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https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/big-data.asp

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What Is Big Data?

Big data refers to the large, diverse sets of information that grow at ever-increasing rates. It encompasses the volume of information, the velocity or speed at which it is created and collected, and the variety or scope of the data points being covered (known as the "three v's" of big data). Big data often comes from data mining and arrives in multiple formats.

Key Takeaways

How Big Data Works

Big data can be categorized as unstructured or structured. Structured data consists of information already managed by the organization in databases and spreadsheets; it is frequently numeric in nature. Unstructured data is information that is unorganized and does not fall into a predetermined model or format. It includes data gathered from social media sources, which help institutions gather information on customer needs.

Big data can be collected from publicly shared comments on social networks and websites, voluntarily gathered from personal electronics and apps, through questionnaires, product purchases, and electronic check-ins. The presence of sensors and other inputs in smart devices allows for data to be gathered across a broad spectrum of situations and circumstances.

Big data is most often stored in computer databases and is analyzed using software specifically designed to handle large, complex data sets. Many software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies specialize in managing this type of complex data.

The Uses of Big Data

Data analysts look at the relationship between different types of data, such as demographic data and purchase history, to determine whether a correlation exists. Such assessments may be done in-house or externally by a third-party that focuses on processing big data into digestible formats. Businesses often use the assessment of big data by such experts to turn it into actionable information.

Nearly every department in a company can utilize findings from data analysis, from human resources and technology to marketing and sales. The goal of big data is to increase the speed at which products get to market, to reduce the amount of time and resources required to gain market adoption, target audiences, and to ensure customers remain satisfied.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Big Data

The increase in the amount of data available presents both opportunities and problems. In general, having more data on customers (and potential customers) should allow companies to better tailor products and marketing efforts in order to create the highest level of satisfaction and repeat business. Companies that collect a large amount of data are provided with the opportunity to conduct deeper and richer analysis for the benefit of all stakeholders.

While better analysis is a positive, big data can also create overload and noise, reducing its usefulness. Companies must handle larger volumes of data and determine which data represents signals compared to noise. Deciding what makes the data relevant becomes a key factor.

Furthermore, the nature and format of the data can require special handling before it is acted upon. Structured data, consisting of numeric values, can be easily stored and sorted. Unstructured data, such as emails, videos, and text documents, may require more sophisticated techniques to be applied before it becomes useful.

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What Is Big Data? Definition, How It Works, and Uses

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Big data refers to large, diverse sets of information from a variety of sources that grow at ever-increasing rates.

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https://populationmatters.org/

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Our vision is of a future in which our population co-exists in harmony with nature and prospers on a healthy planet, to the benefit of all.​

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Learn about how water moves all around our planet.

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What's wrong with our food system | Birke Baehr | TEDxNextGenerationAsheville

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Scroll down for the video

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The production and consumption of sufficient, affordable and nutritious food, while conserving the natural resources and ecosystems on which food systems depend, is vital. Food systems play a central role in all societies and are fundamental to ensuring sustainable development. Sustainable food systems are critical to resolving issues of food security, poverty alleviation and adequate nutrition, and they play an important role in building resilience in communities responding to a rapidly changing global environment.

However, our food systems are under increasing pressure to respond to numerous and complex challenges. These include:

Increasing demands - for greater quantity, quality and diversity of food -the world population is predicted to grow from 7.2 billion in 2010 to over 9 billion in 2050 with corresponding food demand predicted to increase by 60 per cent.

Food loss and waste - roughly 30 per cent of the food produced worldwide is lost or wasted every year.

Chronic hunger worldwide - 12.9 per cent of the population in developing regions suffer from hunger

Obesity related health conditions - globally over 30 per cent of adults are estimated to be overweight or obese.

Food price impacts on food security and wellbeing - in poorer areas people spend 50-80 per cent of their income on food and are highly exposed to price volatility.

Climate change - food systems rely on natural resources, which are extremely vulnerable to rapidly changing climatic conditions.

Wide-scale ecosystem change - food production itself has caused wide-scale changes in ecosystems, being responsible for 70 per cent of water withdrawals and a significant driver of deforestation and loss of biodiversity. It is also heavily dependent on these natural resources.

What is a sustainable food system?
'A sustainable food system (SFS) is a food system that delivers food security and nutrition for all in such a way that the economic, social and environmental bases to generate food security and nutrition for (current and) future generations are not compromised.'

'A food system gathers all the elements (environment, people, inputs, processes, infrastructures, institutions, etc.) and activities that relate to the production, processing, distribution, preparation and consumption of food, and the outputs of these activities, including socio-economic and environmental outcomes.'
UNEP Sustainable Food Systems Programme
Moving towards more sustainable food systems is critical. Urgent attention is required to address existing challenges, as well as new and evolving demands on our food systems. UNEP is committed to accelerating action through its Sustainable Food Systems programme of activities which aim to raise awareness as well as catalyse action at local, regional and international level.

We are doing this through 4 main focus areas:

National Round-Tables on Sustainable Food Systems

Climate Change, Urbanisation and Food Systems

Sustainable Food System Thinking (interconnected policy making on food and agriculture)

Watch this short and fact-filled movie that explains why action is needed now to ensure urban populations can access sufficient, sustainably produced, affordable, safe and nutritious food in a changing climate. You can also watch it in French here.

We are always looking for good opportunities to collaborate and partner with interested stakeholders to help accelerate the shift to more sustainable food systems.

Our main focus in this area is through the 10YFP Sustainable Food Systems Programme in which UNEP with FAO has played an instrumental role in it is development. UNEP and FAO now serve in the Multi-Stakeholder Advisory Committee (MAC).

For more information and background go to the website at 10YFP Sustainable Food Systems Programme

Contacts
James Lomax
Programme Officer (food systems and agriculture)
James.lomax@unep.org
See also

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Sustainable Food Systems The production and consumption of sufficient, affordable and nutritious food, while conserving the natural resources and ecosystems on which food systems depend, is vital. Food systems play a central role in all societies and are fundamental to ensuring sustainable development.

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The trauma caused by colonization is intergenerational

Indigenous people who are fighting addiction. Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. Residential schools. When we see red dresses hanging in trees along the highway or hashtags that say "LAND BACK", it's all rooted in the cultural oppression First Nations have endured since first contact with white settlers.

Indigenous sovereignty begins with learning about whose land you are on. It's about putting children in the middle of the circle. It's about supporting Indigenous businesses, reading Indigenous authors and listening to stories, no matter how awkward and heart-wrenching they may be.

Colonialism then

Colonization happened all over the world, and in Canada, it has a long and violent history that many are only just waking up to. In simplest terms, the practice of colonialism occurred when European settlers assumed control of Indigenous lands and forced Indigenous communities to assimilate to settler culture, laws and religion.

Canada's darkest colonial legacy is the Indian residential school system, which ran for nearly 100 years with the last one closing in 1997. Funded by the Canadian government, residential schools were run by Christian churches as a means to assimilate Indigenous children into Canadian society by forcing them to learn English and practice settler Canadian culture. An estimated 150,000 First Nation, Inuit and Métis children were taken from their homes.

Many children died while attending residential schools from malnutrition, abuse and disease. We may never know the exact number of deaths because of the schools' poor burial records, and the trauma caused from these colonial institutions have had an impact on multiple generations of Indigenous peoples.

Other examples of colonization that took place in Canada were the smallpox epidemic that wiped out thousands of Indigenous people when a vaccine was available; as well as the near-extinction of species like the prairie buffalo, which forced Plains Indigenous peoples to give up their way of life and sign treaties with white settlers.

Colonialism now

Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls is Canadian genocide. In a 14-year period from 2001 to 2015, Statistics Canada reported the homicide rate for Indigenous women was nearly six times higher than that of non-indigenous women. Some databases say the number of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls is around 1,000, but others say it could be as high at 4,000 over the past 30 years.

Let's be blunt: if white women were being stolen and killed at this rate, it would be a national uproar.

Canada's economy is largely founded on resource extraction from land taken from First Nations Peoples. Colonial government bureaucracy dictates the terms of the land use with tenures and licences often forcing bands to cede their land and sign treaties.

Canadians are slowly waking up to the environmental injustice imposed by the government of Canada. Movements like the ongoing Fairy Creek logging blockades in Pacheedaht and Ditidaht territory on Vancouver Island and the many land defenders who stood in solidarity with the hereditary chiefs of the Wetʼsuwetʼen who opposed a pipeline going through their territory show there is growing collective desire to acknowledge and honour Indigenous sovereignty.

How do we decolonize the fabric of society?

In a 2019 TedX talk called 'Decolonization is for Everyone', Indigenous educator Nikki Sanchez eloquently describes what it will take to unravel the fabric of Canada's colonial past and present.

"This history is not your fault. But it is absolutely your responsibility. What happened, what has been done, is not your fault. But where we find ourselves here together, whether we are Indigenous, whether we are settler people, whether we are someone in between, this is work we need to pick up. We need to have the courage to look at our past, we need to have the courage to look at where we are now, and we need to work together to figure out how we can collectively heal moving forward," she says.

The work of decolonization, notes Sanchez, starts with learning and acknowledging the Indigenous lands you live on and what has been done to them in order for you to reside on their lands.

"Find out how you benefit from that history and activate one strategy where you can use your privilege to dismantle that. And share this knowledge," says Sanchez.

Decolonization and environmentalism

One of the recurring themes in Canada's colonial history is resource extraction and pollution. In a 2019 article penned by Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg and two other colleagues, a direct link was made between the climate crisis and colonialism.

"The climate crisis is not just about the environment. It is a crisis of human rights, of justice and of political will. Colonial, racist and patriarchal systems of oppression have created and fuelled it. We need to dismantle them all. Our political leaders can no longer shirk their responsibilities," reads the article entitled 'Why We Strike Again'.

A fresh narrative is emerging in Tofino, B.C. as a result of the Tla-o-qui-aht First Nations Tribal Parks Allies program, which was founded in 2018. Local businesses educate guests about the traditional lands on which they operate in addition to making a donation to the program. In turn, Tribal Park Guardians protect, maintain and restore the ancient rainforest and salmon streams that surround the municipality of Tofino.

Indigenous culture is largely based on the laws of nature.

"The canopy was our church before the white man came here, that's where our people went to pray," says Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation Randy Frank in the video 'For Our Grandchildren'.

Putting value on trees standing and rebuilding salmon streams is all part of Tla-o-qui-aht's land use plan, and when local businesses support Tribal Parks they are protecting the land, the drinking water and the trees for their children's children's children.

The decolonization of our colonial government and giving land back to Indigenous peoples who hope to protect and restore it is one big step closer to saving the planet.

Want to do better?

Find out whose land you're on and use your skills to uplift your Indigenous community.

Hold your local, provincial and federal government accountable for dismantling the colonial economic process by writing a letter.

Share, like and show your solidarity towards Indigenous land defenders on the frontlines.

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What is Decolonization and How Does It Impact the Environmental Movement?

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Indigenous people who are fighting addiction. Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. Residential schools. When we see red dresses hanging in trees along the highway or hashtags that say "LAND BACK", it's all rooted in the cultural oppression First Nations have endured since first contact with white settlers.

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Why do we need international law? An animated explainer

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Why do we need international law? An animated explainer

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This is in case you didn’t get the previous video.

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Singapore Department of Statistics (DOS)

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Price Changes and the Consumer Price Index

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Can you decolonize the world through music? That's exactly what Jace Kaholokula Saplan, a Hawaiian professor from Arizona State University visiting St. Catharines, aims to do.

Saplan conducted a performance of The Songs We Sing, The Land We Stand On: Decolonizing our Music-Making, with Brock University singers and choir in a concert Friday evening.

"Decolonization is about taking a deep breath, having complete awareness of what has happened so that we can make more informed and joyful steps forward," Saplan said.

As part of the university's 2022 Walker Cultural series, Saplan led the Brock University Choir, Avanti Chamber Singers and the Sora Singers in a concert at the St. Catharines FirstOntario Performing Arts Centre Recital Hall on Friday.

Saplan is the director of choral activities and associate professor of music learning and teaching and choral conducting at Arizona State University.

Brock University associate professor of music Rachel Rensink-Hoff invited him to Canada to provide decolonization in music composition seminars at Brock and local high schools.

The stories Jace told of the experiences of the Indigenous people in Hawaii very much parallel what we have experienced here in Canada. - Rachel Rensink-Hoff, associate professor of music at Brock University

Saplan's teachings focus on reconnecting artists to their roots and heritage with an approach to music composition through the combining of these roots and the world around them.

He says decolonizing is not structured as a complete rejection of everything colonial, but instead it recognizes historical pain and experiences and mixes both western and non-western musical practices.

"When used in a decolonial perspective and a pedagogical outlook, choral music can amplify a perspective towards relationship, towards empathetic understanding of the other, towards the catalyzing community solution," Saplan said.

Rensink-Hoff said she invited Saplan to do a guest Zoom lesson for her students in 2021 for an hour-long lecture as part of a Shared Perspectives series, and then said after... 'I have to get you here.'

She found that the lessons Saplan had to teach her students were invaluable and said "Jace is the master of metaphors...the stories Jace told of the experiences of the Indigenous people in Hawaii very much parallel what we have experienced here in Canada."

"We're a relatively smaller community and to have someone like Jace come into this space and open our eyes, especially for my students it really opens up their world, literally," said Rensink-Hoff. "It's created a lifetime memory and it has so much impact, and that's why these residencies are so important."

Saplan said that the performance at the concert hall incorporated the physicality common in Hawaiian music, with some singers doing traditional dance moves.

He wants listeners to receive his story "so that their development, their growth and their journey is expanded in some way."

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How a professor from Hawaii is trying to decolonize the world through music | CBC News

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Can you decolonize the world through music? That's exactly what Jace Kaholokula Saplan, a Hawaiian professor from Arizona State University visiting St. Catharines, aims to do. Saplan conducted a performance of The Songs We Sing, The Land We Stand On: Decolonizing our Music-Making, with Brock University singers and choir in a concert Friday evening.

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An Omaha, Nebraska, company that wants to build an 810-mile carbon capture pipeline across Iowa filed a petition with state regulators this week asking for a permit and permission to use eminent domain to force unwilling landowners to sell the company easement rights for their land.

Navigator Heartland Greenway is the second of three pipeline companies to seek a permit. Summit Carbon Solution began the process to get a pipeline permit in late January.

Navigator's petition, filed with the Iowa Utilities Board, calls for a $3.2 billion underground hazardous liquid pipeline across 33 counties in Iowa, including Story and Polk, to capture carbon dioxide emissions from ethanol and other industrial agriculture plants in Iowa.

A subsidiary of Navigator CO2 Ventures, the company proposes to liquefy the carbon dioxide under pressure and transport it via the pipeline to be sequestered a mile underground in Illinois.

Altogether, Navigator's pipeline would stretch 1,300 miles across Iowa, Illinois, Minnesota, Nebraska and South Dakota. South Dakota-based Poet, the largest global ethanol producer, and the Iowa Fertilizer Co., based in Wever in southeast Iowa, have signed onto the project, whose customers would include 21 ethanol and fertilizer plants in Iowa.

No hearings have been set for the Navigator and Summit permit requests. Wolf Carbon Solutions is the other company proposing a pipeline.

Concerns from Iowa officials, landowners

Iowa farmers, landowners and state and county officials have opposed the three projects, concerned about the possible use of eminent domain powers. They've also expressed concern about the safety of the pipelines carrying carbon dioxide, an asphyxiant, and whether the companies would fully restore any damage pipeline construction causes to farmland and underlying drainage systems.

Navigator didn't immediately file a list of the properties where it anticipates needing to use eminent domain. Navigator said it's still working on access with farmers, many of whom have been busy harvesting this year's crops.

Summit also didn't immediately file a list, but subsequently did.
More: Builders vow CO2 pipelines will be safe. Worried Iowans point to a Mississippi rupture.
Navigator says jobs, environmental benefits to come from pipeline

All the companies have said they are working with landowners to get voluntary easements for the projects and assure Iowans that the projects are safe, saying they will exceed federal pipeline construction and safety requirements.

Navigator said in its permit request that its proposed pipeline will provide economic and environmental benefits to Iowa, the nation's largest producer of ethanol and the corn it is largely made from. It said the project will create 5,500 construction jobs in Iowa, and about 9,200 across the entire project. It also said the pipeline will allow sequestration of 4.2 million metric tons of carbon dioxide in Iowa, enough to cut ethanol's carbon footprint by as much as half ― the equivalent of removing 900,000 cars from the road.
Ethanol giant fighting to keep secret the reason Iowa agency thinks it should repay millions in tax credits
About half of Iowa's annual corn crop is used to make the renewable fuel. But the ethanol industry faces a rocky future, given President Joe Biden's push toward electric vehicles to reduce the carbon dioxide emissions that contribute to climate change. The Biden administration says carbon sequestration projects likely will be needed to reach net-zero emissions across the U.S. economy by 2050.

Opponent calls carbon capture pipelines 'scams'

Some opponents have called the pipelines boondoggles, saying they will fail to provide the promised environmental benefits while receiving huge federal subsidies. Food & Water Watch, a Washington, D.C., environmental group, estimates the three Iowa projects could snag about $40 billion in tax incentives over 12 years.

"Hazardous carbon pipelines like Navigator's are dangerous scams that stand to make a few out-of-staters wealthy at the expense of a whole lot of Iowans," Emma Schmit, a Food & Water Watch senior organizer in Iowa, said in a statement. "But as billions of our tax dollars fund these unproven, unwanted projects, Iowa's legislative leaders have proven unwilling to stand up to private donors and stand up for their constituents. We cannot allow carbon capture and its hundreds of miles of destructive, dangerous pipeline to take root in Iowa."

Wally Taylor, an attorney for the Sierra Club's Iowa Chapter, said he's concerned about a Navigator request to waive some farmland soil restoration requirements.

Taylor also said he's frustrated the Iowa Utilities Board isn't forcing the companies to file their eminent domain list with their permit requests.
Iowa pipeline regulators reject tribe's request for environmental impact study Donnelle Eller covers agriculture, the environment and energy for the Register. Reach her at deller@registermedia.com or 515-284-8457.
"My sense if that the board wants to give the pipeline companies all the time and all the weapons needed to extract 'voluntary' easements,'" Taylor said in an email.

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Second company files for Iowa carbon capture pipeline permit, seeks eminent domain

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An Omaha, Nebraska, company that wants to build an 810-mile carbon capture pipeline across Iowa filed a petition with state regulators this week asking for a permit and permission to use eminent domain to force unwilling landowners to sell the company easement rights for their land.

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This will make it easy to understand.

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The Consumer Price Index and Your Experience of Price Change

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Ebola Hemorrhagic Fever: Tandala, Zaire, 1977–1978

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Abstract. Ebola virus was recovered from a nine-year-old girl who died of acute hemorrhagic fever in June 1977 at Tandala Hospital in northwestern Zaire, in the

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Global Report | IDEA Global State of Democracy Report

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Two years ago, when International IDEA published the second iteration of its Global State of Democracy Report, there was a clear sense that the headwinds that democracy was facing all over the world were severe and growing.

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https://share.stanford.edu/get-informed/learn-topics/gender-discrimination

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https://www.energy.gov/ne/nuclear-reactor-technologies

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Nuclear power has reliably and economically contributed almost 20% of electrical generation in the United States over the past two decades. It remains the single largest contributor (more than 70%) of non-greenhouse-gas-emitting electric power generation in the United States.

Small modular reactors can also be made in factories and transported to sites where they would be ready to "plug and play" upon arrival, reducing both capital costs and construction times. The smaller size also makes these reactors ideal for small electric grids and for locations that cannot support large reactors, offering utilities the flexibility to scale production as demand changes.

The existing U.S. nuclear fleet has a remarkable safety and performance record. Extending the operating lifetimes of current plants beyond 60 years and, where possible, making further improvements in their productivity will generate early benefits from research, development, and demonstration investments in nuclear power.

As a result of ARC research, nuclear energy will continue to provide clean, affordable, and secure energy while supporting the administration's greenhouse gas reduction goals by introducing advanced designs into new energy and industrial markets. DOE will pursue RD&D on both advanced thermal and fast neutron spectrum systems.

In February 2019, the U.S. Department of Energy announced its plans to build a Versatile Test Reactor, or VTR. This new research reactor will be capable of performing irradiation testing at much higher neutron energy fluxes than what is currently available today.

For over 50 years the Department of Energy and its predecessor agencies have been deeply involved in space research and exploration. Currently, the Office of Space and Defense Power Systems supplies Radioisotope Power Systems (RPS) to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and national security applications for missions that are beyond the capabilities of fuel cells, solar power and battery power supplies.

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Nuclear power has reliably and economically contributed almost 20% of electrical generation in the United States over the past two decades. It remains the single largest contributor (more than 70%) of non-greenhouse-gas-emitting electric power generation in the United States.

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NOTE TO READERS
"Milestones in the History of U.S. Foreign Relations" has been retired and is no longer maintained. For more information, please see the full notice.

Between 1945 and 1960, three dozen new states in Asia and Africa achieved autonomy or outright independence from their European colonial rulers.

Harold MacMillan, British Prime Minister, helped begin decolonization

There was no one process of decolonization. In some areas, it was peaceful, and orderly. In many others, independence was achieved only after a protracted revolution. A few newly independent countries acquired stable governments almost immediately; others were ruled by dictators or military juntas for decades, or endured long civil wars. Some European governments welcomed a new relationship with their former colonies; others contested decolonization militarily. The process of decolonization coincided with the new Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States, and with the early development of the new United Nations. Decolonization was often affected by superpower competition, and had a definite impact on the evolution of that competition. It also significantly changed the pattern of international relations in a more general sense.

The creation of so many new countries, some of which occupied strategic locations, others of which possessed significant natural resources, and most of which were desperately poor, altered the composition of the United Nations and political complexity of every region of the globe. In the mid to late 19th century, the European powers colonized much of Africa and Southeast Asia. During the decades of imperialism, the industrializing powers of Europe viewed the African and Asian continents as reservoirs of raw materials, labor, and territory for future settlement. In most cases, however, significant development and European settlement in these colonies was sporadic. However, the colonies were exploited, sometimes brutally, for natural and labor resources, and sometimes even for military conscripts. In addition, the introduction of colonial rule drew arbitrary natural boundaries where none had existed before, dividing ethnic and linguistic groups and natural features, and laying the foundation for the creation of numerous states lacking geographic, linguistic, ethnic, or political affinity.

During World War II Japan, itself a significant imperial power, drove the European powers out of Asia. After the Japanese surrender in 1945, local nationalist movements in the former Asian colonies campaigned for independence rather than a return to European colonial rule. In many cases, as in Indonesia and French Indochina, these nationalists had been guerrillas fighting the Japanese after European surrenders, or were former members of colonial military establishments. These independence movements often appealed to the United States Government for support.

While the United States generally supported the concept of national self-determination, it also had strong ties to its European allies, who had imperial claims on their former colonies. The Cold War only served to complicate the U.S. position, as U.S. support for decolonization was offset by American concern over communist expansion and Soviet strategic ambitions in Europe. Several of the NATO allies asserted that their colonial possessions provided them with economic and military strength that would otherwise be lost to the alliance. Nearly all of the United States' European allies believed that after their recovery from World War II their colonies would finally provide the combination of raw materials and protected markets for finished goods that would cement the colonies to Europe. Whether or not this was the case, the alternative of allowing the colonies to slip away, perhaps into the United States' economic sphere or that of another power, was unappealing to every European government interested in postwar stability. Although the U.S. Government did not force the issue, it encouraged the European imperial powers to negotiate an early withdrawal from their overseas colonies. The United States granted independence to the Philippines in 1946.

However, as the Cold War competition with the Soviet Union came to dominate U.S. foreign policy concerns in the late 1940s and 1950s, the Truman and Eisenhower Administrations grew increasingly concerned that as the European powers lost their colonies or granted them independence, Soviet-supported communist parties might achieve power in the new states. This might serve to shift the international balance of power in favor of the Soviet Union and remove access to economic resources from U.S. allies. Events such as the Indonesian struggle for independence from the Netherlands (1945-50), the Vietnamese war against France (1945-54), and the nationalist and professed socialist takeovers of Egypt (1952) and Iran (1951) served to reinforce such fears, even if new governments did not directly link themselves to the Soviet Union. Thus, the United States used aid packages, technical assistance and sometimes even military intervention to encourage newly independent nations in the Third World to adopt governments that aligned with the West. The Soviet Union deployed similar tactics in an effort to encourage new nations to join the communist bloc, and attempted to convince newly decolonized countries that communism was an intrinsically non-imperialist economic and political ideology. Many of the new nations resisted the pressure to be drawn into the Cold War, joined in the "nonaligned movement," which formed after the Bandung conference of 1955, and focused on internal development.

The newly independent nations that emerged in the 1950s and the 1960s became an important factor in changing the balance of power within the United Nations. In 1946, there were 35 member states in the United Nations; as the newly independent nations of the "third world" joined the organization, by 1970 membership had swelled to 127. These new member states had a few characteristics in common; they were non-white, with developing economies, facing internal problems that were the result of their colonial past, which sometimes put them at odds with European countries and made them suspicious of European-style governmental structures, political ideas, and economic institutions. These countries also became vocal advocates of continuing decolonization, with the result that the UN Assembly was often ahead of the Security Council on issues of self-governance and decolonization. The new nations pushed the UN toward accepting resolutions for independence for colonial states and creating a special committee on colonialism, demonstrating that even though some nations continued to struggle for independence, in the eyes of the international community, the colonial era was ending.

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Milestones: 1945-1952 - Office of the Historian

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By the time you finish reading this story, 24 children will have died from hunger-related causes.

That's because, globally, a child dies approximately every 10 seconds from malnutrition, and that's the sad reality for more than 3 million children every year.

But it doesn't have to be this way, and at the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) we're doing everything we can to save them. You can help. Start by getting clear on the facts:

1. What Is Malnutrition?

According to the World Health Organization, malnutrition refers to "deficiencies, excesses or imbalances in a person's intake of energy and/or nutrients." This can result in either undernutrition or overweight. Undernourished children are deprived of crucial calories, vitamins and minerals, which prevents their brains and bodies from developing properly. The consequences can be irreversible. At its worst, malnutrition can be life-threatening.

Related articles you might be interested in:

2. How Many Children Suffer From Malnutrition?

Severe malnutrition affects 45 million children across the globe each year. That's nearly one out of every three children under the age of five (ie, the entire population of California + Chicago + Houston). In fact, it kills more children each year than AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined. In today's world, nearly half of all deaths of children under the age of five can be traced back to malnutrition.

3. When Does Malnutrition Start?

From the moment a child is conceived, a clock starts ticking. Every second in the womb up until a child's second birthday is described by nutritionists as "the golden window," and it lasts approximately 1,000 days. The nourishment a child receives in this window shapes their potential for the rest of their lives.

For children fleeing their homes, living through conflict or recovering from a natural disaster, this golden window can be especially precarious. Every day without adequate food risks a more tenuous future.

4. What Happens to Malnourished Children?

The immediate impacts of undernutrition are weight loss (called wasting), stunted growth (called stunting), impaired thinking and a weakened immune system. In severe cases, the body shrinks its own muscles and organs to survive. When children don't have adequate food, it directly affects their ability to fight off infection, and common illnesses can become lethal. Most malnourished children will have an impaired ability to learn for the rest of their lives.

Many of the health impacts from severe malnourishment can be prevented, but they cannot be reversed.

5. What Are the Long-Term Consequences of Childhood Malnutrition?

Malnutrition endangers a child's success as an adult by reducing their productivity and heightening their risk of premature death. In turn, their underdevelopment has consequences for their families, their communities and entire nations. This means we're increasingly facing intergenerational losses from hunger. Malnourished children cannot build prosperous economies or peaceful societies, and malnutrition of all types costs the global economy more than $3.5 trillion dollars each year in lost productivity, increased healthcare costs and emergency services.

6. What Is the Best Way to Help Malnourished Children?

To fight childhood malnutrition, we have to both feed children who don't have enough to eat and also empower their families to withstand future causes of food insecurity. The United Nations World Food Programme tackles the problem from both angles.

We deliver specially formulated foods to pregnant women, breastfeeding mothers and their young children during that crucial "golden window" in the first 1,000 days of life. These nutrient-dense foods are high in calories and meet their specific nutritional needs. The people we serve through malnutrition treatment services are suffering from moderate acute malnutrition (MAM).

We lead community workshops to teach nutrition education, sanitation, hygiene, basic healthcare, and breastfeeding practices for newborns and infants up to six months of age. This integrated approach addresses the direct causes of malnutrition.

We operate the largest school meals program in the world - an essential safety net that provides over 15 million children with crucial nutrition, health and education.

We support small-scale family farmers - more than half of whom are women - to improve their food production so they can provide more nutritious diets for their children. For example, our air-tight storage containers enable farmers to store their dried crops for months on end. This cuts their food loss by up to 98% so they can feed their children between harvests.

We work with local governments and key partners across the health, agriculture and education sectors to address the underlying causes of malnutrition and build long-term, sustainable solutions.

And, we do all of this in the middle of the world's worst hunger crises, where children are often the first to fall victim. Nearly 60% of the people we serve are children, many of whom are malnourished and need our assistance - before it's too late.

The Bottom Line

Food is a basic human right. Every child deserves to grow up and live a healthy life free from hunger.

If you agree, help support the programs that are delivering lifesaving food right now to the world's most vulnerable children.
Learn more about child hunger and malnutrition. Learn more about WFP's nutrition programs.

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What is Child Malnutrition & Why Are Children Hungry Around the World

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By the time you finish reading this story, 24 children will have died from hunger-related causes. That's because, globally, a child dies approximately every 10 seconds from malnutrition, and that's the sad reality for more than 3 million children every year.

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https://www.racialequitytools.org/resources/fundamentals/core-concepts/decolonization-theory-and-practice

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Decolonization refers to 'writing back' against the ongoing colonialism and colonial mentalities that permeate all institutions and systems of government, according to Eric Ritskes, editor of Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education and Society. Indeed, decolonization demands an Indigenous framework and a centering of Indigenous land, Indigenous sovereignty, and Indigenous ways of thinking, write Eve Tuck and K. Wayne Yang in their essay "Decolonization Is Not a Metaphor".

(Re)building culture must interrogate colonialism's turmoil on the inner world and psyche, explains Franz Fanon. Artists, authors, and activists draw on Fanon's writings, [...]

"The reach of imperialism into 'our heads' challenges those who belong to colonized communities to understand how this occurred, partly because we perceive a need to decolonize our minds, to recover ourselves, to claim a space in which to develop a sense of authentic humanity."

~ Linda Tuhiwai Smith, Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples

Anti-Racism is defined as the work of actively opposing racism by advocating for changes in political, economic, and social life. Anti-racism tends to be an individualized approach, and set up in opposition to individual racist behaviors and impacts.

SOURCE: Race Forward, "Race Reporting Guide" (2015).

The Critical Race Theory movement considers many of the same issues that conventional civil rights and ethnic studies take up, but places them in a broader perspective that includes economics, history, and even feelings and the unconscious. Unlike traditional civil rights, which embraces incrementalism and step by step progress, critical race theory questions the very foundations of the liberal order, including equality theory, legal reasoning, Enlightenment rationalism, and principles of constitutional law.

SOURCE: Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic, Critical Race Theory: An Introduction, NYU Press, 2001 (2nd ed. , 3rd ed. 2017).

1. Decolonization may be defined as the active resistance against colonial powers, and a shifting of power towards political, economic, educational, cultural, psychic independence and power that originate from a colonized nation's own indigenous culture. This process occurs politically and also applies to personal and societal psychic, cultural, political, agricultural, and educational deconstruction of colonial oppression.

2. Per Eve Tuck and K. Wayne Yang: "Decolonization doesn't have a synonym"; it is not a substitute for 'human rights' or 'social justice', though undoubtedly, they are connected in various ways. Decolonization demands an Indigenous framework and a centering of Indigenous land, Indigenous sovereignty, and Indigenous ways of thinking.

SOURCE:

1. The Movement for Black Lives (M4BL), "."

2. Eric Ritskes, "What Is Decolonization and Why Does It Matter?"

Related Resources: Decolonization Theory and Practice

Location: FUNDAMENTALS / Core Concepts

Internalized racism is the situation that occurs in a racist system when a racial group oppressed by racism supports the supremacy and dominance of the dominating group by maintaining or participating in the set of attitudes, behaviors, social structures, and ideologies that undergird the dominating group's power. It involves four essential and interconnected elements:

1. Decision-making - Due to racism, people of color do not have the ultimate decision-making power over the decisions that control our lives and resources. As a result, on a personal level, we may think white people know more about what needs to be done for us than we do. On an interpersonal level, we may not support each other's authority and power - especially if it is in opposition to the dominating racial group. Structurally, there is a system in place that rewards people of color who support white supremacy and power and coerces or punishes those who do not.

2. Resources - Resources, broadly defined (e.g. money, time, etc), are unequally in the hands and under the control of white people. Internalized racism is the system in place that makes it difficult for people of color to get access to resources for our own communities and to control the resources of our community. We learn to believe that serving and using resources for ourselves and our particular community is not serving "everybody."

3. Standards - With internalized racism, the standards for what is appropriate or "normal" that people of color accept are white people's or Eurocentric standards. We have difficulty naming, communicating and living up to our deepest standards and values, and holding ourselves and each other accountable to them.

4. Naming the problem - There is a system in place that misnames the problem of racism as a problem of or caused by people of color and blames the disease - emotional, economic, political, etc. - on people of color. With internalized racism, people of color might, for example, believe we are more violent than white people and not consider state-sanctioned political violence or the hidden or privatized violence of white people and the systems they put in place and support.

SOURCE: Donna Bivens, Internalized Racism: A Definition (Women's Theological Center, 1995).

1. Exposing [one's] multiple identities can help clarify the ways in which a person can simultaneously experience privilege and oppression. For example, a Black woman in America does not experience gender inequalities in exactly the same way as a white woman, nor racial oppression identical to that experienced by a Black man. Each race and gender intersection produces a qualitatively distinct life.

2. Per Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw: Intersectionality is simply a prism to see the interactive effects of various forms of discrimination and disempowerment. It looks at the way that racism, many times, interacts with patriarchy, heterosexism, classism, xenophobia - seeing that the overlapping vulnerabilities created by these systems actually create specific kinds of challenges. "Intersectionality 102," then, is to say that these distinct problems create challenges for movements that are only organized around these problems as separate and individual. So when racial justice doesn't have a critique of patriarchy and homophobia, the particular way that racism is experienced and exacerbated by heterosexism, classism etc., falls outside of our political organizing. It means that significant numbers of people in our communities aren't being served by social justice frames because they don't address the particular ways that they're experiencing discrimination.

SOURCE:
1. Intergroup Resources, "Intersectionality" (2012).

2. Otamere Guobadia, "Kimberlé Crenshaw and Lady Phyll Talk Intersectionality, Solidarity, and Self-Care" (2018).

Related Resources: Intersectionality

Location: FUNDAMENTALS / Core Concepts

1. Racial equity is the condition that would be achieved if one's racial identity no longer predicted, in a statistical sense, how one fares. When we use the term, we are thinking about racial equity as one part of racial justice, and thus we also include work to address root causes of inequities, not just their manifestation. This includes elimination of policies, practices, attitudes, and cultural messages that reinforce differential outcomes by race or that fail to eliminate them.

2. "A mindset and method for solving problems that have endured for generations, seem intractable, harm people and communities of color most acutely, and ultimately affect people of all races. This will require seeing differently, thinking differently, and doing the work differently. Racial equity is about results that make a difference and last."

SOURCE:

Racial Identity Development Theory discusses how people in various racial groups and with multiracial identities form their particular self-concept. It also describes some typical phases in remaking that identity based on learning and awareness of systems of privilege and structural racism, cultural, and historical meanings attached to racial categories, and factors operating in the larger socio-historical level (e.g. globalization, technology, immigration, and increasing multiracial population).

SOURCE: New Perspectives on Racial Identity Development: Integrating Emerging Frameworks, edited by Charmaine L. Wijeyesinghe and Bailey W. Jackson (NYU Press, 2012).

1. The systematic fair treatment of people of all races, resulting in equitable opportunities and outcomes for all. Racial justice-or racial equity-goes beyond "anti-racism." It is not just the absence of discrimination and inequities, but also the presence of deliberate systems and supports to achieve and sustain racial equity through proactive and preventative measures.

2. Operationalizing racial justice means reimagining and co-creating a just and liberated world and includes:

understanding the history of racism and the system of white supremacy and addressing past harms,

working in right relationship and accountability in an ecosystem (an issue, sector, or community ecosystem) for collective change,

implementing interventions that use an intersectional analysis and that impact multiple systems,

centering Blackness and building community, cultural, economic, and political power of Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color (BIPOC), and

applying the practice of love along with disruption and resistance to the status quo.

SOURCE:

1. Race Forward, "Race Reporting Guide" (2015).

2. Maggie Potapchuk, "Operationalizing Racial Justice in Non-Profit Organizations" (MP Associates, 2020). This definition is based on and expanded from the one described in Rinku Sen and Lori Villarosa, "Grantmaking with a Racial Justice Lens: A Practical Guide" (Philanthropic Initiative for Racial Equity, 2019).

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Fundamentals, Core Concepts, Decolonization Theory and Practice

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Decolonization refers to 'writing back' against the ongoing colonialism and colonial mentalities that permeate all institutions and systems of government, according to Eric Ritskes, editor of Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education and Society . Indeed, decolonization demands an Indigenous framework and a centering of Indigenous land, Indigenous sovereignty, and Indigenous ways of thinking, write Eve Tuck and K.

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Andrea Galindo, IAEA Office of Public Information and Communication

Radiation is energy that moves from one place to another in a form that can be described as waves or particles. We are exposed to radiation in our everyday life. Some of the most familiar sources of radiation include the sun, microwave ovens in our kitchens and the radios we listen to in our cars. Most of this radiation carries no risk to our health. But some does. In general, radiation has lower risk at lower doses but can be associated with higher risks at higher doses. Depending on the type of radiation, different measures must be taken to protect our bodies and the environment from its effects, while allowing us to benefit from its many applications.

What is radiation good for? - Some examples

Health: thanks to radiation, we can benefit from medical procedures, such as many cancer treatments, and diagnostic imaging methods.

Energy: radiation allows us to produce electricity via, for example, solar energy and nuclear energy.

Environment and climate change: radiation can be used to treat wastewater or to create new plant varieties that are resistant to climate change.

Industry and science: with nuclear techniques based on radiation, scientists can examine objects from the past or produce materials with superior characteristics in, for instance, the car industry.

If radiation is beneficial, why should we protect ourselves from it?

Radiation has many beneficial applications but, as in every activity, when there are risks associated with its use specific actions need to be put in place to protect the people and the environment. Different types of radiation require different protective measures: a low energy form, called "non-ionizing radiation", may require fewer protective measures than the higher energy "ionizing radiation". The IAEA establishes standards for protection of the people and the environment in relation to the peaceful use of ionizing radiation - in line with its mandate.

Non-ionizing radiation

Non-ionizing radiation is lower energy radiation that is not energetic enough to detach electrons from atoms or molecules, whether in matter or living organisms. However, its energy can make those molecules vibrate and so produce heat. This is, for instance, how microwave ovens work.

For most people, non-ionizing radiation does not pose a risk to their health. However, workers that are in regular contact with some sources of non-ionizing radiation may need special measures to protect themselves from, for example, the heat produced.

Some other examples of non-ionizing radiation include the radio waves and visible light. The visible light is a type of non-ionizing radiation that the human eye can perceive. And the radio waves are a type of non-ionizing radiation that is invisible to our eyes and other senses, but that can be decoded by traditional radios.

Ionizing radiation

Ionizing radiation is a type of radiation of such energy that it can detach electrons from atoms or molecules, which causes changes at the atomic level when interacting with matter including living organisms. Such changes usually involve the production of ions (electrically charged atoms or molecules) - hence the term "ionizing" radiation.

In high doses, ionizing radiation can damage cells or organs in our bodies or even cause death. In the correct uses and doses and with the necessary protective measures, this kind of radiation has many beneficial uses, such as in energy production, in industry, in research and in medical diagnostics and treatment of various diseases, such as cancer. While regulation of use of sources of radiation and radiation protection are national responsibility, the IAEA provides support to lawmakers and regulators through a comprehensive system of international safety standards aiming to protect workers and patients as well as members of the public and the environment from the potential harmful effects of ionizing radiation.

The science behind radioactive decay and the resulting radiation

Ionizing radiation can originate from, for example, unstable (radioactive) atoms as they are transitioning into a more stable state while releasing energy.

Most atoms on Earth are stable, mainly thanks to an equilibrated and stable composition of particles (neutrons and protons) in their centre (or nucleus). However, in some types of unstable atoms, the composition of the number of protons and neutrons in their nucleus does not allow them to hold those particles together. Such unstable atoms are called "radioactive atoms". When radioactive atoms decay, they release energy in the form of ionizing radiation (for example alpha particles, beta particles, gamma rays or neutrons), which, when safely harnessed and used, can produce various benefits.

What are the most common types of radioactive decay? How can we protect ourselves against the harmful effects of the resulting radiation?

Depending on the type of particles or waves that the nucleus releases to become stable, there are various kinds of radioactive decay leading to ionizing radiation. The most common types are alpha particles, beta particles, gamma rays and neutrons.

Alpha radiation

In alpha radiation, the decaying nuclei release heavy, positively charged particles in order to become more stable. These particles cannot penetrate our skin to cause harm and can often be stopped by using even a single sheet of paper.

However, if alpha-emitting materials are taken into the body by breathing, eating, or drinking, they can expose internal tissues directly and may, therefore, damage health.

Americium-241 is an example of an atom that decays via alpha particles, and it is used in smoke detectors across the world.

Beta radiation

In beta radiation, the nuclei release smaller particles (electrons) that are more penetrating than alpha particles and can pass through e.g., 1-2 centimetres of water, depending on their energy. In general, a sheet of aluminium a few millimetres thick can stop beta radiation.

Some of the unstable atoms that emit beta radiation include hydrogen-3 (tritium) and carbon-14. Tritium is used, among others, in emergency lights to for instance mark exits in the dark. This is because the beta radiation from tritium cause phosphor material to glow when the radiation interacts, without electricity. Carbon-14 is used to, for example, date objects from the past.

Gamma rays

Gamma rays, which have various applications, such as cancer treatment, are electromagnetic radiation, similar to X-rays. Some gamma rays pass right through the human body without causing harm, while others are absorbed by the body and may cause damage. The intensity of gamma rays can be reduced to levels that pose less risk by thick walls of concrete or lead. This is why the walls of radiotherapy treatment rooms in hospitals for cancer patients are so thick.

Neutrons

Neutrons are relatively massive particles that are one of the primary constituents of the nucleus. They are uncharged and therefore do not produce ionization directly. But their interaction with the atoms of matter can give rise to alpha-, beta-, gamma- or X-rays, which then result in ionization. Neutrons are penetrating and can be stopped only by thick masses of concrete, water or paraffin.

Neutrons can be produced in a number of ways, for example in nuclear reactors or in nuclear reactions initiated by high-energy particles in accelerator beams. Neutrons can represent a significant source of indirectly ionizing radiation.

What is the role of the IAEA?

The IAEA assists its Member States in the use of nuclear technologies, including the use of radiation, for health, agriculture, environmental protection, water management, energy, and industry. To do so, the IAEA assists in the research and development of the practical use of radiation and radioactive sources, and coordinates research activities and implements projects in countries around the world.

Through its safeguards and verification activities, the IAEA oversees that materials capable of producing radiation are not diverted from peaceful uses.

Finally, the IAEA develops safety standards and security guidance and report on best practices for the protection of people, society and the environment from the harmful effects of ionizing radiation.

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Andrea Galindo, IAEA Office of Public Information and Communication Radiation is energy that moves from one place to another in a form that can be described as waves or particles. We are exposed to radiation in our everyday life.

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Whether it's powering a flying DeLorean or helping us break free from our dependence on fossil fuels, the concept of nuclear fusion has long seemed futuristic and unattainable. Now, this future is finally coming into sharp relief in light of a new report from the National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

According to the report published Wednesday in the journal Nature, nuclear scientists from NIF have proven through four experiments that it is possible to achieve burning plasma - a crucial milestone along the journey to full nuclear fusion.

Omar Hurricane is a co-author on this paper and chief scientist for the Inertial Confinement Fusion Program at Livermore National Lab. He says that these experiments are a technical triumph that brings nuclear physics one step closer to recreating the kind of sustained nuclear fusion that burns inside the heart of a star.

"These papers report on the first experiments to surpass this burning plasma threshold," Hurricane tells Inverse. "The physical conditions required to generate a burning plasma are extreme, and it requires very precise control to make it happen ... enabling the potential for rapidly increasing fusion performance."

Here's the background - When you think of nuclear energy, it probably brings to mind images of conical smoke stakes reminiscent of Homer Simpson's boring desk job. This kind of nuclear energy is called "fission." It happens when atomic nuclei - the center of atoms - are broken apart to release energy bursts that create electricity by powering steam. While nuclear fission is a greener alternative to oil and coal, it has often faced criticism over mismanagement of aging facilities (think the Chernobyl meltdown) and the toxic waste it leaves behind.

On the other hand, nuclear fusion has a much cleaner public persona. By smashing light nuclei together to create one heavy one (e.g., two hydrogen atoms creating one helium atom), nuclear fusion could create clean, self-sustaining, and waste-free energy. In a world of clean energy sources that struggle to generate power on cloudy or still days, an autonomous energy source could be huge.

This simulated view of the processes happening in the NIF chamber looks a little like Tron. Just a little. LLNL

The big catch, though, is that nuclear fusion is not only incredibly difficult to do but even measuring crucial milestones - like burning plasma - presents a challenge, says Hurricane.

"For fusion plasma to be able to produce more energy than was used to create it... it must first be able to heat itself ('self-heating') by retaining some of the energy generated during fusion," explains Hurricane. "The threshold at which the fusion plasma self-heating just exceeds the external sources of heating applied to make it is what we call a 'burning plasma'."

"[However,] a burning plasma has no obvious data signature, so we use data inferences to understand if the energy balance in our plasma has shifted into a burning state or not," he continues.

This uncertainty can mean that making the call of whether or not their experiments have really achieved burning plasma is difficult, but Hurricane says that the team is confident in their new paper that they have finally done it.

Why it matters - Achieving burning plasma doesn't mean that fusion energy is coming to our homes anytime soon, but it does represent a big step toward this goal.

Alex Zylstra is the first author on the new paper and an experimental physicist at Livermore National Lab. He says that this work will bring fusion research even closer to its goal of clean, self-sustaining energy.

"The dream of fusion is that it can provide a carbon-free, safe, and reliable source of energy," Zylstra tells Inverse. "Creating a burning plasma is a clear milestone on the way towards demonstrating energy production from fusion that would be relevant for power production."

This 2014 photo shows the fuel capsule for hohlraum experiments in a container. Eduard Dewald / LLNL

What they did - As for how you go about creating nuclear fusion in a lab on Earth, here's what the team did:

A spherical capsule of deuterium-tritium fuel (which can be created in part from seawater) is placed in a hollow container called a hohlraum

In a process "indirect drive inertial confinement" fusion, 192 lasers are pointed at the hohlraum to generate x-rays

These x-rays heat the fuel capsule and hohlraum such that the fuel capsule compresses thousands of times its original volume in only a fraction of a second

In the recent paper, the team describes four experiments that followed this technique, and Hurricane says that by measuring the energy balance in the plasma, they were able to determine an energy yield of up to 170 kilojoules of energy. While this doesn't yet surpass the amount of energy put into generating the reaction, it was many times greater than previous experiments.

What's next - As science is never written in stone, the authors note that these recent results described in Nature have already been surpassed this August by another experiment of the same type at NIF. While the team published a press release on these results in 2021, Hurricane says the team is writing the paper on this result as we speak.

Ultimately, the results in this and the forthcoming paper are evidence that self-sustaining nuclear fusion is no longer a thing of science fiction. That said, your fusion-powered car may still have to wait.

"Our current focus is on the science - NIF is an experimental facility and not geared towards power production," says Zylstra.

Abstract -Obtaining a burning plasma is a critical step towards self-sustaining fusion energy. A burning plasma is one in which the fusion reactions themselves are the primary source of heating in the plasma, which is necessary to sustain and propagate the burn, enabling high energy gain. After decades of fusion research, here we achieve a burning-plasma state in the laboratory. These experiments were conducted at the US National Ignition Facility, a laser facility delivering up to 1.9 megajoules of energy in pulses with peak powers up to 500 terawatts. We use the lasers to generate X-rays in a radiation cavity to indirectly drive a fuel-containing capsule via the X-ray ablation pressure, which results in the implosion process compressing and heating the fuel via mechanical work. The burning-plasma state was created using a strategy to increase the spatial scale of the capsule through two different implosion concepts. These experiments show fusion self-heating in excess of the mechanical work injected into the implosions, satisfying several burning-plasma metrics. Additionally, we describe a subset of experiments that appear to have crossed the static self-heating boundary, where fusion heating surpasses the energy losses from radiation and conduction. These results provide an opportunity to study α-particle-dominated plasmas and burning-plasma physics in the laboratory.

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New discovery puts nuclear physicists closer to creating sustained fusion

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Whether it's powering a flying DeLorean or helping us break free from our dependence on fossil fuels, the concept of nuclear fusion has long seemed futuristic and unattainable. Now, this future is finally coming into sharp relief in light of a new report from the National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

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https://www.unanca.org/our-work/issues/international-law

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Researchers from the University of Tsukuba find that soil decontamination efforts in Fukushima result in constant, high levels of suspended sediments and a rapid decline in radiocesium particles, and that rapid vegetation recovery reduces the duration of unsustainable turbidity effects.

The effects of increased sediment load in rivers during the recovery phase after a nuclear accident are a key consideration in decontamination efforts. Researchers from Japan have discovered that with some planning, unsustainable effects from these efforts could be mitigated.

In a study published this month in Nature Sustainability, a research group led by the University of Tsukuba has revealed that although the initial effects of increased sediment load in rivers caused by the Fukushima decontamination efforts were unsustainable, several factors worked in the region's favor to reduce these effects.

On 11 March 2011, the nuclear accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in Japan released a large amount of radiocesium into the landscape, resulting in long-term radioactive contamination of large nearby water catchments. Mechanical decontamination, used to recover contaminated regions such as Chernobyl, was conducted by the Japanese government at Fukushima in the year following the accident.

"Previously, the focus has mostly been directed at understanding on-site decontamination effects and issues caused by the resuspension of atmospheric particles," says corresponding author of the study, Professor Yuichi Onda. "Not much was known about whether these disturbances have long-term, secondary effects on downstream catchments."

To investigate these effects, the researchers conducted a comprehensive impact assessment. They found that the potential for regional erosion increased during the decontamination phase, but declined in the following revegetation stage. The suspended sediment level increased by just over 237% in 2016 compared with 2013. Modeling indicated that the slow increase in sediment from decontaminated areas resulted in a rapid decline in particulate radiocesium, but that there were no significant changes in radiocesium discharge downstream after decontamination.

However, because constant, high levels of turbidity (the measure of water cloudiness or haziness) in rivers affects water use by local residents and the structure of regional aquatic food chains, the unsustainable downstream effects caused by upstream decontamination are of major importance. Vegetation recovery following land development depends considerably on local conditions; both Fukushima's high rainfall level and the soil used for decontamination enabled fast vegetation recovery, shortening the duration of such effects.

"Our results showed that mechanical decontamination upstream caused continuous high levels of suspended sediment downstream, but with reduced radiocesium concentrations, and that quick vegetation recovery can reduce how long these unsustainable effects persist for," says Professor Onda.

This study highlights the need for future remediation projects to include measures such as a pre-assessment of the natural restoration capacity of local landscapes and, where necessary, the addition of suitable revegetation steps in catchment regulatory frameworks, which would reduce the effects of long-term decontamination activities on downstream environments.

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soil types; endangered animals; agriculture and food; quantum physics; virtual environment; physics; water; global warming; el nino and la nina

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Suspended sediment reduced by rapid revegetation after Fukushima decontamination

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Researchers have found that soil decontamination efforts following the Fukushima nuclear accident resulted in constant, high levels of suspended river sediment downstream, but a rapid decrease in the amount of particulate radiocesium. Additionally, the rapid recovery of vegetation reduced the duration of unsustainable sediment effects.

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Understanding the Global Rise of Authoritarianism

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National security analyst and veteran podcaster Ben Rhodes joins Michael McFaul on World Class to discuss his new book, After the Fall: Being American in the World We've Made, and the reasons nationalism and authoritarianism are on the rise across the globe.

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Democracy Report

Introduction

As in previous years, the BTI 2022 has identified considerable regression worldwide with regard to transformation processes. The guiding principles of democracy and the market economy have been subjected to intense pressure and are being challenged by corrupt elites, illiberal populism and authoritarian rule. For the first time, the Transformation Index lists more authoritarian states than democratic states. At no time in the last 20 years has the BTI assessed levels of socioeconomic development and economic performance as being so low. The quality of government performance has also continued to decline, particularly with respect to the consensus-related aspects of governance.

While this new low results in part from the coronavirus crisis affecting the entire world, it also represents a continuation of long-standing global trends. Due to the high number of infections and deaths around the world, the severe strain on health care systems and national budgets, and the additional challenges to good governance, the COVID-19 pandemic has represented an extreme stress test and left an indelible mark on the second half of the review period.

In response to the pandemic, nearly all countries restricted fundamental democratic rights, and most had to make elemental adaptations to their governance mechanisms as a part of their crisis management policies. Although to a much lesser extent than initially feared, measures intended to limit the spread of the virus - such as bans on public assemblies, controls on information, or the assumption of emergency powers - have in some cases provided autocracies, in particular, with a welcome pretext for curtailing civil liberties further and concentrating power in the executive. The BTI's individual country reports also show that pre-existing governance deficits led to poor crisis management as governments sought to respond to the pandemic.

In this regard, the pandemic-related setbacks have only reinforced the previous decade's negative developments and problems. While these current declines in political transformation (globally, an average decline of 0.13 points on the 10-point BTI scale) are not insignificant given the high level of aggregation, they are not in themselves dire. Rather, their alarming character comes from the fact that they are only the latest dip in a persistently downward course marked by steadily growing polarization and repression.

The erosion of democracy continues

The scale of this continuing deterioration can be seen in the progressive erosion of the quality of democracy in many countries. The ongoing curtailment of political freedoms and the undermining of rule-of-law standards represent genuine societal setbacks, but they also make it more difficult for positive corrections to be made. By deliberately weakening the separation of powers and reducing the scope for political activity, democratically elected heads of government with authoritarian tendencies are better able to hold on to power. Conversely, opposition parties, minorities and civil society groups critical of the regime in power have less breathing room and fewer institutional safeguards available for redemocratization efforts. The path along this slippery slope often begins with an insufficiently consolidated rule of law. Once set in motion in this way, the erosion of democracy has often proved hard to reverse.

Over the past decade, nearly one in five democracies has experienced a steady decline in its quality of democracy. This group even encompasses countries that were still classified as stable democracies in consolidation in the BTI 2012, including Brazil, Bulgaria, Hungary, India and Serbia. Since the middle of the last decade, Poland has been in this group, as well. These six countries have all lost more than a full point on the overall 10-point BTI political transformation scale and are now classified as defective democracies. In terms of the party-political spectrum, their governments range from conservative to nationalist and are right-wing populist to varying degrees.

The populist claim to be the sole representative of the people inevitably entails a delegitimization of any opposition. The narrative invoked by this kind of rule therefore requires that populists deliberately set themselves apart from former elites, and it often presupposes discrimination against ethnic or cultural minorities as well as the intent to polarize society. The Hungarian model pursued since the 2010s has demonstrated the authoritarian and avowedly illiberal consequences of this kind of confrontational policy, which is designed to strengthen the executive. In order to implement without hindrance the will of the people - as defined by policymakers themselves - Hungary's government has systematically weakened independent oversight bodies, such as the judiciary and other regulatory authorities. At the same time, it has infringed on opposition forces' freedom of expression and suppressed political participation by enacting a restrictive press law, centralizing and exerting control over the media, and limiting the right to demonstrate, the freedom of association, and the fairness of elections. Amendments permanently enshrining aspects of the ruling party's policies in the constitution have rounded off this authoritarian drift.

In East-Central and Southeast Europe, Serbia and Bulgaria suffered the greatest declines during the current assessment period with regard to political transformation owing to a further weakening of the separation of powers and the lack of protection afforded to democratic institutions. In Serbia, parliamentary, provincial and local elections held in 2020 were marked by numerous irregularities, while the risks associated with the COVID-19 pandemic were high and turnout rates correspondingly low. Since the main opposition parties boycotted the elections, Serbia has a parliament without a real opposition for the first time in its democratic history. In Bulgaria, the government inhibited the freedom of association, especially for the Macedonian minority. Moreover, the separation of powers was undermined in part by a politicized judiciary that failed to punish abuse of office consistently. Hungary, with its further curtailments of political participation rights, and Poland, with its increasing erosion of the rule of law, have continued their authoritarian drift. Passed in March 2020, the Hungarian law establishing a state of emergency in response to the spread of COVID-19 allowed for governance by decree without parliamentary approval. In so doing, it was probably the most extreme example among the democracies of an executive exploiting the pandemic to concentrate power further in itself.

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro's aggressive right-wing populism has perpetuated the political polarization that has defined the country in recent years. The president has sought to reverse past emancipatory and social-policy advances in the interests of his clientele of evangelicals, social conservatives and business lobbyists. While Bolsonaro's overtly anti-democratic aspirations have been kept within bounds by an independent judiciary and a strong civil society, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has in contrast been able to pursue his Hindu nationalist course relatively unhindered, resulting in a deterioration of 0.95 points relative to the BTI 2020, the largest such decline in the current edition. According to the BTI country report, India's democracy currently stands at a tipping point. Modi's re-election in 2019 gave his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) an absolute majority of seats in India's lower house of parliament. Since then, the country's Muslim minority has faced increasing marginalization and discrimination, and the government has acted to stifle dissent and criticism while further curtailing press freedom.

There has been no positive counterweight over the last 10 years to the clear downward political trend shown by democracies formerly in consolidation. In the last decade, only one country, Bhutan (+2.25), has shown a continuous and clear upward political trend, as was recently reflected in a peaceful change of governing party following its democratization. With a score of 7.05, it has now reached the same level of political transformation as Brazil, though it still remains a defective democracy. The same is true of the other three countries - Armenia (+1.50), Sri Lanka (+1.37) and Tunisia (+2.70) - that have undergone a lasting regime change from autocracy to democracy within the last 10 years and consequently also rank among the decade's biggest gainers. Moreover, the quality of democracy in these latter three countries has again declined somewhat over the past two years. In Armenia, this was due to war-related restrictions on press freedom; in Sri Lanka, to a strengthening of the ethno-nationalist executive at the expense of the separation of powers; and, in Tunisia, to a state of emergency decreed by the president in the summer of 2021 (i.e., after the end of the review period) that at least temporarily disempowered the parliament.

None of the developments in these countries are irreversible, and countries such as Ghana and Romania have shown that temporary slumps in democratic quality can be followed by renewed phases of consolidation. Bulgaria, for example, elected a new government after the end of the review period to replace a corrupt conservative government that had been isolated after mass protests. The new government committed itself to social reforms and a strict anti-corruption policy.

It is also worth noting that 14 democracies have been consistently classified as consolidating and stable over the past 20 year in addition to being able to maintain their high level of democracy despite myriad transformation challenges. This group includes: Botswana and Mauritius in Africa; South Korea and Taiwan in Asia; Chile, Costa Rica and Uruguay in Latin America; Jamaica in the Caribbean; and, finally, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia and Slovenia in Europe.

Nevertheless, both the short- and long-term trends are negative even when looking solely at the more advanced democracies, and both become even more pronounced when the defective democracies are also factored in, many of which have ended up under authoritarian rule after a long downward trend. Of the 39 defective democracies listed by the BTI a decade ago, more than a third are classified in the BTI 2022 as highly defective democracies or moderate autocracies. Niger (-0.70 in comparison to the BTI 2012) is representative of a number of African states that have had to cope with exceptionally difficult transformation challenges, such as extreme poverty, rapid population growth, a sharp rise in the incidence of natural disasters and extreme weather events, and intensifying ethno-religious conflicts. Political participation rights in Niger have been severely curtailed by authoritarian backsliding over the past decade. Nevertheless, unlike many states in its regional neighborhood, the country has managed to maintain at least a highly defective democratic system and seen fairly peaceful transfers of power following elections. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Lebanon (- 0.80 points each), Mexico and the Philippines (-1.00 each) also fall into the category of highly defective democracies. In Bosnia and Herzegovina and Lebanon, institutional blockades have resulted from an intra-elite struggle over the distribution of sinecures and political influence. In Mexico and the Philippines, organized drug crime and the exceedingly brutal fight against gang activities have undermined the quality of democracy, especially the freedoms of assembly and the press. In both countries, the separation of powers has been impaired by a concentration of power in the executive branch.

Rising number of autocracies

Nine defective and six highly defective democracies have undergone such pronounced regressive tendencies over the last decade that they must now be classified as moderate autocracies. Turkey, which was classified as an autocracy for the first time in the BTI 2020, can be regarded as prototypical of this decline. At the beginning of the last decade, the country was still being lauded as a positive example of the compatibility of Islamism and democracy, and it had distinguished itself with continuously rising rule-of-law standards, particularly with regard to the separation of powers. However, beginning in 2013, the AKP-led government under Recep Tayyip Erdoğan reacted sensitively and with mounting repression to civil society criticism of Erdoğan's increasingly patriarchal leadership style and the country's creeping Islamization. The failed coup attempt of 2016 was then used to legitimize the transformation into a presidential republic, a shift that undermined the separation of powers and severely curtailed a significant body of political participation rights. Over the last two years, following the lifting of the state of emergency, a number of the decrees restricting fundamental rights and granting extraordinary powers to the executive have been incorporated into regular law. President Erdoğan has exploited a populist nationalism to polarize the country and inflamed sentiment against the Kurdish minority, in particular, but also against secular reform forces. With a decline of 2.85 points, Turkey's overall political transformation score has fallen further than that of any other country surveyed in the BTI over the last 10 years.

The regional focal points of these long-term autocratization trends are in Central America, which is plagued by corruption and drug-related crime, and sub-Saharan Africa, which is politically unstable and faces major obstacles to transformation. In Central America, corrupt and status-securing elites in Guatemala (-1.45 over the last decade), Honduras (-1.98) and Nicaragua (-2.10) continued to dismantle the last remaining vestiges of the rule of law and participatory politics, thereby finally eliminating democratic accountability. In Kenya (-1.43), Burundi (-1.60), Uganda (-1.85) and Mozambique (-1.97), political systems characterized by long-standing cults of personality or single-party dominance have proved susceptible to a creeping rollback of democratic processes. Among those still resisting these backward political steps have been Ecuador, a former highly defective democracy that has once again stabilized after overcoming the left-wing populist authoritarian tendencies prevailing under Rafael Correa, as well as Burkina Faso and Malaysia, which have both reached the level of highly defective democracy but remain vulnerable to autocratization.

Seven countries, all in sub-Saharan Africa, are newly classified as autocracies in the BTI 2022. This group is made up of Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea, Madagascar, Mali, Nigeria, Tanzania and Zambia. For the first time, the BTI now identifies more autocracies than democracies. The index lists 67 democratic governments and 70 autocratic regimes, a clear reversal of the ratio seen in the BTI 2020 (74-to-63).

The seven new autocracies are representative of a creeping erosion of respect for democratic institutions and rights across large parts of the African continent. For the most part, this has been evident in a growing concentration of power in executives. After initially curtailing the rule of law, governments have reacted to protests against corruption and abuses of power and then ultimately encroached further on civil rights and political freedoms. Disregard for presidential term limits has also increased significantly. In Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea, Mali, Nigeria and Tanzania, contested and manipulated elections have furthered authoritarian regression. Madagascar, Tanzania and Zambia, in particular, have seen their democratic institutions erode due to a progressive weakening of the separation of powers.

Here, too, it should be emphasized that the negative trend being outlined is reversible. For example, following the end of the review period, opposition parties won presidential elections in Honduras and Zambia, and a possibly more reform-oriented former vice president took over the presidency in Tanzania. These events hold out hope that the course of autocratization in each of these three countries can be reversed.

Efficiency versus democracy

At the same time, the last 10 years have seen not only a significant drop in the overall number of democracies, but also a decline in the stability and quality of those that have remained. In recent years, this has frequently been associated with rhetorical attempts to portray efficient governance and democratic processes as being incompatible or at least conflicting goals. In some defective and highly defective democracies, political liberties and rule-of-law achievements have been willingly abandoned in favor of a more paternalistic bureaucratic authoritarianism, though to different degrees and with varying intensities. In these countries, government leaders without an obvious ideological agenda, and sometimes with strong popular support, have positioned themselves aggressively against existing democratic institutions and processes, which they describe as inefficient, corrupt or obstructive.

During the period under review, this was most evident in Benin (-0.85 relative to the BTI 2020), where a reform of the electoral code initiated by President Patrice Talon in 2018 was justified as a means of eliminating the party-system fragmentation that had brought policymaking to a standstill. However, in the end, the new law was heavily biased toward the governing party, as it made it more difficult for parties to win approval to participate in elections and set a high hurdle (10% of the vote) as the threshold for gaining seats in parliament. Opposition parties subsequently boycotted the 2019 parliamentary elections, leaving Talon with a parliament entirely loyal to his government. Promising opposition candidates were excluded from the April 2021 presidential election, and some left the country altogether. Talon won a second term with 86% of the vote despite originally announcing he would govern for only a single term. However, the voter turnout rate was low.

In El Salvador (- 0.50), President Nayib Bukele was elected in 2019 as an alternative to the entrenched polarization between the parties on the left and right that had ruled the country since the end of the civil war. His governing style is characterized by impulsiveness and a disdain for constitutional procedures. This was well illustrated in February 2020, when the military occupied the parliament after lawmakers refused to allow Bukele's government to take out a loan to better equip the police and military in the fight against armed gangs. Nonetheless, frustrated with established parties that had failed to reduce the country's severe social inequality and high crime rates, voters rewarded Bukele for his populist-authoritarian course by giving his party a two-thirds majority in the February 2021 parliamentary elections. This allowed Bukele to replace the members of the Constitutional Court and appoint a new attorney general in May 2021, among other steps.

In the Philippines (-0.35), President Rodrigo Duterte, who has held office since mid-2016, presents himself as a determined opponent of corruption and drug-related crime while continuing to enjoy high popular approval ratings and to hold a clear majority in both houses of parliament. This support has persisted despite his militarization of politics, intimidation of opposition figures and government critics, extrajudicial killings of drug dealers, publicly expressed contempt for and violation of political freedoms and human rights, and cooperation with influential family clans. The government took a highly repressive approach in its response to the pandemic, arresting tens of thousands for quarantine violations. In addition, Duterte signed a new anti-terrorism law that gives the government broad powers to suppress criticism, restrict basic civil liberties and arrest people based simply on suspicion of being involved in terrorism-related activities.

Finally, in Tunisia, following the end of the BTI review period, President Kais Saied dismissed the government and suspended parliament in July 2021, controversially justifying his actions by pointing to powers outlined in the country's state-of-emergency regulations. In doing so, he clearly took sides against the Islamist Ennahda party, the strongest faction in the country's domestic political disputes. Nonetheless, since the various factions had for years been unable to agree on an appropriate composition for the Constitutional Court or an effective approach to fighting corruption, he was able to present these measures as a nonpartisan step geared toward overcoming institutional deadlock. The president's unilateral assumption of greater power was welcomed by significant segments of the Tunisian population owing in large part to widespread public disenchantment with years of political paralysis.

All these examples illustrate that after years or decades of cronyism and mismanagement, many countries' populations are desperate for good governance. In some cases, they seem to discount the question of whether this is to be realized through democratic mechanisms or by weakening the separation of powers and fundamental rights. This conclusion is given further weight by the fact that public approval of democratic institutions and processes in the 57 countries classified as democracies in both the BTI 2012 and the BTI 2022 has declined by an average of about half a point over the past decade. The acceptance of and commitment to democratic institutions among policymakers also declined over the same period in these 57 countries, and to an even greater extent (-0.65). By employing political rhetoric that calls for cutting the Gordian knot of institutional deadlock and elitist hostility to reform rather than untying it democratically, many democratically legitimized heads of government have begun drawing from the authoritarian playbook, by emphasizing the advantages of effective state-led action as compared to the lack of resolve in politically fractured democracies.

More repression and civil society resistance

During the review period, numerous autocracies used the pandemic and the need for firm crisis management as a pretext for tightening restrictions on civil rights and prohibiting criticism of their regimes. This manipulative instrumentalization of the coronavirus era's exigencies - resulting, for example, in the suppression of demonstrations and other critical expressions of opinion - took place both in moderate autocracies, such as Algeria, Singapore and Turkey, and hard-line autocracies, such as Cambodia, Oman and Venezuela. In consolidated and technologically advanced autocracies, such as China, increased data collection on individuals and their movements also allowed the digitally enhanced control of the citizenry to be expanded.

On the whole, however, most undemocratically governed countries had already undergone their most radical autocratization push before the BTI 2022 review period, with many authoritarian regimes intensifying repression and curtailing rights in the middle of the last decade in response to the Arab Spring or the Euromaidan protests, among other factors. In the 50 countries classified as autocracies in both the BTI 2012 and the BTI 2022, the freedoms of assembly and association (-0.64 each) and the protections afforded to civil rights (-0.50) have been severely curtailed over the last 10 years, with the already-narrow spaces allowed for civil society activity also being progressively circumscribed.

During the current review period, the most significant political regressions among autocracies were seen among the regimes that met extensive mass protests with the harshest repression. In Belarus, President Alexander Lukashenko responded with unprecedented violence to the protest movement that emerged in reaction to the rigged presidential election of August 2020. Hundreds of people were injured, numerous demonstrators were killed, and the government systematically engaged in the torture of political prisoners. In Nicaragua, President Daniel Ortega brutally suppressed mass demonstrations in April 2018 and has continued his very repressive policy against protests since then. His government has intensified its crackdown on civil society and the free press by revoking the legal registration of NGOs, closing media outlets, arresting journalists and ending the mandates of several international human rights organizations. Both regimes are following the Syrian and Venezuelan example of riding out overwhelming mass protests while discrediting and brutally suppressing them as the opportunity arises. In Haiti, one of the nine failing states identified in the BTI 2022, President Jovenel Moïse has restricted civil rights, ruled by decree without an elected parliament and after having largely sidelined the judiciary, and supported gang leaders who now control parts of the capital and other areas of the country. Moïse was assassinated in July 2021, after the end of the BTI review period.

Even if the overall decline in political transformation scores was not as significant over the last two years as it had been in previous periods, it has become even more difficult in many authoritarian-governed countries to protest against political subjection, corruption and mismanagement. Remaining opportunities for participation have been curtailed, civil society spaces have been further constricted, and regime critics have been subjected to harsh repression - all to such an increasing extent that a near third of the countries surveyed by the BTI must now be classified as hard-line autocracies.

Given these circumstances, the fact that interest groups' organizational capacities, representativeness and willingness to cooperate have bucked the generally negative political trend of recent years is a welcome finding. The same holds true regarding the extent of trust and self-organizational capacity that contribute to civil society's social capital. These gains have been evident within democracies and autocracies alike. Civil societies often represent the last and most tenacious bastion of resistance against autocratization, sometimes at the cost of great sacrifice, as was seen in Belarus, Myanmar and Sudan. Citizens have vehemently called for overdue societal reforms, whether this be for greater social inclusion and representativeness in Chile or consistent adherence to the peace agreement in Colombia. They have successfully denounced corruption and office abuse and been able to herald political change in Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Romania and Slovakia, among other countries. During the pandemic era, they have often filled gaps left by a lack of state services in the health sector or in the care of socially disadvantaged groups, as has been the case in the Czech Republic, Poland and Ukraine.

Tellingly, these activities often intensify at a time when the local country's government is reducing or actively obstructing civil society participation in decision-making processes. In Sudan, the sit-in that stretched from April to June 2019 was a historic event that demonstrated solidarity and trust among citizens. Before its violent dispersal, demonstrators were brought together by the goal of making the revolution a success, but they also shared food, shelter and medical supplies among themselves. In Belarus, civil society forces continued to find new, innovative ways to network and use the internet to organize against electoral fraud and for peaceful protest. They also set up online platforms for social services and counseling in addition to collecting crowdsourced donations to cover hospital bills, drawing on civil society solidarity to counter the state's disregard for the impacts of COVID-19. In Lebanon, the social protest movement of 2019 and 2020 featured a high degree of cooperation across sectarian lines, which was in remarkable contrast to the confessionally delineated patterns of patronage and corruption among the political elite. Demonstrators commemorated victims of the regime's violence in various ways; for example, in October 2019, they formed a chain of tens of thousands of people stretching from the country's north to south to demonstrate solidarity and national unity.

Political disenfranchisement, corruption and social exclusion have fueled protests around the world. For example, for the period between January 2019 and January 2021, the Global Protest Tracker recorded a total of 126 major protests in 72 of the 137 countries analyzed by the BTI. On the one hand, the high number of protests testifies to civil society's continuing ability to mobilize even under repressive circumstances. On the other hand, it is also an expression of the lack of responsiveness on the part of governments as well as a lack of institutional channels of mediation and weak structures of representation.

Polarization and rising conflict intensity

Socioeconomic disruptions exacerbated by the pandemic have contributed to the weakening of social cohesion in several ways in recent years. First, in the majority of the countries analyzed by the BTI, social exclusion and a broad lack of economic prospects have become perpetual features of the social landscape, and there are no signs that the political and economic elites are making any credible effort to bring about a change in the status quo. Second, despite rapidly rising inequality levels, many countries had managed over the past decade to significantly reduce their poverty rates. However, these poverty-reduction gains are now in danger of being wiped out as a direct result of the pandemic's effects. Third, this negative economic dynamic means that significant portions of the population are at risk of renewed social decline, whether through relegation to the informal sector, the loss of an already precarious foothold in the lower middle class, or a regression into absolute poverty.

Lasting social marginalization undermines people's faith in the prospects for overall societal development while diminishing their confidence in the government's competence and increasing their skepticism that those in positions of political responsibility intend to engage in reforms. By increasing economic need, this marginalization also pushes people to turn to alternative care infrastructures based on families or other identity-based groups. This does not necessarily call into question the legitimacy of the state, but rather its capacity to engage in reform and provide its population with the services it needs. As a result, socioeconomic exclusion contributes to a greater turn toward particularistic, non-state forms of organization as well as toward ethnic, religious or clan-based identities. This can lead to political destabilization in some cases, as has been particularly evident in the failing states of Libya and Yemen, for example, as well as in fragile Nigeria.

On the other hand, the promotion of specific dominant identity-based interests has increasingly been used to legitimize rule, with religiously based patterns of polarization playing a particularly important role. In Myanmar, after the close of the review period, ultranationalist Buddhists supported the military's coup. The regimes in Hungary, India and Turkey, in particular, have instrumentalized identity politics in a polarizing way. The right-wing populist course taken by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán explicitly derives its national- conservative, minority-excluding character from the country's Christian culture. In India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Hindu nationalism is undermining the pluralistic and secular foundation of the multiethnic state in addition to exacerbating conflicts with the Muslim minority using ethnocentric measures, such as the new citizenship and immigration law and the abolishment of Kashmir's autonomous status. And Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's authoritarian Islamism is directed against the followers of the Gülen movement, who have been declared enemies of the state, as well as the Kurdish minority. Overall, the influence of religious dogmas on legal systems and political institutions has declined in only 11 countries over the past decade while increasing in 54 countries.

Given these increasingly identity-based, polarizing and exclusionary trends, the intensity of conflict has risen significantly in many countries. This is less true at the level of full-scale armed conflicts, such as war or civil war. Granted, among the 128 countries surveyed continuously since the BTI 2012, the number of states engaged in such all-out fighting has increased from 12 to 16. In the current study, this was particularly evident in Ethiopia, where growing ethno-political tensions broke out into open civil war, leading to large numbers of fatalities.

However, a much larger share of the overall rise in global conflict intensity can be attributed to the fact that violent acts have become a part of the political environment in a growing number of countries. The group to which this applies has increased from 71 countries a decade ago to 82 today. On the one hand, rifts between societal groups, drawn along ethnic, religious or other social dividing lines, have deepened. On the other, an increasing number of discredited dictators are using their state security apparatuses to engage in brutal repression and hold on to power at all costs even in the face of mass demonstrations. This was the case in Belarus, for example, both during and after the review period.

Conclusion

The BTI 2022 finds evidence of a new low in terms of political and economic transformation. Poor governance has exacerbated this development. Most countries do not guarantee political participation rights and the rule of law to the extent needed to provide the population with a free and self-determined voice in the political decision-making process.

On the other hand, the results of the BTI 2022 also give some cause for hope. First, there is and for some time has been a group of stable democracies that have proved resilient in the face of crisis and demonstrated successful transformation paths. Some of these democracies, such as the Baltic states and Taiwan, are today being threatened by authoritarian powers, such as Russia and China. The goal of a values-based foreign policy should be to support them to the greatest extent possible while countering this menace with democratic solidarity.

Second, some of the authoritarian backsliding recorded in recent years appears to have been temporary. The electoral successes of opposition candidates Xiomara Castro in Honduras and Hakainde Hichilema in Zambia following the end of the BTI review period open up the prospect of redemocratization, as does the assumption of office by Tanzania's new president, Samia Suluhu Hassan. Developments in East-Central and Southeast Europe are also positive, as Bulgaria and the Czech Republic - following similar reversals in Northern Macedonia, Romania and Slovakia - have proved able to halt the right-wing and authoritarian trend with the election of more liberal governments. Developing countries with prospects of democratization need international support, and this should be provided by a values-based foreign policy. Conversely, governments that undermine democratic processes, as is currently the case in Tunisia, should be resolutely condemned. Efficient governance must not be regarded as being incompatible with democratic processes. All of the BTI's findings demonstrate - and to a rather striking extent - that democracies are the more efficient governments by a wide margin.

Third, and finally, the civil society forces pushing for peaceful and democratic change even in highly repressive environments, such as Belarus, Myanmar and Sudan, are impressive in their perseverance and creativity. They have exhibited an immense amount of courage and determination, which in turn demands dedicated external advocacy and support. This calls for a values-based foreign policy that not only unequivocally condemns the ruling regimes' repressive actions, but also actively supports the civil society forces and provides them with safe haven should they fail.

The results of the BTI 2022 are undoubtedly sobering. However, rather than paralysis, the response to this should be even more foreign- and development-policy engagement. There are positive signs.

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As in previous years, the BTI 2022 has identified considerable regression worldwide with regard to transformation processes. The guiding principles of democracy and the market economy have been subjected to intense pressure and are being challenged by corrupt elites, illiberal populism and authoritarian rule.

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As a lethal pandemic, economic and physical insecurity, and violent conflict ravaged the world, democracy’s defenders sustained heavy new losses in their struggle against authoritarian foes, shifting the international balance in favor of tyranny.

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https://www.plannedparenthood.org/learn/gender-identity/sex-gender-identity/what-are-gender-roles-and-stereotypes

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Newsela | Changing the face of America: How it would look without gerrymandering

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Newsela | How the 2020 census shifted House seats and could affect 2022 midterm elections

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States that gained seats were mostly Republican-leaning. States that lost seats were mostly Democratic, but consisted of more close battleground states.

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Newsela | Stories from around the world showcase the problem of water inequality

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Lack of safe drinking water and adequate sanitation affects countries around the globe.

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Human Rights
Protection
Development
Treaty’s
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Law

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Gender roles
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* freedom
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Global population
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Disarment
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IAEA
Fukushima
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nuclear safety
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NPT
energy

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International
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Communication
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Greenhouse
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Gas
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Resources
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nuclear safety
nuclear weapons
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nuclear energy
IAEA

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Key Equality. Fairness or pairity.Potential.showing the ability to develop in the future.Achievements.Freedom.the ability to act/speak or think as one wishes without.Discrimination.the unjust/prejudice treatments of different categories of people.Feminism. The advocating of woman’s rightsEmpowerment.authority given to someone to do something.Dedication. Commitment or devotion UNIFEMViolence. Brutality or forcefulness words

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Key Equality. Fairness or pairity.Potential.showing the ability to develop in the future.Achievements.Freedom.the ability to act/speak or think as one wishes without.Discrimination.the unjust/prejudice treatments of different categories of people.Feminism. The advocating of woman’s rightsEmpowerment.authority given to someone to do something.Dedication. Commitment or devotion UNIFEMViolence. Brutality or forcefulness words

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Monkey pox, Covid 19

Health

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People

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Newsela | Instructional Content Platform

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Newsela is an Instructional Content Platform that supercharges reading engagement and learning in every subject.

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Newsela | California to tackle water scarcity by converting seawater

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That huge building project along the California coast isn't more condos, but a desalination plant 15 years in the making. It will convert seawater to drinking water, but it is not without its critics.

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Newsela | Human rights: Questions and answers

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Human rights are basic rights and freedoms that are inherent to all people, regardless of race, sex, religion, political opinion or any other status.

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On December 10, the world marks 70 years since the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Regrettably, instead of the anniversary signalling the enduring impact of human rights, some are fearing the " end of human rights." Here we highlight some of the rights challenges that captured the world's attention this year, illustrating the struggle to secure human rights is far from over.

1. Australia's first year on the UN Human Rights Council

Australia took its place on the UN Human Rights Council this year for a three-year term. Australia delivered a strong statement about Myanmar's atrocities against ethnic Rohingya Muslims, but was criticised for holding refugees and asylum seekers offshore. While Australia supported important country resolutions, it failed to take a leadership role on any key issues.

2. United States' retreat from Human Rights Council

The US faced international condemnation when it quit the Human Rights Council, calling it a "protector of human rights abusers and a cesspool of political bias." The US has long complained of the council's perceived bias against Israel. But, by withdrawing, the US decreased its options for confronting and addressing human rights violators. This increases the responsibility of governments like Australia's to ensure the council addresses the world's most serious human rights violations.

3. Violence against women

In Australia, while the #MeToo movement has spurred women to come forward with their experiences of sexual harassment and abuse, a number of high-profile cases of alleged sexual harassment by actors and politicians highlighted ongoing barriers to justice for victims. At the same time, the #countingdeadwomen femicide index reports that one woman in Australia is killed every week by an intimate partner.

4. Facebook's reckoning

Free speech, privacy and electoral integrity came under the microscope in March, when a former employee of Cambridge Analytica blew the whistle on its practice of harvesting data from millions of US Facebook users in an effort to influence the 2016 presidential elections.

Cambridge Analytica was also investigated in the UK for a possible role in the Brexit referendum.

There is also growing criticism of Facebook for not doing enough to stop its use to spread hate speech. For example, in Myanmar it has been used as a tool to incite violence against Rohingya.

5. Rohingya crisis

In August, a UN Fact Finding Mission on Myanmar, which included Australian human rights expert Chris Sidoti, delivered a scathing report detailing crimes against humanity, war crimes, sexual violence and possible genocide by Myanmar's security forces against the Rohingya.

The UN Human Rights Council, in response, created a mechanism to collect and preserve evidence to aid future prosecutions for atrocity crimes in Myanmar. Australia joined other Western nations in imposing targeted sanctions on military officers named in the UN report. While the Australian government maintains an arms embargo on Myanmar, our defense forces continue to provide training to the Myanmar military.

6. Crackdown against Turkic Muslims in Xinjiang

Turkic Muslims in China's northwestern Xinjiang region have long faced repression. In 2018, Human Rights Watch and others reported an escalation in this repression with the government detaining 1 million people in political re-education camps, with evidence of their torture and mistreatment. Muslims not detained still face pervasive controls on freedom of movement and religion. The Foreign Affairs Department revealed under parliamentary questioning that three Australians were detained in the camps.

7. Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia made international headlines when a prominent journalist, Jamal Khashoggi, was murdered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. The case prompted a closer examination of Saudi Arabia's human rights record. The country's repression, imprisonment and ill-treatment of activists includes the alleged torture of leading women's rights defenders.

In Yemen, the Saudi-led coalition has committed many violations of international humanitarian law, including apparent war crimes, killing thousands of civilians. Millions of Yemenis are confronting a famine, in part because of restrictions on aid delivery. Yet the USA, UK, France and Australia sell the Saudi government weapons and military equipment that may well contribute to its Yemen campaign.

8. Children off Nauru

Australia's government appeared to respond to the "Kids Off Nauru" campaign launched by civil society groups, medical professionals and lawyers. December figures show ten refugee children remain on the island, down from 119 children in August.

Mounting political pressure forced the government to remove children who had been transferred there in 2013 and 2014, though many were removed from Nauru only after legal proceedings were started. But the departure of families makes the situation even more desperate for the adults left behind. And those transferred to Australia are told they will not remain permanently, keeping them in limbo.

9. One year since the Uluru statement

Indigenous communities have fought hard throughout 2018 to have the federal government focus on the Uluru Statement from the Heart, after the Turnbull government dismissed it out of hand in 2017.

The statement calls for a constitutionally enshrined "First Nations Voice" in parliament and the establishment of a Makarrata Commission to supervise agreement-making between governments and First Nations, and facilitate truth-telling of First Nations' histories. These steps were seen as laying the foundation for a treaty with Australia's First Nations peoples. A 2018 parliamentary committee endorsed the need for a voice in parliament and has called for a process of co-design between indigenous people and government appointees.

10. LGBTI discrimination

One year on from the breakthrough on marriage equality, the parliamentary year ended with Australia's politicians unable to find a way to remove legislative exemptions allowing religious schools to discriminate against LGBTI pupils and teachers.

Advocates and the Labor opposition rejected government amendments that sought to stop schools being able to exclude students on the basis of their sexual orientation, gender identity, or sex characteristics, but would also allow them to enforce rules in line with their religious teachings.
Louise Chappell is director of the Australian Human Rights Institute and Professor of Law at UNSW. Elaine Pearson is the Australia director of Human Rights Watch.

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For more on this topic, see "The Basic Facts About Women in Poverty"

Introduction and summary

In America, nearly 11 million children are poor. That's 1 in 7 kids, who make up almost one-third of all people living in poverty in this country. This number should be unimaginable in one of the world's wealthiest countries, and yet child poverty has remained stubbornly high for decades Across the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, which is made up of 37 countries including Denmark, New Zealand, Spain, and the United Kingdom, the United States is consistently ranked as one of the worst in child poverty rates.

As the COVID-19 pandemic and resulting recession continue to devastate the United States, children are facing the consequences of failed leadership. Since April 2020, the share of children with at least one unemployed parent has consistently remained above reported rates during the peak of the Great Recession. More than 4 in 10 children live in a household struggling to meet basic expenses, and between 7 million and 11 million children live in households in which they are unable to eat enough because of the cost. When the pandemic forced schools to shift to distanced and virtual learning, it worsened the barriers to quality education for low-income children and pushed their parents, particularly mothers, to choose between caregiving and employment. Without serious interventions, an economic recovery will leave low-income and marginalized people-and their children-behind. Already, some calculations are finding that the child poverty rate has increased dramatically since the onset of the coronavirus crisis.

In America, nearly 11 million children are poor. That's 1 in 7 kids, who make up almost one-third of all people living in poverty in this country.

Child poverty is solvable. Some recommendations set forth in this report include:

Securing the right to basic needs for all families with reforms to food assistance, housing supports, and health care programs

Easing financial burdens through strengthened unemployment insurance, permanent paid family and medical leave, higher minimum wages, affordable child care and universal preschool, and better tax credits that cover all low-income families

Prioritizing structural reforms that address generational poverty and historic marginalization with policies that target the racial wealth gap and inequitable school systems

Basic statistics about children in poverty

Measuring poverty

America's child poverty problem is persistent and structural-and in many ways, the official statistics undercount the severity of need across the nation. The official poverty measure, as calculated by the U.S. Census Bureau, has long been criticized as narrow and outdated, in large part because it determines the resources a family needs based on a bare-bones food budget from the 1960s. It does not take into account major expenses such as housing or child care, nor does it account for geographical differences in costs of living.

Because of this recognized failure in capturing the experiences of people facing economic deprivation, another measure, known as the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM), was introduced in 2011. That measure counts resources such as nutrition benefits and housing subsidies, along with costs such as taxes and out-of-pocket medical expenses; it also determines a poverty threshold using a more diverse set of necessary expenses-not just food. The SPM isn't perfect either, but it does help show the impact that government programs can have on reducing poverty.

In 2019, 14.4 percent of all children under the age of 18 in the United States were living below the official poverty measure. About 6 percent were living in deep poverty, defined as 50 percent of the federal poverty measure, and almost one-quarter were living in poverty or at risk, defined as 150 percent of the official measure. When using the SPM, which counts noncash benefits from government programs such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and measures poverty more comprehensively, the child poverty rate in America is 12.5 percent.

Children of color across most racial categories are more likely to experience poverty than their white counterparts. (see Figure 2) Black, Hispanic, and American Indian and Alaskan Native (AIAN) children have the highest rates of poverty. And while the broader category of Asian American and Pacific Islander children have lower rates of poverty, disaggregated data from past years show that serious disparities based on ethnicity persist with significantly higher rates for Bangladeshi, Pakistani, Burmese, and Hmong children, for example.

Black, Hispanic, and AIAN children are also disproportionately represented among children living in poverty. For example, while around 14 percent of children in the United States are Black, they make up more than one-quarter of children living below the poverty line.

The poverty rate for children also differs by age, with the youngest children most likely to live under the official poverty line. (see Figure 4) Children under the age of 5 have a poverty rate of 15.5 percent, compared with 14.9 percent for children between ages 6 and 11 and 12.9 percent for those between ages 12 and 17. Those differences are due, in part, to the higher expenses associated with younger children, such as child care, and because parents tend to be earning less earlier in their careers, when their children are younger.

Child poverty rates differ greatly depending on their family structure. (see Figure 5) At a rate of 36.4 percent, more than one-third of children living in households headed by an unmarried woman live in poverty, while 6.4 percent of children in married couple households do.

The analysis: Why are so many children poor in the United States?

The causes of child poverty cannot be separated from those of adult poverty. Expenses associated with raising children are one of the many reasons that families fall into poverty, along with job losses and pay cuts, a transition from a two-parent household to a single one, and a family member developing a disability.

Factors that make it difficult for people to meet their basic needs mean their children also grow up with economic instability and deprivation. The United States does not have a comprehensive social safety net to fully shield kids from the emotional, physical, neurological, and generational impacts of such instability.

The following are just some of the reasons why the United States' poverty rate is so high.

America's economic systems are not designed to support all families

Because America's current policies do not guarantee a reasonable standard of living, a child's economic security is deeply intertwined with their caregivers' experience in the labor market. Changes in caregivers' work have largely driven changes to the child poverty rate over the past several decades.

Persistent economic inequality

Stagnant wages

If wages had increased at the same rate as broader economic productivity, more than 4 million fewer children would be in poverty in a full-employment economy.

Labor market discrimination and other economic forces

Since the early 1990s, family structure has played a much lesser role in child poverty rates than some experts claim. And in those decades, the profile of unmarried parents has shifted; parents are now more likely to be fathers raising children alone or cohabiting with a partner than in previous years, and the share of single mothers raising children without a spouse or partner now hovers at around 50 percent, compared with 88 percent in 1968.

Racist and sexist narratives such as the notable myth of the "welfare queen"-a term popularized by President Ronald Reagan to invoke white Americans' racial resentment and tie welfare to an image of undeserving Black women receiving government assistance-permeate rhetoric and perpetuate the lie that poverty is a result of personal and cultural, rather than structural, failings. However, high rates of child poverty in what the census defines as "single, female-headed households" and disproportionate rates of poverty for children of color can be attributed, in large part, to the many manifestations of racism, sexism, ableism, and other discrimination in the labor market.

Occupational segregation and the resulting wage gaps

This occupational segregation, along with other factors of discrimination, also contributes to racial and gender wage gaps. For example, Black men, on average, earned 70 cents for each dollar earned by white, non-Hispanic men in 2019; Black women earned 63 cents. Those cents compound over a lifetime, depressing savings and limiting day-to-day expenses to the detriment of those workers' children.

Lack of work-family policies to support caregivers

For caregivers, and especially solo mothers, a lack of paid leave and child care support can force people to cut back on the hours they work, leave the workforce entirely, or sacrifice necessary time with their families in order to pay the bills.

Those disparities are exacerbated by a lack of affordable child care, which is one of the biggest expenses for families today. Without better options, parents must consider working fewer hours, taking a pay cut, or leaving their jobs to ensure their children are cared for. For families in poverty, whose jobs already tend be unstable, inflexible, and inadequately compensated, the decisions surrounding child care can have dire consequences for their family budgets and potential future employment.

Unemployment

Low wages are not the sole factor perpetuating child poverty and making it difficult for families to make ends meet; other labor market factors such as unemployment play an important role as well. Losing a job is one of the leading triggers for falling into poverty. The United States' inadequate safety net for jobless people leaves millions of children vulnerable to the prolonged negative impacts of poverty. And, once again, discrimination and systemic racism built into the labor market means that Black people face persistently higher rates of unemployment than whites, contributing to racial disparities in the poverty rates among their children.

Barriers to employment

Racial and gender wealth gaps

Reaching basic living standards is tied to work

Children do not work and cannot earn their way out of poverty, but they face long-term harm because the right to having their basic needs met is not guaranteed. No child, regardless of their caregivers' experience with the labor market, should experience poverty. Yet the social safety net, in its inadequate and fragmented current form, includes burdensome work requirements, excludes those with no or very little income, and leaves jobless people and their families with few stable options.

Other structural inequities compound harm for children experiencing poverty

Such circumstances exist because economic inequality is inextricably linked to other structural inequities in incarceration, education, housing, health, and more. And those inequities are inextricably linked to America's long history of racism and discrimination, compounding barriers particularly for children of color across the country and severely limiting economic mobility.

These examples of the many structural inequities in U.S. policy underscore the need to understand child poverty as a result of lawmakers' decisions even beyond the narrow definition of the economy.

Recommendations: How to end child poverty in America

While America's disastrous child poverty rate is the result of a complicated structure of economic and social systems, the solutions to the problem are actually quite simple. Policymakers need to make sure every child has access to the basics-food, housing, and health care-and ease the financial burdens that families face when raising children. The millions of children living in poverty right now do not have the luxury of waiting for changes that can take decades to fully realize. Thus the push for more immediate assistance must be paired with a forward-thinking strategy to fix policies that promote inequality, limit economic mobility, and perpetuate marginalization.

These solutions must be available to all children and families; policy barriers based on one's involvement with the criminal justice system, immigration status, ability, and other factors only ensure that attempts to end child poverty will fail.

The following recommendations are just some of the policy solutions that can contribute to ending child poverty in the United States.

Secure the right to basic needs for all families

Strengthen food assistance programs

Programs such as SNAP and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) are fundamental in ensuring that families can afford to eat. Both programs have been tied to positive outcomes for mothers and infants, and children with access to the programs can experience significant health gains and improved long-term health, educational, and economic outcomes.

Despite the clear advantage of funding and supporting nutrition assistance programs, they have been the target of regulatory attacks and budget cuts. SNAP's current design means that it is efficient-lifting 2.5 million people out of poverty in 2019-and targeted in times of crisis, but its restrictive eligibility requirements and inadequate benefit amounts limit the program's reach. The WIC program provides nutrition assistance and support programs for more than 4.5 million infants and children, but analysis shows that less than half of all eligible children actually participate, in part due to barriers such as transportation and misconceptions about eligibility, as well as stigma around receiving benefits.

To strengthen the program to better meet the needs of all children, Congress must increase SNAP benefits to more reasonably match a household's food budget (and recognize the differing food needs depending on a child's age), eliminate restrictive asset limits, consider expansions to the goods that SNAP benefits can buy, and address barriers to participation. Lawmakers must also ensure that the WIC program is fully funded and that all of its benefits, including those beyond food assistance such as breastfeeding counseling, are available to all eligible families.

Ensure universal free meals at school

Instead of a means-tested program that can add burdens for both families and school administrators, with complicated paperwork for applications and reimbursements, lawmakers should enact a universal free lunch program at public schools and child care centers.

Fully fund the Section 8 housing voucher program to reach all eligible families

Three-quarters of very low-income families pay more than half of their incomes on rent.

Due to the program's funding structure, it only receives as much funding as Congress allocates to it each year, even if there are more eligible families than there is money. As a result, millions of low-income families are often left with limited options and impossibly long waits for a voucher to become available. Fully investing in the program so that all eligible families receive a voucher-paired with better enforcement and mechanisms against discrimination-would help millions of children live with a roof over their heads.

Ensure affordable health care for all children

The federal government must ensure that all children, no matter their household incomes, have access to comprehensive and affordable health care. Doing so would not only create better health outcomes and future opportunities for those children but would also remove a financial burden for parents.

Future changes to the health care system must ensure stable, affordable coverage for low-income children and provide early and consistent screening, diagnostic, and treatment services so that children have access to the comprehensive and preventive health services that they need.

Ease financial burdens and provide money to help families

Expand and strengthen unemployment insurance

Ensure access to permanent national paid family and medical leave and paid sick leave

Policies that support workers' health and caregiving responsibilities also protect children from economic insecurity and instability. The United States is the only industrialized country without a national paid leave program, leaving many low-wage and part-time workers-who are disproportionately women-without a viable option for paid time off in times of need.

Raise the minimum wage and eliminate subminimum wages for tipped and disabled workers

America's minimum wage has not changed in 10 years-and for longer than that time, it has not kept up with inflation, productivity, or the rising costs families face. Gradually raising the federal minimum wage to $15, as proposed in the Raise the Wage Act, would help almost 10 million parents, including 4.6 million single working parents who need a living wage to ensure financial stability for their kids. The legislation would also phase out the subminimum wage for tipped workers and workers with disabilities. According to a Congressional Budget Office analysis, more than 500,000 children would be lifted over the federal poverty line by increasing the minimum wage alone. And already, evidence from state-level minimum wage increases show that the policy can create record-breaking reductions in the child poverty rate.

Ensure affordable child care and universal preschool for all children

Investing in affordable, high-quality child care and universal preschool is a smart decision-not just for the economy and families as a whole but also as a strategy to reduce child poverty in the coming years.

Expand and strengthen child tax credits

Study after study has shown that cash transfer programs can make a big difference in alleviating poverty. These programs allow people to spend the money where it makes the most sense for their families rather than dictating how or when they can use it. The American tax code already includes a program, known as the child tax credit, to disperse payments to low-income families with children. Although it is meant to help offset the cost of raising children, the phase-in structure of the credit means it intentionally excludes the lowest-income families who stand to benefit the most.

To strengthen the child tax credit, lawmakers must pass legislation to increase the benefit and make it fully refundable, disbursed monthly rather than as a one-time lump sum, and indexed to inflation. Most importantly, they must eliminate the minimum earnings requirement to ensure that the most vulnerable children are able to receive the benefit. This would allow the credit to function much like a child allowance that offers cash benefits to families to help them raise children, a policy used in countries that have more successfully reduced child poverty such as Australia, Germany, and Canada. Changes to America's credit are essential for helping families achieve financial security and stability-and research shows that these changes alone would reduce child poverty substantially.

A supplemental young child tax credit targeting additional funds to families with kids under the age of 6-and created with the same conditions as the expanded child tax credit above-would provide support during some of a child's most formative years.

Make structural changes to address generational poverty and marginalization

Conclusion

Child poverty in America is persistent, structural, and solvable, and the COVID-19 pandemic has only made it clearer that the existing structures to address child poverty and protect children from hardship are inadequate. Policies that tie basic living standards to a narrow definition of work and exclude families with the lowest incomes only serve to exacerbate the negative impacts of living in poverty-but it doesn't have to be that way.

To ensure that all children are able to thrive, policymakers must focus on supporting children and their families by tackling inequality and discrimination in the labor market, strengthening the social safety net, and addressing structural marginalization across policy areas. The recommendations outlined in this report all tackle those goals; with political will and moral clarity, an America where no child is poor can become a reality.

Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank Taryn Williams, Alexandra Cawthorne-Gaines, Rasheed Malik, Diana Boesch, Robin Bleweis, Khalilah Harris, Thomas Waldrop, Lily Roberts, Lorena Roque, Jaboa Lake, David Ballard, and Kenny Lo for their thoughtful contributions and Kyle Ross and Justin Schweitzer for fact-checking.

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The Basic Facts About Children in Poverty

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Nearly 11 million children are living in poverty in America. Here is how the crisis reached this point-and what steps must be taken to solve it.

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Tackling climate change is a priority for us. We're working to protect fish, farms, and Washington's rivers, lakes, and coastline from the damage that rising temperatures and shifting precipitation patterns will cause. ​

Climate change describes a change in the average conditions over a long period of time. Scientists agree that the Earth has been getting warmer over the last century due to human activities that require burning fossil fuels (oil, gas, and coal).

Burning fossil fuels releases carbon dioxide. The carbon dioxide becomes trapped in the atmosphere ( greenhouse gases) and increases the planet's temperature. As the Earth's climate continues to warm the results can have big impacts on the environment.

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When people think of climate change, they often only think of day-to-day weather changes. Extreme weather events will increasingly occur if climate change is not immediately addressed. ​As humans continue to add heat-trapping greenhouse gases to the atmosphere extreme weather events will continue to wreak havoc on the environment, safety, and economy.

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Water supply

Rising temperatures due to climate change means more precipitation falls as rain rather than snow, reducing snowpack levels, and threatening water supplies for many parts of Washington. In many areas, climate change is likely to increase water demand while water supplies are shrinking. In other areas, an increase in precipitation can lead to flooding, degrading water quality and damaging communities and infrastructure.

Sea level rise

Rising sea levels are a serious consequence of climate change. On average, sea levels have swelled over eight inches since 1880, with about three of those inches gained in the past 25 years. The oceans continue to absorb heat from greenhouse gases, resulting in thermal expansion, melting glaciers, and loss of polar ice sheets. Rising waters can lead to coastal hazards such as flooding and habitat changes. Inland, saltwater can contaminate wetlands, aquifers, and agricultural soils.

Ocean acidification

When carbon pollution from human activities is absorbed by seawater, the ocean becomes more acidic. These chemical changes can threaten marine life, especially shellfish, corals, and plankton, on which larger marine life depend.

Wildfires

Over the past several decades, the world has increasingly warmed due to climate change, causing increased potential for wildfires. Snow is melting earlier in the spring leading to soils and forests that are drier, and that stay dry for longer periods of time. This leads to wildfires that can burn hotter and spread faster. These hotter and drier conditions set the stage for more human-ignited wildfires as well. If greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise we can expect more wildfires, for longer seasons, in the years ahead.

Scientific reports

Because Earth's climate is changing faster than at any point in recorded history, it is important to understand and prepare for these changes. We are tracking carbon pollution in Washington, studying its effects on the state's environment, and helping communities prepare for the impacts of climate change.

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Climate change & the environment - Washington State Department of Ecology

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Conservation Technical Assistance

Conservation Technical Assistance (CTA) provides our nation's farmers, ranchers and forestland owners with the knowledge and tools they need to conserve, maintain and restore the natural resources on their lands and improve the health of their operations for the future.

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Water Management | Natural Resources Conservation Service

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Conservation Technical Assistance (CTA) provides our nation's farmers, ranchers and forestland owners with the knowledge and tools they need to conserve, maintain and restore the natural resources on their lands and improve the health of their operations for the future.

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In February 2022, Russia launched a military offensive against Ukraine. For further information see page on Russia-Ukraine War and Nuclear Energy.

The Chernobyl accident in 1986 was the result of a flawed reactor design that was operated with inadequately trained personnel.

The resulting steam explosion and fires released at least 5% of the radioactive reactor core into the environment, with the deposition of radioactive materials in many parts of Europe.

Two Chernobyl plant workers died due to the explosion on the night of the accident, and a further 28 people died within a few weeks as a result of acute radiation syndrome.

The United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation has concluded that, apart from some 5000 thyroid cancers (resulting in 15 fatalities), "there is no evidence of a major public health impact attributable to radiation exposure 20 years after the accident."

Some 350,000 people were evacuated as a result of the accident, but resettlement of areas from which people were relocated is ongoing.

On 24 February Ukraine informed the International Atomic Energy Agency that Russian forces had taken control of all facilities at Chernobyl (see below).

On 9 March the Chernobyl nuclear plant was disconnected from the electricity grid. The IAEA stated that it did not see a critical impact on safety as a result.

The April 1986 disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine was the product of a flawed Soviet reactor design coupled with serious mistakes made by the plant operators. It was a direct consequence of Cold War isolation and the resulting lack of any safety culture.

The accident destroyed the Chernobyl 4 reactor, killing 30 operators and firemen within three months and several further deaths later. One person was killed immediately and a second died in hospital soon after as a result of injuries received. Another person is reported to have died at the time from a coronary thrombosis. Acute radiation syndrome (ARS) was originally diagnosed in 237 people onsite and involved with the clean-up and it was later confirmed in 134 cases. Of these, 28 people died as a result of ARS within a few weeks of the accident. Nineteen more workers subsequently died between 1987 and 2004, but their deaths cannot necessarily be attributed to radiation exposure. Nobody offsite suffered from acute radiation effects although a significant, but uncertain, fraction of the thyroid cancers diagnosed since the accident in patients who were children at the time are likely to be due to intake of radioactive iodine fallout. Furthermore, large areas of Belarus, Ukraine, Russia, and beyond were contaminated in varying degrees. See also sections below and Chernobyl Accident Appendix 2: Health Impacts.

The Chernobyl disaster was a unique event and the only accident in the history of commercial nuclear power where radiation-related fatalities occurred. The design of the reactor is unique and in that respect the accident is thus of little relevance to the rest of the nuclear industry outside the then Eastern Bloc. However, it led to major changes in safety culture and in industry cooperation, particularly between East and West before the end of the Soviet Union. Former President Gorbachev said that the Chernobyl accident was a more important factor in the fall of the Soviet Union than Perestroika - his program of liberal reform.

The Chernobyl site and plant

The Chernobyl Power Complex, lying about 130 km north of Kiev, Ukraine, and about 20 km south of the border with Belarus, consisted of four nuclear reactors of the RBMK-1000 design (see information page on RBMK Reactors). Units 1 and 2 were constructed between 1970 and 1977, while units 3 and 4 of the same design were completed in 1983. Two more RBMK reactors were under construction at the site at the time of the accident. To the southeast of the plant, an artificial lake of some 22 square kilometres, situated beside the river Pripyat, a tributary of the Dniepr, was constructed to provide cooling water for the reactors.

This area of Ukraine is described as Belarussian-type woodland with a low population density. About 3 km away from the reactor, in the new city, Pripyat, there were 49,000 inhabitants. The old town of Chornobyl, which had a population of 12,500, is about 15 km to the southeast of the complex. Within a 30 km radius of the power plant, the total population was between 115,000 and 135,000 at the time of the accident.

The RBMK-1000 is a Soviet-designed and built graphite moderated pressure tube type reactor, using slightly enriched (2% U-235) uranium dioxide fuel. It is a boiling light water reactor, with two loops feeding steam directly to the turbines, without an intervening heat exchanger. Water pumped to the bottom of the fuel channels boils as it progresses up the pressure tubes, producing steam which feeds two 500 MWe turbines. The water acts as a coolant and also provides the steam used to drive the turbines. The vertical pressure tubes contain the zirconium alloy clad uranium dioxide fuel around which the cooling water flows. The extensions of the fuel channels penetrate the lower plate and the cover plate of the core and are welded to each. A specially designed refuelling machine allows fuel bundles to be changed without shutting down the reactor.

The moderator, the function of which is to slow down neutrons to make them more efficient in producing fission in the fuel, is graphite, surrounding the pressure tubes. A mixture of nitrogen and helium is circulated between the graphite blocks to prevent oxidation of the graphite and to improve the transmission of the heat produced by neutron interactions in the graphite to the fuel channel. The core itself is about 7 m high and about 12 m in diameter. In each of the two loops, there are four main coolant circulating pumps, one of which is always on standby. The reactivity or power of the reactor is controlled by raising or lowering 211 control rods, which, when lowered into the moderator, absorb neutrons and reduce the fission rate. The power output of this reactor is 3200 MW thermal, or 1000 MWe. Various safety systems, such as an emergency core cooling system, were incorporated into the reactor design.

One of the most important characteristics of the RBMK reactor is that it can possess a 'positive void coefficient', where an increase in steam bubbles ('voids') is accompanied by an increase in core reactivity (see information page on RBMK Reactors). As steam production in the fuel channels increases, the neutrons that would have been absorbed by the denser water now produce increased fission in the fuel. There are other components that contribute to the overall power coefficient of reactivity, but the void coefficient is the dominant one in RBMK reactors. The void coefficient depends on the composition of the core - a new RBMK core will have a negative void coefficient. However, at the time of the accident at Chernobyl 4, the reactor's fuel burn-up, control rod configuration, and power level led to a positive void coefficient large enough to overwhelm all other influences on the power coefficient.

The 1986 Chernobyl accident

On 25 April, prior to a routine shutdown, the reactor crew at Chernobyl 4 began preparing for a test to determine how long turbines would spin and supply power to the main circulating pumps following a loss of main electrical power supply. This test had been carried out at Chernobyl the previous year, but the power from the turbine ran down too rapidly, so new voltage regulator designs were to be tested.

A series of operator actions, including the disabling of automatic shutdown mechanisms, preceded the attempted test early on 26 April. By the time that the operator moved to shut down the reactor, the reactor was in an extremely unstable condition. A peculiarity of the design of the control rods caused a dramatic power surge as they were inserted into the reactor (see Chernobyl Accident Appendix 1: Sequence of Events).

The interaction of very hot fuel with the cooling water led to fuel fragmentation along with rapid steam production and an increase in pressure. The design characteristics of the reactor were such that substantial damage to even three or four fuel assemblies would - and did - result in the destruction of the reactor. The overpressure caused the 1000 t cover plate of the reactor to become partially detached, rupturing the fuel channels and jamming all the control rods, which by that time were only halfway down. Intense steam generation then spread throughout the whole core (fed by water dumped into the core due to the rupture of the emergency cooling circuit) causing a steam explosion and releasing fission products to the atmosphere. About two to three seconds later, a second explosion threw out fragments from the fuel channels and hot graphite. There is some dispute among experts about the character of this second explosion, but it is likely to have been caused by the production of hydrogen from zirconium-steam reactions.

Two workers died as a result of these explosions. The graphite (about a quarter of the 1200 tonnes of it was estimated to have been ejected) and fuel became incandescent and started a number of fires, causing the main release of radioactivity into the environment. A total of about 14 EBq (14 x 10 ¹⁸ Bq) of radioactivity was released, over half of it being from biologically-inert noble gases.*
* The figure of 5.2 EBq is also quoted, this being "iodine-131 equivalent" - 1.8 EBq iodine and 85 PBq Cs-137 multiplied by 40 due its longevity, and ignoring the 6.5 EBq xenon-33 and some minor or short-lived nuclides.
About 200-300 tonnes of water per hour was injected into the intact half of the reactor using the auxiliary feedwater pumps but this was stopped after half a day owing to the danger of it flowing into and flooding units 1 and 2. From the second to tenth day after the accident, some 5000 tonnes of boron, dolomite, sand, clay, and lead were dropped on to the burning core by helicopter in an effort to extinguish the blaze and limit the release of radioactive particles.
The damaged Chernobyl unit 4 reactor building
The 1991 report by the State Committee on the Supervision of Safety in Industry and Nuclear Power on the root cause of the accident looked past the operator actions. It said that while it was certainly true the operators placed their reactor in a dangerously unstable condition (in fact in a condition which virtually guaranteed an accident) it was also true that in doing so they had not in fact violated a number of vital operating policies and principles, since no such policies and principles had been articulated. Additionally, the operating organization had not been made aware either of the specific vital safety significance of maintaining a minimum operating reactivity margin, or the general reactivity characteristics of the RBMK which made low power operation extremely hazardous.

Immediate impact of the Chernobyl accident

The accident caused the largest uncontrolled radioactive release into the environment ever recorded for any civilian operation, and large quantities of radioactive substances were released into the air for about 10 days. This caused serious social and economic disruption for large populations in Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine. Two radionuclides, the short-lived iodine-131 and the long-lived caesium-137, were particularly significant for the radiation dose they delivered to members of the public.

It is estimated that all of the xenon gas, about half of the iodine and caesium, and at least 5% of the remaining radioactive material in the Chernobyl 4 reactor core (which had 192 tonnes of fuel) was released in the accident. Most of the released material was deposited close by as dust and debris, but the lighter material was carried by wind over Ukraine, Belarus, Russia, and to some extent over Scandinavia and Europe.

The casualties included firefighters who attended the initial fires on the roof of the turbine building. All these were put out in a few hours, but radiation doses on the first day caused 28 deaths - six of which were firemen - by the end of July 1986. The doses received by the firefighters and power plant workers were high enough to result in acute radiation syndrome (ARS), which occurs if a person is exposed to more than 700 milligrays (mGy) within a short time frame (usually minutes). Common ARS symptoms include gastrointestinal problems ( e.g. nausea, vomiting), headaches, burns and fever. Whole body doses between 4000 mGy and 5000 mGv within a short time frame would kill 50% of those exposed, with 8000-10,000 mGy universally fatal. The doses received by the firefighters who died were estimated to range up to 20,000 mGy.

The next task was cleaning up the radioactivity at the site so that the remaining three reactors could be restarted, and the damaged reactor shielded more permanently. About 200,000 people ('liquidators') from all over the Soviet Union were involved in the recovery and clean-up during 1986 and 1987. They received high doses of radiation, averaging around 100 millisieverts (mSv). Some 20,000 liquidators received about 250 mSv, with a few receiving approximately 500 mSv. Later, the number of liquidators swelled to over 600,000, but most of these received only low radiation doses. The highest doses were received by about 1000 emergency workers and onsite personnel during the first day of the accident.

According to the most up-to-date estimate provided by the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR), the average radiation dose due to the accident received by inhabitants of 'strict radiation control' areas (population 216,000) in the years 1986 to 2005 was 31 mSv (over the 20-year period), and in the 'contaminated' areas (population 6.4 million) it averaged 9 mSv, a minor increase over the dose due to background radiation over the same period (about 50 mSv).

Initial radiation exposure in contaminated areas was due to short-lived iodine-131; later caesium-137 was the main hazard. (Both are fission products dispersed from the reactor core, with half lives of 8 days and 30 years, respectively. 1.8 EBq of I-131 and 0.085 EBq of Cs-137 were released.) About five million people lived in areas of Belarus, Russia and Ukraine contaminated (above 37 kBq/m ² Cs-137 in soil) and about 400,000 lived in more contaminated areas of strict control by authorities (above 555 kBq/m ² Cs-137). A total of 29,400 km ² was contaminated above 180 kBq/m ².

The plant operators' town of Pripyat was evacuated on 27 April (45,000 residents). By 14 May, some 116,000 people that had been living within a 30-kilometre radius had been evacuated and later relocated. About 1000 of these returned unofficially to live within the contaminated zone. Most of those evacuated received radiation doses of less than 50 mSv, although a few received 100 mSv or more.

In the years following the accident, a further 220,000 people were resettled into less contaminated areas, and the initial 30 km radius exclusion zone (2800 km ²) was modified and extended to cover 4300 square kilometres. This resettlement was due to application of a criterion of 350 mSv projected lifetime radiation dose, though in fact radiation in most of the affected area (apart from half a square kilometre close to the reactor) fell rapidly so that average doses were less than 50% above normal background of 2.5 mSv/yr. See also following section on Resettlement of contaminated areas.

Long-term health effects of the Chernobyl accident

Video: Experts talk about the health effects of Chernobyl (Recorded 2011)

Several organizations have reported on the impacts of the Chernobyl accident, but all have had problems assessing the significance of their observations because of the lack of reliable public health information before 1986.

In 1989, the World Health Organization (WHO) first raised concerns that local medical scientists had incorrectly attributed various biological and health effects to radiation exposure. Following this, the Government of the USSR requested the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to coordinate an international experts' assessment of accident's radiological, environmental and health consequences in selected towns of the most heavily contaminated areas in Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine. Between March 1990 and June 1991, a total of 50 field missions were conducted by 200 experts from 25 countries (including the USSR), seven organizations, and 11 laboratories. In the absence of pre-1986 data, it compared a control population with those exposed to radiation. Significant health disorders were evident in both control and exposed groups, but, at that stage, none was radiation related.

In February 2003, the IAEA established the Chernobyl Forum, in cooperation with seven other UN organisations as well as the competent authorities of Belarus, the Russian Federation, and Ukraine. In April 2005, the reports prepared by two expert groups - "Environment", coordinated by the IAEA, and "Health", coordinated by WHO - were intensively discussed by the Forum and eventually approved by consensus. The conclusions of this 2005 Chernobyl Forum study (revised version published 2006) are in line with earlier expert studies, notably the UNSCEAR 2000 report which said that "apart from this [thyroid cancer] increase, there is no evidence of a major public health impact attributable to radiation exposure 14 years after the accident. There is no scientific evidence of increases in overall cancer incidence or mortality or in non-malignant disorders that could be related to radiation exposure." There is little evidence of any increase in leukaemia, even among clean-up workers where it might be most expected. Radiation-induced leukemia has a latency period of 5-7 years, so any potential leukemia cases due to the accident would already have developed. A low number of the clean-up workers, who received the highest doses, may have a slightly increased risk of developing solid cancers in the long term. To date, however, there is no evidence of any such cancers having developed. Apart from these, the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR) said: "The great majority of the population is not likely to experience serious health consequences as a result of radiation from the Chernobyl accident. Many other health problems have been noted in the populations that are not related to radiation exposure."

The Chernobyl Forum report says that people in the area have suffered a paralysing fatalism due to myths and misperceptions about the threat of radiation, which has contributed to a culture of chronic dependency. Some "took on the role of invalids." Mental health coupled with smoking and alcohol abuse is a very much greater problem than radiation, but worst of all at the time was the underlying level of health and nutrition. Apart from the initial 116,000, relocations of people were very traumatic and did little to reduce radiation exposure, which was low anyway. Psycho-social effects among those affected by the accident are similar to those arising from other major disasters such as earthquakes, floods, and fires.

A particularly sad effect of the misconceptions surrounding the accident was that some physicians in Europe advised pregnant women to undergo abortions on account of radiation exposure, even though the levels concerned were vastly below those likely to have teratogenic effects. Robert Gale, a hematologist who treated radiation victims after the accident, estimated that more than 1 million abortions were undertaken in the Soviet Union and Europe as a result of incorrect advice from their doctors about radiation exposure and birth defects following the accident.

Some exaggerated figures have been published regarding the death toll attributable to the Chernobyl disaster, including a publication by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). However, the Chairman of UNSCEAR made it clear that "this report is full of unsubstantiated statements that have no support in scientific assessments", and the Chernobyl Forum report also repudiates these claims.

The number of deaths resulting from the accident are covered most fully in the account of health effects provided by an annex to the UNSCEAR 2008 report, released in 2011. The report concluded: "In summary, the effects of the Chernobyl accident are many and varied. Early deterministic effects can be attributed to radiation with a high degree of certainty, while for other medical conditions, radiation almost certainly was not the cause. In between, there was a wide spectrum of conditions. It is necessary to evaluate carefully each specific condition and the surrounding circumstances before attributing a cause."

According to an UNSCEAR report in 2018, about 20,000 cases of thyroid cancer were diagnosed 1991-2015 in patients who were 18 and under at the time of the accident. The report states that a quarter of the cases (5000 cases) were "probably" due to high doses of radiation, and that this fraction was likely to have been higher in earlier years, and lower in later years. However, it also states that the uncertainty around the attributed fraction is very significant - at least 0.07 to 0.5 - and that the influence of annual screenings and active follow-up make comparisons with the general population problematic. Thyroid cancer is usually not fatal if diagnosed and treated early; the report states that of the diagnoses made between 1991 and 2005, 15 proved to be fatal.

Progressive closure of the Chernobyl plant

In the early 1990s, some $400 million was spent on improvements to the remaining reactors at Chernobyl, considerably enhancing their safety. Energy shortages necessitated the continued operation of one of them (unit 3) until December 2000. (Unit 2 was shut down after a turbine hall fire in 1991, and unit 1 at the end of 1997.) Almost 6000 people worked at the plant every day, and their radiation dose has been within internationally accepted limits. A small team of scientists works within the wrecked reactor building itself, inside the shelter.

Workers and their families now live in a new town, Slavutich, 30 km from the plant. This was built following the evacuation of Pripyat, which was just 3 km away.

Ukraine depends upon, and is deeply in debt to, Russia for energy supplies, particularly oil and gas, but also nuclear fuel. Although this dependence is gradually being reduced, continued operation of nuclear power stations, which supply half of total electricity, is now even more important than in 1986.

When it was announced in 1995 that the two operating reactors at Chernobyl would be closed by 2000, a memorandum of understanding was signed by Ukraine and G7 nations to progress this, but its implementation was conspicuously delayed. Alternative generating capacity was needed, either gas-fired, which has ongoing fuel cost and supply implications, or nuclear, by completing Khmelnitski unit 2 and Rovno unit 4 ('K2R4') in Ukraine. Construction of these was halted in 1989 but then resumed, and both reactors came online late in 2004, financed by Ukraine rather than international grants as expected on the basis of Chernobyl's closure.

Chernobyl today

Russian military operation 2022

On 24 February 2022, Russian forces took control of all facilities of the Chernobyl nuclear plant. Control levels of gamma radiation dose rates in the Chernobyl exclusion zone were exceeded. The SNRIU said that the rise in radiation levels was likely due to "disturbance of the top layer of soil from movement of a large number of heavy military machinery through the exclusion zone and increase of air pollution." It added: "The condition of Chernobyl nuclear facilities and other facilities is unchanged." Radiation readings from the site were assessed by the IAEA to be low and in line with near background levels.

On 9 March at 11.22 the Chernobyl plant lost connection to the grid. The SNRIU said that backup diesel generators were running and had 48 hours of fuel. The IAEA stated that, based on the heat load of spent fuel in the ISF-1 storage pool, and the volume of cooling water it contained, there would be sufficient heat removal without electrical supply. It said that it saw no critical impact on safety as a result of the loss of power, but said that the loss of power would likely create additional stress for the about 210 staff who have not been able to rotate for the past two weeks.

Professor Geraldine Thomas, director of the Chernobyl Tissue Bank, said: "They [the used fuel bundles] will not be producing significant amounts of heat, making a release of radiation very unlikely. In the unlikely event of a release of any radiation, this would be only to the immediate local area, and therefore not pose any threat to western Europe - there would be no radioactive cloud."

On 13 March Energoatom reported that transmission system operator Ukrenergo had succeeded in repairing a power line needed to restore external electricity supplies to Chernobyl. The site was due to be reconnected to the grid a day later, but Ukrenergo reported in the morning of 14 March that the line had sustained further damage "by the occupying forces". Later on 14 March Ukrenergo said that external power had been restored at 13.10 local time, and at 16.45 the plant was reconnected to Ukraine's electricity grid.

On 31 March control of the site was returned to Ukrainian personnel.

For more detailed information, see page on Russia-Ukraine War and Nuclear Energy.

Unit 4 containment

Chernobyl unit 4 was enclosed in a large concrete shelter which was erected quickly (by October 1986) to allow continuing operation of the other reactors at the plant. However, the structure is neither strong nor durable. The international Shelter Implementation Plan in the 1990s involved raising money for remedial work including removal of the fuel-containing materials. Some major work on the shelter was carried out in 1998 and 1999. About 200 tonnes of highly radioactive material remains deep within it, and this poses an environmental hazard until it is better contained.

The New Safe Confinement (NSC) structure was completed in 2017, having been built adjacent and then moved into place on rails. It is an arch 110 metres high, 165 metres long and spanning 260 metres, covering both unit 4 and the hastily-built 1986 structure. The arch frame is a lattice construction of tubular steel members, equipped with internal cranes. The design and construction contract for this was signed in 2007 with the Novarka consortium and preparatory work onsite was completed in 2010. Construction started in April 2012. The first half, weighing 12,800 tonnes, was moved 112 metres to a holding area in front of unit 4 in April 2014. The second half was completed by the end of 2014 and was joined to the first in July 2015. Cladding, cranes, and remote handling equipment were fitted in 2015. The entire 36,000 tonne structure was pushed 327 metres into position over the reactor building in November 2016, over two weeks, and the end walls completed. The NSC is the largest moveable land-based structure ever built.

The hermetically sealed building will allow engineers to remotely dismantle the 1986 structure that has shielded the remains of the reactor from the weather since the weeks after the accident. It will enable the eventual removal of the fuel-containing materials (FCM) in the bottom of the reactor building and accommodate their characterization, compaction, and packing for disposal. This task represents the most important step in eliminating nuclear hazard at the site - and the real start of dismantling. The NSC will facilitate remote handling of these dangerous materials, using as few personnel as possible. During peak construction of the NSC some 1200 workers were onsite.

The Chernobyl Shelter Fund, set up in 1997, had received €864 million from international donors by early 2011 towards this project and previous work. It and the Nuclear Safety Account (NSA), set up in 1993, are managed by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD). The total cost of the new shelter was in 2011 estimated to be €1.5 billion. In November 2014 the EBRD said the overall €2.15 billion Shelter Implementation Plan including the NSC had received contributions from 43 governments but still had a funding shortfall of €615 million. The following month the EBRD made an additional contribution of €350 million in anticipation of a €165 million contribution by the G7/European Commission, which was confirmed in April 2015. This left a balance of €100 million to come from non-G7 donors, and €15 million of this was confirmed in April 2015.
Chernobyl New Safe Confinement under construction and before being moved into place (Image: EBRD)
Funding other Chernobyl work

The Nuclear Safety Account (NSA), had received €321 million by early 2011 for Chernobyl decommissioning and also for projects in other ex-Soviet countries. At Chernobyl it funds the construction of used fuel and waste storage (notably ISF-2, see below) and decommissioning units 1-3. In April 2016 the European Commission pledged €20 million to the NSA, the largest part of €45 million expected from the G7 and the European Commission. A further €40 million was expected from the EBRD in May 2016.

In total, the European Commission has committed around €730 million so far to Chernobyl projects in four ways. First, €550 million for assistance projects, out of which €470 million were channelled through international funds, and €80 million implemented directly by the European Commission. Secondly, power generation support of €65 million. Thirdly, €15 million for social projects. And finally, €100 million for research projects.

Chernobyl used fuel: ISF-1 & ISF-2

Used fuel from units 1-3 was stored in each unit's cooling pond, and in an interim spent fuel storage facility pond (ISF-1). A few damaged assemblies remained in units 1&2 in 2013, with the last of these removed in June 2016. ISF-1 now holds most of the spent fuel from units 1-3, allowing those reactors to be decommissioned under less restrictive licence conditions. Most of the fuel assemblies were straightforward to handle, but about 50 are damaged and required special handling.

In 1999, a contract was signed with Framatome (now Areva) for construction of the ISF-2 radioactive waste management facility to store 25,000 used fuel assemblies from units 1-3 and other operational waste long-term, as well as material from decommissioning units 1-3 (which are the first RBMK units decommissioned anywhere). However, after a significant part of the dry storage facility had been built, technical deficiencies in the concept emerged in 2003, and the contract was terminated amicably in 2007.

Holtec International became the contractor in September 2007 for the new interim spent nuclear fuel storage facility (ISF-2 or SNF SF-2) for the state-owned Chernobyl NPP. Design approval and funding from the NSA was confirmed in October 2010, and the final €87.5 million of €400 million cost was pledged in April 2016. Construction was completed in January 2020. Hot and cold tests took place during 2020, and the facility received an operating licence in April 2021.

ISF-2 is the world's largest dry used fuel storage facility, accommodating 21,217 RBMK fuel assemblies in dry storage for at least a 100-year service life.

The project includes a processing facility, able to cut the RBMK fuel assemblies* and to put the material in double-walled canisters, which are then filled with inert gas and welded shut. They will then be transported to concrete dry storage vaults in which the fuel containers will be enclosed for up to 100 years. This facility, treating 2500 fuel assemblies per year, is the first of its kind for RBMK fuel.
* According to Holtec: "Unique features of the Chernobyl dry storage facility include the world's largest 'hot cell' for dismembering the conjugated RBMK fuel assembly and a (Holtec patented) forced gas dehydrator designed to run on nitrogen."
Other Chernobyl radwaste

Industrial Complex for Radwaste Management (ICSRM): In April 2009, Nukem handed over this turnkey waste treatment centre for solid radioactive waste. In May 2010, the State Nuclear Regulatory Committee licensed the commissioning of this facility, where solid low- and intermediate-level wastes accumulated from the power plant operations and the decommissioning of reactor blocks 1-3 is conditioned. The wastes are processed in three steps. First, the solid radioactive wastes temporarily stored in bunkers is removed for treatment. In the next step, these wastes, as well as those from decommissioning reactor blocks 1-3, are processed into a form suitable for permanent safe disposal. Low- and intermediate-level wastes are separated into combustible, compactable, and non-compactable categories. These are then subject to incineration, high-force compaction, and cementation respectively. In addition, highly radioactive and long-lived solid waste is sorted out for temporary separate storage. In the third step, the conditioned solid waste materials are transferred to containers suitable for permanent safe storage.

As part of this project, at the end of 2007, Nukem handed over an Engineered Near Surface Disposal Facility for storage of short-lived radioactive waste after prior conditioning. It is 17 km away from the power plant, at the Vektor complex within the 30-km zone. The storage area is designed to hold 55,000 m ³ of treated waste which will be subject to radiological monitoring for 300 years, by when the radioactivity will have decayed to such an extent that monitoring is no longer required.

Another contract has been let for a Liquid Radioactive Waste Treatment Plant (LRTP), to handle some 35,000 cubic metres of low- and intermediate-level liquid wastes at the site. This will be solidified and eventually buried along with solid wastes on site. Construction of the plant has been completed and the start of operations was due late in 2015. LRTP is also funded through EBRD's Nuclear Safety Account (NSA).

Non-Chernobyl used fuel

The Central Spent Fuel Storage Facility (CSFSF) Project for Ukraine's VVER reactors is being built by Holtec International within the Chernobyl exclusion area, between the resettled villages Staraya Krasnitsa, Buryakovka, Chistogalovka, and Stechanka, southeast of Chernobyl and not far from ISF-2. This will not take any Chernobyl fuel, though it will become a part of the common spent nuclear fuel management complex of the state-owned company Chernobyl NPP.

Decommissioning units 1-3

After the last Chernobyl reactor shut down in December 2000, in mid-2001 a new enterprise, SSE ChNPP was set up to take over management of the site and decommissioning from Energoatom. (Its remit includes eventual decommissioning of all Ukraine nuclear plants.)

In January 2008, the Ukraine government announced a four-stage decommissioning plan which incorporated the above waste activities and progresses towards a cleared site.

In February 2014 a new stage of this was approved for units 1-3, involving dismantling some equipment and putting them into safstor condition by 2028. Then, to 2046, further equipment will be removed, and by 2064 they will be demolished.

See also official website.

Resettlement of contaminated areas

In the last two decades there has been some resettlement of the areas evacuated in 1986 and subsequently. Recently the main resettlement project has been in Belarus.

In July 2010, the Belarus government announced that it had decided to settle back thousands of people in the 'contaminated areas' covered by the Chernobyl fallout, from which 24 years ago they and their forbears were hastily relocated. Compared with the list of contaminated areas in 2005, some 211 villages and hamlets had been reclassified with fewer restrictions on resettlement. The decision by the Belarus Council of Ministers resulted in a new national program over 2011-15 and up to 2020 to alleviate the Chernobyl impact and return the areas to normal use with minimal restrictions. The focus of the project is on the development of economic and industrial potential of the Gomel and Mogilev regions from which 137,000 people were relocated.

The main priority is agriculture and forestry, together with attracting qualified people and housing them. Initial infrastructure requirements will mean the refurbishment of gas, potable water and power supplies, while the use of local wood will be banned. Schools and housing will be provided for specialist workers and their families ahead of wider socio-economic development. Overall, some 21,484 dwellings are slated for connection to gas networks in the period 2011-2015, while about 5600 contaminated or broken down buildings are demolished. Over 1300 kilometres of road will be laid, and ten new sewerage works and 15 pumping stations are planned. The cost of the work was put at BYR 6.6 trillion ($2.2 billion), split fairly evenly across the years 2011 to 2015 inclusive.

The feasibility of agriculture will be examined in areas where the presence of caesium-137 and strontium-90 is low, "to acquire new knowledge in the fields of radiobiology and radioecology in order to clarify the principles of safe life in the contaminated territories." Land found to have too high a concentration of radionuclides will be reforested and managed. A suite of protective measures was set up to allow a new forestry industry whose products would meet national and international safety standards. In April 2009, specialists in Belarus stressed that it is safe to eat all foods cultivated in the contaminated territories, though intake of some wild food was restricted.

Protective measures will be put in place for 498 settlements in the contaminated areas where average radiation dose may exceed 1 mSv per year. There were also 1904 villages with annual average effective doses from the pollution between 0.1 mSv and 1 mSv. The goal for these areas is to allow their re-use with minimal restrictions, although already radiation doses there from the caesium are lower than background levels anywhere in the world.

The Belarus government decision was an important political landmark in an ongoing process. Studies reviewed by UNSCEAR show that the Chernobyl disaster caused little risk for the general population. A UN Development Program report in 2002 said that much of the aid and effort applied to mitigate the effects of the Chernobyl accident did more harm than good, and it seems that this, along with the Chernobyl Forum report, finally persuaded the Belarus authorities. In 2004 President Lukashenko announced a priority to repopulate much of the Chernobyl-affected regions of Belarus, and then in 2009 he said that he "wants to repopulate Chernobyl's zone quickly".

In 2011 Chernobyl was officially declared a tourist attraction, with many visitors.

In 2015 the published results of a major scientific study showed that the mammal population of the exclusion zone (including the 2162 sq km Polessian State Radiation-Ecological Reserve - PSRER in Belarus) was thriving, despite land contamination. The "long-term empirical data showed no evidence of a negative influence of radiation on mammal abundance." The data "represent unique evidence of wildlife's resilience in the face of chronic radiation stress." ( Current Biology, Elsevier) . Other studies have concluded that the net environmental effect of the accident has been much greater biodiversity and abundance of species, with the exclusion zone having become a unique sanctuary for wildlife due to the absence of humans.

What has been learned from the Chernobyl disaster?

Leaving aside the verdict of history on its role in melting the Soviet 'Iron Curtain', some very tangible practical benefits have resulted from the Chernobyl accident. The main ones concern reactor safety, notably in eastern Europe. (The US Three Mile Island accident in 1979 had a significant effect on Western reactor design and operating procedures. While that reactor was destroyed, all radioactivity was contained - as designed - and there were no deaths or injuries.)

While no-one in the West was under any illusion about the safety of early Soviet reactor designs, some lessons learned have also been applicable to Western plants. Certainly the safety of all Soviet-designed reactors has improved vastly. This is due largely to the development of a culture of safety encouraged by increased collaboration between East and West, and substantial investment in improving the reactors.

Modifications have been made to overcome deficiencies in all the RBMK reactors still operating. In these, originally the nuclear chain reaction and power output could increase if cooling water were lost or turned to steam, in contrast to most Western designs. It was this effect which led to the uncontrolled power surge that led to the destruction of Chernobyl 4 (see Positive void coefficient section in the information page on RBMK Reactors). All of the RBMK reactors have now been modified by changes in the control rods, adding neutron absorbers and consequently increasing the fuel enrichment from 1.8 to 2.4% U-235, making them very much more stable at low power (see Post accident changes to the RBMK section in the information page on RBMK Reactors). Automatic shut-down mechanisms now operate faster, and other safety mechanisms have been improved. Automated inspection equipment has also been installed. A repetition of the 1986 Chernobyl accident is now virtually impossible, according to a German nuclear safety agency report.

Since 1989, over 1000 nuclear engineers from the former Soviet Union have visited Western nuclear power plants and there have been many reciprocal visits. Over 50 twinning arrangements between East and West nuclear plants have been put in place. Most of this has been under the auspices of the World Association of Nuclear Operators (WANO), a body formed in 1989 which links 130 operators of nuclear power plants in more than 30 countries (see also information page on Cooperation in the Nuclear Power Industry).

Many other international programmes were initiated following Chernobyl. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safety review projects for each particular type of Soviet reactor are noteworthy, bringing together operators and Western engineers to focus on safety improvements. These initiatives are backed by funding arrangements. The Nuclear Safety Assistance Coordination Centre database lists Western aid totalling almost US$1 billion for more than 700 safety-related projects in former Eastern Bloc countries. The Convention on Nuclear Safety adopted in Vienna in June 1994 is another outcome.

The Chernobyl Forum report said that some seven million people are now receiving or eligible for benefits as 'Chernobyl victims', which means that resources are not targeting those most in need. Remedying this presents daunting political problems however.

Notes & references

Notes

a. Chernobyl is the well-known Russian name for the site; Chornobyl is preferred by Ukraine. [ Back]

b. Much has been made of the role of the operators in the Chernobyl accident. The 1986 Summary Report on the Post-Accident Review Meeting on the Chernobyl Accident (INSAG-1) of the International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA's) International Nuclear Safety Advisory Group accepted the view of the Soviet experts that "the accident was caused by a remarkable range of human errors and violations of operating rules in combination with specific reactor features which compounded and amplified the effects of the errors and led to the reactivity excursion." In particular, according to the INSAG-1 report: "The operators deliberately and in violation of rules withdrew most control and safety rods from the core and switched off some important safety systems."

However, the IAEA's 1992 INSAG-7 report, The Chernobyl Accident: Updating of INSAG-1, was less critical of the operators, with the emphasis shifted towards "the contributions of particular design features, including the design of the control rods and safety systems, and arrangements for presenting important safety information to the operators. The accident is now seen to have been the result of the concurrence of the following major factors: specific physical characteristics of the reactor; specific design features of the reactor control elements; and the fact that the reactor was brought to a state not specified by procedures or investigated by an independent safety body. Most importantly, the physical characteristics of the reactor made possible its unstable behaviour." But the report goes on to say that the International Nuclear Safety Advisory Group "remains of the opinion that critical actions of the operators were most ill judged. As pointed out in INSAG-1, the human factor has still to be considered as a major element in causing the accident."

It is certainly true that the operators placed the reactor in a dangerous condition, in particular by removing too many of the control rods, resulting in the lowering of the reactor's operating reactivity margin (ORM, see information page on RBMK Reactors). However, the operating procedures did not emphasize the vital safety significance of the ORM but rather treated the ORM as a way of controlling reactor power. It could therefore be argued that the actions of the operators were more a symptom of the prevailing safety culture of the Soviet era rather than the result of recklessness or a lack of competence on the part of the operators.

In what is referred to as his Testament - which was published soon after his suicide two years after the accident - Valery Legasov, who had led the Soviet delegation to the IAEA Post-Accident Review Meeting, wrote: "After I had visited Chernobyl NPP I came to the conclusion that the accident was the inevitable apotheosis of the economic system which had been developed in the USSR over many decades. Neglect by the scientific management and the designers was everywhere with no attention being paid to the condition of instruments or of equipment... When one considers the chain of events leading up to the Chernobyl accident, why one person behaved in such a way and why another person behaved in another etc, it is impossible to find a single culprit, a single initiator of events, because it was like a closed circle." [ Back]

c. The initial death toll was officially given as two initial deaths plus 28 from acute radiation syndrome. One further victim, due to coronary thrombosis, is widely reported, but does not appear on official lists of the initial deaths. The 2006 report of the UN Chernobyl Forum Expert Group "Health", Health Effects of the Chernobyl Accident and Special Health Care Programmes, states: "The Chernobyl accident caused the deaths of 30 power plant employees and firemen within a few days or weeks (including 28 deaths that were due to radiation exposure)." [ Back]

d. Apart from the initial 31 deaths (two from the explosions, one reportedly from coronary thrombosis - see Note c above - and 28 firemen and plant personnel from acute radiation syndrome), the number of deaths resulting from the accident is unclear and a subject of considerable controversy. According to the 2006 report of the UN Chernobyl Forum's 'Health' Expert Group: "The actual number of deaths caused by this accident is unlikely ever to be precisely known."

On the number of deaths due to acute radiation syndrome (ARS), the Expert Group report states: "Among the 134 emergency workers involved in the immediate mitigation of the Chernobyl accident, severely exposed workers and fireman during the first days, 28 persons died in 1986 due to ARS, and 19 more persons died in 1987-2004 from different causes. Among the general population affected by the Chernobyl radioactive fallout, the much lower exposures meant that ARS cases did not occur."

According to the report: "With the exception of thyroid cancer, direct radiation-epidemiological studies performed in Belarus, Russia and Ukraine since 1986 have not revealed any statistically significant increase in either cancer morbidity or mortality induced by radiation." The report does however attribute a large proportion of child thyroid cancer fatalities to radiation, with nine deaths being recorded during 1986-2002 as a result of progression of thyroid cancer. [ Back]

e. There have been fatalities in military and research reactor contexts, e.g. Tokai-mura. [ Back]

f. Although most reports on the Chernobyl accident refer to a number of graphite fires, it is highly unlikely that the graphite itself burned. Information on the General Atomics website (but now deleted) stated: "It is often incorrectly assumed that the combustion behavior of graphite is similar to that of charcoal and coal. Numerous tests and calculations have shown that it is virtually impossible to burn high-purity, nuclear-grade graphites." On Chernobyl, the same source stated: "Graphite played little or no role in the progression or consequences of the accident. The red glow observed during the Chernobyl accident was the expected color of luminescence for graphite at 700°C and not a large-scale graphite fire, as some have incorrectly assumed."

A 2006 Electric Power Research Institute Technical Report states that the International Atomic Energy Agency's INSAG-1 report is
...potentially misleading through the use of imprecise words in relation to graphite behaviour. The report discusses the fire-fighting activities and repeatedly refers to "burning graphite blocks" and "the graphite fire". Most of the actual fires involving graphite which were approached by fire-fighters involved ejected material on bitumen-covered roofs, and the fires also involved the bitumen. It is stated: "The fire teams experienced no unusual problems in using their fire-fighting techniques, except that it took a considerable time to extinguish the graphite fire." These descriptions are not consistent with the later considered opinions of senior Russian specialists... There is however no question that extremely hot graphite was ejected from the core and at a temperature sufficient to ignite adjacent combustible materials.

There are also several referrals to a graphite fire occurring during the October 1957 accident at Windscale Pile No. 1 in the UK. However, images obtained from inside the Pile several decades after the accident showed that the graphite was relatively undamaged. [ Back]

g. The International Chernobyl Project, 1990-91 - Assessment of Radiological Consequences and Evaluation of Protective Measures, Summary Brochure, published by the International Atomic Energy Agency, reports that, in June 1989, the World Health Organization (WHO) sent a team of experts to help address the health impacts of radioactive contamination resulting from the accident. One of the conclusions from this mission was that "scientists who are not well versed in radiation effects have attributed various biological and health effects to radiation exposure. These changes cannot be attributed to radiation exposure, especially when the normal incidence is unknown, and are much more likely to be due to psychological factors and stress.Attributing these effects to radiation not only increases the psychological pressure in the population and provokes additional stress-related health problems, it also undermines confidence in the competence of the radiation specialists." [ Back]

h. Image taken from page 31 of The International Chernobyl Project Technical Report, Assessment of Radiological Consequences and Evaluation of Protective Measures, Report by an International Advisory Committee, IAEA, 1991 (ISBN: 9201291914) [ Back]

i. A 55-page summary version the revised report, Chernobyl's Legacy: Health, Environmental and Socio-Economic Impacts and Recommendations to the Governments of Belarus, the Russian Federation and Ukraine, The Chernobyl Forum: 2003-2005, Second revised version, as well as the Report of the UN Chernobyl Forum Expert Group "Environment" and the Report of the UN Chernobyl Forum Expert Group "Health" are available through the IAEA's webpage on the Chernobyl accident ( https://www.iaea.org/topics/chornobyl) [ Back]

j. The United Nations Scientific Commission on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR) is the UN body with a mandate from the General Assembly to assess and report levels and health effects of exposure to ionizing radiation. Exposures and effects of the Chernobyl accident , Annex J to Volume II of the 2000 United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation Report to the General Assembly, is available at the UNSCEAR 2000 Report Vol. II webpage (www.unscear.org/unscear/en/publications/2000_2.html). It is also available (along with other reports) on the webpage for UNSCEAR's assessments of the radiation effects of The Chernobyl accident (www.unscear.org/unscear/en/chernobyl.html). The conclusions from Annex J of the UNSCEAR 2000 report are in Chernobyl Accident Appendix: Health Impacts

k. The quoted comment comes from a 6 June 2000 letter from Lars-Erik Holm, Chairman of UNSCEAR and Director-General of the Swedish Radiation Protection Institute, to Kofi Annan, Secretary-General of the United Nations. [

l. A reinforced concrete casing was built around the ruined reactor building over the seven months following the accident. This shelter - often referred to as the - was intended to contain the remaining fuel and act as a radiation shield. As it was designed for a lifetime of around 20 to 30 years, as well as being hastily constructed, a second shelter - known as the New Safe Confinement - with a 100-year design lifetime is planned to be placed over the existing structure. See also ASE keeps the lid on Chernobyl , World Nuclear News (19 August 2008). [

m. The UNSCEAR committee in 2018 estimated that the fraction of the incidence of thyroid cancer attributable to radiation exposure among non-evacuated residents of Belarus, Ukraine and the four most contaminated oblasts of the Russian Federation, who were under 18 at the time of the accident, is in the order of 0.25 . The committee states that the uncertainty range of the fraction is large, at least from 0.07 to 0.5. [ Back]

References

1. 7. The Accident and the Safety of RBMK-Reactors, Gesellschaft für Anlagen und Reaktorsicherheit (GRS) mbH, GRS-121 (February 1996) [9. Health Effects of the Chernobyl Accident and Special Health Care Programmes, Report of the UN Chernobyl Forum, Expert Group "Health", World Health Organization, 2006 (ISBN: 9789241594172)
2. Appendix D, Graphite Decommissioning: Options for Graphite Treatment, Recycling, or Disposal, including a discussion of Safety-Related Issues , EPRI, Palo Alto, CA, 1013091 (March 2006)
The International Chernobyl Project, 1990-91 - Assessment of Radiological Consequences and Evaluation of Protective Measures, Summary Brochure , International Atomic Energy Agency, IAEA/PI/A32E, 1991; The International Chernobyl Project, An Overview , Assessment of Radiological Consequences and Evaluation of Protective Measures, Report by an International Advisory Committee , IAEA, 1991 (ISBN: 9201290918); The International Chernobyl Project Technical Report , Assessment of Radiological Consequences and Evaluation of Protective Measures, Report by an International Advisory Committee , IAEA, 1991 (ISBN: 9201291914) [
4. Mikhail Balonov, Malcolm Crick and Didier Louvat, Update of Impacts of the Chernobyl Accident: Assessments of the Chernobyl Forum (2003-2005) and UNSCEAR (2005-2008) , Proceedings of the Third European IRPA (International Radiation Protection Association) Congress held in Helsinki, Finland (14-18 June 2010) [
5. UNSCEAR, 2011, UNSCEAR 2008 Report, vol II, annex D (lead author: M. Balanov) [
6. Chernobyl - A Continuing Catastrophe, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), 2000 [

8. Deryabina, T.G. Long-term census data reveal abundant wildlife populations at Chernobyl Health Effects due to Radiation from the Chernobyl Accident, , Current Biology, Volume 25, Issue 19, pR824-R826, Elsevier (5 October 2015) [
Back] Evaluation of data on thyroid cancer in regions affected by the Chernobyl accident, UNSCEAR (2018) [ Back]

General sources

INSAG-7, The Chernobyl Accident: Updating of INSAG-1, A report by the International Nuclear Safety Advisory Group, International Atomic Energy Agency, Safety Series No. 75-INSAG-7, 1992, (ISBN: 9201046928)

Chernobyl's Legacy: Health, Environmental and Socio-Economic Impacts and Recommendations to the Governments of Belarus, the Russian Federation and Ukraine, The Chernobyl Forum: 2003-2005, Second revised version, International Atomic Energy Agency, IAEA/PI/A.87 Rev.2/06-09181 (April 2006)

Environmental Consequences of the Chernobyl Accident and their Remediation: Twenty Years of Experience, Report of the Chernobyl Forum Expert Group 'Environment', International Atomic Energy Agency, 2006 (ISBN 9201147058)

Health Effects of the Chernobyl Accident and Special Health Care Programmes, Report of the UN Chernobyl Forum Expert Group "Health", World Health Organization, 2006 (ISBN: 9789241594172)

The Chernobyl accident, UNSCEAR's assessments of the radiation effects on the UNSCEAR (United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation) radiation website

Exposures and effects of the Chernobyl accident, Annex J of Sources and Effects of Ionizing Radiation, UNSCEAR 2000 Report to the General Assembly Vol. II

Ten Years after Chernobyl: what do we really know? (based on the proceedings of the IAEA/WHO/EC International Conference, Vienna, April 1996), International Atomic Energy Agency

Chernobyl: Assessment of Radiological and Health Impacts - 2002 Update of Chernobyl: Ten Years On, OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (2002).

Zbigniew Jaworowski, Lessons of Chernobyl with particular reference to thyroid cancer, Australasian Radiation Protection Society Newsletter No. 30 (April 2004). The same article appeared in Executive Intelligence Review (EIR), Volume 31, Number 18 (7 May 2004). An extended version of this paper was published as Radiation folly, Chapter 4 of Environment & Health: Myths & Realities, Edited by Kendra Okonski and Julian Morris, International Policy Press (a division of International Policy Network), June 2004 (ISBN 1905041004). See also Chernobyl Accident Appendix 2: Health Impacts

The chernobyl.info website www.chernobyl.info - out of date but some useful information

Chernobyl Forum information on IAEA website

Mikhail Balonov, The Chernobyl Forum: Major Findings and Recommendations, presented at the Public Information Materials Exchange meeting held in Vienna, Austria on 12-16 February 2006

GreenFacts webpage on Scientific Facts on the Chernobyl Nuclear Accident (www.greenfacts.org/en/chernobyl)

European Centre of Technological Safety's Chernobyl website (www.tesec-int.org/Chernobyl) and its webpage on Sarcophagus and Decommissioning of the Chernobyl NPP

Chernobyl Legacy website (www.chernobyllegacy.com)

David Mosey, Looking Beyond the Operator, Nuclear Engineering International, 26 Nov 2014

Chernobyl 25th anniversary, Frequently Asked Questions, World Health Organization (23 April 2011)

Environmental Consequences of the Chernobyl Accident and their Remediation: Twenty Years of Experience, Report of the UN Chernobyl Forum Expert Group "Environment", STI/PUB/1239, International Atomic Energy Agency (2006)

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Chernobyl | Chernobyl Accident | Chernobyl Disaster - World Nuclear Association

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Chernobyl accident information. The Chernobyl RBMK reactor design faults and how they were addressed. The Chernobyl New Safe Confinement. Lessons learnt from the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. Health impacts of Chernobyl.

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Latest Update - October 30, 2023

Domestic food price inflation remains high. Inflation higher than 5% is experienced in 57.1% of low-income countries, 83% of lower-middle-income countries, and 59% of upper-middle-income countries and many experiencing double-digit inflation. In addition, 64.3% of high-income countries are experiencing high food price inflation. The most-affected countries are in Africa, North America, Latin America, South Asia, Europe, and Central Asia. In real terms, food price inflation exceeded overall inflation in 77% of the 170 countries.
Download the latest brief on rising food insecurity and World Bank responses
The agricultural and export price indices closed 3% and 7% higher than two weeks ago respectively, while the cereal price index was unchanged. Increases in cocoa and coffee (arabica and robusta) prices drove the increase in the export price index. Maize prices remained unchanged, wheat prices increased by 4%, and rice prices decreased by 2%. On a year-on-year basis, maize and wheat prices are 28% and 35% lower, respectively, while rice prices are 39% higher. Compared to January 2021, maize prices are 6% lower, wheat prices 12% lower, while rice prices are 19% higher (See " pink sheet" data for agricultural commodity and food commodity prices indices, updated monthly.)

The International Food Policy Research Institute highlighted the 2023 World Food Day theme of "Water is Life, Water is Food. Leave No One Behind," which underscores the often-underestimated role of water in food systems. Although water is vital, it tends to be invisible in many critical processes, including ecosystem health, energy production, and manufacturing. This lack of awareness is problematic as water systems are near a breaking point. The consequences of paying insufficient attention to water's vital roles in sustaining ecosystems, communities, and agriculture are profound and include the increasing risk of food systems "breaking," which would increase undernutrition and lead to humanitarian crises. IFPRI proposes several actions to address this challenge.

A new FAO report found that global agricultural losses due to natural disasters amounted to $3.8 trillion from 1991 to 2021-equivalent to annual losses of $123 billion, or about 5 percent of global agricultural gross domestic product (GDP). It is likely that this is an underestimate of the true amount of damage, because it focuses on crops and livestock. Lack of data prevented comprehensive analysis of damage to forestry, fisheries, and aquaculture. Despite that, estimated losses over the past 31 years could have met the daily dietary requirements of 400 million to 500 million people. Within the context of natural disasters, the two factors that caused the most damage to agriculture were varying levels of water supply and extreme temperatures. Climate change is exacerbating the situation.

The Global Alliance for Food Security has launched a new module on its Global Food and Nutrition Security Dashboard that tracks Food Security Crisis Preparedness Plan (FSCPP) progress and mobilizes early action when crises are detected. This module is based on a collaborative effort to enhance crisis preparedness by sharing timely information and standardizing crisis recognition processes. The system's early impacts are evident in various countries, such as Yemen, where FSCPPs have encouraged collaborative efforts to produce high-frequency food and nutrition security reports. FSCPPs have also contributed to establishment or revitalization of decision-making structures such as food security councils in countries like Somalia and South Sudan.

Following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, trade-related policies imposed by countries have surged. The global food crisis has been partially made worse by the growing number of food trade restrictions put in place by countries with a goal of increasing domestic supply and reducing prices. As of October 23, 2023, 19 countries have implemented 27 food export bans, and 8 have implemented 16 export-limiting measures.

World Bank Action

In May 2022, the World Bank made a commitment of making available $30 billion over a period of 15 months to tackle the crisis. We have surpassed that goal. The World Bank has scaled up its food and nutrition security response, to now making $45 billion available through a combination of $22 billion in new lending and $23 billion from existing portfolio.

Our food and nutrition security portfolio now spans across 90 countries. It includes both short term interventions such as expanding social protection, also longer-term resilience such as boosting productivity and climate-smart agriculture.

The Bank's intervention is expected to benefit 335 million people, equivalent to 44% of the number of undernourished people. Around 53% of the beneficiaries are women - they are disproportionately more affected by the crisis. Some examples include:

1. The $766 million West Africa Food Systems Resilience Program is working to increase preparedness against food insecurity and improve the resilience of food systems in West Africa. The program is increasing digital advisory services for agriculture and food crisis prevention and management, boosting adaption capacity of agriculture system actors, and investing in regional food market integration and trade to increase food security. An additional $345 million is currently under preparation for Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo.

2. A $150 million grant for the second phase of the Yemen Food Security Response and Resilience Project, which will help address food insecurity, strengthen resilience and protect livelihoods.

3. $50 million grant of additional financing for Tajikistan to mitigate food and nutrition insecurity impacts on households and enhance the overall resilience of the agriculture sector.

4. A $125 million project in Jordan aims to strengthen the development the agriculture sector by enhancing its climate resilience, increasing competitiveness and inclusion, and ensuring medium- to long-term food security.

5. A $300 million project in Bolivia that will contribute to increasing food security, market access and the adoption of climate-smart agricultural practices.

6. A $315 million loan to support Chad, Ghana and Sierra Leone to increase their preparedness against food insecurity and to improve the resilience of their food systems.

7. A $500 million Emergency Food Security and Resilience Support Project to bolster Egypt's efforts to ensure that poor and vulnerable households have uninterrupted access to bread, help strengthen the country's resilience to food crises, and support to reforms that will help improve nutritional outcomes.

8. A $130 million loan for Tunisia, seeking to lessen the impact of the Ukraine war by financing vital soft wheat imports and providing emergency support to cover barley imports for dairy production and seeds for smallholder farmers for the upcoming planting season.

9. The $2.3 billion Food Systems Resilience Program for Eastern and Southern Africa, helps countries in Eastern and Southern Africa increase the resilience of the region's food systems and ability to tackle growing food insecurity. The program will enhance inter-agency food crisis response also boost medium- and long-term efforts for resilient agricultural production, sustainable development of natural resources, expanded market access, and a greater focus on food systems resilience in policymaking.

In May 2022, the World Bank Group and the G7 Presidency co-convened the Global Alliance for Food Security, which aims to catalyze an immediate and concerted response to the unfolding global hunger crisis. The Alliance has developed the publicly accessible Global Food and Nutrition Security Dashboard, which provides timely information for global and local decision-makers to help improve coordination of the policy and financial response to the food crisis.

The heads of the FAO, IMF, World Bank Group, WFP, and WTO released a Third Joint Statement on February 8, 2023. The statement calls to prevent a worsening of the food and nutrition security crisis, further urgent actions are required to (i) rescue hunger hotspots, (ii) facilitate trade, improve the functioning of markets, and enhance the role of the private sector, and (iii) reform and repurpose harmful subsidies with careful targeting and efficiency. Countries should balance short-term urgent interventions with longer-term resilience efforts as they respond to the crisis.

Last Updated: Oct 30, 2023

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Food Security | Rising Food Insecurity in 2023

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The World Bank's response to the food insecurity crisis, the solutions it's working on, including financing food and fertilizer-and commodities and agricultural data.

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While the global poverty rate has been cut in half since 2000, still approximately 17% of the world's population - more than 1 billion people - live at or below $1.25 per day. There is more to be done and business has an important role to play in reducing global poverty.

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Manual for Human Rights Education with Young people

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Democracy - Manual for Human Rights Education with Young people - www.coe.int

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https://kids.kiddle.co/Populationhttps://kids.kiddle.co/Population

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A population is the number of living people that live together in the same place. A city's population is the number of people living in that city. These people are called inhabitants or residents. The population includes all individuals that live in that certain area.The world population was estimated to have reached 7.5 billion in April 2017. Asia is the most populous continent, with its 4.3 billion inhabitants being 60% of the world population. The most populous country is China with 1.4 billion people.

Population density is the average number of people in a place. Urban areas such as big cities have a high population density. People there live close to each other. In areas with a low population density, people usually live far away from each other, such as in rural areas out in the countryside.

Usually population refers to the number of humans in a certain area. The maximum population that can be supported in an area is called the carrying capacity.

Population trends

Global population is going up, but the population growth rate is declining all over the world. Growth in poor countries is faster than in rich ones; some rich countries have a population pyramid that is nearly square. Urbanization is also common, and urban areas usually have lower birth rates. In population growth, births exceed deaths. In the modern world this is due to reduction of infant deaths, control of infectious diseases, and improved agriculture so more people can eat.

The change in population from 2010 to 2015 was:

World: +420 million

Africa: +146 million

Asia: +223 million

Europe: +3 million

Latin America and Caribbean: +35 million

Northern America: +14 million

Oceania: +2.9 million

Human population control is the practice of altering the rate of growth of a human population. Concerns about overpopulation and its effects on poverty, environmental degradation, and political stability led to efforts to reduce population growth rates.

Related pages

YAN Kun(2011). The tendency equation of the population and its limit value in the United Kingdom (Brief annotation of the connection equation(R)), Xi'an: Xi'an Modern Nonlinear Science Applying Institute.

Images for kids

PRB 2017 Data Sheet Largest Populations

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A population is the number of living people that live together in the same place. A city's population is the number of people living in that city. These people are called inhabitants or residents. The population includes all individuals that live in that certain area.The world population was estimated to have reached 7.5 billion in April 2017.

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Population is the number of people living in a certain place. A village, city, state, province, country, and continent all have a population. Even the world has a population.…

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Table of Contents

United Nations Decade for Women, United Nations program that began on January 1, 1976, the goal of which was the promotion of equal rights and opportunities for women around the world.

Included in this decade were three major meetings for women. The first UN women's conference, held in Mexico City in 1975, designated 1975-85 as the UN Decade for Women, and five months later the UN General Assembly launched that program. The second UN women's conference was held in Copenhagen in 1980, and the third UN women's conference was held in Nairobi in 1985. The participants at these meetings discussed issues such as pay equity, violence against women, landholding, and basic human rights.

The UN Decade for Women concentrated mainly on women and development. The UN women's conference in Mexico City produced two major documents: the "Declaration of Mexico on the Equality of Women and Their Contribution to Development and Peace" and the "World Plan of Action for the Implementation of the Objectives of the International Women's Year." The conference in Copenhagen was used to report on progress since the Mexico City meeting and produced a "Programme of Action." The conference in Nairobi celebrated the accomplishments of the Decade for Women and established an agenda that would guide future efforts to promote worldwide equality for women. The Nairobi conference adopted a document titled "The Nairobi Forward-Looking Strategies for the Advancement of Women." A Fourth World Conference on Women was held in Beijing in September 1995 to accelerate the implementation of the policies outlined in that document.

The UN Decade for Women and its conferences helped establish the legitimacy of women's issues regarding their roles as workers in the home and outside it. The decade also brought the many inequalities women face in education, health care, and work to the attention of national leaders and the general public.

Marcella C. Gemelli The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica

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United Nations Decade for Women, United Nations program that began on January 1, 1976, the goal of which was the promotion of equal rights and opportunities for women around the world. Included in this decade were three major meetings for women.

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Enshrined
Secretary-general
Multilateral 1
Social development
Economic
Entities

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Nuclear meltdown

Air pollution

Fission fusion

Radioactive waste

Power plant

Chernobyl

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Key words
Human rights
UN women
Justice
OHCHR
Equal rights
Freedom
Government

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The UN
Human Rights
Elections
Freedoms
Government
Participate
Equally
Establishments
Develope
Decisions