In 17 years time developing countries will provide for more than 50% of the total global stock of capital, up from about 33% they do today, the World Bank said in its Global Development Horizons report. The largest portion of that stock will reside in East Asia and Latin America. In absolute terms, China is projected to become the largest saver by a landslide, accounting for $9 trillion in 2010 dollars by 2030. India ranks the second with its $1.7 trillion.On the investment side, China is also projected to become the largest, providing 30% of total investment by 2030. Taken together, the remainder of the popular BRIC club of developing nations – Brazil, India and Russia – will account for 13% of global investment.“Productivity catch-up, increasing integration into global markets, sound macroeconomic policies, and improved education and health are helping speed growth and create massive investment opportunities, which, in turn, are spurring a shift in global economic weight to developing countries,” the report explained.The service sector – one of the key criteria for distinguishing between the developed and developing world – is also going to make a huge leap in developing countries. Employment in services is projected to become more than 60% of their total employment, which brings them closer to the developed world.Results of the research signal a real reshuffle in the alignment of world economic forces, according to Maurizio Bussolo, lead Economist and author of the report.“GDH [Global Development Horizons report] clearly highlights the increasing role developing countries will play in the global economy,” he said. … Read More
US shale oil boom will make OPEC voice smaller in energy market- IEA
The US shale oil will meet most of the demand from across the world in the next five years, even if it goes into ‘recovery motion’. The developing economies outside OECD, such as BRICS countries and Saudi Arabia, that’ll be driving increased demand.The forecast is made by the International Energy Agency (IEA) in its closely watched semi-annual report.“North America has set off a supply shock that is sending ripples throughout the world,” said IEA Executive Director Maria van der Hoeven.“The good news is that this is helping to ease a market that was relatively tight for several years. The technology that unlocked the bonanza in places like North Dakota can and will be applied elsewhere, potentially leading to a broad reassessment of reserves,” Maria van der Hoeven added.The US Government has forecast daily oil production in the country to skyrocket in 2014 to the highest level since 1988.The price of oil slid below $95 a barrel on Tuesday as the Paris-based IEA, that advises 28 countries about energy issues, raised its U.S. oil production forecasts and cut its prediction for global crude demand.On a global demand side, the IEA forecast it to rise by a total of 6.1 million barrels a day over the next five years, from 90.6 million barrels a day in 2013 to 96.7 million barrels a day in 2018.The IEA says supply capacity of non-OPEC countries is set to be steadily rise, while hurdles in North and sub-Saharan Africa, as well as a regional fallout from the ‘Arab Spring’ will be affecting supply from OPEC members.In case global demand rises, this will leave OPEC – an organization largely seen as the last resort to meet demand fluctuations – with the output levels almost unchanged from the current levels, the IEA said.Global refining industry and oil trading patterns are also set to be affected by the rising capacity of the developing world, the report said.“European refiners will see no let-up from the squeeze caused by increasing US product exports and the new Asian and Middle Eastern refining titans,” the paper specified. … Read More
Brazil’s Roberto Azevedo gets top WTO post
Roberto Azevedo is Brazil’s ambassador to the WTO, and will take over from France’s Pascal Lamy who steps down after seven years in the job in August. His appointment will be formally announced by the WTO late on Wednesday. The new head will have to put a lot of effort into restoring the organization’s credibility, and resume the Doha round of global trade negotiations essential to keep the organization ‘relevant’. Roberto Azevedo was among those who spoke of the need to conclude the Doha talks and “find a dynamic of negotiations that accommodates almost all of the 160 countries of various shapes, sizes, and levels of development.” The Doha Round has been stalled for over a decade due to a conflict of interests between the key developed members of the WTO, such as the US and the EU, and developing economies such as India, China and Brazil. Azevedo’s supporters believe that with him being a WTO insider and his broad backing across many emerging markets could be essential in building new relations between conflicting WTO members and reinvigorate talks ahead of a December ministerial conference in Bali, the Financial Times reports.“We need to figure out how to have everyone interact in a positive and constructive way,” Azevedo told the Center for Global Development in April. ”The Brazilian Government welcomes the selection of Ambassador Roberto Azevêdo as Director-General of the World Trade Organization. Still under the effects of the global crisis that began in 2008, it will be up to the WTO in the coming years to give a new, balanced and vigorous impetus to world trade, which is fundamental for the global economy to enter a new period of growth and social justice. By nominating Ambassador Azevêdo as a candidate for this high office, Brazil was confident that his experience and commitment could lead the organization towards a more dynamic and fair world economic order,” the Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff said in a statement. … Read More
US chalks up more first-day newborn deaths than rest of industrialized world combined – report
The London-based charity’s “State of the World’s Mothers” compiled a list of birth-day death rates for 176 countries, as well as information on maternal health, education and women’s income and political status. While only one percent of the world’s more than one-million first-day deaths occur in the developed world, the US far outpaces its industrialized peers in newborn deaths. The report determines that an estimated 11,300 babies die each year in the United States on the day they are born, “50 percent more first-day deaths than all other industrialized combined.”“When first-day deaths in the United State are compared to those in the 27 countries making up the European Union, the findings show that European Union countries, taken together, have 1 million more births each year (4.3 million vs. 5.3 million, respectively) but only about half as many first-day deaths as the United States (11,300 in the US vs. 5,800 in EU member countries),” the report claims. It continues that among 33 other industrialized countries where data was available, there was a combined total of 7,500 first-day deaths each year.“The US represents 31 percent of the population in these 34 industrialized countries and 38 percent of the annual live births, but it has 60 percent of all first-day deaths,” the report continues. In some US counties, the first-day death rates are comparable to those in developing countries. The disparity is attributed to the US pre-term birth rate, which is reportedly the second-highest in the industrialized world behind Cyprus and the sixth highest worldwide (following India, China, Nigeria, Pakistan and Indonesia.) The US has over half a million preterm births each year, and complications from premature births are the cause of more than 35 per cent of newborn deaths in the country. The US also has the highest adolescent birth rate of any industrialized country, with teen mothers tending to be poorer, less educated and the recipients of less pre-natal care. The report also notes poverty, racism and stress as likely contributing factors to first-day deaths in the US, as well as other industrialized states. Worldwide the US comes in 30th place in terms of the overall assessment of mothers’ and children’s well-being. Finland meanwhile, came in first place, with its Nordic neighbors filling out the top 5. Niger was found the be the worst place in the world to be a mother, with sub-Saharan Africa occupying the bottom ten slots for the first time in the reports 14-year history. The charity noted lack of nutrition as a key factor in the high mother and infant mortality rates in the region.India, however, by far outpaced the world in the total number of babies dying within 24 hours of being born. The country registers over 300,000 such deaths per year – 29 percent of all newborn deaths worldwide. Other populous Asian states including China, Indonesia, Pakistan and Bangladesh were among the top ten states with the highest number of first day deaths. … Read More
Latin Americans seen as most probable nominees to lead WTO
The circle of possible contenders to head the institution has narrowed to Mexico’s Herminio Blanco and Brazil’s Roberto Azevêdo.According to the Financial Times citing sources familiar with the situation, the two Latin Americans – Mexico’s former Trade and Industry Minister Herminio Blanco and Brazil’s ambassador to the WTO Roberto Azevêdo are now seen as favorites to succeed France’s Pascal Lamy, who is due to leave the post on August 31.A five candidates are still in the running. Earlier reports suggested that three other candidates from the Asia-Pacific region- New Zealand’s Tim Groser, South Korea’s Trade Minister Taeho Bark, and the only woman on the short list Mari Pangestu of Indonesia – also had a strong chance. The final decision is due by the end of May.Experts say the new leader of the WTO will have to introduce reforms to revive the organization. Resuming the Doha talks is essential to keep the organization ‘relevant’. No progress has been achieved in recent years, due to a conflict of interests between the key members, including the US, the EU, and developing economies such as India, China and Brazil. One of the front runners Herminio Blanco of Mexico said in an interview with Bloomberg, that “Unless you have solved in a substantive fashion the Doha development agenda, the table will be very empty for starting a new negotiation. So there’s no choice. The WTO has to keep moving and modernizing,” he added.In an interview with the Wall Street Journal Banco also said “The rules of the WTO were drafted 20 years ago, and a lot has changed in the sophistication of countries that decrease tariffs but create new very sophisticated barriers.” ”To remain relevant, it must remain competitive vis-à-vis these mega agreements, not only in terms of size but in terms of rules,” he added.Brazil’s Roberto Azevêdo, an eminent figure around the WTO headquarters in Geneva, says the organization survives on “borrowed time” due to “years of paralysed negotiations.” “What we have today is a WTO with almost 160 countries of various shapes, sizes, and levels of development. What we have to do is find a dynamic of negotiations that accommodates all of them. We need to figure out how to have everyone interact in a positive and constructive way,” he told the Center for Global Development. An unnamed official cited by the Financial Times explained that while Blanco has support from the Asia-Pacific region, the Brazilian candidate is widely supported from Africa, a region where Mexico has much less presence. … Read More
Pentagon Manual Urges Precision in Classifying Information
The Department of Defense is not particularly concerned with “openness” in the abstract, but it is strongly motivated to conserve resources and reduce discretionary expenditures. That imperative dictates the discriminating use of national security secrecy — at least in theory — because of the costs incurred by classification.
“Precise classification guidance is prerequisite to effective and efficient information security and assures that security resources are expended to protect only that which truly warrants protection in the interests of national security,” according to a newly reissued Department of Defense manual that provides Instructions for Developing Security Classification Guides (DoD Manual 5200.45, April 2, 2013).
The Manual presents a framework for classifying information, beginning with a series of questions for determining whether information is eligible for classification in the first place. (“Can the unauthorized disclosure of the information reasonably be expected to cause identifiable or describable damage to the national security? If the answer is no, the information cannot be classified.”)
Then it details the considerations that may arise in the classification of information concerning military hardware, military operations, intelligence and foreign relations. Exactly which aspects of a hardware system provide the U.S. with a technological advantage? Precisely which operational information requires protection in order for the operation to succeed?
The Manual discourages broad, sweeping classification of information. Through an extended questionnaire for classifiers, it seeks “to systematically bound and refine the scope of the analysis needed to determine which items warrant protection through security classification.”
As detailed and helpful as this guidance is, it cannot decisively resolve all classification questions in advance. “The outcomes specified in the flow chart are not absolute; judgment must be applied in all cases,” the Manual says.
Some decisions regarding what to classify are easy. Information about “a foreign official speaking in a highly critical manner of his own government’s policy” or “suggesting how pressure might effectively be brought to bear on another part of his own government” would typically be classified. Likewise, the fact of ongoing intelligence cooperation between the United States and a country “with which the United States is not allied should always be classified.” Also, “intelligence identifying a sensitive source or method should always be classified.”
On the other hand, the Manual says, classification can be dispensed with in certain areas. “Intelligence that reveals the identity of a conventional source or method [i.e., one that is not "sensitive"] normally does not require classification.”
And “in general, [intelligence budget] resource information should not be classified unless it reveals some aspect of the intelligence mission, and its revelation would jeopardize the effectiveness of a particular function. An example of classifiable resource information is the intelligence contingency fund.”
At this point, the realization will dawn on some readers that this Manual, which was originally issued in 1999, does not accurately describe — or effectively regulate — DoD classification policy.
It is simply not the case that “in general, resource information [is] not classified unless it reveals some aspect of the intelligence mission.” To the contrary, the Department’s default position is that intelligence resource information is classified. That is why the individual budget total of each DoD intelligence agency — and not simply intelligence contingency funds — is not disclosed. And beyond the total budget for the Military Intelligence Program (MIP), “no other MIP budget figures… will be released,” DoD said last October, “as they remain classified for national security reasons.”
Nor does the Pentagon clearly distinguish between sensitive intelligence sources and methods, which are classified, and “conventional” intelligence sources and methods, which are not. Doing so sounds like a good idea, but it is hard to detect any sign of it in Pentagon practice.
The Manual notes that all classification guidance should be reviewed at least every five years by the original classification authority that issued it. But it fails to mention that all guidance is also subject to a broader periodic assessment known as the Fundamental Classification Guidance Review. It is through such a broader review that changes in classification policy are more likely to come about. … Read More
Report: Austerity cuts led to decrease in aid to developing nations
Rich countries applying budget austerity cut their aid to developing countries by 4.0 percent last year, the OECD said on Wednesday, with the poorest countries taking the brunt of the cutbacks. Development aid from the OECD’s 34 member countries has dropped 6.0 percent in real terms since…
