Day: February 8, 2023

World Vision is responding to the impact of hunger in seven countries across East Africa and requires US $ 181 million to reach 5 million people, including 2.7 million children by April 2023. Since April 2021, we have reached more than 8.9 million people including 4.7 million children.

A deadly mix of conflict, COVID-19 and climate change have pushed more than 7.3 million people across seven countries in East Africa to the very brink of a hunger crisis. Of critical concern are vulnerable children who are experiencing high levels of malnutrition.

Conflict is one of the leading drivers of hunger globally. Every country where World Vision has a presence in East Africa is either in conflict or neighbouring a country in conflict. The region has also endured substantial climate shocks, undermining people’s ability to feed themselves. The economic consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic and the ripple effect from the war in Ukraine has driven hunger to unprecedented levels.

Impact on children and humanitarian needs, including safeguarding risks, are enormous. This challenging period could also erode human and economic development gains that have been made towards the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals across the region.

World Vision is deeply concerned for millions of children in East Africa, who are enduring a devastating hunger crisis. According to UN OCHA, about 4.9 million children are malnourished in drought-affected areas in Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia. This is inclusive of about 1.4 million children who are severely acutely malnourished in the HOA states.

World Vision has reached more than 8.9 million people, including 4.7 million children, since April 2021. World Vision has responded with food distributions in multiple countries. Further, World Vision re-declared its multi-country response comprising Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda. We aim to reach 5 million people, including 2.7 million children, by April 2023 through the second phase of the response. World Vision has been implementing a multi-country hunger emergency response in the above-mentioned countries for the last 17 months and has been able to re-purpose and raise new funds, to the tune of US $ 139 million. However, the needs have insurmountably increased and we require an additional US$ 45 million.

Source: World Vision

European Union leaders are to meet Thursday for a summit dominated by migration, the economy and, not surprisingly, Ukraine. Reports suggest Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy — who arrived in London on Wednesday — may attend the Brussels summit in person.

The EU’s two-day summit comes ahead of the one-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — and days after top EU officials held a summit with Zelenskyy in Kyiv.

Besides Western Europe, Ukraine’s leader has made only one other known trip outside his homeland since Russia's invasion of Ukraine; that trip was to Washington in December, where he met with United States President Joe Biden and addressed the U.S. Congress.

Zelenskyy wants several things from the Europeans, including to speed up Ukraine’s bid to join the EU, more weapons ahead of an expected Russian offensive, and more sanctions against Moscow.

Brussels is unlikely to fast-track Kyiv’s membership application. But in Kyiv last week, European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen praised Zelenskyy’s commitment to join the bloc.

"I must say I am deeply impressed, and I want to commend you for the preciseness, the quality and the speed at which you deliver," she said. "This is phenomenal.”

Europeans already have committed billions of dollars in defense and humanitarian aid to Ukraine. Brussels is also expected to unveil a 10th sanctions package against Moscow later this month.

zeleMigration is also set to dominate the summit amid a sharp uptick in economic migrants and asylum seekers arriving in Europe this past year. That’s on top of the millions of Ukrainian war refugees.

Today, some EU member states are calling for tougher policies — and fences — against what they call “irregular” migration. Using EU funds for border fences is especially divisive.

“I think migration and asylum policy remains a very tricky issue within the EU — with the EU witnessing its biggest migration and asylum crisis since World War II,” said Pauline Veron, a policy advisor at the European Centre for Development Policy Management, a Netherlands-based think-tank.

Veron said that, even as many Europeans continue welcoming Ukrainian refugees, they are feeling rising angst about migration from Africa and elsewhere.

Source: Voice of America

Whether out-of-the-box thinking or a sign of desperation, scientists on Wednesday proposed the regular transport of moon dust to a point between Earth and Sun to temper the ravages of global warming.

Ideas for filtering solar radiation to keep Earth from overheating have been kicking around for decades, ranging from giant space-based screens to churning out reflective white clouds.

But the persistent failure to draw down planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions has pushed once-fanciful geoengineering schemes toward center stage in climate policy, investment and research.

Blocking 1%-2% of the Sun's rays is all it would take to lower Earth's surface by a degree or two Celsius, roughly the amount it has warmed over the last century.

The solar radiation technique with the most traction so far is the 24/7 injection of billions of shiny sulfur particles into the upper atmosphere.

So-called stratospheric aerosol injection would be cheap, and scientists know it works because major volcanic eruptions basically do the same thing. When Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines blew its top in 1991, it lowered temperatures in the northern hemisphere by about 0.5 Celsius for nearly a year.

But there are serious potential side-effects, including the disruption of rain patterns upon which millions depend for growing food.

However, a new study in the peer-reviewed journal PLOS Climate explores the possibility of using moon dust as a solar shield.

A team of astronomers applied methods used to track planet formation around distant stars — a messy process that kicks up vast quantities of space dust — to Earth's moon.

Computer simulations showed that putting lunar dust at a gravitational sweet spot between Earth and Sun "blocked out a lot of sunlight with a little amount of mass," said lead author Ben Bromley, a professor of physics at the University of Utah.

'Balancing marbles'

The scientists tested several scenarios involving different particle properties and quantities in different orbits, looking for the one that would throw the most shade.

Moon dust worked best. The quantities needed, they said, would require the equivalent of a major mining operation on Earth.

The authors stressed that their study was designed to calculate potential impact, not logistical feasibility.

"We aren't experts in climate change or rocket science," said co-author Benjamin Bromley, a professor at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

"We were just exploring different kinds of dust on a variety of orbits to see how effective this approach might be," he added. "We don't want to miss a game changer for such a critical problem."

Experts not involved in the study praised its methodology but doubted whether it would actually work.

"Placing moon dust at the gravity midpoint between Earth and Sun, can indeed reflect heat," said University of Edinburgh professor Stuart Haszeldine.

"But this is like trying to balance marbles on a football — within a week most dust has spun out of stable orbit."

For Joanna Haigh, an emeritus professor of atmospherics at Imperial College London, the study is a distraction.

The main problem, she said, "is the suggestion that the implementation of such schemes will solve the climate crisis whereas it just gives polluters an excuse not to act."

Source: Voice of America