Fuul for Thought – Microcredit..

is a euphemism for microdebt. There is no credit without debt. But, more importantly, let’s call it what it is to the people we claim to be trying to help. Also,”micro” is kind of inappropriate. 50 bucks may be micro to even a hobo in America, let alone GoldmanSachs. But it’s major money to the [...]

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#jan25 – Antecedents to the Uprising

This was written a few weeks ago as the first part of a much larger project. I have yet to get around to addressing the third part. So I am publishing this for the most part as it was written. The material and some of the links may seem dated at this point, but I [...]

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Arundhati Roy on “Democracy” and the state of the world

This is really too good for me to pick excerpts out of. It really expresses so much of what I believe is wrong with the world and to cut it up would diminish it. While focusing mainly on India, Arundhati Roy, author of the God of Small Things (a book I think is overrated since [...]

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Petition vs Nuweiba Power Plant

Strong Objection to the Nuweiba Power Plant Project in South Sinai planned by the Egyptian Electricity Holding Company and to be financed by the European Investment Bank and the African Development Bank. We kindly ask for to join us in combating a serious situation that is arising in Nuweiba! We, and other investors, residents and workers [...]

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Neoliberal Agribusiness causes farmer suicide

Here’s an article by Vandana Shiva, Ph.D., a physicist, environmentalist, feminist, science policy advocate and director of Navdanya and the Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology essentially on how monoculture, non-organic, chemical-fertilizer-and-irrigation-dependent, non-renewable, genetically modified, corporate, IP-protected seeds are fucking farmers. .. and an interview with her. This is really, seriously, one of the [...]

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Human Development Report

The UN’s Human Development Report for this year is out and it focuses on, surprise surprise, climate change. Havent read it yet. But here’s the press release.

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Culture in the Gulf

It’s been clear for a a few years now that Abu Dhabi has been seething with envy towards its oil-poor, commercial super-hub neighbor. Naturally, it wouldnt make too much sense to compete in the same niche. And so they’ve picked culture (no new news, really, though), a concept which, for some reason, i find hilarious.

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Cairo Desert Sprawl

Here‘s more (see previous posts) in FT on Cairo’s mushrooming into the desert. It looks at how both rich and poor have had to accommodate themselves in recent times. I, however, disagree with this: The development of exclusive estates represents a new phenomenon for the ancient city, as the rich and powerful seek seclusion in [...]

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More on biofuels and hunger

George Monbiot argues that governments continue to avoid hard decisions by promoting converting crops for biofuel production – a process which often produces more carbon than petroleum and causes starvation by limiting already stretched food supplies.

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More On Oil

This article looks at supply trends in recent years and the evolving position of (esp. Sub-Saharan) Africa. With proven oil reserves rising to equal Iraq’s, its relative proximity to the US means that more US oil is sourced there. At the same time, Middle East oil has been increasingly directed eastward. That’s not to say [...]

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FreeRice

I love this: i can improve my vocab and feed people in one fell swing.

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4.5: the sum is greater than the parts

This article was published in September in the LA Times. It’s about Arba3a wi Noss (literally, 4.5), which is one of Cairo’s many squatter slums. It also happens to be one of the areas where a lot of (especially Sudanese) refugees have wound up. I know a lot of work has been directed there over [...]

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Enigmatic Egypt

I think my title has a better ring than the one for this Rami Khouri article about the odd mix of progress on the economic level despite re-entrenched political authoritarianism. Efforts to paint this country in a single shade of color are common, but not very useful. Egypt is neither structurally diabolic, nor genetically enlightened. [...]

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Agrarian Reform and Rectification

I’ve been meaning to get around to this article for a few days. The authors look at the evolution of land ownership policy and (often extralegal) practice over several decades, taking Kamshish as a case study. It’s definitely worth looking at. An excerpt on recent legislation: In 1992, a new law on agrarian reform provided [...]

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“The New Face of Egypt”

this is ridiculous… an Indian face for Egypt?!?!?!

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