While many of our businesses have been able to adapt to reopening protocols in a joint effort to protect the health and safety of both employees and consumers, currently it is an entirely different story for New Hampshires arts and culture economy. At best, its journey to recovery is going to be slow and extremely challenging. At worst, without additional support, many are at of risk of having to close despite the creativity and innovation they have shown throughout this pandemic.

In an industry that relies almost completely on bringing people together, the impacts of COVID-19 have been catastrophic. In the latest numbers pulled together by the Granite Stage, a Facebook based resource for New Hampshire theater, over 40 performing arts companies and festivals have either canceled their summer season or canceled the rest of their 2020 season altogether. In a recent presentation to stakeholders, we heard how 71% of arts-based nonprofits have had to lay off staff in order to keep afloat.

In New Hampshire, the creative economy is a $2.6 billion industry, employing over 2,200 full time staff. The ripple effect on our main streets and surrounding businesses is significant. In Portsmouth, for example, The Music Hall brings in 130,000 patrons every year who go on to spend an average of $27 to $37 per person in event-related expenditures including dinner, drinks, and parking. In Concord, at the Capitol Center for the Arts that number is $18 for locals and up to $49 per person for patrons coming in from out of town.

Closure of a theatre, concert hall or museum means more than the loss of a show or a gallery opening. It is the loss of jobs, contracts, and an economic driver that has revitalized downtowns across the Granite State and brings visitors to New Hampshire.

The arts sector is particularly resilient. It has been common practice among professional artists to not only create, but defend the very act of creation and its impact. In the case of New Hampshire, that impact equals $57 million in direct expenditures, local and state government revenues of $6 million, and $60 million in arts-related spending annually.

In response to this crisis our arts organizations have been extremely innovative in reaching out to their clientele, but often with little or no remuneration. Artists have converted their front lawns into drive-by art galleries. Theaters have quarantined together in order to continue the art of live performances which are showcased online. Musicians, who have lost half a years salary in canceled performances, continue to host online free concerts for their audiences. Music teachers have also brought their students online. Dance teachers are sending their students new choreography and checking in to make sure that the years of progress made in training and discipline are not lost in the time they are apart. In short, our arts and culture sector has been bringing us the very thing that we all have been missing, human connection.

As we begin to emerge as a state from the COVID-19 crisis, it will be the role of our arts and culture organizations to continue to help combat the long-term effects of social distancing and isolation. It will be the job of our artists to bring people back together and allow us to share our stories in a meaningful way as well as displacing feelings of loneliness that have become more prevalent, particularly among our most vulnerable populations.

While the stories of perseverance by this vital sector of our economy are inspiring, the loss of actual participation and engagement by attendees, performers and artists cannot be ignored. When someone watches a video online or attends a virtual class, concert, play, exhibition or arts event, the revenue is a fraction of what could be made through in-person attendance. Upon reopening, reduced seating capacity going forward will significantly minimize a venues main revenue stream. Most arts and cultural organizations rely on a combination of direct event revenue, grant funding, and private donations to stay afloat. As the economy as a whole takes a hit, major fundraisers for these organizations have been canceled or postponed and personal liquidity has been put in danger, dramatically decreasing the number of individuals able to make personal donations.

So what do we do? We must continue to support all our arts and cultural organizations by buying virtual tickets, gift cards for our family members and friends, and safely attending their events and programs as they slowly begin to re-open. Arts organizations have worked closely with public health to create guidelines to protect both patrons and artists and their work is to be commended. If you are not already a member, become a member and support the mission of your preferred arts and cultural organizations as they have supported us throughout this pandemic. If you are able, donate in order to keep the impact of fixed overhead costs at bay. We must reach out to local government, state elected officials and our federal delegation to find additional financial support. We must do everything we can to allow these organizations to survive, thrive and do what they do best keep us connected.

Sen. Shannon Chandley represents District 11, Sen. Martha Fuller Clark represents District 21, and Sen. Jon Morgan represents District 23. The views expressed are those of the writers.

See the original post:

Guest View: The show, and all other arts and culture, must go on - Seacoastonline.com

Los Angeles The coronavirus pandemic has rapidly transformed the internet into the most critical infrastructure on Earth.

By enabling people and businesses to remain connected while under lockdown, the internet has helped to prevent the global economy from collapsing entirely. Indeed, with fear and social distancing continuing to separate many of us, it has become the connective tissue for much human interaction and economic activity around the world.

But few appreciate how this critical global resource has remained stable and resilient since its inception, even as its scope and scale have undergone uninterrupted explosive growth. In an age of widening political, economic, and social divisions, how has the one internet connecting the entire world been sustained? And how can we best continue to protect it?

The answers to both questions start with understanding what makes the Internet which consists of tens of thousands of disparate networks look like and function as one network for all. These components, or unique internet identifiers, include Internet Protocol (IP) addresses, which are associated with every device connected to the internet, and internet domain names (like ft.com, harvard.edu or apple.news), which we use to search for and connect to computers easily.

These unique identifiers ensure that, no matter where you are or which network you are connected to, you will always get in touch with the right computer with the desired domain name, or reach the right target device with an embedded IP number (such as a smart thermostat, for example). This simple, elegant architecture reflects the genius of a handful of brilliant engineers who created the internet a half-century ago. Since then, it has never failed to help us locate the billions of devices that have been added to the thousands of networks that make up todays cyber economy. Should the identifiers fail, we would experience immediate digital chaos.

Given the identifiers critical role, it is imperative that they not be compromised or controlled by any authority that is not committed to maintaining the internet as an open, global, common good. In the wrong hands, they could be used to fragment the Internet and enable top-down control of usage and users by governments with malign intentions. And such fears are real, given authoritarian governments online meddling in elections, national security networks and digital commercial transactions in the last few years.

So, the key question is who should be entrusted today to maintain the security and reliability of internet identifiers. The answer is simple: geeks, not governments.

The same engineers who built the internet established nonprofit institutions, such as the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), to take responsibility for the unique identifiers and maintain the internets original ethos of openness. These and other institutions coordinate global efforts to manage the protocols necessary for the Internets stable and reliable operation, and the engineers who run them today do so with remarkable independence, precision, dedication, and humility.

The last major assault on these institutions independence came in December 2012, when a group of governments at the United Nations World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT) attempted to take control of the unique identifiers. This effort was thwarted thanks to the vigilance of democratic governments that valued the power of a single global internet to foster innovation, commerce, and international cooperation.

But today, in the midst of the chaos caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, authoritarian governments are once again using the United Nations to try to seize control of critical internet resources from engineers. During a recent International Telecommunication Union meeting, a proposal for a new standard for core network technology was submitted.

Regrettably, and more worryingly, extreme activist groups and democratic governments also are carelessly intruding on the work of these independent institutions, to police free expression on social media among other things. For example, after Twitter attached a fact-check warning to two of U.S. President Donald Trumps recent tweets, he threatened that his administration would strongly regulate or close down social media platforms that he believes silence conservative voices.

Organizations such as ICANN and IETF have spent decades developing and refining consensus-based decision-making processes, involving inclusive and transparent bottom-up participation by engineers, businesses, civil-society organizations, and governments. The danger is that by subverting these institutions established procedures, official interference and lobbying will make them easy prey for authoritarian regimes.

Attempting to reshape from outside the decisions of bodies like ICANN, or to fuel the efforts of authoritarian regimes to shift control of the internet to governments within the UN framework, contradicts the internets original ethos and could be devastating for us all.

We must commit to safeguarding the resilient system that enables the internet to function free of political interference or control. At a time when our physical and economic health are faltering in the face of a potent virus, protecting the independent, democratic, and transparent institutions that have dependably governed the internet infrastructure since its inception has never been more important.

Fadi Chehade was President and CEO of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) from 2012 to 2016. Project Syndicate, 19952020

See the rest here:

Keep the geeks in charge of the internet - The Japan Times

A top IMF official has said that there is room for more fiscal support in India in the near term, particularly for vulnerable households and SMEs, given the severity of the countrys economic situation due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Vitor Gaspar, Director of the International Monetary Funds Fiscal Affairs Department, told PTI that a complete and successful implementation of the existing support measures (in particular, food provision to households) is of paramount importance.

Given the severity of the economic situation, in the near-term there is room for more fiscal support, particularly for vulnerable households and SMEs (Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises), he said.

Over the medium-term, India will continue to have a very limited fiscal space, and a credible and well-communicated consolidation plan will be urgently needed once the coronavirus pandemic subsides, Gasper said.

The economic impact of the COVID-19 in India has been substantial and broad-based, he said, adding that high frequency indicators point to a sharp decline in economic activity, as reflected in the industrial production, business sentiment (in the purchasing managers index), vehicle sales and trade.

In the June World Economic Outlook (WEO), growth in fiscal year 20/21 was revised down to -4.5 per cent, he said.

The downward revision compared with the April WEO was driven primarily by the continued rise in the number of COVID-19 cases in India.

This led the International Monetary Fund to make specific two adjustments. First, the assumed length of the partial lockdown was extended somewhat. Second, and more important, we made more conservative assumptions about the speed of recovery given that the health crisis has not yet been contained, Gasper said in response to a question.

He said that the near-term growth outlook in India continues to be clouded by the global and domestic slowdown and uncertainties relating to the evolution of the coronavirus pandemic.

According to the senior IMF official, Indias general government fiscal deficit is projected to reach 12.1 per cent of the GDP in fiscal year 20/21, primarily due to weak tax revenues, as well as a denominator effect associated with the negative projected nominal GDP growth as with all other macro variables, estimates are highly uncertain.

Consistent with this, and the deterioration in economic activity, Indias public debt-to-GDP ratio is projected to reach about 84 per cent this fiscal year, Gasper added.

According to Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, the contagion has infected over 12 million people and killed more than 554,000 across the world.

The US is the worst affected country with over 3.1 million cases and more than 1,33,000 deaths. Indias COVID-19 caseload stands at 7,93,802 with 21,604 deaths.

The COVID-19, which originated in Chinas Wuhan city in December last year, has also battered the world economy with the International Monetary Fund saying that the global economy is bound to suffer a severe recession.

Scientists are racing against time to find a vaccine or medicine for its treatment.

Like Loading...

Related

Read the original here:

Room For More Fiscal Support In India In Near Term Given Severity Of Economic Situation: IMF - Inventiva

Ellen Brown is a world-renowned author and founding director of the Public Banking Institute, which will sponsor an online forum Wednesday evening.

Ellen Brown is a world-renowned author and founding director of the Public Banking Institute, which will sponsor an online forum Wednesday evening.

Photo: Photo Contributed By Cimbria Badenhausen

Ellen Brown is a world-renowned author and founding director of the Public Banking Institute, which will sponsor an online forum Wednesday evening.

Ellen Brown is a world-renowned author and founding director of the Public Banking Institute, which will sponsor an online forum Wednesday evening.

CT forum to address public-owned banks, which offer low-interest loans

MIDDLETOWN Local stakeholders are hoping to enlighten people about the possibility of creating a public banking system which potentially could become a financial lifeline to struggling communities.

An upcoming Zoom meeting sponsored by Public Bank Connecticut will be conducted in partnership with the East Haddam-based Sanctuary at Shepardfields, a management services company led by the citys energy coordinator, Michael Harris, who owns Harris Management Services, and administrators with the Public Banking Institute.

These lending entities have been shown to respond more rapidly, effectively and equitably to crises than privately-owned banks, according to California-based PBI, led by Ellen Brown, a world-renowned author and founding director.

These things can really benefit Main Street, and communities and municipalities in Connecticut, which is what were trying to spread awareness, Harris said. I want to get Middletowns attention on this topic.

This is an attractive option both to conservative and more progressive people. The money thats produced in the state stays in the state, according to Cimbria Badenhausen, who runs PBIs engagement and support efforts.

The only such bank in the continental United States was established in North Dakota, and made possible after a Supreme Court ruling, she said.

As a bank, its more successful than Goldman Sachs, Badenhausen said.

Wall Streets interests have prohibited the model from being replicated in other states, she said. They fund the big stuff. We can fund the small stuff through community banks.

It can be an incredibly valuable tool for managing life going forward amid the convergence of crises known as climate disruption and COVID-19, and equity, social and economic justice issues that are all inter sectional, Harris said.

Brown will be the guest speaker at Wednesdays 6 p.m. Zoom session.

Expected to attend are veteran public bank advocate state Rep. Susan Johnson, D-Willimantic, along with Reps. Josh Elliot, D-Hamden, and Christine Palm, D-Chester; Chester Selectwoman Lauren Gister; and East Haddam Selectwoman Theresa Govert, as well as other influencers.

New Haven community organizer Jayuan Carter owns a landscaping company. I love economics. Economics to me is a team sport, he said.

Hes keen on offering additional options to people looking to borrow funds. That way, they can have more access to capital so we can have a better quality of life. The system is not quite working for everyone, said Carter, who called the subject a passion of his.

Johnson proposed legislation five years ago, which is now gaining more interest, Badenhausen said.

Currently, there is some opposition to the plan, including consultants who work to steer people toward private loans, Carter said.

Setting up these public financial institutions at the state and municipal levels is a matter of economy of scale, Harris said. Larger cities are more conducive to the concept.

There are two ways these public banks could be set up in Connecticut, he said. The quickest would be for the governor to make an emergency declaration. An alternative, which would take longer, is legislative action.

Privately held banks have capital resources they leverage by creating credit, Harris said. They can create money out of thin air at a ratio of $10 to every $1 of capital resources they have.

These companies have access to extremely low-cost money through federal emergency measures caused by the economic downturn due to COVID, he added.

All that leverage and profits derived from the way banking takes place today in the world accrue to the capital owners, to private investors through a profit modem, Harris said.

Justin Good, co-executive director of the Sanctuary, which is dedicated to community development, sustainability and other missions, said the Connecticut Bankers Association has come out in opposition to the legislation, saying such banks would mean more competition.

Thats absolutely false. It does just the opposite, Good said. Bank of North Dakota has the highest number of community banks per capita in the states. It increases their lending capacities.

For instance, if Hartford needed $4 billion for infrastructure issues, the city, doing business as the Hartford Bank, could lend itself $4 billion at 1 percent interest. It would be paying 101 percent of the loan rather than traditional, much higher interest levels, Badenhausen said.

Banks are not intermediaries, they actually create money when they create loans, Good said.

Carter gives an example of banks whose policy is to keeping deposited checks for two days, which he considers a questioning of his ability to cover that amount in his own account. In holding that check, theyre depositing and making money in the process.

A car dealer cant sell more than they actually have, but a bank can make more money than it actually has, Good said.

A study in Chicago showed banks there loaned more money to those in white neighborhoods than all others combined, he said. Individual banks loaned 20 to 40 times more funds to white families than to those of color, Good said.

The deepest level of social injustice is in the banking industry. They didnt find explicit racial discrimination because of how they factor risk. This is a problem that, even though redlining is illegal, it still continues with a vengeance. A public bank could address that at the deepest level, he said.

If it were to deposit those revenues into its own public bank, they could leverage that capital resource 10:1 and lend the communitys money at extremely low interest rates, Harris said. The articulated mission is for the communitys good instead of for-profit investors and private owners of capital.

To register for the Zoom meeting, go to CTPublicBank. The event will also be livestreamed on Facebook. For information, visit the Public Banking Institute website and its Facebook page.

Read the rest here:

CT forum to address public-owned banks, which offer low-interest loans - Middletown Press

OTTAWA, ON, July 9, 2020 /CNW/ - Canada is an ocean nation with the longest coastline in the world. Canadians rely on healthy marine ecosystems to sustain our economy, our food supply, and our coastal communities. But the ocean is a shared resource that requires a global effort to ensure marine conservation. That is why the Government of Canada is joining other countries to advocate for international action to increase conservation and protection of our oceans by 2030.

Today, during the Protecting the Ocean's Most Important Places webinar, the Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard, the Honourable Bernadette Jordan, announced Canada has joined the United Kingdom and other countries in the Global Ocean Alliance. The Alliance's goal is to advocate with international partners for ambitious ocean action to protect at least 30 per cent of the world's oceans through the establishment of marine protected areas and other effective area-based marine conservation measures by 2030.

Since 2015, the Government of Canada has worked in partnership with provinces and territories, Indigenous peoples, and environmental and industry organizations to increase the protection of our oceans. Canada aimed to conserve 10 per cent of the country's marine and coastal areas by 2020 and has already surpassed this goal, reaching nearly 14 per cent by August 2019. Canada's efforts, including the establishment of new marine protected areas and other effective area-based conservation measures, have also contributed to the international 10 per cent marine conservation target ahead of the 2020 timeline.

The Government of Canada continues to work toward its ambitious target of protecting 25 per cent of marine and coastal areas by 2025, working toward 30 per cent by 2030. Through the Global Ocean Alliance, we join a growing number of like-minded countries that will advocate internationally for 30 per cent conservation by 2030 around the world. We will work with other countries toward the adoption of new ambitious global biodiversity targets under the Convention on Biological Diversity at the 15th Conference of Parties in Kunming, China in 2021.

Canada is joining the Global Ocean Alliance to help galvanize international efforts towards a 30 per cent conservation goal that allows the marine environment and sustainable marine economies to thrive.

Quotes

Our oceans provide a wealth of opportunity when approached from the position of sustainability and environmental stewardship. Canada is proud to join the Global Ocean Alliance, working alongsidelike-minded countries to advocate for our shared visionof sustainable, healthy oceans around the world. We have made exceptional progress on protecting our own waters, and it is time to move the goal post ahead and reach even farther. Canadians expect our government to be a global leader in environmental protection, and this partnership is another way we will use our voice, leadership, and resources to protect our oceans and make a difference around the world.

-The Honourable Bernadette Jordan, Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard

Our government is working together with provinces, territories, Indigenous peoples, environmental organizations and industry to advance conservation on Canada's lands and waters. Together we have made great progress and achieved the 10 per cent global target for marine conservation ahead of the 2020 commitment. Recognizing we have a responsibility to Canadians, the world, and future generations we are committed to redoubling our efforts to protect the biodiversity of our ocean and support the sustainability of coastal communities. Focused and coordinated action by countries around the world is the only way to stem the decline in biodiversity and rise to the challenge of climate change. Canada's participation in the Global Ocean Alliance demonstrates our commitment to achieving these goals.

-The Honourable Jonathan Wilkinson, Minister of Environment and Climate Change and Minister Responsible for Parks Canada

Quick Facts

Associated Links

Stay Connected

SOURCE Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) Canada

For further information: Jane Deeks, Press Secretary, Office of the Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard, 343-550-9594, [emailprotected]; Media Relations, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, 613-990-7537, [emailprotected]

http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca

See the rest here:

Canada joins Global Ocean Alliance: Advocates for protecting 30 per cent of the world's ocean by 2030 - Canada NewsWire

Text Size:A- A+

By securing victory in a national vote on constitutional changes, Vladimir Putin could now remain president of Russia until 2036 if he chooses to stand again. After 20 years in power, the narrative of Russias chaotic 1990s remains core to Putins legitimacy as the leader who restored stability.

Although the decade still divides public opinion, whats not in doubt is that it was a dangerous and exciting period. The ambiguity of the 90s is summed up by the then-popular Russian word, bespredel, the title of a 1989 prison drama meaning anarchic freedom and unaccountable authority.

At the time, Russias turbulent post-Soviet transition was seen as a lurid sideshow to a stable post-cold war west. A generation later, the uncertainties of that period have a wider resonance than they did at the time.

The 1990s began with the Soviet Unions first multiparty elections in March 1990 when Boris Yeltsin emerged as leader of Russia. It ended, punctually, on December 31, 1999, when Yeltsin resigned in favour of Putin, his designated successor.

The decade included two failed coups in 1991 and 1993, and the abolition of both the ruling Communist Party and the USSR. Massive economic dislocation occurred as Soviet economic ties were severed, a market economy was created and shock therapy accompanied by mass privatisation.

The social impact was immense. Life expectancy fell, with up to five million excess adult deaths in Russia in 1991-2001, birth rates collapsed and both of these trends were compounded by widespread crime and trafficking. These negative effects were concentrated in periods of economic crisis in 1991-94 and 1998-99.

Sharply rising inequality and the emergence of a new wealthy class, including some leading reformers, meant that the term democrat had become a term of abuse as early as 1992.

We are deeply grateful to our readers & viewers for their time, trust and subscriptions.

Quality journalism is expensive and needs readers to pay for it. Your support will define our work and ThePrints future.

SUBSCRIBE NOW

Also read: India doesnt have a Russia problem. New Delhi must stop trying to fix it

My own research from that period shows how the concentration of power was a trend right from the beginning of the reforms. It was from part of the reform movement itself that the style of government associated with Putin emerged.

I arrived in St Petersburg in 1991, expecting to study the conflict between democratic and communist ideologies. Instead, I found that the conflict was between two groups of reformers those who supported strong executive rule and those in favour of representative or parliamentary rule. It was a re-match of the 19th century Russian debate between protagonists of state and society. In both cases it was the statists who won.

For advocates of strong executive rule, such as the leading reformer and mayor of St Petersburg, Anatoly Sobchak under whom Putin served as deputy elected councillors were an obstacle to efficient governance.

All reformers united in opposing the attempted coup by hardline Soviets in August 1991, but from then on the split in the reform camp between the advocates of executive and representative powers grew wider. It culminated in October 1993, in a brief armed conflict between president and parliament. The parliamentary forces were mostly anti-liberal nationalists, but they were also supported by councils. Among them was the reformer-led St Petersburg council, then deep in a legal conflict with Sobchak, its former chair, over what councillors saw as his excessive concentration of power.

Yeltsin ordered his forces to fire on the parliament to quell the attempted coup. With parliament defeated, most regional and city councils across the country were dissolved and replaced by assemblies with reduced powers.

The conflict between Sobchak and his former allies continued until his death in 1999. By then his former deputy, Putin had reached the apex of executive power at national level taking many of Sobchaks St Petersburg team to form the core of his Kremlin administration.

Concentration of power at all levels of the hierarchy meant a more intensive zero-sum struggle to win it, rather than the compromises inherent to parliamentary systems. Higher stakes meant aggressive mobilisation of media for an information war became a feature of 1990s electoral politics at regional level, following the pattern of the 1996 presidential election.

By then, the corruption associated with privatisation had made Yeltsin and the reformers unpopular and many feared the communists would return to power. The democrats had to resort to desperate measures. Every possible resource was mobilised to ensure that Yeltsin was re-elected including deals with powerful oligarchs with large media empires. The communists were defeated but the price was endemic cynicism about the democratic process.

Also read: How India lined up US, Russia on its side of LAC and China was forced to return friendless

The Yeltsin presidency remained beholden to Russias regional governors and the oligarchs. It fell to Putin to curtail the powers of these groups, campaigning in 2000 under the slogan of the dictatorship of law. That such a slogan could have popular support shows the degree to which the public had become disillusioned in the late 1990s. However, the direction towards concentration of power had been set almost a decade before Putin was elected president.

Russias reformers of the 90s largely achieved the irreversible economic change they wanted. They were less successful in creating a positive narrative for the new Russia. Reform had seemed to be based on the idea that Russia needed to learn as much as possible from the west. Over time, disillusion with this idealised view of the west grew and public opinion became more nationalistic.

By the late 1990s, nationalism was both a threat and an opportunity. As in the era of Putins reputed role model, Tsar Alexander III in the late 19th century, the policy appeared to be for nationalism to provide the state with an ideology while centralisation would contain it from getting out of hand. The new constitutional changes Putin has now introduced continue this dual path of greater concentration of power and emphasis on national identity and sovereignty and both have their origins in the early 1990s.

Adrian Campbell, Senior Lecturer in International Development, University of Birmingham

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Subscribe to our channels on YouTube & Telegram

News media is in a crisis & only you can fix it

You are reading this because you value good, intelligent and objective journalism. We thank you for your time and your trust.

You also know that the news media is facing an unprecedented crisis. It is likely that you are also hearing of the brutal layoffs and pay-cuts hitting the industry. There are many reasons why the medias economics is broken. But a big one is that good people are not yet paying enough for good journalism.

We have a newsroom filled with talented young reporters. We also have the countrys most robust editing and fact-checking team, finest news photographers and video professionals. We are building Indias most ambitious and energetic news platform. And we arent even three yet.

At ThePrint, we invest in quality journalists. We pay them fairly and on time even in this difficult period. As you may have noticed, we do not flinch from spending whatever it takes to make sure our reporters reach where the story is. Our stellar coronavirus coverage is a good example. You can check some of it here.

This comes with a sizable cost. For us to continue bringing quality journalism, we need readers like you to pay for it. Because the advertising market is broken too.

If you think we deserve your support, do join us in this endeavour to strengthen fair, free, courageous, and questioning journalism, please click on the link below. Your support will define our journalism, and ThePrints future. It will take just a few seconds of your time.

Support Our Journalism

Read more:

The wild decade: the 1990s laid the foundations for Vladimir Putins Russia - ThePrint

Washington: A top IMF official has said that there is room for more fiscal support in India in the near term, particularly for vulnerable households and SMEs, given the severity of the country's economic situation due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Vitor Gaspar, Director of the International Monetary Fund's Fiscal Affairs Department, told that a complete and successful implementation of the existing support measures (in particular, food provision to households) is of paramount importance.

"Given the severity of the economic situation, in the near-term there is room for more fiscal support, particularly for vulnerable households and SMEs (Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises)," he said.

Over the medium-term, India will continue to have a very limited fiscal space, and a credible and well-communicated consolidation plan will be urgently needed once the coronavirus pandemic subsides, Gasper said.

The economic impact of the COVID-19 in India has been substantial and broad-based, he said, adding that high frequency indicators point to a sharp decline in economic activity, as reflected in the industrial production, business sentiment (in the purchasing managers index), vehicle sales and trade.

In the June World Economic Outlook (WEO), growth in fiscal year 20/21 was revised down to -4.5 per cent, he said.

The downward revision compared with the April WEO was driven primarily by the continued rise in the number of COVID-19 cases in India.

"This led the International Monetary Fund to make specific two adjustments. First, the assumed length of the partial lockdown was extended somewhat. Second, and more important, we made more conservative assumptions about the speed of recovery given that the health crisis has not yet been contained," Gasper said in response to a question.

He said that the near-term growth outlook in India continues to be clouded by the global and domestic slowdown and uncertainties relating to the evolution of the coronavirus pandemic.

According to the senior IMF official, India's general government fiscal deficit is projected to reach 12.1 per cent of the GDP in fiscal year 20/21, primarily due to weak tax revenues, as well as a denominator effect associated with the negative projected nominal GDP growth -- as with all other macro variables, estimates are highly uncertain.

"Consistent with this, and the deterioration in economic activity, India's public debt-to-GDP ratio is projected to reach about 84 per cent this fiscal year," Gasper added.

According to Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, the contagion has infected over 12 million people and killed more than 554,000 across the world.

The US is the worst affected country with over 3.1 million cases and more than 1,33,000 deaths. India's COVID-19 caseload stands at 7,93,802 with 21,604 deaths.

The COVID-19, which originated in China's Wuhan city in December last year, has also battered the world economy with the International Monetary Fund saying that the global economy is bound to suffer a "severe recession".

Scientists are racing against time to find a vaccine or medicine for its treatment.

Read more:

Room for more fiscal support in India in near term given severity of economic situation: IMF - Economic Times

The mining sector is a core driver of a nations economic development. The sector is a significant contributor to GDP, a major source of employment, and a catalyst of growth in other vital industries (such as power, steel, cement, etc.) that are, in turn, critical for overall economic development. As aptly stated in the National Mineral Policy, 2019 (NMP): Minerals are a valuable natural resource being the vital raw material for the core sectors of the economy. Exploration, extraction and management of minerals have to be guided by national goals and perspectives, to be integrated into the overall strategy of the countrys economic development. Endeavour shall be to promote domestic industry, reduce import dependency, and feed into Make in India initiative.

India is richly endowed with metallic and non-metallic mineral resources the country produces as many as 95 minerals, which includes 4 fuel, 10 metallic, 23 non-metallic, 3 atomic and 55 minor minerals. Considering this abundance of minerals in India, the mining sector has huge economic potential. However, this potential is yet to be fully realised.

Reform to Rebound

India, like much of the world, has been left reeling as a result of the black swan impact of COVID-19.Ensuring economic rebound is now an issue of high priority. The mining sector has the potential to play a crucial role in making this aspiration a reality both in terms of its own economic output as well as in responding to the demands of other allied/ dependent industries. Additionally, the sector has the capacity to create over 5 crore jobs directly and indirectly which will be vital given the widescale unemployment that has been brought about by the current crisis. However, for the sector to do so efficaciously, there is a need to address the clear and present fallout of the pandemic, as well as the various issues that have hampered and hamstrung its growth.

This article proposes measures to suitably address identified challenges unique to the mining industry, both in general and as a result of the present crisis. In doing so, the article builds on the reform initiatives outlined in the NMP, viz., incentivising exploration through seamless transmission to mining, pre-identification of no-go areas, simpler and time-bound procedures for granting permits, harmonising royalty rates with international standards, and assuring security of tenure.

Immediate Relief Measures

At the outset, in order to grant relief from the plunging prices of minerals and slumping demand, it should be considered to offer rebates or reductions in royalty payments and contributions to the District Mineral Fund and National Mineral Exploration Trust. Another urgent relief measure to be considered is waiving the GST compensation cess on coking-coal for power intensive industries such as aluminium and streel.

Addressing Systemic Issues

New Exploration Framework

Exploration is an expensive and high-risk proposition with an extremely low success rate. The currentdispensation for exploration contemplates a non-exclusive reconnaissance permit, and a compositelicence (i.e., a prospecting licence cum mining lease). However, the present dispensation leaves a lot to be desired.

For starters, the non-exclusivity of the reconnaissance permit and the lack of in-built transition to mineral exploitation make the concession unattractive to the industry. With respect to composite licences, since it is the State Government that is responsible for notifying mineral blocks for auction, there is often undue delay in initiation of auctions, and the very real risk of blocks being considered sub-optimal by bidders. Another challenge is that of the mineral auction process being completed, only for environmental clearances to be refused this results in much time, effort and investment being wastefully expended.

In order to address these issues, it may be considered for the Central Government and State Governments to work together to develop a mineral exploration atlas that divides the geography of India into grids. Based on the mineral atlas, applicants should be permitted to freely carve out an areaand seek a composite license in respect of the same. Upon receipt of an application, the State Government should put up for auction the area so carved out by the applicant. The applicant may be given an incentive in the auction process (e.g., a right to match). The grant of the concession may be subject to checks in the form of periodic relinquishment and minimum investment requirements. This approach would be in line with the Open Acreage Licensing Policy currently in vogue in the Oil & Gas industry.

As an immediate measure, the Central Government should hasten the issuance of rules laying down requisite bidding parameters necessary to operationalise the newly introduced Section 10C of the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act, 1957 (whereby holders of non-exclusive reconnaissance permits for deep-seated minerals (i.e., minerals which occur at a depth of more than300 meters, with poor surface manifestations) may be granted composite licences or mining leases).

Simplifying Approvals Framework

Presently, developers may expend considerable time and effort on a mineral block, only for environmental clearances to be subsequently denied. In this regard, the atlas described above should set out predefined no-go areas where reconnaissance, prospecting or mining operations cannot be undertaken. Such areas may be identified based on the presence of reserve forests, sensitive eco-zones, coastal areas, defence land, et al.

Additionally, there are currently multiple permits that have to be variously obtained under the Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1974, Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1981,and the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 (and the rules and notifications issued thereunder). Thiscreates multiple overlapping applications processes, despite mostly involving the same grantingauthority, i.e., the respective pollution control board.

In this regard, taking cue from this Governments earlier successful attempts to consolidate and streamline laws (e.g., labour, bankruptcy, etc.), the legislations and executive rules relating to environmental protection should be consolidated in a comprehensive code. In doing so, care should also be taken to restructure and rationalize the approvals process in a manner that avoids overlap and repetition, particularly when the granting authority is one and the same.

Rationalising Royalty

Indias rates of royalty are amongst the highest in the world. This royalty plays a substantial part in driving up costs of production as well as the cost of end-use products produced from the mineral. The high incidence of royalties coupled with the flat structure of royalty discourages investment in mineral processing and value addition, which, in turn, impedes uptake of new technologies which may enhance sustainability and economic growth. Further, there are presently 60 different royalty rates for 55 minerals with varied bases, making Indias royalty regime amongst the worlds most cumbersome.

The rates of royalty should be rationalised by way of benchmarking the same with other mining jurisdictions, and ensuring appropriate incentives for efficiency, economical use of the resources, good performance and optimum investments. In particular, the constituent components of the base value on which royalty is charged should be reconsidered to avoid a situation of a royalty on royalty. Further, to encourage competition amongst the states to attract investments, State Governments should be allowed to offer concessional rates of royalty similar to the practice in Australia and Canada.

Tenure of Leases

Currently, the law prescribes a fixed tenure of mining concessions that is unrelated to the actual mineral potential and realisable ore in a block. Such prescribed tenure of leases causes manifold problems. Firstly, it leads to closure of mine prior to complete exhaustion of mineral resources, which runs contrary to the objective of mineral development and conservation. Secondly, reauctioning the block to a new lessee requires existing lessee to remove all the equipment thereby allowing the former to invest anew in requisite equipment/labour. This is time consuming and inefficient.

In order to avoid the above stated issues, the tenure of all the mining leases should be linked to exhaustion or depletion of minerals to such an extent that it is no longer economical to work the mineral. For existing leases, a similar allowance may be made subject to prescribed conditions, including payment of additional dues by the lessee over and above the existing royalties.

The Road Ahead

The world presently faces an unprecedented economic challenge, and it is incumbent on governments to respond responsibly and demonstrably. To this end, policy makers and industry players should work together and put in concerted efforts to revive, rescue and rebuild the mining sector, thus aiding the countrys overall economic recovery.

Get live Stock Prices from BSE, NSE, US Market and latest NAV, portfolio of Mutual Funds, calculate your tax by Income Tax Calculator, know markets Top Gainers, Top Losers & Best Equity Funds. Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.

Financial Express is now on Telegram. Click here to join our channel and stay updated with the latest Biz news and updates.

Read more:

Govt must rescue and revive mining sector to boost economic recovery - The Financial Express

The ASEAN Centre for Biodiversity, with the High Ambition Coalition for Nature and the National Geographic Societys Campaign for Nature, organised a webinarfor the officials and representatives of the ASEAN Member States. (Screengrabbed from ACB)

LAGUNA, July 10 -- Carving out 30 percent of the Earths surface for protection can be the wisest economic decision that the world will ever make as the nature sector drives the global economy, experts said.

The High Ambition Coalition for Nature and People, with the National Geographic Societys Campaign for Nature and the ASEAN Centre for Biodiversity (ACB), recently organised a webinar titled Making the case for protecting at least 30% of the planet by 2030: the biodiversity, climate, and economics of 30by30,with officials and representatives of the ASEAN Member States in attendance.

Among the webinars resource persons wereCosta Rica Minister of Environment and Energy Carlos Manuel Rodriguez, National Geographic Society Explorer in Residence Dr. Enric Sala, Campaign for Nature Director Brian ODonnell, Professor Zakri Abdul Hamid,founding chair of theIntergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES)andco-chair the Secretariat of Malaysia's Global Science and Innovation Advisory Council, and ACB Executive Director Theresa Mundita Lim.

ODonnellin his presentation gave a preview of the groundbreaking global report, which lays out the economic costs and benefits of protecting 30 per cent of the planet by 2030. The report on the comprehensive study led by Anthony Waldron of Oxford University and 100 other experts, was published on 8 July 2020.

The zero draft of the post-2020 global biodiversity framework, which was released in January 2020, calls for the protection of 30 percent of the Earth surface in 10 years, or touted as 30by30.

Most people think that protected areas are going to be a drain on the global economy. But this report showed that the nature sector is, in fact, a net contributor, not a drain, ODonnell said.

The tourism sector, which includes nature-based tourism, is one of the drivers of global economic growth, outweighing the impacts of other sectors, such as agriculture, timber, or fisheries.

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, tourism was growing at 4 to 6 per cent annually, while agriculture and timber industries have been growing by less than 1 per cent and the fisheries sector posting negative growth,ODonnellexplained.

Apart from these economic benefits, 30by30 also provides nonmonetary benefits, such as climate change mitigation, flood protection, clean water, and soil conservation.

ODonnell said according to the global report, which ran different scenarios of biodiversity conservation for terrestrial and marine areas, the financial and economic benefits of protecting 30 per cent of the planet exceed its costs by a factor of 5 to 1. This means that for every dollar cost of nature conservation, the economic benefit is equivalent to five USD.

To meet the proposed target of protection, USD 140 billion globally every year should be set aside.

Small fraction of global GDP

Minister Rodriguez did a quick math and pointed out that while the figures sounded like a huge sum of money, the amount is a mere 0.16 percent of the Global Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the combinedgross nationalincome of all the countries in theworld.

There is no excuse for us not to mobilise resources to be able to achieve our goal in the next 10 years, said Rodriguez, who has been selected as the next CEO and Chair of theGlobal Environment Facility.

The governments of Costa Rica and France are leading theHigh Ambition Coalition for Nature and People, a grouping of nations pushing for the proposed 30by30 global target.

Rodriguez spoke about how Costa Rica doubled the size of its forest cover and at the same time tripled its economic growth in 30 years.

I come from a country that has systematically invested in policy development, institutional solutions that balance nature conservation, human wellbeing, and economic development, he said, emphasizing the short window of opportunity to address the biodiversity collapse.

Rodriguez underlined the correlation between establishing ecotourism protected areas and efforts to restore degraded landscapes, and the growth of the countrys economy and income per capita.

In Costa Ricas case, 2.5 million tourists visit the country every year and spend around 3.5 billion USD in total, according to Rodriguez.

Effective management

Sala, meanwhile, stressed the importance of effectively managing protected areas, saying only five per cent of the worlds terrestrial protected areas and one per cent of the marine protected areas are considered to be effectively managed.

When protected areas have higher budget and number of personnel, and active and effective management, they not only restore biodiversity effectively, they provide benefits including jobs for local people through tourism, fisheries; they bring in more economic revenues, Sala said.

In her opening remarks, Lim said the onlinediscussion on the science and rationale behind the proposed target will help the ASEAN region determine its own contributions to the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework and define its priority actions to ensure the agreed targets are met.

Lim stressed that setting aside protected areas still remains as one of the most effective ways to tackle biodiversity decline.

Although we are crafting the post-2020 global biodiversity framework, we are not reinventing the wheel. The ASEAN Member States, all of which are parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, have shown considerable commitment to achieving the Aichi Biodiversity Targets, particularly Target 11, whichcalls for the protection of at least 17 percentof terrestrial and 10per cent of marine areas by 2020, Lim said.

Professor Zakri, on the other hand, noted some of the challenges of biodiversity conservation in the ASEAN region, such as poaching, lack of conservation staff, the need for coordinated efforts in transboundary protected areas, and funding for conservation programmes.

The post-2020 global biodiversity framework will be adopted bytheConference of the Parties to the CBD in its 15thmeeting, which was originallyscheduled to take place in October this year, in Kunming, China.

The 15th meeting is tentatively expected to take place during the second quarter of 2021, according to the announcement of the CBD Secretariat. (ACB)

Read more:

Is nature conservation, a drain or a net contributor to global economy? Experts weigh in - Philippine Information Agency

Business for South Africa (B4SA) released an economic recovery strategy paper on July 10 that includes a list of 12 priority initiatives, many infrastructure-related, which the formation argues could bolster gross domestic product (GDP) by R1-trillion, create up to 1.5-million jobs and increase yearly tax revenues by R100-billion in the coming three years.

It also called for the establishment of a Joint Reconstruction Task Team to coordinate the implementation of the recovery plan, which would require public and private funding of R3.4-trillion over the coming three years.

The paper follows hot on the heels of the recent Sustainable Infrastructure Development Symposium South Africa at which President Cyril Ramaphosa argued that infrastructure should be the flywheel of the countrys economic recovery from Covid-19.

It also coincides with the release of a discussion document published by the African National Congress economic transformation committee, which asserts that mobilising society around an infrastructure-led recovery should be the first pillar of a new policy framework introduced to address the economic damage associated with the pandemic.

B4SA, which was established in response to Covid-19, said its paper had the support of a number of business associations, including the Association for Savings and Investments South Africa, the Black Business Council (BBC), the Banking Association of South Africa, Business Unity South Africa (Busa), Business Leadership South Africa and Minerals Council South Africa.

In fact, Busa president Sipho Pityana described the paper as the first-ever unambiguously united response by organised business to any issue, while BBC president Sandile Zungu labelled the intervention a demonstration of business commitment to being a reliable social partner.

Titled A New Inclusive Economic Future for South Africa: Delivering an Accelerated Economic Recovery Strategy, the document includes 12 initiatives, each comprising several specific projects, that mostly overlap with the 18 Strategic Integrated Projects that the Presidential Infrastructure Coordinating Committee has been prioritising in recent years.

Pityana acknowledged that the proposals contained in the document were not new.

He stressed, however, that the projects and reforms outlined remained fundamental to placing South Africa on a new growth trajectory and noted that they had also not yet been implemented as envisaged.

For instance, B4SA said that projects and initiatives to ensure affordable and secure electricity supply should be prioritised along with efforts to fast-track green-economy investments through an acceleration of the deployment of renewable energy and the launch of a green stimulus and national green funding strategy.

It also wanted Eskoms operating and capital structures to be addressed and the Integrated Resource Plan 2019 (IRP 2019) updated to include revised gas-to-power targets. The IRP 2019 currently allocates 3000 MW to gas until 2030.

The other ten projects and initiatives identified, included:

A recurring conclusion across most sectors is that infrastructure is a key enabler which must be addressed with urgency if businesses are to deliver inclusive growth, B4SA argued, adding that a constructive and effective policy framework was also required to support and sustain growth.

B4SAs Martin Kingston said the funding required to implement the plan would be split between the public sector (R2.4-trillion) and the private sector (R1-trillion) and could only be raised if South Africa presented a coherent and compelling case to domestic and international investors.

Given the structure and size of South Africas financial markets, this level of funding need cannot be met by domestic sources, nor is it possible for the South African Reserve Bank to address the shortfall in a responsible and sustainable manner through monetary measures. Increased foreign capital will therefore be required, which South Africa will have to compete for, Kingston said.

FORK IN THE ROAD

Key constraints to accessing the estimated $12-trillion in pandemic-related support available globally was South Africas weak growth, its worsening fiscal position and recent downgrades by the credit rating agencies.

B4SA warned that the Covid-19 pandemic was likely to result in South Africas GDP declining by between 8% and 10% in 2020, as well as a sharp increase in the 2020/21 fiscal deficit to about 13.3%.

In the absence of growth-enhancing structural reforms, budget deficits are expected to remain high and government debt is expected to exceed 100% of GDP in 2023 (versus 26% in 2008), as annual Budget deficits remain above 13% of GDP.

The paper urges government to pursue a zero-based reconstruction Budget and for Finance Minister Tito Mboweni to provide visibility of such a budgetary response when presenting his Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement in October.

The Covid-19 economic shock, B4SA asserts, presents an opportunity to reimagine South Africas future, and has placed South Africa at a fork in the road and actions taken in response to the crisis will determine whether the country follows a low road or a high road.

Should it take the low road, the gains made since 1994 would be lost, while the high road to reposition the economy to grow at a yearly rate of about 5% would help reduce unemployment, inequality and poverty.

The immediate imperative is to kick-start inclusive economic growth by restoring confidence, attracting investment, and implementing projects which will lead to near-term employment gains, and which then support inclusive growth over the medium and long-term, the paper asserts.

Read the original here:

Mining Weekly Infrastructure at core of business' R3.4-trillion economic recovery proposal - Creamer Media's Mining Weekly

Professor Toby Peters of the Centre for Sustainable Cooling, in conjunction with shecco, is refining the definition of Clean Cooling, and developing a process for auditing whether cooling projects fulfill the definition.

Over the past five years, three global agreementsof immense importance to the future of humanity have been enacted: the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the Paris Agreement on climate change, and the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol on HFC reduction.

The SDGs, born at the UN Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro in 2012, encompass 17 urgent environmental, political and economic challenges around the world. They were adopted by world leaders in September 2015 at the UN Sustainable Development Summit 2015 in New York City, and went into force in January 2016.

Around that time (December 2015), the UN Climate Change Conference (COP 21) was held in Paris, where 196 governments negotiated and drafted the Paris Agreement on climate change; it was signed the following April in New York City, and has been ratified by 189 governments as of June 2020. Its objective: keeping the rise in global temperatures since the industrial revolution well under 2C (3.6F), preferably no greater than 1.5C (2.7F).

To support the goals of the Paris Agreement, the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol was enacted on October 15, 2016, by 198 governments (including the European Union) in Kigali, Rwanda; it took effect on January 1, 2019. The Amendment calls for the phase down of the production and use of HFCs, which are potent greenhouse gases, by developed and developing countries, targeting a roughly 85% reduction compared to baselines by 2047.

While these three global treaties all aim to dramatically improve the environmental, economic and social health of the world during the 21st century, they each go about it in different ways. But there is one, often overlooked, area of overlap that is essential to the realization of all three: cooling or, to be more precise, Clean Cooling.

Clean Cooling sits at the intersection of Paris, Kigali and the SDGs, said Toby Peters, Professor in Cold Economy at the University of Birmingham, U.K., and Co-Director of the Birmingham-based Centre for Sustainable Cooling, who first defined the concept several years ago. He has written extensively about it, including a study called A Cool World: Defining the Energy Conundrum of Cooling for All. (See Meeting the Demand for Cooling in a Warming World, Accelerate Magazine, July-August 2019.)

Clean Cooling, Peters explained, is the link that shows how the three treaties are not separate entities but are in fact interrelated; moreover, it is the linchpin that enables you to deliver all three simultaneously, that is, meeting basic societal needs while protecting the environment, he said.

The criteria for the Global Cooling Prize are fully aligned with the intent of the Clean Cooling definition-Iain Campbell, Rocky Mountain Institute

Clean Cooling, which dramatically raises the bar on current norms, is Peters call to arms. If were going to hit our targets, we have to challenge the world to be more aggressive, he said.

The implementation of Clean Cooling would not only help countries achieve the goals of the three major treaties, but in so doing would also deliver what Peters calls Cooling for All. Over a billion people now lack adequate access to cooling for food, health and physical well-being, according to Sustainable Energy for All Chilling Prospects reports. Moreover, unchecked warming will result by 2070 in 1-3 billion people being exposed to mean annual temperatures warmer than nearly anywhere today, said a study, Future of the human climate niche, published in May in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The concept of Clean Cooling as a gold standard for sustainable cooling is currently being refined by Peters and colleagues in concert with shecco, publisher of Accelerate and in discussion with external experts. Its current definition can be found at https://bit.ly/2WQs39D. Peters expects the definition to evolve over time as cooling solutions and strategies improve.

He stressed that Clean Cooling is an attempt to get beyond nebulous terms like sustain-able cooling. I see technologies using refrigerants with a 1,900 GWP, or transport refrigeration running on diesel, called sustainable; they might offer incremental improvements, but they are not sustainable, he said.

Peters and shecco are also, over the course of 2020, leading a collaborative project to develop a standard Clean Cooling process in effect, a series of questions by which cooling projects can be audited. This process could be employed by a variety of stakeholders, including end users, planners, banks, and governments. They will welcome industry feedback on the definition and standards that are developed.

Iain Campbell, Senior Fellow at the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI), which developed the Global Cooling Prize, said he agrees that there is a need for a clearer definition of sustainable cooling that reflects both long-term aspiration while still being in reach, and is a definition that can be applied with rigor and transparency. The criteria for the Global Cooling Prize are fully aligned with the intent of the Clean Cooling definition, he added.

Among the organizations seeking to facilitate the use of efficient cooling in developing countries is the Swiss group BASE (Basel Agency for Sustainable Energy), which is helping companies offer the cooling-as-a-service (CaaS) financing model. Thomas Motmans, Sustainable Energy Finance Specialist for BASE, sees Clean Cooling as aligning with CaaS and other financial instruments.

A standard for clean cooling resulting from an auditable and certifiable process will be a valuable tool to support financial instruments, as it will support investors building portfolios of sustainable projects to better understand what they are investing in, said Motmans.

The concept of Clean Cooling as a gold standard for sustainable cooling is currently being refined by Peters and colleagues in concert with shecco, publisher of Accelerate and in discussion with external experts. Its current definition can be found at https://bit.ly/2WQs39D. Peters expects the definition to evolve over time as cooling solutions and strategies improve.

He stressed that Clean Cooling is an attempt to get beyond nebulous terms like sustain-able cooling. I see technologies using refrigerants with a 1,900 GWP, or transport refrigeration running on diesel, called sustainable; they might offer incremental improvements, but they are not sustainable, he said.

Peters and shecco are also, over the course of 2020, leading a collaborative project to develop a standard Clean Cooling process in effect, a series of questions by which cooling projects can be audited. This process could be employed by a variety of stakeholders, including end users, planners, banks, and governments. They will welcome industry feedback on the definition and standards that are developed.

Iain Campbell, Senior Fellow at the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI), which developed the Global Cooling Prize, said he agrees that there is a need for a clearer definition of sustainable cooling that reflects both long-term aspiration while still being in reach, and is a definition that can be applied with rigor and transparency. The criteria for the Global Cooling Prize are fully aligned with the intent of the Clean Cooling definition, he added.

Among the organizations seeking to facilitate the use of efficient cooling in developing countries is the Swiss group BASE (Basel Agency for Sustainable Energy), which is helping companies offer the cooling-as-a-service (CaaS) financing model. Thomas Motmans, Sustainable Energy Finance Specialist for BASE, sees Clean Cooling as aligning with CaaS and other financial instruments.

A standard for clean cooling resulting from an auditable and certifiable process will be a valuable tool to support financial instruments, as it will support investors building portfolios of sustainable projects to better understand what they are investing in, said Motmans.

In simple terms, we need a step-change intervention to reduce the energy consumption of cooling by 70% by 2050.-Toby Peters, University of Birmingham

The size of the challenge

If Clean Cooling has an ambitious agenda, it is because the scale of the challenge achieving all three global treaties is so immense, noted Peters. The numbers tell the story.

To begin with, the warming world is adding an estimated 13 to 19 cooling appliances per second, and we could see more than 9.5 billion in use by 2050, up from approximately 3.6 billion today, Peters said. But in order to deliver access to cooling for all who need it, this number could be closer to 14 billion appliances without step-change intervention in how we deliver cooling, he said.

With all of those appliances, and meeting the cooling needs of all implied by the 17 SDGs, cooling by itself, without intervention, could account for 17-18Gt CO2e emissions per year at a time when many are targeting net zero. An acceptable cooling number to hit climate targets might be 2Gt, which wont be possible unless we massively change how we do cooling, Peters said, Thats the size of the problem.

In terms of energy consumption, delivering cooling for all, while meeting the new demand for air conditioning in developing countries, could rack up an estimated 19,500tWh (terawatt hours) of energy annually by 2050 without mitigation measures, Peters said. However, under the Paris agreement goal of preventing global warming from exceeding 2C, no more than 6,300tWh or cooling would be acceptable, according to data provided by the International Energy Agency (IEA). (Relying on renewables is not the answer because cooling for all could consume 63%-104% of the total renewable energy generation projections for 2050, Peters added.)

How then to get from 19,500 tWh to 6,300tWh? Peters believes it can only happen through a firm global commitment to Clean Cooling. In simple terms, we need a step-change intervention to reduce the energy consumption of cooling by 70% by 2050, he said, It requires us to radically rethink cooling.

Achieving the 2050 goal in reality requires integrated solutions that meet the targets between 2030 and 2040, given the 10-12 year lifespan of cooling equipment, Peters said. To that end, a room air conditioner that is five times more efficient than conventional models is on the horizon as a result of the Global Cooling Prize, organized by a global coalition led by the Government of India and RMI. Eight finalists who have developed highly efficient AC systems will compete for a US$1 million prize, which will be announced in March 2021.

But Peters, who is a judge for the Global Cooling Prize, stressed the need for countries to recognize what can be achieved and adopt regulations so that affordable AC units consuming 80% less energy become standard by 2030.

A Cooling Mosaic

Efficient equipment alone will not be enough to deliver Paris and the other global accords, Peters said. That requires Clean Cooling.

Clean Cooling, as it pertains to air conditioning and refrigeration, in both stationary and mobile applications, encompasses a wide array of elements akin to a mosaic that gives form to many pieces.

In its essence, Clean Cooling is resilient cooling for all who need it, without environmental damage and climate impact and with the optimal use of natural and thermal resources throughout the lifespan of the cooling system, Peters said.

But Clean Cooling starts with a quantitative assessment and understanding of the need for cooling, he said. For end users of cooling, it means changing the question from How much electricity do I need? to Have I thought about what cooling service I need? he added. This means considering not only the total cooling load, but also the steps that have been taken to minimize the load, and the available energy resources, before the equipment is even installed. Peters calls this thinking thermally not about how much electricity is needed, but how much cooling.

So it is not enough to install an energy-efficient air conditioning system in a building to achieve Clean Cooling, explained Peters. The building itself needs to be designed to reduce the cooling demand via steps like white roofs, shading and natural ventilation to mitigate the need for mechanical cooling. In addition, such a building would seek to instill behavioral or system changes to maintain a reasonably comfortable temperature of, say, 24C-26C (75F-79F) while minimizing room humidity. A computer center would need to leverage free cooling during lower ambient temperature periods. A supermarket would need to have doors on all of its coolers, and reclaim the coolers waste heat to make hot water.

And then the equipment itself has to be accessible, affordable, financially sustainable, flexible, scalable, targeted, safe and reliable, according to the model definition.

Clean Cooling does not stop at installation. It continues with a committed maintenance program something often neglected today to ensure that equipment keeps up peak efficiency, and includes the latest digital monitoring and control systems. It is estimated that upwards of 25% of AC emissions could be cut today via optimization, monitoring and maintenance. But for that to happen, it will be essential to train a sufficient number of technicians to work with natural refrigerants in the latest AC and refrigeration systems.

In addition to offering best-in-class efficiency, Clean Cooling equipment uses refrigerants that have little to no global warming potential (GWP) or wider environmental impacts. That means natural refrigerants (CO2, hydrocarbons, ammonia, water and air) are a fundamental part of Clean Cooling, except in rare and urgent instances where they are not available or cant be supported by technicians. Over time, as natural refrigeration becomes more mainstream globally, the exception will be dropped.

Clean Cooling also applies to mobile air conditioning (MAC). Like stationary AC, MAC will experience increasing demand as global temperatures rise, to the point where up to 24%-26% of the electrical demand in an electrically powered vehicle used in hot, humid climates could be for cooling by 2050, said Peters. (It is now about 3%-7% of a vehicles fuel consumption.) To reduce demand, cars will likely need to be designed with better insulation, along with having more efficient MAC systems, he noted.

Most car manufacturers have switched to R1234yf refrigerant (an HFO), though some, like Daimler, are starting to employ CO2 as the refrigerant.

As with climate change mitigation, natural resource conservation is a byproduct of Clean Cooling. By using cooling to prevent food loss, farmers are able to conserve massive amounts of natural resources like water and land, Peters noted. The efficient use of natural resources in equipment is another mark of Clean Cooling. To that end, it may be better to use ice rather than lithium batteries for cooling energy storage, Peters said.

Clean Cooling is not done inside a social vacuum; it takes into account the basic human needs for food, health and comfort. So, if you are building a factory, alongside mitigating cooling demand, you check that the staff will be kept safe and productive, said Peters. In an agricultural setting, Clean Cooling specifically must include cold chains for food and medical needs to meet both SDG and climate targets. This means integrated, seamless and resilient networks of interconnected refrigerated and temperature controlled storage, aggregation, distribution and process points, and transport modes.

Renewables and Other Energy Sources

Energy management is a critical feature of Clean Cooling.

Importantly, energy for Clean Cooling does not need to come from electricity, stressed Peters. It can also be run on low-grade waste energy (absorption chillers), trigeneration (power, heat, cold) or other thermal energy (including. solar). Waste cold from liquefied natural gas (LNG) regasification can be used, while geothermal energy, bodies of water and sky cooling can effectively provide free energy for cooling. In hot dry climates, water evaporation is commonly employed for cooling. Likewise, energy can be efficiently and cost-effectively stored in phase-change materials, like ice or even tanks of water, not just batteries.

Indeed, these alternatives will be increasingly required given that cooling (thermal services) is one of the fastest-growing energy sectors, observed Peters. That needs to be recognized, he added, as the global transition to renewables is implemented, and the energy system is designed for a variety of needs, including new services, e-vehicles and e-logistics, intermittent generation, flexible loads, peak energy demands, and multiple energy resources requiring different operating conditions.

Thus, Clean Cooling is cognizant of how communities use cooling, such as when peak demand takes place; it endeavors to alleviate the burden that peak demand places on the power grid (including variable renewable energy generation) by switching to thermal storage, such as blocks of ice created when demand is low. In many hotter climates, a significant percentage of peak electricity demand is to drive ACs, noted Peters.

Meeting the challenge of cooling and the transition to renewables simultaneously needs integrated approaches using bundles of technologies that leverage all energy resources, including untapped synergies between thermal sources and sinks, said Peters. It will also mean delivering added value from system optimization, allowing new economic values to be captured, and ensuring resilience and optimized energy management across the transport and built-environment.

In effect, Clean Cooling calls for holistic thinking that includes, not solely the technological domain, but also energy sources, energy storage, manufacturing strategies, social, ecological and economic considerations, governance, policy, finance, business, education and training, he said. For Peters, this will preclude sub-optimal solutions due to adopting a siloed business-unit perspective and a lack of understanding of local needs and requirements.

In short, he said, Clean Cooling calls for a systematic approach to cooling along a value chain with the following elements: planning, making, storing, moving, using, managing and financing cold. He sees this as part of an interconnected cold eco-system designed for circularity.

Who Uses Clean Cooling?

Peters foresees Clean Cooling standards being used by a variety of stakeholders, including end users, banks, and governments.

The UN is already asking governments to develop National Cooling Action Plans (NCAP) that meet the needs of communities and contribute to a countrys Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) to the Paris agreement. However, Peters believes that many NCAPs are failing to assess a countrys total cooling needs. If you dont know how much cooling is needed to meet your goals feed your population, deliver vaccines, keep people safe and productive then how can you have a robust plan? he asked.

To assist countries in determining their cooling demand, Edinburgh, U.K.-based Heriot-Watt University, where Peters is a Senior Research Fellow in Transformational Innovation for Sustainability, has recently released a cooling needs assessment tool, he said.

In order to fulfill Clean Coolings vision of a world with cooling for all, banks and other institutions will need to employ creative solutions, such as CaaS, a pay-as-you-go servitization model that eliminates onerous first costs for the end user. Such a model could be especially helpful to farmers in developing countries with cold-chain equipment, and also help city dwellers pay for more efficient AC units, noted Peters. District cooling is another scheme that could distribute cooling more economically.

Motmans of BASE said his organization would see a strong value in using a Clean Cooling standard to evaluate CaaS projects. Setting clear standards would motivate cooling users and investors alike to seek clean cooling certified CaaS providers, and would motivate the latter to innovate to reach such a standard, he said.

The CaaS model, added Motmans, incentivizes technology providers to implement Clean Cooling strategies, such as passive cooling, to minimize cooling demand prior to installing the cooling system, and preventive maintenance in order to maximize operating efficiency. With CaaS, the technology provider has the incentive to implement those strategies that will reduce the life-cycle cost of the plant, because these will reduce the costs to deliver the cooling service to the customer, he said.

To jumpstart Clean Cooling in India, several projects are underway. For example, a Centre of Excellence (COE) in the form of a pack house that will showcase modern refrigeration technologies is being developed in Haryana state, India, to improve and integrate the local cold chain and help reduce food loss. The COE project has broad support and is being undertaken by a part-nership of the AgriTech Sector Team in the U.K. Department for International Trade, the British High Commission India, as well as the Haryana State Government.

In addition, researchers from the University of Birmingham and Heriot-Watt University have launched a project in India with Shakti Sustainable Energy Foundation and the Consortium for Energy Efficiency (CEE) to help try to engineer an efficient clean cooling COVID-19 vaccine-logistics mechanism.

Banks could employ Clean Cooling standards to force loan applicants to pare the cooling cost of a project. For a building loan, the first question is, have you mitigated the cooling demand? said Peters. Dont get me to fund an air-conditioning system until its the smallest size because you designed the building properly. Then, can you confirm that the AC is at the highest efficiency and the refrigerant is natural? If not, then its back to the drawing board.

The Washington, D.C. (U.S.)-based World Bank, which provides loans and grants to the governments of poorer countries, has embraced the concept of Clean Cooling. Last year, the World Bank announced the Efficient Clean Cooling Programme designed to accelerate the uptake of sustainable cooling solutions (air conditioning, refrigeration and cold chain) in developing countries. Led by the World Banks Energy Sector Management Assistance (ESMAP) and the World Banks Climate Change Group, the program received a $3 million grant from the Kigali Cooling Efficiency Program (K-CEP) to ensure that efficient, clean cooling is included in investment projects and to mobilize further financing.

The bank also last year announced that it was developing a roadmap that will help it look at projects at a system level, considering all of the energy and thermal elements.

In promoting Clean Cooling as an aspirational standard for the world, Peters is trying to orchestrate a shift in the way people generally perceive energy. Instead of simply equating energy loads with electricity, they should understand that energy also includes cooling (thermal energy), he believes.

When we talk about energy, people think electricity and dont realize that in many countries the biggest growth in energy demand is cooling loads, he explained. We need to start thinking thermally. That is the challenge.

This article appeared in issue #110 of Accelerate Magazine.

Read the rest here:

Putting Together all the Pieces of the Sustainable Cooling-For-All Puzzle - R744.com

Scientists are increasingly concerned about the impact that excess industrial activity is having on our planets ecosystems. Our pursuit of perpetual economic growth is driving ever-increasing levels of material extraction, which is causing a wide range of ecological problems: deforestation, soil depletion, habitat loss, and species extinction. The crisis has become so severe that last year more than 11,000 scientists from over 150 countriespublished an article calling on governments to shift toward post-growth economic models, focusing on human well-being and ecological stability rather than constant expansion.

But some figures have rejected this idea and are rallying around a different narrative altogether. In a book published last October titled More From Less, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology-based technologist Andrew McAfee argues that we can continue to grow global GDP indefinitely while reducing our ecological impact at the same timeand all without any structural, much less revolutionary, changes to the economy or society.

At the core of McAfees argument is his analysis of the U.S. economy.He claims that U.S. consumption of resources has remained steady or even declined since the 1980s, while GDP has continued to rise.In other words, the United States is dematerializing, thanks to increasingly efficient technology and a shift toward services. The same thing has been happening in other high-income nations, he says. This proves green growth can be achieved; rich countries are showing the way, and the rest of the world should follow suit.

Its a striking claim, and it has garnered attention from a number of high-profile commentators and policymakers.More From Less received exuberant endorsements from the writer Steven Pinker, European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde, and the economist Larry Summers, plus CEOs, bankers, and a number of Silicon Valley celebrities. The Bloomberg columnist Noah Smith has repeatedly leaned on McAfee to bolster his own narrative about green growth. People find solace in this story, because it means theres no need to worrywe dont need to rethink our growth-based economy or question the consumption patterns of rich countries; we can just carry on with business as usual, and everything will be fine. Its an alibi for inaction.

Theres only one problem: McAfees argument is based on a fundamental accounting error.McAfee uses data on domestic material consumption, which tallies up the resources that a nation extracts and consumes each year. But this metric ignores a crucial piece of the puzzle. While it includes the imported goods a country consumes, it does not include the resources involved in extracting, producing, and transporting those goods. Because the United States and other rich countries have offshored so much of their production to poorer countries over the past 40 years, that side of resource use has been conveniently shifted off their books.

In other words, what looks like green growth is really just an artifact of globalization. Given how much the U.S. economy relies on offshored production, McAfees data cannot be legitimately compared to U.S. GDP, and cannot be used to make claims about dematerialization.

Ecological economists have been aware of this problem for a long time. To correct for it, they use a more holistic metric called raw material consumption, which fully accounts for trade. When we look at this data, which is readily available from the United Nations, the story changes completely. We see that total resource use in the United States hasnt been falling at all; in fact, it has been rising more or less exactly in line with GDP. The same is true of all other major industrial economies, including the European Union, and the OECD as a group. There has been zero dematerialization. No green growth. It was all an illusion of accounting.

This is a problem, because McAfee holds rich nations up as an example for the rest of the world to follow; but if rich nations are achieving green growth by offshoring, then this approach by definition cannot be universalized. Where will the rest of the world offshore to? This is why, when we zoom out and look at the world economy as a whole, where trade no longer makes a difference, we see that global resource use hasnt been slowing down at all, no matter what metric you use. In fact, it has been accelerating since 2000, rising at a historically unprecedented rate, even to the point of outstripping GDP. In other words, the world economy has been rematerializing. Its the exact opposite of green growth.

Ecologists say that the planet can handle maximum annual resource use of about 50 billion metric tons per year. We crossed that boundary in the late 1990s, and today were overshooting it by more than 90 percent. This is whats driving ecological breakdown: Every additional ton of material extraction has an impact on the planets ecosystems.

Crucially, high-income nations are the worst offenders herenot the saviors that McAfee claims. Rich countries consume a staggering 28 tons of material stuff per person per year, nearly four times more than the sustainable per-capita boundary. In the United States its up to 35 tons. If everyone consumed like the United States, global resource use would run up to a staggering 260 billion tons per year. To get a sense for what this would be like, imagine our existing crisis multiplied by a factor of three.

These might seem like strange results when you consider that high-income nations have undergone an extraordinary shift to services over the past few decades. It seems reasonable to believe, as McAfee does, that this should lead to less resource use. But things havent turned out that way. Why not? The main reason is that incomes earned in the service sector end up being used to buy material goods. Someone might make money from YouTube but then spend it on furniture and cars. But its also that most services are resource-intensive in their own right: cruise ships, airlines, hotels, resorts, real estate, retail, tourismall require significant material inputs.

Given the evidence from the past few decades, theres no reason to believe that shifting to services is somehow magically going to reduce our resource use. Its time to put that myth aside.

What about technological innovation? McAfee argues that efficiency improvements will cut resource use. And in theory, thats true, all else being equal. But in growth-oriented economies, savings from efficiency improvements are typically reinvested to expand the process of production and consumption, which ends up causing aggregate resource use to rise. For instance, if a soda company finds ways to use less metal in its cans, it will immediately invest any savings into expanding the business by, say, pumping out advertising to get people to buy more soda.

In other words, growth ends up wiping out the gains we achieve through efficiency improvements. And this raises a real challenge in terms of policy going forward. If technology hasnt helped us reduce total resource use so far, it doesnt make any sense to hope that it will somehow magically happen in the future. Dont get me wrong: We need all the technological innovation we can get in our fight against ecological breakdown. But ultimately its not our technology thats the problem; its growth.

On top of all this, scientists are beginning to discover that there are physical limits to how efficiently we can use resources. Sure, we might be able to produce lighter soda cans, but we cant produce them out of thin air. We might shift the economy to services like gyms and restaurants, but even these require material inputs. There is always a limit to how lightweight something can be. And once we approach that limit, then continued growth causes resource use to start rising again.

This question was recently studied in detail by a team of scientists in Australia. They ran a series of models with extremely optimistic rates of efficiencyfaster than anything thats ever been achieved before. What they found is that while resource use might decline temporarily, it quickly recouples with GDP as we reach the limits of efficiency. This evidence throws real doubt on green growth narratives. It is misleading, they concluded, to develop growth-oriented policy around the expectation that decoupling is possible.

So where does this leave us? What are our options? If we want to reduce resource usewhich we must do if we are to avert ecological collapsethen we cannot wait around for dematerialization to somehow miraculously occur, when all the evidence suggests its not going to happen. We need to be smarter than that.

The only fail-safe strategy is to impose legally binding caps on resource use and gradually ratchet it back down to safe levels. Ecological economists have been calling for this for decades. In a way, this is an elegant solution to the long-standing debate about green growth. If McAfee and others really believe that GDP will keep growing despite active reductions in material use, then this shouldnt worry them one bit. In fact, they should welcome such a moveit will give them a chance to prove once and for all that they are right.

But, to my knowledge, not a single proponent of green growth has ever agreed to this proposal. Perhaps on some deep level, despite the rosy rhetoric, they realize that this isnt how capitalism actually works. For 200 years, capitalism has depended on extraction from nature. It has always needed an outside, external to itself, from which it can plunder surplus value, for freeor as close to free as possible. To put a limit on material extraction is to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs.

There is a deeper question that we need to address here. McAfee and others go to such extraordinary extents to justify perpetual economic expansion because they start from the assumption that we need it. They assume that GDP is necessary for human well-being. Indeed, they seem to see it as a proxy for human progress itself.

But is it true? The evidence suggests otherwise. Lets take the United States, for example. The United States has had extraordinary GDP growth over the past four decades. But, oddly, enough, real wages are lower today than they were in the 1970s, and poverty rates are higher. Why? Because virtually all of the gains from growth have gone to those who are already rich. The incomes of the richest 1 percent havemore than tripled since 1980,soaring to an average of $1.5 million per person. In other words, weve all been pressing on the accelerator of growth, with devastating consequences for the living world, all to make rich people richer.

When you look at it this way, it becomes clear that the United States doesnt need more growth in order to improve peoples lives. We can do it right now, without any growth at all, simply by sharing what we already have more fairly. Equity is the antidote to growthand a much saner way to achieve our social goals.

The key point to grasp here is that beyond a certain level, which high-income nations have long since surpassed, the relationship between GDP and well-being completely breaks down. There are dozens of countries that outperform the United States on every indicator of human well-being, with significantly less GDP. Take life expectancy, for example. Japan beats the United States in life expectancy by more than five years, with 35 percent less GDP per capita. South Korea also beats the United States with 50 percent less GDP per capita. Portugal, too, with 65 percent less GDP per capita. Costa Ricans live longer, healthier lives than Americans, with 80 percent less GDP per capita.

We can see the same pattern playing out when it comes to every measure of human progress, from education to employment, health care to happiness. Over and over again, empirical data shows that it is possible to achieve high levels of human welfare without high levels of GDP with significantly less pressure on the planet. How? By sharing income more fairly and investing in universal health care, education, and other public goods. The evidence is clear: When it comes to delivering long, healthy, flourishing lives for all, this is what countsthis is what progress looks like.

Continue reading here:

Andrew McAfee and the Myth of America's Green Growth - Foreign Policy

In an effort to stop the spread of COVID-19, many schools have had to close, impacting the learning of over 1.5 billion children around the world. With an uneven transition to distance learning, education systemsare confrontedwithmore extensive and dire challenges ofeducational access, equity, quality, and inclusion. Beyond the immediate impacts of COVID-19 on global learning, the global economic crisis it has precipitated will have lasting impacts on todays children and youth over the medium- and long-term. As economic activity slows and government budgets shrink in response to the pandemic, there is a risk thatgovernments will place an emphasis onshort-termism that could shiftfunding away from education and undo some of theprogressachieved over thelasttwodecadesin increasingpublic expenditure in education throughout the world.

This positive trend in education financing was the result of decades of efforts across governments, bilateral and multilateral agencies, donors, civil society, and the private sector to improve the access and quality of teaching and learning that enable children and youth to build the skills they need to thrive in work, life, and citizenship in the 21st century. However, even before the pandemic,the impact of increased education expenditure was not necessarily reaching the poorest and most marginalized and has been insufficient for closing the learning gaps between rich and poor nations, and within rich and poor regions within nations.

COVID-19 risks not only dialing back progress achieved in increasing investment and improving student outcomes in education, but further widening learning gaps within and between countries. Governments around the world are prioritizing spending on health and economic stimulus and social safety nets, and while this is undoubtedly the priority in the short-term, in the medium-term there is a risk that public education investment will decline and leave behind those children and youth around the world who are most in need of high-quality education. Education decisionmakers and stakeholders must grapple with how to ensure much-needed resources and, at the same time, how to build better education systems after COVID-19. How decisionmakers respond to the COVID-19 challenge will have lasting impacts on todays children and youth.

Together with The World Bank, UCL Honorary Lecturer Vikas Pota and Argentinian Senator Esteban Bullrich, the Center for Universal Education at Brookings has been convening a series of private roundtables that bring together ministers of education around the globe, heads of education foundations and multilateral institutions to discuss strategic options to ensure that in these times of crisis, children and youth continue to have access to quality education. We have heard from former heads of state, who have generously contributed their time and insights from previous experience having had to make tough decisions to allocate resources in times of financial crises. Here, I summarize three key messages distilled from these conversations.

1. Education must be perceived as part of the solution to rebuilding the economy. Indeed, education accounts for a large share of direct and indirect jobs: educators, construction workers, food providers, health workers are some of the direct and indirect jobs that serve educational institutions.

2. Education is the key to a countrys competitiveness in a global economy. Countries that have more highly skilled workers fare better in the tech-based, knowledge economies not only of today but of the future.

3. The extensive use of technology in education during the school closures can be a lever not only for transforming education systems, but also entire economies. The challenge is to link schools to the transformation that is needed post-COVID-19, building the breadth of skills needed to rebuild the economy.

Our team at the Center for Universal Education at Brookings is committed to continuing to build and synthesize evidence in support of investing in education efficiently and equitably, to develop tools to help guide decision-makers faced with important trade-offs in resource allocation, and to continue convening ministers of education and stakeholders to facilitate conversations to help mitigate the impact of the financial crises resulting from COVID-19 on education systems worldwide.

Read more:

Investing in public education worldwide is now more important than ever - Brookings Institution

London, June 22, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- POC molecular diagnostics include portable devices and assays & kits used to detect and diagnose diseases in human samples, such as throat swab, blood, serum, and stool. Molecular diagnostics is shifting from centralized laboratories to decentralized point-of-care molecular testing. Due to its simplicity, convenience, rapid turnaround time, and the potential to improve patient outcomes, POCT is rapidly gaining traction. Owing to these advantages, it can be applied for the diagnosis in low-resource or remote areas.

The POC molecular diagnostics market expected to grow at a CAGR of 13.2% from 2019 to reach $2. 39 billion by 2027. The growth in this market is primarily driven by factors such as the rising prevalence of chronic diseases, development of CLIA-waived molecular POC tests, venture capital funding for the development of POC molecular diagnostic products, lack of skilled professionals, and need for rapid decision making in emergency care departments. However, technical requirements & regulatory processes for high or moderate tests hinders the growth of this market to a certain extent. Moreover, emerging countries provide increasing growth opportunities for players operating in the POC molecular diagnostics market.

DownloadFree Sample Report Now @https://www.meticulousresearch.com/download-sample-report/cp_id=5081

Traditional molecular diagnostic technologies require sophisticated infrastructure, expensive reagents, stable electrical power, long assay times, and skilled & trained staff. In developed countries or high economy countries, hospitals and large clinics are observed to have the necessary infrastructure and purchasing power to meet these requirements. However, in developing countries or low-to middle-economy countries, performing sophisticated laboratory testing is difficult due to the lack of high-end resources and infrastructure. Also, laboratory or medical testing facilities are often limited and inaccessible to patients in many parts of the developing countries. To control and prevent growing incidences for infectious and chronic diseases, a majority of the key players are focusing on developing countries to create awareness about POC diagnostic testing and promote their POC products to treat and prevent infectious diseases.

In addition, the lack of skilled laboratory professionals due to unmet training of technologically advanced products is also increasing the demand for POC diagnostic modalities in developed as well as developing countries. For instance, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, employment of medical laboratory technologists and technicians is estimated to grow by 13%, from 330,600 in 2010 to 373,500 in 2020 in the U.S. However, the programs preparing laboratory workforce are training only about a third of what is needed. Fewer than 5,000 individuals each year are graduating from accredited training programs. Thus, it creates gaps between the actual requirement and availability of technicians. Thus, the deployment of rapid and easy-to-use POC molecular tests in such countries can enhance on-site disease diagnosisat physicians office or home care facilitieswithout requiring trained healthcare professionals. Owing to their cost-effectiveness and portability, POC molecular diagnostic methods based on INAAT and RT-qPCR technologies are expected to drive the market growth in low-resource settings.

The global POC molecular diagnostics market is segmented on the basis of product & solution, technology, application, end user, and geography.

Quick Buy POC Molecular Diagnostics MarketResearch Report:https://www.meticulousresearch.com/buy_now.php?pformat=382&vformat=1133

Based on product and solution, the overall POC molecular diagnostics market is categorized into kits & assays, analyzers, and software & services. In 2019, the kits & assays segment accounted for the largest share of the POC molecular diagnostics market. This large share can be attributed to the frequent and repetitive usage of assays & kits. Apart from this, the growing portfolio of disease-specific assays for early diagnosis of chronic diseases, technological advancements, and focus on receiving CLIA approval are some of the other factors supporting the growth of this segment.

Based on technology, the overall POC molecular diagnostics market is categorized into real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR), isothermal nucleic acid amplification technology (INAAT), and other technologies (microfluidic technology and microarrays). In 2019, the RT-qPCR segment accounted for the largest share of the POC molecular diagnostics market due to its growing adoption over the traditional PCR technology.

Based on application, the overall POC molecular diagnostics market is categorized into respiratory diseases, sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), oncology, hospital-acquired infections (HAIs), neonatal & prenatal testing, and other applications. In 2019, the respiratory diseases segment commanded the largest share of the POC molecular diagnostics market. The increasing number of respiratory & associated infectious diseases, large number of commercialized POC molecular diagnostic products, and focus of key vendors on adopting various strategies for developing new POC molecular diagnostic products for respiratory diseases are some of the key factors driving the growth of this segment.

Speak to our Analysts to Understand the Impact of COVID-19 on Your Business:https://www.meticulousresearch.com/speak-to-analyst/cp_id=5081

Based on end user, the overall POC molecular diagnostics market is categorized into clinics & diagnostic laboratories, hospital outpatient departments & intensive care units (ICUs), research & academic institutes, and other end users (ambulatory care settings, nursing homes, and home care settings). In 2019, the clinics and diagnostic laboratories segment dominated the POC molecular diagnostics market. The growing need for rapid & accurate diagnosis, growing number of physicians adopting POC technologies, and increasing focus of key companies on offering disease-specific POC molecular diagnostics are some of the major factors driving the growth of this segment.

Based on geography, the global POC molecular diagnostics market is categorized into five major regions, namely, North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, Latin America, and the Middle East & Africa. In 2019, North America accounted for the largest share of the global POC molecular diagnostics market, followed by Europe, and Asia-Pacific. The rising prevalence of chronic diseases, increasing venture capital funding, development of CLIA-waived tests/systems, lack of laboratory technicians, and presence of key players in the region are the major factors driving the growth of this regional segment.

Some of the key players operating in the global POC molecular diagnostics market are Alere Inc. (U.S.), Quidel Corporation (U.S.), F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd (Switzerland), Danaher Corporation (U.S.), Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. (U.S.), bioMrieux SA (France), Meridian Bioscience Inc. (U.S.), Mesa Biotech Inc. (U.S.), GeneSTAT Molecular Diagnostics, LLC (U.S.), and Biocartis Group NV (Belgium).

To gain more insights into the market with a detailed table of content and figures, click here:https://www.meticulousresearch.com/product/point-of-care-molecular-diagnostics-market-5081/

Scope of the Report:

POC Molecular Diagnostics Market by Product & Solution

POC Molecular Diagnostics Market by Technology

POC Molecular Diagnostics Market by Application

POC Molecular Diagnostics Market by End User

POC Molecular Diagnostics Market by Geography

DownloadFree Sample Report Now @https://www.meticulousresearch.com/download-sample-report/cp_id=5081

Amidst this crisis, Meticulous Researchis continuously assessing the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on various sub-markets and enables global organizations to strategize for the post-COVID-19 world and sustain their growth. Let us know if you would like to assess the impact of COVID-19 on any industry here-https://www.meticulousresearch.com/custom-research.php

Related Reports:

Point of Care Diagnostics Market by Test (Glucose, Cardiac, HbA1c, HIV, STD, HCV, Pregnancy, Cancer, Hematology), Platform (Immunoassay, Microfluidics, MDx), Mode (Prescription, OTC), End User (Hospital, At Home, OPD) Global Forecast to 2024

https://www.meticulousresearch.com/product/point-of-care-diagnostics-poc-market/

COVID-19 Diagnostics (PCR Testing, Antibody Testing) and Therapy (Immunotherapy, Vaccines, Antiviral, Cell-based, Plasma therapy) Market Opportunity Assessment and Global Forecast to 2025

https://www.meticulousresearch.com/product/COVID-19-impact-assessment-health-and-life-sciences-industry-5098/

Influenza Diagnostics Market by Test Type {[Traditional (RIDT, Direct Fluorescent Antibody, Viral Culture, Serology), Molecular [RT-PCR, INAAT (NASBA, LAMP)]}, End User (Hospitals, Laboratories, Academics, Research Institutes)Global Forecast to 2027

https://www.meticulousresearch.com/product/influenza-diagnostics-market-5099/

Infectious Disease Diagnostics Market by Product and Solution (Consumables, System, Software and Services), Technology (Immunodiagnostics, PCR, INAAT), Disease (HIV, HAIS, Influenza), End User (Hospital, Reference Lab, Research) - Global Forecast to 2027

https://www.meticulousresearch.com/product/infectious-disease-diagnostics-market-4976/

Research Antibodies and Reagents Market by Product (Reagent [Sample Preparation (Media, Probe, Buffer), Antibody Production Reagent], Antibody [Type, Source, Research Area]), Technology (Western Blot, ELISA), Application, End User - Global Forecast to 2025

https://www.meticulousresearch.com/product/research-antibodies-reagents-market-5055/

Oligonucleotide Synthesis Market by Product and Service (Synthesizer, Custom Oligonucleotide Synthesis Service, Probes, Primers, Linkers and Adaptor, Reagents and Consumables), Application (Research, Therapeutics, Diagnostics), and End User - Global Forecast to 2025

https://www.meticulousresearch.com/product/oligonucleotide-synthesis-market-4953/

About Meticulous Research

The name of our company defines our services, strengths, and values. Since the inception, we have only thrived to research, analyze and present the critical market data with great attention to details.

Meticulous Research was founded in 2010 and incorporated as Meticulous Market Research Pvt. Ltd. in 2013 as a private limited company under the Companies Act, 1956. Since its incorporation, with the help of its unique research methodologies, the company has become the leading provider of premium market intelligence in North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, Latin America, and Middle East & Africa regions.

With the meticulous primary and secondary research techniques, we have built strong capabilities in data collection, interpretation, and analysis of data including qualitative and quantitative research with the finest team of analysts. We design our meticulously analyzed intelligent and value-driven syndicate market research reports, custom studies, quick turnaround research, and consulting solutions to address business challenges of sustainable growth.

Read the original post:

Point of Care (POC) Molecular Diagnostics Market Worth $2.39 Billion by 2027, Growing at a CAGR of 13.2% from 2019- Pre and Post COVID-19 Market...

Since March 2020, oil prices have been in such a free fall that politicians are now debating whether oil is dead. Financial experts had warned that the future of the oil sector was dim long before COVID hit. But the double impact of a supply war and the COVID-19 economic shutdown saw oil prices plummet: by April 20, the benchmark West Texas intermediate price of oil (for May delivery contracts) had sunk below zero. But rather than hearing this wake-up call and pausing to consider the long-term consequences of fossil fuel extraction, Saskatchewan hit snooze.

Indeed, Canadas second-largest oil producer clings ever tighter to fossil fuel extraction, using the COVID crisis as an excuse to further subsidize the sector and allow it to continue to shirk its climate responsibilities. It is absurd for Saskatchewan to prop up oil and gas through this health crisis when that same industry is hastening an even greater crisis in the long term: the climate crisis, which will result in even greater and more widespread health, community and economic consequences.

While Canadians were reeling from the impact of COVID in early March, oil firms and associations as well as the oil-producing provinces began pressing the federal government for at least $15 billion in relief. The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers submitted a regulatory rollback wish list to Natural Resources Minister Seamus ORegan, requesting that the federal government defer, suspend or waive multiple environmental policies and regulations, including many that serve to reduce emissions. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau initially responded only with funds for orphan well cleanup and loans to help companies meet methane reduction standards. But in May he announced the Large Employer Emergency Financing Facility, to provide loans too risky to be undertaken by banks that would be backed by the federal governments financial institutions.

In mid-April, Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe, frustrated by the lack of federal relief, announced a three-part package for the oil and gas industry, allowing firms to extend filing deadlines on well data, incidents, auditing and other reporting requirements; extending mineral rights by one year; and reducing by 5 percent the oil and gas levy for 2020, with a fee deferral until October. The latter measure will reportedly save the industry $11.4 million. But this response exacerbates the looming problem of Saskatchewans outsized emissions at the very moment when the province needs to enact deep, rapid reductions to help stabilize the global temperature.

Saskatchewans emissions, which are predominantly from fossil fuels, are huge and soaring. The province has the highest per capita emissions in Canada, 244 percent higher than the national average. Viewed globally, it has the highest per capita GHG emissions in the world higher even than OPEC nations like Kuwait. On an absolute basis, emissions were 77.9 MT of CO2 equivalent in 2017. Larger and more populous provinces emitted less: 78 MT for Quebec and 62.1 for British Columbia.

If Canada is going to meet its Paris commitments (or the more ambitious and science-based 1.5C warming targets), the country and Saskatchewan in particular needs aggressive supply-side climate policy (targeting the producers of fossil fuels) in the form of eliminating subsidies for fossil fuel production and managing a controlled phase-out of production. COVID-19 has illustrated that dramatic declines in oil demand lead to significant emissions reductions, but even lockdown measures could not bring demand for fossil fuels (down by about 30 percent in April 2020 from the previous year) in line with the kinds of deep reductions needed to meet Paris targets. And as stay-at-home orders are lifted, demand for fossil fuels will rise again. Without attention to supply-side policy, any progress made toward reduction targets will be all for naught.

Putting job security for fossil fuel workers at the forefront of climate policy and improving the lives of those left out and marginalized by the carbon-based economy along the way are essential to deflating fear-based justifications for pouring public dollars into private fossil fuel firms and to building a broad constituency supportive of the low-carbon transition.

Winding down Canadas fossil fuel production need not imply stranding fossil fuel workers and communities. Sunsetting Saskatchewans carbon-intensive sectors must be done via a just transition, where governments aid workers to transition to low-carbon sectors while providing services to vulnerable people think free public transportation and social housing retrofits or where fossil fuel firms employ workers to remediate the environmental liabilities left by their extraction. Examples abound of just transitions under way in Canada and beyond.

Keeping a focus on a just transition is one inoculation against rising extractive populism in Canada. Pro-oil, anti-carbon-tax rallies often threaded with racist and anti-immigrant sentiment originated in Saskatchewan and Alberta, but the movement has extended eastward, as seen in the pro-pipeline, anti-carbon-tax truck convoy that travelled from Alberta to Ottawa in winter 2019. Participants in these protests are afraid of job losses and the dire consequences for their families and communities, and they urge governments to bolster the fossil fuel sector, rather than curtail it or burden it with extra costs or regulations by attempting to reduce carbon emissions. Putting job security for fossil fuel workers at the forefront of climate policy and improving the lives of those left out and marginalized by the carbon-based economy along the way are essential to deflating fear-based justifications for pouring public dollars into private fossil fuel firms and to building a broad constituency supportive of the low-carbon transition.

Public support for a low-carbon shift is already surprisingly strong in Saskatchewan: in a 2018 survey, just over 50 percent of citizens supported a transition away from coal, oil and gas for the Saskatchewan economy immediately (17.3 percent) or over a 10-year period (33.3 percent). There is an opportunity here to grow a broad-based movement for a just transition on this foundation, now more than ever as we plan for a sustainable recovery from COVID.

But there are major barriers to developing the strong leadership from the provincial government the locus of natural resource jurisdiction and energy grid authority that will be needed to wind down the fossil fuel sector and replace it with a low-carbon economy. Saskatchewans two major political parties are united in their support for the oil industry. Even the more left-leaning New Democratic Party introduced new incentives to spur drilling while neglecting to regulate the industry as part of its climate change plans when it was last in government, from 2001 to 2007. Neither party is pressured by the kind of robust environmental movement that has urged neighbouring Alberta to give at least the impression of addressing the climate crisis. The silence of most environmental NGOs on Saskatchewans fossil-fuel-driven emissions is particularly resounding given the impacts of the recent fracking boom in the province.

The global community needs serious and immediate action from Canada to reach its Paris targets. Canada requires the same bold action from Saskatchewan. Demand-side policies like the carbon tax have polarized Saskatchewan citizens and stoked division and gridlock. Another path forward is a made in Saskatchewan just transition strategy that would use supply-side policies to curtail fossil fuel extraction and invest in alternative local employment and infrastructure. This policy approach would serve to harness the jurisdictional power of the province over natural resources and defuse the political opposition to imposed federal regulations.

COVID-19 is devastating, but climate breakdown will be worse. Saskatchewan is a linchpin province in Canadas struggle to reduce emissions. Rather than protecting and boosting extraction under the cover of COVID, Saskatchewan must rein in emissions from its fossil fuel sector and join the just recovery movement.

Photo:Shutterstock/By Pictureguy

More:

Why the real climate change fight is in Saskatchewan - Policy Options

With the Covid-19 crisis having highlighted the interdependence and fragility of global supply chains, the circular economy offers a far-reaching solution to improving supply chain resilience.

Supply chain integration is also critical for the success of any organisations circular business model, according to internationally acclaimed supply chain specialist Deborah Dull.

US-based Dull is a member of the SAPICS supply chain community and one of the international subject matter experts working with SAPICS, The Professional Body for Supply Chain Management, on its Covid-19 support programme for Southern African supply chain professionals. She is also part of the line-up of presenters who will be sharing their insights at a virtual SAPICS Conference on 23 June.

In her current role as principal: supply chain management at General Electric subsidiary GE Digital, Dull works across the supply chain community to accelerate the transition to a circular economy. Her goal is to progress past a linear take-make-waste approach to one in which supply chains around the world are supporting a make-reuse circular approach to dramatically lengthen the lifecycle of the items around us.

The circular economy is based on three principles: design waste out; circulate materials and resources; and regenerate natural systems, Dull explained in an article recently published by GreenBiz. The underlying premise behind the circular economy is that businesses that are strategically anchored in these three principles will be profitable, hedge their risk on raw material pricing, and add trillions to the global economy by 2030, by decoupling financial growth from limited natural resources historically required for growth.

However, for these business models to be successful, the supply chains that support them must be ready, recognised and expected to offer their capabilities in a new way, and at scale.

Ultimately, the circular economy is about inventory extending its life, reusing it, repurposing it or eliminating the need for it altogether. Supply chain is responsible for inventory, and a global, circular economy requires supply chain innovation beyond its current scope in the linear economy.

Dull says that supply chains possess the capabilities that organisations need to go circular. They move inventory close to the customer. Lean supply chains move inventory and decisions as close to the customer as possible.

Proximity reduces the time between inventory decision and actual customer need. Because more inventory is typically required to buffer against uncertainty, decreasing the time decreases the uncertainty, which decreases the need for inventory.

They create and share data about inventory, including materials, costs, partners, locations, timing, quality, demand. These are all gathered and managed by the supply chain. The data in the supply chain also can be used to facilitate Product-as-a-Service (PaaS) models, Dull notes.

Supply chains ability to reduce and eliminate resource requirements also makes it integral to any circular business model. The supply chain contributes to an organisations zero waste goals and can help it to reduce its footprint and impact supply chains can also circulate inventory.

To make the best use of existing inventory and reuse items as many times as possible, a business must know a lot about that inventory. If it cannot virtually see its inventory, or if it lacks the ability to easily move it, it often ends up buying or creating more to buffer the system.

Supply chains can enable organisations to extend the life of inventory, which is critical in the circular economy. This requires data from different sites to talk to each other, considering forecasted needs and the cost of transfer. Supply chain can enable this.

Because products go through several generations, it is sometimes necessary for an organisation aiming to go circular to maintain multiple product generations.

As these generations mature, the supply chain capabilities inform product design, explains Dull. Over time this leads to modular products with lower variability, reducing response times and lowering costs. In addition, the installation period for upgrades is streamlined.

Being able to locate and transform inventory is essential for the circular business. And supply chain can do this, Dull stresses. In order to recirculate items, the inventory must be located and transformed.

Dull has three recommendations for organisations embarking on a circular journey. First, locate and meet your supply chain team, she advises. This team covers procurement, planning, sourcing, transportation, storage, manufacturing, remanufacturing, contract management, supplier management, inventory management and more.

Secondly, include members of your supply chain in design sessions. Supply chain professionals are trained to design waste out of operational systems. Including them in all steps of the design and management process means listening to their perspectives, insights, and ideas.

Finally, pose a challenge to your supply chain, Dull proposes. Ideally, give the team time to solve a problem, and be dazzled with what they come up with.

Related

Link:

The power of supply chains and the circular economy - IT-Online

With the cooperation of the Re-Open Saskatchewan Post-Secondary Sector strategy, Great Plains College has obtained approval to reopen some programs that would be beneficial to the economic recovery of the province as it digs itself out of the COVID-19 hole.

The strategy during the two-month summer timeline includes skills and safety training to support critical areas of the labour market, student services, and exam monitoring for students that are enrolled in external educational institutions.

David Keast is the president and CEO of Great Plains College.

"We're starting with our programs and courses that are very much labour market-linked and linked to our industry partners. So for example, this summer we'll be doing a lot of skills and safety training which is basically a line of programming that is contracted with the local industries; oil and gas and other industries. And we'll also be offering a couple of other things, like one intake of the heavy equipment operator training program, which teaches certifies people for operating heavy equipment. And we're also doing some work in the power engineering three area."

As the province moves to reopen its economy and recover, much of its economic plan relies heavily on the resource industry, the agriculture sector and infrastructure stimulus, as noted in the latest provincial budget. Saskatchewan is an export-based economy, yet many of those trades that the economy relies on cannot be learned in an online environment. 1A trucking, Heavy Equipment Operation, Welding, and other staples of the Saskatchewan Economy are just a few examples.

We are a hands-on economy that suddenly found itself in an online training world.

It was a situation that both the government and Great Plains College recognized, leading to last week's decision to reopen and move towards a blended model.

"What is now an almost exclusively online environment, (will be moving) to a blended model for a selected number of programs in the summer. And what I mean by 'blended' is that it'll be partly online, but there will be a significant amount of face-to-face practical hands-on training because the programs themselves are very much geared towards hand-on training."

While no one yet knows exactly what post-secondary education will look like in the fall, Keast expects it won't be too different from their summer plan, with a significant online portion combined with some face-to-face depending on each individual program.

"The plan for fall programming is not yet completed at the college, and it's not yet confirmed in the post-secondary sector itself. The Ministry of Advanced Education is working very carefully through that process, but we expect that the fall programming will look an awful lot like the summer programming. looks and that is that it will be a blended model of delivery."

While there is a significant amount of industry training that requires hand-on time, there are also, in Keast's opinion, a number of them that don't. One of the lessons, he says, of the COVID-19 pandemic is that there are a number of areas where the college could be more flexible in its delivery options, adding that it was something that they would be exploring.

"One of the lessons is (that) we could, without a whole lot of trouble, probably adapt and make our programming more flexible using technology. And we will be working towards that, in particular for the fall program plan. I would have to say that the second lesson is (that) online learning is not going to be a be-all and end-all solution to everything. You still have a lot of people who want an on-college, on-campus, face-to-face learning experience."

Finalized details of the summer programming plan is not yet released but will be announced on the Great Plains College website when available.

See the original post here:

Great Plains College Opening Limited Hand-on Training This Summer - SwiftCurrentOnline.com

By Manavendra Prasad

Covid-19 continues to ravage lives and destroy economies, causing disruption that will change the world forever. In India, this has resulted in extreme narratives, on the one hand, are those that see untold devastation of its economy, on the other are those who believe it is Indias moment to achieve its destiny.

A key factor of production to re-ignite growth in the economy from the current deep spiral inflicted by demand and supply shocks is going to be the workforce, not just as an input factor but also as an engine of demand. The extent India benefits from an imminent shake-up of global supply chains and economic order will also be determined by how well it manages its workforce. With limited natural resources, infrastructural constraints, exhausting red tape, and a burgeoning population, Indias principal resource are its people.

Therefore, Indias economy sits on the threshold of many possibilities. Is it staring at an abyss or looking towards its zenith? With around 10-12 million youth entering the workforce every year and many more millions now rendered unemployed, are we heading to social unrest and national despondency, or are we going to leverage this to emerge as an economic powerhouse.

Can we make labour available where it is required? Can the workforce be suitably skilled to participate in gainful economic activity? This is easier said than done primarily because most jobs are available in geographies far removed from where the labour primarily comes from.

India needs to relook at its manufacturing strategy, maybe get an updated one. The Make in India plan seems to have made no noticeable change to the share of manufacturings contribution to Indias GDP (15.07% in 2014 to 15.4% in 2020). Cluster-based industrialisation, a model well proven by late industrialisers such as China, needs a new vigour. India needs to allocate more funds to cluster development. It needs to facilitate technology, skills, market development and integrate the MSMEs with the formal credit process.

Readying an employable workforce is a crucial element of this effort. This is best achieved when skilling is decentralised to the states which can then work with district industry centres and with local industry associations. This will create demand-led skilling opportunities. While the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) has built the current robust skilling eco-system, the cause will now be best served by moving the locus of control to the local administration.

Labour receiving states could work with labour supplying states for an arrangement where both parties jointly fund the skilling programs. The receiving states could determine the training modules, with a part done in the home state and the rest on the job. This will create a win-win situation and will allow industrial centres to get a well-trained workforce. Meanwhile, they can be committed to improving working conditions. This will allow better management of migrant labour, reducing hardships and protecting their rights and benefits.

Manpower supplying states shouldnt waste the current crisis and must create a local industry. They could begin by focusing on urbanisation in small towns with the creation of manufacturing clusters for labour-intensive sectors such as food processing, wood manufacturing, apparel and any other sector in which the geography enjoys comparative advantage.

The skilling centres should be located in these small towns. Such centres will facilitate industry engagement with skilling activities, which will lead to demand-led skilling programs. Such clusters will allow greater participation of women in the workforce. Minimising migration will lower the cost of living for the workforce, besides becoming a lower input cost for industrial units setting up in manpower supplying states.

The government could consider incentivising industry for their support and contribution towards skilling and vocational education. It should strengthen the Unnati scheme that provides MGNREGA beneficiaries 100 days of training to obtain new skills.

Another opportunity that exists for Indias unemployed youth is a job opportunity in select nations abroad. After the successful start of the Indo-Japan Technical Intern Training Program, it is a model worth emulating. In other countries, too, there exist opportunities for Indian youth in multiple trades.

Besides the current health crisis creating a great demand for healthcare professionals, in many other trades too, India has the advantage of skilling its youth for the global market.

To achieve sustained high rates of growth during the coming decades, India needs to harness its workforce. With the large supply, there is much to leverage. Need of the hour, clearly, is to connect the workforce to livelihood, jobs, self-employment and entrepreneurship. Creating an environment where more self-employed and entrepreneurs can flourish, which will compound the benefits.

The author works on skills development among youth.

Get live Stock Prices from BSE, NSE, US Market and latest NAV, portfolio of Mutual Funds, calculate your tax by Income Tax Calculator, know markets Top Gainers, Top Losers & Best Equity Funds. Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.

Financial Express is now on Telegram. Click here to join our channel and stay updated with the latest Biz news and updates.

Follow this link:

Skilled response: Skilling can be a way out of the current economic crisis - The Financial Express

Kowloon Panorama by Ryan Cheng Share Share

Facebook

Twitter

Pinterest

Whatsapp

Mail

Or

The relevance of the Greater Bay Area within international geo-political assets is steadily increasing. Relying on projections and observations by Li Shiqiao, Rem Koolhaas and Manuel Castells as main bases for his interpretation of this process, Thomas Chung investigates the future layout that president Xi Jinxings project will delineate, involving nine urban areas of the Pearl River Delta and the two Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and Macao. In order to construct a range of possible futures, the author critically traces the various political turns that affected the Pearl River Delta since the 80s Open Door Policy up to affirming its contemporary role on a global scale.

For the 2019 Shenzhen Biennale of UrbanismArchitecture (UABB), titled "Urban Interactions," (21 December 2019-8 March 2020) ArchDaily is working with the curators of the "Eyes of the City" section to stimulate a discussion on how new technologies might impact architecture and urban life. The contribution below is part of a series of scientific essays selected through the Eyes of the City call for papers, launched in preparation of the exhibitions: international scholars were asked to send their reflection in reaction to the statement by the curators Carlo Ratti Associati, Politecnico di Torino and SCUT, which you can read here.

The Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, whose development blueprint was finally released in February 2019 following the Framework Agreement signed in Hong Kong during the SARs 20th anniversary in 2017, is nothing less than a political megaproject directed from Chinas highest level [1]. After four decades of reform and opening up, the driving force behind this explicit rebranding of the Pearl River Delta (PRD) is twofold, to reaffirm the regions leading role in national economic development and to address both Chinese geopolitics as well as the countrys global ambitions. The Greater Bay Area (GBA), comprising the nine PRD cities plus the two SARs of Hong Kong and Macao, is presented as an extension of PRD miracle in a new phase. Began in 1979, the PRDs market-oriented reform process has transformed the region from an economic backwater to a regional powerhouse of global significance [2]. From gaining notoriety as the worlds factory with cheap land and labour churning out low-end consumer products in the 1980s-90s, the PRD has been successively restructured, albeit somewhat unevenly, to be more identified with innovation-driven high-tech manufacturing aspiring to smart city developments. With emerging realities such as improved connectivity, rising affluence and mobility and the arrival of new retail with a technology-dependent digital economy, the national GBA directive calls for further commitment to regional cooperation while promising ample opportunities for growth.

In terms of Chinas internal geopolitics, the GBA framework is designed to expedite further reintegration of Hong Kong and Macao with respect to the "one country, two systems" implementation, with an eye on the ultimate resolution of the Taiwan issue [3]. In domestic strategic terms, the GBA also forms the southern tip of five major city-clusters in the shape of a diamond that include the Yangtze River Delta (YRD) on the east coast, the Jingjinji (Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei) or Greater Beijing capital cluster in the north, as well as two clusters in western and central China, the Cheng-yu cluster based around Chengdu and Chongqing and the Middle Yangtze River Valley Megalopolis centred around Wuhan respectively [4]. The GBA is also targeted to rival or become greater than other world-class bay areas, and comparisons have often been made with those of San Francisco, New York and Tokyo [5]. The GBAs competitive advantage lies in its economic momentum and the mega-conurbation having four GaWC classified cities, although its complicated subnational dynamics and various place-based discrepancies are real challenges to be overcome [6]. Externally, the GBA is also expected to playing a key part in the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Chinas cross-continent infrastructure and trade as foreign policy programme aimed at augmenting its international influence [7].

As a top-down strategy tied to national and global political economy, the Greater Bay Areas more abstract appellation suggests images of bays, port cities and near-shore islands with a maritime propensity, subconsciously emphasising a more unifying intention and international outlook. Whereas Pearl River Delta, whose post-war coining in 1947 was based on empirical geographical research, resonates more with its estuarine roots and geo-cultural legacies, evoking the regions rich and diverse local histories [8]. Interestingly, the meticulous Chinese scholars responsible for the PRD naming remarked that the technical term Bay-head delta also correctly described the regions geography [9]. In 1985, the PRD was officially delimited to attract foreign investment, after which industrial relocation from coastal Hong Kong accelerated the growth of labour-intensive light industries inland. This inaugurated the early success of the front shop, back factory cooperation model whereby colonial Hong Kong fronted the overseas exports that was backed up by cheap PRD production.

By the mid-1990s, as the PRD developed into a more formalised 9-city economic region subjected to strategic planning, there was a shift towards heavier industries such as high-tech electronic equipment and machinery for export. The PRDs post-reform urban evolution also came into view of the Western gaze. Rem Koolhaas, maverick architect-cum-theorist, was one of the first to call attention to the PRDs unbelievable quantities of new urban substance, describing what he saw as an important city-prototype whose importance rested on attributes alien to Western measurements of culture and history [10]. Assisted by his students at Harvard, Koolhaas documented pertinent aspects of this so-called COED (City of Exacerbated Difference) in Great Leap Forward. He predicted that these disparate urban parts would eventually become a formidable entity operating within a market economy under communist state control, a new urban condition that might irrevocably alter the notion of city per se [11]. In 1996, eminent sociologist Manuel Castells, who had already worked on the PRD, wrote in The Rise of the Network City that this vaguely perceived southern China metropolis would become the most representative urban face of the 21st century [12]. Whereas Koolhaas eastward gaze of revelatory wonderment was partly predicated on an iconoclastic refutation of the abstract ordering of the Western city, Castells identified the PRDs emergent spatial logic as evidencing the emergence of a network society that is based on a globalized economy and information society. With his prescient research, Castells theorizing of the now-familiar space of flows prefigured the mega-urban futures, and even foreseeing problems such as large scale epidemics and probable disintegration of social control in these mega-city configurations that we are seeing today [13].

Within the discourse on regional planning and mega-city positioning, the PRDs spatial structure has been contoured and realigned according to changing administrative boundaries, economic productivity and infrastructural connectivity. In the early 2000s, Chinese scholars began using the term Greater Pearl River Delta (GPRD) the describe the 9 + 2 city agglomeration that encompassed posthandover Hong Kong and Macao. The GPRD was conceptualized as a series of lesser cities as industrial nodes with specialist functions clustering around two prominent cores - Guangzhou, the provincial capital and historical big brother, and Shenzhen, the young dynamic upstart next to Hong Kong created by direct order from central government [14]. In 2003, Guangdong province advocated the idea of Pan-PRD as an even more extensive regional construct that comprised nine neighbouring provinces to promote economic co-operation [15].

In contrast, Li Shiqiaos erudite and intensive understanding of the Chinese city and its ancient agro-intellectual traditions describes how, by insisting on returning to its indigenous spatial conceptions, Chinese cities continue to adapt to the necessities of contemporary culture or international commerce [16]. Perhaps taking the cue from Koolhaas observations, Li asserts that unlike the Western heritage of representational ordering via proportion, the Chinese city is produced via an alternative quantity regulation of things, information, politics and buildings, etc, whose meanings are conveyed through distributed material orders, giving rise to cities of immense complexity. For Li, such is the hidden continuity between vastly different examples such as the Forbidden City and Hong Kong. Given time, Li argues, archetypal specificities of the Chinese city have the capacity to reformulate themselves into effective strategies under radically different geopolitical conditions, bringing substance and detail to ongoing massive urbanisation processes such as the GBA [17].

Official visions imagine a better connected, functionally integrated GBA with a growing innovation-driven economy in emerging industries, R&D and high-end sectors. Inter-city collaboration and cross-border cooperation are increasingly encouraged via formal mechanisms for joint developments, while logistics sharing and infrastructure upgrades with high-level coordination have been implemented. From an essential three-hour travel outer ring to an inner one-hour living zone with improved liveability, all this will facilitate intra-bay mobility of people, goods and information. Incentives to attract investment, support enterprises and to enlarge workforce and talent pool all dovetail towards the state-driven desire for mega-urban integration. Even the notion of Bay citizen has been floated to speculate on a trans-urban collective identity and social consciousness founded on the common roots of Lingnan culture.

In reality, layers of administrative boundaries and political borders point to continuing institutional, economic and social differences. The first special economic zones (SEZs) established back in 1979, starting with Shenzhen next to Hong Kong and Zhuhai adjacent Macao, were pioneering experiments devised to exploit capability differentials in order to generate interaction and reciprocal flows [18]. These territories of exception designated for accelerated economic growth operated on controlled foreign imports, tax and financial concessions, and were matched with skilled labour and resources. In particular, Shenzhens impressive flourishing testifies to the value of such enclaves in stimulating development and progress. Before Shenzhen speed became the catchphrase for Chinas rapid urbanization however, it was Shekou port at the western tip of Shenzhen that spearheaded the very first industrial and modernizing reforms [19].

More recently created free trade zones, Qianhai in Shenzhen west, Nansha in Guangzhou south and Hengqin in Zhuhai, are similar attempts intended to boost their respective mother cities. Qianhai, with a Field Operations masterplan design, is planned as Shenzhens new international centre for finance, cross-border e-commerce and professional services. Hengqin, facing Macao, is themed for leisure tourism, education and cultural services. Nansha, centrally located in PRD and already with its developed industrial and port facilities through Hong Kong investment, has many labels, among them shipping, high-tech industries, innovative development and quality living. The GBA outline encourages these strategically sited concessional zones to forge new development models and institutional mechanisms, demonstrate further open up to Hong Kong and Macao enterprises and target better integration with international practices, though their eventual contribution or success can only be properly assessed upon further maturation.

+ 17

In fact, economic and politico-ideological differences between Hong Kong (and to a lesser extent Macao) and mainland China have been the fountainhead of the Open Door Policy that triggered the formalization of the PRD. To date, Hong Kongs prized attributes remain as its unrivalled international orientation, pivotal regional role in global finance and robust economy, sophisticated judiciary and administrative systems, free flow of information, people and capital, transparent institutions and highly developed professional services. With the GBA initiative, Hong Kong is urged to build on its distinctive advantages and reinvent itself while expanding its horizons into the PRD hinterland. A local think tank recommended the city to create new niches, explore new industries and discover new geographies [20]. Recommendations include acting as internationalization incubators or a neutral global data hub (a data Switzerland, providing advanced financial, professional and consumer services, fostering understanding by creating cross-jurisdictional institutions and intensifying interaction by setting up precincts with Hong Kong style live-work micro-environments and public services near transport nodes to entice Hong Kongers.

While Macao has mutated into a spectacularly lucrative gambling destination embellished with world heritage, Hong Kong has in recent years developed into a politically fraught global financial hub. Its systemic disparities, exacerbated by social inequities and internal polarizations, are proving to be intensely challenging, and especially manifest in the widespread and sustained social unrest in the latter half of 2019 [21]. Despite enhanced connectivity with the GBA, such as the completion of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao bridge and the Express Rail Link arriving into West Kowloon, Hong Kongs deep-rooted discord ultimately hinges on fundamental questions of identity and governance. Although local contesting voices on integration versus differentiation have been profoundly unsettling, Hong Kongs super-charged irresolution involving the entire citizenry is being thoroughly played out in the citys public domains, which may yet engender deliberative possibilities of genuine social renovation that mediates between appropriate autonomies and collective inter-dependencies, ones that could have wider ramifications for the rest of the GBA.

+ 17

Many mainland researchers still regard the GBA as a global-level experiment in region-building under the twin trajectories of economic progress and national integration. Hardware improvements (such as new connections like the Shenzhen-Zhongshan bridge, port extensions and new special cooperation zones, etc) go hand-in-hand with the earnest pursuit of GDP-oriented benchmarks for the construction of an economic super region of global influence [22]. With improved transportation reducing the effect of boundaries, the GBAs industrial clusters are expected to replace cities as the basic units of global competition. Uneven social conditions between cities are to be overcome via long term planning, coordinated development and growth management.

In terms of regional restructuring, the GBA has transitioned from a simple hub-and-spoke model (front shop, back factory mode) to a polycentric network or constellation of four prominent cores connected to seven lesser nodes [23]. The GBAs bay-head delta geography is creating an inner ring (Hong Kong, Shenzhen and Dongguan up to Guangzhou, Foshan, Zhongshan and down to Zhuhai and Macao) that is heavily invested, highly connected and more developed with advanced urban functions, and an outer ring (Huizhou, Jiangmen, Zhaoqing) acting as supply hinterland with heavier industries and taking spillovers radiating out from the inner ring cities. The three PRD city clusters Guangzhou, Foshan, Zhaoqing (GFZ); Shenzhen, Dongguan, Huizhou (SDH) and Zhuhai, Zhongshan, Jiangmen (ZJJ) are formed to intensify cooperation and interaction, pool resources and raise competitiveness, although collaborations have had varied success. The Guangzhou-Foshan integration has been most notable, with joint mass transit, planning, and development programmes for adjacent areas implemented. Shenzhen has been working with neighbouring Dongguan and Huizhou to relocate companies and industries there so as to accommodate higher value operations itself, while Zhuhai, Zhongshan and Jiangmen will be less active until the western GBA further develops.

More nuanced views recognize the need to deepen institutional innovation and recalibrate governance structures to balance state, provincial and municipal interests. More dialogue and negotiation as well as wider participation by enterprises and sections of society should be enabled.

Instead of over-relying on more hit-and-miss city-level collaborations, there should be effective higher-level interventions with adequate openness that also allow market forces to inform organic integration. To minimize rivalries and avoid overlapping investment and vicious competition, macro policies and procedures that are conducive to the spirit of cooperation should be set up to coordinate the sharing of benefits and responsibilities; while micro projects and incentives that play to the advantages and practical needs of each city should be introduced [24]. More exchange and cooperation platforms with Hong Kong and Macao should be realized both to counter the mainlands impression of favouritism towards the two SARs, as well as allay the SARs fear of losing their distinctive ways of life.

+ 17

The current GBA population of 70 million is already double that of Koolhaas prediction for 2020. It is expected to double again to 150 million within the next 20 years. If Castells caution not to compare the PRD to other examples abroad (such as the San Francisco Bay Area) due to its specific contextualities is to be heeded, then the GBA needs to develop along its own strengths by nurturing complementary differences within. A viable multi-level institution-building process that reconciles competing values and systems, institutes checks and balances, rewards and penalties and guards against resources and environmental over-exploitation is called for. The outdated PRD pattern of municipality-based metabolisms heavy on resource input, environmental cost and unfettered consumption must give way to region-based, energy-conscious and climate-inspired ecologies fitting to the resource resilience and environmental carrying capacities of individual cities. The impetus for developing trade, industries, technology and transportation must be coupled with aspirations to nurture a more enlightened quality of life, cultural inclusivity, intellectual openness and ecological protection. Here we return to Lis understanding of the intellectual foundations of the Chinese city for conceiving alternative urban imaginaries. Instead of the endless production of artificial pleasures and consumption of desirable things, the Chinese city, which maintains a closer intellectual link with labour and things and attunement to the biological rhythms of life, may offer a genuine reformulation of the conception of good life in the context of a renewed understanding of the (situated) freedoms and the rights of humans and things [25].

If the GBA is to be regarded as the 21st-century face of mega-urbanism in this age of climate change, two natural analogies of regenerative ecologies may be relevant. First, the rainforest morphologys potential as a urban model lies in its complex global morphology with varied microclimates that supports symbiotic diversity and indeterminacies of life-forms and cycles [26]. A rainforest city is a super-organism with an internally-regulated metabolic process, whereby the negotiation of climate with the finely tuned coordination of nested loops of energy, matter and information flows inform distribution patterns, height differentiations and density gradients to produce a heterogeneous landscape of emergent interactions within a homeostatic environment [27]. Second, the PRDs once celebrated dyke-pond aquaculture of fish, vegetable, fruit and silk cultivation fused the deltas fertile floodplain tidal ecology with a thriving productive landscape that underlay the economic culture for the regions past prosperity [28]. The idea of catalytic polyculture, the practice of designed mutualism that nurtures unexpected economies and change cultural behaviours [29], could be an integral part of responsibly developing the GBAs rural-urban continuum to produce an adaptable, scalable hybrid ecology of humans, things and the natural world. Perhaps the GBA is where subtropical rainforest cities meet polyculture landscape to become estuary mega-urbanism, a confluence of complex systems with homeostatic periodicities comprising archipelagoes of islands and ports, ponds and dykes, whereby interactions and flows traversing its infrastructures will be energized at its cores and replenished by its nodes and edges, all integrated as a differentiated continuum of regenerative ecologies enlivened by the successive emergence of new economic, social and cultural realities.

Research support: Wu Fangning

Endnotes

About the Author:

Thomas Chung is Associate Professor at the School of Architecture, the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He graduated from the University of Cambridge, and has practiced as a registered architect in the United Kingdom. His research interest involves understanding how architecture contributes to the urban order and culture of the modern city. His research focused on the interplay of architecture with urban representation and cultural imagination, and the metabolisms of urban vernacular in Hong Kong.

"Urban Interactions": Bi-City Biennale of UrbanismArchitecture (Shenzhen) - 8th edition. Shenzhen, China

http://www.szhkbiennale.org.cn/

Opening in December, 2019 in Shenzhen, China, "Urban Interactions" is the 8th edition of the Bi-City Biennale of UrbanismArchitecture (UABB). The exhibition consists of two sections, namely Eyes of the City and Ascending City, which will explore the evolving relationship between urban space and technological innovation from different perspectives. The Eyes of the City" section features MIT professor and architect Carlo Ratti as Chief Curator and Politecnico di Torino-South China University of Technology as Academic Curator. The "Ascending City" section features Chinese academician Meng Jianmin and Italian art critic Fabio Cavallucci as Chief Curators.

"Eyes of The City" section

Chief Curator:Carlo Ratti.

Academic Curator: South China-Torino Lab (Politecnico di Torino - Michele Bonino; South China University of Technology - Sun Yimin)

Executive Curators:Daniele Belleri [CRA], Edoardo Bruno, Xu Haohao

Curator of the GBA Academy:Politecnico di Milano (Adalberto Del Bo)

"Ascending City" section

Chief Curators:Meng Jianmin, Fabio Cavallucci

Co-Curator:Science and Human Imagination Center of Southern University of Science and Technology (Wu Yan)

Executive Curators:Chen Qiufan, Manuela Lietti, Wang Kuan, Zhang Li

See the rest here:

The Greater Bay Area: Integration, Differentiation and Regenerative Ecologies - ArchDaily

2020 heralds the beginning of a new decade dominated by innovative business models for the utility industry as the energy landscape experiences profound transformation. Utility companies will have to seamlessly and constantly evolve to define, enable and navigate their future through various challenges posed by external factors such as climate change, wildfires, cybersecurity threats, changing consumer energy choices, mainstreaming of prosumers and technology advancements coupled with stringent government regulations. Internal factors such as escalating operational costs, stagnant or reducing market growth, an aging workforce, old infrastructure incapable of meeting new demands and bi-directional power flow between consumers and producers will add to the pressure on utilities to rethink on their strategies.

All these factors will demand for a revamp of business processes and digitization of the complete value chain. A rapidly evolving green economy through renewables, Electric Vehicles (EV), storage and adoption of Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) will compel utilities to invest in re-imagining their value chain. At the same time, large oil and gas producers will expand their footprint in the adjacent renewables market and increase their commitments towards a zero-carbon economy. The transition from an oil-based economy to a green economy will happen through natural gas, and the year 2020 will see rapid changes imparted on the energy economy owing to this transition.

Rise of the ProsumerThe relationship between an energy supplier and the end consumer has always been stable with one supplying and the other consuming electricity. Their roles have never changed in the past. The modern energy supply landscape is no longer controlled only by the traditional suppliers. Consumers are turning into producers (prosumers), leveraging technologies that have made energy generation easy and self-serving.

Consumers are now actively considering fulfilling their individual energy demands from renewable energy sources. Availability of home solutions such as electric vehicle charging or counseling for energy efficiency is having ramifications on how energy is being generated, transported and supplied. Distributed energy, community microgrids and prosumers will see increased traction. Efficient energy distribution to homes with relevant and responsive communication layer managed through effective distribution management systems will become mainstream. Consumers have come to expect a digital, omni-channel experience for all of their interactions. Customer experience will depend heavily on how user centric systems are and the kind of tangible value they deliver and realize. These expectations could potentially mandate a thorough review and modernization of core IT systems that also meet the current industry needs for efficient, safe and nimble smart grid operations and an efficient mobile workforce.

We anticipate utilities to differentiate themselves by developing a digitally run end-to-end ecosystem. Utilities will accelerate their enterprise and legacy system transformations, reduce technical debt, derive valuable business insights through data analytics, enhance their customer experience as well as employee experience, disrupt and innovate using emerging technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality as well as ensure safety of equipment, grid security, cybersecurity while meeting all regulatory compliance needs.

Digital offerings for utilities will converge the four distinct vertically integrated solutions:

1.Digital Customer Service will be defined by customer experience modernization, replacement of legacy systems and migration of customer assets into the cloud coupled with rapid automation for superior customer experience. As uberization of energy continues to expand with solar, batteries and storage technology options, customers have more choice than ever before and hence being off the grid is becoming a viable and increasingly popular option for them. Utilities should become relentlessly customer obsessed, by re-inventing customer experience and becoming an integral part of their lives.

Some of the reasons for poor customer experience are:

Utilities should look at accelerating their enterprise and legacy system transformation journey to improve customer experience by:

Some of the key emerging themes that utilities can consider for driving digitization across customer experience are:

2.Digital grid and assets will mandate smart grid automation, Distributed Energy Resource Management System (DERMS), grid analytics and maintenance and solutions for vegetation management. The demand for a smarter grid is increasing driven by distributed generation, improved reliability, increased resilience to outages and grid analytics.

The conventional electric grid was designed to manage the flow of power from large generators on the transmission network down to customers on the distribution network. This flow of power is undergoing a fundamental shift, predominantly driven by the significant uptake of small-scale solar photovoltaics (PVs) by residential customers. The penetration of EVs and storage is growing rapidly, providing, demand-side flexibility in better integrating variable renewable energy. Also, there is significant uncertainty in the future energy demands from customers due to technological advancements, environmental factors and changes in policies and regulations. All of these are throwing a challenge to utility modelers and planners to take a robust approach to network planning, to identify investments with minimum risks and ultimately manage and operate the network in a more efficient and reliable manner.

Historically, utilities have leveraged a combination of Operational Technology (OT) systems like supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA), Order Management Systems and Warehouse Management Systems to operate and deliver power to the customers with reliability. As traditional grids are undergoing transformational changes with modern equipment and technologies, managing the grid with the traditional OT systems, and working in siloes is becoming a challenge. Most of the utilities are looking for an integrated solution like advanced distribution management system (ADMS) to manage outages and operate the distribution system in a safe and efficient way.

Recently, utilities are trying to implement grid-hardening measures to improve grid resilience. According to the Department of Energy (DOE) in the United States, the number of outages resulting from extreme weather is expected to rise as impacts of climate change increase in frequency and intensity. Hence, utilities should consider developing different weather models of an area to understand the impact of storms and implement grid hardening programs to protect the grid. Other measures to be considered by utilities include protecting grids against wildfires and cyberattacks. Vegetation management is one of the critical programs to minimize the effect of wildfires on the power lines. Utilities can consider Artificial Intelligence/ Machine Learning driven vegetation management inspection cycles for early detection and minimum damage. Also, grid analytics play a vital role in making the grid more resilient to outages banking on accurate predictions.

3.Digital mobile workforce requires migrating to the cloud, bringing Robotic Process Automations to the call center and the back office and moving to an IoT-based work and asset management.

Utilities are challenged with extremely difficult work environments, challenging safety conditions, decentralized operations, an aging workforce and tough regulatory requirements. Utilities must transform their workforce with digital solutions by migrating the workforce and asset management systems to cloud and developing efficient back office solutions for flexible and effective grid operations. A complete digital platform for the workforce with real-time tracking, scheduling, dispatching and insightful communication seamlessly integrated with the back office will enable back office and field personnel to interact and visualize tasks in real time. The integrated digital platform should provide single source of truth of data, bring business process harmonization, optimization and re-engineering to improve efficiencies while ensuring regulatory compliance. Utilities should consider modernizing workforce and asset management systems with the following objectives:

The digital platform should be able to handle data from IoT connected devices, sensors, AR/VR, voice-activated chat bots etc. with high speed and focus on safety. It also should involve solutions for not only descriptive and predictive analytics, but also prescriptive analytics using advanced algorithms for AI and ML deployed on edge computing.

4.Digital operations and energy supply will involve Enterprise Resource Planning for supply chain, generation asset management, trading automation and blockchain for wholesale operations.

Though utilities are facing disruption on an unprecedented scale with renewables becoming a major energy source, conventional fossil fuel power plants are likely to remain operative in the global energy supply scene for another decade or so. Fuel efficiency and performance of these power plants need to be improved to remain competitive. To achieve this, the fossil power plants need to embark on a transformation journey that combines digitization and advanced analytics. These technologies can improve performance of the plant by bringing work-flow optimization, condition-based maintenance of assets and reducing operation/maintenance costs.

With rapid penetration of DERs into the distribution network, a centralized system will find it difficult to manage the market operations. Some of the challenges in the wholesale market operations are inefficiencies due to multiple intermediaries, slow and time-consuming procedures owing to multiple reconciliations, longer duration of financial settlement and lack of transparency in the process. Blockchain technology has the potential to decentralize energy market operations and improve flexibility. It enables real-time coordination of electricity supply and demand data and monitors accurately the energy performance, which will ultimately increase supply side efficiency. It brings automation in trading by eliminating the need for centralized control and providing real-time coordination and execution of a sales contract, bringing transparency and efficient data management.

With all these changes on the horizon, progressive utilities will invest in re-skilling the workforce to take advantage of the digital assets and prepare for the future. In summary, 2020 will actively set the base for utility companies to transform into digital, live enterprises with resilient operations, delivering reliable, safe products and services with a promise to revitalize the energy of the future.

View original post here:

Predictions for Utilities in 2020 - Transmission & Distribution World