrumental or even historical record. Without knowledge of prehistoric events, we would have to rely exclusively on the relatively short history of instrumentally recorded earthquakes.

This may cause us to miss the big earthquakes that happen very rarely. We know that longer faults, for example, can usually produce bigger quakes - so if even if we haven't seen a big quake at a long fault, we know it may be possible in future.

Read more: The earthquake that rattled Melbourne was among Australia's biggest in half a century, but rock records reveal far mightier ones

By combining knowledge of the large earthquake history of nearby faults, and the level of activity of random, smaller earthquakes that may not rupture major faults but occur often enough to be estimated from the instrumental record, we can make a computer model of the likelihood of earthquake occurrence.

For this earthquake occurrence model to be helpful in estimating hazard, we also need to calculate the strength of ground motion generated by each earthquake. This depends strongly on the depth, location, and size of each earthquake.

The ground motion also depends on the properties of rock in the Earth's crust through which the seismic waves pass, with some rocks absorbing more energy than others. It also depends on the local geology and soil profile near the site of interest, with softer soil leading to stronger ground motion.

Mapping hazards

At Geoscience Australia, we have mapped some of these probabilities in the National Seismic Hazard Assessment. For everywhere in Australia, this map shows the ground motions that may be exceeded over the next 50 years, at certain levels of probability.

This ground motion, usually expressed in terms of a fraction of the acceleration of gravity at the Earth's surface, is what we call the seismic hazard. Its potential to damage things we value - buildings, for example, or human lives, is what we call "risk".

From the "risk" point of view, we may not necessarily care if the hazard is high in a place where there are no people, for example, but we may be very concerned if the hazard is high in a big city.

Yesterday's earthquake is a good example of this: a magnitude 5.9 earthquake in country Victoria is an exciting novelty for most, but the same earthquake occurring in Melbourne would cause huge problems.

Building codes use hazard maps like this to specify how much shaking buildings in an area need to withstand to keep the risk at an acceptable level. Engineers then make sure their buildings are constructed so they won't fall when they experience the level of ground shaking forecast in the hazard map.

Read more: Earthquakes don't kill people; buildings do. And those lovely decorative bits are the first to fall

However, until the 1989 Newcastle earthquake, no one realised the Australian building code needed to account for earthquake hazard. Many buildings built before this may be vulnerable even to the level of ground shaking forecast by the hazard map.

An earthquake of magnitude 5.9, if it occurs as far from Melbourne as yesterday's earthquake did, shouldn't cause significant damage to buildings that follow the current building code. The fact that it did likely means some buildings are built to a lower standard, and indeed we can see from news photos that many of the damaged buildings look like they were built before 1989.

Insurance companies also use hazard maps to determine the likelihood of damaging earthquakes and set their premiums accordingly.

So, while we can't tell you where the next earthquake will strike or how big it will be, we can quantify the likelihood of ground motion intensity at the location of interest to make sure we're all ready for it.

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We may never be able to predict earthquakes - but we can already know enough to be prepared

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Yesterday's earthquake in eastern Victoria shook the ground for hundreds of kilometres around and damaged buildings as far away as Melbourne - and took many people by surprise. While Australia doesn't compare with seismic hotspots like New Zealand and Japan, relatively small quakes are expected, with Geoscience Australia's quake tracker listing more than a dozen in the past week alone.

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“Haiti is amazingly resilient, but it’s hard to be positive about recovery”—an earthquake adds to woes | The Economist

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A PRESIDENT'S ASSASSINATION, a cratered economy and now this: a tropical depression that will hamper rescue efforts after a massive earthquake. Haiti cannot catch a break. India and Pakistan parted ways 74 years ago this week; we discuss how the tensions that defined their division still resonate today. And why Indonesia is so good at badminton. Runtime: 20 min

For full access to print, digital and audio editions of The Economist, subscribe here www.economist.com/intelligenceoffer

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"Haiti is amazingly resilient, but it's hard to be positive about recovery"-an earthquake adds to woes

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
A PRESIDENT'S ASSASSINATION, a cratered economy and now this: a tropical depression that will hamper rescue efforts after a massive earthquake. Haiti cannot catch a break. India and Pakistan parted ways 74 years ago this week; we discuss how the tensions that defined their division still resonate today.

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Earthquake expert who advised the Haiti government in 2010: ‘Why were clear early warning signs missed?’

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Earthquake expert who advised the Haiti government in 2010: ‘Why were clear early warning signs missed?’

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Earthquake expert who advised the Haiti government in 2010: 'Why were clear early warning signs missed?' (theconversation.com)

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Luigi Di Sarno was part of a team of specialist advisers brought in to help the government of Haiti prepare for future earthquakes after 200,000 people were killed in 2010. Over a decade later, very few of their recommendations had been adopted.
It was about 8.30am, local time, on August 14 2021 when I felt the room starting to shake. I was lying in my bed on the top (21st) floor of a hotel in the Dominican Republic, to the eastern side of Haiti. The picture frames were swinging and I could see that the flat screen TV in front of the bed was also rocking from side to side.

It took me a few seconds to realise that the tremors the building was experiencing were caused by an earthquake - and I am a structural earthquake engineer, with nearly two decades of experience in academic teaching and research, plus professional consultancies for international firms and governmental agencies. But I suppose that goes to show what a shock a situation like that is to the human mind. It can be hard to believe it's happening, and can take a moment to process.

It was Saturday and, being the first day of a bank holiday weekend, I thought that I could take some extra rest to relax. I was in Santo Domingo discussing the ageing bridges and vulnerability of historical buildings in the Ciudad Colonial UNESCO's World Heritage Site. It had been a hectic week of meetings about structural engineering and earthquake risk mitigation.

When I first noticed the movement of the picture frames, I initially thought it was caused by a strong wind passing through the joints of the large sea-view windows. This had happened to me in the past, from high wind speeds caused by tropical storms. But this was not the case on that Saturday morning.

My instinctive reaction was to jump from the bed. By standing on the floor, I started to experience a sense of swaying. I was now sure that an earthquake had struck. To quickly double-check this, I filled a glass which was on my desk with water, and observed the liquid sloshing: clear evidence of the building shaking.

This story is part of Conversation Insights
The Insights team generates long-form journalism and is working with academics from different backgrounds who have been engaged in projects to tackle societal and scientific challenges.

I decided to leave my room when I started to feel the floor vibrating. Approaching the corridor, I could not see any warning signs or evacuation routes, and I was surprised that all the lights were on and that the glass lift was fully functioning. Generally, when an earthquake happens, the power goes off. Following basic rules of earthquake engineering, I stopped close to a large column in the corridor and waited a few minutes until the shaking stopped.

I now had two options: either use the lift or walk down the stairs. I knew that the lift generally takes a few seconds to bring you to the lobby, from the 21st floor. I imagined it could take a few minutes to reach the ground floor using the stairs. So I thought the faster, the better and decided to risk a trip down in the lift. This was also based on the assumption that you never experience two large magnitude events or quakes that are very close to each other. There is an extremely low probability that a large magnitude main-shock is followed by aftershocks of the same magnitude.

When I arrived in the lobby, I checked the internet on my mobile to find out if there was any news about earthquakes in the region. I was amazed to read from the United States Geological Survey ( USGS) that a 7.2 magnitude earthquake had occurred. It was localised in the south-west of Haiti, near the city of Les Cayes, about 200km (125 miles) from where I was staying.

Yet in the hotel reception, everything seemed normal. Tourists were checking in and out without a care in the world. I asked the receptionist if she had felt the strong earthquake, using my basic Spanish: " terremoto" (earthquake). She responded calmly: " Oh, terremoto ... no ... más probable era pequeño " (Oh, earthquake ... no ... most probably it was a small one). Initially, I felt a bit stupid, as it seemed that people in the Dominican Republic were well attuned to earthquake risks, deciding by simply personal perceptions whether an earthquake is "pequeño" or not.

But I soon realised that I was not being stupid at all. People in that hotel could have been at risk. It brought home to me just how much work needs to be done, worldwide, on risk assessment and awareness.

Then, using a white paper napkin, I did some simple calculations. Considering the height of the building (which did not exhibit visible cracks) and the level of ground shaking that I derived from the online maps by USGS, I determined - roughly - the horizontal movement of the building floor (also termed "lateral displacement") that I had experienced 30 minutes earlier. In this case, the displacement was in the order of 12-14cms (or two hand palms). I was worried that the building could be severely damaged with cracks, compromising its stability so I requested a lower room and was transferred to the 13th floor. Being about 30 metres below the 21st floor was much more reassuring and certainly less scary for the night.

Haiti suffers again

The earthquake occurred in the Enriquillo Plantain Garden Fault Zone, located in the south-west of Haiti. The island of Hispaniola, which comprises two nations (the French-speaking Haiti and the Spanish-speaking Dominican Republic) is a very active seismic region of the Greater Antilles arc on the Caribbean plate, with several active faults. A fault is the resulting fracture in the Earth's outer layers, or crust, after an earthquake.

What struck that day was a 7.2 magnitude earthquake. That corresponds to strong seismic events with a large loss of lives. By August 25, the official death toll had reached 2,300, with 12,000 people injured and at least 137,000 buildings severely damaged or collapsed. The energy released during this earthquake roughly corresponded to 36 Hiroshima atomic bombs exploding simultaneously.

Surveys carried out by UNICEF also found that 94 out of the 255 schools in the western part of Haiti were severely damaged or fully collapsed.

The earthquake I had felt in my hotel room was rather "shallow" in that it originated at less than 10km from below the Earth's surface. The depth of an earthquake is very important for its effects on the built environment: the shallower the origin of the shaking, the more devastating the effects are. Seismic energy propagates through waves in the soil and tends to attenuate (or reduce) with the distance from the source (also termed hypocentre or focus).

Seismic wave propagation and attenuation are a complex geophysical phenomenon which depend significantly on the properties of the faults, the soil type, the presence of water and the depth of the "focus". To visualise the seismic wave propagation and attenuation, you might think of the circles in water when a stone thrown in a pond.

Knowledge of the fundamentals of seismology is essential to understand the complexity of Hispaniola and more generally for most Caribbean islands, which are exposed to "multi-natural hazards", such as earthquakes, hurricanes, floods and landslides. In the last ten years, I have been involved in numerous projects, funded by national and international institutions, including the Ministry of Health and Public Works in Haiti, the European Union, the World Bank, the PanAmerican Health Organization (PAHO) and the World Health Organization (WHO). My role has been in risk assessment and disaster mitigation in the Caribbean region.

My research interest has been stimulated by the complexity of natural risks in this part of the world, a place that most people know only for beautiful beaches and crystal clear seas. My work in the Caribbean has focused primarily on enhancing the resilience of existing structures and infrastructure and promoting the enforcement and adaption of building codes.

I have provided advice for the implementation of early warning systems at critical facilities, such as hospitals. The approach that my colleagues and I at PAHO/WHO have illustrated and discussed with several Caribbean institutions is to ensure the resilience of hospitals, at least those that are at high risk (for example, large vulnerable buildings close to seismic faults or built on unstable soils). I work to try and make the buildings in earthquake zones safer and I try to help those zones be more prepared when an earthquake hits.

Many large cities in Hispaniola are heavily exposed to seismic risk because of their proximity to seismic sources, high vulnerability of existing infrastructure and the large concentration of population, as well as poor quality soils. Soil instability, exacerbated by strong ground motions and heavy rains during tropical storms, has induced hundreds of landslides. As a consequence, thousands of buildings are washed out by mud flow every year. This was the case on August 14 as the earthquake followed on from tropical storm Grace.

This devastating earthquake highlighted, once again, the high vulnerability of buildings and infrastructure on Haiti, which is the poorest country in the Latin American and Caribbean region and among one of the poorest nations in the world. Hospital facilities have been under extensive stress since the disaster. They have lost much of their functionality and most injured people were initially transported to Miami. Temporary tents were also installed in hospital outdoor parking areas and in the streets to deal with less serious cases. But such activities were jeopardised by heavy rains and storm surges following the wake of storm Grace.

Warning signs missed

What happened on August 14 was all too familiar to me. I surveyed Haiti in February 2012 in the wake of another 7.0 magnitude (2010) earthquake when I was sent by PAHO for post-disaster recovery. That earthquake caused more than 200,000 casualties as it occurred in a far more densely populated area.

During site visits, the joint PAHO and World Bank team, of which I was a member, met with several representatives of Ministry of Health and Ministry of Public Works, and we advised the enforcement of simple and robust seismic design criteria for new constructions, especially for hospital buildings. A few of the recommendations were successfully implemented in practice. Sadly, others were not.

The truth is there have been very few improvements between the 2010 and the 2021 earthquakes. For example, it is now possible to access data on the strong motions recorded by the seismic network which was installed in some private residences in different locations in Haiti. These data can be easily and freely accessed online.

Nevertheless, this network has not been efficiently used for early warning alerts. A quick examination of the data revealed to me that at least two strong motions (with magnitude 4.0 or above) were recorded before August 14 along the Enriquillo Plantain Garden Fault. So the warning signs were there, but nobody - it seems - was looking out for them.

But it is not only about the deployment of technology, it is about its efficient use for risk mitigation. People could have been saved by a simple message on their mobile phones which are widely used in Haiti, even in rural communities. Yet, the government issued no such warnings to its residents. The question must be asked: what exactly did Haiti's National Civil Defence do to warn the people it is charged to protect?

Sadly, many vital issues in earthquake mitigation and assessment are just not on the agenda of any of the Caribbean islands - but Haiti, in particular, has been badly served due to political turmoil and a combination of other environmental and economic factors.

Personally, I have never seen in all my career the combination of so many hazards in a single place at the same time.

The devastation of the earthquake was combined with heavy rain from tropical storms. The affected communities are poor and already under threat from COVID-19. And finally there are the political tensions - which led to the assassination of the former President of Haiti in early July. All these issues together means that it is almost impossible to manage the situation.

For example, international support for the deployment of relief supplies, along with the delivery of aid from neighbouring Caribbean countries and many other nations have been hindered by COVID-19 restrictions. All these "non-technical" aspects require further investigations to evaluate their effects on the recovery.

But the 2021 Haiti earthquake has starkly demonstrated how weak communities are in low-income countries and has shown that governance of disaster management is still far from being successfully implemented in several countries worldwide, as advocated by the UN. Activities sponsored by the PAHO/WHO, World Bank and other international agencies in response to the devastating 2010 earthquake have not been very successful.

Read more: Haiti: what aid workers can learn from the previous earthquake as they struggle to rebuild the country

Even one month after the devastating event of August 14, there are still numerous unsolved challenges on the ground for those who are providing humanitarian aid and disaster relief. I know this because I am in regular contact with colleagues and friends who are there right now. Colleagues like Shalini Jagnarine, regional consultant for PAHO and WHO, Barbados. She told me:

Travelling within Haiti is extremely difficult. The United Nations do not permit us to go alone by car because of the ongoing security situation. There are only two helicopters, with a long waiting list for their use. This is really delaying our relief operations.

Philippe Lauture, manager and structural engineer of a construction company, in Haiti's capital'laterthe loca Port-au-Prince, told me how thousands of residential buildings, schools, churches and hospitals have been severely affected and he has witnessed several collapses caused by landslides due to torrential rain. "We need to seriously rethink our way of planning and constructing to avoid future devastating effects," he said.

Stable local governance is a vital component for effective disaster preparedness and in building community resilience. The United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction summed it up perfectly when it said: "We will not eradicate poverty if we do not reduce disasters." So the challenge is on all of us.

For you: more from our Insights series: To hear about new Insights articles, join the hundreds of thousands of people who value The Conversation's evidence-based news. Subscribe to our newsletter.

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Earthquake expert who advised the Haiti government in 2010: 'Why were clear early warning signs missed?'

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Luigi Di Sarno was part of a team of specialist advisers brought in to help the government of Haiti prepare for future earthquakes after 200,000 people were killed in 2010. Over a decade later, very few of their recommendations had been adopted.

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Faults and earthquake hazard: the past is the key to the present

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Faults and earthquake hazard: the past is the key to the present

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Faults and earthquake hazard: the past is the key to the present

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What a century of earthquakes has taught Japan

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Monday’s quake renewed Japan’s collective trauma - but it’s also a story of engineering success.

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Rebecca Morelle and Alison Francis BBC News Science

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Scientists think eruptions on the Reykjanes Peninsula could continue for decades or even centuries.

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National Hurricane Preparedness Week 30th April - 6th May!

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National Hurricane Preparedness Week 30th April - 6th May!

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https://www.noaa.gov/hurricane-prep

Be Prepared!!!

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What is a storm surge and why does it matter in hurricane preparedness?

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What is a storm surge and why it matters in preparedness | World Economic Forum (weforum.org)

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What is a storm surge and why does it matter in hurricane preparedness?

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As Hurricane Ida makes landfall in the US, a meteorologist explains how storm surges form, why they are dangerous and how climate change could affect them.

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Hurricane Ida: 4 essential reads about New Orleans’ high hurricane risk and what climate change has to do with the storms

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Hurricane Ida: 4 essential reads about New Orleans’ high hurricane risk and what climate change has to do with the storms

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Hurricane Ida: 4 essential reads about New Orleans' high hurricane risk and what climate change has to do with the storms (theconversation.com)

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Hurricane Ida hit the Louisiana coast with 150 mph winds on Aug. 29, 2021, 16 years to the day after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans on nearly the same path.

Ida was one of the most intense tropical storms on record in the state. Its storm surge was less than Katrina's, but it quickly flooded streets and homes outside the levee system where many residents were under mandatory evacuation orders. Most of New Orleans' rebuilt levees appeared to have held, but the powerful winds tore up roofs, knocked down trees and caused " catastrophic damage " to transmission lines, cutting power across the region.

Four articles from our archives, written by meteorologists and atmospheric scientists, offer some insight into why the New Orleans area is at high risk for intense hurricanes and what climate change has to do with these powerful storms.

1. Some areas are more prone to hurricane damage

New Orleans is among the most at-risk places along the U.S. coast for hurricanes. An analysis by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration estimated the area was likely to see a hurricane within 50 nautical miles about once every seven years and a major hurricane about every 20.

NOAA

Several characteristics can put a region at higher risk for destructive hurricanes, University of Florida meteorologist Athena Masson explained.

One factor is timing, she wrote. Storms tend to hit Texas and the Atlantic Coast earlier in the season, while the northern Gulf Coast is at higher risk from late August into October. Trade winds tend to push storms away from the western Gulf later in the fall.

NOAA

Another is the shape of the sea floor. A shallow continental shelf like Louisiana's can generate a powerful storm surge. Parts of the coast were inundated with more than 9 feet of water as Ida arrived.

Conditions along the storm's path, particularly the water temperature, largely determine whether a tropical storm becomes a dangerous hurricane, Masson said.

"Three key ingredients are needed for a hurricane to form: warm sea surface water that's at least about 80 degrees Fahrenheit (26.5 C), a thick layer of moisture extending from the sea surface to roughly 20,000 feet, and minimal vertical wind shear so the thunderstorm can grow vertically without interruption," Masson wrote.

Hurricane Ida had all three. The Gulf of Mexico's surface was exceptionally warm as Ida moved through, with temperatures around 85 to 90 F (29.4 to 32.2 C). The storm also had plenty of moisture and very little wind shear to stop it.

Read more: Some coastal areas are more prone to devastating hurricanes - a meteorologist explains why

2. What does climate change have to do with hurricanes?

The 2020 hurricane season broke records with 30 named storms, seven major hurricanes of Category 3 strength or higher, and 10 storms that underwent rapid intensification like Ida did before making landfall.

In analyzing the 2020 season, atmospheric scientists James Ruppert at Penn State and Allison Wing at Florida State University discussed climate change's role in raising hurricane risks.

NOAA

On the question of whether climate change affects the number of hurricanes, there is no detectable global trend in hurricane frequency, and studies using computer models have had conflicting results, Ruppert and Wing wrote. But, they said, there is a trend toward more intense storms - those that are Category 3 and higher, like Hurricane Ida.

"Since ocean temperature controls the potential intensity of tropical cyclones, climate change is likely behind this trend, which is expected to continue," they said. "The U.S. is also seeing more storms with extreme rainfall. With warmer temperatures, more water is able to evaporate into the atmosphere, resulting in greater moisture in the air."

Read more: The 2020 Atlantic hurricane season was a record-breaker, and it's raising more concerns about climate change

3. Climate change and storm surge

Climate change also affects the level of hurricane damage in another way: It gradually increases the risk from storm surge.

Storm surge - the huge volume of water that the hurricane pushes on shore - is one of the greatest threats to life and property from any hurricane. The height and extent of the storm surge depend on the strength and size of the hurricane, but sea level rise is raising the baseline height of the ocean, Penn State meteorologist Anthony Didlake Jr. explained.

The COMET Program/UCAR and National Weather Service

"As water warms, it expands, and that has slowly raised sea level over the past century as global temperatures have risen. Freshwater from melting of ice sheets and glaciers also adds to sea level rise. Together, they elevate the background ocean height," Didlake wrote. "When a hurricane arrives, the higher ocean means storm surge can bring water further inland, to a more dangerous and widespread effect."

Read more: New Orleans issues evacuation orders ahead of Hurricane Ida as forecasters warn of dangerous storm surge - here's what that means

4. The IPCC on hurricanes

The latest global climate analysis from the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change offered similar conclusions.

It discussed evidence that hurricanes are now more intense than they were 40 years ago, are intensifying more rapidly and are slowing in their forward movement, leading to more rainfall. The influence of greenhouse gas emissions in these changes is still being determined; reductions in particulate pollution have also had important effects, said Robert Kopp, an author of the report's chapter on oceans and sea level rise.

"The clearest effect of global warming is that a warmer atmosphere holds more water, leading to more extreme rainfall, like that seen during Hurricane Harvey in 2017," Kopp explained. "Looking forward, we expect to see hurricane winds and hurricane rains continue to increase."

Read more: IPCC climate report: Profound changes are underway in Earth's oceans and ice - a lead author explains what the warnings mean
Editor's note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation's archives.

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Hurricane Ida: 4 essential reads about New Orleans' high hurricane risk and what climate change has to do with the storms

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Hurricane Ida hit the Louisiana coast with 150 mph winds on Aug. 29, 2021, 16 years to the day after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans on nearly the same path. Ida was one of the most intense tropical storms on record in the state.

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Human vulnerability to natural disasters - Hurricane Katrina

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Human vulnerability to natural disasters - Hurricane Katrina

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In maps: Thousands of acres on fire in LA

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Maps and images showing how the fires currently affecting the Los Angeles area are developing.